How exactly do the dead communicate? With Van Praagh and Edward it’s evidently some weird arse form of charades. “Second word… sounds like… sounds like driving… or he died of an aneurism… and aneurism or drowning… or he had a C in his name… one of those…” Why can’t the dead just say it, or write it down? Wouldn’t you be better off using a Ouija board?
And why are the dead so
1- BORING- it’s always “it’s beautiful over here”… “I’m free of pain”-
Gee, that’s nice Granny… now tell us where’s the key to the safe deposit box? And any insight you might have into next week’s tri-state lottery would be proportionately reflected in the grandeur of your gravestone…
2- FORGIVING- it’s always “he wants you to know how much he loved you” or “she says all is forgiven and she’s sorry you two argued”. What about just one “she says she knows you the skank done took Andre away from Paula and she is waiting on the other side with the pumps off and the clips off and as soon as you cross over you got a butt whippin’ comin’… or maybe there’s a K in her name… she’s gonna whip your butt or there’s a K…”
Also remember that Edwards is edited. You only see a small percentage of what was on the show.
Tho I’m not sure if CROSSING OVER is any more theologically questionable than SINNERS IN THE HANDS OF AN ANGRY GOD.
Btw, from what I understand Jonathan Edwards was also a great
intellect & preacher of Christian grace & it’s unfortunate that
his most widely known sermon is that venomous rant.
In addition to what some others like UnuMondo have said, Edward’s audience members also have to fill out an extensive questionaire in an before the show which elicits all sorts of personal information. These forms are supposedly not given to Edward, but plants from the show circulate the anteroom around, peeking at the forms, eavesdropping on the rubes, and even starting conversations with them.
The rest is just garden variety cold readings. Here is some more info on the from the Randi site. Just scroll down to the Edward stuff.
Ryan, trust us, he’s a fake. The people in the audience have to fill out personal information questionnaires, then he goes through them before the show, and that’s how he manages to know so many “secret” personal details.
Check out the Amazing Randi’s website that a couple of people have already linked to, he specializes in this kind of debunking.
Seriously, why do psychics always see letters? Wouldn’t they see some sort of tangible images, or maybe get an impression of a word or a name? No they only get initials which can conveniently be filled in by the marks.
Another trick they use is birthdays. They’ll claim that “someone here was born on November 25,” and a rube leaps to his feet. Think about it. There are 365 days in a year. In an audience of, say, 500 people, any day you name will be some idiot’s birthday. For smaller crowds they use months–even better, only twelve of those–“someone here was born in November.”
four rubes leap up.
“First week of November.”
Two rubes sit down.
“On the fourth?”
Rubes remain standing.
“How about the FIFTH?”
“Oh my god that’s ME!” says lady in print dress.
“You have lost someone dear to you.” (who hasn’t?)
“Yes!”
“It’s either a parent or a spouse.”
“It was my brother!”
"Yes, a close family member. He has an ‘T’ in his name? (second most common letter in the english language after ‘E’)
[silence]
“How about an ‘E?’”
“Oh my god, his name was Ernie!”
“Yes, of course, well Ernie wants you to know that he is in a good place and that he loves you very much.”
“Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
Lady leaves studio after the show gushing about how much he KNEW about her. :rolleyes:
3- WONDERFUL. Isn’t it strange that mediums never hear a word from the dead who are total pain in the necks? They are always wonderful, warm people anxious for us mortals. C’mon, we all know annoying people like this when they are alive, does death radically re-work their personality?
Of course the answer is that no-one goes to a medium to hear from those they were glad to see the back of. The number one rule of cold reading is always tell the sucker what they came to hear.
There’s also a knack to phrasing what you say in cold reading, so that people are never quite sure if you are making a statement of fact or asking a question.
So the cold reader can relate information in a way that sounds to the sucker like he is confirming a fact that both, of course, know because it was on the form. So the sucker nods in agreement. But to everyone else it sounds like you are asking a question, something you’re not sure about. They don’t know what was written on the questionaire, they just see the sucker nod. It’s amazing! How does he know that?!
Some must say “Yes, we both know that 'cos it was on the questionaire I filled in.” But you can bet that bit never makes the final transmission.
The rest of the time the general rule is if what is being said is wrong it quickly morphs into a vaguer question. If it is right, well of course it was a statement of fact right from the very start!
There’s a definite skill to this, but the end result is that mediums have this bizarre way of talking unlike anyone else on the planet. Everything they start out to say is ambiguious. They have to wait to see how the sucker will react before determining which way they should go, question or statement. So nothing is pinned down to mean anything until the last possible moment.
You can tell a lot about someone by looking at them, and make educated guesses about them. An older person is likelier to have lost one or both parents. A person wearing old and ostentatious jewelry is likelier to be the sort of person to keep knickknacks and mementos left behind by dead relatives. A person’s manner of dress and the way they act to people around them will tell you which ones to try your schtick on and which ones you might want to avoid.
And along those lines, go with the odds. An old woman who doesn’t have her husband with her is likely to have lost him - that’s why he isn’t there - so that’s a good guess. If that’s a hit, your next step is to guess he died of heart disease, the most common cause of death for males; you’re likelier than not to nail that one, and if it’s wrong and you can smoothly transition to cancer you’ve covered 90% of all old men who’ve died. Start guessing common letters and before you know it you look like King Solomon.
What’s creepy about Edwards (other than his general sleezyness) is the whole theology implied by this creep.
According to what we see on Edwards’ show, when one dies, one doesn’t join with God and live in heaven blissfully, one doesn’t reincarnate and continue on the great circle of existance, one doesn’t achieve nirvana…one hangs around waiting for some idiot relative to give you a trivia quiz. Eww.
There’s a Puritan minister here… he says he went to Yale… no, founded Yale… and he killed the Secretary of the Treasury… oh, no, wait, he has his grandson with him… his grandson is saying something about a milk commercial…
One of the most disgusting examples was a ‘celebrity’ show in which one of his guests was Anne Rice. He accurately predicted that she had a daughter who died young of a blood disorder and inspired one of her characters, and she was impressed.
EVERYBODY who has ever read ANYTHING about Anne Rice, even if they haven’t read INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE, knows that she had a daughter who died of leukemia and inspired the character of Claudia. You can get this in any of 32,000 articles about her available full-text on the Internet.
I understand that one episode featured one of the children of the LaBiancas (victims of the Manson murders). I wonder if John Edward summoned an image of knifewielding hippies?
