Russian TV show

soikins · 27th August 2007, 02:52 AM

“Battle of clairvoyants (extrasenses)” is a Russian TV show on clairvoyants, which has run two full seasons and seems to be up fort the third. Every episode of the show features some sort of a challenge for several clairvoyants eliminating the weakest one. At the end of the season only one was left - Natalia Vorotnikova (Наталья Воротникова).

Yesterday I saw the last episode of season one (here in Latvia the show runs with a delay

), where I heard an interesting thing – it was announced that the winner of the show would apply for the JREF prize. The organizers promised to cover all the expenses and provide lawyer and translator for communication with JREF. The episode aired in April 2007. I was wondering if someone has heard anything of this? Has Randi written about in SWIFT and I missed it?

A little bit about the show itself:
Unfortunately I watched only the first episode of the show, so I will discuss only that particular episode, but I think you will get the picture. You can watch the show online at www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/ (sorry, can’t paste links, put the necessary dot where needed.) Videos of the first episode are here:
www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/01/

The first episode was a casting of more than a thousand (!) self claimed clairvoyants.
In the first test (www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/01/video02.flv) the participants had to guess what was behind a black wall (it was a ballerina). All the participants where divided in groups, given an envelope with the photo of ballerina and allowed to sit in front of the black wall.
Only six managed to guess that it was a woman. Nothing surprising there, the only interesting thing is that you can see all six of them in one group (see video at 1:56). I guess the shots are not from actual test but who knows, it’s never explained.

The second test (www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/01/video03.flv) was much simpler. The clairvoyants played a little guessing game. First they had to choose one of the three correct shapes, then one of three colors, then one of three numbers. Not a tough one, as you understand at least one of nine participants could be expected to get lucky. It is not clarified how the winners of the first experiment did and only one of participants is shown to guess all the right answers. The she is given an amazing test – a photo of five men and is asked to tell the experimenter which of those men dead now. The photo is approximately 20 years old – it’s black and white and features two men in soviet army uniforms. A couple of men on the photo are in their sixties so it’s not very hard task to accomplish. Surprisingly the experimenter himself is on the photo and what is even more surprising – the clairvoyant doesn’t recognize him and pronounces him dead. But even this idiotic blunder is not considered a mistake. As it turns out, our experimenter has had a clinic death. So voila, the clairvoyant is right – he is actually dead!
It’s never clarified in the show how many clairvoyants participated in this experiment and what was the success rate.

The third experiment (www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/01/video04.flv)was the most interesting – there were 30 cars and a man hidden in one of them. The participants had to find the right car. The experiment was run by three brothers magicians, who claimed to be skeptics themselves. The experiment wasn’t properly blinded, though. Nevertheless only three participants were successful. It’s again not clear how many tried.

In the fourth (www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/01/video05.flv) test the clairvoyants had to give a reading to a celebrity artist. The clairvoyants wore blindfolds and some of them gave very precise reading, while some others gave… well, Sylvia Browne kind of stuff. The experiment can easily be questioned though, because it was shown how one of the participants tried cheating by peaking under the blindfold. So it turns out that it wasn’t such a good blindfold at all…

So you get the picture of the quality of tests put before the self proclaimed clairvoyants. Anyway, one of them turned out to be the best and promised to participate in the JREF Challenge. There is no doubt that Natalia Vorotnikova has the media exposure to qualify, so I wonder why I haven’t heard anything of it.

27th August 2007, 02:52 AM	#1
soikins Scholar Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Riga, Latvia Posts: 90	Russian TV show “Battle of clairvoyants (extrasenses)” is a Russian TV show on clairvoyants, which has run two full seasons and seems to be up fort the third. Every episode of the show features some sort of a challenge for several clairvoyants eliminating the weakest one. At the end of the season only one was left - Natalia Vorotnikova (Наталья Воротникова). Yesterday I saw the last episode of season one (here in Latvia the show runs with a delay ), where I heard an interesting thing – it was announced that the winner of the show would apply for the JREF prize. The organizers promised to cover all the expenses and provide lawyer and translator for communication with JREF. The episode aired in April 2007. I was wondering if someone has heard anything of this? Has Randi written about in SWIFT and I missed it? A little bit about the show itself: Unfortunately I watched only the first episode of the show, so I will discuss only that particular episode, but I think you will get the picture. You can watch the show online at www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/ (sorry, can’t paste links, put the necessary dot where needed.) Videos of the first episode are here: www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/01/ The first episode was a casting of more than a thousand (!) self claimed clairvoyants. In the first test (www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/01/video02.flv) the participants had to guess what was behind a black wall (it was a ballerina). All the participants where divided in groups, given an envelope with the photo of ballerina and allowed to sit in front of the black wall. Only six managed to guess that it was a woman. Nothing surprising there, the only interesting thing is that you can see all six of them in one group (see video at 1:56). I guess the shots are not from actual test but who knows, it’s never explained. The second test (www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/01/video03.flv) was much simpler. The clairvoyants played a little guessing game. First they had to choose one of the three correct shapes, then one of three colors, then one of three numbers. Not a tough one, as you understand at least one of nine participants could be expected to get lucky. It is not clarified how the winners of the first experiment did and only one of participants is shown to guess all the right answers. The she is given an amazing test – a photo of five men and is asked to tell the experimenter which of those men dead now. The photo is approximately 20 years old – it’s black and white and features two men in soviet army uniforms. A couple of men on the photo are in their sixties so it’s not very hard task to accomplish. Surprisingly the experimenter himself is on the photo and what is even more surprising – the clairvoyant doesn’t recognize him and pronounces him dead. But even this idiotic blunder is not considered a mistake. As it turns out, our experimenter has had a clinic death. So voila, the clairvoyant is right – he is actually dead! It’s never clarified in the show how many clairvoyants participated in this experiment and what was the success rate. The third experiment (www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/01/video04.flv)was the most interesting – there were 30 cars and a man hidden in one of them. The participants had to find the right car. The experiment was run by three brothers magicians, who claimed to be skeptics themselves. The experiment wasn’t properly blinded, though. Nevertheless only three participants were successful. It’s again not clear how many tried. In the fourth (www tnt-tv ru/programs/Extrasense/video/01/video05.flv) test the clairvoyants had to give a reading to a celebrity artist. The clairvoyants wore blindfolds and some of them gave very precise reading, while some others gave… well, Sylvia Browne kind of stuff. The experiment can easily be questioned though, because it was shown how one of the participants tried cheating by peaking under the blindfold. So it turns out that it wasn’t such a good blindfold at all… So you get the picture of the quality of tests put before the self proclaimed clairvoyants. Anyway, one of them turned out to be the best and promised to participate in the JREF Challenge. There is no doubt that Natalia Vorotnikova has the media exposure to qualify, so I wonder why I haven’t heard anything of it.