Twenty-five years ago, I met Philip Haldeman, cochair of Seattle’s Northwest Skeptics, and we formed a friendship. One of the many topics of interest we shared was cold reading. As a result, over the years I have invited Haldeman to my general psychology classes to pose as a psychic and see how my students would react. At first, Haldeman doubted that even a studious application of cold reading techniques could fool college psychology students. But time and time again he was successful, convincing my students of his amazing “psychic” abilities. After his “readings” of the students’ lives for much of the class time, I would shatter the reality of what Haldeman was doing by announcing that he was in fact a fraud.
Since 2003, I have been teaching a two-credit class once a year at Highline College in Des Moines, Washington, titled Critical Thinking about the Paranormal. Despite the first two words of the title, I’ve found that students are attracted to the class because of the last word in the title. Like most people, my students are fascinated with claims of the paranormal but haven’t developed critical thinking skills to evaluate the claims.
I have been teaching a class titled Critical Thinking about the Paranormal. Despite the first two words of the title, I’ve found that students are attracted to the class because of the last word in the title.