• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Friend talks to dead, I need help

BPScooter

Muse
B
Joined
Mar 6, 2004
Messages
820
Hey all,

I was at a recent local friend-party, and ran into a friend who has some problems. Spouse drug/mental illness=suicide and this is the widow. Grief, etc. all the usual but she was adamant about the phone reading she had recently received. "The name of my mother's first horse" and "where we used to hide our keys."

This was a new one for me, so I said things like "I tend to come from a more skeptical place" and "there are things called 'hot' readings and 'cold' readings."

She was totally convinced that this was a 'cold' reading, when I suggested that people could acutally learn about her life in a sneaky way. So far so good.

She appears to completely believe that an Idaho psychic, for $50 a call, is talking to her dead husband. "All my family are young widows...she's talking to him..."... {[[[[[all my aunts talked to her}}}}}]

This is nothing I can do but damn, it makes me mad that the effluvial excremental poo-poo of our modern world is making money off this.

Any advice would be welcome. It would be possible to find and spend quality time with this person but it isn't possible to teach and embrace every lost soul. I did my best and at least she knows the difference between hot and cold.
 
Last edited:
BPScooter said:
I did my best and at least she knows the difference between hot and cold.
Click to expand...
I'm confused. She says she thinks the "psychic" was cold reading. "Cold reading" means there's no psychic powers, just generalities and certain techniques to make the speaker appear to know more than they do.
 
Is this ONE psychic she and her aunts talk to?? Not just a hotline? Because it seems reasonable that if on the subject of being a widow, one or more of the aunts may have mentioned your friend, your friend's husband's name, and other details. Just something to think about.
 
Last edited:
Yes, right! I don't know exactly who or how she was talked to!

"Widow" not window was how she described herself. Apparently there are other "widows" in the family, that referred her to the Idaho phone psychic. I immediately suspected HOT versus cold. My friend is convinced that there is no way what she heard was in any way HOT.

So she is sitting there on the phone, and it is COLD. What I mean by cold is fishing. What she means by cold is that "nobody could know that." I think it is a total hot reading, in the Randi sense, but the person is only wiling to admit that a skeptic could have a good point. She is wrapped in it, I just hope I put a little bit of "hey, sister think for a second" in her brain.

Yes Gomonde I think it is a total unconscious grief-woman thing that all the aunts do without thinking. They all seem to think that the Idaho psychic is for frigging real.
 
(But it only appears to be $50 a call, and it's giving some comfort for a grief-stricken, widowed, single mother, and so what-the-hell, right?) AAAAAAGH NOOOOO this cant be!

Only reason I post this is because it's really happening to a real person I know. F***
 
Ersby said:
I'm confused. She says she thinks the "psychic" was cold reading. "Cold reading" means there's no psychic powers, just generalities and certain techniques to make the speaker appear to know more than they do.
Click to expand...

I have heard a few people use the term to mean a genuine psychic reading, as opposed to a 'hot' reading using prior information.
 
That's what we got to. She was diligently arguing for the happy relief she had experienced, and the extra-worldly knowledge gained, from her psychic.

This whole thing bugs me. I suppose my value will be as a one-in-a-hundred friend who listens with empathy, but doesn't agree.
 
On this board, cold reading most often means giving generalities that could apply to anyone (e.g. "Some of your aspirations tend to be pretty unrealistic. At times you are extroverted, affable, sociable, while at other times you are introverted, wary and reserved"). http://skepdic.com/coldread.html

Warm reading most often refers to observing a client's accent, mannerisms, clothes, jewelry, and affect to deduce information about the deceased.

Hot reading refers to doing research on the client - a very simple task with the internet. For instance, if a person called a psychic hotline, then the "psychic" could enter the caller's phone number into a public database to get a name and address. That information can then be entered into other public databases to get work history, credit reports, relatives' names, etc. Also, a name can be directly googled and might produce a blog which reveals other personal information.

As Godmode pointed out, if several relatives all use the same psychic service, the "psychics" might simply be feeding back information they learned from other family members - again a very simple task with today's computers. Even before the advent of computers, psychics have been caught keeping detailed files on clients and have sold these records to other psychics who then perform exceptionally well when the provide an initial reading for someone they have never met.
 
BPScooter said:
"where we used to hide our keys."
Click to expand...

How many places are there that people regularly use to hide keys?

_______
ETA: ask the widow to find out why this powerful psychic doesn't apply for the well-documented JREF Million Dollar Peize?
 
Last edited:
Ladewig, I guess the reason I didn't bust out in full JREF mode and ask for the name-o-the-psychic was because of social graces. We were having a conversation in a room full of adults, children, senior citizens, and well... it wasn't Appropriate to Do So.

The context of the conversation wasn't clear in my previous posts, sorry for that. Only later upon thinking did I dust off my fingers and post here.

I wound up nodding up and down most of the time, and then did some "no-no" sideways head gestures when I could, and asked a kind question about "hot" and "cold" only to see whether she was totally Deep End or had some Looking before Leaping.
 
Does your family have a linneage history out on the web somewhere? Personal pages? Even distant relatives doing this? Because information from those, and from emails, and judicious use of Google to locate them, are nice fast sources of unwitting info about everyone.
 
I see this coming with a close friend of my partner's; her dad is dying of cancer, and she's already fully imbued with psychic BS. When he goes, I can definitely see her following this person into the void of self-deception. And I won't be much able to help. She already thinks Derek "Kreed Kafer" Acorah is the real deal.

Good luck with this. Subtlety is your friend; wait for clear opportunities to show evidence of psychics that have been caught out, any comments you can make to gently steer them toward looking into it for themselves. If you can show them the Derren Brown reading video on youtube, or get the DVD, that would be a good one to use. Try this thread.
 
If you explain to someone (who is claiming to be happier as a result of a reading) that the best explanation for the hits is cold or warm reading, and if you explain the tricks and cons employed by such folk to get their results, and if you can further back that up with some evidence, but the person remains not only unconvinced, but secure that he or she will continue to get comfort from the psychic, then I don't see why you should be frustrated.

All you can do is educate, or sometimes the best you can do is offer to educate. If an adult chooses not to accept facts over fakery, that is their choice. As long as they are making an informed decision, it's theirs to make.

Psychics are like prostitutes. They will always exist because there will always be a market of people willing to pay for something they cannot get elsewhere. There is no point in getting angry about it. You did your best by explaining to your friend how it really works, and she chose to reject your explanations in favour of her own emotional comfort.

That is her right. All you can do is teach, whether people choose to listen or learn is not something you can control.
 
Big Les said:
I see this coming with a close friend of my partner's; her dad is dying of cancer, and she's already fully imbued with psychic BS. When he goes, I can definitely see her following this person into the void of self-deception. And I won't be much able to help. She already thinks Derek "Kreed Kafer" Acorah is the real deal.
Click to expand...


Ah, but here you can be of real help. Explain that Harry Houdini spent part of his life exposing fraudulent psychics and he knew that when he died, after-death communicators (ADCers) would tell his widow that they were really in contact with him. To weed out the fake ones, he and his wife agreed on a code word and never told anyone else what that word was. When he died, all sorts of ADCers claimed to be in contact, but none could produce the code word, so his widow knew that they were charlatans.
 
Zep said:
Does your family have a linneage history out on the web somewhere? Personal pages? Even distant relatives doing this? Because information from those, and from emails, and judicious use of Google to locate them, are nice fast sources of unwitting info about everyone.
Click to expand...

I thought about starting a blog about losing a child (even though I don't have children) and documenting all the things I miss about the child. I figured keeping it up for a year or so would produce pretty strong bait for a fake ADCer if I had a reading. I'd love to document a JVP or SBrowne doing very bad hot reading.
 
Hi BP

As a very good place to start understanding the "hot" & "cold" reading techniques that supposed psychics use, I would highly recommend Ian Rowland's "Full Facts Book of Cold Reading". I can think of a few people for whom it would make an excellent X'mas present! (also see "ianrowland.com")

Good luck with your friend.
 
firecoins said:
I talk to dead people. Nothing is wrong with. THere is only something wrong when they talk back.
Click to expand...
:)

UK paranormal researcher Steve Atty came up with this delightful site some years ago to amuse us on the Most Haunted forum. I think the "readings" of the mythical Algernon Bantock may amuse - and if anyone wants to take this seriously, well it's cheaper than telephone psychics, being free! :)

http://www.tty.homelinux.org/paranormal/reading.cgi

I felt he caught the flavour of 'readings' quite well.

I also love the disclaimer
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-2]
The online services provided by Algernon Bantock are for entertainment purposes only. Algernon Bantock, Pendantix Productions, or the Tty Organisation cannot be held responsible for any events of any nature arising from actions taken by you as part of your idiotic interpretation of his inane, meaningless flim-flammery

[/SIZE][/FONT]
cj x
 
BP, you could point her to the Stop Sylvia Browne website, www.stopsylviabrowne.com, and have her watch a few videos.

Thing is, if she really wants to believe this @#$%, there's probably precious little you can do.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom