During the period that the Yorkshire ripper was still on his killing spree heartless frauds and greedy tabloid papers reported this utter nonsense in an attempt to make money off the backs of innocent murdered women. The Star, The people and The Sun newspapers ran numerous front page items declaring that so called Psychics had information from the spirit world about the murderer. The Star headlined "amazing dossier from beyond the grave", The people had a sketch of the rippers face and The Sun displayed psychic drawings of people who knew the murderer...including his mechanic!!, next to these sketches was the headline.."Each person here knows the identity of the maniac - perhaps without realising it". This is such a good example of how the gutter press promote such rubbish in order to make money and sell more papers because they know how the uneducated lap this stuff up. None of the stories provided accurate information, the location of the ripper was incorrect and the sketches were all total nonsense. Fortunately the Police NEVER seek audiences from psychics, neither are there any official police psychics, further there has been no recorded example of any case being solved as a direct result from information supplied by one. The sad truth is that many of these nutters contact the police with their drivvle and the police have no choice but to investigate, often taking them in the completely wrong direction wasting everyone's time.
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Recently reported in the National news, a hoax advert convincing some iphone users that by updating their software it could make their iphones waterproof!. This just goes to prove that as technology changes so do the scams and hoaxers. How often do we see advertisement pop-ups appear on our PC screens displaying a cross in the top right corner that instead of closing the window actually links to the product they are shoving in our faces. How to fool the nation...until a Sceptic comes your way.
...and still goingHomeopathy is an ancient form of alternative medicine but still endorsed by millions of people worldwide. The problem with Homeopathy is that it is utter nonsense! Homeopathy works on the premise that 'like will cure like'...The belief is that a substance that causes the symptoms of a disease in healthy people will cure similar symptoms in sick people. If that wasn't bizarre enough for you it get's even better. Let's assume someone walks into a Homeopaths clinic and has symptoms that one may get if they drank rat poison, obviously the Homeopath can't give the patient rat poison so will instead give the patient DILUTED rat poison!...wait for it because it gets even better than that!! In homeopathy the original virus or substance used for the 'cure' (in this case rat poison) is diluted to the point where there is ZERO molecules left of the original substance. In simple terms the end product on the shelves is WATER with no healing properties inside it whatsoever. Imagine if you will putting a tiny droplet of rat poison into the worlds oceans combined...all the worlds oceans right? Now double that a maybe a million times over.....wow that is dilute! How then can Homeopathic remedys work with no original part of the substance left? Homeopath's tell us that the water retains 'water memory' and therefore is still effective with a zero amount of the original substance in it and they go further to say that the more dilute it is...the STRONGER it is!! OMG! Homeopathy has been challenged many times including subjects taking lethal doses of Homeopathic sleeping tablets and not only surviving but also staying awake the entire night for good measure. A few years ago Homeopathy was finally put to the test, the BBC accepted the one million dollar paranormal challenge on behalf of Homeopathy from the James Randi foundation and was broadcast via their 'Horizon' series. If Homeopathy was genuine the JREF would have to pay the BBC one million dollars. As expected Homeopathy completely failed the test's. Homeopathy is complete nonsense and the sad fact that it has been around a lot longer than regulations means it thrives. However when the effects have 'reported' to have worked this has been confirmed as the simple but well documented 'placebo effect' and the medicine itself serves no other purpose....how could it? It's water. If you are currently buying Homeopathy products for a loved one....just use the containers and fill them up with tap water, with the money you save buy them a box of chocolates or go to the pictures!! How Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was fooled by schoolgirlsThe cottingley fairies made headlines in the early 1900's, a set of five photographs taken by two young girls at the bottom of their garden showing the apparent existence of fairies. The photographs created quite a buzz for many years, contributed in part by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle who took an interest in the photo's and thought they proved the existence of fairies once and for all. Does it make sense that the author of Sherlock Holmes, the most intelligent, logical, critical thinking famous detective of all time would believe in Fairies? It does when you consider two things, first, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was actually a spiritualist and second, Sherlock Holmes was a fictional character created by Doyle who of course also invented the crimes that our great detective solved in the first place, to attribute the traits of Holmes to the author is therefore a mistake. The photo's would continue to pop up throughout the years and although generally accepted by most as fakes the ladies insisted that the fairies were real right up to the 1980's. Shortly before their deaths they finally admitted the fraud and how they produced the photographs. The 'Fairies' were simple cut-outs from a 1914 children's book held in place with hat pins. proceeding with false assumptionsWe need to make assumptions to function normally every single day of our lives as James Randi once pointed out. When sitting down on a sofa you don't check it first to make sure its not been switched by a fake one made of jelly, no you make the safe assumption its a normal sofa. When crossing a road you assume its a normal road and not a sticky glue that will hold you in place only to get squished by an oncoming bus. We need this ability to be able to function normally but sometimes we can be very very wrong. If you have noted my photo (not a pretty sight) you yourself may have already made assumptions about me. The first assumption you might have made was that I wear glasses....I don't and I couldn't even see the images on my PC screen while I was wearing them, secondly you may not even have considered that the teeth gnawing at my pen in the photo are in fact fake teeth that fit over my real ones...the assumption was made subconsciously that they were real. Not a major revelation I know but it proves that we automatically make rational logical assumptions. If you are walking through a woodland park and you hear flapping of wings above your head you assume that it is probably a bird perhaps a Robin or something similar. That would be such a safe assumption that we 'normal folks' wouldn't even bother looking up, however others may conclude that it might be a rare parrot of some kind never before seen in the country...it's possible but let's face it highly unlikely. Then you have the last batch of people who hear the flapping and would conclude that it was probably an angel watching over them or the last undiscovered Dodo. When I am alone in the house at night and I hear a noise in the house I make the pretty safe assumption that it is the boiler, the cats or maybe next door crashing around but I do not automatically assume it's a ghost or any other paranormal event....but so many people, who are normally quite intelligent logical thinking folks will jump straight to that bizarre conclusion. Similarly we see the likes of Uri Geller, Jonathon Edwards and Sylvia Brown on our TV sets and because they appear to be very successful rich and famous Psychics the assumption is made that they must be genuine. In the same way we see old film footage of Russian experiments where subjects seem to be moving compasses and other objects using only their mind and because it appears to be set in a controlled environment the assumption is made that it must be genuine. They are not genuine and here then begins my cause. |
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