What is Cold Reading

I found this article humorous because it is so true. People get caught up in wanting to believe these people that they will take whatever they say and run with it. It’s obvious from the little bit that I have seen, whether on TV or elsewhere that the so called “psychic” is starting with the most general statements and allow the client to say just enough for them to say another fairly generic statement to find out more about the clients situation or problem.

I think if someone who truly believes in this sort of thing would actually reason their way through the idea of psychics and astrologers could come to the obvious conclusion that there is no truth to it. It is just people that can read someone else’s body language and then show confidence in the statements they say. I have found that you can convince people to believe complete lies if you do it with confidence. If you can earn the trust of someone or come to them as a person of authority in a subject you can make them believe anything you want them to because they don’t know any better. Most of the information and knowledge that we have today comes from trusting others. For example, the “common knowledge” that the earth is round is something that is taken for granted by most if not all people. How many people have actually seen the curvature of the earth or been lucky enough to actually see earth from space with their own two eyes. Very few can say they have but everyone believes it without evaluating it for themselves and coming to that conclusion on their own. I’m not implying that the earth is flat, I’m just taking my argument to the absurd. How much of our common knowledge do we really understand and how much more is just faith in words of someone else?