Patricia Does Mental Mediumship Experiment For The One Million Dollars

As i mentioned before James Randi skeptic and magician has a million dollars for anyone that can prove their paranormal powers under controlled strict scientific conditions. I mentioned before how their is compelling reasons why the challenge is unwinable.


http://www.dailygrail.com/features/the-myth-of-james-randis-million-dollar-challenge
http://michaelprescott.typepad.com/michael_prescotts_blog/2006/12/the_challenge.html
http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/New/Examskeptics/Sean_Randichallenge.html
Discussion on Randi's prize can be found at the following internet forum:
www.steorn.com/forum
http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/New/Skepticsmedia/Auerbach_Randi.html





Recently an medium named Patricia apparently failed the test. Their are two possibilities here one she couldn't do what she claims she can do, we do know without a doubt many mediums are frauds, cold readers. However their are some that are genuine. Another possibility is that perhaps the data was altered some. The reason why i say this is because of a number of reasons.



1] He's the fellow who claimed that his own work invalidated Rupert Sheldrake's research on "pet telepathy," but when Wiseman's results were analyzed, they were found to match the same patterns Sheldrake had identified!

http://www.sheldrake.org/D&C/controversies/Wiseman_psi.html

2] He was also one of the investigators in the thoroughly botched Natasha Demkina experiment.

http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/New/Demkinafile/index.html

3] Here's a good takedown of Wiseman by Stephen Braude.

http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/New/Examskeptics/Braude_Wiseman.html

4] More articles critical of Wiseman can be found here

http://search.freefind.com/find.html?oq=Wiseman+demkina&id=70607058&pageid=r&_charset_=utf-8&bcd=%C3%B7&scs=1&query=Wiseman+&Find=Search&mode=ALL&search=all

Then their is the other scientist who conducted that experiment on Patricia, called Professor Chris french

in The Skeptic, 14(4): "I am biased in my approach to evidence relating to the paranormal…..I make no claim to be a neutral assessor of the evidence". He takes the view that the on-going debate about the existence of psi "is more consistent with the notion that psi is a powerful illusion rather than the idea that it is real and we are making progress in understanding it".

A negative result not supportive of mediumship claims

Here is an source called ''A negative result not supportive of mediumship claims''
O'Keeffe, C. & Wiseman, R. (2005). Testing alleged mediumship: Methods and results. The British Journal of Psychology, 96(2), 165-179.

The experimental design is OK, the choice of mediums and sitters isn't...

'The five sitters (all male, age range 25–30) were either students or staff from the university. They were selected from a pool of individuals who responded to a generale-mail, circulated within the university, asking for volunteers to be involved in a scientific test of mediumship. The sitters were chosen using the following criteria; (a)they did not know one another, (b) they were the same gender, and (c) they were approximately the same age. '


Why choose such a group? Young male students or staff from a university sounds just about the most skeptical group possible for mediums to give readings to. Males are more skeptical sex, particularly younger male students (even more so if psychology students). Both O'Keefe and Wiseman will have been familiar with claims of sheep/ goat effects... this seems like adding potential bias IMHO.

(a) Young people are less likely to have close dead relatives
(b) Since this age group/sex are perhaps more likely to be cynical towards mediumship claims, any subsconsious bias against mediumship could lead to subconsciously marking statements poorly.

Solution
The sitters should have been a mix of males and females old enough to have close dead relatives. Ideally believers since then it rules out any subconscious bias to mark statements inaccurately.

And of course more care over selecting mediums rather than trusting the SNU, whose criteria over what makes a good medium isn't based upon accuracy but other criteria.

The O'Keefe/Wiseman's protocol is very much based on Dr D J Pratt's protocol. Pratt had significant results in favour of mediumship being real, he was careful to choose a good medium, Eileen Garrett, one of the most impressive and most lab tested mediums of the 1940s.

My Day At Work, The Weather Here, Richard Wiseman Refuted By Stephen Braude

Today I did a box of bananas, bag up some bananas[markdowns], I bag up some onions, I put out vegetables that look like potatoes but aren't. I put out some romaine lettuce, I put out some hothouse tomatoes and 5 by 6 tomatoes, I also put out some cucumbers and some oranges.

The weather here is hot like 44 degrees in the sun.

Here's a good article refuting Richard Wiseman Agrument on a classic case of physical mediumship

http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/New/Examskeptics/Braude_Wiseman.html

Here are some wrestlers I like watching

Melina
John Cena
Hulk Hogan
Stone Cold
Batista
Kane
The Big Show
Lita
Christy Hemme
Goldberg
Brock Lesnar
Candice Michelle