The Amazing Randi
The Amazing Randi was a successful magician from Toronto, Canada.
Early in his career, he performed numerous escape acts from jail cells and safes around the world. On February 7, 1956, he appeared live on NBC's Today show, where he remained for 104 minutes in a sealed metal coffin that had been submerged in a hotel swimming pool, breaking what was said to be Harry Houdini's record of 93 minutes, though Randi called attention to the fact that he was much younger than Houdini had been when he established the original record in 1926.
During Alice Cooper's 1973–1974 Billion Dollar Babies tour, Randi performed on stage both as a mad dentist and as Cooper's executioner. He also built several of the stage props, including the guillotine. In a 1976 performance for the Canadian TV special World of Wizards, Randi escaped from a straitjacket while suspended upside-down over Niagara Falls.
Randi has been accused of actually using "psychic powers" to perform acts such as spoon bending. According to James Alcock, at a meeting where Randi was duplicating the performances of Uri Geller, a professor from the University at Buffalo shouted out that Randi was a fraud. Randi said: "Yes, indeed, I'm a trickster, I'm a cheat, I'm a charlatan, that's what I do for a living. Everything I've done here was by trickery." The professor shouted back: "That's not what I mean. You're a fraud because you're pretending to do these things through trickery, but you're actually using psychic powers and misleading us by not admitting it." A similar event involved Senator Claiborne Pell, a confirmed believer in psychic phenomena. When Randi personally demonstrated to Pell that he could reveal—by simple trickery—a concealed drawing that had been secretly made by the senator, Pell refused to believe that it was a trick, saying: "I think Randi may be a psychic and doesn't realize it." Randi consistently denied having any paranormal powers or abilities.
James Randi became increasingly frustrated with the eagerness of people to believe in absurd claims. He saw faith healers making millions from gullible and desperate people.
Uri Geller
Randi turned his attention to a increasing popular entertainer. Randi was frustrated by the medias blind acceptance of his physic powers. Very few journalists exercised any kind of skepticism or probing questions.
https://youtu.be/V7T-IwemzqU
So Randi got in touch with his friend Johnny Carson who also used to be a magician and was presenting the tonight show. They planned to invite Uri Geller on but would make sure he couldn't bring his own props.
https://youtu.be/zD7OgAdCObs
In an interview, Geller talked about the night after the show. "I sat there for 22 minutes, humiliated, I went back to my hotel, devastated. I was about to pack up the next day and go back to Tel Aviv. I thought, That's it—I'm destroyed."
However, when Geller woke up the next morning he found that thousands of his fans had come to his defense. They criticized Johnny Carson for his skepticism and hostility. To Geller's astonishment, he was immediately booked on The Merv Griffin Show. He was on his way to becoming a paranormal superstar. "That Johnny Carson show made Uri Geller,". To an enthusiastically trusting public, his failure only made his gifts seem more real: if he were performing magic tricks, they would surely work every time.
Randi travelled the world and appeared on TV numerous times to test people with supernatural powers.
https://youtu.be/7CASghTzNhc
Randi also turned his attention to faith healers who claimed to channel God to heal people's sicknesses and injuries.
https://youtu.be/xdUIqKJyD0Q
https://youtu.be/Lp32xhYp_Xc
Peter Popoff experienced a temporary loss of reputation. However, a few years after being exposed, he started doing the same thing again and people loved him. Today he has 28,000 followers on Facebook and makes millions of dollars a year. He now sells healing miracle water to his followers in the mail.
https://youtu.be/GGuawSq6zDA
It was a reaccuring problem that everyone Randi debunked experiemced very little damage within their supporters. People still chose to believe. People still wanted to believe.
Why do you think this was the case?
"They like the fantasy, they like the comfort. To them, the truth is ugly." - Randi
Tired of debunking the supernatural and it having very little effect on those who believed it, Randi thought up a more extreme idea to expose the gullibility of the general public.
Carlos and Australia
https://youtu.be/qN54PDwNa6s
The One Million Dollar Paranormal Challenge was an offer by the James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF) to pay out one million U.S. dollars to anyone who could demonstrate a supernatural or paranormal ability under agreed-upon scientific testing criteria. A version of the challenge was first issued in 1964. Over a thousand people applied to take it, but none were successful. The challenge was terminated in 2015.
Early in his career, he performed numerous escape acts from jail cells and safes around the world. On February 7, 1956, he appeared live on NBC's Today show, where he remained for 104 minutes in a sealed metal coffin that had been submerged in a hotel swimming pool, breaking what was said to be Harry Houdini's record of 93 minutes, though Randi called attention to the fact that he was much younger than Houdini had been when he established the original record in 1926.
During Alice Cooper's 1973–1974 Billion Dollar Babies tour, Randi performed on stage both as a mad dentist and as Cooper's executioner. He also built several of the stage props, including the guillotine. In a 1976 performance for the Canadian TV special World of Wizards, Randi escaped from a straitjacket while suspended upside-down over Niagara Falls.
Randi has been accused of actually using "psychic powers" to perform acts such as spoon bending. According to James Alcock, at a meeting where Randi was duplicating the performances of Uri Geller, a professor from the University at Buffalo shouted out that Randi was a fraud. Randi said: "Yes, indeed, I'm a trickster, I'm a cheat, I'm a charlatan, that's what I do for a living. Everything I've done here was by trickery." The professor shouted back: "That's not what I mean. You're a fraud because you're pretending to do these things through trickery, but you're actually using psychic powers and misleading us by not admitting it." A similar event involved Senator Claiborne Pell, a confirmed believer in psychic phenomena. When Randi personally demonstrated to Pell that he could reveal—by simple trickery—a concealed drawing that had been secretly made by the senator, Pell refused to believe that it was a trick, saying: "I think Randi may be a psychic and doesn't realize it." Randi consistently denied having any paranormal powers or abilities.
James Randi became increasingly frustrated with the eagerness of people to believe in absurd claims. He saw faith healers making millions from gullible and desperate people.
Uri Geller
Randi turned his attention to a increasing popular entertainer. Randi was frustrated by the medias blind acceptance of his physic powers. Very few journalists exercised any kind of skepticism or probing questions.
https://youtu.be/V7T-IwemzqU
So Randi got in touch with his friend Johnny Carson who also used to be a magician and was presenting the tonight show. They planned to invite Uri Geller on but would make sure he couldn't bring his own props.
https://youtu.be/zD7OgAdCObs
In an interview, Geller talked about the night after the show. "I sat there for 22 minutes, humiliated, I went back to my hotel, devastated. I was about to pack up the next day and go back to Tel Aviv. I thought, That's it—I'm destroyed."
However, when Geller woke up the next morning he found that thousands of his fans had come to his defense. They criticized Johnny Carson for his skepticism and hostility. To Geller's astonishment, he was immediately booked on The Merv Griffin Show. He was on his way to becoming a paranormal superstar. "That Johnny Carson show made Uri Geller,". To an enthusiastically trusting public, his failure only made his gifts seem more real: if he were performing magic tricks, they would surely work every time.
Randi travelled the world and appeared on TV numerous times to test people with supernatural powers.
https://youtu.be/7CASghTzNhc
Randi also turned his attention to faith healers who claimed to channel God to heal people's sicknesses and injuries.
https://youtu.be/xdUIqKJyD0Q
https://youtu.be/Lp32xhYp_Xc
Peter Popoff experienced a temporary loss of reputation. However, a few years after being exposed, he started doing the same thing again and people loved him. Today he has 28,000 followers on Facebook and makes millions of dollars a year. He now sells healing miracle water to his followers in the mail.
https://youtu.be/GGuawSq6zDA
It was a reaccuring problem that everyone Randi debunked experiemced very little damage within their supporters. People still chose to believe. People still wanted to believe.
Why do you think this was the case?
"They like the fantasy, they like the comfort. To them, the truth is ugly." - Randi
Tired of debunking the supernatural and it having very little effect on those who believed it, Randi thought up a more extreme idea to expose the gullibility of the general public.
Carlos and Australia
https://youtu.be/qN54PDwNa6s
The One Million Dollar Paranormal Challenge was an offer by the James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF) to pay out one million U.S. dollars to anyone who could demonstrate a supernatural or paranormal ability under agreed-upon scientific testing criteria. A version of the challenge was first issued in 1964. Over a thousand people applied to take it, but none were successful. The challenge was terminated in 2015.
https://youtu.be/bELcj8vyzog
"it's easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled."
"it's easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled."
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