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Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To think psychics are all fakes?

684 replies

LambinsideaDuckinsideaTrout · 11/12/2013 08:33

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?

OP posts:
ANormalOne · 11/12/2013 11:01

No that's not proof at all. Personal feelings about a subject are not proof.

Gileswithachainsaw · 11/12/2013 11:03

But often feelings can be based on nothing. There's no reason to feel that way.

Feelings are usually accepted even though they arebt logical.

HettiePetal · 11/12/2013 11:04

but it is unreasonable to assume that anything someone experiences that they cannot prove to other people means that they must be either crazy or deluded

But it is reasonable to conclude that when the probabilities suggest it.

The chances that they've imagined something (or are crazy & deluded) is millions of times more likely than that they've really seen a ghost.

Do you not think it's reasonable to conclude that the person who thinks they are Napoleon is deluded?

They might be Napoleon, sure, but it's stunningly unlikely. It's far more likely that they're not.

Gileswithachainsaw · 11/12/2013 11:06

So normal

Are you saying you never base a decision on a gut feeling?

Honestly just curious now, because how does someone decide based on evidence alone even even it goes against how you feel. Can u ignore feelings like that because it's not physical proof?

HettiePetal · 11/12/2013 11:08

Feelings are usually accepted even though they arebt logical

No, they're not.

"Is that the Police Commissioner? I have a feeling that HM the Queen is a secret agent from the Planet Zorg & she's going to kill us all at 4pm this afternoon".

"Do you have evidence for this, Sir?"

"No. It's a feeling I have".

"May I speak to your nurse, please?"

We don't accept feelings that aren't logical.

ANormalOne · 11/12/2013 11:10

Accepted by who? When? Your feelings are just that, your feelings, if you want to base your belief on psychics on your personal feelings, despite all evidence to the contrary, have at it, that's your prerogative.

Just don't pretend it's proof of anything, it really, really, isn't.

KatnipEvergreen · 11/12/2013 11:13

I don't think they are all fake, but I don't believe any of them are getting their information from the spirit world etc.

I think some of them have a gift of sorts which is being very good at noticing things and 'reading' people. I think some of them know their gift for exactly what it is, deliberately make it all "woo" and exploit people - proper charlatans.

Others have the same ability but genuinely believe they are receiving messages from the dead and don't deliberately set out to defraud or take advantage of people.

ANormalOne · 11/12/2013 11:15

If I have a gut feeling that a dress looks horrible on me, would I buy it? No, not unless I tried it on and got other people's opinion on it first. My gut feeling my be right but it could be wrong, I'm not going to accept it as fact simply because that's how I feel.

Gileswithachainsaw · 11/12/2013 11:15

You didn't answer my question. Would you ignore a bad feeling about something purely because it didn't make sense to the time? Would you choose a house or a school or a job or whatever even if for some reason it have you a very bad feeling?

paxtecum · 11/12/2013 11:18

I talk to people who have passed and they talk to me.

Just because you don't, doesn't mean no one does.

I don't do psychic readings and if I did it would be for free.

Psychic Sally sued the Daily Mail for libel and won the case.
The DM did admit that they had made up that article about her.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22988215

I have a friend whose Dad was a very famous healer, he was also an officer in the RAF.

What do you cynics think about Dowsing?
Dowsing has been scientifically proven to work.

ANormalOne · 11/12/2013 11:20

Dowsing has been shown to work but there is no evidence this is due to supernatural abilities. m.sciencefocus.com/qa/there-any-scientific-evidence-dowsing

KatnipEvergreen · 11/12/2013 11:21

^The issue is not whether ghosts exist or not. You can't prove a negative.

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

The answer to that is no^

I disagree, I absolutely believe that ghosts exist, but they are not spirits of the dead. They don't exist in a way that can be measured or proved by science, in the way that dream images can't be projected directly from the sleeping person's brain onto a screen. It doesn't mean that the dream doesn't exist or that the person hasn't properly experienced it.

I absolutely believe in people's experiences but put it down to imagination, atmospheric/environmental conditions, electromagnetic fields, low frequency sound, drugs, alcohol, being asleep/semi-conscious, collective hysteria, grief, or another function of the brain.

ANormalOne · 11/12/2013 11:22

You should go see James Randi then, if you can speak to the dead Paxe, there's a million dollars waiting for you if you can demonstrate your amazing gift.

Chivetalking · 11/12/2013 11:24

But I do still believe that recorded or not there have been cases

I don't.

If a cast iron 100% genuine case had ever happened it would have got out. It just would.

Snake oil salesmen the lot of 'em.

LaRegina · 11/12/2013 11:25

Ok Pax can you talk to someone now who may want to connect with someone on MN?

HettiePetal · 11/12/2013 11:28

I talk to people who have passed

OK.

and they talk to me

No they don't.

Just because you don't, doesn't mean no one does

Dead people can't talk. They don't exist.

Psychic Sally sued the Daily Mail for libel and won the case

They said she was wearing an earpiece. She wasn't. That does not prove, or even suggest that she's actually talking to dead people.

Dowsing has been scientifically proven to work

On occasion. But it's been equally proved that, when it does happen, the dowser has some unconscious knowledge of where the water/oil is. Nothing supernatural about that.

BaldricksTurnip · 11/12/2013 11:31

What a fantastic analogy Katnip about dreams. Absolutely spot on.

HettiePetal · 11/12/2013 11:32

They don't exist in a way that can be measured or proved by science

How convenient.

in the way that dream images can't be projected directly from the sleeping person's brain onto a screen

Brain imaging can show dreams happening in a brain. That's evidence that dreams happen & are real. You don't have to see the images to know that dreams happen physically.

Your evidence for ghosts?

Chivetalking · 11/12/2013 11:34

No answer yet.

Could Pax be in a psychic trance? Grin

BaldricksTurnip · 11/12/2013 11:35

There are things in nature that we know exist because we experience their effect, yet they are unmeasurable, unquantifiable and nobody knows what they are or how they work, gravity for example. It is simplistic to say that just because you can make a pie chart out of it something cannot possibly exist. You would have to know every detail about the way the universe works in order to dismiss absolutely something that cannot be proven either way.

HettiePetal · 11/12/2013 11:36

It's a terrible analogy!

ANormalOne · 11/12/2013 11:37

But we know how gravity works, we know what it is and it is measurable and quantifiable.

HettiePetal · 11/12/2013 11:38

Baldrick

For goodness sake.

Drop a pencil. See what happens.

That's called gravity.

It's not fully understood, true - but it's very existence is not in doubt Hmm

curlew · 11/12/2013 11:40

As it is impossible to prove a negative, obviously it is impossible to say 100% that psychics don't exist. But bring them to me, one by one, and I will be able to prove that each individual psychic is either a fake or deluded. And I could keep doing that adinfinitum.

HettiePetal · 11/12/2013 11:41

Aeroplanes wouldn't work if we couldn't measure and quantify gravity!