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Anonymous
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An interesting article from today's Guardian.
Psychic? It could just be the power of persuasion
Umberto Eco on investigators of the paranormal
Saturday February 23, 2002
If you're not satisfied with your financial situation and want to switch careers, why not become a psychic? It is among the most profitable lines of work and - despite what you might think - among the easiest. All you need is a certain degree of friendliness, a minimal ability to understand others, and thick skin. And even without these traits, there are always the laws of probability to work in your favour.
Just try this experiment: sidle up to any person, chosen by chance (though it certainly helps if they are willing to verify the accuracy of your paranormal capacities). Look him or her in the eyes and say: "I sense that someone is thinking intensely of you, someone who you haven't seen for many years, but someone who you loved very much at one time. You suffered, though, because it was an unrequited love. Now that person is starting to realise how much she/he made you suffer, and regrets it, even if they understand that it's too late."
Is there anyone anywhere, beyond childhood, who hasn't had an unhappy love, or at least, love not returned? And that is why your subject (or "victim") will be the first to collaborate with you, telling you that they have figured out who the person is whose aura you picked up.
You could also tell someone: "There is a person who underestimates you and goes around speaking ill of you, but does it out of jealousy." The odds are pretty slim that your subject would respond that he is universally loved and has no idea who you're talking about. Rather, he'll be quick to guess who it is and admire your extrasensory perception.
Or you could tell your subject that you can see the ghosts of his deceased loved ones all around him. Go up to someone of a certain age and say you see nearby the shadow of an old person who died from some sort of heart problem. Every living soul has had two parents and four grandparents and, if you're lucky, also an uncle, aunt or godfa ther who was much loved.
If your subject is already of a certain age, it's probable that these relatives are already dead, and out of a minimum of six deaths, there has to be at least one who died of heart failure. If, however, you are extremely unfortunate, there's always this back-up plan: since you would have had the foresight to approach your subject while he was near other people who were equally interested in your paranormal abilities, you could say that perhaps you were mistaken - what you saw was not a relative of your initial subject, but a relative of someone else nearby.
It's almost certain that someone among the group will start to say that you're talking about his father or mother, and that's when you know you're back in business. You can talk about the heat that the shadow is emitting or the love that it feels for your new subject who, by this point, is putty in your hands.
Shrewd readers will recognise these techniques as those used by charismatic characters on television shows. Nothing is easier than convincing a parent who has just lost a child or someone who is still crying over the death of his mother or husband that the loved one's good soul has not dissolved into nothing and is still sending messages from the great beyond.
I repeat: Being sensitive is easy - the pain and belief of others works in your favour. Unless, that is, there is someone in the vicinity from the Italian Committee for the Verification of Paranormal Assertions, which provides information on its website and in its magazine, Scienza & Paranormale .
Their researchers go in search of phenomena that are purportedly paranormal, from poltergeists to levitation, from mediumistic phenomena to circles in wheat fields, from UFOs to divining, not to mention ghosts, premonitions, bending forks with telepathy, reading tarot cards, crying Madonna statues, etc. And they disassemble the mechanism, reveal the trick, scientifically explain that which appears to be miraculous.
Often, they redo the experiment to show that they understand the tricks and that anyone can become a magician. Two sleuths from this organisation, Massimo Polidoro and Luigi Garlaschelli, are now jointly publishing (by gathering the test results of their colleagues) a report: Investigatori Dell'Occulto: Dieci Anni di Indagine sul Paranormale " (Investigators of the Occult: 10 Years of Investigating the Paranormal). As long as you're not among those who cry when they're told that Santa Claus doesn't exist, you're sure to find their many tales entertaining.
But enough about entertainment. The fact that their organisation is so busy means that believers are more widespread than we thought. At the end of the day, thousands of copies of this new book will circulate, while those psychics who appear on television preying on the pain of others are watched by millions. Who can we blame for misguiding so many people?
The jury is still out.