I remember when I first started the Attic. It was weekly, then, and I had lots of articles written. Really, a huge stockpile. I could've put four months of articles online without having to write any new ones.
But of course, I did write new ones. And sometimes I'd come close to running out, and a few times, I'd throw something hastily together at the last minute. And yeah... sometimes I'd have to wrack my brains to come up with something. But I always did.
Of course, I eventually went bi-weekly with the Attic. I found I was coming up with fewer and fewer really good articles. And maybe that's happening again. Because here it is, nearly 10:30 p.m., and tomorrow is my deadline. And I have nothing.
Hm. "Deadline."
Dead.
Okay. Maybe I do have something.
Back in late June, my wife and I went back to my home state of Pennsylvania for a couple weeks. We stayed for a few nights with some very dear friends of mine whom I've known for years.
One evening, Lori and I stayed up late talking with the female half of this couple (her husband having gone to bed). I don't recall now how the whole topic came up, but our friend mentioned to us a guy by the name of John Edward. I'd never heard of the man, but my wife saw him on TV once. Seems he has his own show on cable called "Crossing Over." It airs on the Science Fiction Channel, if you can believe it.
As our friend described it, Edward claims to be able to talk to the dead. He picks people out of the audience and does this rapid-fire monologue, asking a few questions here and there, and eventually the victim... er, the participant... is amazed at how accurate this guy is.
As our friend described this whole process, all the little voices in my head (and there are several) screamed, "FRAUD!"
I calmly proceeded to explain to our friend how Mr. John Edward does his little tricks. It's not hard, and he uses some of the same techniques that these idiotic people on "psychic hotlines" use. He'll be very vague with his statements, narrowing them down by picking up on subtle clues (including body language and such) from the participant. He won't really know anything about them, but can zero in easily enough. Or he'll use psychology to his favor. He'll often ask for a piece of jewelry, for example. And with what seems astounding regularity, he'll "know" that it belonged to the deceased. (It's very common for people to wear jewelry belonging to their dead loved ones, and Edward knows this.) And so on.
No, our friend said. She and her husband had actually attended one of his free seminars, and he's for real.
I asked if the guy was always right. No, he wasn't, she informed us. And he admits it. In fact, sometimes he's (pardon the pun; it's late) dead wrong. But he confesses that sometimes things just don't go well. It's not an exact science.
Right. Because it's an exact fraud. But our friend wouldn't even accept this blatant display of error as being evidence that the guy's a fake.
After some time, we just let it go.
Interestingly, the August issue of Scientific American contained an article by Michael Shermer (founder of Skeptic magazine) called "Deconstructing the Dead." Guess who it was about? And guess what he had to say about it? Yup, almost verbatim what I'd told my friend, weeks before.
I photocopied it and mailed it to her. I don't expect it'll do any good. I don't expect she'll even comment on it. But I couldn't resist.
This seems like a good time to plug a movie. If you've never seen Leap of Faith, with Steve Martin, I recommend it. It shows actual methods that faith healers have used to con the gullible over the years. It's actually based on an actual "faith healer" who was revealed as a phony by that debunker of debunkers, James Randi. For more on this whole type of thing, check out his website.
Well, look at that. I made my deadline. And before 11:00, even.
