This article is based on an interview with OSSCI executive member Timothy Campbell.
A diligent channel surfer should notice a new trend in TV talk shows: psychic guests supposedly channeling the dead relatives of audience members, often conveying information they could not possibly have known in advance. Can psychics really divine the future by speaking to the dead, or do they, as skeptics insist, just use an old magician’s parlour trick called “cold reading”?
On February 13, 2004, Toronto-area skeptics attended a reenactment of highlights from the December 3, 2003 instalment of Larry King’s phone-in show. Skeptic Deirdre Breton, sporting a blonde wig, played purported psychic Sylvia Browne. David Gower wore Larry King’s suspenders. Francesca Groves stood in for the callers by adopting a variety of accents.
Long-time skeptics are well aware of the important role that magicians play within the skeptical community. A professional magician’s skills (used solely for purposes of entertainment) enable him or her to develop a keen awareness of the pitfalls and foibles of those darker, more malicious forms of deception, paranormal and pseudoscientific fraud. Granted, both the trained skeptic and the scientifically astute magician are able to view the world through a clearer lens of understanding than that of the average person. But the magicians, by virtue of their training, see a certain dark side to human nature: the illegitimate claim of self-proclaimed psychics to have been blessed with paranormal talents. This is truly an extraordinary claim, demanding extraordinary proof. These alleged talents (“gifts” as they are sometimes reverentially referred to) are akin to “black magic”: no scientific explanation is offered, and indeed no logical explanation is even considered possible.
Part of “Pseudoscience A to Z”, a series of articles first appearing in the OSSCI newsletter about topics that have not been subjected to much critical thinking by their promoters.
I had no premonition of any synchronicity coming on. There were no warning signs or vague impressions. Nothing portended any good fortune or impending joy. It was, after all, Friday the 13th, August, 2004. There was an OSSCI (Ontario Skeptics Society for Critical Inquiry) meeting taking place but in true skeptical fashion, the triskaidekaphobia factor was being ignored.