Skeptics issue $1 million psychic challenge

Looking forward to hearing the results but I guess I know what they'll be... 'inconclusive'

A non-profit organization called The James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF) has announced that it is publicly offering $1 million to celebrity "psychic mediums" including James Van Praagh, Allison DuBois, Sylvia Browne, Carla Baron, John Edward, and others if they can prove their abilities in controlled experiments.

source


This bit is interesting though, I'm sure I've seen cases of crimes where psychics had been of value

Psychics have reason to be cautious about putting their abilities to the test. The track record of psychics is abysmal, for example when it comes to helping police find missing persons. Despite claims to the contrary, there is not a single documented case of a missing person being found or recovered due to psychic information.

Mod Edit: All Caps – Please Review This Link.

You can tell just how biased they are by including the likes of Sylvia Brown. Still, if no psychic can claim the money it seems to settle the debate. I just wonder how there are so many people claiming to be psychics that say the police call them to help them solve crimes.

I guess I'd be saitisfied either way this turns out.

would projecting actions into a person's mind make me a candidate if so, i guess i have just earned a cool million. Then again, i can earn far more than a million and staying off the grid instead of being fattened up for kitchen.

The sad part of should i say the ludicrous part of all this, is that people assume that money is the answer to everything.

There was a guy I saw on t.v. a long time ago a few times who offered something like 25k for anyone that could move stuff with their mind. He would put a pencil or something on a table then surround it with styrofoam or put a glass box over it.

He would then show how people do it. As far as I know there was never anyone that could do it without blowing air.

I don't know if psychics are real or not, Darren Brown seems to have figure them out.

Anyways, I've always been impressed by the psychic that was on Ghost Hunter's that time when Jason was getting a reading and his heat signature on an infrared camera started going crazy.

I'll see if I can find a clip of it.


Edit to add:

Go to about the 7:00 minute mark and watch from there. The psychic pulls like heat or something off Jason and over to himself to get a reading.

Originally posted by Versa
SKEPTICS ISSUE $1 MILLION PSYCHIC CHALLENGE

This prize has been open since 1968 in one form or another.
JREF

And JREF isnt the only one. Anyone with any paranormal abilities who can actually do what they claim, can win prizes from a whole bunch of different organisations...
List of prizes for evidence of the paranormal

Originally posted by kro32
There was a guy I saw on t.v. a long time ago a few times who offered something like 25k for anyone that could move stuff with their mind. He would put a pencil or something on a table then surround it with styrofoam or put a glass box over it.

Would that be this video?

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/f7738894687d.jpg[/atsimg]

Challenge accepted!

I highly doubt anyone will be able to claim the prize, and I don't think there is going to be any conspiracy covering up the truth. The majority of these people are scammers. I would say the majority as in ALL.

James Randi's JREF is not about fair, objective testing of psychic abilities. It's a game whose rules are rigged so as to disprove psychic claims. Instead of having an independent panel of parapsychological experts to assess and judge a claim, it always ends up with Randi and his cronies making the final call. Which is about making the psychic fail however good he or she is.

Anyone who takes up JREF's bogus challenge is a fool.

Anyone who wants to see irrefutible evidence of the paranormal should examine these pictures:
smphillips.8m.com...

(third picture down)
and compare these pictures:
smphillips.8m.com...

Then let him or her examine the amazing evidence presented at this website for remote viewing of subatomic particles such as quarks and superstrings nearly a century before they were conceived by physicists. With evidence like that which cannot in principle be explained in terms of cheating or lucky guessing, you don't need second-rate stage magicians like Randi playing their mind-games to prove the existence of paranormal abilities.

I guess what a number of people dont understand about psychic abilities is that its not literally where one homes in on your brain and thoughts and can see what your exact thought it, its more so almost a distinct intuitive feeling or inkling towards a specific action that these abilities pick up on...

Something like foreseeing tonight's lottery numbers just doesn't work...something like intuitively leading a team of police to a buried body based on sensing the "spirit" or energy does...

I remember reading a very simple explanation in regards to this that went something along the lines of true psychic ability is not knowing ones thoughts but knowing ones intent, If that resonates with anyone.

I'm about as psychic as a house brick and never had any time for most of these charlatans, but I'd always understood that it was in the nature of such things that you couldn't tune in when your mind wasn't clear and that doing tricks for money was impure and would foul up the process.

No real psychic is going to accept this or any other challenge. Why should they? They have no need to prove anything to anyone. And why should they expose themselves to a circus of media and naysayers. Let alone the fact that true psychics like to keep a very low profile.

Originally posted by SprocketUK
I'm about as psychic as a house brick and never had any time for most of these charlatans, but I'd always understood that it was in the nature of such things that you couldn't tune in when your mind wasn't clear and that doing tricks for money was impure and would foul up the process.

Seems like a nice built in excuse, quite convenient actually. I once dated a wicchan, and she told me "it won't work on you if you don't believe", the convenience of these statements make me extremely skeptical of such things.

IF you , they, are sooooo psychic, then why don't they think of powerball numbers and win all the time?

reply to post by OMsk3ptic


I know what you mean, but it strikes me that if there is anything to it then its off on another plane and the more you root yourself in this plane, the less you are able to interact with the other. That's why you don't find a shaman building a sweat lodge in a shopping mall or working for a city bank. Similarly, you don't build a particle accelerator out of wood and old bones.

This is a good show about psychics and the host takes up Randi's challenge.

Psychic fanboys won't like it but people with a sense of humour will...

Weve got a guy over here called Colin Fry and i dont know, hes just not specific enough, i feel cold reading, however, guys what do you think about John Edward, i know theres probably massive amounts of editing going on but ive watched some of his shows and frankly some of them have been weird/spooky, really really crazy specifics about people.Trouble is, unless we work on the show how are we gonna know if its genuine, thoughts?

reply to post by thedoctorswife


The show above I linked to discusses Edwards and how he hot reads along with cold reading...

He can get personal information of people in the audience from when they buy tickets.

One of the dangers I worry about with these psychic tests is that it would be hard to tell whether someone passes the test through actually having psychic abilities, or if they have tricked you in other ways. James Randi is a pretty good magician, and they've had lots of good minds devise tests which would prevent most kinds of tampering. It would probably be incredibly difficult, though not impossible, for someone to pass the psychic test through use of trickery.

I really don't know much about psychics or the like, but I would imagine trying to test a person that claims to be a psychic would be a futile effort.

For one, because the testers are testing what they consider to be psychic ability, not what a person with these abilities would actually be able to do.

For two, if someone is willing to pay out a million for someone to "prove" it to them, it seems they might have some psychological problems they need to address. The people wouldn't allow a "psychic" to "win" as their offering of a prize to "prove" it, is already stating in a round about manner that they won't believe anyway.

Not to mention I bet if someone was able to pass all their test inconclusively the government would come along and usher them away into a prison like life.