For me growing up in the UK during the 70's was a confusing time, A popular cartoon series called 'Boss Cat' used to run on BBC1 after school and featured the adventures of a gang of street Cats and a police beat officer called Officer Dibble. The show referred to its main character as 'Top Cat' including a theme tune with lyrics naming this as his title however in the UK it was billed as 'Boss Cat'. The reason for this was because a well known cat food selling in the UK at that time was 'Top Cat' cat food and the BBC didn't want to advertise the product. The final broadcast of the edited UK version was shown in 1989, since then the show has been broadcast with it's correct title in the opening and closing credits.
0 Comments
1. The BIGGER picture When a few friends get together sometimes the subject of the paranormal crops up and it always seems to bend the same way. Instead of a discussion about the very nature of the supernatural, ghosts, spirits and other paranormal phenomenon, what tends to happen is a collection of spooky ghost stories and nothing more. Most of the stories are second hand or old urban legends and some experiences have apparently happened to the speaker themselves, often the experiences will only be limited to hearing doors shut; lights turning on or other strange things, however some will tell yarns to make your hair stand on end. When will the bigger picture get a look in? Never will a true honest debate take place because to do so might invite the truth to the party. 2. Duplicate Duke Something spooky happened to me once as a child, we used to have a beautiful dog (German shepherd) but he was tragically killed by a car one night. One day I came downstairs and headed into the kitchen and as I turned to walk through the door I saw, out of the corner of my eye, the dog in the back garden. At this point you will assume that what I suggest I saw in the garden was a ghost spirit of my deceased dog right? No this particular day was a day when he was actually still alive. What was spooky about this incident is that as I walked into the kitchen the dog was in there instead and not in the garden at all. How could I have seen two versions of my dog, it was clearly impossible because he was in the kitchen eating out of his bowl the whole time. My point to telling you this story is simply that had this experience happened AFTER my dog was killed how easy would it have been for me to state that I had in fact seen a ghostly apparition of my dog? So what did I actually see that day? The brain and the eye really do have an interesting relationship with the mind forever attempting to make connections and that's all I believe it was. 3. I saw something...out of the corner of my eye! People think their eyesight is better than it is but when you look around, your eyeballs pan around inside your head incredibly fast so you get the impression that your field of vision is larger than it actually is when in fact you can only see whatever is directly at the center of your gaze. Try this experiment and you will understand my point. First you need to have an object to look at on the other side of the room, a living room is ideal. Concentrate your gaze on an object on the other side of your room and remain focused on that object; it could be a pattern on the wall or an ornament or anything else. While you are looking at this object you will still be able to see other things around it, try and see something else in the room that's in your field of vision but REMAIN FOCUSED on that first object at all times. You will be amazed that you can't actually 'see' any of these things at all. You may have a TV on that you can see but its just shapes, you know that's a photo of grandpa but can you see his face clearly? Try this and you will be surprised how limited your field of vision really is, let alone 'the corner of your eye' which is a thousand times worse. The other eye test is also rather fun and involves watching a finger moving left to right using just your eyeballs to track it. Try it and you will notice a smooth gliding motion as your eyeballs effortlessly track the finger, now take the finger away and pan the room from left to right, you will notice your eyeballs no longer have the deluxe gliding system but will freeze at points along the way. This second eye experiment has nothing to do with this work except to highlight our biology but this third test goes even further. We all have a blind spot in our sight and it has something to do with the way our eyes function. This blind spot is literally void, blank it does not exist and we cannot see in this area, why then do we not notice it? The reason we cannot 'see' this blind area is because our brains fill in the gap for us, but it is possible to overcome this rather pleasant service that our brains perform by doing an experiment. Here we go, first look straight ahead closing your LEFT eye and extend your RIGHT arm straight ahead with a thumb up in your field of vision. Now move your right arm still extended in front of you with thumb up about 2-3 inches to the right (60 degrees or 1 o'clock) BUT keep looking straight ahead don't follow your thumb but you will still see it. Keep moving your extended arm slowly up, down, around in that area and you will find the blind spot. Your left eye must be closed and you must remain looking ahead, eventually you will find your blind spot and when you do your thumb will vanish, it will literally disappear. I hope you find it and then marvel at our wonderful biology, not paranormal, the aliens didn't build the pyramids humans did we are amazing. 4. Anyhoo....on to the moggy I must move on to the cat in my title. This is a true story about a guy who, as a master skeptic, debunked all paranormal activity and up to this moment in his life could explain every paranormal occurrence with a more scientifific explanation, but one night he himself went through an out of body experience. He rose from his bed and looked down from the bedroom ceiling and he could see himself lying fast asleep on the bed below him. He explains that the detail was so clear that from the ceiling he could even see the patterns on his duvet and that his cat had sat right in the middle of the bed so he was all scrunched to one side. In the morning he awoke and immediately remembered his experience...but it wasn't the amazing phenomenon it appeared to be. First the duvet during the out of body experience was actually in the wash and had not been on the bed, second the cat had been locked outside the entire night, it was impossible for him to have seen the cat on his bed that night. Suppose this had been a man who never washed his duvet, and imagine if his cat had been inside that night; then this experience surely would have been an undeniable supernatural experience. The point here is that what sometimes may appear to be unexplained or supernatural has a more down to earth boring explanation. 5. The warning Most folks limit their experiences to creaking floors and second hand telling of stories but I offer a serious warning to you; beware anyone who will tell you with a straight face that they regularly see ghosts; talk to them or hear voices in their heads; these people are ill and share a common experience with many serial killers!! Beware so called fairground psychics and church faith healers for these people are con artists who feed off the vulnerable and soil beloved treasured memories of the bereaved. Anyone with a gateway of communication with the afterlife will also have a gateway to stardom and riches and we've seen them all including the church preacher who wore an earpiece to communicate with his wife fooling his flock into believing it was God and breaking their necessary walking sticks. Let’s face it if Jonathon Edwards, Doris Stokes and Uri Geller had to rely on standard 'cold reading' techniques to hoodwink the masses, the old hag in the tower block that's charging five pounds for a reading is not worth the bother. Just save your money whoever they are; the only difference between the gypsy in the fairground and Sylvia Brown is that Brown is a better charlatan. Please have a look at a real transcription of a psychic reading never before published arranged and analyzed by me http://theharlowsceptic.weebly.com/the-harlow-sceptic/transcript-of-psychic-reading-tricks-of-the-trade 6. Supernatural clothing manufacture Among the most ridiculous of ghost sightings in my opinion are that of spirits when they are in full dress, you know with nuns, old ladies, soldiers and other ghosts dressed in clothing from days gone by......that's right....DRESSED!! Consider...if we do have an eternal soul or spirit surely it would be naked? Can the spirit world manufacture spirit clothing...really? Does it make any sense that if a human being dies the spirit world would manufacture an exact copy of the clothes that they were wearing? Maybe they go to Marks and Specter or psyKE? Another theory is that perhaps what people see as ghost's are actually real pieces of past time frozen...like a re-run of past events? This would sit more comfortable with me and explain our clothed ghouls but even that explanation is absolutely riddled with major flaws and not dissimilar to my socks...full of holes. When this first popped up a few years back it was reportedly to get users to 'like' a page that had been set up in protest to this new charge, the page had numerous virus's including placing pornographic images on users machines. It has returned with other variations since so be warned, it is a hoax. An impressive video is making the rounds at the moment claiming that hover boards exactly like those depicted on the 'Back to the Future' series are now a reality. The video featuring many celebrities including Doc Emmett Brown himself (Christopher Lloyd) seems to show the hover board in action. One watch of the presentation pretty much confirms it was achieved using the same methods as Back to the Future II using wires. The video has been credited to Will Ferrell's Funny or Die company, the same folks responsible for the previous year's fake video featuring NASCAR's Jeff Gordon. The Ouija board that became popular many years ago is making a comeback and helps to further the belief in the supernatural. Can a factory manufactured product grant us access to the afterlife? Are my gonads gold plaited? The answer to both of these questions is a disappointing no I'm afraid....hear me out. First, would I have the money to gold plait my gonads in the first place? Second, the Ouija board is ...just a board! There are letters, numbers and the words 'yes' and 'no' printed on one side and it normally comes with a pointer of some kind made of wood. People taking part will keep their fingers on the pointer and attempt to contact a spirit, the spirit will communicate by moving the pointer to the symbols printed on the board..as the pointer moves the participants keep their fingers on top and move with the flow. Will tell you a story....this will put hairs on your hairs!! My uncle Ronnie, (big mean no nonsense will eat you with his stare Ron), once bought home a Ouija board. It didn't do anything for a while...but one night it started to spell out the words..."LEAVE ME ALONE"! He snapped the board shortly after. That story was told to me when i was a kid and it still freaks me out now...and I don't even believe in them!!! If I told you that uncle Ron's experience could be true but not supernatural would you believe me? So is that story true? Perhaps..but I'll get on to that in a second. Knowing human nature as I do Ron's story was probably not as scary as it sounds. Truth is, human nature dictates that we will exgagerate our stories and experiences when we can ...yes you do it too! You know you do. This doesn't make us bad people or liars, we are storytellers and entertainers and we want to be popular and for people to like us. Yes ok... some people will also deliberately move the pointer for whatever reasons, but this fact alone doesn't quite explain Ouija boards ..but it fuckin helps. We need something else. The Ideomotor function is a psychological phenomenon tested and proven time and time again to be the cause of this nonsense. Put simply it is the unconcious motion of your hands during a very suggestive state. Some examples of this phenomenon can be found on Derren Brown television specials (apart from conjuring, hypnosis etc... Derren Brown using the Ideomotor fuction to demonstate table tipping and the necklace hold during stage shows), while we dream we sometimes imitate our dream self, during testing on 'dowsers' (water finders etc), body language and numerous other instances. Some of you will be great at this - you're the guys on stage clucking like chickens under hypnosis, ....but some of you will not. During a seance with an Ouija board one of the participants will probably be one of the former personalities and will be the one moving the pointer, during a seance where all the participants are aware of the specific spirit they are trying to contact the effect will be stronger as more than one will be expecting the same answers. If you don't believe me I can give you the final proof you seek, first...no significant information ever comes out of sessions that at least one person present didn't already know, no murder case has EVER been solved using this system...despite what you may have read or currently believe....it has never happened!! and second.. IF YOU WANT TO DO A SEANCE WITH AN OUIJA BOARD HERE'S WHAT YOU DO.... 1. Blindfold everyone taking part. No loose hankercheifs that will allow gaps down the nose (classic mind reading trick) it must be absolutly obvious that nobody taking part could posssibly see ANYTHING. 2. One person must be watching the whole process but NOT a participant!! It should also be filmed. 3. The board must be covered until the blindfolds are in place. In many countries these things are only sold in toy shops and thats where they belong. You couldn't be critised for thinking that ‘Ant and Dec's Saturday night takeaway' was simply a light hearted family entertainment programme for us all to chuckle over on a Saturday night, it is far from it. The show is infact a very cleverly constructed piece of marketing flooded with advertising of the highest degree throughout it's 80 long minutes. Whilst we all accept advertising to some degree this programme bombards its viewers to a distasteful and insulting level. Let's start with the last show. Before the show begins and throughout we clearly MUST be informed that MORRISONS “sponser” the show! Like they need a sponser, in the opening credits shiny smiley Ant and Dec run into the ITV studio. SARAH MILICAN (ON TOUR IN MARCH) and DIVERSITY (2014 TOUR TICKETS ON SALE) are introduced as the guest stars and will keep popping up throughout to remind us of their tours. The game segment “win the ads” (probably the biggest kick in the teeth) is mentioned...the possible contestants are displayed on the BT tower who could win items advertised during ITV’s DANCING ON ICE these companies are mentioned with logos on screen..IKEA, SKY, HOSEASONS, HALIFAX, EASYJET, CONFUSED.COM, VOLVO, P&O and DISNEY. A small suprise thingy to an audience member is also strangly connected to ITV’s DANCING ON ICE, SPLASH AND I’M A CELEBRITY. This same couple win a holiday courtesy of ON THE BEACH.CO.UK. A nasty back-hander follows when Sarah Milican turns up again to cue commercials and gets handed several boxes of Pizza’s that look like ‘Papa Johns’ and then during the 4 minute commecial break that followed a PAPA JOHNS advert appears with a shot of several boxes of pizza’s exactly like Milicans minutes earlier....this is blatent. At this point its worth mentioning that during the 80 minute show a full 20 minutes are actual commercials...you are sat there for nearly half and hour watching solid advertising during a show that - is in itself - full of advertising...and one of these was Ant and Dec's own tour!!. The show returns after its first of many commercial breaks to follow with another mention of DISNEY and UNIVERSAL followed by “little Ant and Dec” who are the most nauseating brats in the country who were used to plug yet another ITV production MR SELFRIDGE . The celebrity (house party) “gotcha” segment was performed on Gordon Ramsey to promote MASTERCHEF USA and the show closes with the “win the ads” nonsense and again promotes all of the advertisers. This is not something on my takeaway menu for next week. Fakers pretending to have Psychic powers use a technique called "Cold reading". In Cold reading there are certain tried and tested methods used to perform the trick....and unfortunately they all use these methods, from Jonathon Edwards to the old lady in the flats who'll charge you a tenner for half an hour of nonsense...they all use them. The tricks of the trade are very simple but highly effective and can usually only be discovered by transcripts. My friend (whom we shall name 'Bob') agreed to have a reading and that it would be recorded on tape, I asked him if he would allow me to analyse the reading as I knew they were cold readers and I wanted to prove it to him. To my delight he agreed and he kept his word and gave me the reading. So here then is that analysis I wrote over 10 years ago. My comments are in red and I make no apology for my sarcasm!! - Harlow Sceptic Transcript and analysis of psychic reading - read on Thursday 23rd March 2000. The 'psychic' started the reading before pressing record on the machine so our transcript comes in after 'contact' had apparently already been made with the subject's grandmother. "…. Very strong character this lady, very dominant sort of lady would be known at most readings that you go to. I am sure she does come through most of the time. Not very tall would have worn glasses or put glasses on. Slight curl in her hair and you know one of those Victorian type lady's, at the same time a good woman she had a heart in her, took a bit of understanding and where she was coming from and would have liked to wear blue or bluey type colours and you'll have to think about that." Although having made contact with the grandmother a surprising lack of information comes from this and is very vague. She describes a classic elderly woman, born early 1900-1930 with Victorian values and almost certainly wearing glasses, the 'psychic' allows herself a 'get out' clause by stating that had she not worn glasses she would have needed them for reading. The fact that she may have enjoyed blue as a colour would seem to be irrelevant information. Why would Bobs deceased grandmother be rambling on about her favourite colour?? "I don't know whether you've needed a bit of a push lately and you've been feeling a bit flat but she's trying to..you know?" At this point the 'psychic' has asked a question but has cleverly covered that fact up,"I don't know whether you've needed a bit of a push lately..?" ...that was a direct question but she goes on to close the sentence knowing that the question has registered and will receive feedback as Bob now answers the question..
"Have you been a bit apprehensive about work recently?"
"Yeah, I didn’t feel you were changing work and I didn't feel that change was with work, so I'm sorry about that. But I just felt apprehensive."
I honestly feel something's going to come in and you'll think 'I'll go for that' because you tend to, sort of, stay with the devil you know and not the devil you don't, a bit cautious that way".
So somethings going to come in and you'll look at it and you'll think 'yeah', and this little lady's going to say 'go' and you'll think 'I will have a change' alright?"
Having made contact with our subjects grandmother all that our subject received was vague generalization and clichés ("better the devil you know" and so fourth) After a long pause the grandmother is forgotten and then...... "Who is David on the earth plane?" Our man looks confused and is trying to think, the 'psychic' clearly realising that this 'David' cannot be THAT important to our subject and certainly not family she adds.... "A Friend." The subject is still having problems connecting this name.
"And who is George in spirit?" Hang on!!!!!, what happened to David? "Don't worry, who is John?" Now the name George is again quickly forgotten as is david and the name 'John' is tried-on.
Our subject cannot connect with these names, amazingly the 'psychic' tries another. "Stephen?" and another! "Mark?" "People on the earth, or people you've worked with or just happen to come into contact with.?" Here the 'psychic', who is starting to sweat, has no choice but to dramatically widen the field for bob to try and accept these numerous rather common names. He has been invited to select anyone from a deceased close relative to someone he may have bumped into at Tesco.
Knowing that none of these attempts have excited our subject she goes on to try others... "I also want the name Harry in spirit and I want the name Tom in spirit so there are a lot of people around you who want to be remembered." The 'psychic' states that there are 'a lot of people around bob who want to be remembered' ...really?? Certainly the names George, Harry and Tom were designated as 'spirit' but the other names (Stephen, John, Mark and David) were not and could have been anyone? "Bob: There is a Tom yeah." "Theres a gentleman bearing your fathers look and your dads on the earth?" Note the subtle use of questioning to establish the status of bobs father.
Although Bob has seemed to confirm this information it is not correct. The connection of 'Tom' is in fact a deceased Uncle and was not his grandfather. "Nice old boy this one, very much around you again, can I ask you, did your family ever lose a dog?" Let's pause here for a moment, having apparently just made a significant contact with Bobs grandfather to the point she could state he was 'a nice old boy' the 'psychic' immediately turns to some dog!!! Does this make any sense?
Why would bob worry about the details of this dog? Since bob has already indicated that the dog has no significance why would he care about the colour of this animal. The 'psychic' then decides to fill more time talking about this insignificant dog after apparently contacted his Grandfather. "Umm, it’s a dark coloured dog, not a big dog but not a small dog…. average size dog"
Bob agrees that an average size dog is not small or big !!! "Dark colour, could be mongrely or just…err, all I could see was a dark coloured animal sitting next to you." "Your mum still on the earth?"
Another direct question to attain the status of bobs mother; strange though that she hadn't already been told by bobs grandmother or grandfather. "Not been too well has she?"
Bobs reply to this question on the tape sounds half-hearted and is quickly picked up on by the reader. "Just down nothing serious. This lady says not ill just a bit down."
The 'lady' being referred to must obviously not be the grandmother as she was referred to as 'Nan' previously. "And according to the lady again she has been trying to be around your mum so lots of things going around, there's a young lady in your life?" Another direct question to probe bobs social situation.
Another direct question.
Their follows more probing about bobs relationships then the recording is paused. The reason for this was supposedly due to the personal nature of the conversation but since bob himself had provided the cassette and the recording was for him this does not make sense. When the recording is resumed the reader is in full swing having undoubtedly obtained further information whilst the machine was on pause. The conclusion of this discussion must therefore be discounted from our study, as there is no evidence to explain how the information was obtained. "Can I ask did anyone you were connected to ever lose a child? Anybody miss-carry or terminate?"
Note the 'addition' added after bobs negative response, now the child can be treated as a mystery and easily forgotten, had bob of responded the other way it would have been yet another display of her supernatural abilities. "Welll theres a child stood by the side of you, so you'll either accept that or you don't, theres actually two nans here in spirit, you've got quite a collection of people here." So much for the child! "Somebody in your family was in the navy as well, now the work that you do, can I ask you, do you have to use a lot of mental pressure with the job that you do?"
question!
For those really following this and think I've missed one…I have not. Bob does look and sound as though he would work in an office and is always smartly dressed and does not look like your average bricklayer! "..he also tells me you've not been sleeping 100%, you've still got a lot going on - emotionally, and it is emotional stability you're looking for at the minute, job changes? Not yet, better the way are at the minute, I think theres too much going on around you at the moment to change jobs." "Bob: yeah." "Does that make sense?" "Planning to go abroad?" This is yet another direct question and lets not forget this was supposed to have been a READING!
"I do want the name please of somebody called Joan on the earth?" A massive connection with this name as Joan is the name of bobs mother and she is indeed on the earth.
"Because the little lady here has said would you say hello to her for me?" "Bob: right." "So, Say hello to her,.her daughter ...which is your mum, and she's also saying happy birthday, because I've got birthdays around?" There were no significant birthdays around that week, the reading ended shortly after. It is human nature to walk away from these sessions retaining in our minds the 'hits' that the psychics stumble across and we forget all the misses...all the duff names and dogs!! This is how this industry survives and it is only by recording your sessions that you will know the truth....the sad boring truth....but at least it is the truth. We may one day meet our departed loved ones....I don't know?? but I know it won't happen while we're still on the earth. Did we spot the tricks of cold reading during this session? The answer is yes they were all there for all to read as you have just done. What follows is a summary of the hits and misses during the reading. WORRIED ABOUT WORK MISS DAVID MISS GEORGE MISS JOHN MISS STEPHEN MISS MARK MISS HARRY MISS TOM WRONG RELATIONSHIP DOG MISS LOST CHILD MISS NAVY MISS GOING ABROAD MISS JOAN HIT BIRTHDAYS MISS Thank you but especially to my friend, Bob. |
Archives
June 2016
|