Does this prove that ouija boards and NDEs are fake?

Question

The skeptics will love this...In fact...maybe that's 2 or our own.

Sorry about the language. Cover your ears.

(This didn't change my mind one bit.)

http://video.stumbleupon.com/#p=8jri4fc7xz

Answer 1

Deenie, forget skeptics. They don't care what others believe in and people that people in something else shouldn't care what skeptics believe  in. What ever you believe in you do and eff what others have to say about it.

Answer 2

First, both your question and the video address 2 different phenomena, so maybe 2 questions next time (the answers can be shorter that way).

As usual skeptics (in this case magicians) feel the need to continue to debunk something that actual scientist (Michael Faraday) examined and provided an explanation (ideomotor effect) for long ago.

Then skeptics continue their poor logic by using the straw man argument and stating that "spirits are claimed to be physically moving the board" this claim has been dismissed even by believers long ago, if spirits were moving the board touch would not be required. Even most believer acknowledge they are moving the board but feel they are being guided by spirits. The idea that spirits need a person's physical attributes to operate dates back at least to trance mediums.

You will notice that in none of the demonstrations did they (skeptics or believers) test to see if they could get information not already known to them (unless of course this was edited out).

This might not provide evidence for spirits (but it might depending on the experiment) but it may provide possible evidence for ESP which has long been a competing hypothesis for spirit activity in parapsychology (even back when it was called psychical research).

What's most important of course is that these impartial investigators set out to find the truth with no prejudgement as to the phenomena they were investigating and did everything to make it a fair and unbiased test rather than setting it up to have a predetermined outcome even at the cost of ignoring objections to the way they wanted to test it.(ha ha ha)

Why do people choose to believe such sloppy bias work by skeptics and ignore such well controlled work that meets the criteria of every field of science by parapsychologist?

In fairness Penn & Teller are more amusing than those stuffy old scientist toiling away at experiments in labs and publishing those boring articles in peer reviewed science journals.

Psiexploration

Answer 3

If you believe in these things why are you always posting comments that seem to be trying to disprove your beliefs? or confirm them? It really does not matter what who say or what they video taped, you should follow what yo believe. I have a belief system that is completely my own and when someone asks me to explain I have gotten looks that say "why would you believe that?" but I don't care because I really believe what I believe.

Answer 4

I can not take them seriously. Why? They used the most ridiculous human beings on the planet to try to make believers look stupid. If you want to prove a point you need to do it from an unbiased point of view. This man hates religion and religious people. He said that he would never allow a person that believes in God to step a foot into his home. Good, that why his lame *** show sucks.

Those are also hired actors. While I understand that this may happen much of the time, I do not believe it happens all of the time.  

EDIT: Loki_Luc...  What is the point of a one sided discussion?

Answer 5

To know more about this read the book Dying to Live.In this book Blackmore notes the aspects of the near-death experience,including the tunnel and out-of-body experience,can be induced by strictly physiological events.During brain surgery,for instance,under local anesthesia,patients sometimes report seeing things from an out-of-body perspective .Others have reported similar things under the influence of LSD ,opium,hashish and anesthetic drugs.Blackmore points out that the brain is awash in its own opaite-like substances,called endorphins,during periods of stress.she contends that evidence leads to the conclusion that out-of-body and all other components of NDEs,no matter how real they seem,begin and end with a dying brain.

Answer 6

Ouija boards only attract lower evolved spirit forms, so don't mess with that.  NDE's are very real.  The people who have come back tell the most unbelievable stories of pure unconditional love and acceptance.  The beauty they describe is awesome.  There's so much more to it than we could possibly comprehend.  P&T are idiots.  I think people who constantly debunk everything like that are afraid.  They don't understand it so it doesn't exist.  Narrow mindedness gives me a headache!

Answer 7

I love P&T, they are funny guys. They are not scientists, but they do provide some cogent arguments and entertainment along the way.

No, they did not prove that a spirit (if spirits exist) cannot wander by and move a Ouija board planchette or otherwise influence its movement. Scientifically you can't prove that this won't happen, for several reasons: (1) spirits aren't scientifically known to exist and (2) there is no known scientific way to test for the presence or activity of a spirit. And since this is the case, if you offer an argument against why it isn't a spirit at work (e.g., it doesn't work if you blindfold the participants), the believer can always manufacture a new "fact" about spirits to counter your argument, i.e., the fallacy of the ad hoc hypothesis, and you'll continually go around in circles.

However as a reasoning person you should apply Occam's razor to determine what explanations should be pursued first. The most obvious is that the people touching the planchette are moving the planchette themselves, no spirit influence needed. We know from human experience that we can move things by first touching them. It's impossible to prove this is not the case here. So why believe an outrageous unsupported explanation (spirits) and reject a likely, natural and well-supported one (ideomotor response)?  

Again, when it comes to paranormal claims it's not about what you can prove to be false -- it's what you can defend as being real. Science can provide evidence supporting a testable claim but it's impossible to disprove an unfalsifiable claim (a claim that can't be scientifically tested).

Answer 8

I think the 3 witches from Salem had been visited before from the Bad Hair Day spirit.

Notice most of the questions asked were either yes or no?

And then when the 3 regular people were blindfolded and ASSUMED they were hitting the yes or no's, it really just goes to show that without your eye sight you can't make it respond the way you want it to.

Pretty much what we've been saying all along.

So in conclusion, the only portal the Ouija board opens is make believe land.

Answer 9

The ouija board is just a game that you can buy in most toy stores and department stores, an ordinary piece of wood or plastic or cardboard.  It has no supernatural powers.  The people using the ouija board make it work.  It plays on your mind and imagination and your susceptibilities and beliefs and fears.  It can be scary because the imagination is a powerful thing, and can make you believe just about anything.  Here are a couple of links that discuss ouija boards and how to use them.  

Answer 10

In short,and even without the cash register syndrome,the answer,perhaps uncomplimentary,is a load of cobblers,and applied logic proves it to be so,and on all occasions!

Answer 11

I like Penn & Teller, in general... however, you are missing a very important point in that episode: are they credible?

For those who haven't watched, I go through the episode, point-by-point.

The next question is: how "unbiased" are the people who did the test and turned the board around? Are they discounting the idea that a spirit actually takes control, using ideomotor response? I think they dismissed it outright. Thus, the somewhat hokey explanation by the witches in Salem was kind of accurate, actually. Kinda. Personally, I don't think they really knew the mechanics of how it's supposed to work, they're just out to make a quick buck.

The psychologist talks about ideomotor response being "deceptive" but I can't find anything in the way of a frame of reference at least as credible. It doesn't negate the mechanics of how the board is supposed to work... the board is the tool for the living, while the mind is the tool for the dead and is used for controlling the responses in order to communicate. The point of its operation is missed entirely in order to make a case for being skeptical, instead of merely questioning and leaving the "unexplained" part of the question as such. Bias? You bet! On to the NDE's.

NDE's are difficult to debunk without completely discrediting the unknown. Claiming that they are hallucinations is fine and good, but it didn't seem to correlate well with the bulk of NDE experiences under controlled conditions. The woman who wrote that book didn't seem very genuine. Knowing at least a half-dozen NDE-ers, I will have to say that the experience they had was life-altering. On top of that, they generally don't want to talk about it. Writing a book about it? Highly suspect to start with.

Both believers and disbelievers ARE the same group: irrationals. Irrational rejection is the same as irrational acceptance. It's still irrational. I won't negate personal experience, but that's proof to an individual, not something I can present to others as undeniable. I've had my own experiences, and from these I believe that SOMETHING is happening. And yet, I remain unconvinced as to what that something might be.

And presenting a half-truth as a truth and then demanding the burden of proof is as good as poisoning a fruit tree and then demanding that it grows money. Penn & Teller do raise a good point that the paranormal shouldn't be used to make money, because not only are you toying with the emotions of others, you're doing it with the intent of taking their money. If you deeply upset them, is the money worth it? If they decide to commit suicide in order to be with a loved one as the result of your communication, how are you going to feel about a life cut short? I agree wholeheartedly on that one point with them.

The rest of the show, however, is a perfect example of skepticism for the sake of skepticism. They want to disprove things, instead of allowing a suspension of judgment. They don't have the whole story, nor are they interested in something that might cast doubt on their livelihood.

Sorry, P&T, this was half-baked and half-reported, and something I happen to know a lot about because of such a long time with direct experiences.

Getting to the answer, now:

Proof is subjective, and is merely "what makes a person believe".

Evidence is objective, and is an object or record of an experience.

So is it proof? The only real answer: if you want it to be. I don't find it evidence of fakery, however.

Answer 12

Do they make ouija boards for Chinese people? They have had the most population for ages. How big a board would you need?

Answer 13

No... ouijja boards and real... near death experiences resemble something that is real but are not completely true.