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To: kattracks
"Psychic" quacks rely on all sorts of tricks. I see signs of several possibilities in this article:

1. People remember your "hits" and overlook your "misses". Note that the article admits several things this woman "predicted" which simply have not panned out (e.g. "five people" involved).

2. People who "want to believe" will give them the benefit of the doubt on things which fail to match, and/or "stretch to fit" ("aha, there *might* be five people involved, we just didn't catch them all!")

3. With dozens of "psychics" making "predictions" on any big public story, one or two are bound to have a few unusually lucky guesses. We never hear about the "psychics" which predicted yellow cars, red cars, orange cars... But the one that spun a tale about a "blue" car gets to make all the papers, and use it as "proof" that she's the real McCoy...

4. The really slick "psychics" will do a hell of a lot of research, so that their "predictions" will be better than wild guesses. They'll have spent years developing far-flung sources they can turn to for "inside" information. (One famous example hired private detectives to investigate her wealthy clients, so that she could "know" things about them that she "couldn't possibly have known unless she were truly psychic"). In this case, note that the blue car "prediction" was publicly announced TWO DAYS short of the snipers' capture. Rather than being "evidence" of her amazing abilities, it's more likely evidence that she had found an inside source in the investigation and pumped them for information -- the police had known about the involvement of Muhammad's blue Caprice for at least a week before the capture. Then the "psychic" arranges a big radio interview where she can "reveal" her "psychic insight" so that she can reap loads of free publicity when her "prediction" turns out to be "uncannily accurate". One more "miracle" for the ol' resume...

A good "psychic" knows every trick in the book to rope in new suckers.

8 posted on 10/30/2002 3:33:39 AM PST by Dan Day
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To: Dan Day
A good "psychic" knows every trick in the book to rope in new suckers.

Although there ARE a multitude of frauds who claim to have psychic abilities, there ARE some who DO actually have that gift. There is much more to this Universe that we don't fully understand, and to dismiss that which we don't fully understand as impossible is counter productive to discovery.

23 posted on 10/30/2002 5:05:06 AM PST by FormerLurker
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To: Dan Day
"e.g. "five people" involved). "

We know Muhammed had a girl friend; the boy a Mother who has been newsworthy; and there was Malvo. . .and the five could just be; people in and out of 'this scene' without being directly involved in the murders per se.

You can go to great lengths to deny psychic abilities - mental gymnastics such as the 'Amazing Randy' performs; but it does not change the 'fact' that our senses define our reality; and some people have sharper senses than others.

. . .sort of like trying to read a message written in the sand; or even asking someone with glasses to help. . .

. . .and like the message in 'sand writing', the truth of the matter and it's possibilities, are constantly shifting and changing; being altered by winds of time. . .

. . .and some people never walk on the beach; and just won't go there. . .

29 posted on 10/30/2002 5:30:38 AM PST by cricket
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To: Dan Day
have not panned out (e.g. "five people" involved

We don't know that yet.

34 posted on 10/30/2002 6:26:52 AM PST by arthurus
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To: Dan Day
I might agree with you that psychics are fakes, if I had not had a friend years ago who had psychic dreams. She didn't know how to manage this gift/curse. When I knew her, her revelations never involved any big earth shaking events. I was a part of several incidents which she had told me about before they happened, her husband confirmed many more. Every dream was not a precognitive dream & until something happened she didn't know which were & which were not a revelation. I moved away & the friendship ended. To be quite honest, it was difficult being her friend & I was just as happy that it ended. Years later I heard her being interviewed on the radio. I turned it off.
60 posted on 10/30/2002 4:34:18 PM PST by Ditter
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To: Dan Day
Funny, your points 1 through 3 (especially 3) also applies to stock market "gurus." They all make predictions during a rally as to when the market will crash. Naturally, one of them gets lucky. That one then becomes THE guru for the next few years and gets to cash in with pricy newsletters, etc. However, had the famous guru been wrong, another would have been right. The process never changes, just the guru of the moment.
81 posted on 10/30/2002 9:17:27 PM PST by bluefish
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