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Do psychics believe their own claims?
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Do psychics believe their own claims? Setting aside for a moment the question of whether psychic gifts are real, the question is not as cynical as it might seem. Many westerners sincerely believe in psychic gifts, and most of those have a story about something that happened for which they have no other explanation than that it was a paranormal event.
Fewer people actually claim to have psychic powers, and fewer still make money off of these claims. The question here pertains to this latter group, the people like Sylvia Browne, John Edward, and Rosemary Altea, who make thousands, or perhaps millions, by convincing others they have abilities for which there is no fact-based evidence.
Is it possible these psychics believe at some level that their gifts are real?
It seems likely that they do not always believe, and this is probably true of most world views. A very popular Examiner said in a recent article, “We are all atheists, we are all radicals, we are all lonely children”
His meaning, if it is not self-evident, was that every believer doubts from time to time, and I suspect he also meant that most unbelievers sometimes find themselves believing. If true, this would mean that even the most devout psychic questions his or her ability from time to time.
Certainly, they seem to question each other’s abilities. Psychic Rosemary Altea, whose own credibility has been questioned, slammed Sylvia Browne for claiming abilities she did not have.
John Edward, after listening to two psychic colleagues expound on the spiritual awakening arising from, among other things, the spread of electric lighting across the globe, had this to say: “I’ve been involved in the metaphysics for the past twenty-five years and I have absolutely no idea what either one of you two people are talking about.” The audience laughs at this, and the conversation continues, undeterred by Edward’s apparent doubts. It would seem, then, that doubts are not unusual in the psychic community, even among its most famous members.
Is it possible, however, that those same psychics somehow convince themselves that some of their own claims are real? Perhaps they persuade themselves that, even if all of their predictions and readings are not entirely true, they are somehow “doing good” by providing comfort to the berieved. It would certainly be an unattractive reflection on human nature if they were able to build lives and careers around gifts and abilities that they fully understood had no grounding in truth.
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