In case I sound too sceptical for my own good...

I don't intend to expose tricks here, so some of the more 'secret' magic shops have not got listed in the Links Column. I don't intend to act in an arch and knowing manner, just respect a few discrete mailing lists I have joined. As I don't perform magic right this moment I don't feel part of an 'in-crowd' and came to all those professional links by surfing, so no big secrets, but just a little respect. At the same time, if I tip a few methods, or places to look at least, it arises from the fact that I mostly belong in the sceptical camp when it comes to 'psychic phenomena'. I don't deny the possibility, I don't claim to understand all the mysterious goings-on, I simply don't choose to jump to explaining one unknown with another.

Using Occam's Razor I want all possibility of conscious or unconscious 'cheating' (experimenter bias!) eliminated before I can even consider such things. I appreciate that Martin Gardner can get too zealous on the side of the sceptical, just as James Randi can lose his sense of humour at times - so can Richard Dawkins or Jonathan Miller when confronted by True Believers - and in the Maybe Logic Academy forum I have received material to follow up, from people who dislike me prematurely slamming a door on any possiblities (fair enough - but for every careful debunking book you can find 20 best-sellers of glib nonsense).

I have no faith in 'God' as an explanation of anything, I dislike New Age people co-opting half-digested Quantum Mechanics to explain stuff, and even trying to sound streetwise ("What The *#!*# Do They Know?"). I find crop circles hilarious and rather impressive, but don't really think they indicate messages from aliens, and I have a similar position on UFOs and abductions.

I have little problem with mental phenomena (we understand consciousness so little) so lucid dreaming, out-of-the-body travelling, various trance phenomena don't challenge me much. When these become 'remote viewing' or 'communication with the dead' I get a bit more sceptical - but remain curious and interested - after all, I don't challenge Buddhists about reincarnation, I just wonder if I properly understand what they might mean by that.

As I said, I don't deny the (small and remote) possibility that the common explanations of 'mysterious events' have an element of truth, but I certainly lean towards the idea that they all arise from the wonderful nature of human creativity - and the anthropological difficulties of imagining people more devious, imaginative or misguided than oneself! heh.

I prefer Charles Fort making up even more improbable explanations than these rather timid ones of 'energy' and 'powers' and 'spirits', when he found himself confronted with events he found hard to explain.
I find Banachek (a professional mentalist now, but originally one of the two boys who conspired with Randi, in Project Alpha, to demonstrate how easily 'scientists' could get fooled) more interesting than (say) Christian faith healers (even if placebo effects and other such may explain some of their results - rather than pure cons).

"My own notion is that it is very unsportsmanlike to ever mention fraud. Accept anything. Then explain it your way". Charles Fort