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This article reads like an elaborate dodge to me, something a mentalist might do. A dodge I might use if I actually did believe in the supernatural and mind rea

This article reads like an elaborate dodge to me, something a mentalist might do. A dodge I might use if I actually did believe in the supernatural and mind reading, but knew people would scoff at me and demand proof. Instead I'd say I use nothing but intuition and fancy things like neurolinguistics programming and focus on the times I got lucky to point to my success. > I perfected another where I asked a person to think of a loved one, and then I guessed their loved one’s name No amount of intuition or NLP will enable you to correctly guess the name, so he's indicating that he really believes he can read minds. Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence https://quoteinvestigator.com/2021/12/05/extraordinary/ https://quoteinvestigator.com/2021/12/05/extraordinary/

mikercampbell 5y ago
I thought the same thing. No twitch or shrug of a tell would indicate a random name.
- labrador 5y ago
  The guy is a comedy writer. I think the article is a joke to get people like me thinking about it. He got me to respond, so it worked. I took the bait from the mentalist and was controlled by him. Funny.
jamal-kumar 5y ago
Actually it works pretty good on the kind of person who might believe in NLP themselves. It's hard to take it seriously if you consider it vs a rationalist of course. But what footing does someone who has no idea and doesn't care what any of this 'veracity' stuff is and gets amazed by crap like the shamwow guy selling them garbage on TV or horrible war crime denialist government propaganda? A big part of NLP is just boosting your own confidence that you've got this person on the hook and taking it from there, after that none of this veracity stuff matters because now we're just in the realm of manipulation of belief space, something which is demonstrably way easier than convincing people to take up enough stuff like understanding of math and probability to know otherwise. This kind of person is the rule rather than the exception and that's why this shit works. It's a large part of the reason why everything is horrible these days. Talking down on people captivated by this stuff for years has only entrenched their beliefs harder. Us rationalists should maybe realize that we're doing it wrong if there's to be any hope for a rational future. This guy is definitely hand waving like mad though you're right about that for sure
- labrador 5y ago
  I don't think you're giving people enough credit. Sure, there's the very low end of the bell curve, but they're a smaller group than the middle group where most of the effort is applied. I believe that most people are in on the joke and playing along because they're bored and want entertainment. These kind of manipulators are mocked endlessly on comedy shows. Infomericals are a joke, but they work anyway.
  - jamal-kumar 5y ago
    Everyone's in on the slap chop joke until the thing breaks on literally the second slap
alasdair_ 5y ago
It's possible to assess the person (say, an eighty year old lady from the United Kingdom) and then use the name "Albert" as a statistically-likely significant name. This doesn't need to be THE name that was thought of - a good mentalist can convince the subject that "Albert" is actually the "loved one" they were thinking of, even if it wasn't the first name to be considered. People are inclined to be agreeable, especially in an unfamiliar setting with a large number of strangers staring at them and even more so if the person is alone and elderly.
- labrador 5y ago
  But wouldn't it be fairly obvious to the audience that this kind of manipulation is happening and thus find it less interesting?
srcreigh 5y ago
Technically projecting a thought is a different ability than reading people's minds. The trick could be supernatural but still not involve reading minds. Aka send a few messages of common names, look for cues (such as "I got it") then say the most recent name that was projected.

mikercampbell 5y ago

I thought the same thing. No twitch or shrug of a tell would indicate a random name.

labrador 5y ago
The guy is a comedy writer. I think the article is a joke to get people like me thinking about it. He got me to respond, so it worked. I took the bait from the mentalist and was controlled by him. Funny.

jamal-kumar 5y ago

Actually it works pretty good on the kind of person who might believe in NLP themselves. It's hard to take it seriously if you consider it vs a rationalist of course. But what footing does someone who has no idea and doesn't care what any of this 'veracity' stuff is and gets amazed by crap like the shamwow guy selling them garbage on TV or horrible war crime denialist government propaganda? A big part of NLP is just boosting your own confidence that you've got this person on the hook and taking it from there, after that none of this veracity stuff matters because now we're just in the realm of manipulation of belief space, something which is demonstrably way easier than convincing people to take up enough stuff like understanding of math and probability to know otherwise. This kind of person is the rule rather than the exception and that's why this shit works. It's a large part of the reason why everything is horrible these days. Talking down on people captivated by this stuff for years has only entrenched their beliefs harder. Us rationalists should maybe realize that we're doing it wrong if there's to be any hope for a rational future. This guy is definitely hand waving like mad though you're right about that for sure

labrador 5y ago
I don't think you're giving people enough credit. Sure, there's the very low end of the bell curve, but they're a smaller group than the middle group where most of the effort is applied. I believe that most people are in on the joke and playing along because they're bored and want entertainment. These kind of manipulators are mocked endlessly on comedy shows. Infomericals are a joke, but they work anyway.
- jamal-kumar 5y ago
  Everyone's in on the slap chop joke until the thing breaks on literally the second slap

alasdair_ 5y ago

It's possible to assess the person (say, an eighty year old lady from the United Kingdom) and then use the name "Albert" as a statistically-likely significant name. This doesn't need to be THE name that was thought of - a good mentalist can convince the subject that "Albert" is actually the "loved one" they were thinking of, even if it wasn't the first name to be considered. People are inclined to be agreeable, especially in an unfamiliar setting with a large number of strangers staring at them and even more so if the person is alone and elderly.

labrador 5y ago
But wouldn't it be fairly obvious to the audience that this kind of manipulation is happening and thus find it less interesting?

srcreigh 5y ago

Technically projecting a thought is a different ability than reading people's minds. The trick could be supernatural but still not involve reading minds. Aka send a few messages of common names, look for cues (such as "I got it") then say the most recent name that was projected.