Thanks Allen! Great stuff and a lot of psych is involved. Derren Brown is a
wonderfully entertaining mentalist who employs various psychological techniques
in his presentations. Though they are revealing a lot of the social psychology
of psychic reading, and this could make for some useful class discussion, a
good psychic entertainer can still come in to the class and wow students
afterwards. I do a psychic show in some of my classes after spending much of
the earlier weeks talking about critical thinking and the weak evidence for
psychic powers, etc. All it takes is for the audience to get engaged and "come
with an open mind" to direct the intuition of the psychic (in other words, help
me, have some fun, don't be skeptical!) and the critical thinking usually is
forgotten!
I couldn't help but think of the Myers-Briggs and similar psych tests,
and also psychotherapists when they were discussing the Barnum effect and the
ethics of providing people with the comfortable beliefs they want reinforced.
An issue that also would be valuable to discuss in graduate level classes. Gary
Gerald L. (Gary) Peterson, Ph.D.
Professor, Psychology
Saginaw Valley State University
University Center, MI 48710
989-964-4491
[email protected]
>>> Allen Esterson <[email protected]> 12/21/2008 6:12 am >>>
If you've got a bit of time to spare, this is worth watching (and the first
instalment could be good for class discussion):
Richard Dawkins interviews Derren Brown about Psychics
http://tinyurl.com/5wapzl
Allen Esterson
Former lecturer, Science Department
Southwark College, London
http://www.esterson.org
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