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John Edward - psychic or what?

meg said:
Here is exactly what you wrote:



So how is, "you had a dream, then a week later got a free big mac, and two months later got a free pina colada" somehow NOT what happened?

ETA, though I see I should have said "a few months" instead of "two months"
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Meg, my story is not JUST , I had a dream then a week later got a free Big Mac & 2 months later got a free pina colada , which is what you said in your original post. Yes, the details matter. You seemed to have left the important details completely out. Are you deliberately trying to mislead and mock, in order to rudely attain another unjustified TLA award? You know what, forget I asked.
 
Robin Stettnisch said:
Meg, my story is not JUST , I had a dream then a week later got a free Big Mac & 2 months later got a free pina colada , which is what you said in your original post. Yes, the details matter. You seemed to have left the important details completely out. Are you deliberately trying to mislead and mock, in order to rudely attain another unjustified TLA award? You know what, forget I asked.
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If there were important details that meg left out, you could have (calmly and politely) posted them here. If no one here can see the "important details" that were left out, this is a commentary on your communication skills, not meg or others being rude.
 
Robin Stettnisch said:
Resume, I believe some experiences offered here (including Remie's pizza story, although she doesn't think so) are glaringly distinguishable from mere coincidence. You and others believe the direct opposite. Never the twain shall meet.
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At this point, I think it is important to ask how these experiences are demonstrably distinguishable from mere coincidence. You haven't demonstrated this.

You have accused people here of refusing to accept any evidence in support of the supernatural no matter what, but you have provided nothing worthy of consideration as evidence.
 
carlitos said:
If there were important details that meg left out, you could have (calmly and politely) posted them here. If no one here can see the "important details" that were left out, this is a commentary on your communication skills, not meg or others being rude.
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I have no idea what these important details are. A dream about getting a free drink and a Big Mac and then later it happens? So what? Why not next week's winning lottery numbers? The paranormal seems to be aiming its sights low.
 
Squeegee Beckenheim said:
Penn & Teller: Fool Us. And yes, unfortunately, it is no more. It was a brilliant series.

One of the best things about it was how giving everybody was. Not only did Penn & Teller love being fooled (with one notable exception, the details of which are boring and I won't go in to here), but there are plenty of examples of where they would, for example, draw a diagram of how they thought a trick was done and the magician would say something along the lines of "not really, but close enough". In other words, they could probably have argued the point and tried to "win", but they were honest enough to recognise that Penn & Teller may not have got their technique quite right but were close enough to the methodology that they knew what they were getting at.

For an example of them loving getting fooled, watch their reaction at being told he's wrong at the end of this clip:



That's genuine admiration and respect, right there. They're genuinely glad to have been fooled. And quite right, too, as it's a great trick.

More OT, but there are loads of clips of the show on YouTube, and it's really worth checking out.
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Excellent effect, and it proves my point very well.

As an aside, may I egotistically say that I think I know how this was done? I've never seen it before, but I can easily conceptualize a method (which is not easy in execution).
 
Robin Stettnisch said:
Meg, my story is not JUST , I had a dream then a week later got a free Big Mac & 2 months later got a free pina colada , which is what you said in your original post. Yes, the details matter. You seemed to have left the important details completely out. Are you deliberately trying to mislead and mock, in order to rudely attain another unjustified TLA award? You know what, forget I asked.
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Robin, I actually like you so I hope this doesn't come across as too harsh, but aren't you the least bit embarrassed by this?

You claim consistently accurate memory, yet when your own words are shown contradicting themselves you ignore it.

In this instance, Meg responded to your story using your words saying pretty much exactly what you said. It has been shown to you that this is the case, yet you continue to act as if you are being completely clear and consistent.

Couple the above with the continued ignoring of the expertise thing and it speaks very poorly for your credibility and your case.
 
Robin Stettnisch said:
Meg, my story is not JUST , I had a dream then a week later got a free Big Mac & 2 months later got a free pina colada , which is what you said in your original post. Yes, the details matter. You seemed to have left the important details completely out. Are you deliberately trying to mislead and mock, in order to rudely attain another unjustified TLA award? You know what, forget I asked.
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Perhaps I have misinterpreted what you have been arguing, Robin. Up to now, with your "well SOMEONE went to a lot of effort.." comments, and your multiple references of your dream about your dead dad, that you were somehow inferring that you think got free stuff because "spirits can "impress" ideas upon people".

Are you now trying to say that it's not dead relatives giving you fattening foods, but your own act of thinking about fattening foods that got you free fattening foods?

As we've stated before. Somewhere around 40,000 free big macs get distributed every day. Hundreds (I really don't know the number, but that seems reasonable) of free pina coladas get distributed on cruise ships every day. It doesn't matter what the recipients were thinking about or or had dreamed about months before. They just get em.

You are the only one convinced that somehow your free big mac is special, because only you dream about dead relatives and only you argued yourself out of cheating on your diet, I guess?

Fiddlesticks.

Now, if you would like to actually conduct a scientific experiment in which you go to McDonalds multiple times and think things in order to get free food, and then we count how much free food you got and calculate whether that amount is greater than what you would get by chance, then I know many people here that would be most excellent at helping you to create a fair and equitable test.

And then you might actually start thinking skeptically.
 
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Robin Stettnisch said:
Meg, my story is not JUST , I had a dream then a week later got a free Big Mac & 2 months later got a free pina colada , which is what you said in your original post. Yes, the details matter. You seemed to have left the important details completely out. Are you deliberately trying to mislead and mock, in order to rudely attain another unjustified TLA award? You know what, forget I asked.
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The Language Award award?

Is that like a chicken sandwich sandwich?
 
Robin, unless I've missed it, you still haven't told us what criteria you use to actually determine whether an unlikely even is mere coincidence or "something else." But clearly this is a distinction you do make, because you seem to believe that there are some coincidences that are "just" coincidences, and some that are something more. So I'm genuinely curious as to exactly how you make that distinction.

You've said that you factor in things like how unlikely an event is, and how "personally meaningful" it is for those involved, but that's not much of an answer. In order for it to be useful, you need two specific things: a way of measuring both of those components (likelihood and meaningfulness), and some sort of cutoff point at which you decide an event is too unlikely and too meaningful to be just coincidence.

Measuring probability is relatively straightforward (if not always easy or practical), so you at least have something to work with there, but how do you measure meaningfulness? Not only do I not see how you could evaluate such a thing objectively, but there seem to be cases where you're claiming that other people's experiences were actually more meaningful for them than they themselves believe (like the increasingly infamous pizza story). So I'd like to know how you personally gauge meaningfulness in anything other than an arbitrary, hand-waving, "I know it when I see it" way.

And then, once you've got that down, how unlikely and how meaningful does something have to be before it becomes too much to be mere coincidence? And yes, I'm asking for numbers here, or at least objective, non-opinion-based comparisons. For example, if you had two children and they both had the same birthday as you, would you consider that to be "something more" than mere coincidence? How about a more mundane event, like winning the lottery? And once you've compared those two, how does your answer square with the objective reality that the chances of your first two kids sharing your birthday are over 3 times better than the chances of you winning the PowerBall?

Yes, I and several others here are harping a bit on the coincidence thing. But we're not doing so for the reasons you seem to think. You've thrown out the argument that this kind of analysis is some sort of defense mechanism against having to admit that the paranormal might be possible. It isn't. It's just the way stuff is figured out, reliably and repeatably, in a complex world with a whole lot of stuff happening all the time. In such a world, one-in-a-[arbitrarily large number ending in "-illion"] coincidences do happen. They just do. All on their own, with no help from paranormal agencies. If you can't explain how you determine which unlikely things are coincidental and which are paranormal, in a more reliable manner than "because I can just tell," then whether you realize it or not, you're simply believing in what you want to believe.
 
I haven't read all 28 pages of the thread, just the first one, so it's probably that this has already been mentioned. Could it be possible that something happened before you were in line behind Liam? He went to a bar in the casino and had to show ID? He paid for a pack of gum with a credit card at the gift shop? They have cameras all over. It's possible that they tracked him back to something that, even if the employees of the casino didn't know they were involved.
 
;)
bumlet5 said:
I haven't read all 28 pages of the thread, just the first one, so it's probably that this has already been mentioned. Could it be possible that something happened before you were in line behind Liam? He went to a bar in the casino and had to show ID? He paid for a pack of gum with a credit card at the gift shop? They have cameras all over. It's possible that they tracked him back to something that, even if the employees of the casino didn't know they were involved.
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You're right. You haven't read all 28 pages.
 
Robin Stettnisch said:
Here's what I think makes all the difference. And I'm going to string a lot of words together now : ) I believe I have all the knowledge required to spot a fake medium, and experience, and intelligence, and critical thinking skills, common sense etc. I approach all experiences with a very healthy dose of skepticism. I go out of my way to look for other explanations. I really do not think that I am being tricked because of my bias only because I've gone to so many mediums and psychics and was able to conclude they were all fakes except John Edward. Yes memory can play a role but I factor that in (and I think the memory explanation is also used as a fail-safe sometimes ...for instance i do think Batvette can remember & retell the most important points of that story accurately forever barring old age, sickness...) Again, I am able to recognize that I have a personal stake and so could be biased and the proof that I am able to successfully apply that recognition is that I was able to discount all the other psychics and mediums I've been to. I account for all possible other explanations first including cold reading, hot reading, spies, bugs,lucky guesses, mind reading( yes even that) background research on the Internet a friend giving him information, etc. etc. I consider all of it and weigh their likelihood because yes I have researched all of it and am aware of it. And I am skeptical. I leave open all those possibilities including coincidence before I make my judgement whether it be regarding mediums or my own personal psychic experiences. And I am willing to reexamine conclusions later on. I accept coincidence as a possibility and consider the details and likelihood etc. So in essence I accept and consider all possibilities and yes supernatural is a possibility to me. But I think most here will never accept the possibility of the supernatural. Even if you say you are open to the possibility you truly can't be, if anything, even the hugest of meaningful, unusual coincidences, and how often they happen, can always always be...just a coincidence.Or memory fail. Or someone is lying... Consider it all but weigh the likelihood in that instance. In short, I consider all of it. But I don't think you truly do. And that makes all the difference.
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Robin, I understand what you are saying here, and what you say in these last 2 lines is true. But let me just point out that there is good reason for that: ESP and psi type events have been the subject of research and studies for over a century, and in all that time... nothing. It fails time and again when it's tested.

Now, you may initially be skeptical at that statement (I was). You mentioned Gary Schwartz earlier. You are probably familiar with many others who claim that effects have been found but rejected by so-called hardnosed skeptics. This is a huge topic, covered in other threads here over the years, probably beyond the scope of this one. But there are threads that deal with all of this, looking at the various studies, discussing the statistics and the claims of various paranormal researchers, how certain research is faulty, and why, and so on. There are also good books out there that go into this. If you are interested, it is worth reading up on. You might be surprised to find out the major flaws that exist in research that is claimed by so many believers to demonstrate psi effects.

THAT is the reason no amount of coincidence will convince a skeptic.

It isn't an arbitrary mindset. It isn't a "no amount of research will convince me" mindset. It's a "the research simply has never supported the existence of this" mindset, and therefore it seems the only reasonable view is to recognize that coincidence is much more likely to be just that... coincidence.

Because if the research, after all of this time, has come up empty, and it has, there must be a reason. First, though, you will obviously need to recognize that the evidence is not there, and granted this is NOT immediately obvious because there is a lot of misinformation out there.

So, once that has been established, there must be a reason for the lack of experimental evidence, right? It is not enough to say that the experiments are foiled by skeptical energy (people have tried working around that and it still fails), or that it is unpredictable, as John Edward himself tried to say, comparing it to a lightning strike. If it were really that uncontrollable, it would be impossible for him to be on stage consistently all these years making a living at it, right? Why wouldn't it work just as well in a lab under properly controlled conditions (no Gary Schwartz's research doesn't stand up here, but you've got to read up on it) as on stage, at will? No, it's not fair to say the spiritual world is not interested in convincing skeptics. Aren't skeptics good, deserving people, too? If the spirit world wants to keep it all hush hush, why is John Edward on TV? You've got to believe it to see it, they say. And yet paranormal researchers like Susan Blackmore, in the beginning years anyway, DID believe, and STILL came up empty. The excuses fall flat. When all is said and done, the most likely reason the experiments have failed all these years is that there is simply nothing there.

If you understand the lack of evidence where evidence SHOULD BE, given that there has NOT been a lack of trying all these years, then you will consider lying, and trickery and all of those other things you mentioned, even coincidence, but you will NOT consider a paranormal explanation. Because it just no longer seems logical to do so.

At any rate, Garette and others here are much more well versed in the fine points of this type of research than I am. If you are interested, I'm sure any one of them could point you in the direction of good solid information on this.
 
ExMinister said:
Robin, I understand what you are saying here, and what you say in these last 2 lines is true. But let me just point out that there is good reason for that: ESP and psi type events have been the subject of research and studies for over a century, and in all that time... nothing. It fails time and again when it's tested.

Now, you may initially be skeptical at that statement (I was). You mentioned Gary Schwartz earlier. You are probably familiar with many others who claim that effects have been found but rejected by so-called hardnosed skeptics. This is a huge topic, covered in other threads here over the years, probably beyond the scope of this one. But there are threads that deal with all of this, looking at the various studies, discussing the statistics and the claims of various paranormal researchers, how certain research is faulty, and why, and so on. There are also good books out there that go into this. If you are interested, it is worth reading up on. You might be surprised to find out the major flaws that exist in research that is claimed by so many believers to demonstrate psi effects.

THAT is the reason no amount of coincidence will convince a skeptic.

It isn't an arbitrary mindset. It isn't a "no amount of research will convince me" mindset. It's a "the research simply has never supported the existence of this" mindset, and therefore it seems the only reasonable view is to recognize that coincidence is much more likely to be just that... coincidence.

Because if the research, after all of this time, has come up empty, and it has, there must be a reason. First, though, you will obviously need to recognize that the evidence is not there, and granted this is NOT immediately obvious because there is a lot of misinformation out there.

So, once that has been established, there must be a reason for the lack of experimental evidence, right? It is not enough to say that the experiments are foiled by skeptical energy (people have tried working around that and it still fails), or that it is unpredictable, as John Edward himself tried to say, comparing it to a lightning strike. If it were really that uncontrollable, it would be impossible for him to be on stage consistently all these years making a living at it, right? Why wouldn't it work just as well in a lab under properly controlled conditions (no Gary Schwartz's research doesn't stand up here, but you've got to read up on it) as on stage, at will? No, it's not fair to say the spiritual world is not interested in convincing skeptics. Aren't skeptics good, deserving people, too? If the spirit world wants to keep it all hush hush, why is John Edward on TV? You've got to believe it to see it, they say. And yet paranormal researchers like Susan Blackmore, in the beginning years anyway, DID believe, and STILL came up empty. The excuses fall flat. When all is said and done, the most likely reason the experiments have failed all these years is that there is simply nothing there.

If you understand the lack of evidence where evidence SHOULD BE, given that there has NOT been a lack of trying all these years, then you will consider lying, and trickery and all of those other things you mentioned, even coincidence, but you will NOT consider a paranormal explanation. Because it just no longer seems logical to do so.

At any rate, Garette and others here are much more well versed in the fine points of this type of research than I am. If you are interested, I'm sure any one of them could point you in the direction of good solid information on this.
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Exminister, let me try to explain myself another way...I believe I use the right side of my brain somewhat more than the left. Whereas,I think people here use the left side of their brain much more than the right. On my blog someone posted a link which I found interesting in explaining this way better than I ever could. Briefly, Dr. Jill Taylor is a Harvard trained brain scientist or neroanatomist. She relates in the video her own personal experience describing the effects of a massive stroke that severely damaged the left hemisphere of her brain. And what happened when she was left to rely on the functioning right hemisphere of her brain. I am never going to be able to explain it better than watching the video so if anyone is interested I am posting it.
http://flowpsychology.com/contemplative-practices/nirvana-and-right-brain/
 
Robin Stettnisch said:
Exminister, let me try to explain myself another way...I believe I use the right side of my brain somewhat more than the left. Whereas,I think people here use the left side of their brain much more than the right. On my blog someone posted a link which I found interesting in explaining this way better than I ever could. Briefly, Dr. Jill Taylor is a Harvard trained brain scientist or neroanatomist. She relates in the video her own personal experience describing the effects of a massive stroke that severely damaged the left hemisphere of her brain. And what happened when she was left to rely on the functioning right hemisphere of her brain. I am never going to be able to explain it better than watching the video so if anyone is interested I am posting it.
http://flowpsychology.com/contemplative-practices/nirvana-and-right-brain/
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Oops , I should also mention the man who posted this link on my blog claims to have had a very similar experience to Dr. Taylor. I know I don't know him. But from his posts, I get the feeling I can trust him : )
 
Fast Eddie B said:
I had the same experience with "Fads And Fallacies In The Name Of Science" by Martin Gardner. That was about 40 years ago, so it may be dated if it's even in print anymore*.

It really helped me in analyzing tales of the occult.


*eta: apparently still available from many sources. A classic.
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There's also Science: Good, Bad, and Bogus which is a newer book of his on the subject. Both are recommened reading ... along with everything else he wrote. :-)

-- Roger
 
Robin Stettnisch said:
Oops , I should also mention the man who posted this link on my blog claims to have had a very similar experience to Dr. Taylor. I know I don't know him. But from his posts, I get the feeling I can trust him : )
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I did read her book a few years ago shortly after a good friend of mine had a stroke. As far as left brain/right brain:

http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/more-left-brain-right-brain-nonsense/

At any rate, I think you do yourself an injustice by labeling yourself that way. But I do think it is true the people here overall tend to use their brains a bit differently. This would be from a critical thinking standpoint. When I first landed at this forum, I was mostly unfamiliar with this way of thinking. I was unfamiliar with most logical fallacies, was not used to being expected to speak precisely or called on inaccuracies, and especially not used to being asked for evidence. After all of that, it surprised me gradually to learn how many people here HAVE had their own "spiritual" experiences and all manner of occult backgrounds. They have taught themselves to think more critically by reading and learning, just as I had to do.

So now, for example, if you tell me you are a right-brained person, I immediately think of Dr. Steven Novella describing the way the brain actually works and how this is pseudoscience. :)

Read the books recommended here. You already consider yourself skeptical so you have a headstart over people who aren't even interested in the facts.
 
Hey Robin.

Just as I was reading a post about a fight over a Philly cheese steak that Guy Feiri dude started blabbing about one on the TV.

I don't know the protocol here: Do I go get one? Do I have a salad? Do I consult the Magic 8-Ball?

Which one of these?
 
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