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Are All Psychics & Fortune Tellers Fakes?

Ronnie Jersey said:
I'm not so sure that I want to hear from the dead - I do wonder, though, if my Grandmother would show up with some advice! Lol!
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Me too and that's why I haven't been involved with mediums for the past 20 odd years, during which time all the events which were predicted have come true, all of them , perhaps with one exception, totally contrary to what I wanted in life. The future has to take care of itself.
Did grandma give good advice when alive?
 
I am not saying that there are no genuine ones I believe there are but i doubt they are giving card or tea leaf readings or even taking money for it, I've not met one but that does not mean they exist
 
escargot said:
The feathers and butterflies are personal superstitions. Nobody's pulling the wool over anyone's eyes, however sad and desperate the belief. Being told lies for comfort is undignified for all concerned.

Besides which, there is never psychic reassurance for the love of it. People profit from it in other ways beside taking payment, not least the emotional kick they get.
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I didn't think of what the teller might be getting from it. Maybe there's an element of control creeping in there.

I just know that I wouldn't be totally horrified if someone told me, out of the blue, that someone I'd lost was happily watching over me. I think I'd know, deep down, that it was a pile of poo though. And now I'm wondering what reason the person would have for telling me that...
 
PeteS said:
Me too and that's why I haven't been involved with mediums for the past 20 odd years, during which time all the events which were predicted have come true, all of them , perhaps with one exception, totally contrary to what I wanted in life. The future has to take care of itself.
Did grandma give good advice when alive?
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My dear Grandmother refused to tell any of us about our futures, my Mum asked her many times.
She said that she didn't want to influence any of our futures with what she told us, but she did tell me a few things that absolutely came true, and I know she wanted me to stay in England when I visited her there, and now I'm forever sorry that I didn't.
In the past I have read many palms, cards and the like, but I stopped doing it (never did it for money) because it gets so out of hand - some people want to know when they're going to win the lottery, and others think I have the secrets to life and death, and I don't. I only know what I'm told, and that's it. I get definite impressions of things.
 
This one from the mums net glitch in the matrix is interesting.

‘katseyes7
A few years ago l went to see a psychic. I hadn't seen one in years, and l didn't know any near where l live now - l moved 150 miles from my home town nearly 10 years ago.
So they couldn't have known me, or anyone who knew me. I found one online, a few miles from where l lived, and booked it under a different name.
When l arrived at the place (new age shop, in an area l didn't know, l had to use the sat nav to get there) there was a man in the shop looking out of the window.
When l went in, before l'd even closed the door behind me, he said "Who's XXX?" (my dad's name). Then he laughed and said "he was in the car with you, he was out and in here before you'd even switched the engine off!"
So l went for the reading, writing stuff down, and he was good, he told me a lot of stuff he couldn't possibly have known.
About halfway through, he looked really distressed and said "Oh no, no, no, suicide!"
My mother had taken her own life at 83 five months after l'd moved to where l live now. No one here knew her, or that she was dead, or how she died. I wasn't working at the time, and the only friends l had here at the time didn't know l was going to see a psychic.
I can understand people saying "oh, they always say, do you know a John or a Mary" which is true in a lot of cases, but not everyone has a suicide in their close family. He actually gave me details of how she did it (which was unusual, even the coroner said that to me) and said she wanted to say she was sorry, and that she was with my dad, he'd come to get her when she died.
I honestly can't explain it. But it did give me some peace of mind.’

https://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_classics/4451596-to-ask-your-glitch-in-the-matrix-moment?pg=40
 
MorningAngel said:
This one from the mums net glitch in the matrix is interesting.

‘katseyes7
A few years ago l went to see a psychic. I hadn't seen one in years, and l didn't know any near where l live now - l moved 150 miles from my home town nearly 10 years ago.
So they couldn't have known me, or anyone who knew me. I found one online, a few miles from where l lived, and booked it under a different name.
When l arrived at the place (new age shop, in an area l didn't know, l had to use the sat nav to get there) there was a man in the shop looking out of the window.
When l went in, before l'd even closed the door behind me, he said "Who's XXX?" (my dad's name). Then he laughed and said "he was in the car with you, he was out and in here before you'd even switched the engine off!"
So l went for the reading, writing stuff down, and he was good, he told me a lot of stuff he couldn't possibly have known.
About halfway through, he looked really distressed and said "Oh no, no, no, suicide!"
My mother had taken her own life at 83 five months after l'd moved to where l live now. No one here knew her, or that she was dead, or how she died. I wasn't working at the time, and the only friends l had here at the time didn't know l was going to see a psychic.
I can understand people saying "oh, they always say, do you know a John or a Mary" which is true in a lot of cases, but not everyone has a suicide in their close family. He actually gave me details of how she did it (which was unusual, even the coroner said that to me) and said she wanted to say she was sorry, and that she was with my dad, he'd come to get her when she died.
I honestly can't explain it. But it did give me some peace of mind.’

https://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/mumsnet_classics/4451596-to-ask-your-glitch-in-the-matrix-moment?pg=40
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I'd just like to point out that katseyes7 has no connection to me at all! Pure coincidence!
 
I'd like to contribute to this thread with a few personal "fortune telling" stories (IHTM) :

1/ When I was 17 years old, I was in love with the younger sister of one of my classmates. She worked as a waitress in her family's Chinese restaurant. At that time, I was far too shy to attempt anything, but I worshipped her so much I felt compelled to waste most my time in her restaurant as someone would go to a church or temple to pray his god. Whenever I had some spare time, I would go there, order a cup of tea and dream and dream for hours ...

Once, I was heading to the subway in order to spend a few more hours in my favourite restaurant, when an old Gypsy coming out of nowhere suddenly blocked my way. The little ugly lady forcefully took my hand and started to read my "lines". Before I had time to realize, she looked at me and said, "you're going to court someone" ! Obviously, she wanted me to give her some money, but it had never been my intention to get a reading, especially since I do not believe in fortune telling and usually avoid professional mendicants. So I promptly left. But still, I was amazed at her intuition. How the hell did she guess ?! I did wonder if she indeed "foresaw" something ... or if she was simply a champion in cold reading.

2/ About ten years ago, I was trecking the Landmannlaugar way in Iceland with brand new walking shoes. At a boothy, I met a strange old German man with a flowery beard. We had some nice conversations, and seeing that I was travelling alone, he invited me to join his group, as this would be "less dangerous". I was young and impetuous, and willing to finish the treck one day in advance as compared to the traditional schedule, so I politely refused. Later on, I met the old man again in the main hall of the refuge. He was (unsuccessfully) attempting to put on my shoes. I told him "Excuse me ! I think you are trying to put on the wrong shoes ...". He laughed and said : "Ah ! They're yours, aren't they ! That's why they don't fit. You know, such shoes, when they're brand new hardly fit anyone. You have to walk with them through water and let them dry. And then, they fit perfectly !". I thanked him for this weird insight, put my shoes on, and left to continue my treck.

When you follow the path toward the South, you meet with several small rivers you have to ford. It is advised to take out your shoes and ford the waters barefoot. As the waters come down from Icelandic glaciers, they're freezing cold ! Not my best memory of the treck ... But worse was to follow. At one point, I reached a very large river, both deep and wide. I really wondered how I could cross this stream without my feet turning into dead blocks of ice before I could reach the other shore. So I said to myself "F**k off! I won't take out my shoes. I'll just ford the river with my shoes and pants on. Otherwise I won't make it". That was very foolish. The wise option would have been to keep on my side of the river, as it was obviously flooding, with a very strong current. But I dismissed this option and ran into the fiery waters ! The river was much deeper than I had thought, and soon enough, I was struggling against the currrent with the lower and most sensitive part of my body fully immerged into a glacial flood. Unexpectedly I made it to the shore, but it took three days for my shoes to dry. I had to give up finishing the trail, as I had to pass trough a glacier and I could not attempt that with moist shoes ...

Afterwards, I wondered what spurred the old man in red to tell me about immerging with one's shoes into a river ... In retrospect, it seemed a perfect prediction of what would happen to me two days later.

3/ Last one : a fun piece of bibliomancy :

A few month ago, I received the latest issue of a "popular" scientific newspaper. The issue was about how scientists and artists envisioned the future. The cover of the paper boasted : "the first newspaper to predict the future". When I saw that catchline, I laughed heartily and said to myself : "well, if you predict the future, let's say that, if I randomly open you and read the first word on the choosen page, it will tell me what lies before me" [edit : "what lies ahead" would have been a better translation of the question I asked, in my native language].

And so I opened the paper and looked at the first word on the left hand page. The word was : "The future" !

Pure coincidence ! Yet it is indeed an answer that could never be proven wrong. What were the odds to get such an accurate answer ? It was the only page of this newspaper starting with this word ...

I know not what is the ultimate essence of this world we live in. But this is the kind of incident that makes me wonder whether we are "dreaming" our lives, as this would account for the sometimes uncanny "dialogue" which occasionnaly occurs between us and our environment. A more mundane explanation would of course be found in the human tendency to see "meaning" where there is absolutely none.
 
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AmStramGram said:
I'd like to contribute to this thread with a few personal "fortune telling" stories (IHTM) :

1/ When I was 17 years old, I was in love with the younger sister of one of my classmates. She worked as a waitress in her family's Chinese restaurant. At that time, I was far too shy to attempt anything, but I worshipped her so much I felt compelled to waste most my time in her restaurant as someone would go to a church or temple to pray his god. Whenever I had some spare time, I would go there, order a cup of tea and dream and dream for hours ...

Once, I was heading to the subway in order to spend a few more hours in my favourite restaurant, when an old Gypsy coming out of nowhere suddenly blocked my way. The little ugly lady forcefully took my hand and started to read my "lines". Before I had time to realize, she looked at me and said, "you're going to court someone" ! Obviously, she wanted me to give her some money, but it had never been my intention to get a reading, especially since I do not believe in fortune telling and usually avoid professional mendicants. So I promptly left. But still, I was amazed at her intuition. How the hell did she guess ?! I did wonder if she indeed "foresaw" something ... or if she was simply a champion in cold reading.

2/ About ten years ago, I was trecking the Landmannlaugar way in Iceland with brand new walking shoes. At a boothy, I met a strange old German man with a flowery beard. We had some nice conversations, and seeing that I was travelling alone, he invited me to join his group, as this would be "less dangerous". I was young and impetuous, and willing to finish the treck one day in advance as compared to the traditional schedule, so I politely refused. Later on, I met the old man again in the main hall of the refuge. He was (unsuccessfully) attempting to put on my shoes. I told him "Excuse me ! I think you are trying to put on the wrong shoes ...". He laughed and said : "Ah ! They're yours, aren't they ! That's why they don't fit. You know, such shoes, when they're brand new hardly fit anyone. You have to walk with them through water and let them dry. And then, they fit perfectly !". I thanked him for this weird insight, put my shoes on, and left to continue my treck.

When you follow the path toward the South, you meet with several small rivers you have to ford. It is advised to take out your shoes and ford the waters barefoot. As the waters come down from Icelandic glaciers, they're freezing cold ! Not my best memory of the treck ... But worse was to follow. At one point, I reached a very large river, both deep and wide. I really wondered how I could cross this stream without my feet turning into dead blocks of ice before I could reach the other shore. So I said to myself "F**k off! I won't take out my shoes. I'll just ford the river with my shoes and pants on. Otherwise I won't make it". That was very foolish. The wise option would have been to keep on my side of the river, as it was obviously flooding, with a very strong current. But I dismissed this option and ran into the fiery waters ! The river was much deeper than I had thought, and soon enough, I was struggling against the currrent with the lower and most sensitive part of my body fully immerged into a glacial flood. Unexpectedly I made it to the shore, but it took three days for my shoes to dry. I had to give up finishing the trail, as I had to pass trough a glacier and I could not attempt that with moist shoes ...

Afterwards, I wondered what spurred the old man in red to tell me about immerging with one's shoes into a river ... In retrospect, it seemed a perfect prediction of what would happen to me two days later.

3/ Last one : a fun piece of bibliomancy :

A few month ago, I received the latest issue of a "popular" scientific newspaper. The issue was about how scientists and artists envisioned the future. The cover of the paper boasted : "the first newspaper to predict the future". When I saw that catchline, I laughed heartily and said to myself : "well, if you predict the future, let's say that, if I randomly open you and read the first word on the choosen page, it will tell me what lies before me" [edit : "what lies ahead" would have been a better translation of the question I asked, in my native language].

And so I opened the paper and looked at the first word on the left hand page. The word was : "The future" !

Pure coincidence ! Yet it is indeed an answer that could never be proven wrong. What were the odds to get such an accurate answer ? It was the only page of this newspaper starting with this word ...

I know not what is the ultimate essence of this world we live in. But this is the kind of incident that makes me wonder whether we are "dreaming" our lives, as this would account for the sometimes uncanny "dialogue" which occasionnaly occurs between us and our environment. A more mundane explanation would of course be found in the human tendency to see "meaning" where there is absolutely none.
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That old man not only tried to steal your boots, but he seems to have deliberately given you some dubious advice.
 
Next week we are going to visit the old 'Lafayette Bar & Grill' in Paterson NJ, close to where we live.
Three people were murdered there in 1967, 2 men were convicted and spent years in prison before they were released - the boxer Rubin 'Hurricane' Carter and John Artis, who both professed their innocence.
I have to see what I feel when walking into the doorway of that pub, which has since changed hands.
 
Ronnie Jersey said:
Three people were murdered there in 1967, 2 men were convicted and spent years in prison before they were released - the boxer Rubin 'Hurricane' Carter and John Artis, who both professed their innocence.
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Do you know iof there has been any concerted attempt to get to the bottom of it?
 
Frideswide said:
Do you know iof there has been any concerted attempt to get to the bottom of it?
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GNC said:
There's a classic Bob Dylan song that tells the story from Carter's perspective called The Hurricane. I won't link to it because the language gets a bit racist, but it's a searing indictment of institutional racism.
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Yes, there have been books, news articles, a movie, and loads of websites commenting on this case for years.
Difficult to get to the bottom of it because of all the conflicting reports - but my thing is always, why their hands were never tested for powder burns that very night, that would have been some type of proof one way or the other. Also, the tire marks from the getaway car were never investigated.
And that's just the beginning.
 
I visited the old Lafayette Bar & Grill in Paterson NJ today, it is still a bar, and the area is very bad now.
Upon walking inside, I was stunned by how small the area is. The bar is now on the other side of the room and I would think the ceiling has been lowered.
There were customers sitting at the bar, and a line for the liquor store cashier. I stood on line to see if I could get some lottery tickets as I tried to pick up on any feelings I might have.
The cashier did not speak English, but one young man came in who did and I asked him if anyone knew anything about the murders back in 1966, no one had even heard of it.
I didn't like the place at all, I got the 'creeps' there. On leaving, I placed my hand on a far wall, but could not pick up anything on Carter and Artis being there.
Instead, I heard a big argument between the man who was bartending the night of the murders, and several men and one woman. The argument was over shady dealings and money, and it was bad. All the focus was on this bartender, I picked up nothing on Carter or Artis. I saw the phone ring that night, this man answered, it was someone checking to make sure he was working that night, and two men were hired for those murders.
I couldn't wait to leave, then put my hands on several outside walls, but still did not see or feel Carter or Artis.
I'm no great psychic or anything like that, those were impressions given to me.
 
Ronnie Jersey said:
On leaving, I placed my hand on a far wall, but could not pick up anything on Carter and Artis being there.
Instead, I heard a big argument between the man who was bartending the night of the murders, and several men and one woman. The argument was over shady dealings and money, and it was bad. All the focus was on this bartender, I picked up nothing on Carter or Artis. I saw the phone ring that night, this man answered, it was someone checking to make sure he was working that night, and two men were hired for those murders.
I couldn't wait to leave, then put my hands on several outside walls, but still did not see or feel Carter or Artis.
I'm no great psychic or anything like that, those were impressions given to me.
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Maybe Carter and Artis were there for such a brief time that they left no impression?
 
Ronnie Jersey said:
The area is sadly a slum, I was really shocked.
Quite a bit of commercial buildings and a lot of businesses there, it's a shame.
We actually went to Paterson in search of a lighting business but never found it because we couldn't find anyone who spoke English to give us directions.
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Quite a few Haitians there, for some reason.
 
Mythopoeika said:
Maybe Carter and Artis were there for such a brief time that they left no impression?
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I don't know, I'm certainly no expert - when I tried to look for them, that was blocked by the focus on an argument that got out of control.
I would think that the shooting of 4 people would leave some type of impression, but I did not feel it, and I did not want to stay.
Now I'm wondering if any mediums / psychics have gone there and what they found.
 
Ronnie Jersey said:
I don't know, I'm certainly no expert - when I tried to look for them, that was blocked by the focus on an argument that got out of control.
I would think that the shooting of 4 people would leave some type of impression, but I did not feel it, and I did not want to stay.
Now I'm wondering if any mediums / psychics have gone there and what they found.
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Just a thought - what time were you there, and what time of day did the murders occur? Maybe if you went at the time, on the day, you might get something different?
 
Mythopoeika said:
Just a thought - what time were you there, and what time of day did the murders occur? Maybe if you went at the time, on the day, you might get something different?
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I was there at noontime, and the murders occurred on Saturday morning June 17, 1966, at 2:30 a.m.
I would not want to be in Paterson at that hour LOL!
 
I wonder if police at the time looked into all aspects of the case - all the people involved, customers in the previous months, those who were running the business, financial details, etc.
Just my opinion that there is too much doubt there.
 
Very sad story, and sounds like this young man wanted his mother to find him. Sometimes I think the deceased are very much alive, as in this story that I posted here some time ago:

"The worst thing that ever happened to me was after my mother passed away a few years ago. When I was a little girl, 6 to 7 years old, we lived in a 2nd floor apartment, a single woman lived downstairs. This woman (I'll call her 'Anna') worked in the textile mills all day, and often went out to the bars at night, she was a drinker. She started drinking so heavily that when she came home at 3:00 a.m. and put something on the stove to heat, she would fall asleep and the smoke would come upstairs. My parents then bought a house and we moved, never seeing her again.
As I grew older, my mother would show me photos she had taken of Anna, and told me her story. Anna had gained weight and didn't look well, she took my mother into confidence, she was putting a girdle on to hide the fact she was pregnant when she went to work, then went on vacation for a few weeks to give birth, came back and said she had given the baby up for adoption. My mom never told anyone, just me, and always hoped that Anna had gotten married and had a family and was happy.
Just after my mother passed on, Anna kept entering my consciousness, which is the only way I can put it, she kept saying to me, 'Find me, Find me', and wouldn't leave me alone. Whenever I had some time, I went onto the computer to look her up by her last name, but no luck. Months went by, my husband and I were busy moving, and I certainly had no time to look for her. I was just leaving the house to go to work one morning and I felt her grab my hand, imploring me.
Well I ran out of the house and looked her up on the computer at work when I had a moment, this time I found her through her husband's obituary, she had married, moved to another state, and he passed on. Now that I had her married name, I found that she had also passed on. But she still didn't leave me alone - I kept looking on census records and found she had several sisters scattered across the country, to make a long story short I found a nephew of hers in my area, and called him.
This nephew was not too pleased, and I gave him the old address where we had lived to prove I knew his Aunt. He also was not too pleased to hear that she had given a child up for adoption, especially since her family was annoyed with her because she had had a child previous to this one out of wedlock, and they had no idea she had a second child. Anyway, he emailed me a photo of Anna, a beautiful young woman, I still have the photo.
Obviously, she wanted her family to know about this child and perhaps to search for it, because after that Anna left me alone. But my conclusion is that I was the ONLY person alive who knew her story, my mother had passed, and it was left to me to tell her family.
And her family held a church service for her, to help her rest in peace."
 
I don't think that all psychics and fortune tellers are fake, I am more on the sceptical side.
I remember some 20 years back a young lady stopping me in Brighton and explaining that she was a Romany gypsy and could tell my fortune.
I invited her to continue. She explained that I was soon going to marry my girlfriend ( I am homosexual so not likely). Also that I was going to buy a new car ( I don't drive). .....gave me a chuckle or two. And this girl was probably a benign chancer hoping that I'd give her a couple of quid for a drink.
However I am very concerned about the motives of other fortune tellers though. Especially after this video from the 'Good Thinking Society' where customer are being given quite harmful advice.
 
Been thinking again about this: I think that it would be a step too far to maintain that 'All Psychics and Fortune Tellers are fakes' as it would only need an example of one being accurate to demolish that statement !
I adopt what I would like to think of as a sceptical & Fortean approach. I don't dismiss the possibility of all sorts of psychic phenomena or the possibility of prediction.
In relation to fortune telling ....there is simply a mundane chance of making a chance prediction which has an element of truth. There is that wonderful line in 'Withnail and I' about 'even a stopped clock tells the correct time twice a day'.
In respect of psychic power, find that there is a danger of not looking at any alternative mundane explanation. I went through a phase in my younger years of noticing what seemed to be an uncanny ability to hear strange noises of different frequencies which seemed to intensify when went to places of historical buildings and or sites which were meant to have religious significance. Thought that this was some sort of audio-clairvoyance.
Transpired that I had a problem with getting too much ear wax building up which in turn would bring on a mild form of tinnitus .The fact that the noises would develop near certain sites was most likely to be that I was more aware of being somewhere different, stepped out of my normal routine, and therefore more observant to said condition. A sound ear syringing stopped the 'audio-clairvoyance'.
Just as there are hardcore closed minded sceptics, there also seem to be people who want to believe a psychic or a fortune teller without critical thinking. Especially if they have invested time and money in a consultation....and they risk making themselves vulnerable to being fleeced.
 
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