Mediums. Can people really contact dead people's spirits?
 

There is another thread about a specific woman who is having a presentation at a local church. There were some very interesting comments deleted on that thread and the moderator explained that it was because it was about a certain person and that we could begin a discussion about our views on the whole practice of people appearing to be able to communicate with the spirits of people who have died.

I don't believe that is possible.

I don't think my mind can be changed. I am somewhat influenced by my Catholic upbringing, although I am not really a practicing Catholic. I have always been skeptical and disbelieving of such things. Perhaps we all have hidden feelings and even fears about the spirit world.

I think that this may be a comforting experience for some but I personally think THIS kind of thing is a scam.

Is there money involved with this particular happening? Do people pay to be involved? Does someone make money on this get together?

Best Books On Psychics, Mediums, Spirit Communication & Life After Death | Best Psychic Mediums

I read a really good book on this and am looking for the title. Some of these also look useful.

This is it and it is by a very good writer. 'Ghost Hunters: William James and the Search for Scientific Proof of Life After Death,' by Deborah Blum - Book Review - The New York Times

Do you believe in communication with the dead, Tal?

I believe but cannot show any evidence that would convince anyone. However, there any many people who do swindle people out of their hard earned money by offering them false hope. The book I linked describes a lot of them and how the ghost hunters would expose them as frauds. Ghost Hunters, by Deborah Blum | The Independent

I think I remember in the original thread there was mention of tickets to see this local woman at the Unitarian Church? Tickets usually mean money.

I believe this woman is the real deal. Suzanne Giesemann | Messenger of Hope

Suzanne Giesemann
- YouTube

Making/taking money from the gullible through clairvoyance, mediums, self-proclaimed prophets and also from megachurches...is probably the second oldest profession.


Not buying any of it.

No more of a scam than all churches are. All about the $$.

I sort of believe.....try to catch an episode of Long Island Medium. I think it's on TLC. Not on right now, but you can find episodes to watch on TLC app, etc... she seems very real, reads random people in stores, etc... along with people who do come to her by appt. in almost every single case the people are shocked that she knows things about the departed and that the departed are conveying meaningful messages specific to their loved one. You'll notice that as she starts to read a person she is writing very fast and also her mouth usually is making what appear to be involuntary movements.
Ok, she's a very entertaining " personality", as is her family, but I still think she's for real. Now the ones who work with a partner I'm a little suspious of still.

I have an open mind about individuals who profess something unique. The mass advertised organized forces are always suspect in my mind.

The ghost hunters researched some of these mediums.

Amazing what you can find out about a person on Google, isn't it?

Long Island Medium - Wikipedia

She just might be very observant about details and how people respond to questioning. And she might have plants in the audience??? I am very suspicious of people that have an industry attached to them.

It's rare that a medium is well done.

Like fortune tellers and Tarot card readers, mediums are clever performers who prey upon the desperate, the gullible and the vulnerable for compensation. Seances or whatever are shows, entertainment of sorts.

You should read that book I linked. Not all of the mediums are fake.

Society for Psychical Research - Wikipedia

Several years ago I read the book you cited and provided a link for in post#6.

If Harry Houdini were still around we might be able to find out if she truly is the real deal. Houdini's Greatest Trick: Debunking Medium Mina Crandon | Mental Floss

I would like to talk to my late younger brother who died on December 3, 2014 but know there is a lot of information about him on Google and I would go into such a situation hoping to hear good news from him. I also think he would just go with the idea that I will see loved ones when I see them so why bother me up here with all the drama down there!

What is more likely; that someone can communicate with the dead or shady individuals are preying upon the vulnerabilities of desperate people? This is essentially in the same category as alien visitations: there is no proof that can withstand objective, scientific investigation and more plausible explanations exists.

This might be of interest--

American Society for Psychical Research - Wikipedia

International Association for Near-Death Studies - Wikipedia

IANDS - the most reliable source of information on NDEs

Suzanne Giesemann - Home | Facebook

I would love to hear from people who have actually been to one of these mediums like Suzanne Giesemann.

Although she does not claim to communicate with the dead, per se, this woman, who I have met and spent a little time with when she lived in Laguna Beach in the mid 1990's, has made a fortune with her "Angel" pitch. She is obviously enormously creative. Doreen Virtue - Official Angel Therapy Website

...
Sounds like a fascinating book, hope i can get it on my kindle.

Have a lot of amazon Kindle shipping dollars set to expire soon.

You are, of course, free to believe what you wish but there is a real difference between speculation and hard science. Occam's Razor is at work here.

It was also at work for(against) Jodie Foster in "Contact", but you never know. We know so little about how the physics of the universe works that I believe almost anything is possible, although many things are unlikely---"angel therapy" comes to mind. Aliens??? At least the math and probabilities suggest billions of alien races out there. But can, or have any of them visited Earth? Is it even possible to travel at FTL speeds to make interstellar travel feasible? We've only been broadcasting electromagnetic signatures for 100 years, so finding us would have been a complete accident prior to WWI.

What did Albert Einstein think about the afterlife and ghosts?

No idea. But who among us actually thinks like Albert Einstein??????:1rotfl::1rotfl::1rotfl:

Stephen Hawking does. Neither seems to really believe in the afterlife.

Of course, they are looking for empirical evidence and mathematical proof, not blind faith. The truth, as usual, may be somewhere in between.

This might be of interest--
Afterlife (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

My friend Tom Snow was dead for maybe five minutes back around 1980 from a number of knife wounds into his heart upper chest area. Lost a lot of higher brain functions like his command of Spanish but maintained others.

He either was scared of the re-action of his peers in the Philosophy Department at the University of Nevada, Reno or just said that he did not remember anything after he was stabbed. The man that did it got off very lightly because of a heat of passion defense as Tom was trying to pick up his wife and I believe that this was rather close to Mustang Ranch but that just might be part of the story that was going around back then.

Tom cracked up when Indiana Jones shot the sword welding thug in Raiders of the Lost Ark when we went to see it. He was still trying to pick up married ladies around me so I kind of started to distance myself. He did have a habit of ****ing off boyfriends and wives. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) - Rotten Tomatoes

He still looks like quite a character.

If this lady had been born about 2100 years ago, she might have become a Biblical Heroine.

If she were born in the 11th or 12th centuries, she would have been burned at the stake.

But, she was born in enlightened times with more benign mythologies and she and her believers are safe to do as they please. If her believers come to her seeking comfort, pay to achieve that comfort, and walk away comforted, what is wrong with that?

In my opinion, what she provides is far more beneficial to the consumer than weight loss pills, powders, and diets, wrinkle creams, golf improvement gizmos, better gas mileage products, erectile dysfunction cures, or miracle hair growth spray.

Is it real? I don't know. Does a dead person even have a viable spirit? If so, does it have to be a heavenly spirit or could I talk to Hitler, Genghis, Attila, or Joe Paterno?

What a great movie! Full interesting characters.

I would look more to poets, artists and musicians myself to get at what the afterlife might be like. Not earth bound scientists.

Well, these guys may be in a hotspot and therefore reachable...

If anyone could have done it, Harry Houdini would have.

Grace,

With God...........anything and everything is possible.

Sounds great ? Give ya nice warm fuzzies at night ? What a crock.

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Stanislav Grof - Wikipedia

Well if you are very high on drugs....

I don't feel like I sound like a crazy person but I do in fact believe that there are people that can connect with people that have passed all that claim to be able to do it I believe some or majority are fake but I've also been to someone who is now in Nevada I believe ...he did originally live in Pennsylvania outside of Philadelphia and a friend of mine's husband had passed suddenly he was only 49 years old she went to him about two weeks after her husband died ....she just called and made an appointment she didn't say she wanted a psychic reading or a mediumship she just made an appointment with him and did only give her first name and no other personal information about herself unless there was a phone number that I'm not sure ....when she walked in he asked her what was she there for and she said him but my husband just died and he looked at her and he said but that was only two weeks and it takes 30 days for spirit to become settled to where they're going to be now he had no way of knowing her husband had died because they did not use the same last name so there was no research that could've been done anyway he told her he would try but he didn't think it would work the next thing was he said to her he's very confused he does not know what happened he keeps thinking that maybe it was a dream and then he started to tell her so many personal things like he said to her really he smoked a lot he also spoke to her about a sandwich he used to make on Christmas & Easter morning it was with scrapple which is a Philadelphia thing he went on to tell her so many personal things there was no way he could not of been genuine so I do believe I don't believe all of them can do it and I don't like that some people take other peoples money but I do believe there are people that can connect you just have to be very cautious ....He did also state the date of his death correctly. They say we're all have an ability. It's our intuition. I think these true people are highly intuitive....

There is a town north of Deltona, Florida called Cassadaga. It calls itself a spiritual camp. You must be a certified psychic to live in this town. You can have a reading or a seance. I am a skeptic so I have never paid for a reading but I have been in a group seance. They use a tilt table at the seance. It was a hoot and not scary at all. Google it if interested.

I believe there are people with different abilities based on how they use their brains. Could explain some of this.