Psychics who predicted 9/11

[Peter Filis]

Here is an article about a psychic who predicted the 9/11 terrorist attack in 1986.

It is from the US millary files.

Read the descrpition in the red box.

The prediction is very detailed and specific.

I expect a skeptic or two to come along and say the prediction is vague and general. In order to say that, you need to show *another* instance where:

1. It became a newspaper headline.
2. The building collapsed.
3. A lot of people are hurt.
4. Something to do with an aircraft.
5. Involves a large object falling...heading towards the building.
6. Travelling at great velocity.
7. The object causes structural damage.
8. The object crashed through the building.

Or suggest what else it could mean, but it must involve a building collapse and an aircraft.

If the prediction was genuinely made in 1986 then Randi should get his million dollars (if it exists) ready.

Danger Room - Wired Blogs

Regards
Peter Filis

[kat]

Originally Posted by Peter Filis

I expect a skeptic or two to come along and say the prediction is vague and general. In order to say that, you need to show *another* instance where:

1. It became a newspaper headline.
2. The building collapsed.
3. A lot of people are hurt.
4. Something to do with an aircraft.
5. Involves a large object falling...heading towards the building.
6. Travelling at great velocity.
7. The object causes structural damage.
8. The object crashed through the building.

Or suggest what else it could mean, but it must involve a building collapse and an aircraft.

I'll chime in as a skeptic. Let's take the scenario of an airplane hitting a building, causing its collapse. This is a scenario which has been discussed in risk analysis communities, etc; it's far from unheard of.

This scenario instantly implies 'a large object falling' (the airplane and/or building), the causing of structural damage, and the airplane going through the building. Large velocity isn't necessary, but it is likely. Casualties are likely, even if not theoretically necessary. Given that a large building of some importance is more likely to be the target if someone bothers to execute something of this size, they are more likely. Newspaper headlines are essentially assured - we hear about plane crashes, even when no buildings are involved, and all the more when there's loss of human life. Which part of this was psychic, again?

I do not need to show another instance where this happened to refute that it is a 9/11 prediction. It looks like a fairly typical "this is a threat scenario" setup, of the type that you could see in, for instance, a Bruce Schneier column. The fact that this scenario came to pass, and others didn't, doesn't make the people who came up with it psychic; it just means that people have made a lot of predictions and thought of many, many scenarios, some of which have ended up happening, and many more of which have not. Given that essentially the same information has been found in non-psychic fora, and that it was one of -many- possible risk scenarios, which both people claiming to be psychic and people claiming not to have written about at length... I see no correlation with psychic ability.

Originally Posted by Peter Filis

If the prediction was genuinely made in 1986 then Randi should get his million dollars (if it exists) ready.

Nope. Even if you don't accept the debunking above, Randi shouldn't be bound by this, any more than by "psychic wins lottery!" phenomenon (which is essentially what I see this as, albeit in a much grimmer way - throw enough psychics at something, and, just like everyone else, they will sometimes predict correctly: this is true whether or not one believes in psychic powers). Randi insists on setting up conditions in advance, with odds that are set in such a way to nearly eliminate the impact of random guessing, which is the only way I'm aware of to guard against this phenomenon.

[Brutha]

How comforting that you droped the high pitched winning sound prediction.

[Calculusaurus]

Originally Posted by Peter Filis

If the prediction was genuinely made in 1986 then Randi should get his million dollars (if it exists) ready.

Um... no... Scientific validation requires repeatability, for one...

[Peter Filis]

Originally Posted by kat

This is a scenario which has been discussed in risk analysis communities, etc; it's far from unheard of.

I have never heard of any other airplane striking a building causing it's collapse and becoming a headline.

If you have heard of another famous incident like this, then us about it.

Not only it is unheard of, it is extremely rare.

[Peter Filis]

Originally Posted by Brutha

How comforting that you droped the high pitched winning sound prediction.

No, the prediction did incude the high pitched wining sound. Those who have had a seat next to the engine in a large aircraft will know about the high pitched wining sound.

:-)

Regards
Peter

Originally Posted by kat

Which part of this was psychic, again?

All of it, taken as a whole. The prediction made in 1986 about a large object, having something to do with an aircraft, hitting a building, causing the building to collapse, with many deaths and casualties and the event becoming a headline. This closely describes the events of 9/11.

I know of no other headline events where this has happened since 1986.

Originally Posted by Calculusaurus

Um... no... Scientific validation requires repeatability, for one...

So, if a psychic makes a public prediction that "a 3 legged black dog with one eye and a white left ear called fluffy wearing a red leather flea collar will bite you on your right ankle next year on your birthday at 9.00am" and it happens exactly as described - down to the very last detail - then randi is not expected to hand out the million dollar psychic prize?

[Brutha]

All of it, taken as a whole. The prediction made in 1986 about a large object, having something to do with an aircraft, hitting a building, causing the building to collapse, with many deaths and casualties and the event becoming a headline. This closely describes the events of 9/11.

I know of no other headline events where this has happened since 1986.

That kind of argumentation is wrong.
I will here predict that all trips to mars in the next century will have something to do with mars. I can afterwards make similar predictions for other planets.

That leaves:

So, if a psychic makes a public prediction that "a 3 legged black dog with one eye and a white left ear called fluffy wearing a red leather flea collar will bite you on your right ankle next year on your birthday at 9.00am" and it happens exactly as described - down to the very last detail - then randi is not expected to hand out the million dollar psychic prize?

It's not that difficult to find a dog like this and train him to bite people. It costs considerably less than 1.000.000 dollars to set up that event.

But to the story about your psychic:
Every plain that crashes into a normal building will destroy the building.
A plane that crashes into a building kills everyone on the plane. Planes also normally travel at great speeds.

Lets say their are on average 5 plane crashs per year.
In addition 1/500 of the earth is covered with buildings.
That means every year the chance of a plane crashing into a building is around 1%.
Lets say the prediction of the psychic included a timespan of the next 25 years.
That means the prediction had rougly a 1:4 chance of becoming true, that better than rolling a six with a dice. I would even suspect that her chance would have been better if I would research the correct numbers on plane crashes and area covered by buildings.

In addition the description does also describe non-plane crashes.
Every military jet that launches a missle at any building with lots of people in it would fit.

[Calculusaurus]

Originally Posted by Peter Filis

So, if a psychic makes a public prediction that "a 3 legged black dog with one eye and a white left ear called fluffy wearing a red leather flea collar will bite you on your right ankle next year on your birthday at 9.00am" and it happens exactly as described - down to the very last detail - then randi is not expected to hand out the million dollar psychic prize?

This is different than the 9/11 prediction you mentioned. The 9/11 prediction was vague. If you think that the 9/11 prediction was proof of psychic abilities, then get your brain checked or take a course in logic, math, or science.

I realize that your 3-legged dog example is to illustrate a point. And I understand your point. But the example is very abstract, entirely unlikely, and no psychic has even come close to predicting that absurd with that amount of detail, nor am I even aware of something that retarded actually happening. IF a psychic predicted that and it happened (and that's a huge, 1 in a trillion IF), then sure, scientists might raise their eyebrows. But the psychic and all witnesses could lie about it, it could be a hoax, so scientists require repeatability, there is no way around it.

we have yet to discover any law about the universe that is not independent of time. Meaning, that if your psychic friend can predict something so absurd then that psychic power should be repeatable either by him/her or another psychic. Never in the history of acadamia has a 1-example case been convincing proof of anything.

My claim about the need for repeatability holds. That 9/11 "prediction" is not proof of anything and Randi keeps his money for now.

[Yukio]

Originally Posted by Peter Filis

"1. It became a newspaper headline.
2. The building collapsed.
3. A lot of people are hurt.
4. Something to do with an aircraft."

Regards
Peter Filis

1 to 4 are pretty generic, even I had those ... Almost everyone with some degree of "sensitivity" could catch this. Also aircraft disasters are very common, about building there would be several hits (without a imminent collapse) except that normally a pilot will avoid those building when trying to landing ...

[kat]

Originally Posted by Peter Filis

I have never heard of any other airplane striking a building causing it's collapse and becoming a headline.

If you have heard of another famous incident like this, then us about it.

Not only it is unheard of, it is extremely rare.

It's not unheard of. People who don't claim to be psychics, previous to 9/11, thought of it, just as they thought of many other scenarios, some of which have happened, some not (just like those who call themselves psychic...).

Yes, the events of 9/11 were, thankfully, extremely rare. That doesn't mean that people predicting them were psychic - whether or not they claimed to be. Nor does it mean that "to prove that the predictor wasn't psychic, you must come up with another event that matches this criteria". Where on earth did you come up with that? Why do you think that would validate or invalidate anything?