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Looking for Skeptics

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John Jones said:
... I wonder if there is there some way we can receive PMs if the discussion ever moves ahead.
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There is a system in place.

Sadly in all the years that people have been coming here posting their paranormal/fantastical claims, it has never been needed. :D
 
Stray Cat said:
Great work... From now on, for your patience you shall be known as St. Alice. :)
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Agreed!

All hail St. Alice! With courage beyond that of any mere mortal she fought the trecherous Blood Brambles, swam the vile EVP Sea, ranneth through the deep, dark Forest of Befuddlement, and delivereth to us the Scroll of Chronos!

I lift my cup of Mana +5 to you :)


Scordatura
 
In fact, I nominated it. I'm not sure what category it goes in, but your work deserves to be recognized.
 
A big thanks from me too, Alice, though I have to say it makes very depressing reading all compressed into a single post like that. It doesn't look like we're ever going to be able to help flaccon out of the quagmire of superstition she's got herself into, though I for one will keep trying as long as she keeps posting here.
 
Alice Shortcake said:
Here goes!


flaccon’s claims: a timeline

2013
1st June – flacon starts the thread and asks for the opinions of ‘good-mannered sceptics’ on evidence of the supernatural she’s gathered since last October. She’s seeking help but the ‘church hood’ won’t oblige, and is also working on her own website, Spirits in the Blood.



Flaccon tells us that she has been in touch with her bishop in Chester, who recommended that she consult her doctor. She is asked if she’s heard of pareidolia. She hasn’t, but says she will Google it.

More from flaccon about the voices:



She tell us that she has had to protect her children and has moved house several times to escape the attentions of supernatural entities (these aren’t the spirits who are trying to communicate with her).

2nd June – flaccon mentions ASKE, and Pixel42 suggests a test protocol involving cards. flaccon’s response:



She will continue to reject pareidolia as an explanation because the images in tiny blood stains and the recorded voices are familiar.

3rd June – flaccon tells us what type of equipment she uses to record the spirit voices:



Stray Cat asks: “If you can get this information from the voices you hear, would it be possible to ask them for more detail? It doesn't matter if you understand the level of detail, just so long as you can pass that information to someone who does understand it.”

Flaccon replies:



We also learn that the voices of living people turn up on the recordings.

More about flaccon’s problems with the supernatural:



4th June – flaccon is asked what the spirits think of being investigated by sceptics:



Alderbank, who lives not far away from flaccon, offers to visit her and help with a test protocol. Flaccon replies:



5th June – flaccon tells us more about what she can hear on the recordings:



Several regular posters raised concerns about the content of flaccon’s website, which amongst other things offered prospective customers guaranteed contact with the dead and referred to demons, chemtrails, David Icke and The Da Vinci Code. From it we learn that some members of flaccon’s family are convinced by the voices and pictures but some aren’t:



6th June – flaccon provides sound files of some of her recordings. No-one can hear the words she hears but flaccon is still convinced:



She goes into more detail about her experiences with the supernatural (my bolding):



This was presumably the great revelation from the spirit world that flaccon never got around to disclosing.

She also shared some technical details about the recordings:



Other posters listen to the recordings but are unable to hear what flaccon hears. She isn’t deterred:



7th June – flaccon returns to the subject of why the spirits are unhappy with some aspects of testing:



She continues to reject pareidolia:



8th June – there is some discussion of Alderbank’s projected visit. flaccon says:



Unfortunately, the spirits haven’t changed their attitude to proper scientific testing. They also seem to be rather more than common or garden ghosts:



Biscuit drew our attention to some startling information on flaccon’s website – Reg, the spirit of flaccon’s father, revealed that cats cause cancer:



flaccon tells us that a mysterious procedure called ‘calibration’ is involved in the voice-recording process. We never discover exactly what this is.

When asked how the spirits see and hear she replies:



Alderbank posted:



9th June – flaccon makes a suggestion about the forthcoming meeting:



Several protocols for a test involving cards were suggested, then flaccon dropped this bombshell:



This just left the recorded spirit voices. flaccon made the following comments about how hearers could make out the words:



11th June – the meeting between Alderbank and flaccon finally took place (Alderbank’s nephew was also present). Alderbank wrote (my bolding):



He added:



Speaking to Alderbank, Flaccon refers to another odd phenomenon she had mentioned earlier – the spirits seem to be able to see into the future:



12th June – flaccon gave Alderbank permission to share some of the sound files she gave him during his visit. He renamed them as she had named them after the words and phrases she recognised. All anyone could hear were compression artifacts and sounds picked up from the internal microphone.

13th June – flaccon was still convinced that the voices were real:



Flaccon explains that the spirits can jump from computer to computer:



Her “special fingers” may be involved in this process, but we never find out exactly what she means by this.

16th June – 25 regular posters listen to flaccon’s sound files. None of them hear what she hears.

19th June – flaccon took down her website.

27th June – flaccon’s friend Mr Roberts makes his first post under the name ‘scrappy’:



He continues to post on the forum whilst flaccon is having internet connection problems.

28th June – tuxcat makes the following suggestion:



6th July – flaccon returns, full of indignation that she only had 90 minutes prior notice of Alderbank’s arrival on 11th June. She seems to have forgotten that the visit was discussed for days beforehand.

She also sends jsfisher a scan of a letter written by her GP – later posted in the thread - in which several sentences have been obscured. Nowhere in the visible text is it suggested that the GP himself heard the recorded voices or saw the same images in the bloodstains.

9th July – for the fourth time tuxcat asks flaccon to fill out the following form:



Flaccon’s reply:



10th July – another round of experiments is suggested using tuxcat’s MD5 hash/checksum idea. Pixel42 outlines what a checksum is:



The checksum of the file in question remained unchanged, yet both flaccon and scrappy are convinced that they heard things that were not on the ‘original’ file.

11th July – Calebprime demonstrates how distortions generated by flaccon’s software could be mistaken for human voices and chirping birds. She never addresses this.

18th July – flaccon is asked to send a recording of a spirit distinctly saying “We want to end trouble” to Alderbank so he can upload it. Her reply:



It was pointed out to her that no-one said anything of the kind, and that a copy of a digital file is identical to the original unless it has been manipulated. flaccon’s reply:



The distortion is of course due to the fact that any extraneous noises are from the landline itself.

31st July – flaccon returns after a brief absence:



1st August – flaccon writes:



Alderbank made no mention of this incident.

8th August – Alderbank writes about a second meeting with flaccon at which he also met scrappy:



16th August – Scordatura drew our attention to flaccon’s YouTube page:



25th August – scrappy returns with more news about the YouTube vids:



24th September – flaccon is back:



This turned out to be Casey Kasem’s jokey radio ad for Rock and Roll Heaven, a vintage record store in Florida. Other YouTube videos with demonic messages/spirit voices in the background mentioned by flaccon were equally mundane.

Even more disturbingly:



16th November – scrappy reports a new development:



23rd November – more sound files are uploaded and the regular posters have wildly different interpretations of what the spirits are supposed to be saying.

7th December – Scordatura found a post flaccon made on the David Icke forum in September:



2014
10th February – flaccon returns:



11th February – despite earlier claims that the spirits couldn’t predict future events, flaccon provides three “date-stamped” examples of the spirits...predicting future events.



None of the alleged prophecies were made public before the events they supposedly foretell.

12th February – Tony Youens of ASKE posts on the thread:



14th February – unfortunately the meeting between flaccon and the psychic investigors/press had to be cancelled due to bad weather.

16th February – flaccon meets with the ASKE representatives but doesn’t provide any details of what took place.

18th February – flaccon posts several examples of the spirits’ bloodstain art. Regular posters see different images or no images at all.


I hope that helps!
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Thanks for the summary, Alice Shortcake. I agree with everyone here- great work!

flaccon, when you feel ready, I'd like to learn what happened in your session with the press.
 
Pixel42 said:
A big thanks from me too, Alice, though I have to say it makes very depressing reading all compressed into a single post like that. It doesn't look like we're ever going to be able to help flaccon out of the quagmire of superstition she's got herself into, though I for one will keep trying as long as she keeps posting here.
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Well said, and seconded.

Yay, Alice!
 
Amazing work, Alice! Take several internets and a cookie from petty cash.
 
Thanks, all! :relieved: :D

It was a bit of a slog but at least no-one else has to wade through 158 pages to grasp the essence of this very sad case.

I wonder why we've heard so little about the ASKE meeting, which apparently went ahead as planned last Sunday?
 
Short version:

Flaccon: I can do <unlikey things.>
JREFF: We doubt it, but show us.
Flaccon: <Fails.>
JREFF: See?
Flaccon: No, but..<more unlikey things.>
JREFF:
14475308a459499e0.gif
 
Donn said:
Short version:

Flaccon: I can do <unlikey things.>
JREFF: We doubt it, but show us.
Flaccon: <Fails.>
JREFF: See?
Flaccon: No, but..<more unlikey things.>
JREFF: [qimg]http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/imagehosting/14475308a459499e0.gif[/qimg]
Click to expand...


Yes, I facepalmed quite a few times whilst condensing the thread into a bite-sized chunk. There are times when it's almost impossible to make any sense out of flaccon and scrappy's tortured syntax.
 
Fair play to St Alice for wading through the thread.

As we stand, it seems to me that flaccon would have been posting with gusto had she been given any credence from her Friday meeting. Telling.
 
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