bad psychic: sorry to call your dead boyfriend a liar, but he drowned

[jolinar of malkshor]

Originally Posted by Frank the Tank

No I really really can. This is all a scam. Total. ######baggery.

I agree with you that it is a scam.....but there is no way that you or I or anyone else for that matter can prove or disporve of these types of phenomenom.

Hell, we can;t even prove that we are not just a bunch of brains sitting in some kind of thing like the matrixs.

[GoinAllTheWay]

Originally Posted by photon

Can you say, without doubt, without question, 100% certain, that invisible unicorns do not exist?

No, I can't as I obviously can not prove it. But I also wouldn't through out a blanket statement like "anyone who believes in it is stupid"


I am not for a second saying that girl is not a fraud, I just have never understood why people say things like "it does not exist" when they can not prove it, they can't know for sure. It just seems ignorant and closed minded to me. It's like the very existance of the debate is somehow threatening.

It's like that test above, why hasn't someone come up with the exact opposite? Why not have a contest PROVING that it does NOT exist and then give someone a million bucks? Betcha they wouldn't have much luck either.

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay

No, I can't as I obviously can not prove it. But I also wouldn't through out a blanket statement like "anyone who believes in it is stupid"

The logical way of thinking in society is if you say something exists or that you can do something, it's your responsibility to prove it, not ours to prove you can't do it.

[Prototype]

I have a hard time proving anything, therefore I don't believe in too much.

[Burninator]

Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay

No, I can't as I obviously can not prove it. But I also wouldn't through out a blanket statement like "anyone who believes in it is stupid"


I am not for a second saying that girl is not a fraud, I just have never understood why people say things like "it does not exist" when they can not prove it, they can't know for sure. It just seems ignorant and closed minded to me. It's like the very existance of the debate is somehow threatening.

It's like that test above, why hasn't someone come up with the exact opposite? Why not have a contest PROVING that it does NOT exist and then give someone a million bucks? Betcha they wouldn't have much luck either.

There is lots of research out there trying to prove that psychics are nothing more than liars. But Science doesn't work the way your describing.

I'll photon's example of the invisible unicorn. I'm saying that there are invisble unicorns. I"ll give you a million dollars to prove me wrong. You wouldn't be able to prove me wrong, but I wouldn't be able to prove it's right either. So Science would say that there is no such thing as invisible unicorns. The way Science works is that you first have to prove something before you can claim its true.

[photon]

Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay

I am not for a second saying that girl is not a fraud, I just have never understood why people say things like "it does not exist" when they can not prove it, they can't know for sure. It just seems ignorant and closed minded to me. It's like the very existance of the debate is somehow threatening.

It's like that test above, why hasn't someone come up with the exact opposite? Why not have a contest PROVING that it does NOT exist and then give someone a million bucks? Betcha they wouldn't have much luck either.

Exactly like Burninator said. You can't prove it doesn't exist, but where is the line between being closed minded and being stupid? (As an aside, being closed minded means not being able to change your mind when you are shown to be wrong, as opposed to not believing in everything that comes along).

Put it in the context of something different. Gravity is a theory.. we can predict what will likely happen when you jump out the window of a building, but we can't be 100% sure until it actually happens. But if you called people closed minded because gravity hasn't been "proven" yet and if you jumped out the window there's a chance you'd fly you'd be technically correct but you'd also be called stupid by pretty much everyone.

You can't prove it doesn't exist, so having a $1 million reward to prove it doesn't exist doesn't make any sense. But you can give it a very small probability given that there are much more likely explanations for the phenomena and very little evidence to prove it does exist.

You would need an infinite number of tests to prove it doesn't exists, but you only need one positive to prove it does exist.

[GoinAllTheWay]

Originally Posted by rubecube

The logical way of thinking in society is if you say something exists or that you can do something, it's your responsibility to prove it, not ours to prove you can't do it.

Or it can be left to personal choice.

Billions of people in the world believe in God, with blind faith. No one has yet proven to them that God exists yet they still believe it. Why is it any different here?

I wouldn't put myself into the category or ALL of society for that matter that someone has to prove something to me for me to believe it. I have a brain, I am more than capable of evaluating the the arguments/evidence for and against and drawing my own conclusions.

[Table 5]

Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay

Or it can be left to personal choice.

the whole point of a scientific arguement is that there is no personal choice. it's based on facts and tests, not beliefs.

[Burninator]

Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay

Or it can be left to personal choice.

Billions of people in the world believe in God, with blind faith. No one has yet proven to them that God exists yet they still believe it. Why is it any different here?

I wouldn't put myself into the category or ALL of society for that matter that someone has to prove something to me for me to believe it. I have a brain, I am more than capable of evaluating the the arguments/evidence for and against and drawing my own conclusions.

The difference between God/Religion and science is one word. Faith.

[photon]

Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay

Or it can be left to personal choice.

Billions of people in the world believe in God, with blind faith. No one has yet proven to them that God exists yet they still believe it. Why is it any different here?

I wouldn't put myself into the category or ALL of society for that matter that someone has to prove something to me for me to believe it. I have a brain, I am more than capable of evaluating the the arguments/evidence for and against and drawing my own conclusions.

It's different here because she's having a negative impact on people's lives, making money off of the gullibility of others. If she was running a different kind of scam for old people she'd go to jail. She gets away with it though because at the beginning of every performance there's a "this is for entertainment purposes only" disclaimer. If she didn't have that she'd be arrested on the spot (as recently shown by psychics in NY that were arrested).

Since you don't require proof in order to believe something, what DO you require in order to believe it? What other reasonable tests are there? If enough people say it it must be true? If it's in the middle of the two extremes it's true?

[GoinAllTheWay]

I never said I required proof, never said I believe in it either. I honestly don't know. The whole point behind all of my above posts was to try to understand how people could say "It does not exist, positive of it" or even "it does not exist, positive of it" when it really is impossible to say either for sure.

And that is not the only defenition of being closed minded. It also means that someone is not open to having their opinions challenged. Unwilling to explore new ideas or even the possibility that they are wrong.

If she is hurting ANYONE by doing these shows, then it really is their own fault. Granted I am not sure how these shows run but I would imagine that everyone in that crowd knew the show was about her and showed up of their own free will. No one forced that lady to ask her question.

[troutman]

A "psychic" once called me to see if she could sue a newspaper that refused to run her advertising, on the grounds of discrimination.

I told her she would probably have to prove she was psychic before she could claim any damages. I asked her "tell me what I am thinking right now".

She hung up the phone.

[anyone with an ounce of intuition could have guessed what I was thinking]

[photon]

Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay

I never said I required proof, never said I believe in it either. I honestly don't know. The whole point behind all of my above posts was to try to understand how people could say "It does not exist, positive of it" or even "it does not exist, positive of it" when it really is impossible to say either for sure.

Very true. But like I said it comes down to degrees, it's impossible to say for sure. It's also impossible to say for sure that Zeus doesn't exist. But if I started a company where people could send me money to have Zeus throw lightning bolts and their enemies, I'm sure I'd be shut down pretty quick.

And that is not the only defenition of being closed minded. It also means that someone is not open to having their opinions challenged. Unwilling to explore new ideas or even the possibility that they are wrong.

That's saying what I said in different ways. It's funny, because skeptics get accused of being closed minded all the time. But if you ask a skeptic what it would take to change their mind, they'll usually tell you exactly what it would take, in detail. Ask a psychic what it would take to change their mind...

If she is hurting ANYONE by doing these shows, then it really is their own fault. Granted I am not sure how these shows run but I would imagine that everyone in that crowd knew the show was about her and showed up of their own free will. No one forced that lady to ask her question.

No, but society and the media by supporting these things give people false hope. Like I said, if I scam someone it's their fault they didn't do their research isn't it? It's their fault they bought into the scam isn't it? It's not their fault though, and that's why we have laws to protect the innocent and the naive.

The reality is the mind is easily manipulated, it's not reasonable to expect people to be able to protect themselves against some of these things without eduction of that. There's a reason these things flourish in places where the overall education level is lower.

[GoinAllTheWay]

nm-at work atm, don't have time to properly put together my posts. I'll look at this thread again when I get home.

[Burninator]

Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay

I never said I required proof, never said I believe in it either. I honestly don't know. The whole point behind all of my above posts was to try to understand how people could say "It does not exist, positive of it" or even "it does not exist, positive of it" when it really is impossible to say either for sure.

And that is not the only defenition of being closed minded. It also means that someone is not open to having their opinions challenged. Unwilling to explore new ideas or even the possibility that they are wrong.

If she is hurting ANYONE by doing these shows, then it really is their own fault. Granted I am not sure how these shows run but I would imagine that everyone in that crowd knew the show was about her and showed up of their own free will. No one forced that lady to ask her question.

But she is hurting people. She is misleading them, wasting peoples money and time. She is deceiving people by claiming she has powers. Powers which she claims can find missing people or bodies in murder investigations, which never pan out and just waste time and money. People use her and other psychic's for medical advice, which is extremely dangerous as they have no medical background.

Psychic's usually refuse to have any scientific tests done to prove what they do has any merit. They are taking advantage of people. There are people out there who want to believe it and are often blinded by the fact that they want their dead relative taking to them instead of thinking logically about what is happening.

There are people out there peddling junk like this all the time. We don't need more people telling us that you can cure medical ailments through the power of triangles, certain points in your foot and hypnotism. Or other things that people claim to be true but have no scientific backing. It is a waste of time, money and potentially dangerous.

[Prototype]

Originally Posted by troutman

A "psychic" once called me to see if she could sue a newspaper that refused to run her advertising, on the grounds of discrimination.

I told her she would probably have to prove she was psychic before she could claim any damages. I asked her "tell me what I am thinking right now".

She hung up the phone.

[anyone with an ounce of intuition could have guessed what I was thinking]

Were you thinking "Jeepers, I wish she'd hang up the phone already"? Then, I'd believe she'd have a leg to stand on.

[Reaper]

Originally Posted by Burninator

The difference between God/Religion and science is one word. Faith.

If by faith you mean the suspension of logic and reason then yes, you are correct.

[Burninator]

Originally Posted by Reaper

If by faith you mean the suspension of logic and reason then yes, you are correct.

I wasn't sure if I had to ellaborate on that or not. But yes that is what I was getting at. Anytime you corner someone of religion they can always fall back "well we have faith that god exists...blah blah...etc." So it's hard to compare believing in a psychic and belieing in god. Unless people have the same faith in a psychic as others do in god...yikes I hope not.

[Teh_Bandwagoner]

Originally Posted by Burninator

There is lots of research out there trying to prove that psychics are nothing more than liars. But Science doesn't work the way your describing.

I'll photon's example of the invisible unicorn. I'm saying that there are invisble unicorns. I"ll give you a million dollars to prove me wrong. You wouldn't be able to prove me wrong, but I wouldn't be able to prove it's right either. So Science would say that there is no such thing as invisible unicorns. The way Science works is that you first have to prove something before you can claim its true.

Not necessarily. Isn't null hypothesis a common statistical test that is the exact opposite? Where you assume something to be true, and you keep testing it until it's either proven false, or falls within an probability that is statistically true?

[Red Mile Style]

Originally Posted by Reaper

If by faith you mean the suspension of logic and reason then yes, you are correct.

Faith does not mean the suspension of logic and reason... It takes just as much faith to believe in science as it does religion.