The challenge we offered to Sally, which she did not take up, is still open – if at any point Sally feels that demonstrating to her critics, and indeed to her fans, that the services she sells are genuine, she need only get in contact and we’ll happily arrange for the test to take place. Collaborating with the JREF, we had the test set up as an official preliminary test for their $1m challenge, and a future test for Sally would fall under a similarly official remit.

Each Halloween, we intend to give those with paranormal claims the opportunity to demonstrate what they believe they are able to do. More details of the focus of next year’s challenge will be announced late next year.

Below you can watch the press conference we held, including talks from Simon Singh, Chris French and myself.

Part 1: Introduction from Mike Hall, and talk from Dr Simon Singh:

Part 2: Talk from Prof Chris French

Part 3: Prof Chris French Q&A

Part 4: Talk from Michael Marshall and Q&A

Note: Although it shouldn’t need to be pointed out, it’s worth clarifying that the Merseyside Skeptics Society don’t condone or support people publishing contact details for Sally, her office, her lawyers or anyone, nor do we support anyone sending her abusive phone calls or emails (if indeed anyone has done this). Our challenge was offered in an open and respectful way – we wish Sally no personal harm, we just want to establish whether the extraordinary claims she makes and the wholly-unproven services she sells are genuine, or not.

In the first half, in a pained and distressed voice, Sally linked to a spirit who had committed suicide. She linked the spirit with a woman in the audience. She then proceeded to explain that the deceased man had tried to commit suicide four times. This was news to the woman in the audience. Sally also said that the spirit was “furious at the reason” he had to commit suicide. Not only does the woman in audience have to consider telling her family that their deceased relative is still angry, but she also has to explain that they might have missed three previous attempts at suicide, which could be interpreted as three cries for help that were ignored by his family and friends.

In the second half, Sally spoke to another woman in the audience and revealed that her uncle had drowned many years ago. As far as her family were concerned, the uncle had gone abroad as a boy to live with relatives and had never returned to Britain, but now Sally was filling in the gaps by introducing a tragic event. She had also removed any hope that the relative might still be alive. Again, it is easy to imagine how such a message could cause upset within a family. Indeed, it is quite possible (based on something else that was mentioned by the woman in the audience) that the elderly mother of the deceased boy is still alive. She might now have to cope with this revelation.

Scary stuff. Scary, but unfortunately not uncommon, as Simon goes on to point out:

The impression I get from others who see Sally’s shows is that a spirit who committed suicide is a fairly standard part of the show. (Of course, Sally has no control over which spirits will choose to speak to her.)

It may well be that suicide victims are disproportionately likely to be drawn to a genuine psychic. Or, it may well be that those who have lost a loved one to suicide find it exceptionally hard to deal with their grief, seeking out ‘psychics’ to offer some scant and empty comfort for their loss. And it may well be that a non-genuine psychic would be well aware of the particular vulnerability of someone whose loved one committed suicide, and will therefore play the odds by ensuring at least one suicide connection per show – be it an open question of ‘I’m sensing someone lost someone close to suicide’, a vague hint with ‘and, in some ways, he was partly to blame for his death, wasn’t he?’, or even through a good old-fashioned hot reading (where the psychic has read for the sitter before, and invites them along to the theatre show to ‘connect’ with their loved one further – feeding back snippets of past readings amongst unremarkable details, astonishing the rest of the audience with their insight).

It is, of course, impossible to tell how Sally Morgan’s regular claims to contact the spirits of suicide victims come about – we can but speculate. However, what we can do is put Sally’s wider claims to the test – can she really contact the dead? Do the spirits of the deceased really reach out to her?

Regular followers of the Guardian online will already have read that Simon Singh is working with us to devise just such a test for Sally. Very soon we’ll be offering Sally the opportunity to silence her many critics, and demonstrate that communication with the deceased is indeed possible. More details to come very soon – watch this space.

Detractors claim that Project Barnum is illiberal and seeks to censor those they disagree with.  Supporters say that it is about consumer protection, preventing the unscrupulous (or even merely misguided) from making money by telling people they can do things that they can’t.

Parallels have been drawn, by both sides, with the 10:23 Campaign.  Critics of 10:23 similarly claimed the campaign was illiberal, and supporters claimed that it was about consumer protection, preventing the unscrupulous (or even merely misguided) from making money by telling people their pills can do things that they can’t.

The aims of 10:23 have evolved since the campaign was first launched.  Then and now, the campaign sought to raise public awareness about homeopathy, what it is, how we know it doesn’t work, and why people should care.  But during its initial phase, 10:23 also asked Boots the Chemist to stop selling homeopathic products because, as best anyone can tell, they cannot do what they claim.

Responding to the campaign, Boots justified the sale of homeopathy by pointing out that the NHS also offers homeopathy, and by claiming that they were offering ‘patient choice’.  For these reasons, and others, the focus of the campaign shifted to these two areas.

I do not believe that encouraging Boots to stop selling homeopathy is illiberal.  Boots is not obliged to sell every pill and potion in the world, and if I were to turn up at Boots head office with Mike’s Marvellous Medicine™, the company would have every right to tell me to sling my hook.  Would that be illiberal?  I think we would be hard-pressed to argue that it would.

Indeed, the recent Theo Paphitis-fronted BBC series Britain’s Next Big Thing featured entrepreneurs attempting to hawk their wares, X Factor-style, to Boots’ buying department.  Was Boots being illiberal in rejecting the products pitched to them?  Should we lambast them for denying access to those products?

Of course not.

As a commercial enterprise, Boots is entitled to stock any product it chooses, for any arbitrary reason.  If they decide tomorrow to take up selling used cars, they could.  Nor are they being illiberal by refusing to sell used cars.  Currently, for whatever reason, Boots has decided it wants to sell homeopathy.  I would argue, as did the 10:23 Campaign, that they are wrong to do that.  I don’t mean legally wrong, of course.  They have the right to sell any product for any reason.  But I believe that a company like Boots should put patients first, and stock only those products for which there is rigorous evidence.  This is not currently Boots policy, but 10:23 would like it to be.  And so they attempted to persuade Boots to change its mind.

Clearly, Boots were not persuaded and they continue to stock homeopathy.  But what if we had succeeded?  What if the top brass at Boots had looked at 10:23 and thought, “you know, they’re right, we shouldn’t sell this stuff if it doesn’t work”.  Would that have been illiberal?  Would it have been any more illiberal than Boots rejecting products pitched on Britain’s Next Big Thing, or not selling used cars?

Boots are still entitled to stock any product they choose.  And 10:23 is entitled to think they’re wrong to stock homeopathy and to attempt to persuade them of that.

This is not illiberal.  This is free speech.

And so we come to Project Barnum.  Like the 10:23 Campaign, Project Barnum seeks to raise awareness.  In this case, awareness of how psychic frauds operate, what magic tricks they use, and how to spot them.  Like 10:23, Project Barnum is encouraging vendors to stop selling these products.  It is asking theatre owners to stop booking self-described psychic acts because, as best anyone can tell, they cannot do what they claim.

Like Boots, theatre owners are not obliged to book every act on the circuit.  If I were to turn up at the MEN Arena with Mike’s Marvellous Stand-Up Act™, the company would have every right to sling my hook.  If they decide tomorrow to book the South Dorset Primary School Nativity, they could.  They are not being illiberal by refusing to book South Dorset Primary School Nativity.

Currently, for whatever reason, theatres are booking psychic acts.  I would argue, as does Project Barnum, that they are wrong to do that.  Not legally wrong, of course, they have the right to book any act for any reason.  But I believe that theatres should refuse to book acts which defraud their audience.  This is not currently theatre policy, but Project Barnum would like it to be.  And so they are attempting to change some minds.

If the top brass at a major theatre chain looks at Project Barnum and thinks, “you know, they’re right, we shouldn’t book performers who defraud our audiences”, would that be illiberal?  Would it be any more illiberal than the same theatre rejecting the South Dorset Primary School Nativity?

Theatres are still entitled to book any act they choose.  Project Barnum is entitled to think they’re wrong to book psychics and to attempt to persuade them of that.

This is not illiberal.  This is free speech.

In the interests of transparency, I would like to declare the following conflicts of interest.  I am one of the founders and coordinators of the 10:23 Campaign.  I have a tangential relationship with Project Barnum, who have sought (and were given) my advice on their campaign.  I also consider those currently coordinating Project Barnum to be friends.

Lori Neill is a former occupational nurse in Colorado Springs, who recently resigned from her job. She is also, she believes, psychic. And she believes those two facts are related, and I’m inclined to agree, though doubtlessly for very different reasons.

Lori’s story is that her psychic abilities made her supervisors uncomfortable, and that on the occasion she had told her supervisor he might be suffering from a life-threatening illness, and that he should seek medical help, he was so angered that he made up allegations about her, to force her out of work.

Officials at the hospital and city, however, tell a different story. They have accused Lori of accessing the medical records of around 2,500 patients. Given that Lori worked not for the hospital but for the city, they argue she had no medical need to look at those records. Especially given that most of the accessing happened outside of work hours. Their implication is that Lori is not actually psychic, or able to spiritually intuit the illnesses of people by tuning into the other side (where diagnosticians are ten a penny, I’d presume). They claim instead that the reason she was able to accurately tell people what ailments had befallen them, was that she’d read their medical records.

Of course, Lori denies this entirely, stating that she did not check medical records in order to fake psychic ability. Not at all. The reason she accessed the encrypted and protected database was to check the phone number of a friend of hers, whose number she’d misplaced, which she claims is routine practice. Oh, and to check her supervisor’s record, so as to see if he’d sought the help she’d recommended for the life-threatening condition she definitely knew about before she checked a record of any life-threatening conditions he might have. Presumable the other 2498 records she viewed were in error. Maybe her cat sat on her keyboard at an inopportune time.

So which is it – a paranoid and creeped-out hospital supervisor pressurising a worker caught innocently checking a phone number in 2500 private medical records she had no right to view, or a phony psychic caught in the act of hot reading for having the balls to hot-read her boss’s records? Without further evidence, or the ability to speak to Lori, it’s impossible to tell. But Neill smells a rat. Quoting the Colorado Gazette:

Niell, who said she has had three near-death experiences, said she was often able to get a psychic reading from people she was around. Once, she said, she was recognized by the city after correctly warning a patient he was close to a heart attack and advised him to seek immediate treatment.

“The city gave me a plaque for life-saving intervention,” she said. “They liked it when it worked for them but didn’t like it when I made them uncomfortable.”

Personally, it seems a lot more likely to me that the ‘personal reasons’ she’d been accessing 2500 patients’ information, and the fact that she admits she’d been writing a book about her psychic skills – this all would suggest that she’s a hot reading psychic way more than an innocent. Gather enough testimonies and accounts of correct predictions of past illnesses (remembered from having actually read an account of the past illness), and you’re more than on the way to becoming psychic. That’s not to be too harsh on Lori – perhaps she believed in her ability, perhaps from the one time she did correctly diagnose a potential problem, earning her a plaque. I’ve little surprise that an occupational nurse might be able to notice symptoms of a pending heart attack – or even get dumb lucky in predicting one, once. I certainly don’t need to leap to psychic powers to explain it, and nor should anyone else.

The article continues:

She suspects the city made her case public because officials are worried about information she has from a deceased city employee who has been speaking to her from beyond the grave.

“It’s a power play,” she said. “They are showing me how strong they are. I know for a fact that they are pushing me because there is a dead city employee with important information who I have access to.”

She would not elaborate on the name of the dead employee or the type of information she had.

As for the conspiracy angle – if she does have something to go on, why make it public that she has something and not say what it is, at this point? It’s a classic diversionary tactic, muddying waters to hide the fact she got caught with her hand in the database.

One thing this whole affair did make me think, though – if there actually WERE psychics, how would we cope with things like doctor patient confidentiality, information privacy and the like? At a time when listening to people’s voicemails is bringing down major newspapers, it does make me wonder why, if we’re really to believe that people are capable of tuning in to people’s thoughts for real, there aren’t more psychics either a) in jail for invasion of privacy, or b) working for News International.

Get your QED ticket now!

(I’d just like to point out that this story is sponsored by Schadenfreude – for all your laughing-at-people-who’ve-gotten-their-comeuppance needs)

This is actually a story that’s been covered in many other places, including by Steve Novella, and I wasn’t going to add to that… but then I saw a few people on Twitter actively saying they were looking forward to what I had to say about it, so how could I disappoint?

So, three guesses which lovable Liverpudlian fraud I’m going to talk about now? That’s right – Joe ‘just popping to your toilet‘ Power. And, to be clear, I can say fraud, as Joe’s served time in the past for fraud. Oh, and ABH, of course. Nice, friendly Joe Power. I’m not saying any of his act involves fraud at all. But then again, I don’t need to, given the fact that Joe Power’s career is going to pieces so fast that people are getting hit by the bullshit shrapnel.

That’s because Joe, as has been extensively covered, had an Edinburgh fringe show throughout the month of August. Things kicked off on a pretty bad foot, you’ll remember, at the Assembly gala – a curtain-opener of an event where fringe acts go on and do 5 minutes of material to demo their show – where Joe Power seemed curiously Powerless.

As the BBC blog reports, he made 2 big mistakes – the first was playing to a room full of people there to see comedy, not bullshit. They didn’t like it when they got the latter, so they provided the former by booing and heckling. The second mistake was to do with the target Joe picked out… looking around the room, he began to connect with a spirit, saying:

“I see Pertoski, Prokoski, Petreski…”, he began.

Of course, in the audience, right by the front was London PR guru Mark Borkowski… who’s book The Fame Formula actually covered the relationship between psychics and publishers, and who’d had a show at Edinburgh the previous year. So, something of a recognisable face then, metres from the front of the audience. Who Joe just happened to try and connect with… massively against Borkowsky’s wishes. As Mark sat stony-faced trying not to get involved, Joe ‘The Power’ Power continued, insisting on “a father in the spirit world, trying to say sorry to his two sons”. Which was a huge miss. Cue a shitstorm of heckling and a quick retreat from the stage.

So, how did Joe ‘does my sister live near here’ Power respond? He blamed the skeptics. After all, he’s had trouble with skeptics before…

“Since the Derren Brown programme I have had threats and had to move home”.

Funny, the only reference he’s ever made to threats turned out to be a lie about me, which the police dismissed out of hand.

“So I was expecting the sceptics at the Assembly launch night but I didn’t think it would be as bad as it was because anything people do should be respected”

That’s right, Joe ‘skeptics are paedophiles’ Power believes that anything people do should be respected. Oh the irony. Oh the fail.

“I only had five minutes to go on stage, say who I am and do a quick connection with someone in the audience. If you are a comedian you are alright because you know what you are going to say but mine’s a live act. I went home that night and told my wife it had gone badly. It is good to have criticism but that kind of bad behaviour should not happen in a venue. My mistake was that I didn’t have the lights on so I couldn’t see the recipient in the audience. I need response and dialogue to keep the energy.”

So Joe needs to be able to see people to pick up on their energy? That’s funny, his website sells psychic reading over the phone at £1.50 per minute, and via text message at the rate of up to £3 per reply (more on this in a future blog).

Still, that’s what happens when Joe ‘John Lennon wants peace’ Power plays a room full of ‘skeptics’ – for which you can read people who don’t believe he’s talking to the dead, which is pretty much anyone who’s ever seen him pretend to talk to the dead. But how does his luck fare in front of a more forgiving and believing, and more well-lit audience? Well, the reviews weren’t so good… with many skeptical or comic blogs tearing Joe’s stage act to pieces.

However, most interesting in my opinion is the review in The Edinburgh Spotlight, who actually gave him enough benefit of the doubt to send a supposedly “REAL” medium to see his act and pass verdict – so we’re talking here about someone who actually believes SOMEONE can do what Joe claims to do – and the results were equally scathing:

Joe doesn’t look to any spirit world as he channels messages, he looks direct into the audience. In a Scouse voice, he tells the audience to put up their hands if anything sounds familiar and the audience are here in the hope that they will get a message from a loved one. Joe’s starting message is to a row of ‘older’ women in the front and he asks if their parents are in the spirit world. Without meaning to be rude about their ages, even I could have told you that their parents were no longer in this world.

The women reply no to all the information he is relaying to them, with a brief confirmation when he says “five” which equates to the amount of brothers one of the relatives had. He channels some distant in-law and mentions a young man, the number 62 and yellow flowers which are all met with a negative response from the woman who is willing a message from the spirit world.

This routine continues another couple of times with different audience members, once with the subject of two miscarriages. Joe channels the energy he is receiving and asks if the lady concerned had tests afterwards, before moving on after this ’success’. Again, this is common sense and did not convince the audience he was receiving any information from the spirit world.

Joe didn’t give up. He continued with generic questions to audience members and the next to ‘receive messages’ is a man who told him it meant nothing to over a dozen questions Joe channelled. At one point a joke is attempted to be cracked to ease the tension in the room, but Joe just comes across as an abrupt man who is not entirely convincing.

Just when the accuracy rate was plummeting downwards, he received a message for one half of our review team. He asks about a family member in bad health, which is confirmed and if there is a birthday soon – which there is – but that’s about as successful as it gets.

I had to laugh when he asked one volunteer if she had connections in America, to which she replied, “no, but I live in Hong Kong”. His following message from the spirit world was: “I see you living in a tall building apartment” – yes, indeed the lady did, along with the millions of others in the city.

A German man was then chosen and needed a little help with translation from his friend, but again, rather than dealing with this in a light-hearted manner, Joe ploughed on abrasively asking if he lived on a cliff, or somewhere with a view. The man stated he lived in a little flat in the middle of the city, the polar opposite

So, how did this believer sum up Joe ‘I can’t see people’s cars if I’m speaking’ Power?

Joe thanked the audience for his time and announced he would be in the courtyard selling books and available for private readings. After his performance, I completely by-passed the stall and discussed the show with other audience members who had been picked, who concluded that their money would have been better spent elsewhere.

Joe claims to be ’The Man Who Sees Dead People’ and despite going in completely open minded, neither of us were convinced by his medium skills, but there is a little something in his psychic abilities. Our spiritualist medium concluded with a comment that couldn’t possibly be printed but it’s safe to say your money would be better spent elsewhere during the Fringe.

So, not only are the skeptics against you, Joe Power, but even the believers don’t believe. Once you lose the believers, I’m not sure what you have left.

Once again, this story was brought to you in association with our sponsors ‘Schadenfreude’. Schadenfreude – available from any good medium – try some today!

Get your QED ticket now!

Just the other week, I touched on the amazing story of Robin Alexis, the psychic who claims to be able to psychically shoehorn the spirit of Michael Jackson into the unborn foetus of a couple of strangers. You’d think that would be as ridiculous as psychics can get, right?

Well, you’d be entirely wrong. I present to you exhibit A – Lisa Greene, and exhibit B – Ellen Kohn. Both are perfect examples of their trade, and both featured in newspapers in the last couple of weeks. Let’s take Lisa first.

As Newsweek asked us:

What’s your Pooch Thinking?

Sorry, should have mentioned – Lisa is a pet psychic. Which doesn’t mean she’s a psychic you keep in a cage and feed dead mice to now and then, she’s a psychic who specialises in contacting pets. Which makes me wonder if Newsweek should have changed their title from ‘what’s your pooch thinking’ to ‘what’s our editor thinking?’

“Horses are the most gossipy,” says Lisa Greene, a pet psychic from Houston. “They’ll always tell me everything that’s going on in the barn. Snakes usually have a pretty bizarre sense of humor. And rodents like to spell for me.”

Recently on the schedule: a reading for a whale.

I’d call this whole thing batshit crazy, but Lisa would probably point out that bats are in no way crazy and they actually most love to test her with fiendish logical brainteasers.

Greene, who has worked as a pet psychic for just over 10 years, may, in a busy week, receive anywhere from 15 to 40 calls. “Not all the animals want to talk to me,” she says. “I have some animals flip me the paw.” She considers her services a luxury item, with rates of $120 for an hourlong telephone consultation during which she speaks with the owner, who asks her questions to communicate psychically to the animal, and $240 for in-home/in-barn treatment.

Now, let’s pause for a moment – and that’s not a reference to animals flipping her the paw – and consider what she makes here. For her to come see you, she makes $4 per minute, or around $1 every 15 seconds, to tell you vague and vacuous thoughts your animal had (one animal psychic is quoted in the article as having astoundingly communicated that a dog wanted to ‘see Grandma’ because ‘Grandma feeds me eggs’). But not only that, she can psychically connect with your animal OVER THE PHONE. And what if you’re skeptical, or want support? She deals with that on her website PetPerceptions.com:

“You are welcome to have someone with you during the reading, both in person or over the phone, but please limit the number to two people. Lisa is able to connect with your animals through your energy, so if you have many other people with you, it may be their animals that come through and not yours. Also, if you have someone who isn’t interested in the reading, negative about it or even just having a bad day, their energy will affect your reading.”

Oh, and what’s more:

“During the reading, please let your animals be free to do what makes them comfortable. THEY DO NOT HAVE TO BE NEAR YOU OR THE PHONE FOR A GREAT READING!”

Any ideas how any of this works? Well, here’s a clue, from Lisa’s tips on gaining a great reading:

“Lisa likes to work with specific questions as you get more out of a session when you ask what you want to know. Make a list of questions for each animal. They can be as specific as you like, but please don’t have a specific answer in mind as the answer may not be what you think! If you have certain issues you want to concentrate on, please mention it during the initial phone call, but understand that Lisa will never start a session with problems. Another point to consider is that Lisa cannot change your animals behavior.”

AND

“If you have health concerns with your pet, please just let her know that you’d like her to scan for problems. Normally if there is a health concern that’s really bothering your animal right then, Lisa will pick up on it before she even calls you. She will normally not pick up on health issues or disabilities that your animals are used to. She only picks up on what’s bothering them now and what is coming up.”

AND

“You never know who’s going to come through in a session with Lisa! It’s been known to happen that an animal or person in spirit comes through to relay messages to you. Know that if they expend the energy to come through, there is a reason for it.”

And this is beautiful:

“Lisa does ask that you, the client, pay attention to the time spent in session. During her reading, it’s very hard for her to concentrate on both your animals and the time, so it’s up to you to wind it up in the time you have allotted to spend with your animals. You are always in control of how long a session lasts and you are only charged for the time spent in session.”

Translation – if we go over the time alloted, you’re paying. And Lisa will do what she can to make that happen.

So, that’s exhibit A. What of Ellen Kohn, of Enlightened Animals.com? Well, she was recently featured on AOL News…

“Animal Psychic Searches for Reincarnated Pets”

Yeah.

“Pet psychics are serious about their jobs. Dead serious. In fact, to find a missing pet, pet psychics like Ellen Kohn will turn to reincarnation — looking into an animals’ past lives — for clues to where it might be.

This was the case last year when Christine Horowitz lost her 13-year-old golden shepherd, Dina, to cancer. Distraught, Horowitz remembered Kohn, who had mentioned contacting animals in the afterlife during a previous consultation about her mother’s missing cat.”

I have worked with other animal communicators, but I didn’t know any that could find pets reincarnated,” Horowitz said. “I trusted [Kohn], but I was like, ‘How would we find this puppy? Thousands are born every day.’”

And as pet psychics know, there’s one born every minute… enter Ellen Kohn:

“When Kohn began channeling the deceased dog and asked Horowitz about Dina putting her paws on her shoulders, Horowitz was sold — she and Dina would often dance around, always with Dina’s paws on her shoulders.

Sure enough, Kohn kept talking with Dina’s spirit, who led her to a picture on Petfinder.com of a puppy that jumped out at her, and Horowitz eagerly visited Dina’s possible incarnation.

Nine months later, Horowitz is sure this new dog, a foxhound-mix named Annie, is Dina.

“Even my husband, who normally doesn’t believe these things, is like, ‘Oh that’s what Dina use to do,’” Horowitz explained.

New dog does stuff the old dog used to do – hardly a surprise. For one thing, the range of potential doggy activities really isn’t that broad. For another thing, the owners had 9 months of treating this dog like their dead dog, plus 9 months of confirmation bias and animal training. I’m not surprised in the slightest that the two dogs have some traits that could be seen to be alike…

“The animal doesn’t even have to be present for Kohn to chat them up.

After “grounding” herself with a Kabbalistic prayer, getting her prayer stone (a quartz) and touching base with her animal spirit guides, she can be shown a photo or even just talk to the pet owner to make a connection.

Kohn then silently projects messages to the pet, all while taking notes on the words, pictures or feelings the pet sends back.”

How did Kohn find her amazing skills?

“Kohn met a healing touch professional who encouraged her to work with animals. Kohn trained with mentors, first learning to do energy healing and then eventually began communicating when the animals she was working on began to talk to her, telling her what ailed them.

Kohn says talking to deceased pets ended up being a lot like talking to the living.”

I’d agree with this, in a way – talking to dead pets IS a lot like talking to living pets, in that you can do it all you like and the pets are never going to talk back to you.

So, again, I headed over to her website… and buried on the contacts page is Ellen’s advice on how to get the conversation going:

“For interspecies communication, please click on the “Let’s Chat” button to familiarize yourself with the general guidelines I use when we first begin together.”

This opens a PDF, which reads:

“This is an example of some of the general questions that I might ask your animal to get the communication flowing. Then, specific questions might be asked for you or your animal’s needs or concerns.”

Want to hear the questions that help her get the conversation going?

Are you willing to communicate with me?

Share with me what your favorite meal is (or favorite snacks).

Tell me what your favorite activities are.

Share with me your dislikes.

Tell me who your best friend is.

I’d like to know where your favorite place in the house is.

Tell me what your home (barn, outside area for farm animals) looks like.

I’d like to know how you feel physically.

Share with me what you like about being a dog (cat, horse, etc).

Tell me if there is anything you’d like to change about your environment.

I’d like to know what your purpose in life is with your person.

Share with me if there is anything you want me to tell your person.

Tell me if there is anything additional that your person can do for you.

Share with me your age.

Share with me anything about your past you would like me (and your person) to know

I can imagine, once Ellen has answers to all of those, it’s actually a pretty easy conversation from that point onwards…

Oh, I should have mentioned, Robin Alexis is described as ‘psychic Robin Alexis’. So, ‘psychic seeks privacy, says local paper’? Accompanied by a charming full photo of said privacy-seeking psychic? Ho hum, I’ll carry on…

“She’s found it a welcoming place, where she can develop a variety of ventures: her Mystic Radio program, her Web portal to psychic readings and her online Soul Spa, all at www.robinalexis.com.”

Again, to reiterate – seeking privacy here, the privacy to discreetly go about her radio program, web portal and soul spa. Ho hum ho hum.

Apparently, as the paper tells us:

“Alexis describes herself as more than a psychic; she’s also a spirit medium and “metaphysical mother” who is now in the midst of an extraordinary three-way conversation”

Quite what a metaphysical mother is, I’ve no idea. Surely it’s a mother who isn’t actually there, or is there but on another plane? Like a meta-mum?

Still, this privacy-seeking, self-professed meta-mum with a burgeoning-yet-discreet media empire to non-promote has a terrible burden – she, discreetly and in no way publicly, despite being in the paper about it, claims to have been communicating for ‘many moons now’ with… Michael Jackson.

Just to be clear, that’s deceased king of pop Michael Jackson, not the former Tranmere Rovers and Blackpool defender Michael Jackson, nor Canadian actor Michael Jackson, best known for his role as Trevor on Trailer Park Boys, nor even the soldier Michael Jackson from Massachusetts, wounded at Bunker Hill during the American Revolution (though admittedly one of those would still be impressive, not least because the Tranmere defender’s been notoriously reclusive since his retirement at the end of the season). No, she’s been talking – she non-publicity-seekingly claims – to the deceased former most famous man on the planet, Michael Jackson. Ho hum ho hum ho hum. Also, as a couple of footnotes – I’ve got to thank Wikipedia disambiguation for a few Michael Jacksons there, and I’ve also been listening to way too much Andy Saltzman on the Bugle podcast lately. Back to the psychic.

As the paper tells us:

“Alexis believes she has been communicating, for many moons now, with the late King of Pop. As in Michael Jackson. Like if he was on TV”

Quick quibble – communicating with him like as if he was on TV: not really all that impressive. TV is a one-way medium, after all. Like all spirit mediums, in that respect – they give out a signal, but there’s no way for anyone to get a signal back to them. Still, that’s splitting hairs – I promised you a left turn. I’ll let Alexis take up the story:

“I started seeing him in my third eye,” she said, “It was like he was on television, only “right here,” she added, tapping her forehead. “He started telling me right away: ‘I want to come back.’”

Are you ready for it?

Then, Alexis said, she received a phone call from an Olympic Peninsula woman — whom she said she’d never met — requesting a one-on-one psychic consultation.

Their conversation got under way, but Alexis had to tell her: “OK, this is completely weird, but I keep feeling Michael coming through,” trying to communicate.

The woman told her she already knew Jackson wanted to return to Earth, Alexis recalled; her husband knew about it, too, and both had agreed to bring a reincarnated Jackson back.

The woman isn’t pregnant yet, Alexis said. But she and her husband are preparing to be parents.

That’s right – not content with merely contacting the king of pop – this privacy-seeking psychic wants to bring the man back. Discreetly. And in no way publicly. I’ve ran out of ho hums.

You might imagine she’s had a LOT of people call bullshit on her in the past (as, incidentally, I am right now – because it is bullshit. Massively so). However, she has a tried and tested response to those doubting naysayers:

“..if one refuses to consider that her story is possible, then she says — “very respectfully” — something to the effect of “You do your thing, and I’ll do mine.”

She’d rather others would explore for themselves such phenomena.

“What I say to people is: Know, trust and act upon your own knowing.”

That’s right – if you know for near cast-iron certainty that it’s unlikely beyond comprehension that a) she’s talking to a dead Michael Jackson, b) she’s able to bring him back, and c) she can somehow magically inseminate him into the womb of a total stranger – then you go your way, and she’ll go hers, and you can both confusingly ‘act upon your own knowing’.

While she plans to continue counseling the couple, serving as the metaphysical mother who helps them get ready to bring a soul back into the world, she also hopes the mother- and father-to-be will connect with the Jackson family and with Jackson’s closest friends.

See – now THAT’S where the metaphysical mother fits in, I suppose.

The couple – a white woman and a black man, the article randomly pains to point out – are not paying her anything.

“These people don’t have any money,” she added.

Well that’s very noble of her, and very un-publicity-seeking… oh wait, sorry, there’s a bit more here, what’s this say?

Alexis, however, said she’s working with a documentary film producer on obtaining financing for a movie to tell the Michael Jackson story, including this new chapter.

She said the film, if made, will be titled “This Is Not It,” in counterpoint to the documentary about Jackson’s preparation for his final concerts, “This Is It.”

Again, just to recap for those at the back – this psychic moved away from LA to avoid all the publicity, now she’s ushering in the rebirth of Michael Jackson in order to add it to the filming of a documentary she’s working on as part of her media empire.

Meanwhile, Alexis and her husband, Bob Bordonaro, are developing the Soul Spa website along with Mystic Radio, a program airing on KKNW-AM 1150 in Seattle and available at www.robinalexis.com.

She hopes for national syndication of the show, and for expansion of her 100 registered members of her Web programming.

She also plays a metaphysical mother on TV, on the cable series, “The Real L Word,” about lesbian relationships. The show is on at 10 p.m. Sundays on Showtime.

Alexis’ book, Raising Humanity, available on her website, teaches soulful parenting: remembering to share joy with your child each day, visualizing the family life you want instead of dwelling on what you don’t want.

Again, this is all publicity-avoiding, of course…

Still, for a change, I’m going to write about an abject psychic failure that doesn’t involve Joe ‘the Power’ Power. You see, sometimes, in order to give the impression that they’re able to see the future, psychics will make predictions about things. And sometimes, they’ll make those predictions somewhere that ends up in the news cycle, and documented on the internet. And sometimes, just sometimes, they utterly fail to realise how much scope this gives for their duff predictions to come back and bite them on the behind. Case in point:

U.K Psychic: Ghana Will Win The World Cup

It’s not the prediction England fans in the county wanted – but Fabio Capello’s men will not be bringing home the World Cup this summer.

In fact – if Ipswich medium Sue Knock’s information from the psychic world proves true – an African side will lift the trophy for the first time.

She is predicting Ghana – the team of Essien, Muntari and Appiah – could take home the coveted cup.

For any non-football fans out there, Ghana will not be winning the World Cup, at least not in 2010, having lost to Uruguay in the Quarter Finals.

Now, any psychic with half a brain would stop there. You’ve made your prediction, now seal it up and hope it comes true. But not so our Sue Knock, who follows the wild prediction up with a few safe bets:

“England and Germany will both make very good starts but then fade, while Italy and France will do well. Ghana – the name which comes to me most strongly – will win it,”

Ordinarily, these would be great bankers. Bear in mind, Italy and France were the finalists at the last World Cup, and England tend to do alright before the Quarter Finals. How was Sue to know that neither France nor Italy would progress from their (relatively easy) groups, the latter of the two coming bottom in a group that included footballing superpower New Zealand? And how was she to know that England would start the group stages with two shocking, tedious draws, before limping past Slovenia to be culled by the rampant Germans?

Well, she’s meant to be psychic, THAT’s how she could know.

Not to dwell on the misfortune of others (after all, doing so would be to muscle in on Psychic Sue’s patch), but here are a few of Sue’s other winning predictions:

• A Royal birth – a canny guess – William’s past his mid 20s, Harry’s settling down – this has the potential to come true… and of course if it’s not one of the princes, then Sue could claim it was a lesser Royal. However, as far as I can see, 7 months into the year, there are no pregnant Royals. (Update: I think we’ve found the lesser Royal Sue can claim she was predicting! To illustrate how good a chance guess this was, bear in mind a quick Google search reveals that between 1993 and 2007, Royal babies arrived in 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1999,  2002, 2003, 2004 and 2007 – so it’s hardly so rare an occurrence).
• A major volcano eruption – this one seems to be the stand out prediction – with the unpronounceable Icelandic volcano doing its thing earlier in the year, this has to be proof of Sue’s psychic skill. However, as Wikipedia notes: “Seismic activity started at the end of 2009 and gradually increased in intensity until on 20 March 2010″. Hardly a stretch, then, to foresee a volcano erupting once it had already been observed to be increasing in activity.
• Earthquakes in northern England which will be felt in Suffolk – little to be said here, really. Suffice to say, we’ve not been hit, and I presume Suffolk remain untroubled by the shockwaves.
• A terrorist alert at the Port of Felixstowe connected with a chemical – again nothing so far, but who knows – maybe Al Qaeda’s next target is indeed the Suffolk port. We’ll see.
• A huge row over the axing of a popular TV star over their age – this still has the potential to be true, but is hardly a revelation – in fact on Righteous Indignation, during our predictions game, we made exactly the same prediction.
• Conservatives will win the General Election – I’m sure this looked like a safe bet too, with the horror show predicted for Labour in the polls… except with the popularity of the Lib Dems, and Labour’s unexpected late rally, the hung parliament meant the Tories didn’t win the election. Did her psychic skills not foresee the possibility of a hung parliament? Or do the dead not play by the rules of First Past The Post?
• A nice hot summer – if all else fails, at least you can rely on the weather

In short, I don’t think Sue’s psychic, and I’m sure she’s regretting not putting her psychic dime on Spain like everyone else has.

On Friday of last week, I got a phone call. From Ormskirk police. The polite and friendly officer assured me there was nothing to worry about, but that he was looking into alleged threats of violence coming from people on Facebook. Specifically, within the group page of the Merseyside Skeptics Society. And aimed at non-psychic non-detective Joe ‘I’ll just pop to your toilet‘ Power.

This was news to me. It was also utterly untrue.

As I explained to the officer, we at the Merseyside Skeptics Society have never made threats to anyone, ever, and nor would we; further, we’d NEVER condone physical or personal threats made by anyone else. Aside from a complete and utter aversion to violence – which for one thing has been shown by many people in history to be a truly terrible way to get a point across – making personal threats would go completely against the whole point of what the MSS is about: examining the evidence, and pointing out where the claim (and subsequently the claimant) is lacking. In fact, when I met Joe over a year ago, I went to great lengths to remain calm and even-tempered while he continually insulted me in increasingly bizarre and surreal ways. Paedophile? OK Joe, go for it. Homosexual? Sure, if you like. Atheist? Absolutely (well one out of three isn’t bad, for the Man Who Talks To Dead People. Or at least 1/3rd of dead people, presumably).

Fortunately, having spoken to me for a good five minutes, the officer was able to assure me that he was quite confident no wrong-doing nor anything malicious had taken place. After I’d explained Joe’s full history with the MSS, our polite insistence that Joe at some point, some time, in some way – any way at all – shows some evidence that he can indeed contact the dead, and the fact that when I met Joe a year ago I ended the conversation by wishing him well – after I’d explained all of this, the officer concluded that I’ve almost certainly not gone beyond practising freedom of speech, which is true.

He also asked whether I’d mind clarifying my lack of violent or threatening intent to Joe – which I’m more than happy to do: I’ve never, in anyway, suggested or advocated anything threatening in the direction of Joe or his family.

You can probably imagine my surprise – and, indeed, deep disappointment – to now hear from Joe via the police, with tales of his wife being ‘unable to sleep’ due to worrying about threats made against him. It’s a shame, but not really that much of a surprise, that Joe decided to go direct to the police with these unfounded allegations of threats, rather than email me – I am, after all, easily reachable and more than amiable. I’m sure it’s nothing more than a simple misunderstanding, which I’m happy to clear up. Because, were it that Joe was creating spurious reports of threats in order to use the police to silence entirely reasonable criticism of the magical claims he makes, that would represent a serious waste of police time, which is in itself not a laughing matter. Still, Joe’s not one for wasting police time, really, so I’m sure it’s just a misunderstanding.

Wasting Police Time

In 2009, in an article in the Liverpool Echo, Joe Power claimed to be using his psychic powers to track the abductor of Madeleine McCann, who famously went missing from a family trip in Portugal in 2007. Joe said in 2009 that he had ‘seen the face of the person who abducted Madeleine and it is not dissimilar to the sketch which the detectives released‘. To this day, Madeleine has not been found, and Joe’s tips (happily shared with the newspaper) have proven fruitless. Joe’s book came out soon after the article made the papers, and his book signing was advertised at the foot of the article in which he talked about a child who had been abducted. Those are the facts. Here are some more.

In February 2008, 9-year old Shannon Matthews was kidnapped. Interested in lending his talents to the search, Joe took the Sunday People newspaper along to the house of Shannon’s mother, where he spent time giving her a reading in order to locate her missing child. Joe comfortingly predicted that her child was taken by a man driving a car with a baby seat and a brown cushion in the back, and a religious card hanging from the rear-view mirror. All of these predictions did not prove to be true. In March 2008, Shannon was found. In April 2008, Karen Matthews – Shannon’s mother, and the person Joe spent an afternoon having photos taken with – was charged with child neglect and perverting the course of justice. In December 2008, she was sentenced – along with her boyfriend – to eight years after being found guilty of kidnapping, false imprisonment and peverting the course of justice. If Joe Power was able to psychically tell at the time – as he now claims – that he knew of Karen’s involvement, he was strangely happy to pose for photographs with a child abductor and was bizarrely content to leave Shannon in her kidnappers clutches for a further six days. Fortunately, the police located Shannon safely, after a neighbour reported of hearing child’s footsteps in her abductor’s home. Joe Power’s website prominently features Shannon’s kidnapping, including a photo of Joe taken with her kidnapper.

In 2006, Joe spoke to the Daily Mirror about the murder of Sally Anne Bowman, explaining how he:

“told police the killer could have the surname White and first name Stephan or Stephen. He might live in a block of flats by railway lines and have been in a park before the murder. And Mr Power believes the killer, who he thinks is a delivery driver aged between 24 and 26, met part-time hairdresser Sally Anne through the friend of a friend.”

In March 2008, the police caught and arrested Sally’s killer – Mark Dixie, 34, a chef. DNA confirmed the match. To this day, Joe’s involvement in the Sally Anne Bowman case is put forward as proof of his talents. Mark Dixie was not called Stephan. Or Stephen.

In 1999, Joe claims to have provided ‘stunningly correct’ information to the police, in helping to locate the body of missing 22-year old Lynsey Quy. As Joe states on his website:

I took this information to police and still have the receipt for my statement. I was frustrated police did not follow up on my meticulous information, so I wrote a letter to the chief inspector Bob Marsden and took it to the police station in person. I never heard from him.  Five months later, Marsden was replaced with a new chief inspector named Jeff Sloane who never saw my information. Police eventually pressured Lynsey’s husband Mitchell into a confession and indeed they located her body parts at the fairground and near the railway tracks.

When contacted about Joe’s involvement, Det. Supt. Geoff Sloan, senior investigating officer, said:

I wish to state, categorically, that as the Senior Investigating Officer on the Lyndsey Quy murder, I made a policy decision not to use psychics on the investigation. Joe Power has allegedly made claims that he assisted the enquiry but this is not the case.

Joe’s website does not correctly spell the name of the senior investigating officer in a case Joe claims to have helped solve.

In 2005, Joe claimed to know the whereabouts of the remains of Helen McCourt – whose body had gone unfound for 17 years. He told multiple papers, including the Wigan Today, that “her body lies in Carr Lane, between her village and Prescot, possibly in or near an old fishing lodge.” Helen’s body has never been found.

In all of Joe’s involvements with the police, he has never produced anything which has demonstrably proven to be true. He has, however, featured his involvement in murder, kidnapping and missing persons cases in much of his publicity materials.

So, just to summarise: nobody involved with the Merseyside Skeptics Society – or anyone that I even know of – has ever made threats to Joe or his family, and we absolutely never will. However, we will continue to examine Joe’s work, to document where he might be using tragedy and bereavement for publicity gain, and will be delighted if he’s ever, at all, able to demonstrate even one of the fantastic claims he makes. Furthermore, given that these intellectual tussles with Joe have increased the popularity and presence of the Merseyside Skeptics Society no end – not to mention that Joe’s been responsible for providing more than 10,000 hits to this very website in the last 12 months, I’d actually like to take this opportunity to formally thank Joe for his outstanding contribution to skepticism in the Merseyside area. I look forward to his future endeavours, and the many Google hits they’ll gain us. Thank you Joe, and all the best!

Oliver the Missing Mog

Psychics, eh? Is there anything they can’t do? They can cure/heal/treat/help cancer, use their magic to confirm police reports and wear flat caps with their arses hanging out, and they can contact dead people who never actually existed. They’re a marvellous lot!

But that’s not the full extent of the psychic realm, it seems, as the BBC reported last week:

‘An Indian psychic is helping to search for cat which went missing from a Lincolnshire village. Oliver, a four-year-old tabby and white cat, went missing from Boothby Graffoe in October.

Owner Sue Machen, 56, has paid £1,000 for Hertfordshire-based company Animal Search UK to hunt for the animal.

It has employed psychic Sarita Gupta, who is based in Bangalore, to help in the search, a move which has been criticised by a sceptics’ society’. - Source: BBC

That’s right – we’re dealing psychic pet detectives! Which, to be clear, isn’t a detective who specialises in finding psychic pets (I can’t really see how one could make a full career out of that, really), but instead people who claim to use their psychic powers to detect and locate missing pets. Obviously.

So, what’s the story here? Well, it’s pretty simple - Oliver is a white and grey tabby cat. He has a white stomach and legs, and is tabby down his back and tail. He also has a distinctive black spot on the left side of his pink nose. And he’s missing. His owner Sue Machen, ‘distraught’ (according to the Fail) turned to Animal Search UK to locate him, and – as the newspapers report – they hired Indian mystic, magic woman and general all-round superhero Sarita Gupta to locate said missing moggy.

Miss Gupta, it’s reported, had similar success a fortnight ago in finding a tabby called Chiquitita in Birmingham, so she has form in this area, as Tom Watkins of Animal Search UK attests:

‘We did a search in Birmingham recently where the owner contacted her and was told the cat would be found where children play.

‘We then got a call from somebody – and when we searched a local garden, the cat was found trapped in a Wendy house. It was quite remarkable.’ – Source: Daily Fail

Remarkable indeed. So, what’s the Gupta feeling for the location of dear Ollie?

‘Ms Gupta believes the cat has been adopted as a stray by a new family, who do not know he has an owner.’ – Source: BBC

Amazing. Or not, as the spokesperson for the sceptics society explained to the BBC:

‘Looking at the advice given by the psychic in both cases, we have the suggestion that the cat is staying with another family, and the idea that lost cats like to be near children. Both of these are incredibly obvious scenarios to suggest for a missing cat, and would likely be the suggestions you’d get from someone without psychic powers – and without the need for a fee, too’. - Source: BBC

Now there’s some REAL wisdom, if you ask me. Which they did – because the very cool thing is, when the BBC saw a story of a missing cat and a psychic, they turned to we Merseyside Skeptics for balance. I can’t begin to tell you how happy it makes me that they actually bothered putting balance into the tale. In fact, in full, what I told the BBC was:

‘Looking at the advice given by the psychic in both cases, we have the suggestion that the cat is staying with another family, and the idea that lost cats like to be near children. Both of these are incredibly obvious scenarios to suggest for a missing cat, and would likely be the suggestions you’d get from someone without psychic powers – and without the need for a fee, too.

I’m sure if the cat is living with another family, people will feel it proves Ms Gupta’s psychic skills. However, if the same advice had been given by a non-psychic party, purely as an educated guess, nobody would suggest psychic powers were at play.

Of course, if Ms Gupta were interested in demonstrating that her skills work in less predictable and obvious scenarios, the Merseyside Skeptics Society would be only to happy to help put her powers to a fair and reasonable test’. – Source: Erm, Me.

And I stand by that – if Ms Gupta, or any other psychic, is in any way interested in demonstrating their talents, please contact me and we’ll discuss it: press@merseysideskeptics.org.uk. I check my email obsessively, and promise I’ll get back to you immediately.

Still, that’s not quite everything, where our little Ollie is concerned. Never one to shy away from a bit of research, I thought I’d check out what Animal Search UK have to say about the case of Oliver and the psychic. Fortunately, their website prominently displays their contact details, so I thought ‘why not?’

Interestingly enough, I was able to get straight through to Tom Watkins, who’s the lead investigator in the case of missing Oliver. He was happy to discuss the case, although entirely reticent to give me any details not already in the public domain (which is understandable, I suppose). First of all, I asked if employing psychics is the norm for their pet searching – as it turns out, they don’t hire psychics, they only consider psychic information when provided to them via the owners independently consulting a witch of their own accord. So strike one for the Daily Fail, who titled their whole piece ‘Distraught owner of missing cat pays team of PSYCHICS £1,000 to find her moggy’.

Further, when I asked how much stock his company places in the information of psychics, Tom told me: ‘We listen to them if the owners want us to, we don’t place too much stock in what they say, but we don’t discount anything’.

Interestingly, Tom was also able to confirm to me that the moggy in Birmingham was indeed located pretty much exactly where the psychic said it would be – in the sense that it was somewhere that children play. OK, sure a wendy house seems like a great hit there (although, of course, missing cats are more likely to be found by/with children than you’d imagine, I expect). However, Tom would not share any other details of that case, when I asked. Data protection? Possibly. I’ll come back to that.

Even more interestingly, Tom seemed to be a little confused as to the timelines involved with missing Ollie. As the papers have all reported, the psychic has been drafted in to help. When I asked Tom when this involvement occurred, he told me it was last week (roughly the time of the article). Which I found a little interesting, given that the website ‘ThisIsLincolnshire’ reported on Sue’s contact with a psychic back in December 2009. As I say, not one to shy away from the research. So, of course, I mentioned this to Tom… who confirmed that Sue contacted psychics to locate her missing cat 6 months ago. And, amazingly, the cat still isn’t found. Which says an awful lot about the quality of the psychic’s information, if you ask me.

So, bearing all of this in mind, one particular question springs to mind: Why is it that a story which essentially boils down to ‘psychic fails to help find missing cat after 6 months of involvement’ makes the national press, while supposedly a week before the story the same psychic successfully helped locate a missing cat in Birmingham, in a tale that’s not even been reported in local media in Birmingham?

Why is it that the success story gets no column inches, whereas the ongoing and unsuccessful search makes headlines across the world?

And why is there not a single report of a cat called Chiquitita in Birmingham, a missing cat being found in a wendy house, or Animal Search UK locating a missing cat in Birmingham? Isn’t it strange that even the company themselves don’t feature this amazing success story on their website, despite having a ‘Latest News‘ page and a ‘Happy Tails‘ page?

Is it me, or does anyone sense a shaggy cat story here?

Finally, just to cap off the story, it’s worth noting that the tale gets a whopping 850-word write-up in the Mail, in the most glowing and positive of terms, with the psychic angle largely peripheral throughout. As would be consistent, say, with a piece of PR.