It was building up for weeks. TV’s ‘Deal Or No Deal Test of the Psychics’. In the ads, played throughout the Olympic Games, we heard the phrase “We’ll put psychics to the ultimate test!” Oh boy!

The show started with the words,

“These 26 people all possess extraordinary abilities. Will those powers win one of them 2 million dollars? 26 cases containing randomly placed cash amounts. Inside one of them is 2 million dollars. Every one of these clairvoyants, mediums, psychics, telepaths and astrologers believes they can sense where it is.”

Without going into detail, the show is more or less a guessing games with the contestants picking suitcases to try and win money. They are made temping offers along the way but usually hang on to try and win the big bucks. This can lead to them at times walking away with next to nothing.

Some old familiar faces turned up to have a go. Simon Turnbull, president of the Australian Psychics Association, Dadhichi a ‘face reader’ and astrologer seen on morning TV, ‘Astro Girl’ who is related to Athena Starwoman and various others some of whom claimed to talk with the dead. However it was Reiki healer, Jacqueline Frazer who won the first round and the right to try for the lot.

It was hard, practically impossible, to pick which of the contestants were sincere but deluded in their belief of their own ‘powers’ and which were outright con sharks. Judging from the comments from some of them, I would not be surprised to discover many, if not most, were indeed sincere. Regardless, each one was allowed a brief time to trumpet their particular ‘powers’ and successes.

In the end the ‘psychics’ did no better than chance alone would predict. What a shock. I wonder why none of them foresaw this! Still, there was always a possibility, as is the case with each episode of the show, that someone would win the top prize. Frazer herself bagged $31,150 after her Reiki powers and crystals failed to detect the case with the 2 million dollars.

The whole exercise demonstrated one very important ‘rule’ that many ‘psychics’ and others have used for years to dodge taking the Skeptics’ test for the $110,000 prize.

“We could never use our powers to take a test for money! It’s a misuse of our abilities that are only there to help others.”

Now we have a clear example of just how ridicules this ‘rule’ is. For Deal Or No Deal, each one of the 26 ‘psychics’ were willing to use their ‘powers’ to win money not for charity, not for a home viewer but for themselves.

But maybe it was Jacqueline Frazer who had the last laugh. After all, $31,150 and an hour’s worth of free publicity isn’t bad.

One of my favourite sayings comes from James Randi.

“They [ the psychics] are like unsinkable rubber ducks. No matter how many times they are disproved, they keep coming back.”

Ian Rowland also uses the term ‘Re-bunking’. Again, no matter what we Skeptics do to show something is clearly false, all it takes is one bit uncritical media exposure and the ‘psychic’ is once again flying high.

A case in point is the so-called “controlled and scientific” tests of three of Australian’s leading "psychics", carried out by Channel 7’s TodayTonight program and shown on the 19th of April.

First of all, what makes someone ‘a leading psychic’? Real ability? Fame? Connection to a particular magazine? For the TodayTonight story, the three psychics used were, Ann Ann, psychic columnist of Woman’s Day Magazine (and a candidate for this year’s Bend Spoon Award), “Rev.” Glennis Saggers of The Christian Spiritual Fellowship in Wynnum, Queensland and Ann Dankbaar, winner of the 1987 Bent Spoon Award for claiming to have discovered, by psychic means, the remains of the legendary Colossus of Rhodes. They were all chosen as they each claim to have been in contact with the dead for over 25 years.

Briefly, the tests consisted of each of the ‘psychics’ sitting behind a curtain, so they could not see their subjects and being hooked up to an 'electro-encephalograph' to record their brainwave activity. (Why, I have no idea, but it gave the viewers the impression that something scientific was going on.) The subjects were only allowed to give their names and ages and then only to answer ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ to the "psychic’s" questions.

What ensued was nothing more than stock-standard cold reading. It really did not matter that the subjects were behind a curtain, or that they were limited to answering ‘Yes’ or ‘No’. ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ still gave the ‘psychics’ valuable feedback. However it gave the illusion of the tests having strict protocols. In fact the protocols were laughable.

At one stage Glennis Saggers is trying to get a ‘hit’ with the name Alice. The subject had no idea who Alice could be, but Saggers was insistent. (This is a standard cold reading trick, see page 99 of 'The Full Facts Book of Cold Reading'.) Suddenly Sandy McGregor of the CALM Research Centre, the man recording brain-wave activity and not a subject of the tests, chimes in saying that Alice is his sister’s second name! “But they’re over there…” says Saggers, implying that the message is from beyond the grave. “Then it could be my Grandmother”, answers McGregor. So much for the protocols!

Another gem was when Anne Dankbaar, clearly getting nowhere with one of the subjects, complains, “Sorry, I’m going have to cut this one…. I did not have the contact… she is not open minded.” Putting the blame for a poor performance onto the subject is simply pathetic, but it is also another cold reading trick.

Anne Dankbaar & Sandy McGregor

Overseeing this sham was “the nation's foremost expert in the study of psychic phenomena”, parapsychologist Dr. Peter Delin from Adelaide University. The only reference to this foremost expert in all the years of the Skeptic can be found in relation to reports of Anne Dankbaar. But whatever his history, he was clearly out of his depth. I would have thought an expert on these matters could have spotted the tricks a mile off. He also was critical of science in general for not being accepting enough of psychic research. Well, if this was an indication of his research, is it any wonder?

Despite Anne Dankbaar in particular being shown to have as much psychic ability as a donut, (see the many reports in the Skeptic) it was no impediment to her and the others receiving thousands of dollars of free TV publicity and apparent scientific endorsement. Truly unsinkable rubber ducks.

TodayTonight could only present a simple black & white scenario for their viewers. Either the psychics are real, or they are frauds. The third possibility and the one I suspect accounts for a great many psychics, is that they are sincere but self-deluded. The only time I have ever heard this possibility being expressed on TodayTonight, I was the one expressing it! Having said that, I have more than a few doubts about the sincerity of people who claim to talk with the dead.

Mystery Investigators 20. May.04

Two of the members of the Australian Skeptics committee have started a new venture that will take critical thinking from a Skeptical perspective into the Science classrooms.

Richard Saunders and Alynda are the ‘Mystery Investigators’ and their school science show demonstrates the relevance of science in the real world.

Spoon Bending, Fire Walking, a Bed of Nails and Water Divining. How do you use the scientific method to investigate and explain these strange and other amazing claims?

The Mystery Investigators show demonstrates scientific concepts in a fun and fascinating way by testing paranormal phenomena.

For more information, see:
mysteryinvestigators.com