Now I'll have to get the blu-ray to see that cold reading.

This is one of the rarest shows I've ever seen where every episode is great and it seems to just be getting better at the very end.

Most other shows are disappointing at the end, like Dexter, for example.

that caller is really weird...
indian that's anti-mexican..aren't mexicans are pretty much the same as indians?

i love how librush keep fishing for something to latch on. he's like one of those psychic scammers trying to do cold reading.

cold reading *debunked

>> ^Stormsinger:
I still vote that she's an accomplice. Just like Copperfield's "make the space shuttle disappear" had the entire audience lying participating in the illusion.
Nobody can cold read tells that subtle...they're simply not that consistent across the population. It takes time to study your target in repeated situations to see what the various twitches actually mean.


Which is why he screened the audience for someone that will do exactly what he expects.

I still vote that she's an accomplice. Just like Copperfield's "make the space shuttle disappear" had the entire audience lying participating in the illusion.

Nobody can cold read tells that subtle...they're simply not that consistent across the population. It takes time to study your target in repeated situations to see what the various twitches actually mean.

This is called cold reading. It's quite clear from the last encounter. The thing about being panic struck and something involving water when you were small is a very common phrase that most cold readers do. This is a very general memory, and if you think about it, you probably have a memory like it yourself.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'pyschic, medium, dead, relatives, probabilities' to 'pyschic, medium, dead, relatives, probabilities, cold reading' - edited by BicycleRepairMan

This is stupid. His observations on body language are somewhat correct, but you don't need NLP to make them. They're pretty basic and sometimes they cross over to simple pop psychology or outright bullshit (and let's not even get into the matter of his melodramatic delivery and language). Basically, he's showing off the cold reading side of NLP: pseudo-objective and unnuanced interpretations given as facts to make you think he can see through anyone. I like Korzybski's idea of a non-Aristotelian system of thought, but NLP is not it. NLP is to non-Aristotelian thought as Scholasticism is to Aristotelianism, i.e. a convoluted and unnecessary dead-end.

But what ticks me off the most is that the guy is trying to debunk Fox News, which is run by a bunch of idiots, by defending someone even more idiotic, namely a conspiracy theorist nut disguised as a professor (or more accurately, former university lecturer and teaching assistant). The first thing a "professor" should do is say that he doesn't believe the conspiracy theories because there isn't sufficient conclusive evidence, but that the real important thing is that Muslims believe in them. Thus he would bypass even Hannity's brain dead "questions" and could talk about his course (because Hannity hates Muslims and would love to make fun of their conspiracy believing ways). The fact that he didn't do this and chose to go on about how this little minuscule piece of possibly relevant information was somehow a big boost of conspiracy theories shows one of two things: either that he simply is a general idiot and thus is unfit to teach in the first place; or that he really believes his "evidence" makes a strong case for the conspiracies, which fact proves him to be an idiot and thus unfit to teach anyway (at least on the topic of anything related to 9/11 and other conspiracy theories). From his Wikipedia article, the latter seems more likely.

sad... people looking for answers will grasp at anything, but it's great to watch their reactions... total shock of "we thought she might know something".

almost makes me laugh... but it's just too sad!

She's clearly just plucking stuff out of their air and trying really hard to cold read them (this is what all psychics do - it's nothing but cold reading!)

What most people do though is forget the times she's wrong and remember the times she's right because it strikes such a chord!.

Sadly lots of ppl will believe her and she will still make money out of people's desperation, loss and grief.

MINK, This vid touches so many different organizations that an individual debunk of each is not really relevant to the central issue.

The question is have these organizations produced extraordinary evidence through replicable experiments to back up their extraordinary claims, and the answer is still no.

You may notice that they tend to say "the probability is X to 1 against random chance", but these are statistical weasel words. For instance if I flip a coin 100 times and it comes up heads 50 times, the chance of me getting the exact order of H-T I got is 1.00891345*10^29 to 1 against, it also so happens to be an exactly statistically average result.

here they are one at a time, just to show you where my BS meter goes off:

Monagle: pure cold reading, draws a bus stop, and talks about being near trains - his subject is in Europe and attempting to be somewhere interesting, he probably took a bus or train, that's just good stage magic. Draws what looks like a bike wheel, which the show decides “looks like a jet engine” - of course it looks like many things, that is why he drew it. “a chapel, maybe” - religious institutions are pretty common, safe bet there. “lots of glass” - my study has lots of glass, almost all public buildings have lots of glass, this is another no brainer. He uses a lot of “maybe”, and of course we don't get to see all the blatantly wrong guesses, that would not be good television.

PEAR: http://skepdic.com/pear.html nuff said

Marilyn Schlitz: http://skepdic.com/ganzfeld.html http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2320/is_n2_v60/ai_18960809

while there does appear to be something statistically significant going on with the ganzfeld experiments, we don't have any reason to believe this is “psi” related. We only know that something is going on. To assume, without basis, that the cause is supernatural, rather then psychological, or experimental design failure, is groundless.

We also have the problem that some studies, such as those of Carl Sargent, have “regular” ganzfeld results, but the experimenters have been caught cheating (see second link) while preforming the experiment, this implies a problem with replicability.

Please remember, if we are talking about science, the burden of proof lies with the extraordinary claims, you should instead be asking for a sound, demonstrable, falsifiable, scientific hypothesis. Debunking is a hobby for stage magicians, not a scientific endeavor.

Graphology starts with the implicit assumption that whatever metaphors, symbolic meaning, or nuance that the features of a person's writing bring to mind are necessarily descriptive of the writer as well. This type of faulty thinking is present in most all forms of divining as well. So I'd say comparing this to a psychic who does cold-reading is not too far off the mark now that I think about it, because even THEY have a certain established methodology/set of guidelines to make these bogus claims or "guesses". Certainly there's a methodology to graphology, but this was only added recently with the onset of psychology to make it appear as a seemingly valid area of study and once again with the onset of computer technology to add to the air of respectability/seriousness normally enjoyed by other proven sciences. Before that, graphology was no different than any other form of divining (which it's roots are clearly in) in the sense that the claimed "expert" uses free association/symbolism to make a purely allegorical interpretation for the subject.

Thing is, there's also many different branching schools/types of graphology and graphologists now, each with it's own set of guidelines towards divining "the true you", making the whole thing even more confusing for a prospective employer/customer seeking to use these methods. One graphologist might show me to be a compulsive-liar who, by use of his methods, has discovered me to be sexually abused as a child without my own knowledge JUST by my handwriting mind you; while at the same time another may have me pegged as being a paranoid closet-gay with post traumatic stress disorder and violent tendencies towards a perceived enemy. Both equally false and outrageous. One school of thought may have slanty letters as being "passive-aggressive" while for another big-bubbly letters mean that. The whole thing is just utterly vague and ridiculous and subjective and people's lives and reputations are certainly affected by this process which is shown to have no strong empirically demonstrable links. The fact that it's actually legally used/endorsed in big corporations and has won favor in certain courts adds to the illusion of credibility. Also I would just like to add graphology is not to be confused with forensic analysis of handwriting used to investigate crime scenes, etc.

I agree with much of what you say Messenger, in that this could've been more thorough. I think it's more of an indication towards the ridiculously grandiose nature of graphology itself and what it claims to be capable of though. The initial premise of determining personality through hand-writing seems faulty enough, now attaching someone's job based on that ill-gotten, vaguely perceived personality based on largely stereotype makes it even faultier. He was a willing participant, he agreed to the parameters and that said "experiment" was a fair approximation of what it is he does, in an effort to prove his art true, and he failed. At least that's my take on it.

he will continue to miss the important point that religion and its beliefs are just one of many excuses mankind uses to justify atrocity and inhumanity to fellow human beings.

I'm betting not a single viewer of these videos became an atheist because of them. Dawkins is no Guitar Hero.

Did any of you two even watch this before posting? This clip focuses on the scams of astrology, new age, psychics, cold reading, dowsers and other nonsense, and leaves your imaginary friend completely be.

That being said, I dont think Dawkins/atheism videos convert people on the spot either, but I think Dawkins views are very, very far from persephones "microscopic view on humanity" (please see "Queerer than we can suppose" to see how "dogmatic" RD really is.. : http://www.videosift.com/video/Richard-Dawkins-TED-The-Strangeness-of-Science-22-min(and no there are no atheist "preaching" there either))

You also probably judge him from the title of "Root of all Evil?", a title he objected to, and has ever since tried to distance himself from, he did get the question mark in there, but I guess thats not enough for people who only reads by title.. Dawkins has never actually claimed religion truly is the root of all evil, what he does say its that it does little good and much harm.

I cant speak for Dawkins, but if I could change the title slightly, I'd perhaps call it "The root of just evil" because I cant see anything good thats ever come from believing incredibly arrogant, ignorant things about the way the world works, nor have I ever seen a good deed committed in the name of these ideas that are not -or could just as well be- a result of genuine human solidarity and a reasoned view on things.

If we humans didnt know right from wrong innatley, we would have no way to distinguish between the best ideas of Jesus and the worst of Hitler..

But when we hear stuff like "love thy next as yourself" or "do onto others" etc, it rings like music in our ears, because we already know it.

BrknPhoenix: I'm have a big geek-on for Derren Brown, so I have to correct you on the NLP thing. Although he acknowledges that there are some good general concepts in NLP, which he makes use of now and then, Derren knocks it in his book for being too rigid in its application of those concepts (as well as massively overstating its own effectiveness).

Some of the main techniques you'll see in this show are cold-reading, reading (and sending) body language, and hypnotism. However, over and above all of these is the art of showmanship. You'd be amazed how much of this stuff works purely through getting the people involved to believe it will work...

Their excuse is: power. And to some power also leads to money and everything you get with money.

On the other hand, there are those who are far more responsible with their ability. Some might actually be intelligent enough to exceed what would be considered 'normal' ability. People of that sort typically don't go very far with cold readings. They don't have enough 'awe-inspiringness' to go far with it. The majority of people, as I've gathered, don't go for fortune tellers who don't tell them what they want to here, so the people who have real ability and yet don't fully capitalize on that ability are brushed aside. Honesty does that. It can bore people and even make them very angry with you.

Going after Edwards would pretty much be a waste of time, there really is no secret to how Edwards operates. Cold reading techniques, spying on the audience before the show and while they're in line, probably the occaisonal plant in the audience, etc.