David Mandell

[Anonymous]

Did anyone see the program on David Mandell last night on Channel 5? It was called The Man Who Paints the Future and was on from 8pm to 9pm (I think). Here's the blurb:

A scientific examination of clairvoyant artist David Mandell who paints future disasters after having premonitory dreams. He claims to have drawn images depicting September 11 and the Dunblane massacre before the events happened.

It was basically 60 minutes of sceptics trying to debunk the guy by the use of various studies and tests. But all tests failed to prove Davis Mandell was either lying or fraudulent. They actually managed to make his case MORE convincing.

It really was quite an intriguing program. Anyone else see it?

 

[elffriend]

I saw it and think it's all a load of bunkum myself.

Whereas some of his stuff is quite convincing, there is nothing to stop him adding pieces to his pictures after he has photographed them in the bank, apart from his say so that he hasn't.

 

[Anonymous]

I think it was a repeat, so I am familiar with the case.

It is very interesting, but I'm of the opinion that he may have drawn dozens of pictures with no correlations at all. Those that he has produced have some similar features, but are not true depictions of the event.
I might do the same myself. Draw a boat crashing into Sydney Harbour, a plane crash in Paris, London, Oslo, a train in Delhi. An explosion at a football match.
Just put them away for a few years and pull them out when the time is right.

The tests on the programme I saw were only really to see if people liked his interpretations. I think if you show a picture of a plane crashing into a tower and ask "Is this a picture of a crash in Tokyo, Madrid or New York?", people are going to say New York no matter how accurate the picture is. It's just the most famous one.

I'm not saying this is definitely how it is done, but his method (not revealing pictures until after the event) is very suspect and does not make for a realistic analysis of his ability.

 

[Rrose_Selavy]

I saw the original prog some time ago. Two points. He produces hundreds(?) of drawings - only those considered significant after the event are highlighted -. We don't see all the misses. Any future events (eg the London City Airport) may never happen. In that sense he can never fail as we can never say an event will never happen that will tie in with a picture but those that do appear to somehow "confirm" his "powers".

The next time a "Psychic" has a prediction of a terrorist catastrophe to share could they just kindly let the police etc know the exact location of the planners sufficiently prior to the event with enough evidence to convict for conspiracy etc.

Never seems to happen that way, does it?

 

[hallybods]

I think if anyone did happen to have a glimpse of the future I don't think they would be taken seriously.