Can the cynics explain this (mediums)

[Disturbia81]

I've always been sceptical of them and know there are a lot of charlatans.
But have heard stories from people over the years who wouldn't lie. But remained cynical

A friend and I went to a group one, there were about 150 people there. He spoke to 10.
We used fake names on the booking so no research could be done on us.
Didn't talk about anything while there.

Anyway he mentioned a surname that had come to him, it was her brothers so she put her hand up. Then he got all her family names, relationships between them, specific funny things said, how he died, even how he looked when he was found etc.
She was in shock but got so much comfort knowing her was with her still.

He couldn't have known any of this.
I want to believe but also want to see if anyone can logically explain it?

Logic does explain it: if you could genuinely communicate with the dead and look into and predict the future, would you really be advertising yourself in the classified ads or charging £12 a ticket in a budget function room somewhere to lost and sad people looking for an answer as to whether they’ll ever get married to someone whose name begins with C or whether their dead gran is happy in the afterlife? Of course you fucking wouldn’t. You’d be in demand from every government on the planet wanting to pay you megabucks to get the answers to the important questions. Hence logic tells me that anyone doing the former, can’t actually do what they claim to be doing.

I always find it curious that many people give “they got everything about me right” as the measure of satisfaction for a spiritualist or clairvoyant visit. I already know that my uncle is called Brian, that my mum really likes Chanel perfume, that I’ve got a big trip planned soon, that my ex and I broke up, and that my grandad before he died had pain but is now at peace and that he loved/s me. Etc etc. Why would I want a clairvoyant for information I already know about? What is actually the purpose of clairvoyants telling clients this stuff? Surely this is the most underwhelming aspect of it all, that their party piece is giving utterly pointless information?

It's just cold reading. Have a read about it. That's why people like Derren Brown can do it whilst being very clear that they aren't psychic and that it's just a technique.

Hot and cold readings. They are good at what they do.
There is no science to prove it can be done, which tells you it's all bollocks really.

It's just cold reading, OP.

These charlatans never tell you anything useful, like what the next lottery numbers are going to be.

Just a load of bullshit about how much your uncle had loved his old car................

If they have to ask people to put up their hands to identify themselves… it’s fishing. And clearly a cold reading.

The other half of the cold reading equation is that the audience operates via confirmation bias. They’re so busy marvelling at how accurate they were about their uncle’s love for his car or how attached their dad was to the dog that they miss the gaps and errors.

It's just not possible to communicate with the dead. It just isn't.
One of the signs of death is no brain activity so how could the dead communicate?

There's this thing called Google. You can type things such as 'Death Crash <local area>' into it and hit enter. That gives the name of somebody (and probably their relatives and family circumstances) that, out of 150 people from a small radius who are specifically looking for reasons to believe, some are highly likely to be connected to said Death Crash <town name> by friendship or family.

The rest will be things like names with J, R and T in them and older Male Relatives with sore backs and a pain in the torso that ended very quickly. And a little dog. There's always a dog.

Darren Brown explains it all brilliantly. It's all a con

It could be useful to record one of these and play it back.

"a name that sounds like Su.. Sus... yes Fred that's it."

Why is there a bad line at all? Why wouldn't grandad be able to have a whole conversation with the guy repeating everything he said like a translator.

There seems to be a time limit too beyond which they fade away.

Also food for thought. I'm atheist, but for those who are religious it makes a mockery of your beliefs. You'd have to think that god is ok with you contacting your relatives, but won't make it easy and you have to pay some guy to do it?

Doesn't sound right does it.

Loads of info on Google @Disturbia81. for example: https://secrets-explained.com/derren-brown/cold-reading

Thank you!!

I remember a very excited friend telling me that a medium had told her what her uncle was called and what her job was.
Underwhelmed, I told her “but you already know this, why do you need someone to tell you?”

She said I was being deliberately obtuse, but I genuinely don’t know why people want to be told things they already know.

Go look at "Barnum Effect"

And.. some douche sta doing in front of a crowd of 30 people could call out a common name... Someone will put their hand up.

It's often Johnson, smith, Jones, fletcher, Davies etc.
And then it's wide causes of deaths..
They're seeing pain... And the spirit is holding their heart.. but that doesn't mean heart attack, it could be that they're broken hearted or maybe lung issues or it could be a digestive issue ..
And then it's a message that the person they're speaking to wants to hear..
"He's saying he's here and he's happy and he's not left you...."

How often do they say:

"I've got Terry Chevapravatdumrong here and he fell off the Humber Bridge in 1998 whilst trying to climb to the top and he wants to speak to his ex wife Brian and let her know he left the £20 in the glove box of the red Citroen."

I have tickets for a man next week. Have absolutely no faith he will be able to talk to anyone I knew... Will be reading links to cold reading. I am not on any sm or Google. I am not a local per say.. I have no mates who could have prompted him.

What they said. Also, people, especially the bereaved and vulnerable, exaggerate the correct guesses and underestimate the misses. Presumably, as he wasn’t your brother, you’re reliant on your friend to have confirmed the accuracy of much of the information after the show, because you wouldn’t know it — chances are she was (probably unconsciously) exaggerating the ‘hits’, just as her responses were giving away more than she was aware of.

Also, depending on the age of the person a ‘medium’ is reading, it would be fairly clear a sibling didn’t have a natural death, for instance.

If you'd have recorded it I bet you'd have been better able to see.

Explain it - well, first of all we have to believe that you're telling the truth. How do we know that?
So we have a starting point that there is no way at all to independently verify.

Then we have to believe that your memory is accurate and multiple studies have shown that is absolutely not the case. Human memory is so unreliable I am amazed it's allowed in legal testimony tbh!

Then we have to believe you didn't lead the 'medium' by responding through body language when they said something vague that might fit.

Then we have to think that the names were really uncommon like Gostalgerath and not something like Smith, Jones, Holmes, Stevens and so on. You've got a room full of people and you chuck half a dozen common names about - at least half in attendance with have some sort of non verbal reaction. Then it's a case of zoning in on one and probing further.

Etc

I get what you are all saying.
Except the ones going on about telling the future, it's not about that. It's the ones communicating with the dead.
Or the ones saying why you would want to know.. well for loved ones it's confirmation someone is with them still.
I've always thought it's bollocks but as I said,
She went in totally anonymous mixed in with a huge crowd, he was nowhere near her, and got EVERYTHING right. I know this.
I love Derren Brown! So they're not communicating with the dead. But isn't that magic in itself that someone could reel off all this factual specific info to a face in the crowd.

I did record it for her.

No cold reading, he reeled everything off and she only said yes or nodded, gave nothing away

You did? And there were no body language clues or vague or leading questions or wrong guesses or anything like that? It was all unprompted, accurate and with no confirmations of any kind?

If that's the case then completely seriously you have recorded something science has been unable to verify and you should consider submitting it.

Just.. no. He said her surname, then reeled off her mums, brothers, sons in quick succession. Referenced in jokes between them, how he died, how he was found. She went in anonymously and said nothing while we waited.
No-one has answered yet really, just not read my OP.

Richard Dawkins did some tv programs a few years ago where essentially he was giving various groups an opportunity to prove themselves. A medium did a reading on him ...claimed to be in contact with RDs father. The slight problem was that RDs father wasn't dead... it was very funny.

But that is cold reading.

Tbh my answer is that I don't believe you. Sorry.

What you are saying is you are asking us to believe the word of a stranger who has provided zero evidence to support their claim when no mediums have ever been able to prove themselves in controlled conditions.

Occam's razor applies.

No. He didn't ask leading questions. He didn't ask anyone anything. He just "saw" people stood by people and then said the name to the person sat there and reeled off the other accurate information. With my friend he said her surname and then said the rest. It was stuff only been him and her. He didn't say anything incorrect, no leading questions
Like I say I'm a cynic, but no-one has given me an alternative answer to what I saw.
I want to stay a cynic 😂