Ouija Board, Talking Board, etc

Okay, well let's talk more about my experiences.


This happened when I was about 18.

One time at a friends house, about 8 of use got together on a friday night. This was a really small crowd from the usual of about 20 or 30, and we got bored.

Drunk and stoned, the self-proclaimed wiccan wytch suggested we do a seance with a Ouija board. We literally had nothing better to do, billards was getting old and it was raining outside.

We all got around with the board and tried to channel a spirit for about 20 minutes. She was very dramatic, shouting and flailing her arms. A very convincing show, I'm sure. Nothing happened.

At the time, I was just getting into critical thinking and scientific skepticism, and elected that we channel my recently deceased Aunt Helen. It should be noted that I do not have an aunt helen, and at the time, nor ANDY deceased aunt or uncles. She did not know that, and those that did were fond of my shinanigans and did not protest.

So the self-proclaimed wytch agreed that this was a great idea. She urged me to share more information about this Aunt Helen. I made up some things, none of which had anything to do with me or my family. In fact it was entirely misleading, I lied about our ancestry and family history.

Despite all this, she went through her little rituals, shouted some gibberish and "channeled" my imaginary Aunt Helen. To my amazement, apparently my non-existent Aunt Helen wanted to share stories about my youth that I was too young to remember, one specifically about how she always cared for me and wished me luck in applying to university.

Amazing, isn't it? I mean, how else could my imaginary aunt helen known I was applying to university, if she wasn't REALLY being channeled by the Parker Brothers' game board?

Scary stuff, dude!

 

The board is not real, it has no power and no actual basis in anything but suggestion. The only reason that some people like to pretend that it has is to further the spookiness that you feel is associated with it, thus making the effects of suggestion - and the speed it works on you at - that much deeper.

Watch the video

MelT

 

Care to elaborate?

You're using Freudian explanations, I think. Trying to give answers to everything which is unclear based on what you think, instead of actual fitting evidence. i.e finding answers and getting them to fit in with the theory, instead of first analyzing the theory and then finding the appropriate answer.

e.g. you could use your argument every single time that the board didn't work. Which, obviously, is not a satisfying explanation.

 

hahaha now i wanna try it

 

Ok if you say so. Then all my spiritual experiences must of been a product of power of suggestion, just because a video on youtube says so...

I would post it in the thread but it will only lead to disbelief and ridicule. If you would like to know my experiences shoot me a pm.

 

You can pretend your 30$ piece of cardboard with letters on and magnifying glass it are mystical all you want, but that doesn't change the fact that it's about as mundane as a plantar wart. Your claims of supernatural forces at work behind a Parker Brothers product are absolutely ridiculous and baseless and possibly border on delusion.

 

It's not if 'I' say so, this is well known and understood.

TBH - though obviously I don't know all of them - I would say that suggestion was the cause of all your experiences. Not because of a You Tube video, but because that video represents the real psychology behind this board and many other supposed events too. How do we know? Well, the same idea is used as the basis of hypnosis, and it's easy to use this board (or a belgian waffle on a string) to garner any response you'd like, very easily.

I used to perform hypnosis and psychological 'magic' ('mentalism', along the lines of the UK's Derren Brown or David Blaine), where cold-reading and the use of suggestion can create tremendously strange looking effects, and make it seem like someone can actually read your mind. I write books and articles on it for performers now, but in the past I've worked as a 'tarot reader', using nothing more than simple skills to make people believe (until I told them otherwise) that I had paranormal abilities. I could get a table with four people around it to rise off the floor, apparently unaided; make the board or a pendulum spell out names in someone else's hands; or stop someone being able to speak or move - all with simple suggestion that anyone can learn. The mechanism behind the Ouija board is very, very well known. Mediums, tarot readers - all use exactly the same methods.

These things have been out since 1891 and the name means 'Good Luck'. They were sold as novelties, and weren't thought of as anything ancient or arcane. There is no 'lore' associated with them,they were sold for fun.

Not really with all due respect. Anecdotal stories aren't really proof.

Unfortunately, though I'm sure it wont happen in this fine thread, setting up the Ouija board as the work of the devil and evil is a fundamental christian troll, designed purely to get impressionable minds on forums like this to begin to accept the idea that there really is a spiritual realm of the dead and a devil, thus inferring too the existence of god. What better way to get you switched on to god than through a fear of the devil?

Does all the above make me a total cynic who would discount everything you could possibly say? Not at all. I believe in many, many strange things too - but that doesn't mean that I should accept everything that's allegedly paranormal just so I can be seen to be open-minded and 'right on'.



MelT

 

Pen and Teller are experts in the use of suggestion. Who better to comment on the Ouija board?

MelT

 

But, our point is that by beginning with the premise that it could work, and that there are any kind of 'rules' governing it's use, it validates it. This is where suggestion begins, by putting the idea that it might work in someone's mind. Without this, it wont work.

The rules aren't just to help in the board 'work' as it would seem, but in fact to provide a way of excusing itself when it doesn't come up with results. It's like me saying that I can emanate a golden light from my hands, but if you don't see it you're either not a believer, or sensitive to able to see it. It's an instant answer to almost every criticism of the board. It wont work if you don't believe in it, because it relies on suggestion. The answer is actually in the 'rules' themselves.

What seems to be happening (as you say unintentionally) is that you sound like you've begun with the premise that a board and a handful of people can contact the spirit world and talk to the dead or demons on a regular basis (obviously, only if they believe in it That's instantly giving it more credibility than it deserves.

MelT

 

I think I am falling in love with you, MelT

 

lol @ the assumptions that the board is a play toy made by parker brothers.
i dont blame you for not believing in the spiritual world, i really dont. But just because I do doesnt mean you can make stupid assumptions. Im not religious at all. Im agnostic. And the board can be used for good, not only evil. It just so happened that the one time it was someone very angry who I have communicated with.
I do believe in the power of suggestion as well im not naive to that fact and I know ALOT of people practice that for entertainment purposes. But im positive that was not the case. Because the consequences went far beyond the board.... it didnt end when "the game" ended. Whatever we communicated with meant serious business. But if I tell you my story none of you would believe it or you would just try to find a "logical" assumption for what happened.
The board I used was a very old board passed on six generations from the King of Kongo Affonso the First. The person was my cousin (not blood but very good family friend). She just moved from Africa to Poland to escape her father (the ruler of the Congo) from horrible abuse. It's not like the board was bought from Toys R Us lol. This was a real piece of history, if not "just a board" with letters and numbers.

 

It would never work, our children would be ugly

"...The Ideomotor Reflex

Ray Hyman, a professor of psychology at the University of Oregon, knows quite a bit about how the triangular Ouija stylus seemingly glides across the board without being intentionally pushed by those playing. It's called the ideomotor effect, and it is the widely accepted principle on which the scientific community explains dowsing, facilitated communication and, of course, the Ouija. Ideomotor effect refers to the psychological phenomenon in which people unconsciously move, especially when claiming that the motions were induced by a supernatural source they believe in.

"Our muscles will behave unconsciously in accordance with an implanted expectation," Hyman writes in an issue of The Scientific Review of Alternative Medicine. "What makes this simple fact so important is that we are not aware that we ourselves are the source of the resulting action. This lack of any sense of volition is common in many everyday actions."

To prove his point, Hyman created an experiment with his college students using dowsing rods. Dowsing is a term to describe practices in which some people use metal Y-shaped rods to find water, metals or gem stones hidden under land.

He explained to them that they should hold the rods parallel in each of their hands while walking around a room. Hyman demonstrated how they worked, and when he reached a certain spot in the room, he crossed his rods. "Perhaps there is a water pipe under the floor here," he tells them.

When it was each of the students' turns, all of their rods crossed in the same spot they had seen Hyman's cross.

Then he did the same demonstration with a second, different group of students, only this time, he crossed his rods at a different spot in the room. In turn, each student crossed their rods just as they arrived at the spot Hyman had shown the second time.

"The experience for most students is eerie," he says. "They insist that they are doing nothing on purpose to make the (movement) occur."

Suggestion.

MelT

 

The very first boards were a play toy (a little before parker bros got he license).

So you're saying that this board pre-dates any other known board? I think magic historians would be very intersted in that claim, as there are no kown boards before 1891 - those made as novelties. If you can get pictures of it you will be making history.

Also, if the woman you spoke to claimed to be a daughter of the ruler of the congo I think you need to check her passport. You might also want to ask here why only 6 generations have passed between her and Affonso the First who reigned from 1506 to 1545.

Whether the board was forged in the fires of hell by the hands of deamons, or bought in Woolworths yesterday, it still works entirely through the use of suggestion.

MelT

 

Ahh, so the old argumentum ad antiquitatem.

Hahaha

For somebody who claims not to be religious, you sure enjoy subscribing to religious ideas.

 

Which omits the fact that I arrived at that conclusion through reasoning and study.

I have had such a personal experience, many times from 1984 to 1990. And in no case was any thing revealed to me or anyone else who took part that could not be put down to suggestion. There was a mix of believers/nearly believers and non-believers at every sitting, actually hoping to find some valid effect. And as you'll see below,it's very easily testable.

The board is easy peasy to debunk, just blindfold those using it, as has been done in experiments. It will render nothing but gibberish. Strange that 'demons' should be able to see us and interact with us, but not see the board itself??

So we have two very good reasons not to begin by giving the board equal footing with real phenomena in a sane reality; we have experience of it not working; and we know provably that suggestion creates all of its effects. What's left?

MelT

 

Haven't oujia boards already been disproven time and time over?