Derren Brown: Seance Yesterday

[Slick]

I'm sorry that you find the truth difficult to deal with, even if you do believe in spirits etc, the possibility that the same effect can be achieved through psychological techniques surely highlights the fact that there most probably are con artists out there. That you believe there are legitimate spiritualists out there or not, surely you are not that far removed from the world to see that where exploits do exist, people will exploit them. If people are so happy in their ignorance that they don't wish to be educated as to other possibilites, they probably shouldn't watch television.

lol I'm not finding anything difficult to deal with. If anything you're finding it difficult to deal with the possibilty that some of these could be real. I believe that it is possible to do those things through the brain and there will be people who do this to fake them. The thing I disagree was how he did it, he set out to prove that seinces were fake. People watching it will think that if the people there could be fooled, so could everyone else so everything is faked. He also encouraged everyone at home to try it to by making a Ouiji board with candles and a glass, he then got people at home to try it and phone in with weird happenings. He then made all these people feel stupid by telling them it was a fake.

[fondie]

The thing I disagree was how he did it, he set out to prove that seinces were fake. People watching it will think that if the people there could be fooled, so could everyone else so everything is faked. He also encouraged everyone at home to try it to by making a Ouiji board with candles and a glass, he then got people at home to try it and phone in with weird happenings. He then made all these people feel stupid by telling them it was a fake.

Oh, boo hoo.

It was an excellent way of demonstrating his point.

lol I'm not finding anything difficult to deal with. If anything you're finding it difficult to deal with the possibilty that some of these could be real. I believe that it is possible to do those things through the brain and there will be people who do this to fake them.

I'll happily accept the possibility that it's true, i find it extremely unlikely though as there are much more plausible explanations currently available, but that does not mean i have a closed mind to further exploration of the subject.

[G4Z]

Not wanting to speak for him but surely G4z was just commenting on the fact that Derren has created experiences similar to yours for numerous people on numerous occasions claiming to only use psychological techniques, I don't see what you were referring to is relevant, you put forward you experiences and they were commented upon. It seems as though you are trying to deny us the possibility that spirits don't exist while you will not open your mind to the possibility that your experiences could have been created by similar techniques to that that Derren uses.

Was about to respond to that but you make my point nicely. thanks mate.

[G4Z]

Also, like to say to slick, Im not gonna humor you, there is not even a tiny possability its true, people DO NOT come back from the dead ever, we know what a lot of the brains parts do and we understand some of how it works, however In the end its just a machine and as such at some point we will understand it fully. Are you saying that even when we understand everything about the body and how the brain works and we know that there is no such thing as a "soul" to go to heaven or whatever you are still gonna think dead people can talk to you? Listen to what your saying!!! You will be telling me the witch doctors in south africa have found a cure for AIDS next (and just FYI they actually belive that having sex with virgins cures aids and has led to numerous baby rapes). When your dead you are dead, its as simple as that, and maybe you dont wanna belive it because a con man 2000 years ago convinced a bunch of un-educated and unsophistcated Jews that when you die your soul goes to heaven, but its the truth, im sorry if it makes a liar out of Jesus, but maybe what he was saying was a parable...


Also, all seances are rubbish as well tbh, I am not saying derren brown offered conclusive proof but he has shown how its possible to convince people stuff like this is real. If he can do it why couldnt these spiritualists? Just because your mother didnt tell this guy those details verbally she was giving out signals all over in other ways and they guy simply observes them.

[Slick]

Just because your mother didnt tell this guy those details verbally she was giving out signals all over in other ways and they guy simply observes them.

G4z, read my post again, they were details my mother DID NOT KNOW, but later found from her brother that they were true. It couldn't have been subconscious

Also, like to say to slick, Im not gonna humor you, there is not even a tiny possability its true

I feel sorry for you with a view like that. People have been trying to prove for thousands of years if there is an afterlife and no one has reached a definite answer either way so I can't see how you can say that. You seem to take the side of science however most of history's greatest scientists were also deeply religious for example Einstein, they acknowledged that not everything can be explained by science.

[G4Z]

sorry, must have mis-read that part, but even so I simply dont buy it at all.

Slick you dont need to feel sorry for me as I have already said, im perfectly comfortable with the truth. Also, I just gave you the definitive answer about the afterlife... there isnt one! People may have been looking for these answers for thousands of years but how can you prove or disprove somthing that simply does not exist? The only thing you can do is look at the overwhelming evidence that there is not an afterlife because of the fact that nobody who has dies has ever come back (And I include Jesus in this as there is zero physical evidence it happened, its pure anecdote) In any sense, there is zero hard evidence to prove it yet we have so many people who say "oh well I know some1 that this happened to", or "the spiritualist knew my brothers dogs first name" That is not proof, and I think derren has proved this by walking up to people in the street and guessing stuff, its all psycology, I cant explain your mothers experience other than with the most likely assumtion that she is talking crap. Sorry to say that and I dont mean any offence, I am just saying that its the most LIKELY explanation.

[Slick]

I cant explain your mothers experience

lol exactly....you can't explain it. After she did it she told me and said she couldn't understand that part of what the person had said, it was only later in the night when she phoned her brother that she found it was true.

So now I'm a liar for seeing the glass move when I did it and my mother's a liar about when a medium told her all this info? Why don't you try it yourself if you're just going to call everyone who's had an experience like this a liar because that's a really poor argument.

[G4Z]

No its not, its simply the most likely explanation, ok lets say we have a guy in court, he is gonna go down for murder, he was found over the body of the victim with blood on his hands and a knife, all the DNA and forensic stuff says he did it and he has a motive. Pretty clear cut so far... except the guy protests his innocens "I know he was shagging my wife but I didnt kill him!, I just came here and found him in a pool of blood and picked up the knife and thats when the police caught me", Now clearly the guy is guilty but by your logic he isnt just because he says thats what happened and obviously the possabillity is there it wasnt him its only 99.9999%. Show me some proof of this afterlife and I would gladly consider it, but your trying to convince me you and some people sat and watched a glass moved on its own with no external force, science has shown its not possible so why should I belive you and not dismiss it as pure crap?

Also Id like to know how much stuff this guy said to your mother that was not accurate, because surely if he was having a chat with some1 from beyond the dead there would be no chance of getting anything wrong and he would be 100% correct in everything he said.

[Slick]

No its not, its simply the most likely explanation, ok lets say we have a guy in court.......

or another example would be everyone believing the world was flat, then this crazy guy Columbus comes back with proof that it isn't. Hmm that doesn't fit with the science that everyone believes to be true so he must be a liar!

Also Id like to know how much stuff this guy said to your mother that was not accurate, because surely if he was having a chat with some1 from beyond the dead there would be no chance of getting anything wrong and he would be 100% correct in everything he said.

Everything else was accurate, and that's why my mum came home and said about that detail which she couldn't work out and she thought at the time was false but later found to be true. I know you're not going to believe this but that's too bad.

[Paul Adams]

Hehe, given the number of hot topics lately we should just do a massive multi-option poll:

Do you believe in (a) god?
Do you believe in evolution?
Do you believe in magic?
Do you believe in the supernatural?
Do you believe intelligent life exists on other planets?
Do you believe aliens have visited/are on Earth?
Do you believe Elvis is still alive?




Edit:

or another example would be everyone believing the world was flat, then this crazy guy Columbus comes back with proof that it isn't. Hmm that doesn't fit with the science that everyone believes to be true so he must be a liar!

Actually I caught the end of a TV programme with Terry Jones recently looking into the "science vs religion" myth - it turns out that the Earth was known to be a globe hundreds of years before Columbus was born.
Noone seems to know where the "earth is flat" myth developed.
Personally, I blame the French.

Going slightly OT for a second, but it was an interesting programme

We now return you to your scheduled viewing...

[G4Z]

Slick, I would point out that columbus proved the earth was round.. the guy in my scenario simply said he was telling the truth but had no evidence to offer... a bit like you.

[Slick]

Slick, I would point out that columbus proved the earth was round.. the guy in my scenario simply said he was telling the truth but had no evidence to offer... a bit like you.

But unlike your scenario you have no evidence to prove me wrong. There never will be any hard evidence that there is a God or Afterlife because that would take the whole point of faith away and then everyone would believe.

[G4Z]

Thats the problem with argueing this point with people with you, you accept that earth is round not because you have seen it but because science has proved it and you have seen pictures from space. Science has also proved that higher reasoning and conciousness resides in the brain and so when you die, how exactly does this lump of flesh transfer into a "spirit"? where are all these things, where is the spirit world? the answers you give me are going to be totaly unfounded and probably a tad stupid but i will ask anyway....

The simple answer and certainly correct one is that none of this exists and when you die, the brain shuts down and then rots and the conciousness created with all the connections in there is gone. simple.

[Slick]

how exactly does this lump of flesh transfer into a "spirit"? where are all these things, where is the spirit world?

I don't know and I'm not going to pretend I do, possibly another dimention?

We still don't know what most of the brain does and science can't explain a lot of what it does so you can't say that everything to do with us resides in our brain.

[G4Z]

I have already stated we dont know everything about it, but we do understand aquite a bit and I am sure it will not be long before we understand it completely. Do you think that when this time ocmes you will accept it as the truth? Or would your prefer to delude yourself with an idea of an afterlife that you cant explain what it is or where it is? (also another dimension..... Do you even understand what a dimension is? If more than 4 dimensions exist it would be on a sub quantum level, its all to do with string theory and is at the moment beyond our technology to prove one way or another, either way I think its thuroughly unlikely that if we discover more dimensions we will find 100bn dead people there)

[Slick]

do you honestly think we'll ever fully 100% understand the human brain and body? Watching a brain die is just our observation of what happens, the reality is you won't know yourself till it happens to you.