On Sunday, three psychics in a scientific experiment tried to prove their paranormal abilities. If they were successful, they would have come close to receiving 1 million rubles, - the founders of the Harry Houdini Prize promised them such a prize. In a rigorous experiment, under the supervision of cameras, test participants guessed the location of photographs of 12 stars of the famous TV show "The Battle of Psychics". About who came closest to the coveted million and how you can “cheat the system”.
Photo: globallookpress.com © Elena Kulikova
Clairvoyance versus experiment
Hi everyone! This is a battle of psychics about the granite of science,”neurobiologist Valery Sobolev, the host of the event, which took place on December 11 for the fourth time, addressed a full audience of curious people. One of its tasks, according to the organizers, is to draw attention to the excessive trust of people in claims of supernatural abilities. Another is to show the advantages of the scientific method of evaluating information. Under the terms of the test, anyone who can demonstrate the declared paranormal ability within the framework of an objective and transparent experiment will receive a cash prize of 1 million rubles.
By the way, the expert council of the Harry Houdini Prize includes specialists in the field of medical, technical, exact and natural sciences, members of the RAS commission on combating pseudoscience and falsification of scientific research, illusionists, as well as the former fortune teller Alisa Kuznetsova, who was disappointed in her abilities. As she told the RT correspondent, she is interested in the opportunity to show psychics how they can deceive themselves.
“When I read the Tarot, I found that the results that I got were more the result of self-deception, cognitive distortions. For example, “survivor's mistake”, when I know about successful results because people talk about it, but I don’t know about unsuccessful ones, because these people just disappear somewhere, do not remember me, and I have no idea what they actually happened,”she said.
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Guess without prompts
Even before the experiment, the organizing committee, together with the applicants, developed its detailed scheme. It was based on the test offered to the participants of the program "Battle of Psychics", in which the expert council saw a number of organizational flaws.
Photo: vk.com/scinquisitor
The expert of the organizing committee of the award, skeptic and video blogger Mikhail Lidin, before the start of the tests, told the public what were the mistakes of the famous TV show. According to him, in a competition where psychics had to find an image of one of the winners of the previous seasons of the program among the photographs, the participants had too many opportunities to receive tips, for example, from the hosts. These chances were also increased by the fact that the audience could not see everything that was happening on the set, where there were many people. With the help of an assistant, Mikhail Lidin demonstrated how it works. Using clues, he not only guessed in which of the four photographs a particular person is depicted, but also told who is depicted in the rest.
As RT Lidin explained, there are ways to cheat without the help of the presenters and the film crew: “It would be possible if we, for example, hung photographs in front of the screen of a large TV with a reflective surface. Sometimes the floor or glossy walls can be reflective. Illusionists usually use hidden mirrors to peep. So, Ninel Kulagina deceived one Japanese television, it seems. In our experiment, for example, we excluded the possibility of bringing a hand behind a photograph - in case such a mirror is hidden somewhere. Even a watch strap could be very well polished and could help unleash "paranormal powers."
Lost the lottery
This time the experiment involved three subjects. They were psychic search engine Irina Bondar, medium, clairvoyant and tarologist Marina Grechishnikova, as well as clairvoyant Olga Elchaninova. Before testing their abilities, the participants made sure that there were no conditions that could prevent them from doing this. The experiment was carried out in a separate room under the supervision of three cameras, the recordings from which are available to anyone.
The task of Irina, Marina and Olga was to guess who is depicted in at least 6 out of 12 photographs - this would mean successful completion of the test. To exclude information leakage, at the stage of preparing the experiment, the organizers twice determined the order of the photos by drawing lots. None of those who prepared the "tools" for the experiment did not know exactly in which package whose photograph was. The subjects took turns entering the hall and took up the task. Their guesses were written on the board.
“Like a lottery,” Olga Yelchaninova assessed her results before the announcement of the results.
As it turned out, Irina's declared abilities failed the most - not a single hit. Olga guessed one photo out of 12, and Marina guessed two.
Should we expect sensations?
According to a member of the expert council, winner of the Enlightener Prize, candidate of biological sciences and blogger Alexander Panchin, for about a year that the Harry Houdini Prize has existed, this is one of the best results. “Today, for the first time ever, a person has given two correct answers, so there is development in this sense,” the expert jokes. "Of course, if anyone passed the test, it would be a sensation, but it's unlikely."
Stating the failure of psychics, the organizer of the Harry Houdini Prize Stanislav Nikolsky noted: “If the subjects do not demonstrate their ability in the proposed and agreed conditions, from the point of view of logic, this does not prove the absence of paranormal abilities at all. This proves that in this case, in these conditions, this ability was not demonstrated."
During the existence of the Harry Houdini Prize, self-named psychics have submitted about 120 applications. More than 10 people took part in the experiment, who declared their psychic abilities and were able to provide evidence. The challenge ended successfully for none of them.
Anna Odintsova