One paranormal/psychic experience I know of

[ChristineR]

I see no reason to assume that “Alice” was a close acquaintance to the dying woman. Nothing in the original piece post says this. The only thing implied is that she knows of an Alice.

I’m not impressed.

LLH

ETA I know at least 4 Alices, and with my crappy memory there might have been more I've just forgotten.

Except that if the most important Alice turned out to be the next door neighbor, the OP would have interpreted it as a wild guess and would never have posted it here. Even if we assume that there is only a 5% chance that Alice would be a "quality hit" in this case, it is still very hard to think "She got this wrong 19 times I don't know about" when your mother is on her deathbed.

 

[Dogdoctor]

Actually, if these visits occurred at about the same time every night, then simply that timing could be an explanation, as well. Without hearing clues that she was coming or anything else. When I've been on a regular schedule, I don't need an alarm clock to wake up, for example. The body will fall into certain patterns and rythms, and expect things at certain times. Wake/sleep cycles seem to be the most prone to this type of conditioning.

It wasn't every night and very irregular and also not at exactly the same time. I used to think I was a psychic for a while following that experience due to that and several other difficult to explain occurrences in my life. It actually took me a few months to come up with the sleeping thing, but I found I could do other things in my sleep such as put a clock where I can see it from my bed and tell myself I want to wake up at a certain time and I would.

 

[neponset]

Thanks to those who have posted on this thread. I apologize for the tardiness of my reply.

Let me add some additional information. My mother was born in 1919 in a large metropolitan city on the East Coast (U.S.), and spent the first 30 years there until she married and moved to the neighboring suburbs. She died in 1989 at age 70. At no time did she live in a small town, so the small town gossip angle suggested here is not credible as an explanation.

There are two Alices in my account; I suppose I should have left the irrelevant one out since the inclusion has been a distraction here, but I wanted to relate the story as I experienced it. Since the account hinges on the name, let me elaborate on that. For the sake of argument, let me call her friend Alice F, and her former neighbor Alice N. I also need to clear up some of the details in how the alleged psychic, whom I will refer to as the psychic for brevity, came to make her comment.

There is no question in my mind at all that there could only be one Alice that the psychic was referring to, i.e. Alice F, and the name was not Allyce or some variant thereof. She would have been born at about the same time (1919) since they had been classmates, both from the same city. She died in the mid 1960s, so it was some 25 years before my mother died. Clearly the reason why I thought of Alice N rather than Alice F was that I was staying in my mother's home when she was hospitalized, and I was thinking that I did not know the people who were living behind her now, but I did recall Alice N. My brother did think of Alice F, although both he and I had forgotten about her, as you might well expect after 25 years. This is not uncommon when we have forgotten something, but instantly remember with perhaps a wealth of accurate details once our memory has been jogged.

In fact I do remember her quite well. We used to visit her before she moved to our town, and I played with her son. Later when she moved here, she became the school nurse when I was in elementary school. She often had lunch at our home, and I recollect that she was a devout Catholic and would never eat meat on Fridays throughout the entire year, not just during Lent.

Of my mother's closest friends that I knew during the last 40 years of her life, Alice F was perhaps the closest. Two other close friends from childhood were still alive at the time. One was in the advanced stages of Alzheimer's, and the other did not get out much. I went through my mother's papers looking for other Alices, but found none among the cards, names on the wedding reception guestlist, and so on. I am convinced that if you were going to pick a name, Alice was the right one.

As to why her own mother was not mentioned, why should it be? Wouldn't in most cases you expect her mother to be waiting for her? Also, naming her husband could not have been farther from correct, since they had been estranged, and my mother specifically said she did not want to meet him after her death. About the psychic's failure to mention others who have passed, what is the point? Is your burden of proof that the psychic name everyone of significance? Similarly, while it is certainly easier to deal with first names only, in this case the surname is entirely superfluous for the benefit of the recipient, namely my mother. Had the psychic been fraudulent, it would have been a coup de maitre to give the full name, but it was not given.

As to the chronology of events, the psychic never met my mother at all. I am not sure on this one point, but I think my brother had not even met her in person at that time, as he had met his girlfriend, the psychic's daughter, only quite recently. The request for any words of comfort was relayed from my brother to his girlfriend, and the information back to my brother from his girlfriend. My brother and I were the only people to visit my mother in the hospital; his girlfriend never went with him. The psychic never met my mother at all. There is simply no way that my brother could have given the name of Alice to the psychic or anyone else because, like me, the woman had passed from his memory over the years.

When my brother mentioned the name Alice to my mother, she was in very serious condition - nonresponsive, intubated, and heavily medicated. She was definitely terminal at this point, as she had had two bypass surgeries after her first heart attack. After this second heart attack, her heart was consdidered too weak for any additional procedures. He told me that when the name was mentioned, she opened her eyes briefly and smiled at him, then her eyes closed again. Not long after, she fell into a coma, and mercifully died a couple of days later.

Of course I cannot judge her state of mind at that time, but I did visit her as often as I could, usually daily after hours for the final week and a half or so. She had very little to say, not surprising given her weak condition, and did not mention any friends, and only her husband, my father, once. Who knows if she was thinking about Alice F, but obviously she never mentioned her to me or my brother, or the name would of course not have been a surprise to both of us.

I just don't get Dark Jaguar's post at all. I do not admit that the name Alice ws a random guess; that's the whole point. There is in my opinion no other Alice that could fit the bill. The psychic could have come up with any name at all, but she didn't and this one is particularly significant. As I noted earlier, I do not have any indication at all of her track record. It's true that we remember the hits but forget the misses, selective recall, but in this one instance the psychic is batting a thousand, even if it's only one turn at the plate. Perhaps not all that impressive, but noteworthy at least to me.

I am unprepared to offer this story as conclusive proof of psychic ability, but the story is sufficient for my purposes to permit me to accept the possibility that it might, in some few cases, exist. That there are a bunch of phony psychics does not in and of itself invalidate the existence of genuine ones, however rare they might be. If I had conclusive proof, I would not be posting here; I would be writing to the journals Nature or Science, and the NY Times.

Clearly my experience will not convince hard-core skeptics of anything. It's either a coincidence, or a scam of some kind, or misremembered facts, or something entirely of this world. Case closed. And that's fine. Occam's razor cuts rather deep, as it should. Ultimately we all believe what we want to believe in the long run. I am comfortable in allowing the possibility of psychic ability, but I won't bet the house on it. Most of what you hear about are obvious demonstrable scams or frauds of some kind, so it pays to be skeptical.

As for the psychic, as I had said she did not accept any money and apparently was very low profile about her talents. I got to know two of her daughters, one of whom became my sister-in-law, and both were college educated with good profesional careers, one in a large software company, the other an interior decorator. It was a nice middle-class family, not a band of roving gypsies reading tarot cards and crystal balls out of an abandoned store front or in a traveling carnival sideshow.

I maintain that the story is accurate and true as presented (what else would I say, I suppose), and I am inclined to be a bit resentful of suggestions that I might be a liar. That's just uncalled for. If I were lying, I would think that I would be able to produce a more nearly airtight and more intriguing story than the truth I have told, which is admittedly somewhat short on details that might be more convincing to those of a skeptical frame of mind. Most posters here I would expect to be of that ilk.

The case seems to hinge on whether the name Alice was just a lucky guess. Those with actuarial abilities can come up with a proxy to the probability that the name Alice was simply a coincidence given the data presented above: again, Alice F born circa 1919, East Coast U.S., Catholic, also, of Irish descent.

I am going to at this point that the probability of a pure coincidence is well down in the single digits. Alice seems fairly far down the list of names, but even if the probability turned out to be one in a million, it's hardly proof positive, but rather an indication of the likely truth.

Maybe when I die myself I will find out the real truth. I know I won't find it in this world. Nevertheless, it remains a fascinating albeit brief story. This is in fact the first time I have related it "publicly"; the total number of times in the past 17 years I can probably count on one hand.

 

[Beth]

Neponset,

Thank you very much for providing additional details to the story. It is, indeed, intriguing. I appreciate your sharing it.

 

[joller]

Also, naming her husband could not have been farther from correct, since they had been estranged, and my mother specifically said she did not want to meet him after her death.

This is what I don't understand - you said you're partially Christian but really somewhere between agnostic and atheist.
Yet you believe this woman is psychic although she 'channels' through a Christian saint?
Was your mum christian? was she a believer?
I thought you don't get to choose whou you want to meet in heaven, you're just happy with the lot (and the presence of God obviously).
Besides, holding a grudge against the estranged husband might actually be a mortal sin.
And if we assume it's not heaven, just 'the other side', how does the christioan saint fit into the picture?

she was in very serious condition - nonresponsive (...) name was mentioned, she opened her eyes briefly and smiled at him, then her eyes closed again. Not long after, she fell into a coma, and mercifully died a couple of days later.

So she wasn't really non responsive if she could react, but never mind.
It might be that your brother misjudged her reaction - he said what he said, and he was EXPECTING some reaction. He got something, and he took it. Maybe it was the fact that he spoke to her, and she just reacted to his voice rather than to what the message was? Maybe she was happy her son was there speaking to her in these tough times?
You wrote she didn't say anything, and the rest (corrctness of the hit etc) are just your and your brother's opinion.

Of course I cannot judge her state of mind at that time,

So you can't judge her reaction either, since you don't know what she was really reacting to.

I am unprepared to offer this story as conclusive proof of psychic ability, but the story is sufficient for my purposes to permit me to accept the possibility that it might, in some few cases, exist

While it's obviously a very important memory for you, please also accept the possibility that the ability doesn't exist. Accept the fact that you're not objective but biased in that situation, the situation must have been very emotional for you.
.

That there are a bunch of phony psychics does not in and of itself invalidate the existence of genuine ones, however rare they might be

What about the problems on a philosophical level?
Where do they get the information from? Who speaks to them? Christian saints? So that means you can only speak to people in heaven?
if Christian saints and other people exist in the afterlife, that automatically means some sort of soul exists, and consciousness prevails after death (and there's so much wrong with that possibility). Still even you're writing you're agnostic/atheist so even you're not convinced! If you accept she's got the gift and gets the inside info from the christian saints, shouldn't you accept christianity?

Clearly my experience will not convince hard-core skeptics of anything. It's either a coincidence, or a scam of some kind, or misremembered facts, or something entirely of this world. Case closed. And that's fine.

Don't write us off as idiots - one who disregards everything without checking the arguments/ possible evidence etc is not a skeptic.

Occam's razor cuts rather deep, as it should.

What does it have to that whit Occam's razor?
occam's razor says 'one should not make more asumptions than needed' it doesn't say be stubborn and disregard any arguments.
That's the philosophy of the religious lot.

Ultimately we all believe what we want to believe in the long run.

Not the skeptics - we believe the evidence and the results if acheived following the scientifical method. If the experiment can be repeated and similar results obtained etc.

Most of what you hear about are obvious demonstrable scams or frauds of some kind, so it pays to be skeptical.

So maybe you can get the lady to apply for the challenge?
She can demonstrate once and for all that there's afterlife, God, Christian religion is correct and if she doesn't want the money, she can donate it to a charity of her choice.

II am inclined to be a bit resentful of suggestions that I might be a liar. That's just uncalled for

.
Of course. I myself am not suggesting you're lying. I do however think there's a possibility you 'turned' the one name 'alice' into a hit.

The case seems to hinge on whether the name Alice was just a lucky guess.

No, i disagree. It's also about your interpretation of what happened and your vulnerability to suggestion at that specific time. Don't uderestimate the power of suggestion.

During one of the lectures on psychology I took at the uni, a lecturer came and asked us to write a number on a piece of paper, collectively - one person writes a digit, than another one etc.
At the end we had about 6 digits, he didn't see the paper, and he guessed the number!
Was he a psychic? no, he said he wasn't, he said it was a trick. Do I knolw how he did it? no idea. he told us it's all about suggestion. But I think some other methods might have been used as well (mirrors? cameras?)

probability that the name Alice was simply a coincidence given the data presented above: again, Alice F born circa 1919, East Coast U.S., Catholic, also, of Irish descent.

But the psychic didn't have that info, did she? so what's the use?

Maybe when I die myself I will find out the real truth. I know I won't find it in this world.

i thought you were agnostic?

 

[Rodney]

So maybe you can get the lady to apply for the challenge?

Exactly how would the lady's psychic ability to know of a departed close friend -- to the extent her ability is real -- allow her to win the million dollars based on the rules Randi has established?

 

[joller]

Exactly how would the lady's psychic ability to know of a departed close friend -- to the extent her ability is real -- allow her to win the million dollars based on the rules Randi has established?

Why not?
if she can predict with agreed accuracy the names of departed close friends of other people (who are alive to confirm that this indeed was their close friend), it might be good enough to get her the money!
Besides she's been portrayed here as a psychic, and I take it naming close departed friends isn't the only thing she can do.
I.e. maybe sha can answer questions like "who's waiting for me on the other side?" from random Christians, giving the first name and relation, i.e. "St. Nicolas says your grandfather John is waiting for you"

I think we agree that if she can't be that specific, we can't take her abilities seriously

 

[Godmode]

It's quite possible she didn't even say the name Alice. Sometimes people will remember "psychics" saying things even though what they actually said was something like "an old friend" or someone with the name that begins with the letter A.

 

[Rodney]

Why not?
if she can predict with agreed accuracy the names of departed close friends of other people (who are alive to confirm that this indeed was their close friend), it might be good enough to get her the money!

The Challenge Application states: "All tests must be designed in such a way that the results are self-evident, and no judging process is required." How would the test of this lady be set up so that "no judging process is required"?

 

[meg]

I'm guessing Glite hit it on the head. I imagine the conversation between psychic and brother went something like:

psychic: Hmmm. I'm seeing an A name....Ann...Arabelle...Alice...did you mother have anyone close to her like that?

brother: Why yes! My mother's best friend was named Alice! Wow!

psychic: ah yes...I could tell they were very close. Well, tell her that Alice is waiting for her.

brother: Gosh, that is simply amazing.


Brother goes and tells everyone that the psychic specifically named Alice. What are the odds of that?


Meg

 

[Rodney]

I'm guessing Glite hit it on the head. I imagine the conversation between psychic and brother went something like:

psychic: Hmmm. I'm seeing an A name....Ann...Arabelle...Alice...did you mother have anyone close to her like that?

brother: Why yes! My mother's best friend was named Alice! Wow!

psychic: ah yes...I could tell they were very close. Well, tell her that Alice is waiting for her.

brother: Gosh, that is simply amazing.


Brother goes and tells everyone that the psychic specifically named Alice. What are the odds of that?Meg

About the same odds that you read the thread carefully. According to Neponset: "There is simply no way that my brother could have given the name of Alice to the psychic or anyone else because, like me, the woman had passed from his memory over the years."

 

[meg]

oops. my mistake.

 

[Steven Howard]

About the same odds that you read the thread carefully. According to Neponset: "There is simply no way that my brother could have given the name of Alice to the psychic or anyone else because, like me, the woman had passed from his memory over the years."

Which is a bit stronger than what he wrote in his first post: "My brother did not recall having mentioned Alice to the woman ... He told me himself he had forgotten about Alice, as I had, until her name was mentioned."

When you think about it, neponset's only got his brother's word on any of this. The brother says, "My girlfriend's mother told me to tell mom that Alice would be waiting for her." The brother says, "I didn't even remember who Alice was." The brother says, "I told Mom what the psychic said about Alice and she recognized the name and was comforted by that."

It's all third- or fourth-hand hearsay. It's neponset telling us what his brother told him his girlfriend's mother told him. Or else it's neponset telling us what his brother told him his girlfriend told him her mother told her. That detail changes between the two versions.

I'm not casting aspersions on neponset's veracity, nor that of his brother. Just pointing out that stories change in the telling and memory is much less reliable that we think it is.

 

[ChristineR]

Neponset, thank you for posting more information. I certainly don't believe you are lying. You have to realize though that lying and cheating are common among psychics.

Generally psychic phenomena fall into three groups: the "so vague it isn't impressive" category, the "whoa! I guess it could be a coincidence, but..." category, and the absolutely inexplicable.

In every case, the absolutely inexplicable turns out to involve cheating or fraud. At the very least someone is able to figure the trick out, even if they cannot prove that's how it was done.

Your case falls firmly into the "whoa! It could be a coincidence, but..." category. About 1% of females born in the U.S. in 1919 were named Alice, so although it is unlikely that your mother was very close to someone named Alice, it's not a huge shock. For example, if there were 20 women (approximately her own age) close to your mother in her lifetime, there is a 5% chance that at least one of them would be named Alice.

Given what you told us in the second post, and assuming everyone's memory is correct, we can probably rule out most forms of cheating. It's not 100% sure. Psychics have been known to use some pretty sleazy tricks. We can't prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that this woman never talked to anyone who knew your mother and Alice, for instance.

The real issue I see is that it's just one incident. If this psychic made similar comments to many dying people, how many would be relevant? If it's roughly 5%, then she is certain to get a hit sooner or later. And remember that the psychic did not say "Your good friend Alice." Alice could have been a lot of people including enemies, which increases the likelyhood of a hit even more.

When something like this happens to you it can be very disturbing, and it's hard to say "She probably says something random like that to a lot of people, and most of them just laugh it off." But the fact that there has never been an absolutely inexplicable case makes me feel that this case, too, likely has a non-psychic explanation.

 

[Rodney]

oops. my mistake.

Thank you for the refreshing honesty.

 

[Rodney]

Neponset, thank you for posting more information. I certainly don't believe you are lying. You have to realize though that lying and cheating are common among psychics.

Generally psychic phenomena fall into three groups: the "so vague it isn't impressive" category, the "whoa! I guess it could be a coincidence, but..." category, and the absolutely inexplicable.

In every case, the absolutely inexplicable turns out to involve cheating or fraud. At the very least someone is able to figure the trick out, even if they cannot prove that's how it was done.

Your case falls firmly into the "whoa! It could be a coincidence, but..." category. About 1% of females born in the U.S. in 1919 were named Alice, so although it is unlikely that your mother was very close to someone named Alice, it's not a huge shock. For example, if there were 20 women (approximately her own age) close to your mother in her lifetime, there is a 5% chance that at least one of them would be named Alice.

Given what you told us in the second post, and assuming everyone's memory is correct, we can probably rule out most forms of cheating. It's not 100% sure. Psychics have been known to use some pretty sleazy tricks. We can't prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that this woman never talked to anyone who knew your mother and Alice, for instance.

The real issue I see is that it's just one incident. If this psychic made similar comments to many dying people, how many would be relevant? If it's roughly 5%, then she is certain to get a hit sooner or later. And remember that the psychic did not say "Your good friend Alice." Alice could have been a lot of people including enemies, which increases the likelyhood of a hit even more.

When something like this happens to you it can be very disturbing, and it's hard to say "She probably says something random like that to a lot of people, and most of them just laugh it off." But the fact that there has never been an absolutely inexplicable case makes me feel that this case, too, likely has a non-psychic explanation.

. . . As opposed to this stale spin.

 

[ChristineR]

I can assure you that my comments were sincere and thought-out, even if I fall short of Rodney's standards.

 

[Steven Howard]

Your case falls firmly into the "whoa! It could be a coincidence, but..." category. About 1% of females born in the U.S. in 1919 were named Alice, so although it is unlikely that your mother was very close to someone named Alice, it's not a huge shock. For example, if there were 20 women (approximately her own age) close to your mother in her lifetime, there is a 5% chance that at least one of them would be named Alice.

The odds are a little better than that, I think. Leaving aside the fact that names vary in popularity among different ethnic and socioeconomic groups and just assuming a flat 1% chance for any friend to be named Alice, the probability that at least one in a group of twenty friends is called Alice is 1 - (.99)^20, which works out to roughly 0.18, or 18%.

 

[ChristineR]

The odds are a little better than that, I think. Leaving aside the fact that names vary in popularity among different ethnic and socioeconomic groups and just assuming a flat 1% chance for any friend to be named Alice, the probability that at least one in a group of twenty friends is called Alice is 1 - (.99)^20, which works out to roughly 0.18, or 18%.

You're right--I did the math right, but I think I punched the wrong keys on Windows Calculator. It seemed too low to me, also.

 

[joller]

The Challenge Application states: "All tests must be designed in such a way that the results are self-evident, and no judging process is required." How would the test of this lady be set up so that "no judging process is required"?

If she could give a first name and relation than no judging would be required.
With naming 'friends' it might be dificult, because who is a friend and who's not is a subjective call.