Ok. Could Be Opening Up A Can O Worms. What Are Your Views On Pshycic Mediums.

[bountyboy]

I saw one the other day. The things she was telling me not even my mother knew at the time. Just curious to know what you guys think.

[naomi24]

What did she tell you that was so extraordinary?

[Old_Geezer]

I've had mediums tell me unlikely things that i've denied and which later turned out to be so. Makes one think.

[Kathyan]

I used to go to a medium about once a year. She told me things that no-one else knew. She even told me about my (now) husband two years before we met.

[AB Editor]

Here's the can that was opened previously: http://www.theanswerbank.co.uk/Body-and-Soul/Question1245247.html

[RATTER15]

I think they are cruel charlatans who make money out of praying on the weak and vulnerable!

[Kromovaracun]

I think it's easy for skilled "mediums" to generate the feeling of providing unknown information when they are actually not. It's a staple of technique known as 'cold reading' - you put out very broad suggestions, respond to the hits,and then repeat until you actually get quite specific information.

Derren Brown is merely the most famous magician to replicate this, but I know several magicians personally who can do so just as effectively.

So no, I think psychic mediums are frauds, using methods of deception to make their clients feel as though they are imparting knowledge or wisdom.

[sandyRoe]

I agree. ^ People might visit a medium when they're at a particularly low ebb.

[Booldawg]

I think there are people out there who genuinely have the ability, but anyone who attempts to make money out of it can often be a fraud, using the same old tried and tested tricks.

I'm fairly cynical tbh but my SIL has a friend who has the ability, she's quite bashful about it and doesnt advertise the fact or attempt to earn money for it. She told me a few things about me that were very true and she had no way of knowing.

[RATTER15]

Sorry Ed, that was a bit of a different issue.

[pixie373]

I agree with ratter. You'll remember what "fits" and ignore what doesn't

[Old_Geezer]

Just to say psychics and mediums are different (although I suppose one can claim to be both). Psychics claim to be able to 'pick up' information from non-usual means, and so can have a go at predicting futures and gaining information from objects and all sorts of strange thing. Mediums claim the ability to sense those in the spirit world, mainly those who once lived and have died, and so can pass messages in an effort to prove existence after bodily death.

[islasmum]

I've been interested in this subject for a while, and think that 90% of mediums are not as psychic as they would have you believe, but also have met two mediums separately who told me things that they could not possibly know about, which have proved correct. So I'm happy to keep an open mind on the subject.

[mikey4444]

Charlatans, every one of them. They make money out of stupid, gullible fools, that either don't the education to see that it is all nonsense, or do have the education and still prefer to believe in it.

[AB Editor]

Well, the answers look the same Ratter :)

I find the Psychic Mediums to be much more roomy than the Psychic Smalls.

Really though I'm of the the opinion that it's a very dangerous to invest anything very much in what a medium might tell you.

[jno]

a stranger once told me three things about myself. One was complete nonsense, the other two were stunningly accurate. I'd given him no hints about any of them.

However, he wasn't a psychic (or didn't claim to be one), he was an osteopath taking my pulse. Reading my body rather than my mind.

[Kromovaracun]

This is a good video which deals with how people who feel they have successful readings do often alter their memory of a given reading:

[Brinjal]

I have an open mind about it. I do believe there are a very few certain people than can have an ability to see or feel things. but most are charlatans. Derren Brown makes no claim to be a psychic he defininetly puts out the suggestion which people to react to and he doesn't deny this. My mother used to read tea leaves. She was very accurate in her readings. She didn't always do it but just when the feeling came over her she would pick up her friends tea cup and do a reading. Would give them something to think about. Not so easy now with tea bags.

[jomifl]

Just to add to my offensive postings on the thread mentioned above. Psychics just play tricks with your mind, They just understand intuitively more about how peoples minds work than the people themselves do. I've seen a few operate, the recipient thought it was wonderful, I thought 'you gullible fool'. The psychic is in a win win situation People only remember the bits they guess correctly and the bits the psychic convinces them actually happened (but in reality didn't).

[LazyGun]

Its an illuminating video link, Kromo.

I have heard many people swear that they have received amazingly accurate observations from psychics, or are convinced they have been uniquely aided by a medium putting them in touch with a passed over loved one. On a few occasions, this recollection of the individual has been independently observed,and their power of recall can be gauged. In all cases like this, the individual themself has a false recollection of the events, forgetting or dismissing the many observations or comments made by the pyschic/medium that are just not applicable and seem blatant examples of cold reading.

Selection bias and faulty recall account for a lot of these amazing insights, it seems to me....

[jomifl]

My reading of Maureen Flynn is that she knows that she is lying, the givaway it the way her voice drops on the word 'spirit' in her intro.