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Interestingly, Penn and Teller (although I've never heard Teller talk about it [har har] they seem to be in agreement) look at and talk about this sort of moral quandary a lot in the context of the tradition of magicians. For them, it's not enough to think think that "of course the audience knows" but to be honest from the get go.

Darren Brown did a stage show called "Miracle" (which was fantastic, but a different discussion) where he talks about his experience with faith healers and the like and says at the beginning that, which he doesn't like people getting suckered or lying, the experience is one that people should have, and goes on to spend the rest of the show "in character" as a faith healer.

The movie Leap of Faith also explores this moral dilemma.

I've never been upset at people doing whatever it takes to survive, but I don't think that it excuses you from the ethics of what you do. I definitely wouldn't consider what he did 100% ethical and it's OK to question what you do.

Do address something else:

> I think this guy needs to stop and revisit what he was doing. He wasn't a fraud. He was exactly what those people were paying for.

The cursed man didn't come in to see a magic trick or to be lied to, he came to have his curse lifted. There are many many people, whether ignorant or ill, who do not see this as some sort of entertainment or escapism, but actually how the world works. This is where the morally questionable part comes in. It's like casinos or the lottery: plenty of people go in expecting to "throw their money away" on entertainment, but nothing is done to tell people that it's not wise to expect anything to actually happen, and over-correlation can lead to addiction (and yes, addiction to psychics can and does happen)

It's far more grey than you think.

> although I've never heard Teller talk about it [har har] they seem to be in agreement

He does actually talk in interviews and they are definitely in agreement. He also has a rather soothing radio voice, in a way its a pity he doesn't talk more, although I do feel his performances are stronger because of his silence.

I think I recall seeing him act in Big Bang Theory, acting as Amy's father.

I don't like Derren Brown.

I feel he is happy with people leaving his shows believing in psuedo-scientific nonsense, it's just a different brand of nonsense.

I'd be interested in a poll of people leaving his shows being asked if they thought it was a) mostly traditional magic / sleight of hand or b) Psychology, influence, whatever nonsense Brown calls his stuff nowadays.

I might be wrong, but I think most would go with with b)

Derren Brown is in a weird space for me. On stage, he mixes his very heavy skepticism with other claims of pseudoscience, and the two can be a bit muddled. He does always say that what he does is a trick and "honestly dishonest", but obscures how he does it. Off stage, he rails against any thought that things like NLP or subliminal suggestion works, but people might not be aware of that.

I don't doubt that at least a small portion of what he does is very similar to what the author of the article describes, with cold-reading and just a good understanding of people, but there's plenty of traditional stage magic with it. I also don't doubt that he would never go on stage with a trick that couldn't be performed correctly 100% percent of the time.

To me NLP always felt more like mysticism than science.

It's absolutely considered pseudoscience by most people, including Derren Brown himself [0].

[0]: http://derrenbrown.co.uk/claim-claim-2/

Penn doesn't just talk about it in the context of magicians. He's mentioned James Randi many times, and has been very forthcoming about his atheism (see https://youtu.be/oKGjHmeKUQs )

Irrational problems have irrational solutions.

If your child is scared at night because of the monster under their bed, you don't show them that it isn't there. You make a magic stick and give it to the child and tell it that it'll scare away the monster.

For the man that came in and genuinely believed he was cursed, you tell him you have the counter spell.

Doesn't this kind of argument work for almost every type of fraud though? "The customers were paying for the fraud, not what was advertised."

Would a magician then be fraud? They purport to move a card, force a coin, etc, but they do not do those things, they trick you instead.

How about "sports entertainment" like professional wrestling? They purport to provide a sport, but in reality it's a fraudulently scripted drama. Would that be a fraud?

Customers appear happy to buy into many things even with the full knowledge of what it is.

In the magician's case everyone, except maybe small kids, knows that what they see is not real and just the illusion. The entertainment comes from the fact that we don't know how that illusion is done or even if we do know we still admire the mastery. In the case of astrology, cold reading, etc. many sincerely believe that there are some higher forces at work.

I don't agree. Magic works on a lot more people than you're willing to admit, and a lot less people truly believe in psychics than you think.

I also notice you didn't touch professional wrestling, another case where while many know it's fake, many others enjoy it as if it were real.

Or if we want to get political, let's talk about religion and Christian churches. Is it fraudulent to offer a religious service to people who believe it's real?

While I personally don't get the appeal of wrestling, I accept that some people get enjoyment out of it. However beyond losing them some money (tickets, merchandise) the harm in this case is minimal.

For psychics and religion? not so much. People who blindly take what they are told as the truth may make life defining decisions based on the "advice" given. In some cases the outcome may be benign or even positive, but in most cases a real persons action are influenced by statements not grounded in reality. So overall it is valid to call out these "services" as fraudulent IMO.

> Is it fraudulent to offer a religious service to people who believe it's real?

If one knows something is untrue then I'd say it's fraud. After decades growing up in increasingly progressive churches I'd say that secular education is whittling away at all the falsifiable claims.

Conveniently there are scriptures like "don't test the Lord your God." So there are parts that, in their view, can never be disproven. (Of course god can and does test people and violate free will.)

EDIT: fixed incomplete quote

There's a kind of ethos in magic and illusion: "being honest about dishonesty". MAny many magicians are very upfront about their "dishonesty" and have a disdain for people who aren't. This is why you see many magicians rail against psychics and faith healers. Yes, they basically do the same thing, but the magicians label themselves as such to be honest about the dishonesty. See Derren Brown's stageshow "Miracle" or the & Teller's Magic and Mystery Tour episode about the indian rope trick. It's a pretty big deal in the in the art.

Magicians are entertainers, and it's fake just like all entertainment is, like the movie characters and plots are fake. If you're adult you're expected to know that. It makes it very different from astrology, where people actually believe in it. They're selling people advices as actual educated truths extrapolated from stars by means of science. Astrologists are not less of con-artists than say a person practicing medicine without any medical education or license. They might help one, or two, or ten people by using common sense, but sooner or later they'll cause harm to someone because they're just a bunch of charlatans.

>like the movie characters and plots are fake. If you're adult you're expected to know that. It makes it very different from astrology, where people actually believe in it. They're selling people advices as actual educated truths

Okay, so what about religion then? Would it not be fraudulent using this criteria you've laid out? Or maybe it's less fraudulent since many religions operate under a tithing "donation" scheme instead?

Personally, as someone who does not believe in god, the divine or the supernatural, I do believe that religion is fraudulent and that most believers at this point are indoctrinated. I mean, obviously believers think otherwise and I'm not going to argue with them, everyone has a right to their own beliefs, but I think pushing those beliefs on others, especially children, is immoral (but I also understand that if you believe, then you would believe the opposite: that not doing so is immoral). Its a tricky situation, so I don't try to change anyone's minds.

The difference is in the awareness of the "fraud". A religious teacher truly believes in the existence of god, therefore they're not a fraud.

It seems you need these criteria:

1. The fraud knows they are duping the subject.

2. The subject truly believes the fraud is real.

In the magician example, 2 does not hold.

In the religion example, 1 does not hold.

Of course, there are _some_ frauds in religious circles. But I don't think the average church minister is rubbing their hands together in anticipation of the next donation.

>The difference is in the awareness of the "fraud". A religious teacher truly believes in the existence of god, therefore they're not a fraud.

So as long as the psychic actually believes they are psychic, it's 100% not fraudulent. Got it.

It can't be fraud if your intentions are good, apparently.

> It can't be fraud if your intentions are good, apparently.

I'd love for any lawyer to chime in, but I believe that's the case, yes.

I believe it's similarly not murder if you can prove it wasn't your intent, making it manslaughter or other classifications.

Huge IANAL disclaimer.

Let's say people have religious experiences, where they sense or feel something that's as real to them as what you see in front of your face. I have.

Are they supposed to ignore that, not dig into it, and pretend it didn't happen? That's as irrational as asking you to believe it without such an experience.

> So as long as the psychic actually believes they are psychic

Exactly.

I can't speak for other legal systems, but in the United States, fraud is defined as intentional deception. You may view their actions as fraudulent, but without earnest intent to deceive, it doesn't qualify as the crime of fraud.

The key here is intent. With religion people aren't intending to deceive -- it's what they believe. With astrology psychics know they don't have magical powers.

There's a boat load of generalisations here though so will be plenty of exceptions to what I've said.

edit: it's really weird that there's two comments posted around the same time and making the same point. One comment has several replies agreeing with it where as this one has been downvoted and a comment disagreeing with it. I'm not complaining though, it's just amusing me how erratic this site can sometimes be.

Are you suggesting that no psychic believes what they say, or that no priest questions what they say?

I would strongly push back on both of those assertions, myself.

> Are you suggesting that no psychic believes what they say, or that no priest questions what they say?

My last sentence clearly answers that question:

"There's a boat load of generalisations here though so will be plenty of exceptions to what I've said."

I suggest you read peoples comments in full if you intent to rebuke them.

I think you may need to separate religion from churches/pastors/missionaries/etc here.

Magic is used to swindle. (Three card monte, I saw the cups and balls on the streets of Paris taking bets). I find that different than paying for a magic show.

When I was a kid we weren’t sure the wrestling was scripted. When people wanted to bet on it. Regulators made it known. People still enjoy it, much like scripted movies and tv.

A good magician won't pretend to have supernatural abilities and instead treat it like any other performance art.

I think what makes this really tough morally (at least compared to "normal" fraud) is that this fraud can actually help the person being defrauded, and in some cases might be the only way to reasonably help them.

Felicity who wanted a "hot boyfriend" and studied theater is probably a woman, I think.

Notice how nobody got outraged by the "and studied theater" stereotype? ;-)

at least someone noticed, lol

I missed the "hot boyfriend" entirely and was mislead by the stock image at the top of the article.

> After all the help he gave all those people, he quit because someone called him a fraud and refused his help?

No, she quit because she she realized that the esotheric service industry, of which she was a part, was supporting and reinforcing that man's refusal to get medical help, which is what he urgently needed to prevent him from harming himself and possibly also others.

Someone who can read people that well won't have much trouble finding interesting work, I think.

I find this issue ethically interesting: she lies to people to help them. Or just to entertain them, but when people need something specific, she uses their irrational superstitions to convince them to do something that would be the rational thing to do.

It also touches a bit on the placebo effect: should a doctor be allowed to present a placebo as real medicine because that might enhance the placebo effect, which may still be better than nothing?

> Tell him to go to the doctor, but have an in-character way of doing it instead of using logic. If they were willing to listen to logic, they wouldn't be there.

Actually, I'd say the problem was that she did stay in character. I don't understand why she couldn't just say the truth: "I was just reading about a neurological condition with these exact symptoms. You may have $name, and if you don't get it treated immediately $bad_thing may happen."

I think that was just what tipped the scale, looks like she could not handle selling psychic powers she did not have. You may not see it like it, but this fits many definition of a fraud.

The fact that her clients were delusional does not make it much more ethical.

If I made a business selling cheap plastic Shenzhen baubles as potent magic pendants, would it be a legitimate business just because I find people willing to pay?

Reading between the lines a little, maybe that example summarized multiple similar incidents that built up to a point where this person simply couldn't accept the premeditated context projected onto each session. Never really thought about it that way before, but I can imagine that would get old/draining pretty quick.

Yeah.

This is (100-eps)% of classical psychoanalysis (including the extensive word association, etc.) except for the crucial bit that's transference -- the long term relationship between patient and analyst.

Psychoanalytic theory (at least Lacanian theory, which is what I'm studying at lunch hour) explores a lot of this stuff -- the healing of people by prodding them to heal themselves and maybe grasping a clue here and there.

I wouldn't recommend analysis (or astrology) to anyone in pain, but if you can read French (translations of Lacan are atrocious, and I'm told Freud is even worse) reading seminars I and XV are a great investment of time.

No. She was an untrained individual providing unprofessional and unproven mental health and potentially life changing advice to fragilized people.

That's called charlatanism and has a tremendous potential for causing serious harm on scales we sometimes can't even think of.

Just from the top of my head: South Korea was until recently governed by someone who took official decisions from faeries advices, and Brazilian right wing extremism is fueled by a former astrologer turned political influencer.

There used to be a nice collection of similar stories in this website http://whatstheharm.net/ and while it hasn't been updated in a while, I believe it still serves as a decent repository of examples.

in general people are too fast to drag a hard line between scientific and hogwash, as if wisdom is useless without proof or p-values