Last week, Sally Morgan -- a performer who bills herself as "Britain's best-loved psychic" -- sued the publisher of the Daily Mail for £150,000 for printing an article suggesting that she and other self-proclaimed psychics might be using trickery rather than mystical powers when they appear to talk to the dead.
Maybe the Mail's article (by magician and former psychic Paul Zenon) really did damage Sally Morgan's reputation so much that she needs the money. The irony is that just after that article was published, when the allegations that "Psychic Sally" was a cheat were front-page news, our organization along with peer organizations in the UK offered her $1,000,000 and the chance to clear her name, simply by proving her powers were real. Yet, she declined. Why?
If Sally Morgan is not a fraud, then the preliminary test we proposed to prove her powers should be easy. The test -- devised by Professor Chris French, Simon Singh, and the James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF) -- was based on the same routine she performs every time she takes the stage: looking at photographs of deceased persons and communicating with their spirits to learn their names.
Since 1996, The James Randi Educational Foundation has offered $1 million to any psychic who can prove their powers are real under fair conditions that prevent cheating. When challenged, many psychics have made excuses for why they won't put their powers to the test, saying they don't need the money or that they don't want to use their powers for financial gain. Neither of those excuses can work for Sally Morgan, since using her "powers" for financial gain is her full-time job, and she's telling a judge she needs £150,000 from the Daily Mail because Paul Zenon questioned her authenticity.
So what's Sally Morgan's excuse for turning down the chance to prove herself for $1 million? She never gave one, preferring instead to respond to the offer with the threat of a lawsuit.
When a celebrity "psychic" spends so much time and money trying to quash reports of fraud and silence people who question her claimed abilities... yet turns down a $1 million opportunity in order to avoid a simple test that could prove she's on the up-and-up... It makes one wonder if even Sally Morgan believes that Sally Morgan's powers are real.
Follow D.J. Grothe on Twitter: www.twitter.com/jref
I will miss her!
No. No you didn't. Sorry but your information is in err.
Did you see the test scores or see this test take place?
Did you you see actual demonstrations of her psychic ability?
You seem to have taken many assertions on faith here.
How about; Did you see the tests take place to deny or question it?
Ignorance is bliss i suppose?
The challenge myth: http://tinyurl.com/2tbdsk
The Million Dollar Hustle: http://tinyurl.com/44tfok3
Randi's Million Dollar Challenge: Not Science: http://tinyurl.com/7u96qge
In the last post Mr. Grothe is quoted:
"…we're not doing science because we don't have enough trials,"
"…we want to use the process of the Million Dollar Challenge to put forward and promote everything we do at the JREF."
It's publicity, pure and simple, not science.
And it's not a myth: the money is real (it's in trust, you can check if you want), the tests are real, and the participants have to agree to the conditions. No trick is pulled on them (contrary to what the fake psychics do).
The links you point to are from organizations which promote the existence of psychic phenomena. So they clearly have an axe to grind, and they have been making false accusations against Randi for years.
It cannot "publicity in the guise of science", since the JREF has never claimed to be doing science. They are DEBUNKING, not proving. They are showing frauds for what they are, not proving once and for all that psychic phenomena don't exist.
So you're either mistaken about the role of the JREF, or you are dishonest. Which one is it?
http://weilerpsiblog.wordpress.com/randis-million-dollar-challenge/
http://weilerpsiblog.wordpress.com/2011/03/01/can-you-win-randis-million-dollar-challenge/
What is particularly galling, is that in the rules, Randi does not have to admit the existence of psychic ability if the challenge succeeds, but the applicant has to admit that the challenge represents a fair test of his/her abilities.
The test themselves are deliberately short, high profile, high stress high difficulty affairs that run counter to all parapsychological research.
It's a publicity stunt.
How about substituting "honesty" for science? We're not trying to prove evolutoon here, nor the amount of sodium or cholesterol in Sally, but honesty/authenticity.
Right the "preliminary" test. Nice insurance for JREF. Even if she passes the test she doesn't get the million dollars and they can just tweak it so that it is unwinnable for the so-called "challenge." I'm all for a real scientific test of psychic powers, but JREF is just a self-promoting organization with a fake "challenge" that they bandy about to get attention and money. Why have a "preliminary" test DJ? Why not just propose a test in advance for which the person would get the million dollars if he/she passes it? I think we all know why. There is no challenge. Your challenge is as fraudulent as some of the psychics you mock.
In fact, it's the psychics who constantly move the goalposts, by claiming, after their failures, that the conditions were just not right, that the disbelief of some of the participants were "polluting" the "vibrations" or some such hogwash.
As for one test to rule them all: if you can devise a single test that can screen real psychics from fakes, then I'm sure JREF would be happy to hear about it. But you can't move the goalposts: if psychics fail that magical single test that everyone would agree to, you can't turn around and claim that psychics exist. Deal?