Psi Baba
Homo Skepticalis
- Joined
- Aug 13, 2001
- Messages
- 4,027
I know this topic isn't about Randi's latest commentary, but it seems that Randi completely forgot about the contest in which readers were to submit their analyses of James Van Pragh readings on the Larry King show. This contest appeared in the May 3, 2002 Commentary. He gave readers two weeks to send in responses. One week later, this statement appeared in the May 10 Commentary:
Since no winner was ever declared (if someone can point me to where the winners are named, please do). I hereby present the analysis I submitted.
My comments are interspersed in the original transcript and are preceded with '->'
--begin analysis---
Excerpt #1
CALLER: I lost a daughter in 1987, and I'd like to hear from her.
KING: How old was she?
-> King jumps in with a question which gives JVP free information. JVP should have had to guess--oops, I mean get this from the spirit.
CALLER: She was 15.
JVP: Was this cancer condition at all?
CALLER: No.
-> stee-rike 1
JVP: Was it blood related?
CALLER: No.
-> stee-rike 2
JVP: How was she killed?
-> Gave up already. Chicken. So we just ask. Impressive.
CALLER: Hit by a car.
JVP: What's her first name?
-> You mean the spirit can't even tell you her own first name?
CALLER: Christy. Her first name or mine?
JVP: No, her first name.
CALLER: It was Christy.
JVP: Let me ask you something, because I don't — you know, I just get what I get,
and I can only give you something that I get. Was there a baby born after she passed
over? In the family?
CALLER: Yes.
-> So. Lots of families have babies. Babies=family, get it?
JVP: Because this might sound very strange to you, but she wants me to tell you that she's a guide for this baby. I don't know if it's a brother's baby.
CALLER: There's been three.
-> Oops. He didn't know there was MORE THAN ONE. He assumed there was only one.
JVP: Okay. Does the brother have a baby?
CALLER: Let me see — there's been four girls born since her.
-> Does the caller even know how many there were?
JVP: Okay. Well, there's a baby there that the brother has, that she's a guide to, also. I'm going to tell you that someone in the family is a teacher, okay, or wanted
to go into teaching. All right? I'm going to tell you that this girl — she forgives the person that did this to her, very much so. And I'm telling you she's telling me
she came to your dreams just recently?
CALLER: I very seldom remember my dreams.
-> No validation of the teacher thing. Buzz! Wrongo too on the dream thing.
JVP: Well, she said she's been in your dreams. And I also see a kitten. And I don't know why I'm being shown a cat, or kitten. But I don't know if she had a kitten or a
cat?
-> There are more cats in the U.S. than people. Not a stretch here.
CALLER: I called her "cat." Those were her initials.
-> Interesting lucky "hit" although it's not really what he said, is it? He definitely was talking about the animal, since he started with kitten, then said kitten or cat. Besides JVP already knows the girl's name begins a 'C'.
JVP: Okay. Well, maybe that's why she's showing me this. But that's what I'm being given you. I'll tell you right now, she's there at night a lot around you in your
dream state. I'm going to ask you also, did you have a little vegetable garden when she was alive?
CALLER: Her grandmother did.
-> A lot of people have vegetable gardens. He didn't even get the right individual.
JVP: Okay. And is her grandmother in spirit now?
CALLER: Yes.
JVP: Okay. She's talking about helping her with that garden. Do you remember her helping with the vegetable garden?
CALLER: Yes.
JVP: You remember that?
CALLER: Yes.
JVP: With tomatoes and carrots, and she's talking about helping grandma doing this. She's with this grandmother, which must be your mother or something.
CALLER: Yes.
-> "this grandmother, which must be your mother or something." Duh! The "or something" might refer to, perhaps, "your husband's mother?" Ya think? And he's supposed to be getting this information from dead people?
JVP: She's connected with her, with you.
CALLER: Yes.
-> Of course she's connected with her and you, she's YOUR MOTHER and HER GRANDMOTHER! Aaaaahh! My brain!
JVP: Okay? I'm going to tell you something also. I don't know if there's a watch of hers you have and also a locket of some sort, but she's talking about that. I also
want to tell you one more thing. Is there a footstool in your house?
CALLER: No.
-> Stee-rike 1 Stee-rike 2 Stee-rike 3. Yer outa there! Wrong on all counts. No watch. No locket. No footstool.
JVP: Well, who puts their feet up? She helps someone put their feet up with a pillow underneath their feet. I don't know if she's helping grandma, but she's showing me putting a pillow underneath someone's feet.
CALLER: May have been my mother.
-> Real firm validation there. I'd call that a "no."
JVP: I think — would you check that out?
-> Translation: Help me, I'm dyin' here. At least let me get ONE right!
Excerpt #2
CALLER: . . . I lost my mom in December '97, my dad in January 2000. I was wondering if you...
JVP: I'm going to tell you there's somebody here with a cancer condition. Was it your dad?
CALLER: Yes.
-> Ok, got that one. Not a hard guess, though. They always start with cancer, heart attack, or car crash.
JVP: Because I feel cancer. And I feel lungs, also. I feel with him also, it could be emphysema at one point, too or trouble with his lungs breathing.
CALLER: The lungs it was my mother.
-> He was connecting lungs with the Dad's cancer. He said so. Technically, this is a miss.
JVP: Well, I am getting lungs and trouble breathing here. I also want to tell you that these two are very connected. I don't know.
-> Lungs...trouble breathing. Who'd have imagined those two things would be connected?
JVP: Did you say they passed very closely in time?
-> Did he even listen to what the caller said at beginning?
CALLER: Two years apart.
JVP: One of them had a brother over there who met them when they passed over. Hadn't seen this brother for a very long time, Okay.
CALLER: Yes. That would be my father, he had a couple brothers.
JVP: Well, there was a brother there for a long time. He hadn't seen him. He was very impressed — he was very happy to see this guy. Your father, by the way, didn't
believe in this sort of thing. Very skeptical of this sort of thing. But he is a true believer now. A name Joseph comes in also. Or Joe. And that's interesting, very
strong in front of me.
CALLER: I don't know who that is.
-> Buzz! No validation on brother not seen for a long time. Buzz! Wrong on the Joe name.
JVP: Did you have to give your mother medications?
CALLER: Did I have to give her?
JVP: Who gave her the medications? She's telling me that there were medications that
she had to receive.
CALLER: She did have a lot of medications, nothing I gave her directly.
-> Wrong on the giving of medications.
JVP: But there was a schedule of medications she had to get. Every hour. She had to
receive medications.
-> Sick, elderly people tend to be on medications. Wow. He doesn't miss much, does he? Well, yes he does.
JVP: I also want to ask you, is there a box of hers you have? A jewelry box?
CALLER: No.
-> Stee-rike 1
JVP: Who has a box of hers, like a jewelry box of some sort?
CALLER: Oh, god, I don't — I don't know.
-> Stee-rike 2
KING: We are running out of time.
JVP: Well, I'm being shown it, and it has flowers on it.
-> Stee-rike 3 (I love it, he insists on describing a box that probably doesn't even exist).
---end analysis---
If anyone else submitted an analysis and wondered whatever became of that contest, post it here!
I have just finished going through the texts of all the Commentaries from May through August, 2002. Then I looked at the topic lists of the Commentaries for the remainder of the year. I did a search on the term "JVP" within the Commentaries and got only two hits, the May 3 and May 10 issues. This contest was never mentioned again.
Since no winner was ever declared (if someone can point me to where the winners are named, please do). I hereby present the analysis I submitted.
My comments are interspersed in the original transcript and are preceded with '->'
--begin analysis---
Excerpt #1
CALLER: I lost a daughter in 1987, and I'd like to hear from her.
KING: How old was she?
-> King jumps in with a question which gives JVP free information. JVP should have had to guess--oops, I mean get this from the spirit.
CALLER: She was 15.
JVP: Was this cancer condition at all?
CALLER: No.
-> stee-rike 1
JVP: Was it blood related?
CALLER: No.
-> stee-rike 2
JVP: How was she killed?
-> Gave up already. Chicken. So we just ask. Impressive.
CALLER: Hit by a car.
JVP: What's her first name?
-> You mean the spirit can't even tell you her own first name?
CALLER: Christy. Her first name or mine?
JVP: No, her first name.
CALLER: It was Christy.
JVP: Let me ask you something, because I don't — you know, I just get what I get,
and I can only give you something that I get. Was there a baby born after she passed
over? In the family?
CALLER: Yes.
-> So. Lots of families have babies. Babies=family, get it?
JVP: Because this might sound very strange to you, but she wants me to tell you that she's a guide for this baby. I don't know if it's a brother's baby.
CALLER: There's been three.
-> Oops. He didn't know there was MORE THAN ONE. He assumed there was only one.
JVP: Okay. Does the brother have a baby?
CALLER: Let me see — there's been four girls born since her.
-> Does the caller even know how many there were?
JVP: Okay. Well, there's a baby there that the brother has, that she's a guide to, also. I'm going to tell you that someone in the family is a teacher, okay, or wanted
to go into teaching. All right? I'm going to tell you that this girl — she forgives the person that did this to her, very much so. And I'm telling you she's telling me
she came to your dreams just recently?
CALLER: I very seldom remember my dreams.
-> No validation of the teacher thing. Buzz! Wrongo too on the dream thing.
JVP: Well, she said she's been in your dreams. And I also see a kitten. And I don't know why I'm being shown a cat, or kitten. But I don't know if she had a kitten or a
cat?
-> There are more cats in the U.S. than people. Not a stretch here.
CALLER: I called her "cat." Those were her initials.
-> Interesting lucky "hit" although it's not really what he said, is it? He definitely was talking about the animal, since he started with kitten, then said kitten or cat. Besides JVP already knows the girl's name begins a 'C'.
JVP: Okay. Well, maybe that's why she's showing me this. But that's what I'm being given you. I'll tell you right now, she's there at night a lot around you in your
dream state. I'm going to ask you also, did you have a little vegetable garden when she was alive?
CALLER: Her grandmother did.
-> A lot of people have vegetable gardens. He didn't even get the right individual.
JVP: Okay. And is her grandmother in spirit now?
CALLER: Yes.
JVP: Okay. She's talking about helping her with that garden. Do you remember her helping with the vegetable garden?
CALLER: Yes.
JVP: You remember that?
CALLER: Yes.
JVP: With tomatoes and carrots, and she's talking about helping grandma doing this. She's with this grandmother, which must be your mother or something.
CALLER: Yes.
-> "this grandmother, which must be your mother or something." Duh! The "or something" might refer to, perhaps, "your husband's mother?" Ya think? And he's supposed to be getting this information from dead people?
JVP: She's connected with her, with you.
CALLER: Yes.
-> Of course she's connected with her and you, she's YOUR MOTHER and HER GRANDMOTHER! Aaaaahh! My brain!
JVP: Okay? I'm going to tell you something also. I don't know if there's a watch of hers you have and also a locket of some sort, but she's talking about that. I also
want to tell you one more thing. Is there a footstool in your house?
CALLER: No.
-> Stee-rike 1 Stee-rike 2 Stee-rike 3. Yer outa there! Wrong on all counts. No watch. No locket. No footstool.
JVP: Well, who puts their feet up? She helps someone put their feet up with a pillow underneath their feet. I don't know if she's helping grandma, but she's showing me putting a pillow underneath someone's feet.
CALLER: May have been my mother.
-> Real firm validation there. I'd call that a "no."
JVP: I think — would you check that out?
-> Translation: Help me, I'm dyin' here. At least let me get ONE right!
Excerpt #2
CALLER: . . . I lost my mom in December '97, my dad in January 2000. I was wondering if you...
JVP: I'm going to tell you there's somebody here with a cancer condition. Was it your dad?
CALLER: Yes.
-> Ok, got that one. Not a hard guess, though. They always start with cancer, heart attack, or car crash.
JVP: Because I feel cancer. And I feel lungs, also. I feel with him also, it could be emphysema at one point, too or trouble with his lungs breathing.
CALLER: The lungs it was my mother.
-> He was connecting lungs with the Dad's cancer. He said so. Technically, this is a miss.
JVP: Well, I am getting lungs and trouble breathing here. I also want to tell you that these two are very connected. I don't know.
-> Lungs...trouble breathing. Who'd have imagined those two things would be connected?
JVP: Did you say they passed very closely in time?
-> Did he even listen to what the caller said at beginning?
CALLER: Two years apart.
JVP: One of them had a brother over there who met them when they passed over. Hadn't seen this brother for a very long time, Okay.
CALLER: Yes. That would be my father, he had a couple brothers.
JVP: Well, there was a brother there for a long time. He hadn't seen him. He was very impressed — he was very happy to see this guy. Your father, by the way, didn't
believe in this sort of thing. Very skeptical of this sort of thing. But he is a true believer now. A name Joseph comes in also. Or Joe. And that's interesting, very
strong in front of me.
CALLER: I don't know who that is.
-> Buzz! No validation on brother not seen for a long time. Buzz! Wrong on the Joe name.
JVP: Did you have to give your mother medications?
CALLER: Did I have to give her?
JVP: Who gave her the medications? She's telling me that there were medications that
she had to receive.
CALLER: She did have a lot of medications, nothing I gave her directly.
-> Wrong on the giving of medications.
JVP: But there was a schedule of medications she had to get. Every hour. She had to
receive medications.
-> Sick, elderly people tend to be on medications. Wow. He doesn't miss much, does he? Well, yes he does.
JVP: I also want to ask you, is there a box of hers you have? A jewelry box?
CALLER: No.
-> Stee-rike 1
JVP: Who has a box of hers, like a jewelry box of some sort?
CALLER: Oh, god, I don't — I don't know.
-> Stee-rike 2
KING: We are running out of time.
JVP: Well, I'm being shown it, and it has flowers on it.
-> Stee-rike 3 (I love it, he insists on describing a box that probably doesn't even exist).
---end analysis---
If anyone else submitted an analysis and wondered whatever became of that contest, post it here!
