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Psychic
A psychic is a person who claims to use powers rooted in parapsychology, such as extrasensory perception (ESP), to identify information hidden from the normal senses, particularly involving telepathy or clairvoyance; or who performs acts that are apparently inexplicable by natural laws, such as psychokinesis or teleportation. Although many people believe in psychic abilities, the scientific consensus is that there is no proof of the existence of such powers, and describes the practice as pseudoscience. Psychics encompass people in a variety of roles. Some are theatrical performers, such as stage magicians, who use various techniques, e.g. prestidigitation, cold reading, and hot reading, to produce the appearance of such abilities for entertainment purposes. A large industry and network exist whereby people advertised as psychics provide advice and counsel to clients. Some famous psychics include Edgar Cayce, Ingo Swann, Peter Hurkos, Janet Lee, Miss Cleo, John Edward ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Psychic Detective
A psychic detective is a person who purports to investigate crimes using paranormal psychic abilities. Claimed techniques and abilities have included postcognition (paranormal perception of the past), psychometry (information psychically gained from objects), telepathy, dowsing, clairvoyance, and remote viewing. In murder cases, psychic detectives may purport to be in communication with the spirits of the murder victims. Individuals claiming psychic abilities have stated they have helped police departments to solve crimes, however, there is a lack of police corroboration of their claims. Many police departments around the world have released official statements saying that they do not regard psychics as credible or useful on cases. Prominent cases Many prominent police cases, often involving missing persons, have received the attention of alleged psychics. In November 2004, purported psychic Sylvia Browne told the mother of kidnapping victim Amanda Berry, who had disappear ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Psychic Surgery
An alleged psychic surgeon at work Psychic surgery is a medical fraud in which practitioners create the illusion of performing surgery with their bare hands and use sleight of hand, fake blood, and animal parts to convince the patient that diseased lesions have been removed and that the incision has spontaneously healed. The technique may fool the general public, but it can be observed by experienced stage magicians, who use the same sleight of hand techniques for entertainment. The US Federal Trade Commission described psychic surgery as a "total hoax". It has also been described as fraud, fakery, deceitful,Martin III, Harvey J. 1999. “Unraveling the Enigma of Psychic Surgery.” ''Journal of Religion & Psychical Research'' 22 (3): 168. irrational, charlatanry, and quackery. Even supporters have been forced to admit that sleight-of-hand tricks were "widely used" and that charlatans were common and miracles unlikely. Psychic surgery may cause needless death by keepin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sylvia Browne
Sylvia Celeste Browne (''née'' Shoemaker; October 19, 1936 – November 20, 2013) was an American writer and self-proclaimed medium and psychic. She appeared regularly on television and radio, including on '' The Montel Williams Show'' and ''Larry King Live'', and hosted an hour-long online radio show on Hay House Radio. Browne frequently made pronouncements that were later found to be false, including those related to missing persons. In 1992, she pleaded no contest to securities fraud. Despite the considerable negative publicity, she maintained a large following until her death in 2013. Early life Sylvia Browne grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, the daughter of William Lee and Celeste (née Coil) Shoemaker. Her father held several different jobs, working at times in mail delivery, jewelry sales, and as a vice president of a freight line. Although Browne was raised mostly as a Catholic, she was said to have an Episcopalian mother, a Lutheran maternal grandmother, Je ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Psychic Archaeology
Psychic archaeology is a loose collection of practices involving the application of paranormal phenomena to problems in archaeology. It is not considered part of mainstream archaeology, or taught in academic institutions. It is difficult to test scientifically, since archaeological sites are relatively abundant, and all of its verified predictions could have been made via educated guesses. Practitioners of psychic archaeology utilize a variety of methods of divination ranging from Pseudoscience, pseudoscientific methods such as dowsing and mediumship, channeling. Some psychic archaeologists engage in fieldwork while others, such as Edgar Cayce (who claims to have had access to ancient Akashic records), exclusively engage in remote viewing. Frederick Bligh Bond's research at Glastonbury Abbey is one of the first documented examples of psychic archaeology and remains a principal case in many discussions of psychic archaeology. Description Psychic archaeology is the use of extrasen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cold Reading
Cold reading is a set of techniques used by mentalists, psychics, fortune-tellers, and mediums. Without prior knowledge, a practiced cold-reader can quickly obtain a great deal of information by analyzing the person's body language, age, clothing or fashion, hairstyle, gender, sexual orientation, religion, ethnicity, level of education, manner of speech, place of origin, etc. during a line of questioning. Cold readings commonly employ high-probability guesses, quickly picking up on signals as to whether their guesses are in the right direction or not. The reader then emphasizes and reinforces any accurate connections while quickly moving on from missed guesses. Psychologists believe that this appears to work because of the Barnum effect and due to confirmation biases within people. Basic procedure Before starting the actual reading, the reader will typically try to elicit cooperation from the subject, saying something such as, "I often see images that are a bit uncl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Miss Cleo
Youree Dell Harris (August 12, 1962 – July 26, 2016) was an American television personality and actress best known for portraying Miss Cleo, a spokeswoman for a psychic pay-per-call-minute service called Psychic Readers Network, in a series of television commercials that aired from 1997 to 2003. Harris used various aliases, including Ree Perris, Youree Cleomili, Youree Perris, Rae Dell Harris, Cleomili Perris Youree, and Cleomili Harris. Early life Youree Harris was born on August 12, 1962, at Los Angeles County Hospital to Alisa Teresa Hopis and David Harris. She attended, as a boarder, Ramona Convent Secondary School, a Catholic girls' school in Alhambra, California. The ''Seattle Post-Intelligencer''s Dorothy Parvaz reported that University of Southern California found no records that Harris had enrolled for four classes in 1980, as reported by ''People'' magazine. Career Seattle In 1996, Harris as "Ree Perris", wrote a play entitled ''For Women Only'', playing ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Parapsychology
Parapsychology is the study of alleged psychic phenomena (extrasensory perception, telepathy, teleportation, precognition, clairvoyance, psychokinesis (also called telekinesis), and psychometry (paranormal), psychometry) and other paranormal claims, for example, those related to near-death experiences, synchronicity, apparitional experiences, etc. Criticized as being a pseudoscience, the majority of mainstream scientists reject it. Parapsychology has been criticised for continuing investigation despite being unable to provide reproducible evidence for the existence of any psychic phenomena after more than a century of research. Parapsychology research rarely appears in mainstream scientific journals; a few niche journals publish most papers about parapsychology. Terminology The term ''parapsychology'' was coined in 1889 by philosopher Max Dessoir as the German . It was adopted by Joseph Banks Rhine, J. B. Rhine in the 1930s as a replacement for the term ''psychical research'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Psychokinesis
Telekinesis () (alternatively called psychokinesis) is a purported psychic ability allowing an individual to influence a physical system without physical interaction. Experiments to prove the existence of telekinesis have historically been criticized for lack of proper scientific control, controls and repeatability. There is no reliable evidence that telekinesis is a real phenomenon, and the topic is generally regarded as pseudoscience. Reception Evaluation There is a broad scientific consensus that telekinetic research has not produced a reliable demonstration of the phenomenon. A panel commissioned in 1988 by the United States National Research Council to study paranormal claims concluded that:despite a 130-year record of scientific research on such matters, our committee could find no scientific justification for the existence of phenomena such as extrasensory perception, mental telepathy or "mind over matter" exercises... Evaluation of a large body of the best available ev ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hot Reading
Hot reading is a technique used when giving a psychic reading in stage magic performances, or in other contexts. In hot reading, the reader uses information about the person receiving the reading (for example, from background research or overhearing a conversation) which the receiver is not aware that the reader already knows. Hot reading is commonly used in conjunction with cold reading (where no previously gathered information is used) and can explain how a psychic reader can get a specific claimed "hit" of accurate information. The psychics may have clients schedule their appearance ahead of time, and then collect information using collaborators who pose as religious missionaries, magazine sales people, or similar roles. Such visitors can gain a wide understanding of a person from examining their home, where tickets for the show may have been sent in advance. The "psychic" may then be briefed on the information, and told where the person will sit in the audience. History The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edgar Cayce
Edgar Cayce (; March 18, 1877 – January 3, 1945) was an American clairvoyant who claimed to diagnose diseases and recommend treatments for ailments while asleep. During thousands of transcribed sessions, Cayce would answer questions on a variety of subjects such as healing, reincarnation, dreams, the afterlife, Past life regression, past lives, nutrition, Atlantis, and future events. Cayce described himself as a devout Christians, Christian and denied being a Spiritualist or communicating with spirits. Cayce is regarded as a founder and a principal source of many characteristic beliefs of the New Age movement. As a clairvoyant, Cayce collaborated with a variety of individuals including osteopath Al Layne, homeopath Wesley Ketchum, printer Arthur Lammers, and Wall Street broker Morton Blumenthal. In 1931, Cayce founded a non-profit organization, the Association for Research and Enlightenment. In 1942, a popular and highly-sympathetic biography of Cayce titled ''There ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Edward
John Edward McGee Jr. (born October 19, 1969) is an American television personality, writer and self-proclaimed psychic medium. After writing his first book on the subject in 1998, Edward became a well-known (and controversial) figure in the United States with his shows broadcast on the Sci-Fi Channel premiering in July 2000 along with broadcasting on We TV since May 2006. Biography Edward (born in Glen Cove, New York) is the only son of an Irish-American police officer and an Italian-American working mother. He was raised Roman Catholic and although he later stopped practicing, he stated that he has never stopped feeling connected to God and his Catholic roots. Edward was quoted saying, "This is something that is driven by a belief in God. It's the energy from that force that I think allows us to create ''this'' energy." According to Edward, when he was 15 and "a huge doubter" (in psychic abilities), he was read by a New Jersey woman who convinced him that he could beco ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Hurkos
Pieter van der Hurk (21 May 1911 – 1 June 1988) known as Peter Hurkos, was a Dutchman who claimed he manifested extrasensory perception (ESP) after recovering from a head injury and coma caused by a fall from a ladder when aged 30. He went to the United States in 1956 for psychic experiments, later becoming a professional psychic who sought clues in the Manson Family murders and the Boston Strangler case. With the help of businessman Henry Belk and parapsychologist Andrija Puharich, Hurkos became a popular entertainer known for performing psychic feats before live and television audiences. Testing and analysis Hurkos stated in a 1960 episode of the television series '' One Step Beyond'', after giving a lecture at Massachusetts Institute of Technology to a scientific panel, that he would participate in any scientific experiment under any circumstances. However, author and stage magician James Randi contended that Hurkos refused to allow his skill to be tested by scien ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
