Iguanas are a hobby of mine and have been for years. You can easily *visibly* tell the sex of an iguana that is over 8 inches in body length. The one she was "talking to" was a full grown mature *female*. Female iguanas do have a very feminine appearance - a bit more *delicate*, narrower head/snout, heavier bodies, and the camera panned the whole iguana. No hemipenal bulges, which you can *easily* see on a full grown male *from a distance*.

The iguana she was "talking to" had the exact same appearance as my Akbar, who is very, very female (had a couple clutches years ago).

Man, I'm amazed at some of the replies to this thread. No where in Jadzia's starting post did she say she believes in psychic powers. It's an entertaining and emotional show, especially for animal lovers, and that's it. She's not going after the amazing Randi's prize b/c she's not psychic. So why call it The Pet Psychic? To get people to be intrigued and watch - and it's working!

I watched the web cast on the AP site and it was interesting. Doubt I'll make it appointment TV but I'll probably watch when I happen to be flipping around the dial.

This show is a sham. All psychics are a sham.

I don't belive in psychics either, but I think totally dismissing anything supernatural is a little overboard. I mean, this one million dollar prize thing is run by sceptics, and so of course they're going to REALLY REALLY need incredible proof and dismiss a lot of stuff as coincidence...

i wrote to animal planet to complain about this show. people who actually believe in this stuff won't be convinced that it's all bs, but ponder this. if she is a "real psychic" then please explain why what she does on the show is in fact telepathy. you'd think a person with magical powers would know what they are huh?

Since she is psychic shouldnt she already know when her show will be canceled?

The thing is that there is a test only when both parties agree to all the criteria beforehand. The result that would signify success is agreed to. Judges acceptable to both parties are agreed to. Randi's requirements are merely controls that prevent any cheating on the part of the challenger. He uses his knowledge of how magic tricks are done to set up his criteria (he does take the chance that someone could outwit him in that area, although that seems unlikely, given his expertise).

I don't know what could be more fair.

http://www.randi.org/research/

Edit: I was wrong about one thing above. I had seen a test done on television about 20 years ago that used judges. Obviously the protocol has been changed a bit since then. From the rules:

http://www.randi.org/research/challenge.html

Since the results that would constitute success are spelled out to be totally objective, this makes sense.

Edited for typo.

Yeah, but it's hard to say. A person could predict someone's future and it could be called a coincidence. A person could tell someone all about themselfs, and it could be called a coincidence.

Don't get me wrong, I think most, if not everything, out there is bogus and nothing is supernatural... but I do know I have met a TON of sceptics who are totally biased.

I don't know much about this test, so I can't judge it or anything... but when someone says something like "If you're real, why not prove it" I'd just like them to know it's not always that easy.

That's why tests under controlled conditions are needed.

Perhaps. But I have read extensively and studied this area for about three decades. I have seen that time after time, under controlled conditions, psychic powers fail. When they are claimed to have been shown, such as in the Targ and Puthoff experiments with Uri Geller, subsequent analysis has shown that the controls were laughably lax. James Randi's Project Alpha exposed just how poor much of the parapsychology testing is (see http://www.banachek.org/Articles/Project%20Alpha.htm ). I think the continuous lack of evidence for psychic powers, despite attempts to establish it for well over a century means something. You can call it bias if you wish.

A 100% failure rate would tend to support that.

Seriously though, why should it be difficult?

Here's a test of my claimed ability I like to call "sight." Put me in a room where I am shown the face side of a card from a standard 52 card deck. I claim I will be able to tell you what the card is (e.g. Queen of Clubs). Furthermore, show me each of the 52 cards, one at a time and I will be able to identify each one. I claim 100% accuracy. You can test me. Put controls on the experiment so that there is no other way except "sight" from which I can get any information. I can repeat this ability for any experimenter.

Now take someone who claims to have "second sight." This person claims to be able to identify the cards by looking at the back of them. Do the exact same experiment as above except that this person sees only the back of the cards instead of the front. If this person indeed has this ability, why should it be difficult to demonstrate it? And repeat it? Now I know, when they fail, we then start hearing the excuses such as It doesn't work all the time, You can't just turn it on whenever you want to, The experimenter is a skeptic and is blocking the psychic vibrations, and on and on and on.

Take it as interesting entertainment. Why get so bent out of shape about it? At least there is no $1.99/minute hotline like a certain Miss Cleo.

"Call me now for free reading!"

movielib, yeah, I understand what you're saying. Obvioulsy, stuff like second site is easily disproven. And those who claim it isn't are wrong. Obivoulsy, if you can claim to do it, but not under witnesses, then you're screwed.

However, things like being able to sense when someone else is in danger, and some other things are very tricky to test.

And while I do belive it's all ********, I will admit that they are harder to test. I also will admit that I have known some people so secure in their unbelive that I wouldn't be suprised if they would cover up evidence, or give someone a hard time even if they did show some signs of having some sort of power.

OK, I go into a lab to get my claimed ability of "sight" tested (see above). I show my ability but the evil, skeptical, closed-minded experimenter is so "secure in his unbelief" that he covers up the evidence and claims I failed the test. Of course, he knows he is lying.

I go to ten more experimenters, five "believers" and five skeptics who doubt my ability but are honest and open-minded. All confirm my ability.

Others now wonder what the hell was going on in the first experiment and scrutinize the first experimenter's data. The first experimenter is exposed as a cheat and a fraud, gets fired from his university or research foundation position and is next seen asking if you want to supersize that order.

Look, I feel really weird arguing with you on this because I am normally on the other side of the argument. I don't belive in all this stuff.

But I'm not going to ignore the fact that some things would be hard to prove, and some people would be biased, and some people would just not see any evidence of supernatural powers, while others will.

Don't try to think I'm saying anything more.

People belived in crazy stuff for years and years because of relgion, and were so secure in it. They thought it was proven. When things came along to disprove a lot of this stuff, it took AGES for it to be accepted by many people. People would just keep deneying it constantly. They'd make up things to hide it... they wouldn't accept it.

I'm not going to pretend such things couldn't happen today either.