"Religious" experiences you've had that are unprov

[Lagmonster]

To quote Winston Zeddemore of the Ghostbusters, I've seen shit that would turn you white. I've seen a fork fly off a level table and skid across the floor but I haven't seen anything that I couldn't explain.

Bizarre paranormal events fall, in my amateur opinion, into two categories:

1) Shit that your brain made up. You might have seen something fleetingly, while drunk or tired or even asleep, and your brain reinvented it for your entertainment pleasure, or to run parallel to whatever you believe in (which is why Christians see visions of Jesus, Hindus get visions of their own gods, etc. for every other religion).

2) Shit that your brain didn't make up, but that you don't know enough about your environment, physics, chemistry, or biology to explain on your own (and, possibly, that nobody will be able to trace your steps and discover an explanation for due to the uniqueness of the environmental conditions which caused your phenomenon)

[Dakarne]

I'd add more, but I'm probably more of an Amateur.

[Rye]

I've had 2 honest to weirdness "paranormal" experiences, but nothing religious beyond wonder at the natural world.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

Why should someone "be very careful" with Tarot? Or for that matter, reading tea leaves or any other fortune telling. All of these things are no more or less valid that any particular religious belief, astrology or divination.

Because what you ask for you may not want to know. Say you ask the cards to predict how well a business presentation will go. You may get the tower card - a card that signify disaster. With this knowledge, you may loose all confidence in the presentation and cause the presentation to become a disaster.

Except isn't what you deal in Tarot open to interpretation? Only someone who believes in the validity of Tarot would blow a presentation based on a card draw.

Divination is a hard to pull off, and what you discover may not happen. Life is like a tree - there are many branches that one can take that will alter what you encounter. It's essentionally Terry Prachett's Trousers of Time concept. A person could predict what could happen to him/her in the near future. With that knowledge he/she can could change their destination when they come upon a choice of which branch to follow.

Or a person may not actually be predicting events. They could either believe that they did so, because they believe in the stuff, so a random card draw causes them to become self-conscious and approaching things with trepidation, where they might've charged forward and done things differently. That, or they are suffering from selective memory and confirmation bias, where they're remembering and hyping-up the random coincidences, while forgetting the all the misses. This is also an example of a post-hoc fallacy, where one fallaciously assumes causality between two events in a sequence.

I view the tarot as magick. Specificate tarot cards can be used to focus on a particular god. When I started using tarot cards, I had asked the gods which card best represent them. Then one of my scary moments with tarot cards happened.

I scattered my cards face down and moved them around randomly, making it totally unpredicatable to choose a specificate card on purpose. I perfer this method of picking cards. The first card I picked was to represent the Goddess Daes. I picked up the Justice card, a card associated with balance and justice. From what I know of Daes already, I know she strived for balance in everything, because when on side becomes too powerful, the other(s) suffer. For God Old Grey Wolf, I picked the Lovers. Old Grey Wolf devotes himself to his mate, Goddess White Wolf. The third, and last card I picked, was the Ace of Pentacles. A card signifying intelligence and content. Goddess White Wolf is a very intelligent hunter, and she is content with her mate.

Ok, that may not sound so scary, but its hair raising to pick these cards that signifies the gods I follow so well from what is essentionally, chaos.

This is subjective validation, since you seem to have shoehorned random cards you picked up into something that was personally meaningful to you. Also, this is one experience. As an outside observer, I would ask "Well, how many other times did you pitch the cards and come up with something meaningful? And do you have a record of those results?"

Tarot cards don't have to used to just ask questions. They can be used to call up elementals and spirits, other beings, as well as perform magick rituals, curse people, and other stuff. Kind of like a Ouija Board, but less dangerous as you have more control in what you do. Also, you must always give thanks to any spirit, elemental, god or other being that helped you in your reading, no matter what the result, as you really do not want to piss them off.

The million dollar challenge.

As always, when confronting this sort of mysticism, I feel compelled to point out that the James Randi Foundation is offering a million dollar prize to anyone who can demonstrate paranormal powers in a controlled scientific test.

[Andrew J.]

I've noticed some weird coincidences, but it's probably just synchronicity.

[sketerpot]

I scattered my cards face down and moved them around randomly, making it totally unpredicatable to choose a specificate card on purpose. I perfer this method of picking cards. The first card I picked was to represent the Goddess Daes. I picked up the Justice card, a card associated with balance and justice. From what I know of Daes already, I know she strived for balance in everything, because when on side becomes too powerful, the other(s) suffer. For God Old Grey Wolf, I picked the Lovers. Old Grey Wolf devotes himself to his mate, Goddess White Wolf. The third, and last card I picked, was the Ace of Pentacles. A card signifying intelligence and content. Goddess White Wolf is a very intelligent hunter, and she is content with her mate.

I played with an I Ching set a few years ago, rolling those funny little sticks in the way the instruction booklet recommended and dutifully looking up the interpretation of what my fortune would be. The description fit. Then I did it again, and got a different description. The description fit. I repeated this several times, and each time the description was sufficiently vague that it fit.

You see a similar thing with astrology. The predictions are so vague that you can stretch them to make sense. If you don't realize what's going on, it can be pretty spooky.

By the way, this is an anecdotal restatement of what GrandMasterTerwynn said about subjective validation.

[AntarDragon]

You shouldn't ask the same question in a short period of time when doing divination. Multiple answers will only give you a mixed results.

In tarot, and I expect in other methods of divination, each card has several meanings, which varies from person to person, as well as the question and how the cards are spread/layed out.

I don't know about Ching, but there are over 70 different tarot cards. All of them have multiple and in some cases, similar meanings.

If you really want to test divination, don't ask the same question all the time. Try asking, say three different future prediction questions and see if the results happen. For example, you could ask for a overall weekly prediction of the next month, a simple three card prediction (past, present and future), and a prediction of say, how well your favourite sport team will do in the next competion/league/whatever.

Oh, and practicing divination requires you to have faith in what you are doing. There's no point in doing this if your skeptical. Oh, and you could ask for the help of any dieties you happen to believe in, or any nearby elementals and spirits.

[Vendetta]

You shouldn't ask the same question in a short period of time when doing divination. Multiple answers will only give you a mixed results..

Doesn't the fact that you can get 'mixed results' in the first place kind of tip you off that the whole thing is a mighty pile of steaming bullshit?

If you are, in fact, 'divining the future', then you should get the same results.

[Zero]

You can find the good or the bad in any amount of time, really. You're likely experiencing positive confirmation bias.

[The Spartan]

Oh, and practicing divination requires you to have faith in what you are doing. There's no point in doing this if your skeptical.

In other words it's not objective. It is, in fact, a self-fulfilling prophecy, at best. It's worded vaguely enough that you can read into it whatever you like.

Reminds me of a line from the movie Dragonslayer, "They never do tests. Not many real deeds either. Oh, conversation with your grandmother's shade in a darkened room, the odd love potion or two, but comes a doubter, why, then it's the wrong day, the planets are not in line, the entrails are not favorable, 'we don't do tests!'"

[AntarDragon]

Except isn't what you deal in Tarot open to interpretation? Only someone who believes in the validity of Tarot would blow a presentation based on a card draw.

Correct. Each tarot card have several meanings, and the interpretation of each differs from person to person. If you want to get a successful reading, then you need to believe that tarot works. Yet if I did a reading for someone, that person doesn't nessicary need to believe in divination, but I'd expect it helps. A person could have got a reading from someone and still muck up the presentation even if he thinks he's going to get it right.

This is subjective validation, since you seem to have shoehorned random cards you picked up into something that was personally meaningful to you. Also, this is one experience. As an outside observer, I would ask "Well, how many other times did you pitch the cards and come up with something meaningful? And do you have a record of those results?"

Well, what can I say to make you believe that I didn't choose the meanings that best suit them? You only have my word that I choose these three cards that match the gods so well. In fact, looking at every card in the deck, those three cards are the ones that have the greatist signifince with those three gods. Plain luck? Maybe.

As for the results of the prediction of a year, I haven't got round to looking it up yet. I'll post the results tomorrow.

The million dollar challenge.

As always, when confronting this sort of mysticism, I feel compelled to point out that the James Randi Foundation is offering a million dollar prize to anyone who can demonstrate paranormal powers in a controlled scientific test.

Hmm, interesting. I'll look into this tomorrow. I could do with £500,000.

[sketerpot]

You shouldn't ask the same question in a short period of time when doing divination. Multiple answers will only give you a mixed results.

If divination is valid, then you should get consistent results without needing to tack on some bullshit explanation saying "that's just the way divination is, but it's still valid".

If divination is just a combination of random chance, broadly interpretable answers, and someone who has enough faith in it to interpret the answers to be "correct", then you would expect to see multiple answers give mixed results which can all be stretched to fit. Occam's razor, anyone?

In tarot, and I expect in other methods of divination, each card has several meanings, which varies from person to person, as well as the question and how the cards are spread/layed out.

That gives you leeway to interpret, which is necessary for divination to seem plausuble to anybody. After all, what good would fortune cookies be if they told you that you were going to stub your toe in three days? If they get too specific, then their predictions can be proven wrong easily.

I don't know about Ching, but there are over 70 different tarot cards. All of them have multiple and in some cases, similar meanings.

They're similar in that respect.

If you really want to test divination, don't ask the same question all the time. Try asking, say three different future prediction questions and see if the results happen. For example, you could ask for a overall weekly prediction of the next month, a simple three card prediction (past, present and future), and a prediction of say, how well your favourite sport team will do in the next competion/league/whatever.

The problem is that the predictions are so damn vague you can reinterpret them after the fact if they didn't turn out right, and they're likely to turn out decently no matter what question you ask. Check out this "psychic reading":

You can be a very considerate person, very quick to provide for others, but there are times, if you are honest, when you recognize a selfish streak in yourself. I would say that on the whole you can be rather quiet, self-effacing type, but when the circumstances are right, you can be quite the life of the party if the mood strikes you. Sometimes you are too honest about your feelings and you reveal too much of yourself. You are good at thinking things through and you like to see proof before you change your mind about anything. When you find yourself in a new situation you are very cautious until you find out what's going on, and then you begin to act with confidence.

What I get here is that you are someone who can generally be trusted. Not a saint, not perfect, but let's just say that when it really matters this is someone who does understand the importance of being trustworthy. You know how to be a good friend.

You are able to discipline yourself so that you seem in control to others, but actually you sometimes feel somewhat insecure. You wish you could be a little more popular and at ease in your interpersonal relationships than you are now.

You are wise in the ways of the world, a wisdom gained through hard experience rather than book learning.

Look at that, and tell me: does that sound like it could be a profile of you? Several people thought it described them perfectly when Michael Shermer tried it out on them, despite the fact that he used it on all of them. Tarot cards are similarly vague.

Oh, and practicing divination requires you to have faith in what you are doing. There's no point in doing this if your skeptical. Oh, and you could ask for the help of any dieties you happen to believe in, or any nearby elementals and spirits.

Back when I tried the I Ching thing, I was superstitious enough to believe in it.

What I find interesting is that you're practically coming out and saying that divination doesn't work without confirmation bias. Can it be the evil Skeptic Field driving away the deities, elementals, and spirits?

[Darth Wong]

Hmm, interesting. I'll look into this tomorrow. I could do with £500,000.

You haven't got a clue how high the bar is set for legitimate repeatable scientific observations, do you? The standards that you are accustomed to would not be sufficient for the janitorial staff at Randi's foundation.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

Let's translate this to rational-speak...

You shouldn't ask the same question in a short period of time when doing divination. Multiple answers will only give you a mixed results.

In other words, what you're seeing is the inherently random nature of trying to predict the future using a deck of cards. Instead of realizing that this is random and has no merit as a method of prediction whatsoever, you instead choose to say "You shouldn't ask the same question in a short period of time..."

In tarot, and I expect in other methods of divination, each card has several meanings, which varies from person to person, as well as the question and how the cards are spread/layed out.

In other words, it is entirely subjective. Not to mention the interpretations can be so vague that you can fit a given deal to practically anything you choose. Not only is this subjective validation, but an example of the Forer Effect, where people pick out things and cling to things that apply to them from a generic reading that, to the objective observer, could apply to anyone and their pet dog.

I don't know about Ching, but there are over 70 different tarot cards. All of them have multiple and in some cases, similar meanings.

In other words, there are so many possible meanings and card combinations, that you're liable to come up with a combination that fits through sheer dumb luck alone!

If you really want to test divination, don't ask the same question all the time. Try asking, say three different future prediction questions and see if the results happen. For example, you could ask for a overall weekly prediction of the next month, a simple three card prediction (past, present and future), and a prediction of say, how well your favourite sport team will do in the next competion/league/whatever.

"I can't ask the same question, otherwise the random nature of a Tarot prediction would be revealed for all to see."

Oh, and practicing divination requires you to have faith in what you are doing. There's no point in doing this if your skeptical. Oh, and you could ask for the help of any dieties you happen to believe in, or any nearby elementals and spirits.

This is the same response one expects from a lot of practicers of this mystical New Age superstitious bullshit. "Oh, but it won't work if you don't have faith in it!!!!"

Well, of course it won't work if you're skeptical of it. That's because the skeptic can easily see that the practicer of Tarot is relying on the vague and subjective nature of his or her interpretation the cards to try to pry something out of what is inherently a random exercise, and relies on the ignorance of the person who is recieving the reading. It is wishful thinking and self-deception at best, and outright fraud, flummory, and quackery at the worst.

Real predictive tools work whether or not you have faith in them. For example, an astronomical ephemeris will just as reliably predict the next solar eclipse whether you're an astronomer, or an ignoramus who believes an enormous monster eats the Sun, and you have to get it back by shooting AK-47s into the air. Weather forecasts are reasonably accurate regardless of whether you're a meteorologist, or someone who believes that God makes weather by opening up the heavenly floodgates.

[AntarDragon]

You haven't got a clue how high the bar is set for legitimate repeatable scientific observations, do you? The standards that you are accustomed to would not be sufficient for the janitorial staff at Randi's foundation.

I was being humourist. I've heard about the challenge before and I know no one has passed it at all (yet). Anyway, I don't know how they do the challenge - I've only looked at the website for five minutes.

Thinking about it last night, I'm wondering how it would actually work. Anyway, I'll look into it at a later date.

[Darth Wong]

You haven't got a clue how high the bar is set for legitimate repeatable scientific observations, do you? The standards that you are accustomed to would not be sufficient for the janitorial staff at Randi's foundation.

I was being humourist. I've heard about the challenge before and I know no one has passed it at all (yet). Anyway, I don't know how they do the challenge - I've only looked at the website for five minutes.

Thinking about it last night, I'm wondering how it would actually work. Anyway, I'll look into it at a later date.

The fact that you have no idea what controlled scientific observation means is a pretty severe indictment of your claims already. Why do you need to "look into it" to figure out what that means?

[AntarDragon]

I'm not good at arguing, nor explaining things properly. I'm very pissed off at this time because its quite hard for me to type what I'm thinking into a reply.

As for the predictions I made earlier this year, hah, I can't put what I discovered here. I made a very stupid mistake when I wrote them down. Instead of what I gathered from the cards, I only wrote down what cards appeared in what order. Nor did I write down the exact answer I asked. I'm not trying to backtrack out of what I've already said. Without the question, I can not read what the answer is supposed to be (nor can I guess the question and see what the cards say - as I haven't written down what I found out, I could be biased in my reading if I used the cards I did earlier this year). More fuel for the skeptics.

So it seems the only way I can show divination at work is by doing some at this present time.

[Lagmonster]

So it seems the only way I can show divination at work is by doing some at this present time.

You're going to need a hell of a mouthwash to clean out all that bullshit you're talking.

Why not, instead of stating that diviniation can work and giving a litany of convenient excuses why it might fail, explain what makes it work when you think it does, the mechanisms behind it, etc.. I'd be tickled to hear your reasoning. In my experience, hearing a self-proclaimed mystic explain their powers and how they work makes for far better listening than the fortune itself.

[AntarDragon]

I'll shall do so.

[Magnetic]

Let's not look at this topic in terms of "religious". I suppose that I shouldn't have added that word to the thread title. Though I did put it in quotes, it may still appear to be me asking for religious types of instances. Things that are obviously NON-religious would be of great interest to me, too. In other words, ANYTHING that can't be explained by the scientific method. So an "explaination of the mechanisms for divination", if still not scientifically explainable would work.

I don't necessarily believe in UFO's (beings from another planet), but even weird UFO type phenomenon would be of interest as well.

Thanks guys/gals. It has been an interesting thread so far, but even so, I haven't really seen anything that peaked my interest/reasons as of yet.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

I'm not good at arguing, nor explaining things properly. I'm very pissed off at this time because its quite hard for me to type what I'm thinking into a reply.

As for the predictions I made earlier this year, hah, I can't put what I discovered here. I made a very stupid mistake when I wrote them down. Instead of what I gathered from the cards, I only wrote down what cards appeared in what order. Nor did I write down the exact answer I asked. I'm not trying to backtrack out of what I've already said.

Well, you know what they say: If it looks like a duck, waddles like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it sure as hell ain't a horse.

Without the question, I can not read what the answer is supposed to be (nor can I guess the question and see what the cards say - as I haven't written down what I found out, I could be biased in my reading if I used the cards I did earlier this year). More fuel for the skeptics.

Well, you're right. Us ZOMG EVIL!!!!11 skeptics are going to use this against your claims that Tarot is actually worth something as a predictive tool, since you cannot derive your previous predictions from previous data.

So it seems the only way I can show divination at work is by doing some at this present time.

No, the only way you can show divination at work is to do it within the context of a controlled double-blind test. Where we attempt to minimize all unknowns, and establish specific criteria for success. Those of us observing the results, and you, must agree upon the protocols beforehand.

[Darth Wong]

Let's not look at this topic in terms of "religious". I suppose that I shouldn't have added that word to the thread title. Though I did put it in quotes, it may still appear to be me asking for religious types of instances. Things that are obviously NON-religious would be of great interest to me, too. In other words, ANYTHING that can't be explained by the scientific method. So an "explaination of the mechanisms for divination", if still not scientifically explainable would work.

You mean "hasn't been explained yet". We still don't know what dark matter is (there's a mystery), but that doesn't mean we leap to a supernatural "explanation".

[Magnetic]

Let's not look at this topic in terms of "religious". I suppose that I shouldn't have added that word to the thread title. Though I did put it in quotes, it may still appear to be me asking for religious types of instances. Things that are obviously NON-religious would be of great interest to me, too. In other words, ANYTHING that can't be explained by the scientific method. So an "explaination of the mechanisms for divination", if still not scientifically explainable would work.

You mean "hasn't been explained yet". We still don't know what dark matter is (there's a mystery), but that doesn't mean we leap to a supernatural "explanation".

That is true. What we would consider to be unexplainable today may very well be discovered later in the future. What was once considered to be 'magic' has been proven as natural, as science has come to understand, and as technology assists.

I actually do have good reasoning for this thread. It is a hypothesis I'm working on personally.

[Magnetic]

Anyone else care to chime in on an experience?

If you don't want to give it on this thread and would not be opposed to PM-ing it to me, then that would work as well.

[Magnetic]

I've had 2 honest to weirdness "paranormal" experiences, but nothing religious beyond wonder at the natural world.

Rye, would you care to explain those 2 experiences here, or on PM? If so, I'd appreciate it.