To think psychics are all fakes?

[LambinsideaDuckinsideaTrout]

I don't like that they take peoples money when they are in a vulnerable place, lost loved ones etc. It's immoral. Just my opinion.

Thoughts? Opinions?

My grandmother recently died and I did get a bit sick of all the well meaning "wherever she is she's looking down etc..." and that I should take some coincidence that happened shortly afterwards as "a sign she's alright"

Ffs. If she was alright she'd be on the phone or at the door with a hand knitted cardi to give me. But she isn't - she's gone.

It may comfort some to believe otherwise and that's fine but anyone willing to accept cash to exploit that belief is just contemptible.

What I am saying is if a good friend tells me they saw a ghost I wouldn't reply "LIAR! THE EXISTENCE OF GHOSTS CANNOT BE SCIENTIFICALLY PROVEN!

Neither would I.

I think most "psychics" (not all) are liars - but most people who see ghosts aren't. And I've never, ever said they are.

I think they're mistaken.

So, not only was your argument not really an argument at all (you in fact don't disagree with my position that ghosts don't exist) - you put words in my mouth that I have never said.

Apart from that - spot on.

But what's to discuss now? The 2/3 of us who believe in it have basically been told we are mentally ill.

The evidence I read was a long long long time ago. It fascinated me then and increased coverage , programs such as "paranormal witness" and films based on true stories , mainly possession/exorcism films and documentaries still fascinate me to this day.

I can't link to anything as it's just stuff I've see. Over the years and tbh links are useless. Because you can find anything on the internet to back up absolutely anything.

I remember watching that child psychic who failed the ready. He was clearly cold reading. And wasn't even that good at it.
I think that things like that are off putting to many people who are genuine because they have confirmed in other people's minds that it's rubbish.

I understand people don't believe that's their choice. I honestly don't think it will ever be proved 100% either way.

Black holes then. Hettie you've obviously measured one and know what it's made of had how it's created as your intelligence is so vast. Explain them to me.

Black holes then. Hettie you've obviously measured one and know what it's made of had how it's created as your intelligence is so vast. Explain them to me.

Measured? We can see them! (Or rather, infer their existence, because of what we can't see). We can measure how they interact with other matter and EM radiation.

Made of? An object whose gravity field is too strong for even light to escape.

Created how? Expected to occur when a very large star collapses at the end of its lifespan.

loads of things can't be scientifically proven or even explained.

doesn't mean they don't exist/work/happen etc.

for example most miscarriages can't be explained - there's no way of telling why they happened only that they did.
yet sadly they exist.

scientific explanations/experiments and therefore the results and conclusions are limited, because human knowledge and resources are limited.

just because something has not been proven to exist it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
The most you can say is that you "think" it doesn't or you don't believe it does.

Miscarriages? Really? Grasping at straws now.

an example.

I could give you more.

I don't think anyone has said that those who believe in the paranormal are mentally ill. People have said such people are fraudulent, deluded, self-deluding, mistaken, vulnerable, credulous or slightly stupid. But I suppose you could add mental health problems as one potential source of hallucinations.

People get angry on these threads because there's something terribly frustrating about watching otherwise rational people reiterate their own delusions or errors in the face of all reason.

An extremely bad example. Miscarriages can be observed, we know they exist, we don't have to know why they happen, to know they exist. Not at all comparable to ghosts in the slightest.

"Black holes then. Hettie you've obviously measured one and know what it's made of had how it's created as your intelligence is so vast. Explain them to me."

I can't explain black holes to you. I'm not a physicist. But Brian Cox could. And, crucially, you don't have to have "faith" to be able to see the effects of them- anyone can if somebody tells them how.

'Paranormal Witness' is comedic. Did you see it last night? Two patients, in ICU, no less, one on ventilator, thrashing about for quite extended periods and no one medical around. Imagine that? Never heard of an ICU with so little staff.

The one guy who saw ghosts and black mists, whilst suffering from life-threatening infection and doped to the eyeballs, no less. Strong drugs and hallucinating, who'd have thunk it?

The haunted operating theatre, because morgues in hospitals are always located near theatres.

C'mon!

That show is hysterical.

To be fair - most people who are agreeing with me don't begin conversations by saying: "I absolutely disagree with you".

I was arguing with you, not with myself.

Cultural concepts are the things that exist. Father Christmas, God & ghosts do not.

Baldrick

You are being a bit silly, you know - quite childish really. I have never measured either black holes or gravity because I'm not a physicist.

Black holes? Very interesting things.

I don't think they can be detected directly yet - but they have an effect that can be measured. On gravity, apart from anything else.

A better example for you to pick would be dark matter.

The most mysterious part of the universe. Completely undetectable & physicists can't say very much about it - but it must be there because the universe couldn't exist if it wasn't.

The thing is - for science to even suspect that something is there, it has to have some kind of measurable effect.

You could prove that invisible unicorns exist, for example, if you could find their footprints. In this instance, you would neither have to see or touch the invisible unicorn, but you would see it's interaction with the ground and make a conclusion from that.

There must be some kind of interaction with something in order for us to suspect that there's something there.

Yellow

Pax was referring to me saying that someone I know used to hear voices and was in and out of psychiatric hospital.

I said that because pax stated that they talked to the dead and the dead talked back.

I guess they took it that I was inferring they were mentally ill.

*for example most miscarriages can't be explained - there's no way of telling why they happened only that they did.
yet sadly they exist.

scientific explanations/experiments and therefore the results and conclusions are limited, because human knowledge and resources are limited.*
Actually, we have very good scientific knowledge of the various reasons why miscarriages occur. What we often do know is why any particular miscarriage occurs, and as such, it is called "unexplained".

But why get angry?

People believe what they want to believe. Mental illness or drugs doesn't have to be the reason behind it. Thy are not even discrediting the argument with fact they are just outright calling the people with an opposing view delusional or crazy.

These stories pre date media. Predate science. The belief of these things goes back thousands of years only back then they burnt or drowned them.

There is no proof 100% either way. Ergo people are free to make up their own minds based on whatever they want.

Most of these people must spend every day thinking everyone is crazy.

as your intelligence is so vast

Well, thank you very much. Nice to be appreciated.

My intelligence is functional, not vast. Nothing I'm saying takes that much intelligence.

Maid

I said most

some are explained. but not all.
just one example of limited human knowledge

Gravity is ghosts pushing stuff down.

And scientific knowledge is growing all the time. Theories that don't stand up in the face of the evidence are discarded or rethought. Everything is subject to scrutiny and has to justify its place in the scientific canon.

Unlike pseudoscience that doesn't have to justify itself at all. And can ignore all the evidence stacked against it with a simple "well, I know what I thnk"

But why get angry?

Because the world is just so full of bullshit, it infuriates me. It's everywhere, speaking to dead people and medicating yourself with sugar and planning your day around what Saturn is doing. Just so much nonsense, pervading society and doing very real damage, perhaps not at the level of you chatting with your mates about it, but on a global scale. Every time someone utters "it's not doing any harm", they unwittingly feed into the system that sees virgins raped to cure men of HIV, that sees children die because parents don't seek formal medical treatment, that sees the vulnerable counting their few remaining pennies because they've been conned by someone so disgustingly amoral to take their cash in return for fake messages form their dead family.

It DOES do harm.

Reading about Doris Stokes makes me fume, for instance. Made a lifelong career out of preying on grief, routinely planted newly bereaved people with whom she had previous contact in the front rows of her sell-out shows, and scanned the local press for deaths, murders, disappearances while on tour.

Looked like a nice little dumpling of an elderly lady, all doilies and bosom, so more difficult to finger her as a cold-hearted predator who, when she was contacted by a desperate woman who believed in her 'psychic abilities' about whether she should turn off her husband's life support machine, got the hospital to keep her updated on his last hours, then invited the grieving widow to a front row seat at a show a few weeks later at the Palladium, and gave her a 'message' from her husband, saying he supported her decision to turn off life support. That is a morally despicable act.

Hettie in my first post to you I quoted where you said:

^The issue is whether anyone on earth has any reason to believe they do.

The answer to that is no^

You seemed to be overly dismissive of people's experiences of "seeing" "ghosts". I'd say, on the other hand, people have plenty of reason, because of their experiences, in believing in the existence of ghosts, though I don't personally believe ghosts exist, in the sense of being able to be observed objectively. It was the dismissiveness I took objection to.

Anormal

I was bringing an example to illustrate that human knowledge is very limited.

we don't know so many things and even if we know about them we are unable explain them logically or scientifically.
That's all.

It's a foolish to entirely dismiss ideas, occurances, beliefs etc just because science hasn't caught up yet.