Belief in Psychic Detectives
Psychologists, researchers, and other authors have posited a number of possible explanations for the belief that some can provide valuable crime information from psychic abilities. The possible explanations include confirmation bias (or our natural tendency to favor information to confirm our beliefs), wishful thinking (which is the act of making decisions based upon what is appealing rather than reasoned), and retrofitting (or retroactively refining the specifics of a prediction after the facts are revealed). The act of reinterpreting vague and nebulous statements made by psychic detectives is also referred to as the multiple out. Taking advantage of these cognitive limitations is the practice of cold reading which creates the illusion of knowing specific information. Additionally, police detectives and other authors suggest that psychic detectives appear successful due to making common-sense or high-probability predictions such as finding bodies at dump sites or "near water."
While police departments claim they do not seek out or use psychics to solve crimes, they must follow up on all credible tips. If police do not refute this theory then "many in the public continue to believe that psychics are secretly employed by law enforcement" If the police state they do not use psychics then psychics claim that the police do not want to "share the credit" and are just covering up.
Finally, the use of psychics may simply reduce anxiety and fill the emotional needs of individuals who must be experiencing great stress.
Read more about this topic: Psychic Detective
Famous quotes containing the words belief in, belief and/or psychic:
“Hang ideas! They are tramps, vagabonds, knocking at the back- door of your mind, each taking a little of your substance, each carrying away some crumb of that belief in a few simple notions you must cling to if you want to live decently and would like to die easy!”
—Joseph Conrad (1857–1924)
“It is impossible to calculate the moral mischief, if I may so express it, that mental lying has produced in society. When a man has so far corrupted and prostituted the chastity of his mind as to subscribe his professional belief to things he does not believe he has prepared himself for the commission of every other crime.”
—Thomas Paine (1737–1809)
“Hastiness and superficiality are the psychic diseases of the twentieth century, and more than anywhere else this disease is reflected in the press.”
—Alexander Solzhenitsyn (b. 1918)