Pseudoskeptics and Psychic ability [Archive] - Page 2

Mojo

25th May 2008, 03:11 AM

In your link, the article says:

"Overall, the results were mixed. I found it a bit surprising that about 35 percent of those officers surveyed responded that they would use a psychic in a police investigation. I had expected (and hoped) the percentage to be lower."

"One area I found particularly troubling was the high response (41 percent) of police officers who called in the psychic to assist in the investigation. Prior to this survey, I had felt that the psychics volunteering themselves would be number one, followed by the family calling in the psychic."

The situation doesn't seem to be the same in the UK. A forum member at UK Skeptics wrote to all the police forces in the UK asking if they'd used psychics.

Here are the results (http://www.skeptics.org.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=47).

On the plus side for you, there was one case in which the Metropolitan Poice said that use of psychics "played a major part". On the minus side, we can't get access to all the documentation on this investigation because "some parts of the record are closed as it remains an unsolved case."

a few representative comments: Devon & Cornwall Constabulary do not use the "services" of psychics and any persons offering such services are routinely declined.

...

Durham Police does not use and would not seek the use of a Psychic for
Investigations.

...

In my personal experience as a police officer with 30 years service, in the aftermath of a major crime many people offer information, as witnesses, psychics or experts. All information is evaluated and considered. Personally, I have never found a person claiming to have psychic abilities to have been of benefit to an investigation.

...

To my knowledge, there would be no way of keeping records on matters of this nature as they would be individual policy decisions made by individual Senior Investigating Officers. I have no knowledge of them being formally used in Norfolk, although many psychics often write in with their varying suggestions when a high profile incident takes place. The Psychic Challenge on Channel 5 has provoked a lot of people to call in with suggestions to unsolved cases and these are forwarded to the relevant investigating officers. This evidence has no credibility although it may point to a line of enquiry otherwise not thought of.

...

Whilst it is not the policy of Dumfries & Galloway Constabulary to use 'psychics'in criminal investigations, information from ‘psychics’ could from time to time be volunteered.

I am not aware of any information having been provided by a 'psychic' which has contributed to the evidence chain of a police investigation, however, any information provided is carefully assessed and considered before being pursued.

...

This Constabulary has not used the services of a psychic in relation to crime investigation

...

Merseyside Police has not deployed psychics to assist in solving crimes.

However, psychics have contacted Merseyside Police in relation to two investigations. The unsolicited information they provided was of no evidential value.

Maybe American police are more gullible.

fls

25th May 2008, 06:24 AM

He then says:

"A few problems do exist regarding the accuracy of this survey. In certain areas, such as rank and department size, I felt there were not enough participants to give an accurate conclusion."

Just like Shermer, when things go wrong there has to be something wrong with the survey he put together. There's something wrong because what he already believed wasn't verified.

It is good research practice (and after all, if you don't do it, someone else will ;)) to discuss the relative strengths and weaknesses of your study. Walstad is simply demonstrating good scientific practice. It is telling that you did not recognize this.

Also note that you and others here are treating these results as though they can be extrapolated to police officers/departments in general (i.e. generalized). However, the study design strongly suggests that they cannot. It should be treated as a biased sample (I'm not as sure about that) of a selected population.

Linda

Rodney

25th May 2008, 07:14 AM

Ok. I'll debunk the first two of them. They both do not mention that the psychic used psychic powers to get/give the info.
That's not debunking. According to my Webster's New World Dictionary, "debunk" means "to expose the false or exaggerated claims, pretensions, glamour, etc. of"

Rodney

25th May 2008, 07:31 AM

The same way all such cases are solved, they just kept searching until they found the guy's body. It seems to have been in the last of all the places it might have been. I often have the same problem when searching for my glasses.
And "the last of all the places it might have been" just happened to coincide with where Renier said it was?

A disappointingly large minority, but a minority. And it doesn't necessarily mean that they believe a psychic would actually help; they might just be saying they would use a psychic if, say, the parents of a missing child asked them to.
But 41% of the time it was the police officer who called in the psychic, and only 20% of the time was the psychic called in by the family. This contradicts the conventional wisdom on this forum about predatory psychics continually foisting themselves on bereaved families.

And only 13% said it was useful.
With an additional 36% saying "Maybe."

But not a single one said No. So not a single one credited a psychic with solving a case.
No, the question was: "Would the case have been solved without the assistance of the psychic?" 49% said that they didn't know.

They are disappointing, though not surprising, to me too. I would have hoped that police officers' training would have enabled more of them to see through the simple tricks these people use, but the level of gullibility appears to be not much better than that of the general population. Better training is clearly needed.
Or maybe many have seen the value of psychics.

Lanzy

25th May 2008, 07:34 AM

I am amazed at the number of people that come here to share their "odd" opinions, meet the stone wall of real skeptics and continue to post after being deciseively destroyed. I have yet to see the wall crack and have yet to see misguided individuals back off. Good reading but amazing.

fls

25th May 2008, 09:15 AM

But 41% of the time it was the police officer who called in the psychic, and only 20% of the time was the psychic called in by the family. This contradicts the conventional wisdom on this forum about predatory psychics continually foisting themselves on bereaved families.

Yeah, that's why I'm suspicious that in addition to being a select group of police officers (those who attended one of his lectures), there was a strong sample and/or response bias towards those police officers who were somewhat sympathetic to the idea. The way the data was collected makes it unlikely that the data is representative of police departments. And the results are quite different from what you'd expect based on prior information, which should make one also suspect its generalizability. The UK survey is more likely to be representative, on its face.

Linda

Frankenstyle

25th May 2008, 09:17 AM

No, the question was: "Would the case have been solved without the assistance of the psychic?" 49% said that they didn't know.

How could they know?

It's not like they're psychic.

Bob Klase

25th May 2008, 09:40 AM

How could they know?

It's not like they're psychic.

I would think the 'yes' and 'no's' would be more significant:

Yes-33 (51%)
No-0 (0%)

Pixel42

25th May 2008, 09:56 AM

And "the last of all the places it might have been" just happened to coincide with where Renier said it was?
Well if it was the only likely place left, it's hardly a conincidence for Renier to suggest it. Anyone who looked at a map of the area would have suggested it. Note that Renier's first consultation had suggested the most obvious place, but that nothing was found there. And that Posner could find no record of the second and third consulatations, only of the first - unsuccessful - one.

Moochie

25th May 2008, 10:06 AM

What a joke. Some kid is regularly watching police and psychic shows, and then tries to convince the world that psychics are real cuz he saw it on teh telly.

I wonder if in the credits at the end of these shows there's one for "Writer," or if there's a disclaimer of any sort.

M.

polomontana

25th May 2008, 10:30 AM

Again if it's so easy and police are just gullible idiots when they deal with psychics, the skeptic should be able to do it.

The skeptic can find a police officer with a old case that's closed and they can describe what happened at the crime scene to the police officer that worked the case and they can draw a picture of the criminals involved since it's so easy for the psychic to do.

They could tell the police where the criminals lived and the criminals name without looking at the police file. The only information the skeptic would have is there was a murder commited.

See, it's easy for the skeptic to come in after the case is solved and say everything was obvious and simple to the stupid police officer.

The skeptic will be in the same position as the psychic before they look at a case. They will not have any information about the crime and they will have to give police the information about the case.

If the skeptic is so convinced that police have Forrest Gump memories when they are dealing with psychics, they should be able to tell the police alot of the details about the crime. They should be able to draw pictures of the criminals involved without any knowledge of how they look.

Call up your professional pseudoskeptic Randi and ask him to put together a test where he or some other skeptic can tell the police what happened with crimes that our closed.

Shermer probably will not do it because his recent test blew up in his face.

JoeEllison

25th May 2008, 10:41 AM

polomontana, why are you lying in what appears to be a compulsive manner?

polomontana

25th May 2008, 10:45 AM

Sorry Mojo,

Your UK test makes no sense and heres why (my commentary is in CAPS):

Dear Sir or Madam, for your information, psychics have never been used by
the City of London Police to my knowledge.

Kieron Sharp, Detective Chief Superintendent

OKAY, KIERON SHARP DOESN'T USE PSYCHICS TO HIS KNOWLEDGE.

Thank you for your email - I have passed this to the Freedom of Information Unit but as far as I know we have not and do not use psychics.

EMail Office, New Scotland Yard

AS FAR AS THIS UNKOWN E-MAILER KNOWS THEY DO NOT USE PSYCHICS. NO INFO FROM THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION UNIT. HOW LONG HAS THIS UNKNOWN E-MAILER BEEN WITH SCOTLAND YARD? WHO IS IT WRITING THIS E-MAIL?

In my personal experience as a police officer with 30 years service, in the aftermath of a major crime many people offer information, as witnesses, psychics or experts. All information is evaluated and considered. Personally, I have never found a person claiming to have psychic abilities to have been of benefit to an investigation.

Kevin Turner, Detective Chief Superintendent

OKAY, KEVIN TURNER DOES NOT USE PSYCHICS.

To my knowledge, there would be no way of keeping records on matters of this nature as they would be individual policy decisions made by individual Senior Investigating Officers. I have no knowledge of them being formally used in Norfolk, although many psychics often write in with their varying suggestions when a high profile incident takes place. The Psychic Challenge on Channel 5 has provoked a lot of people to call in with suggestions to unsolved cases and these are forwarded to the relevant investigating officers. This evidence has no credibility although it may point to a line of enquiry otherwise not thought of.

Sgt Ed Brown, Norfolk Police

THIS WAS INTERESTING, HE SAYS THE EVIDENCE FROM THE PSYCHIC HAS NO CREDIBILTY AND THEN IN THE NEXT BREATH IT MAY POINT TO A LINE OF ENQUIRY OTHERWISE NOT THOUGHT OF. IF A PSYCHIC LEADS A DETECTIVE INTO A NEW ENQUIRY NOT THOUGHT OF THEN THIS IS CREDIBLE INFORMATION IF IT PERTAINS TO THE INVESTIGATION.

ALSO, SGT. ED BROWN DOESN'T USE PSYCHICS.

I can go on and on. All this test shows is that there's police officers that don't use psychics. No surprise there.

Senex

25th May 2008, 10:59 AM

Here http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080523/od_nm/foot_odd_dc;_ylt=Ahd3UMdzG4VDhubmy2efQhas0NUE is a case the police clearly need some psychic help with. Call in the woos and let's see what they can do.

JoeEllison

25th May 2008, 11:45 AM

Here http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080523/od_nm/foot_odd_dc;_ylt=Ahd3UMdzG4VDhubmy2efQhas0NUE is a case the police clearly need some psychic help with. Call in the woos and let's see what they can do.Nothing, of course... until after the case is solved. Then they'll retroactively slide themselves into the story. :rolleyes:

thaiboxerken

25th May 2008, 12:05 PM

That's not debunking. According to my Webster's New World Dictionary, "debunk" means "to expose the false or exaggerated claims, pretensions, glamour, etc. of"

I understand what you mean. I psychically made love to your mother during your conception. I'm your psychic father. Until you can debunk my claim, I guess you'll just have to accept this.

JoeEllison

25th May 2008, 12:08 PM

I understand what you mean. I psychically made love to your mother during your conception. I'm your psychic father. Until you can debunk my claim, I guess you'll just have to accept this.

That's just mean.

Frankenstyle

25th May 2008, 01:45 PM

Mojo

25th May 2008, 02:11 PM

Sorry Mojo,

Your UK test makes no sense and heres why (my commentary is in CAPS):

...

All this test shows is that there's police officers that don't use psychics. No surprise there.

Not individual police officers: these officers were responding on behalf of their respective police forces, in an official capacity. What we have is entire police forces that say they don't use psychics. Or do you think that all these police officers are lying or deluded?

TRY USING THE QUOTE FUNCTION.

four elevener

25th May 2008, 02:21 PM

Good move.

Now you'll be stuck paying back psychic child support for the next 18 years.

So in other words, it won't actually be real money.

polomontana

25th May 2008, 02:24 PM

Mojo,

Where does it say in this one example of your test that the e-mail responder is speaking for the entire police headquaters?

Thank you for your email - I have passed this to the Freedom of Information Unit but as far as I know we have not and do not use psychics.

EMail Office, New Scotland Yard

HE SAID "AS FAR AS i KNOW."

I believe him or her because as far as they know this is the truth. This doesn't tell me how long this person has been with Scotland Yard. What if it's only a few years? Then as far as they know only goes back a few years.

Scotland Yard was founded in 1829.

polomontana

25th May 2008, 02:27 PM

The UK test is worse than the first test that was cited. It just tells me that some cops don't use psychics. I already knew that.

Mojo

25th May 2008, 04:23 PM

Where does it say in this one example of your test that the e-mail responder is speaking for the entire police headquaters?

Thank you for your email - I have passed this to the Freedom of Information Unit but as far as I know we have not and do not use psychics.

EMail Office, New Scotland Yard

HE SAID "AS FAR AS i KNOW."

I believe him or her because as far as they know this is the truth. This doesn't tell me how long this person has been with Scotland Yard. What if it's only a few years? Then as far as they know only goes back a few years.

Yes, you're right: the Metropolitan Police, as I mentioned in my earlier post, were the one force who were able to find information about a case in which psychics "played a major part". As might be expected, given the general accuracy of "psychic" information, "it remains an unsolved case".

The letters were sent to the police forces, not individual officers, so whoever replied will have been replying on behalf of the force rather than in a personal capacity.

Rodney

25th May 2008, 06:32 PM

Yeah, that's why I'm suspicious that in addition to being a select group of police officers (those who attended one of his lectures), there was a strong sample and/or response bias towards those police officers who were somewhat sympathetic to the idea. The way the data was collected makes it unlikely that the data is representative of police departments. And the results are quite different from what you'd expect based on prior information, which should make one also suspect its generalizability. The UK survey is more likely to be representative, on its face.

Linda
According to Detective Walstad:

"To further my investigation in this field and to see for myself exactly what police officers, do, think and believe about the police use of psychics, I conducted a survey of police officers throughout 1993. From Jan. 1, 1993, through December 31, 1993, I questioned 270 police officers by means of a written questionnaire. Of the 270 completed questionnaires, 7 were spoiled or incomplete in such a manner that they were unable to be used, thus leaving 263 completed ones.

"The questionnaires were given out at seminars I conducted for law enforcement personnel on fraud. The officers were asked to participate, and to be candid with their responses. Their names or department names were not asked. There were no biased opinions or remarks made before the questionnaire was completed."

blutoski

25th May 2008, 10:15 PM

It's important to step back a bit and identify what question is being asked: are we trying to show

* some police dpts have used psychics (I think it's pretty obvious they have)
* some police dpts use psychics today (probably true)
* many police dpts have used psychics (doubtful)
* many police dpts use psychics today (doubtful)
* psychics have helped solve cases (possibly)
* psychics have helped solve cases via psi (no good evidence for this)

Also worth reading is Denys Parson's Detective Work in Parapsychology and Piet Hein Hoebens and Marcello Truzzi's Reflections on Psychic Sleuths. This last piece is relevant, because Truzzi is both the coiner of the phrase "pseudoskeptic" and in this piece he pretty flatly points out that there is no good evidence at the time of writing that psychics have ever 'solved a crime' or otherwise been instrumental in assisting police.

Of particular importance is the chapter titled "The Value of Police Opinion," where I quote: It is important, however, to note that in assessing the paranormality of a given psychic's feat the average police officef is a layman whose judgement has no more intrinsic value than that of the average citizen. Police officers to not need to be familiar with the numerous techniques of simulating telepathy or with the psychological principles underlying cold reading and other soothsayers' tricks. In fact, police officers may be at a disadvantage, as they are trained to quickly [discover] patterns in apparently chaotic data, whether real or imaginary. They are conditioned to encourage a witness even when it is not justified. They may be ideal victims for the talented psychic who relies on the cooperation of a sitter. This can be a serious problem as soon as a police officer steps outside his or her role as an expert in crime detection, and starts playing amateur parapsychologist.

Hoebens and Truzzi then proceed with a chapter dedictated to Nonpsychic Alternatives to apparent cases of police assistance, and sum up with their personal opinion that psi is real, but that the evidence of psychic sleuths is extremely weak at best.

blutoski

25th May 2008, 10:29 PM

Well they could, but in my mind that's obstruction of justice. Why convolute the search for a criminal by lying about having magic powers, and making wild guesses? Only an immoral scumbag would be so crass.

Ah, you're starting to understand the skeptical concern here.

Now, alternatively, we're also arguing that people can be self deluded. I go on ghost investigations all the time, and some of the practicing intuitives are just plain fantasy-prone. They're getting the homeowners all in a tizzy about some story they pretty much made up, and at some level, I'm sure they do know that it's just make-believe, but at least on the surface, they appear to be sincere about believing it.

However, there is the malevolent element who are intentionally deceptive. Some of these, though, are providing real information, but fabricating the origin to protect others. This actually has a name in the criminology literature: "information laundering." And there is a pedigree of information laundering via psychic or medium going back to the 1830s. The somewhat seedy connections between psychics and organized crime (see: The Psychic Mafia by Keene and Spraggett) has led to quite a few case investigations that revealed that the information was passed through psychics as a way for police to shield informants, or for rival crime gangs to expose information about their competition.

Pixel42

25th May 2008, 11:33 PM

"The questionnaires were given out at seminars I conducted for law enforcement personnel on fraud. The officers were asked to participate, and to be candid with their responses."
Hence Linda's misgivings. Filling in the questionaire was voluntary. Those police officers who give credence to psychics might well be more likely to take the time to fill it in, whilst those who'd concluded it was all nonsense would probably be more inclined to impatiently screw it up and throw it away. I believe opinion pollsters describe those who choose to participate in this sort of voluntary survey as a self-selecting sample, and treat results obtained from them with appropriate caution.

The interesting question to me is why it's so important to people like polomontana that psychics are genuine that they will fail to understand even simple points which cast doubt on that belief. From polomontana's last post it's clear that (s)he still hasn't understood that the argument from authority - a fundamentally flawed argument to begin with - fails completely when it is demonstrated that the majority of the chosen authority group disagree with you. Nor does (s)he yet seemed to have grasped that if someone makes enough guesses a few correct ones are to be expected, especially when the guesses are deliberately chosen to be the ones with the highest probability of being correct, and those looking for anything that matches those guesses have human brains which are hard-wired to pick out whatever they're expecting to see and filter out whatever doesn't.

This is the second time that polomontana has come to this sceptics' forum, started a thread, and put forward exactly the same worthless "evidence" and arguments. Why is (s)he doing this? What on earth does (s)he expect to achieve?

Mojo

26th May 2008, 01:15 AM

"The questionnaires were given out at seminars I conducted for law enforcement personnel on fraud."

Looks like they needed to attend the seminars. Perhaps he could have measured the success of the seminars by asking how many of them would still call in a psychic in future.

slingblade

26th May 2008, 01:33 AM

Good move.

Now you'll be stuck paying back psychic child support for the next 18 years.

Might as well. I've been paying inner child support longer than that.

polomontana

26th May 2008, 05:42 AM

Sorry Mojo,

I can give you three examples from your study that does not add up as evidence that police in the UK do not use psychics.

1. Thank you for your email - I have passed this to the Freedom of Information Unit but as far as I know we have not and do not use psychics.

EMail Office, New Scotland Yard

THIS IS OBVIOUS. UNTIL YOU GET THE INFORMATION BACK FROM THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION UNIT YOU WILL NOT KNOW. THE PERSON THEN QUALIFIES THE STATEMENT WITH THEIR OPINION BY SAYING AS FAR AS I KNOW. YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW WHO THIS IS.

2. I note you seek access to the following information:

Point 1 Where and when psychics have been used by Hampshire Constabulary
Point 2 The cost of psychics to Hampshire Constabulary

Point 1 Your request for information has now been considered and I am not obliged to supply the information you have requested.

Point 2 Hampshire Constabulary has no record of making any payment to psychics.

Rebecca Sheppard, Freedom of Information Officer

AGAIN, OBVIOUS. SHE CAN'T SUPPLY THE TESTER WITH THE INFORMATION AND HER MAIN CONCERN SEEMS TO BE THE PAYMENT OF PSYCHICS. SOME PSYCHICS HELP POLICE FOR FREE OR TAKE A CONSULTANT FEE THAT WOULDN'T SHOW UP AS PAYMENT TO A PSYCHIC.

3. Following your request, searches were conducted at Bedfordshire Police. These searches failed to locate any records relating to your request based on the information you provided. Accordingly I have determined that the information to which you seek access is not held by Bedfordshire Police.

Lisa Oliver, Freedom of Information and Policy Officer

AGAIN, OBVIOUS. SHE TELLS YOU THE INFORMATION YOU SEEK IS NOT THERE.

Using these statements as evidence shows how far some will go to support there pre-existing belief that psychic ability can't or doesn't exist.

To my understanding police in the UK cannot oficially say they have worked with psychics on solved cases because that can be grounds for overturning the case since psychic testimony is not allowed in court.

What the person should have done is went to retired police officers. The UK is different from the police in the United States because a case can't get overturned in the U.S. because of a psychic.

So far, the test proves nothing. Some police officers use psychics and some don't. I already knew that.

Locknar

26th May 2008, 05:59 AM

To my understanding police in the UK cannot oficially say they have worked with psychics on solved cases because that can be grounds for overturning the case since psychic testimony is not allowed in court.

BOLD added by Locknar
What? You mean the courts will not allow baseless, made up evidence?

On the other hand, the item in bold is key - what does it matter who works on solved cases? If that is how "psychics" work then sign me up. When it comes to working on solved cases, I'm never wrong.

polomontana

26th May 2008, 07:00 AM

Wrong Locknar,

It's because the way psychic ability works. A psychic can give the police information like the killers name or show the police where the killer lives. They can also give police more abstract information that leads to the killer.

Here's an example:

A psychic will tell the police they see the letters P & C and they also are seeing their 2 dogs and their fish and these things will lead to the killer.

The police office will go to family and friends and ask them about this information and he gets nothing.

He goes back to the office and looks at the files and see's there two recent receipts that were found in the victims apartment for a Pet Shop.

This catches the police officers eye because of what the psychic told him and he goes to the pet store and asks is there any any employees with the initial P and C. He learns there's a Pete and a Perry but the last names are Davis and Walker. He then finds out Peter Davis middle name is Charles.

He digs a little deeper and finds he liked the victim and he takes his picture back to her apartment building and a neighbor recognizes him.

Under questioning he breaks and confesses to the crime and is convicted.

The police solved the case but the psychic gave him information that helped him. The police might say it was an anonymous tip that led them to Peter Davies in order to make things easier in court.

To the skeptic, they will say the psychic did nothing and they will say anybody can do that. To the police officer the psychic helped him with his case.

The skeptic will say it's easy after the case is solved but they could never duplicate it.

Sometimes the psychic can have a sketch drawn of the criminal before the police have a suspect and sometimes they can give the police important information that they have to piece together like a puzzle.

tumnus

26th May 2008, 07:12 AM

...but, this is just in your fantasy world?

tumnus

26th May 2008, 07:22 AM

or if it isn't, then this is really important, and can really help our beleagured law enforcement agencies. We need to ramp this up, so many crimes can be solved.

However, to do this properly, we would need some way of knowing which are the real psychics, blessed with the gift, and which ones were just benign but self-deluded types who think they have 'the power' tm. Its important, because we need to work with the best for the best results. Theses days there are many cases of people with fraudulent qualifications operating in medicine, engineering etc.

What would you devise for a test, to make sure the police arent wasting their valuable time with some chancer? You'd have to be pretty stringent, there are lives at stake here!

tumnus

26th May 2008, 07:26 AM

I notice you slipped in a sly dig about michael shermer's 'failed' attempt to debunk astrology.

Honestly, a methodical and thorough approach to the subject fails to convince you, yet a half-hour tv show on uk living has you gurgling in your pants. Perhaps you are not actually approaching this as an open mind as you think you are.

Locknar

26th May 2008, 07:36 AM

The police solved the case but the psychic gave him information that helped him. The police might say it was an anonymous tip that led them to Peter Davies in order to make things easier in court.
You previously wrote this:
To my understanding police in the UK cannot oficially say they have worked with psychics on solved cases because that can be grounds for overturning the case since psychic testimony is not allowed in court.

BOLD added by Locknar
So which is it? Either it is not allowed, or the police lie about it (according to you) to "make things easier in court"?

For that matter...why wouldn't "psychic testimony" allowed, if it is as factual an reliable as you (et all) claim?

An odd claim, given all the tall tales you've been posting...wonder why defense attorneys are not eating this stuff up...claiming that the police used means "not allowed in court" and getting case after case overturned.

polomontana

26th May 2008, 07:40 AM

...but, this is just in your fantasy world?

This is just a hypothetical example, real cases are more impressive like this one.

Breach of Rule 4 removed.

JoeEllison

26th May 2008, 07:45 AM

...but, this is just in your fantasy world?

No, because he saw it on TV!!!! It is some producer's fantasy, along with con artists' lies.

JoeEllison

26th May 2008, 07:49 AM

You previously wrote this:

So which is it? Either it is not allowed, or to "make things easier in court"?

For that matter...why isn't "psychic testimony" allowed, if it is as factual an reliable as you (et all) claim? An odd claim, given all the tall tales you've been posting...wonder why defense attorneys are not eating this stuff up...claiming that the police used means "not allowed in court" and getting case after case overturned.Wait, so he's saying that the police LIE UNDER OATH IN COURT!

chillzero

26th May 2008, 07:49 AM

Individual police officers making use of psychics is a completely irrelevant piece of information. It's as irrelevant as how many schoolteachers use them, or plumbers. Police officers in these instances are offering personal opinions on mostly anecdotal evidence from personal experience. They are not the results of scientific rigour.

If psychic abilities worked, the police force as a whole in every country would make use of them. They don't.

chillzero

26th May 2008, 07:52 AM

The breakthrough came after the autopsy report showed that John Reece’s alibi did not cover the actual time of death. After heavy questioning, John Reese confessed, was charged, convicted and is now serving a lifetime in jail.

So the breakthrough came through scientific evidence, and a confession.

Capt. David Heater stated, “My thoughts had always been that a psychic is a very valuable tool (to solve crimes).”

Idiot. I would prefer to see this entire comment in context, however.

Locknar

26th May 2008, 07:57 AM

Wait, so he's saying that the police LIE UNDER OATH IN COURT!That seems to be what polomontana is claiming.

JoeEllison

26th May 2008, 08:00 AM

That seems to be what polomontana is claiming.

But he's also claiming that they would never, ever lie about psychics to a TV producer?

polomontana

26th May 2008, 08:00 AM

No, because he saw it on TV!!!! It is some producer's fantasy, along with con artists' lies.

That means I have to question and doubt Forensic Files, The First 48 Hours and the Investigators because they have a producer?

That makes ZERO sense.

polomontana

26th May 2008, 08:04 AM

So the breakthrough came through scientific evidence, and a confession.

Yes, psychics don't solve cases, they supply the police with information. Without the psychic, they wouldn't even have the suspect because they were concentrating ion the boyfriend.

chillzero

26th May 2008, 08:06 AM

Without the psychic, they wouldn't even have the suspect because they were concentrating ion the boyfriend.

I disagree. Would still like to see the information in context also. Link?

polomontana

26th May 2008, 08:19 AM

Wait, so he's saying that the police LIE UNDER OATH IN COURT!

This is wrong on so many levels.

First, it was in context with my conversation with Mojo about UK police and psychics. There's not a precedent for psychics in the UK as far as I know and it would be easier to say they got the info from a tip or a consultant on the case.

Do police lie under oath? I'm sure some have in the past.

This would mean police officers on shows like Psychic Detectives and Forensic Files are all liars and that's silly.

I'm not blinded by belief to the point where I have to accept absurd notions to placate my pre-existing belief system.

Many pseudoskeptics tend to talk in absolutes.

chillzero

26th May 2008, 08:27 AM

This would mean police officers on shows like Psychic Detectives and Forensic Files are all liars
...or mistaken ... or not very critical in their thinking.... or misrepresented ... or exaggerating to have a story to tell......

You seem to think it's all cut and dry / black and white.

polomontana

26th May 2008, 08:48 AM

...or mistaken ... or not very critical in their thinking.... or misrepresented ... or exaggerating to have a story to tell......

You seem to think it's all cut and dry / black and white.

This makes no sense,

So every cop that disagrees with you is either,

A. Mistaken
B. Not very critical in their thinking (this one really made me laugh)
c. Exaggerating

This is pseudoskepticism at it's worst.

You start with the priori that psychic ability can't or doesn't exist and the skeptic will stretch and bend logic in order to fit their pre-existing belief system.

It's what I call the George Costanza syndrome.

On an episode of Seinfeld he said,"If I don't go to the hospital, then I will never know if I'm sick."

This is the pseudoskeptics philosophy in a nutshell. If they deny logic and even accuse police officers who protect are lives of not being critical thinkers and basically idiots when they disagree with them, then they will go to any length to protect their pre-existing belief system and this is dogmatic skepticism.

JoeEllison

26th May 2008, 08:51 AM

That means I have to question and doubt Forensic Files, The First 48 Hours and the Investigators because they have a producer?

That makes ZERO sense.

No, it makes very good sense. Entertainment shows are not strictly scientific, and rarely even rise to the lower standards of journalism. You SHOULD take television shows with a grain of salt, and more-so when the claims of the TV shows seem less than grounded in reality.

tumnus

26th May 2008, 08:53 AM

This makes no sense,

This is the pseudoskeptics philosophy in a nutshell. If they deny logic and even accuse police officers who protect are lives of not being critical thinkers and basically idiots when they disagree with them, then they will go to any length to protect their pre-existing belief system and this is dogmatic skepticism.

can't you see at all that that is actually what you are doing?

hey, you're not from Stockton-on-tees, are you?

Locknar

26th May 2008, 08:54 AM

This is wrong on so many levels.

First, it was in context with my conversation with Mojo about UK police and psychics. There's not a precedent for psychics in the UK as far as I know and it would be easier to say they got the info from a tip or a consultant on the case.So, in other words, they would lie and claim "anonymous tip" vs admit they got a information from a "psychic" as you claim courts will not allow their testimony.

Then the very same police go on TV shows and blab away about their use of "psychic's"...apparently having no fear or worry that defense attorneys would not jump at this (use of non-allowed information) for new trials.

JoeEllison

26th May 2008, 08:54 AM

This makes no sense.

Most things seem to make little sense to you.

Here's the question you've avoided: what would convince you that the psychics you've seen on TV are frauds? Anything, ever? We've all told you our standard of evidence, what's yours?

JoeEllison

26th May 2008, 08:57 AM

This is wrong on so many levels.

No, it is exactly right, and there's nothing you can do about it. You said that the police lie under oath, but don't lie on TV. YOU are wrong, on so many levels, that when my wife read this thread she didn't know whether to laugh at you or just feel sorry for you.

JoeEllison

26th May 2008, 08:59 AM

So, in other words, they would lie and claim "anonymous tip" vs admit they got a information from a "psychic" as you claim courts will not allow their testimony.

Then the very same police go on TV shows and blab away about their use of "psychic's"...apparently having no fear or worry that defense attorneys would not jump at this (use of non-allowed information) for new trials.

That's what he's saying.

chillzero

26th May 2008, 09:01 AM

This makes no sense,

So every cop that disagrees with you is either,

A. Mistaken
B. Not very critical in their thinking (this one really made me laugh)
c. Exaggerating

I never said anything about agreeing with me or otherwise. That's your strawman.

You are talking about police officers who state that they use psychics. I have already pointed out that their profession is irrelevant in determining the validity or otherwise of psychics. Actually, less than that - you are talking about representations of incidents on shows designed to tout the value of psychics. In these cases, the producers want to make shows, and they need certain things in order to get the show on air. None of these are valid or scientific examinations of the accuracy or otherwise of calimed psychics. They are anecdotal and unscientific. They are evidence of nothing.

This is pseudoskepticism at it's worst.

You can stop flinging about your 'word of the month' until you know and define what it means, and apply it appropriately.

You start with the priori that psychic ability can't or doesn't exist and the skeptic will stretch and bend logic in order to fit their pre-existing belief system.

You don't know me very well, do you? This is completely wrong.
To fill you in a little - I came to this site as a psychic, hoping to make a bid for the Million Dollar Challenge. I absorbed information about how to test it - paid attention to the answers I was given. I learned that it is very unlikely that psychic abilities exist (being a skeptic I am always open to the possibility of being wrong - I was wrong in this before). I am yet to see anything compelling, and when I engage in these discussions it is always diappointing to become a target as a close-minded skeptic, instead of having any of my questions actually addressed. If you were to try answering my questions instead of ignoring them, one of us might learn something.

This is the pseudoskeptics philosophy in a nutshell. If they deny logic and even accuse police officers who protect are lives of not being critical thinkers and basically idiots when they disagree with them, then they will go to any length to protect their pre-existing belief system and this is dogmatic skepticism.

Perhaps you could provide quotes and information in context... give some links etc so we can examine the evidence. We argue on past experience that these things may be the case. What you are missing (or willfully ignoring since I've mentioned it a few times) is that the skeptics are not speaking in absolutes. You are. We are trying to examine multiple possibilities for these incidents, and make an informed choice on the most likely. You on the other hand just claim 'it is so', and expect us to accept it without substantiation.

We aren't trying to protect our skepticism - we are asking you for solid information that may sway us. Got any?

chillzero

26th May 2008, 09:04 AM

So, in other words, they would lie and claim "anonymous tip" vs admit they got a information from a "psychic" as you claim courts will not allow their testimony.

Which is an irrelevant argument now for any believer in psychics, as they are currently touting the UK case when a psychic is 'reported' (not very clearly) to have testified in a court case about information he allegedly received from an abused girl's grandmother.

So - they want to claim a psychic can give evidence... and yet they also claim they can't.

Bob Klase

26th May 2008, 09:31 AM

Do police lie under oath? I'm sure some have in the past.

This would mean police officers on shows like Psychic Detectives and Forensic Files are all liars and that's silly.

How do you make the jump from claiming "some" lie under oath to mean that "all" lie on TV?

Many pseudoskeptics tend to talk in absolutes.

You'd never do that by making an absolute claim like "all lie on TV", would you?

I'm not blinded by belief to the point where I have to accept absurd notions to placate my pre-existing belief system.

Virtually everything you've posted here indicates that you're doing exactly that.

polomontana

26th May 2008, 09:43 AM

I never said anything about agreeing with me or otherwise. That's your strawman.

You are talking about police officers who state that they use psychics. I have already pointed out that their profession is irrelevant in determining the validity or otherwise of psychics. Actually, less than that - you are talking about representations of incidents on shows designed to tout the value of psychics. In these cases, the producers want to make shows, and they need certain things in order to get the show on air. None of these are valid or scientific examinations of the accuracy or otherwise of calimed psychics. They are anecdotal and unscientific. They are evidence of nothing.

You can stop flinging about your 'word of the month' until you know and define what it means, and apply it appropriately.

You don't know me very well, do you? This is completely wrong.
To fill you in a little - I came to this site as a psychic, hoping to make a bid for the Million Dollar Challenge. I absorbed information about how to test it - paid attention to the answers I was given. I learned that it is very unlikely that psychic abilities exist (being a skeptic I am always open to the possibility of being wrong - I was wrong in this before). I am yet to see anything compelling, and when I engage in these discussions it is always diappointing to become a target as a close-minded skeptic, instead of having any of my questions actually addressed. If you were to try answering my questions instead of ignoring them, one of us might learn something.

Perhaps you could provide quotes and information in context... give some links etc so we can examine the evidence. We argue on past experience that these things may be the case. What you are missing (or willfully ignoring since I've mentioned it a few times) is that the skeptics are not speaking in absolutes. You are. We are trying to examine multiple possibilities for these incidents, and make an informed choice on the most likely. You on the other hand just claim 'it is so', and expect us to accept it without substantiation.

We aren't trying to protect our skepticism - we are asking you for solid information that may sway us. Got any?

Your post actually backs my claims.

To say police officers giving you information about their use of psychics is silly just shows your bias.

These police officers can be trusted with peoples lives but they become Forrest Gumps when they work with a psychic.

These police officers don't know the difference between bogus information and real information.

These police officers are just lying or exaggerating on shows like Psychic Detectives but they are truthful on other shows about crime.

Just because you don't fully understand psychic ability doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

People don't fully understand:

Evolution
Origin of Life
Dark Matter
Dark Energy
String Theory
M-Theory
Black Holes
Virtual Particles and more.

Should all of these things be thrown out of the window because there not fully understood?

I have given you case after case and not one has been disputed on this board.

Will the pseudoskeptics please dispute the cases I've presented on this board. The only thing you have done is mallign police officers you don't agree with.

Not one case that I have cited has been debunked by a skeptic.

Chillzero, if your examaning possibilities for these things then go back and read through the thread and give some alternative explanations for the cases I cited.

You are basically talking about things that have been asked and answered.

I will try this one more time.

wahrheit

26th May 2008, 10:36 AM

That means I have to question and doubt Forensic Files, The First 48 Hours and the Investigators because they have a producer?

That makes ZERO sense.

It makes perfect sense. I have been a TV producer and I certainly know quite a few of them. It makes perfect sense to question entertainment programs. Nothing, absolutely nothing needs to be true, accurate, researched or even scientific in any way.

The only thing that counts is drama and the number of viewers, and of course production costs and if the network wants a second season.

TV shows are written by authors and directed by a director. Nobody gives a [ruleX] if truth is served.

Even the show I once worked on, which was completely based on real events that happened to real people, was written by authors. Each and every minute of the program, in fact, every second of it was written by authors.

Reality and facts are very boring for the most part. You need to spice up things heavily and, um, maybe omit this or that fact or else the so-called "true" story would be severely flawed or dead boring. The network would preview the tape and tell you to dump in the trash.

In other words: Me, myself, I do not trust a single second of a program I watch on TV. And that's not only true for entertainment, but also most other formats.

Pixel42

26th May 2008, 11:02 AM

Chillzero, if your examaning possibilities for these things then go back and read through the thread and give some alternative explanations for the cases I cited.
A complete explanation of all the cases you cite has already been given, several times. Here it is again:

1. If you make lots of guesses some are bound to be correct.

2. If you make guesses that are statistically likely, even more will be correct.

3. The human brain is hard-wired to find patterns. It will automatically filter out "noise", i.e. anything which doesn't match the pattern it is expecting to find.

4. Some police officers are not as conversant with statements 1 to 3 as others.

5. TV producers are more interested in ratings than accuracy.

Jimbo07

26th May 2008, 11:22 AM

polomontana,

since you haven't addressed a single one of my posts, I'll try a different tactic...

Even if a single genuine police officer could be found who did attest to a psychic's help, and attested so in good faith...

It would not be evidence of psychic powers! If a criminal attested to selecting a victim by consulting with a psychic, would that make psychic powers valid?!? :eek:

My example may be disturbing, but equally... it's wholly and completely irrelevant!

Stop it. Now. Make not one more post maligning police officers, by suggesting they invoke psychic powers. It's irrelevant, disingenuous and... frankly... stupid. This goes for Rodney, too.

polomontana

26th May 2008, 11:34 AM

Lets take these one by one.

1. If you make lots of guesses some are bound to be correct.

This is incorrect and assumes the police are idiots and they don't know the difference between real and bogus information. A psychic will usually tell the police something about that important to the case and then they will continue to work with them.

2. If you make guesses that are statistically likely, even more will be correct.

Again, when a psychic has a sketch drawn of a criminal this has nothing to do with guessing. You try it.

3. The human brain is hard-wired to find patterns. It will automatically filter out "noise", i.e. anything which doesn't match the pattern it is expecting to find.

See number 1

4. Some police officers are not as conversant with statements 1 to 3 as others.

Again, this is assuming the police are stupid and don't know the difference between real and bogus information.

5. TV producers are more interested in ratings than accuracy.

This means we have to question and investigate shows like Forensic Files and American Justice just because they have a producer.

So each case that I've presented has not been disputed or debunked with alternative explanations.

All I'm getting is the police must have been mistaken, exaggerated or flat out lied. You make these assumptions because you are trying to protect your pre-existing belief system about psychic ability.

Pixel42

26th May 2008, 12:09 PM

Lets take these one by one.
Good grief, you didn't understand a single word I said. I thought you might be beginning to get a clue by this time, but no, not even a suggestion of a clue. Amazing.

chillzero

26th May 2008, 12:10 PM

Your post actually backs my claims.

Then I suspect you either have not read it, or have not actually understood it.

To say police officers giving you information about their use of psychics is silly just shows your bias.

Where did I say that?

These police officers can be trusted with peoples lives but they become Forrest Gumps when they work with a psychic.

Where did I say that?

These police officers don't know the difference between bogus information and real information.

Where did I say that?

These police officers are just lying or exaggerating on shows like Psychic Detectives but they are truthful on other shows about crime.

Where did I say that?

Just because you don't fully understand psychic ability doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

I think I understand it better than you do. As I explained, and you conveniently ignored, I come from a background of psychic practice. I researched it, and learned how it works, and I can examine cases without resorting to absolutes as yu keep doing. You still have not answered any of my questions, choosing instead to attempt to mock me, but you do so very poorly, given that you have comlpetely missed the point of what I have explained to you, and asked you to support.

People don't fully understand:

Evolution
Origin of Life
Dark Matter
Dark Energy
String Theory
M-Theory
Black Holes
Virtual Particles and more.

Should all of these things be thrown out of the window because there not fully understood?

Another strawman.
In any case... your problem here is that you don't understand:

confirmation bias
statistical bias
showmanship
ratings
cold reading and more.

I have given you case after case and not one has been disputed on this board.

I think they have. However, the cases I have tried to discuss with you in this thread are unsupported by any evidence or source material. If you could provide it, I can make a better examination of the evidence. I have asked you several times for the full quote from a police officer - in context - and yet you avoid providing it - why is that?

Will the pseudoskeptics please dispute the cases I've presented on this board.

Who are those?

The only thing you have done is mallign police officers you don't agree with.

You really need to read what is posted more carefully. I have not maligned anyone. I haven't made any judgement call and will nto do so until you can provide better information.
The closest I have come is to add a few possibilities to your insisted conclusion that the psychics are correct. Again - please read this carefully and absorb it - you are the only one speaking in absolutes.

Not one case that I have cited has been debunked by a skeptic.

Chillzero, if your examaning possibilities for these things then go back and read through the thread and give some alternative explanations for the cases I cited.

I have already provided some possibilities, and am waiting for you to actually respond to some questions here, instead of sitting there sniggering to yourself at imagined declarations against law enforcement from what you term (incorrectly) as pseudoskeptics.

You are basically talking about things that have been asked and answered.

I will try this one more time.
I'm waiting.

chillzero

26th May 2008, 12:17 PM

polomontana

26th May 2008, 12:55 PM

polomontana,
The police are people.. just normal people. They don't have any supernatural powers or abilities.

They are just as subject to being fooled, being wrong, or being vain as anybody else. Please stop using their jobs as if it is some magical verification that makes their opinion any more important or valid than anyone else's.

Even if psychic powers are ever found to be real, the fact that some police officers believe in it will not be the determining factor in proving it so.

And my opinion that some officers have definitely been fooled, or mistaken, or wilfully blind to a fraudulent 'psychic' does not mean I have any less respect for the work done by the police force, or for all the other millions of police officers who have not.

I'm glad you started posting because you are showing exactly what I'm talking about.

You say the police have no magic powers.

1st, nobody has ever made that claim.

2nd, It's the skeptic who would have to have special powers in order to divine the conversations between the police and the psychics.

It's something you need Chillzero and it's called evidence. You have to impeach the witness by showing the officers in each of these cases are mistaken, being fooled or exaggerating.

Again, this is pseudoskepticism at it's worst.

The logic is, the cops can be mistaken or fooled so this MUST be the case because I don't believe psychic ability exists.

This is DOGMATIC SKEPTICISM and it starts with the priori that psychic ability can't or doesn't exist.

So because you believe this any officer must be mistaken or fooled ABSENT of any proof.

I have cited case after case and I'm not going to keep reapeting myself. Go back through the thread chillzero and do some reading.

I lay out names and circumstances of the case. Skeptics like Randi, Shermer and Nichols have been over these cases and the ones they think they can debunk they write about. The ones they can't debunk they ignore.

If your so sure that these police are mistaken or being fooled, I give you the names of the police officers involved and what precinct they work for.

If you think it's fake when a psychic leads the police to criminals house before the police have a suspect, prove it.

The skeptic acts like their absent of any burden of proof because they can somehow magically know what happened between psychics and police.

You have to impeach and prove that the police were fooled or mistaken and that the police wouldn't know the difference between real or bogus information.

Here's one more:

"In 1977 a Filipino nurse, Teresita Basa, was brutally murdered in her apartment in Chicago, Illinois. Investigators found no clues and had no leads. Months later an acquaintance of the dead woman, Remy Chua, walked into the police station and told investigators that for several nights she had been possessed by the ghost of Teresita Basa, who told her husband that the murderer was Allen Showery, and his girlfriend still had her jewelry. The police knew Showery had a bad rap sheet, called him in for questioning and showed him Teresita Basa's pearl ring that they'd recovered from his girlfriend. Stunned, Showery broke down and confessed to the murder, but during the trial changed his plea to not guilty on the grounds that the testimony of a ghost was inadmissible evidence. Both the judge and jury disagreed. He was sentenced him to fourteen years in prison. The decision created quite a stir in legal circles because it was the first case on record in which the chief witness for the prosecution was a ghost."

The police officer who investigated the case was named Joseph Stachula. The trial was held in Illinois on Jan. 21, 1979, and the name of the Judge was Frank W. Barbero.

The defense argued, naturally, that a ghost's testimony was inadmissable; nevertheless, the jury could not acquit the defendent, Allen Showery, because the victim's jewelry was found in the defendent's girlfriend's house.

The case ended in a mistrial five days after it began.

On Feb 23, 1979, as the authorities were preparing to retry him, Showery confessed and was given a fourteen year sentence. He could conceivably still be alive, as well as the detective, the judge, jurors and even (as far as I know) Remy Chua, the woman who was reportedly possessed.

The murder took place on Feb 21, 1977 in Chicago.

Do your homework Chillzero, if you think this didn't happen do some research.

Here's the link for this discussion on this forum.

http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=61895

Since you couldn't or wouldn't try to debunk any of the cases I cited, I saw this thread and maybe this is easier for you.

chillzero

26th May 2008, 01:09 PM

I'm sorry, you have ignored and misconstrued so much of what I said that I think trying to discuss this with you is a complete waste of my time.

fls

26th May 2008, 01:24 PM

According to Detective Walstad:

"To further my investigation in this field and to see for myself exactly what police officers, do, think and believe about the police use of psychics, I conducted a survey of police officers throughout 1993. From Jan. 1, 1993, through December 31, 1993, I questioned 270 police officers by means of a written questionnaire. Of the 270 completed questionnaires, 7 were spoiled or incomplete in such a manner that they were unable to be used, thus leaving 263 completed ones.

"The questionnaires were given out at seminars I conducted for law enforcement personnel on fraud. The officers were asked to participate, and to be candid with their responses. Their names or department names were not asked. There were no biased opinions or remarks made before the questionnaire was completed."

Yeah. I couldn't tell from that description who was coming to these seminars and where they were held. Whether the surveys were given to all attendees or just some. And whether all were returned or just some. It makes a big difference, so I just e-mailed Det. Walstan to ask for clarification. I will let you know if he responds and what he says.

Linda

Tricky

26th May 2008, 02:32 PM

There are plenty of unsolved crimes out there. Why don't some of these psychics actually solve some of them for the JREF under controlled conditions and win a million dollars for their favorite cause?

Here is where the excuses will begin. Perhaps it will be "They can't perform on demand", which is ludicrous, since some of them have websites where they advertise how they are often called in. If that's not "performing on demand" I don't know what is.

An ever-popular excuse is "James Randi cheats", or some variation of the above. If they could show that this is true, they could shut him down. One variation of this is "I have nothing to prove to James Randi." This one is laughable. If they had nothing to prove, then they wouldn't be advertising their skills, now would they? Imagine how much business they'd have if they were able to perform under properly controlled conditions rather than on a produced TV show.

Or perhaps the excuse will be that the "negative vibrations" from the skeptics will interfere with their "powers". But then, skeptics are everywhere. If they were capable of foiling psychics with their vibrations, then psychics could never perform.

And of course, there's the old tried and true, "It doesn't work that way." That one has a shred of truth. It doesn't work under controlled conditions. Neither does Uri Gellar's spoon-bending. Neither does Sylvia Browne's conversations with the dead. Neither does dowsing. Neither does remote viewing. None of these things work when you take out the variables.

schlitt

26th May 2008, 02:41 PM

Situations which seem to show psychic ability come down to the convergence of many variables and components. Together these variables can build a faulty conclusion in those not equipped with the knowledge or critical thinking skills necessary to identify each variable and its true role in the formation of the situation.

These are only a few, very apparent components of which there are two many to list:

Educated guessing
There are two main sub sections:

-Consciously contrasted facts leading to a conclusion which has a greater chance of accuracy than guess work alone.

-Subconscious awareness of facts leading to an educated conscious decision. Due to the nature of the facts being out of the conscious awareness of the decision maker, the accuracy of the guess seems mysterious if subsequently confirmed. This is a key component in psychics who are not blatant frauds, and genuinely believe they have powers.
An example of this might be a psychic, who is aware of the police having searched an area in a forest for a lost child. The police officers doing the searching have not had much experience in forests, but coincidentally the psychic grew up in a forest and spent a lot of time as a child in them. This leads the psychic to make a guess as to what might catch a child’s interest more accurately than the police officers and the psychic heads in the correct direction. The connection of subconscious information is never made, and instead the educated guess gets put down to psychic ability.
Or, a simpler example, the psychic is aware of the areas already searched by police to no avail, so guesses somewhere that has not been searched. They think they had a psychic impulse to search there, but it was really the knowledge of the other areas being searched being subconsciously considered, which lead to the impulse to search in the certain area.

Memory fallibility
This is linked closely with other key components, most importantly Desire, followed by linguistic tricks and psychological techniques, each working in conjunction with memory fallibility to result in faulty recollection and conclusion.
This is perhaps the hardest component to fathom, and is perhaps the most powerful ally the fake psychic experience has. Corrupted memory recall cannot be recognized as corrupt by the person recalling, unless it can be contrasted against an objective verification of the recalled situation. Commonly those recalling a situation will colour the events with the bias of what they believe the end result to be. So typically you might hear someone recalling a psychic reading saying “She told me my fathers name was John and he was standing beside me, and he had died of a heart attack!”. Remembering the psychic as saying “Your father John is beside you, he died of a heart attack”. When what actually happened was, the information was provided by the client themselves unwittingly, drawn from the psychic through linguistic tricks, psychological techniques.

Such as;

Psychic – “I see a male figure behind you, and I am getting an M and a J. This is a family relation.”

Client – “Yes! My father is called John!”
(The M will never be mentioned again or remembered, or the fact that it was not identified as the father, just a relative)

Psychic – “His passing was rather sudden and unpleasant”

Client – “Yes! He died of a heart attack!”

From that point onward the recollection, biased from the perspective of the perceived result, will be as outlined above. No recall of the techniques used and the flow of the dialogue, just a corrupted recollection of a psychic telling them knowledge.

This component is also extremely important in retrofitting. A Police officer recalling a psychic’s comments after the facts of the case have been learned, may have a strong desire to try and make what they remember the psychic saying, fit with what happened. With no objective verification, over time the memory gets more corrupted, and more importantly, more entrenched in the believers mind as being accurate. A psychic’s comments like “He may be found near water” becomes “you will find him in Beaver River”. And the other comments that may have been made by the psychic which ended up being wrong or having no relation at all, are completely forgotten.

The fallibility of human memory has been well documented in many studies. Elizabeth Loftus’s working being a great example of this. Anyone who has mastered cold reading is well aware of this also.

Desire, causing bias
This is linked primarily with memory fallibility but also pays a key part and the unwitting divulgence of information, and unwillingness to consider alternate possibilities.

Coincidence
Coincidence can play a key factor in supposed psychic events, which combined with desire, causing bias, and memory fallibility leads a person to recognise what could merely be a coincidence, as a genuine psychic event and ignore the other numerous times the psychic has failed. Someone may consider an account of a police officer who seems to think a psychic helped in the investigation, yet they fail to consider the countless times they have been wrong, and fail to recognise the one time they seemed to be right, could be a coincidence. No believers consider cases like Madeline McCann where numerous psychics have come forth to help, yet not a single one has. Or shows like “Sensing Murder”, which have produced absolutely nothing useful for solving the crimes featured on the show, and has not lead to a single arrest. They focus on the very few cases which could easily have been a lucky guess, but ignore the vast majority of other failures.
As they say, a broken clock is right twice a day.

Linguistic tricks
This relates mainly to one on one psychic readings, and is the main crux of cold reading. This technique combined with the other components makes for extremely convincing readings.
See “The full facts book of cold reading” by Ian Rowland for more information on these tricks.
These tricks are often to precursor to the memory fallibility component.

Psychological techniques
Two sub-categories:

- Psychological quirks – Referring to fallibilities of one’s psyche, which can lead to faulty logic. Every human has the propensity to be duped by their own mind. Confirmation Bias or example, plays a huge part here, and everyone interested in psychics should be well aware of what this is. There are many ways our own thought process can betray us.

- Proactive exploitation using psychological techniques – Those who are aware of how to skew someone’s perception in their favour by using various techniques. These might be in the form of withholding information, using suggestion, creating expectation, exploiting naivety. This encompasses the linguistic tricks to a large extent.

---------------------------------------------------------------

When we consider all of the possible explanations for supposedly psychic events, it becomes clear that we are going to need verifiable, repeatable, testable evidence before we could reasonably accept psychic ability. We are already aware there is no reasonable scientific explanation for how it would work, and indeed the premise contradicts what we know to be true about gaining knowledge, which is that you can only gain external knowledge using your physical senses.

So while we can treat some anecdotal accounts of supposed psychic situations as being interesting, and perhaps warranting more investigation, we cannot reasonably consider them as sufficient evidence, because we just cannot rule out other possibilities (such as the things I outlined above).

It seems curious that if psychic powers existed, the only evidence would be in anecdotal form, which is so open to alternate explanation and error.
Why is there no good scientific evidence for psychic ability?
Perhaps this is because psychic ability does not exist?

If it does exist, it must have a measureable effect, which means we could test for it. Why does it not show up when tested for in situations where the possibility for alternate explanation is eliminated? It would seem that the most reasonable answer for this is “It does not exist, and the times it has appeared to exist in the anecdotal accounts have alternate explanations for what happened, other than psychic ability”.

If psychic ability exists, it will one day be proven with verifiable scientific evidence. Until that day, these anecdotal accounts are nothing more than “interesting”, to be considered with an open mind.

articulett

26th May 2008, 02:50 PM

Natalie Holloway is still missing.

So is Hoffa's body.

So is Madeline McCann.

There's lots of great opportunities for psychics to prove their magical powers.

And tons of money to be made in Vegas.

And then there's the MDC.

So... where are they?

Why didn't anyone give us the specifics on 9-11 so that we might have prevented it? Psychics should be call Psuckicks.

blutoski

26th May 2008, 03:54 PM

One of the akward things about psi is that it is defined by exclusion: it is psi when there is no natural explanation for information transmission or action at a distance.

A hundred years ago, bat navigation was thought to be via psi. Eventually, a very satisfactory natural explanation was found (echolocation), and nobody's arguing the psi angle anymore.

So, this is the reason advocates depend on and seek out debunking discussions.

Psi of the gaps, if you will.

Locknar

26th May 2008, 04:01 PM

I'm sorry, you have ignored and misconstrued so much of what I said that I think trying to discuss this with you is a complete waste of my time.Aye...I tend to agree; polomontana seems to "cherry pick" what s/he pays attention to let alone replies to.

wahrheit

26th May 2008, 04:09 PM

Aye...I tend to agree; polomontana seems to "cherry pick" what s/he pays attention to let alone replies to.

Dang, beat me to it. In this very moment I wanted to quote chillzero's post and say exactly the same.

JoeEllison

26th May 2008, 04:10 PM

Aye...I tend to agree; polomontana seems to "cherry pick" what s/he pays attention to let alone replies to.

Yeah, I think I asked him 3 different times if there was anything that would change his mind.

articulett

26th May 2008, 04:13 PM

What else is a woo to do?

Babbylonian

26th May 2008, 05:10 PM

What else is a woo to do?
Watch some more TV? :D

articulett

26th May 2008, 05:21 PM

go to work...

earn more money...

buy more woo books...

spin the delusion further on a skeptics forum...

so many choices for keeping the fantasy alive, eh?

Ron_Tomkins

26th May 2008, 05:32 PM

I see an infinite amount of mistakes and strawmen and inconsistencies... but I'll just point one particular one for fun:

First:
Again,

The pseudoskeptic subsitutes their opinion for evidence and that's silly.

Then:
Now your asking me to "pretend." In a hypothetical like that, I'm not sure what I would accept until the evidence is in front of me.

I see. So you are indeed a pseudoskeptic after all.:)

articulett

26th May 2008, 05:46 PM

To a woo-- a fact is their opinion heaped with tons of conviction and presented an indisputable claim about reality.

tsig

26th May 2008, 07:09 PM

This is just a hypothetical example, real cases are more impressive like this one.

On the Biography Channel - brilliant gifted psychic, Nancy Weber, proved that the police polygraph testing by police expert J Lewis in a murder case in Belvedire, Warren County, New Jersey was all wrong. Nancy Weber supplied critical information which helped the police solve the crime. The police formally acknowledged that her assistance was critical. Detective Tom Trainor and Captain David Heater state in the program that they could not solve the murder of Elizabeth Cornish, a nurse who was brutally killed with a sharp instrument. The report stated that over a hundred police were involved, but the case went cold. The closest the police came to solving the crime was to suspect the victim’s boyfriend. “WRONG!” said gifted psychic Nancy Weber, “he’s innocent”. The actual suspect, she said, “has reddish brown hair, is 5’10” tall, has a scar in his right side of his face, has a beard, his first name is John and his surname was one syllable starting with “R” (later confirmed to be ‘Reece’), he wore a “W” buckle on his belt and he resided in the flat above the murdered victim.” All these clues subsequently were found to be correct. The police brought him in, to do a polygraph test which was administered by a police expert with 23 years experience. But the polygraph CLEARED the suspect! At this point the police wanted to concentrate on the victim’s boyfriend but the psychic said ‘stay with the tenant.’ The breakthrough came after the autopsy report showed that John Reece’s alibi did not cover the actual time of death. After heavy questioning, John Reese confessed, was charged, convicted and is now serving a lifetime in jail. Capt. David Heater stated, “My thoughts had always been that a psychic is a very valuable tool (to solve crimes).”

Why go thru all the charades? Why not just give the police his name and address?

tsig

26th May 2008, 07:12 PM

This is wrong on so many levels.

First, it was in context with my conversation with Mojo about UK police and psychics. There's not a precedent for psychics in the UK as far as I know and it would be easier to say they got the info from a tip or a consultant on the case.

Do police lie under oath? I'm sure some have in the past.

This would mean police officers on shows like Psychic Detectives and Forensic Files are all liars and that's silly.

I'm not blinded by belief to the point where I have to accept absurd notions to placate my pre-existing belief system.

Many pseudoskeptics tend to talk in absolutes.

I never talk in absolutes unless it's vodka.

Mojo

26th May 2008, 11:39 PM

To my understanding police in the UK cannot oficially say they have worked with psychics on solved cases because that can be grounds for overturning the case since psychic testimony is not allowed in court.

If a conviction had been obtained without the use of "psychic" testimony in court, why would the use of a psychic in the investigation be grounds for overturning the conviction?

Mojo

26th May 2008, 11:40 PM

So far, the test proves nothing. Some police officers use psychics and some don't. I already knew that.

The statements you quoted don't show any police officers using psychics.

Pixel42

26th May 2008, 11:45 PM

polomontana: there is no point in continuing this conversation as long as you ignore half of what is said to you and wilfully misunderstand the other half.

You must first abandon this strange belief you have fixated on that sceptics here are saying that the police are stupid. No-one has said this. The most intelligent person in the world could easily be fooled by a psychic. Many psychics are highly intelligent and have managed to fool themselves for years.

Now take the advice you have given others, and go through this thread again. Read the replies you have been given, and try to understand them. Don't assume you already understand them, because you clearly don't. Remember, if you think a sceptic is saying that policemen are stupid or liars you are wrong. Read the post again until you understand what (s)he is really saying.

I'm retired and it's raining but even I am not prepared to waste my time trying to talk to someone who simply will not listen to what I'm saying. So make an effort to understand, or go away. Either will do.

fagin

27th May 2008, 07:26 AM

Just admit you are all pseudoskeptics - repeat 5 million times, and maybe he/she will be satisfied and go away.

articulett

27th May 2008, 07:56 AM

Seeping your brain in woo... makes you incredible certain of things that aren't true and increasingly unlikely to remedy the brainwashing.

Teach the kids: Faith is not a way to know truths. Education is the process of overcoming ignorance and learning of the many ways humans fool themselves. It also opens your eyes to the many things you don't know that you don't know... and gives you a chance to further knowledge for the rest of humanity.

Woo leads nowhere, but, damn, do the woo feel good for believing in their woo! They feel sure that they've stumbled upon the true woo due to something special about them. It's not really special to believe you are special. Humans can be convinced of this rather easily in fact as any scam artist knows.

fls

27th May 2008, 08:11 AM

Yeah. I couldn't tell from that description who was coming to these seminars and where they were held. Whether the surveys were given to all attendees or just some. And whether all were returned or just some. It makes a big difference, so I just e-mailed Det. Walstan to ask for clarification. I will let you know if he responds and what he says.

Linda

I heard back from Det. Walstan. He says that the surveys were given to all attendees. He doesn't remember how many did not participate, but that it was a very small number.

He thought that overall it was a good cross-section of police officers.

He also worried about the accuracy of the police officers' knowledge.

So my suspicion that there may be a significant response or sample bias was contradicted. There may have been some bias, but if the number of non-responders was very small, I wouldn't think it could make much difference - I would guess that people without any experience with psychics would be more likely to be non-responders.

It may or may not be a representative sample of police officers' impressions, although I think it can be reasonably treated as such. However, we can't tell how accurate the police officers' knowledge was, so we can't tell if this accurately represents the true state of affairs when it comes to police departments use of psychics. I don't think it can be used to impeach contradictory information, for that reason.

Linda

polomontana

27th May 2008, 10:06 AM

I heard back from Det. Walstan. He says that the surveys were given to all attendees. He doesn't remember how many did not participate, but that it was a very small number.

He thought that overall it was a good cross-section of police officers.

He also worried about the accuracy of the police officers' knowledge.

So my suspicion that there may be a significant response or sample bias was contradicted. There may have been some bias, but if the number of non-responders was very small, I wouldn't think it could make much difference - I would guess that people without any experience with psychics would be more likely to be non-responders.

It may or may not be a representative sample of police officers' impressions, although I think it can be reasonably treated as such. However, we can't tell how accurate the police officers' knowledge was, so we can't tell if this accurately represents the true state of affairs when it comes to police departments use of psychics. I don't think it can be used to impeach contradictory information, for that reason.

Linda

Exactly, you can't use the police in the UK to say the police in the US are not using psychics. This test is to ambiguous and I'm surprised that some skeptics will use that as proof against psychic ability when they ask for perfect testing when it comes to psychic ability.

A Gary Schwartz study is tighter than that UK test.

This goes back to the difference between skepticism and pseudoskepticism.

Skepticism is used to get to the truth. Pseudoskepticism is used to obscure the truth to protect what you already believe. That's just another ism and turns skepticism into a religion.

When you use absolutes to justify your belief, your following a belief system.

Here's some examples from post in this thread:

1. The UK police don't use psychics so psychic ability doesn't exist.

2. If one police officer can be fooled or mistaken when working with a psychic, then all police that work with psychics are either fooled or mistaken.

The pseudoskeptic can't see how illogical this sounds.

You see to some, all these police officers have to be fooled or mistaken in order to support what they already believe. This is an absolute and this is turning skepticism on it's head.

You also talk about psychic ability and use terms like magical or supernatural.

This again is a diversion from the truth. I never claimed or said anything about magical powers.

Psychic ability occurs naturally. Psychics say they are connecting to a persons energy, and we know what energy is.

We also know there's energy that can exist beyond our 3-dimensional perception and we are blinded to it because of decoherence.

It's like the story Flatland. A 2 dimensional being will be part of 3 dimensions but they will be blinded to this third dimension because of there 2 dimensional perception.

There will be things this 2 dimensional being can't fully understand because they only get glimpses of the third dimension and they see it in a two dimensional way.

So some 2 dimensional beings will say it's absurd and crazy when other two dimensional beings try to tell them about these things.

This also applies to us. It's because the whole is divided. Religion, spirituality and metaphysics have been saying this for years and now science is saying it through things like non locality and entanglement.

Three dimensional beings are entangled with things outside of their 3 dimensional reality that they can't directly observe but they are still connected to.

So things like the Paranormal are part of the natural order of things they are just outside of our 3 dimensional perception like dark matter and dark energy.

Visible matter makes up 4% of the mass in our universe. Dark matter around 22% and Dark energy around 74%.

So, for anyone to talk in absolutes about our universe based on our 3 dimensional perception goes back to Plato and the Allegory of the Cave. Those in the cave believe the shadows are the total sum of reality.

articulett

27th May 2008, 10:23 AM

But when we find out what we don't know it's never from gurus or woos...
it's from scientists.

You imagine what lies outside the cave and assert that you KNOW what it is. Funny.

chillzero

27th May 2008, 10:44 AM

Here's some examples from post in this thread:

1. The UK police don't use psychics so psychic ability doesn't exist.

2. If one police officer can be fooled or mistaken when working with a psychic, then all police that work with psychics are either fooled or mistaken.

The pseudoskeptic can't see how illogical this sounds.

And yet, you need reminded once more - the only person making these assertions is you.

alfaniner

27th May 2008, 11:11 AM

The pseudoskeptic can't see how illogical this sounds.

I do not think that word means what you think it means.
http://www.freewebs.com/swbroadway/Inigo.jpg

thaiboxerken

27th May 2008, 11:17 AM

I find it rather pathetic that polo calls people "pseudoskeptics" if they demand scientific verification and evidence to support absurd claims.... I guess in polo's world, science is "just a theory" and the anecdotes of people outweigh scientific evidence as long as it supports polo's beliefs.

Senex

27th May 2008, 12:54 PM

polomontana,

This entire thread is pretty silly. If some people possess psychic ability why are they limited to giving initials of people or circling areas on a map or stating the body is near water. Why can they only give clues and not state the who, what, where and why of the crime? They either are psychic or they aren't. Why can they only provide just enough (mis)information to keep believers like yourself in the game.

Why can't they provide indisputable proof of their powers -- even once in anyones lifetime?

articulett

27th May 2008, 01:04 PM

I guess a million dollars isn't enough to entice people to prove their powers.

fls

27th May 2008, 01:12 PM

Exactly, you can't use the police in the UK to say the police in the US are not using psychics. This test is to ambiguous and I'm surprised that some skeptics will use that as proof against psychic ability when they ask for perfect testing when it comes to psychic ability.

I agree. However nobody has said the police in the US are not using psychics, or that psychic ability should lead to perfect results, so it does you no good to raise this point.

A Gary Schwartz study is tighter than that UK test.

The UK test was pretty well done for what it was testing. Gary Schwartz's studies tend not to actually test what they are claiming to test. It's a poor comparison.

This goes back to the difference between skepticism and pseudoskepticism.

Skepticism is used to get to the truth. Pseudoskepticism is used to obscure the truth to protect what you already believe. That's just another ism and turns skepticism into a religion.

When you use absolutes to justify your belief, your following a belief system.

Here's some examples from post in this thread:

1. The UK police don't use psychics so psychic ability doesn't exist.

I haven't seen anyone say that except you. Are you outing yourself?

2. If one police officer can be fooled or mistaken when working with a psychic, then all police that work with psychics are either fooled or mistaken.

Again, I haven't seen anyone say that except you.

We are all fooled and mistaken. I'm willing to consider that someone hasn't been, if they tell me why. That is the fundamental purpose of any research article, after all - an explanation as to why the researchers may not be mistaken.

The pseudoskeptic can't see how illogical this sounds.

True.

You see to some, all these police officers have to be fooled or mistaken in order to support what they already believe. This is an absolute and this is turning skepticism on it's head.

No, merely all people have to be fooled or mistaken. The scientific method allows us to rise above our foibles, though.

You also talk about psychic ability and use terms like magical or supernatural.

This again is a diversion from the truth. I never claimed or said anything about magical powers.

You will notice that we don't refer to vision or hearing as magical powers.

Psychic ability occurs naturally. Psychics say they are connecting to a persons energy, and we know what energy is.

We also know there's energy that can exist beyond our 3-dimensional perception and we are blinded to it because of decoherence.

It's like the story Flatland. A 2 dimensional being will be part of 3 dimensions but they will be blinded to this third dimension because of there 2 dimensional perception.

There will be things this 2 dimensional being can't fully understand because they only get glimpses of the third dimension and they see it in a two dimensional way.

So some 2 dimensional beings will say it's absurd and crazy when other two dimensional beings try to tell them about these things.

This also applies to us. It's because the whole is divided. Religion, spirituality and metaphysics have been saying this for years and now science is saying it through things like non locality and entanglement.

Three dimensional beings are entangled with things outside of their 3 dimensional reality that they can't directly observe but they are still connected to.

So things like the Paranormal are part of the natural order of things they are just outside of our 3 dimensional perception like dark matter and dark energy.

Visible matter makes up 4% of the mass in our universe. Dark matter around 22% and Dark energy around 74%.

So, for anyone to talk in absolutes about our universe based on our 3 dimensional perception goes back to Plato and the Allegory of the Cave. Those in the cave believe the shadows are the total sum of reality.

It's just that we normally propose these things in order to explain observable phenomena in a way that's better (necessary, sufficient, useful) than other explanations.

Linda

fingersmith

27th May 2008, 01:37 PM

wahrheit

27th May 2008, 01:59 PM

I have to applaud the patience of you guys. I read the first couple of pages when this thread started, then just read some of the latter posts now, to find polomantana posting basically the same thing. Clearly (s)he is either not able to understand what you are saying or is willfully misunderstanding. Either way it's probably not worth another 10 pages since there is no conversation happening, and since the same thread was already posted last year (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=87952) by polomontana.

You are right. However, the "problem" is the E in this forum's URL, Educational.

We can't leave threads like this unanswered, even if the same rubbish has been posted numerous times before. To the occasional viewer it would look like silent agreement if we did.

I certainly hope, just like you, that it will not go on for another 10 pages, though.

articulett

27th May 2008, 02:07 PM

the more you immerse yourself in woo, the more clueless you become-- and eventually, it's unfixable-- but man do you feel special and enlightened. The woo may not get a clue... but lots of people read these pages... and some can avoid being made stupid by woo in doing so. Forewarned is for-armed.

Hellbound

27th May 2008, 04:56 PM

Why hasn't any of these psychics identified a criminal or suspect before the crime occurs? That's what I want to know.

Senex

27th May 2008, 05:15 PM

Why hasn't any of these psychics identified a criminal or suspect before the crime occurs? That's what I want to know.

Evidently you missed the Tom Cruise movie, Minority Report. That's a flawed way to run a justice system. Mistakes may be made :rolleyes:

Rodney

27th May 2008, 06:20 PM

Frankenstyle

27th May 2008, 09:06 PM

First, thanks for the effort and congratulations on getting such a prompt response. Second, while I agree that this survey should not be taken as the final word on the subject, it sure beats the unsupported belief about police use of psychics expressed by most members of this forum. Almost every thread that I've read here about psychic detectives argues that predatory psychics are constantly hampering police departments by intruding into police investigations and wasting resources. But the survey shows that police officers are more likely to request a psychic's involvement than the psychic is to become involved with no invitation.

Let's look at this a second. Your belief system is unwavering in the face of a complete absence of substantive evidence, but you feel this "study" gives your position a degree of validity.

First off let's realize that the study was filled out by a total of 263 police officers, out of a national total of 836,787 full time sworn officers. This alone renders it statistically irrelevant.

The questionnaire never asks the obvious question, "Does your office keep records specifically pertaining to the involvement of psychics?", which would be handy to know.

Also, none of the questions included an option to answer with some variation of "I don't know". The handful of "unknown" responses are noted as having been written in by hand.

Even so you draw th conclusion that,

the survey shows that police officers are more likely to request a psychic's involvement than the psychic is to become involved with no invitation.

Based on a flawed questionnaire, which dosen't take into consideration how many psychics become "involved in a case" by lying about their involvement well after the fact.

I'm sure you'll accuse me of being a fearful little man who walks through life with blinders on, afraid to admit that the world view which props up my delicate ego will be shattered by the fantastic truths that are hidden by my self imposed myopia.

But in my own defense I'll say that if the evidence for laws of gravity were as thin as the evidence for psychic crime busters, I'd be spending all my free time flapping my arms, honestly expecting to fly.

articulett

27th May 2008, 09:31 PM

I like your style, Frankenstyle.

Frankenstyle

27th May 2008, 10:24 PM

I like your style, Frankenstyle.

Thanks! I call it "A-hole chic".

Most people drop the "chic", though.

articulett

27th May 2008, 10:34 PM

I think I may be part of the same clique.

fls

28th May 2008, 04:46 AM

First, thanks for the effort and congratulations on getting such a prompt response. Second, while I agree that this survey should not be taken as the final word on the subject, it sure beats the unsupported belief about police use of psychics expressed by most members of this forum. Almost every thread that I've read here about psychic detectives argues that predatory psychics are constantly hampering police departments by intruding into police investigations and wasting resources. But the survey shows that police officers are more likely to request a psychic's involvement than the psychic is to become involved with no invitation.

I think you are talking about two different things - bringing in a psychic to assist on a case and psychic tips that are called in to the police. While the former may waste some time, it is the latter which is the bigger problem, if only because of the number. He gives an example where the officers working on one case had over 200 psychic tips. The survey doesn't ask about the number of psychics that call in with tips (even if this wasn't obvious from reading the questions and responses, you would have to reconcile the responses indicating the low numbers of times a psychic was called in with the reports about the high numbers of tips received).

Of note, Det. Walstad (without any prompting on my part) confirmed that it has been his experience that those police officers that use psychics are ignorant of how techniques such as cold-reading and retro-fitting give the appearance of 'hits', and that when he educates people about these techniques, some of them change their mind. This is consistent with what we have been saying; that police officers do not have some special ability or training that makes them immune from the biases and errors in thinking that plague the rest of us.

Linda

Rodney

28th May 2008, 05:59 AM

Your belief system is unwavering in the face of a complete absence of substantive evidence . . .
Yep, I've got a very strong belief system that other folks here lack. That's why, when the question posed by a skeptical police officer was . . .

"How did the psychic get involved in the case?"

And the responses were . . .

"Called in by officer 31 (41%)
Called in by Family 15 (20%)
Volunteered self 26 (34%)
Unknown 4 (5%)" . . .

the only possible conclusion to be drawn is that psychics are constantly injecting themselves into police investigations. Never mind the survey, who needs that when you've got people here who know all about psychics and how predatory they are?

Rodney

28th May 2008, 06:09 AM

I think you are talking about two different things - bringing in a psychic to assist on a case and psychic tips that are called in to the police. While the former may waste some time, it is the latter which is the bigger problem, if only because of the number. He gives an example where the officers working on one case had over 200 psychic tips. The survey doesn't ask about the number of psychics that call in with tips (even if this wasn't obvious from reading the questions and responses, you would have to reconcile the responses indicating the low numbers of times a psychic was called in with the reports about the high numbers of tips received).
The police are quite capable of evaluating the worthiness of tips from psychics the same way they evaluate the worthiness of tips from non-psychics. Since 9/11, how many worthless tips have been called into police about someone acting "suspiciously"?

Of note, Det. Walstad (without any prompting on my part) confirmed that it has been his experience that those police officers that use psychics are ignorant of how techniques such as cold-reading and retro-fitting give the appearance of 'hits', and that when he educates people about these techniques, some of them change their mind. This is consistent with what we have been saying; that police officers do not have some special ability or training that makes them immune from the biases and errors in thinking that plague the rest of us.

Linda
I don't think Det. Walstad needs any prompting from you, his webpage states: "Det. Bruce Walstad has spent much of his law enforcement career-debunking psychics and protecting unwary victims." So, his opinion is not exactly unbiased. To his credit, however, his survey does appear to have been unbiased.

fls

28th May 2008, 06:29 AM

The police are quite capable of evaluating the worthiness of tips from psychics the same way they evaluate the worthiness of tips from non-psychics. Since 9/11, how many worthless tips have been called into police about someone acting "suspiciously"?

I agree that there is more than one source of worthless tips. I don't think that means it should not be considered a problem, though. And even if a police officer thinks the tip is worthless, if the policy is to follow up all tips (as has been reported to be the case, at least sometimes), it still means wasted hours.

I don't think Det. Walstad needs any prompting from you, his webpage states: "Det. Bruce Walstad has spent much of his law enforcement career-debunking psychics and protecting unwary victims." So, his opinion is not exactly unbiased. To his credit, however, his survey does appear to have been unbiased.

I meant that he continued the conversation with some of his own observations (I didn't ask him about this topic). He is in a much better position than I to discover the state of knowledge and critical thinking among those police officers that believe in psychics.

Linda

Frankenstyle

28th May 2008, 06:40 AM

Yep, I've got a very strong belief system that other folks here lack. That's why, when the question posed by a skeptical police officer was . . .

So you’re not troubled by the fact that the results of the questionnaire don’t address matters of official record, or compare the total number of cases to the number of cases where psychics were involved? Or that the size of the sample group is insignificant? Or that the questions were geared to force a “yes” or “no” response, which encourages the respondents to presume they’re expected to make a “best guess” answer in spite of the potential absence of concrete information?

Personally, I wouldn’t be inclined to employ such shoddy evidence to support an argument, and would simply disregard its conclusions as being too vague to be given any credence.

If fairness though, I have to admit that it is certainly the most compelling evidence in support of “spooky crime fighting at a distance” produced in the last 10 pages. That says a lot.

Pixel42

28th May 2008, 07:04 AM

If fairness though, I have to admit that it is certainly the most compelling evidence in support of “spooky crime fighting at a distance” produced in the last 10 pages. That says a lot.
And it was a sceptic (namely me) who found and posted it. That says even more.

Frankenstyle

28th May 2008, 07:13 AM

And it was a sceptic (namely me) who found and posted it. That says even more.

I thought about mentioning that, but I figured it’d just subject you to accusations of sabotage, or of fiendishly crafting reality to suit your evil designs.

Mwahaha….

fls

28th May 2008, 07:51 AM

So you’re not troubled by the fact that the results of the questionnaire don’t address matters of official record, or compare the total number of cases to the number of cases where psychics were involved? Or that the size of the sample group is insignificant? Or that the questions were geared to force a “yes” or “no” response, which encourages the respondents to presume they’re expected to make a “best guess” answer in spite of the potential absence of concrete information?

Personally, I wouldn’t be inclined to employ such shoddy evidence to support an argument, and would simply disregard its conclusions as being too vague to be given any credence.

If fairness though, I have to admit that it is certainly the most compelling evidence in support of “spooky crime fighting at a distance” produced in the last 10 pages. That says a lot.

I disagree.

The problem is that Rodney is attempting to use the survey to support assertions that the survey does not even address. Just because he is misusing the survey does not mean the survey is shoddy or its conclusions should not be given any credence.

As a measure of opinion it is reasonable. The author specifies several times where the opinions may not accurately represent practice.

What difference would it make to compare it to the total number of cases?

The sample size is adequate within +/- 6%. The main issue is whether it is representative.

It also does not support "spooky crime fighting at a distance". If anything, it provides support against the idea, since even though some police officers were willing to use psychics, none of them knew of a case where the psychic had solved the case.

Linda

Frankenstyle

28th May 2008, 08:52 AM

As a measure of opinion it is reasonable. The author specifies several times where the opinions may not accurately represent practice.

Yes. As a measure of the opinion of those 263 individuals, it’s not unreasonable. I still maintain that not including a “no confidence” option for the questions is more than a little leading, though. I also still say that a survey of .031% of police officers is too narrow a cross section to draw any accurate conclusions regarding police officers outside the study participants.

If anything, it provides support against the idea, since even though some police officers were willing to use psychics, none of them knew of a case where the psychic had solved the case.

I do agree that the study shows that this is exactly the case among the group that took the survey, and that Rodney is misinterpreting the results, but in light of its flaws it doesn’t serve the inverse argument significantly either.

I’m not suggesting that Dr. Walstad is being disingenuous or sloppy with his work. I get the impression it was a small experiment preformed out of his own curiosity, and he made the results public. He certainly doesn’t seem to be suggesting anything else.

fls

28th May 2008, 09:38 AM

Yes. As a measure of the opinion of those 263 individuals, it’s not unreasonable. I still maintain that not including a “no confidence” option for the questions is more than a little leading, though. I also still say that a survey of .031% of police officers is too narrow a cross section to draw any accurate conclusions regarding police officers outside the study participants.

It always surprises people to discover that when it comes to surveying large populations, 0.031% can be more than adequate to draw conclusions about the whole population. The absolute number for the sample size matters far more than the proportion that it represents. For example, a sample of 384 gives you a result that is within +/- 5% with a 95% confidence level regardless of whether your population is 836,787, one million or ten million (a proportion of 0.00384%). Crazy.

Linda

Pixel42

28th May 2008, 09:44 AM

It always surprises people to discover that when it comes to surveying large populations, 0.031% can be more than adequate to draw conclusions about the whole population. The absolute number for the sample size matters far more than the proportion that it represents. For example, a sample of 384 gives you a result that is within +/- 5% with a 95% confidence level regardless of whether your population is 836,787, one million or ten million (a proportion of 0.00384%). Crazy.

Linda
An analogy I've found useful when trying to explain this to people is soup. Provided the soup is well stirred (i.e. the sample is representative) then a spoonful is enough to assess the taste, regardless of whether that spoonful is taken from a small saucepan or a large vat.

fls

28th May 2008, 09:45 AM

Frankenstyle

28th May 2008, 10:13 AM

An analogy I've found useful when trying to explain this to people is soup. Provided the soup is well stirred (i.e. the sample is representative) then a spoonful is enough to assess the taste, regardless of whether that spoonful is taken from a small saucepan or a large vat.

I understand the math. To get results that fall within plus or minus 4% for a population of 836,787, you need a sample size of 600.

…aaaaand I’m stupid for not noticing that fls did the math for +/- 5% up there.

Still, the sample size was only 263, which blows it up to a confidence level between six to seven percent. Which to me is a big spread, but I’m admittedly anal.

Ron_Tomkins

28th May 2008, 10:55 AM

Hmmmm... what about Psychic Police Officers?

Do we got any of those?

What about Pychic Judges???
..Ok, I´ll stop.

articulett

28th May 2008, 11:37 AM

psycho judges?

thaiboxerken

28th May 2008, 11:43 AM

Psychic juries, no need for evidence and due process.

wahrheit

28th May 2008, 11:54 AM

Psychic juries, no need for evidence and due process.

But $750 for twenty minutes, each.

Bob Klase

28th May 2008, 12:06 PM

Psychic juries, no need for evidence and due process.

Psychic jury: "Someone is guilty. They committed a robbery, or a murder, or a crime with an 'r' in it. The defendant is guilty... or his brother is guilty... maybe his father, his wife's father...a 2nd cousin, or someone who lives in the same city. Also, he has problems with his leg, or his lung, or liver, or some other body part that starts with an 'L'."

Ron_Tomkins

28th May 2008, 10:05 PM

psycho judges?

..........

............!!!!!

OMFG What about Psychic Psycho Judges????

Ok ok... seriously now. I´ll stop. For real.

JoeEllison

28th May 2008, 10:09 PM

..........

............!!!!!

OMFG What about Psychic Psycho Judges????

Ok ok... seriously now. I´ll stop. For real.

What about Cycling Psychic Psycho Judges??

Now you have me doing it!

UnrepentantSinner

28th May 2008, 11:59 PM

What happens when the Psychic Psycho Judges cycle in a circle?

JoeEllison

29th May 2008, 12:30 AM

What happens when the Psychic Psycho Judges cycle in a circle?

There's a Cyclone of Cycling Psychic Psycho Judges, of course!

four elevener

29th May 2008, 01:11 AM

But what about the circling cyclone of circumsized cycling psycho psychic circus judges who are in a circle of cymbals and cylinders and they're ssss...ssss...ing somewhere and a one, and a two to the E and I'm drooling fo-shizzle my nizzle and...um...ok I give up.

articulett

29th May 2008, 05:08 AM

psychophant

Jeff Corey

29th May 2008, 05:24 AM

Psychicpath.

EHocking

29th May 2008, 05:29 AM

Maddie = deafening silence from psychics.Shannon Matthews.

Her mother and sister(?) consulted no less than THREE psychics, none of whom could help - even though one of the people involved in the kidnapping was probably sitting right in front of them.

Yes. Her mother is being held on perverting the course of justice as it is believed she knew where the girl was.

Not only did the psychics have no clue where the girl was, they couldn't work out who was involved even though they were probably in the same room as them.

Bob Klase

29th May 2008, 09:43 AM

Shannon Matthews.

Her mother and sister(?) consulted no less than THREE psychics, none of whom could help - even though one of the people involved in the kidnapping was probably sitting right in front of them.

Yes. Her mother is being held on perverting the course of justice as it is believed she knew where the girl was.

Not only did the psychics have no clue where the girl was, they couldn't work out who was involved even though they were probably in the same room as them.

That type of reasoning is very close to the kind of logic believers use.

Since authorities "believe" the mother is involved then she's "probably" involved, therefore the psychics should have known she's involved? If it turns out she's not involved, would that mean the psychics are vindicated because they were in the room with her and didn't pick up any psychic indications of her guilt?

More important, is there any indication that any of the 'psychics' involved have ever claimed that close proximity to the guilty party would increase their chances of knowing?

Ron_Tomkins

29th May 2008, 02:48 PM

I take it the OP has been by now intimidated by the awful truth, the lack of consistency in his arguments and most importantly, the mentioning of several types of Psycho Judges by the members of this forum.

EHocking

30th May 2008, 04:58 AM

That type of reasoning is very close to the kind of logic believers use.

Since authorities "believe" the mother is involved then she's "probably" involved, therefore the psychics should have known she's involved?
If it turns out she's not involved, would that mean the psychics are vindicated because they were in the room with her and didn't pick up any psychic indications of her guilt?

More important, is there any indication that any of the 'psychics' involved have ever claimed that close proximity to the guilty party would increase their chances of knowing?Quite true, I don't have much argument with that dissection of my post/position, since mediums tend to believe they get their messages from the spirit world.

One psychic, though, *did* accompany the mother and others around the Dewsbury area in a bid to pick up a trail, (http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/topstories/2008/03/06/i-know-who-s-got-shannon-89520-20341479/) which certainly implies to me that proximity is essential for at least one type of "psychic".

Another "psychic" boasting of involvement uses (amongst other flim flammery) psychometry, (http://www.joepower.co.uk/about.html#psychometry) which he claims, "[is] a process using a person's personal items such as a ring or other jewellery he/she has worn for a long time."

Again, proximity seems to be implied to be helpful to a "psychic".

Frankenstyle

30th May 2008, 08:24 AM

...stuff...

But both of you are overlooking the state of confusion that would be the result of the “psychic feedback loop” generated by having the object of the search also act as the psychic compass for the search? Has no one learned anything from Polowhatshisname about the art of justifying magical powers at any cost?

It’s not rocket surgery people.

Hellbound

30th May 2008, 10:16 AM

It’s not rocket surgery people.

Yeah, but it is brain science!

;)

pchams

12th June 2008, 08:05 PM

I'm not sure why special credence is being applied to police officers here.
Last time I checked, they were recruited from the general populace, and many times, without post secondary education.

That being said, I have read through this entire thread, and found it interesting.
However, I don't think any evidence, outside of anecdotal evidence, has been presented showing that psychics help police investigations.

Am I now a swede-o skeptic (as my astrologer friend would pronounce it)? ;)

Can we please get a new logical fallacy called "Appeal to television" now?

Senex

19th June 2008, 05:44 AM

Here http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080523/od_nm/foot_odd_dc;_ylt=Ahd3UMdzG4VDhubmy2efQhas0NUE is a case the police clearly need some psychic help with. Call in the woos and let's see what they can do.

This is a good case for a woo to shine. They could hold the appendage and state the vibes that come off it. Speed is needed -- another foot has been found.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/18/world/americas/18briefings-5THFOOTFOUND_BRF.html?ref=world

VulcanWay

20th June 2008, 05:14 AM

Long time reader, first post on the thread... :p

The OP keeps sarcastically referring to how when they get a psychic, police become "Forrest Gump." The thing is, that's just it. The police officer who gets a psychic involved in a case is exactly the OP's definition of pseudoskeptic - he believes psychics are real things by the very act of getting a psychic involved. Especially when lives are on the line police - at least those I know personally - don't screw around. They do what they believe will work. So, assuming that these police are anything like the ones I know that they get a psychic involved means that they believe in them. And, is it safe to assume that they are putting their reputations on the line just by getting one on board?

The pseudoskeptic part comes in with the second part - do you want to be the cop that hired a psychic, using up time and money and man-hours that could have been spent on more tried and true investigation techniques, and have that psychic fail? Heck no. I'll be the first to say that this following observation is not scientifically based but how far would you go to save your job? Seriously - your job, your career, your livelihood. For the average human being is it beyond the bounds of reason that you would you leave a psychic alone in a room of evidence while you "got some coffee" (wink, wink, nudge, nudge). Again, not a scientific observation, but I think it's a good slice of human nature.

As much credence as the OP lends to police (and I have a high respect for them myself) it's rather the circumstances of the psychic involvement that make this completely irrelevant and unscientific. Can we say for sure that the psychic didn't do some hot reading in addition to cold? Can we say for certain that the police are familiar with cold reading enough to not only recognize it but to not feed it? Do we know what evidence or witnesses the psychic had access to prior to their "revelations"? Do we know how many guesses the psychic made before they got a hit? We really don't - it's not a controlled situation and if the police are desperate enough to get a psychic involved they're not interested in a scientific study.

So are the police all stupid and dishonest? I don't think so. I have seen no evidence for actual psychic abilities under honest to goodness controlled circumstances, so Occam's Razor leads me to the conclusion that it's the "psychics" who are the dishonest ones, manipulating people who are desperate to help others and use that mental state to their advantage. Imagine being a police officer searching for a person after turning up no real leads and suddenly a psychic says, "Search...where you haven't searched yet and you will find them" (as happend in one case that Rodney references in another post). At that level of desperation, that level of certainty sounds like a miracle when to those of us not in that situation it's more like, "No...really?"

So anecdotal evidence is really useless - we need the situation to be controlled and monitored and police just aren't up to that task during an investigation. They aren't Forrest Gumps - they're just believers who will make whatever piece the psychic hands them fit into their own puzzle no matter what.

Rodney

20th June 2008, 07:38 AM

The police officer who gets a psychic involved in a case is exactly the OP's definition of pseudoskeptic - he believes psychics are real things by the very act of getting a psychic involved.
Evidence? Psychics are generally called in when standard police procedures aren't working.

wahrheit

20th June 2008, 07:45 AM

Psychics are generally called in when standard police procedures aren't working.

Evidence?

Rodney

20th June 2008, 07:58 AM

Evidence?
For example:

"Police in Nelson, B.C., have found the body of a young woman who disappeared last March, and they credit a local psychic for pointing them in the right direction.

"Kimberley Anne Sarjeant was last seen walking alone in a popular hiking spot near Nelson.

"Police say they used every tool at their disposal to try to find her, including search dogs, helicopters and infrared heat detectors.

"When none of the standard techniques seemed to work, Sgt. Steve Bank called on a local psychic for help.

"Police had already searched along an abandoned railway line where the 23-year-old woman was last seen.

"But local psychic Norm Pratt steered police away from that trail. About a kilometre into nearby woods, police found Sarjeant's clothes. Her remains were discovered in the same area.

"'Without the use of the psychic, I think I'd still be looking for this person,' Bank said Wednesday."

See http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2005/01/27/psychic-body050127.html

wahrheit

20th June 2008, 08:18 AM

And in what way is that evidence for "Psychics are generally called in when standard police procedures aren't working"?

Do you have statistics on this, or nothing but single news reports that give little more than anecdotal quotes?

Something like this would be nice:

- 1000 cases last year
- 300 times the "standard police procedures didn't work"
- called in 300 psychics last year
- they solved 240 of the 300 cases

VulcanWay

20th June 2008, 08:45 AM

Evidence? Psychics are generally called in when standard police procedures aren't working.

When one set of investigative techniques doesn't work, police try another. The use of psychics is in no standard operating procedure manual in any police agency in the US.

It is an understatement to say that you have overstated the use of psychics in police work, Rodney. Of the millions of unsolved crimes in the US alone, Rodney, how many have been documented to have used psychics? And then does that number work out to "generally"? Come on.

JoeEllison

20th June 2008, 08:50 AM

Nice anecdote... no evidence.

Rodney

20th June 2008, 09:13 AM

And in what way is that evidence for "Psychics are generally called in when standard police procedures aren't working"?

Do you have statistics on this, or nothing but single news reports that give little more than anecdotal quotes?
You mean like the overwhelming evidence that VulcanWay supplied to support his position? ;)

Something like this would be nice:

- 1000 cases last year
- 300 times the "standard police procedures didn't work"
- called in 300 psychics last year
- they solved 240 of the 300 cases
That would be nice, but if you think about it, why would the police call in a psychic early in an investigation? It would make them look as if they can't solve a case without a psychic.

Rodney

20th June 2008, 09:19 AM

When one set of investigative techniques doesn't work, police try another. The use of psychics is in no standard operating procedure manual in any police agency in the US.

It is an understatement to say that you have overstated the use of psychics in police work, Rodney. Of the millions of unsolved crimes in the US alone, Rodney, how many have been documented to have used psychics? And then does that number work out to "generally"? Come on.
You misinterpreted what I said. Bear in mind I was responding to your assertion:

"The police officer who gets a psychic involved in a case is exactly the OP's definition of pseudoskeptic - he believes psychics are real things by the very act of getting a psychic involved."

I responded:

"Evidence? Psychics are generally called in when standard police procedures aren't working."

So, what I meant was: "Psychics are generally called in only when standard police procedures aren't working."

Do you have an example of a psychic being called in at the early stage of an investigation?

wahrheit

20th June 2008, 09:27 AM

You mean like the overwhelming evidence that VulcanWay supplied to support his position? ;)
Um, that does not answer my question.

That would be nice, but if you think about it, why would the police call in a psychic early in an investigation? It would make them look as if they can't solve a case without a psychic.

Nice to see that you try to change the sentence. Now it is "call in a psychic early in an investigation".

Anyway, you don't have such evidence, nor any statistics on it.

I wonder why? Maybe perhaps because police doesn't have any such statistics?

Maybe because we mostly hear about those psychic helped find a body fairy tales in questionable news sources or psychic's books and websites, but never in a press conference given by the Secretary of the Interior?

JoeEllison

20th June 2008, 09:31 AM

Maybe because we mostly hear about those psychic helped find a body fairy tales in questionable news sources or psychic's books and websites, but never in a press conference given by the Secretary of the Interior?

Not even in a press conference from the police, or on the front page of a major newspaper. Always some small town paper, always a tiny article buried with the other filler non-news and nonsense.

VulcanWay

20th June 2008, 10:08 AM

You misinterpreted what I said. Bear in mind I was responding to your assertion:

"The police officer who gets a psychic involved in a case is exactly the OP's definition of pseudoskeptic - he believes psychics are real things by the very act of getting a psychic involved."

I responded:

"Evidence? Psychics are generally called in when standard police procedures aren't working."

So, what I meant was: "Psychics are generally called in only when standard police procedures aren't working."

Do you have an example of a psychic being called in at the early stage of an investigation?
Fair enough - I did misinterpret what you meant.

My confusion, then, is how that bears on my statement of the officer in question believing in psychics.

thaiboxerken

20th June 2008, 10:09 AM

You mean like the overwhelming evidence that VulcanWay supplied to support his position?

Doubt requires no evidence.

That would be nice, but if you think about it, why would the police call in a psychic early in an investigation?IF psychic powers actually worked, it would lead to a faster conclusion to the case. Also, if the case is about a serial killer still on the loose, it would save lives.

It would make them look as if they can't solve a case without a psychic.So what? IF psychic powers really worked, they'd have justification to start a psychic police division.

Police don't go out to solve crimes for prestige, psychics do.

Why haven't psychics helped the USA find Bin Laden yet?

Rodney

20th June 2008, 10:22 AM

Fair enough - I did misinterpret what you meant.

My confusion, then, is how that bears on my statement of the officer in question believing in psychics.
Your point, if I understand it correctly, is that a police officer who gets a psychic involved in a case believes in psychics. I'm saying that isn't necessarily so -- generally, the police officer turns to a psychic only when the case is at a dead end. So, while (s)he may be skeptical of psychics, (s)he figures there's nothing to lose by calling in a psychic.

thaiboxerken

20th June 2008, 10:57 AM

If he only calls because he has "nothing to lose" by calling a psychic, but he doesn't believe psychics are real.. why would he not call a sorcerer, a voodoo priest or consult a magic 8-ball as well?

Rodney

20th June 2008, 11:09 AM

If he only calls because he has "nothing to lose" by calling a psychic, but he doesn't believe psychics are real.. why would he not call a sorcerer, a voodoo priest or consult a magic 8-ball as well?
Maybe because he heard about the Norm Pratt case, or perhaps he heard about other cases where psychics allegedly helped, and he is at least not completely close-minded? Now, if you can cite credible cases where sorcerers, voodoo priests, magic 8-balls, or Randi Forum members allegedly helped in police investigations, an open-minded police officer might consider using them as well.

wahrheit

20th June 2008, 11:23 AM

Maybe because he heard about the Norm Pratt case, or perhaps he heard about other cases where psychics allegedly helped, and he is at least not completely close-minded? Now, if you can cite credible cases where sorcerers, voodoo priests, magic 8-balls, or Randi Forum members allegedly helped in police investigations, an open-minded police officer might consider using them as well.

That would be me, for example. I found my stolen camera lens on eBay, reported it to the police, the thief was arrested, I got back my lens, and he served his sentence in prison.

Feel free to ask for the file number and tons of documentation I have. Hint: No psychic ever, ever had a file number and documentation to offer.

Frankly, the thought of psychics helping in the investigation of crimes seems so totally absurd to me, I have no idea, even if I stretch my fantasy to the wildest extent, how anybody could even consider that a "for entertainment only" palm reader could contact the spirits of lala land for information regarding a crime. This is just so absurd. Why can't you guys just read a good fantasy or science fiction book instead of insisting that these fairies exist in the real world. Seriously.

Rodney

20th June 2008, 01:00 PM

That would be me, for example. I found my stolen camera lens on eBay, reported it to the police, the thief was arrested, I got back my lens, and he served his sentence in prison.
Congratulations, although that isn't exactly what I had in mind. I was thinking of a case, such as the Norm Pratt one, where the police reached a dead end and sought assistance.

Feel free to ask for the file number and tons of documentation I have.
Feel free to supply whatever documentation that you want.

Hint: No psychic ever, ever had a file number and documentation to offer.
So you don't think that police Sgt. Bank's statement that "Without the use of the psychic, I think I'd still be looking for this person" counts for anything?

Frankly, the thought of psychics helping in the investigation of crimes seems so totally absurd to me, I have no idea, even if I stretch my fantasy to the wildest extent, how anybody could even consider that a "for entertainment only" palm reader could contact the spirits of lala land for information regarding a crime. This is just so absurd. Why can't you guys just read a good fantasy or science fiction book instead of insisting that these fairies exist in the real world. Seriously.
Because cases like the Pratt one aren't that infrequent. Seriously.

wahrheit

20th June 2008, 01:19 PM

Congratulations, although that isn't exactly what I had in mind. I was thinking of a case, such as the Norm Pratt one, where the police reached a dead end and sought assistance.

They had reached a dead end. If I had not done research myself, nothing would ever have happened. They filed my stolen camera and equipment under "some tourist crap got stolen". I don't blame them, they simply would not realize that the lens alone was worth a couple of thousand dollars.

However, the files that the State Attorney send to me did not contain any information regarding police asking for the help of a psychic.

Feel free to supply whatever documentation that you want.

While the two of us seem to be of a very different opinion regarding the topic of psychics helping the police, I do not think that you seriously question my statement above. Under German law, I can not freely post prosecutor's or police documents, but if you really doubt that what I said above happened, send me a PM and I'll send you the prosecutor's file number and address. The stupid thief sold my photographic equipment under his real name (!) to a camera shop, which in turn sold everything to a bigger camera shop, which finally put everything on eBay. The picture on eBay of the lens clearly showed the serial number of the lens. These lenses are very rare and quite expensive, so there was no doubt it was mine. That's how they got nailed.

So you don't think that police Sgt. Bank's statement that "Without the use of the psychic, I think I'd still be looking for this person" counts for anything?

Frankly, no. No, I do not think that it counts for anything. It's nothing but a quote from a news stub written by some intern to fill space where advertisement is sold.

Because cases like the Pratt one aren't that infrequent. Seriously.

If they are not infrequent, I wonder why we do not hear about them more frequently. Especially in other countries. For example, I never heard of that psychic stuff in my home country, Germany. Does that mean that German police solve every crime, and thus wouldn't need to ask for help from a psychic when they reach a dead end? I don't think so....

Rodney

20th June 2008, 04:16 PM

They had reached a dead end. If I had not done research myself, nothing would ever have happened. They filed my stolen camera and equipment under "some tourist crap got stolen". I don't blame them, they simply would not realize that the lens alone was worth a couple of thousand dollars.

However, the files that the State Attorney send to me did not contain any information regarding police asking for the help of a psychic.

While the two of us seem to be of a very different opinion regarding the topic of psychics helping the police, I do not think that you seriously question my statement above. Under German law, I can not freely post prosecutor's or police documents, but if you really doubt that what I said above happened, send me a PM and I'll send you the prosecutor's file number and address. The stupid thief sold my photographic equipment under his real name (!) to a camera shop, which in turn sold everything to a bigger camera shop, which finally put everything on eBay. The picture on eBay of the lens clearly showed the serial number of the lens. These lenses are very rare and quite expensive, so there was no doubt it was mine. That's how they got nailed.
I don't doubt your story, and I'm glad justice prevailed.

Frankly, no. No, I do not think that it counts for anything. It's nothing but a quote from a news stub written by some intern to fill space where advertisement is sold.
Are you doubting whether Sgt. Bank thought Norm Pratt was responsible for leading police to the missing woman's body?

If they are not infrequent, I wonder why we do not hear about them more frequently.
I've cited several cases; for example, see http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php?p=2295976&postcount=17

Especially in other countries. For example, I never heard of that psychic stuff in my home country, Germany. Does that mean that German police solve every crime, and thus wouldn't need to ask for help from a psychic when they reach a dead end? I don't think so....
If the German police admitted using a psychic, would that get them into legal trouble?

thaiboxerken

20th June 2008, 05:33 PM

Maybe because he heard about the Norm Pratt case, or perhaps he heard about other cases where psychics allegedly helped, and he is at least not completely close-minded?

It takes more than an "open mind" to consult a psychic, it takes gullibility.

Now, if you can cite credible cases where sorcerers, voodoo priests, magic 8-balls, or Randi Forum members allegedly helped in police investigations, an open-minded police officer might consider using them as well.

Only if you can cite one credible case where a psychic actually helped to solve a case using psychic powers.

wahrheit

20th June 2008, 05:36 PM

I don't doubt your story, and I'm glad justice prevailed.
Well, justice prevailed. That poor drug addict who stole my stuff was arrested and got jail time. I'd rather have the camera shop owners behind bars, because they knew perfectly well that the bag full of brand new equipment was worth thousands and not the mere $300 they paid the drug addict.

Are you doubting whether Sgt. Bank thought Norm Pratt was responsible for leading police to the missing woman's body?

It doesn't matter whether I doubt Sgt. Bank's account or not. It is nothing but an anecdotal account in a news stub from the website of a TV station. Even if he is really convinced that Norm Pratt lead police to the body it doesn't matter. Real evidence is more than that. And his title being Sgt. does not make him impeccable. Appeal to authority is not a valid argument.

I've cited several cases; for example, see http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php?p=2295976&postcount=17

I'm sorry, but the only thing I can see at that link is a link to the web page of an alleged "psychic". Under no circumstances can this be accepted as evidence of anything.

If the German police admitted using a psychic, would that get them into legal trouble?

I certainly hope so, but I am not a lawyer.

While Germany is full of woo just as any other country in the world, this psychic helps police stuff seems not very popular there. There's not even a fully satisfactory translation for "psychic" in the German language that I am aware of.

Jeff Corey

20th June 2008, 05:54 PM

....

While Germany is full of woo just as any other country in the world, this psychic helps police stuff seems not very popular there. There's not even a fully satisfactory translation for "psychic" in the German language that I am aware of.

Psychisch, seelisch, spirititisch, uberesinnnlich?

blauregen

20th June 2008, 07:06 PM

Psychisch, seelisch, spirititisch, uberesinnnlich?

'spiritistisch' is rarely used anymore, 'seelisch' and 'psychisch' aren't generally used for alleged psychic abilities. Commonly used terms for this would be 'übersinnlich' ( extra sensory ) or paranormal.

Ron_Tomkins

20th June 2008, 08:25 PM

It takes more than an "open mind" to consult a psychic, it takes gullibility.

Indeed. Especially if we consider that having an "open mind" means that you are not biased towards a specific conclusion, but rather you're willing to accept whatever is supported by evidence, whether that pleases your expectations or not.

But in woo language, "having an open mind" means "Believe whatever's convenient for you to believe".

"... and it shall be automatically true":)

Sherlock

21st June 2008, 11:18 PM

Polomontana would be advised to do far better research than attempting to build his case using Noreen Renier.

Perhaps that might begin by reading www.amindformurder.com (http://www.amindformurder.com/) completely --- all four hours worth --- and examining the public transcripts. Among things he would find in the transcripts would be a court cross examination of Noreen Renier where she testified that she was paid by directly by a law enforcement officer named "Joe" for work on a criminal case. Now the first question might be why a law enforcement officer would pay cash to Noreen Renier and not apparently provide any record of doing so to his department, or be involved in providing funds that Renier claims came directly from his department. I understand the rules of the department would hamper payments being provided to a psychic without proper authorization and recording. Apparently according to the testimony “the IRS wouldn’t like” the way Renier was paid without receipt, and without recording.

The second question would be whether this “Joe” is Joe Uribe. Perhaps Joe Uribe can set the record straight himself on that.

However, I believe a good researcher can come to recognize that multiple law enforcement officers can be hoodwinked from among the many citizens they meet who claim psychic abilities. Or hoodwinked by another law enforcement officer who passes on a psychic as “highly recommended.”

Some officers are so taken in that they actually transfer public funds into the hands of one or more psychics they meet over the course of their careers. There is certainly some sense that with some female psychics who operated in the ‘70’s and early ‘80’s throughout the United States and received attention and/or payments from law enforcement officers often provided special personal attention back to the officers they engaged. Imagine that. One officer whom I contacted admitted that some psychics got quite a “head start” in their careers with this interaction. There is no mention here of anyone specific as dozens of female psychics operated across the United States during those years and some may have been operated professionally and with high moral intent. Certainly if a psychic had real psychic abilities there would have been no need to “get sauced” during police interviews and be taken home by a local officer after providing information. Unless it takes getting sauced for a psychic to improve their credibility and recall.

But I am off the track. Back to a specific case and Noreen Renier.

In the case of Noreen Renier specifically, the web site I mention showcases so many exaggerations generated from the mouth of Noreen Renier --- not to mention what several eye-witnesses have deemed deception and lies --- that only those who have not taken the time to examine facts would conclude anything but bubble gum and charades are in play. Why is it that Renier provides little but a few brief quotations and dozens of media fluff stories but little direct factual and specific evidence about her claims? Perhaps this comes from a misty mind caused by her entities communicating with the dead or perhaps a fear of getting caught in yet another exaggeration or a flip flop of a prior claim? Those who like certain of her claims should also be fully ready to support her God-like claims of communicating with the dead and charging clients to communicate with the dead, and being a host for her multiple entities named Sing and Robert. Or do supporters get to select one of her claims and ignore others? I don't think so. And frankly she has a several dozen whoppers that place her credibility on an open slab for all to compare. At least those who would do their homework first.

Now be a good boy and do your homework first before immediately replying.