How would you go about testing?

[HeyJupiter]

This is just a bit of curiosity and may be a bit rambling, so I apologise in advance.

I'm fascinated by the idea of testing Psychic abilities and things such as Crystals and Reiki Therapy... But I'm curious as to how you would go about doing such a thing - I know the JREF have set up several tests for various people and I've heard quite a few people say that they need to "double-blind" experiments.

I can see how you could test someone claiming to be a Medium, for instance, as they should be able to give you very specific information about the dead person that they are conversing with (i.e. something that only that person would know) and a Dowser would have very definite Yes or No answers... But how would you test, say, a Tarot Reader or a Psychic? Is it possible?

[Mojo]

But how would you test, say, a Tarot Reader or a Psychic? Is it possible?

How you would test them would depend on exactly what they claimed to be able to do, and any teat would have to be designed around their particular claim. But as long as they claim to do something, it should be possible to design a test for it.

For example, recent preliminary tests for the JREF challenge have involved people who claimed that they could tell the sex of someone from their diary (without actually opening the diary and reading the contents), and someone who claimed that they could identify someone's location on an A-Z streetmap.

[Admin]

Yes, it really comes down to what it is such people actually claim and then a test is designed to to see if they can do it under controlled conditions.

To design a test we'd normally need something like:

• What it is they claim to be able to do;
• Under which conditions they claim they can do it;
• What accuracy do they claim to achieve.

Testing things like astrology can be difficult as individual readings don't lend themselves to statistical scoring as they tend to be interpreted.

The way to do it is to get, say, a dozen people's birthdays and other information required by the astrologer, get the astrologer to create a chart for each individual, and then get the individuals to choose the chart which they think most closely matches themselves.

Of course the astrologers would be blind as to who the individuals are and the individuals will be choosing their chart from the entire batch.

If astrology works then people should be picking out their own charts.

That's one way to turn these interpretive tests into statistically measurable ones.

It depends what they're claiming but there's usually a way to create a test.

[HeyJupiter]

If astrology works then people should be picking out their own charts.

Thanks for that, Mojo & John... I saw an episode of Jane Goldman Investigates (not the most scientific of programmes, I'll grant you!) where they did a similar test to the one John describes for Astrology.

They did a series of Rune readings for a group of 15 people, based on their own personal questions and then just put the answers on pieces of paper and asked them to choose the one they thought was theirs... I can't remember the exact figure but it equated to the same that chance would produce! Very few of them chose the right one for their reading.

I would really like to have a go at testing a friend of mine, if she is willing, but I was curious as to how I would go about it. The explanations from both of you were very helpful - thanks!

[Zaira]

John,

First let me assure you that this is not a wind-up.

I was just trying to imagine how you could test what happens to me and this is what I came up with.

You would have to drive into a car park with me a few hundred time to see how many time I find a parking space while other drivers appear to be going around in circles looking for one.

I'm not sure how you would smell what I smell. For example, I smell roses when there are no roses around just before I come up with the answer to a problem as if 'someone' helped me out, the smell of nappies just before someone arrives with the news that they are pregnant etc.

I don't know how you would test how other people's conversations help me out. For example, I was waiting for a friend to join me for dinner and he was late, I was sitting in the restaurant bar on my own, feeling conspicuous and becoming quite agitated when I heard someone at the bar next to me say, "He'll be here. He just got caught up with some Christmas shopping." It wasn't the first time it had happened, and it helped me to relax because I knew he was coming, I wasn't getting stood up. Sure enough he turned up and that was the reason he gave me. Not sure how we could test that one either.

Going to take a short cut and post some stories I have already posted on the psychic site -

When we ‘ask’ for something, I've experienced and felt that it doesn't matter where it comes from, sometimes we just get it!

It, whatever 'It' is, also enjoys a joke.

Short stories -

1) The very short version. Hubby in army, boys in boarding school, army pays half the school fees, money goes from paymaster to school direct, had a short cash month and 'asked' for some money, just happened to check the bank and got the surprise of my life, loads of money, went to check it out and discovered that the school fees had been sent to the bank instead of straight to the school! Had to be redirected of course, so I was still skint.

2) The very short version. Sitting in the garden with the kids on lovely sunny day, chatting about where we wanted to go on holiday, one of them comes up with some exotic place and I said we would need to win the pools (the football pools) to afford that one, then the door went and while the kids argued about who should get it, as usual I went and answered the door, a delivery guy held out a box and asked me to take it in for my neighbour, I took it and closed the door, there was a picture on the box, it was the picture of a large paddling pool! I thought, "s**t! Need to be more precise next time!"

3) The very short version. Kids were on summer holidays from school, I fixed Sunday lunch but had forgotten to get gravy granules, one son kept on about not having any gravy, I got annoyed and told him if I could get him some gravy I would but I couldn't so shut up and eat your lunch, next day while I was clearing up, the letter box went, I went to check for mail, what came through the letter box was a free sample of gravy granules! I walked up to my son and held it out to him and said, "There's your gravy." The kids began to whistle the Twilight Zone tune.

4) The very short version. Grandkids visiting with playstations, I had two TVs, one in sitting room and one in the bedroom, I was watching a movie, kids were arguing about whose playstation should be plugged into the other TV, Trying to distract then I said, "What we need is another TV." Then the door went, My neighbour asked if I could use a spare TV, said he was just going to dump it.

I don't know what this is. Some would say it is coincidence but after so many years coincidence just doesn't cut it anymore.

[Melanie]

Some lovely stories there - looks like the Cosmic Joker really is your friend!

[Zaira]

Melanie,

I did the Visualisation thing some time ago. But going with the way things turned out in my 'short story' post above, I'm not very good at it. Have to keep reminding myself to -

Be More Precise! Be More Precise!

Anyway, the kids used to get a good laugh out of it.

Not sure what the connection is though with the other stuff that happens.

And I'm rather a serious person so wonder too where the humour comes from.

Actually with all this going on from time to time, I hope the ‘Cosmic Joker’ stays my friend. I would truly freak out otherwise.

[Araneus]

I was just trying to imagine how you could test what happens to me and this is what I came up with.

Obviously anecdotes from the past cannot be tested. What probably could be tested is the statistical frequency with which you experience these events, compared to the general population. Since nothing in your list appears to me to be particularly unusual or out-of-the-ordinary, you might be surprised to find that a large number of people report very similar "amazing coincidences" thoughout their lives.

[Zaira]

Araneus,

Thanks for that. I don't seriously expect to be tested. I was just making light. I'm sure you’re right about coincidence but there's no getting away from the fact that it feels like something else..... A combination of positive thinking and visualisation, perhaps. I've work with both in order to over come abusive childhood fallout. I don't think that's the whole answer but never mind. I'm older and wiser and getting along just fine these days.

[Araneus]

I'm sure you’re right about coincidence but there's no getting away from the fact that it feels like something else..... A combination of positive thinking and visualisation, perhaps.

Yes, such things can certainly feel very odd at the time. I remember at college when I used to play the chapel organ for a while, I once had a dream that all of the stops (the knobs you pull out to make different sets of pipes play) had been cut off. The next day when I went to practice, I found a note listing a whole load of stops which weren't working.

If I had been "psychically inclined" I might well have interpreted it as a premonition, but in reality most dreams I have about equipment involves it being broken or malfunctioning in some way, so in fact there was nothing unexpected at all (it was also the only "coincidence dream" that I can remember in my life, making it fall well within the bounds of ordinary probability).

[Zaira]

Araneus,

I'm glad you experienced even one dream like that because it means you have some idea of what I'm talking about. But dreams are only one aspect of it. When younger I thought I may be 'psychically inclined' but I couldn't accept that explanation for some reason. So I went in search of answers and began to read everything I could get my hands on. There is something going on but I don't believe it to be mystical or paranormal, nor do I believe it to be a brain abnormality. My best theory so far is that something may have been triggered in the brain accidently or otherwise.

[Admin]

Zaira,

Have you heard of Apophenia?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apophenia

http://skepdic.com/apophenia.html

It's where people have a propensity to see meaning in coincidence or random events.

It could explain why you see meaning in events that others would see as coincidental.

Worth a look anyway.

[Zaira]

Thanks, John. I'll go have a look.
But I warn you if I disagree - I'll Be Back!!

I'll be back anyway to let you know what I think.

[Zaira]

John,

I'm still checking it out but I'm having a eureka moment. I have had many of them when I thought I had answers before, so I'm not getting too excited. But I am going to check it out.

I find this hugely reassuring.

"Conrad originally described this phenomenon in relation to the distortion of reality present in psychosis, but it has become more widely used to describe this tendency in healthy individuals without necessarily implying the presence of neurological or mental illness."

Thanks for that. I'm off to check it out some more.

[Zaira]

In statistics, apophenia is called a Type I error, seeing patterns where none, in fact, exist. It is highly probable that the apparent significance of many unusual experiences and phenomena are due to apophenia, e.g., ghosts and hauntings, EVP, numerology, the Bible code, anomalous cognition, ganzfeld "hits", most forms of divination, the prophecies of Nostradamus, remote viewing, and a host of other paranormal and supernatural experiences and phenomena.


Peter Brugger of the Department of Neurology, University Hospital, Zurich, gives examples of apophenia from August Strindberg's Occult Diary, the playwright's own account of his psychotic break:

He saw "two insignia of witches, the goat's horn and the besom" in a rock and wondered "what demon it was who had put [them] ... just there and in my way on this particular morning." A building then looked like an oven and he thought of Dante's Inferno. He sees sticks on the ground and sees them as forming Greek letters which he interprets to be the abbreviation of a man's name and feels he now knows that this man is the one who is persecuting him. He sees sticks on the bottom of a chest and is sure they form a pentagram. He sees tiny hands in prayer when he looks at a walnut under a microscope and it "filled me with horror." His crumpled pillow looks "like a marble head in the style of Michaelangelo." Strindberg comments that "these occurrences could not be regarded as accidental, for on some days the pillow presented the appearance of horrible monsters, of gothic gargoyles, of dragons, and one night ... I was greeted by the Evil One himself...."


I don't experience anything like this. All my 'patterns' for want of a better word are simple every day experiences which seem to be slightly enhanced and seem to connect to something that happened or was said before hand. Like wanting some gravy when I had none only to have a free sample come through the letter box the next day. Above they are talking about things he imagined seeing in ordinary objects like his pillow. I don't see crazy stuff in pillows and patterns of things. I 'get' and 'see' things that are useful, things I might have been talking about before hand. Example; shopping on Friday I saw a young girl who looked like my niece, I was about to say hello when i realised it wasn't her. Then I walked into a store and my niece was there. I don't think I'm talking about 'patterns' in objects, like he is above. I think I'm referring more to patterns of events.

Still reading. I'll be back.