Psychics and Frauds

[Arouet]

We can't all be at your level of reasonableness I guess. Good luck to you...

[ProfWag]

[craig weiler]

Arouet,
I don't claim to be reasonable. That's your job. I'm psychic remember? I know what psychic ability is and it is accessible to me. It's no more possible to convince me otherwise than it would be for me to try to convince you that trees don't exist. If you were trying to convince someone that trees existed, how much effort would you expend? Would you be reasonable about it and allow for the possibility that trees might not exist in order to spare their feelings? That's the position I'm in. I choose not to spare your feelings.

You don't have psychic ability and you have to rely on others to tell you about it. Others such as myself will only go so far in trying to convince you. After that, well, we have better things to do. It's up to you be flexible. If you want to actually learn, great, but don't pretend for an instant that it's my job to convince you. Homey don't play that game.

[Arouet]

[ProfWag]

[Craig Browning]

[craig weiler]

ProfWag,
I have made comments about your attitude towards psi. Nothing more. To the best of my ability I have avoided personal insults. I freely admit that I would not be a good experimenter for reasons of bias. As for being an experimental subject? That's what experimental controls are for. If they are sufficient, then I could do no harm to an experiment by participating.

You have asked me to prove my psychic ability. As you are not convinced by the scientific evidence or the 3 1/2 billion people who have had psychic experiences, I don't see much point in trying. I don't claim to have any psychic super powers and I think that's what it would take to convince you. My ability lies mostly in healing and while I have done this remotely, it has always been with people who were receptive. I have no idea what it would be like to try to heal someone through their brick wall of disbelief. I could try I suppose, but any lack of results could easily have more to do with your attitude than my ability. That's the problem with psychic ability: it functions best with trust, belief and openness.

You do not ever need to say "sorry" in any of your comments to me. I value your honesty regardless of whether I agree or not.

Arouet,
Unless telling you the truth is rude, I don't think I have done that. I have given you my opinions, not directed any insults toward you. I personally, don't think that you are very open to the idea of psi existing. That is not exactly a news flash.

Craig,
I am well aware of innate psychic abilities, I was merely phrasing it in an easy to understand way.

Bias is the elephant in the room. I am out in the open with my bias so that everyone understands my position whether they like it or not. I do not agree with Arouet or ProfWag, obviously, and pretending otherwise is something that I view as disrespectful. They might find me obnoxious, but at least they know where they stand with me. I am flat out admitting who I am.

And of course it's their job to convince themselves. No one can convince anyone else of anything. I'm not asking anything that I don't expect of myself.

[Arouet]

Craig, you've made it clear that you have no interest in discussing things with me, so I'm going to return the favour and ignore you.

[ProfWag]

[craig weiler]

ProfWag,
You have a point there. I'm not entirely civil. I'm an emotional person and it comes through in my writing on occasion. I'm not actively trying to offend you, it's just that my language gets colorful. I grew up with two brothers and a non stop barrage of insults (including from my father) until I grew up and got away from there. Consequently, I"m so thick skinned about it that something that seems mild to me might be more offensive to someone else. I'm not hypocritical either. I'm not offended even by direct personal insults. I don't care anymore. I will make an attempt in the future to tone it down.

I have gotten my biases out in the open. I think that this honesty is required for any real discussion; I felt this before I could articulate it and it took awhile for me to get clarity on that issue. Going around accusing other people of bias forced me to examine that bias in myself. It is the elephant in the room. What sort of discussion is it when everyone is pretending to be reasonable, but really isn't? It's not really a discussion at all. Everyone has an agenda and is just talking past the other person. I'm not comfortable with that.

I'm not sure where I'm heading with this but I'm sure it's better than the alternative.

Arouet,
Let me be clear. I don't want to do in depth examinations of anything with you. Other than that I'm fine.

[ProfWag]

It's all good Craig. If someone were trying to convince me and others that my chosen profession wasn't valid, I'd get a little testy as well. Considering the subject matter though, I don't think we do tooooo bad in this forum!

[craig weiler]

ProfWag,
I thought that I had clarified this point, but apparently not. I'm not a professional psychic nor do I do psychic healing professionally. Years ago I tried to make a go of psychic healing professionally, but found that it wasn't a good business. I have two different day jobs these days. I am a general building contractor that specializes in handyman jobs and I have sort of fallen into also shooting cheapo commercials meant to be played on the iphone. I blog on psychic stuff, but this is more a resource for psychic people than anything else. I have a lot of professional psychics as readers. I'm also a writer and I'm working on my first book.

[ProfWag]

[craig weiler]

No problem.

[ProfWag]