The Smug Baldy Speaks

The Guardian reported the interesting story of self-proclaimed psychic, Patricia Putt, and her attempt to take home 1 million dollars from the James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF). While many “psychics” have tried to take home the top prize, which would be a scientific stamp of approval to their claims of esp or other super powers, not a single one has ever passed the preliminary round of testing.

The same can be said of Ms. Putt:

Did we make history last week? Is Mrs Putt now preparing to face that final challenge? The chosen readings were compared with the actual readings by Richard Wiseman and Mrs Putt together, with several observers present and the whole procedure recorded. The first volunteer did not choose the reading that had been produced for her. Neither did the second. Or the third. By chance alone, the most likely outcome was for one hit out of ten. Unfortunately for Mrs Putt, every single volunteer chose a reading that had not been written for them. It looks like JREF’s million dollars are safe for the time being.

To her credit, Ms. Putt declined to make any excuses for her failure, at least not until a day later. Many of her predecessors have done the same before her, complaining that the JREF tests are unfair, rigged, or influenced by James Randi’s own powers. As with all JREF challenges, Ms. Putt agreed beforehand to the testing procedures as outlined by JREF staff, and she certified that they were a fair way to demonstrate her psychic powers to the world.

Later, in an email to JREF, Ms. Putt explained her failure:

“With them [the volunteers] being bound from head to foot like black mummies, they themselves felt tied so were not really free to link with Spirit making my work a great deal more difficult.”

Of course, Ms. Putt never spoke with any of the volunteers in her test, and the guardian reporter was correct to point out that she must have picked up on their sense of “being tied” using her extrasensory gifts.

Or not.