Suggestions for Ouija Board experiments

[Paradox74]

After reading some of the replies to my threads dealing with this paranormal issue, I came across the following from Cuddles:

Quote:

As for the content, I don't agree with your claims about blindfolds. It's a very common part of Ouija board and similar claims to say the spirits can only see through the eyes of the people participating. It's not even obviously an excuse, since the idea of possession, talking through living people, automatic writing, and so on, are pretty well established. The important part of a test is having the test blinded, not literally blinding the people taking part.

Good point.

Since the blindfold thing doesn't work, for the reason mentioned above, what we could use is a new wave of different experiments to test this game. This is going to be a brain storming thread so I'll start out with some suggestions. If anyone can suggest any improvements, I would greatly appreciate it if you would do it in the following order:

I start out with Experiment #1:

Place a Bible on top of the Ouija Board and leave them in a locked room overnight. Analyze the results in the morning.

Then you come along with another one:

Experiment #2:

Write down a series of numbers on a piece of paper and ask the players, who are going to ask the game, what you have written down.

Then, Experiment #3...#4...#8 etc.


For any improvements, reminders, suggestions say:

Suggestions/improvements/reminders etc. for Experiment #2:

Make sure to exclude yourself out of the next session. Do not give out any hints as to what you have written down to the other players (I know that's obvious, but it's just an example).

Then Suggestions/improvements/Reminders etc for Experiment #X

I want a consistent format so that we can easily refer back to any Experiment number.


Lets begin.

P.S: I know that I have made quite a few threads about this topic, but I think that this might be much more effective than writing some essay on some blog that might get less than 100 views within 3 months.

[Sean84]

I read it twice.

I read it twice.

Huh?

[Akhenaten]

Originally Posted by Sean84

I read it twice.

I read it twice.

Huh?

I'm very relieved to find out that it's not just me.

Thanks, Sean.

[Tony99]

Originally Posted by Paradox74

I start out with Experiment #1:

Place a Bible on top of the Ouija Board and leave them in a locked room overnight. Analyze the results in the morning.

I thought that was kinda funny.
To be fair to the experiment you would probably have to use a variety of religious texts to see which books juju was stronger than the Ouija board.

[C_Felix]

Get Stpehen Hawking.
Place his hand on the thingy.

He can't move his hands.
But, he can see.

If it moves and spells out, "Change me" or something, then we know its for real.

[Ladewig]

Throw three dice on the top of a tall bookshelf in the room. Have the "spirits" spell out the sum. Get a stepstool and check results.


ETA: opps I forgot the most important part. If the sum is 10 and the spirits spell out 11, then it is a fail.
No if's and's or but's. 10 ≠ 11. If the spirits cannot meet the standard that we hold second graders to on their math tests, then the spirits are too stupid to listen to.

[Beerina]

Hehe, the only valid science would be checking if the lens is the proper distance to start a fire on the board in noonday sun.

[Paradox74]

Originally Posted by Sean84

I read it twice.

I read it twice.

Huh?

I'm not really suprised that people found my original post somewhat confusing...I did write it in the dead of night so obviously I wasn't my best due to fatigue.

I'll say it again in short; we're going to be comming up with experiments (and improving on each other's if possible) in this thread.

Originally Posted by Ladewig

Throw three dice on the top of a tall bookshelf in the room. Have the "spirits" spell out the sum. Get a stepstool and check results.


ETA: opps I forgot the most important part. If the sum is 10 and the spirits spell out 11, then it is a fail.
No if's and's or but's. 10 ≠ 11. If the spirits cannot meet the standard that we hold second graders to on their math tests, then the spirits are too stupid to listen to.

Good idea. That might be better than writing down numbers on a piece of paper and then having the spirits spell them out. With this experiment, you can still participate in the Ouija Board session.

[Ladewig]

The other approach to the Ouija board is to tell believers that the more people participating the more accurate it is. It is fun watching six people trying to push the planchette in six different directions. Or ask the spirits to spell something backwards.

[Denver]

How about a test to see if there are any bilingual spirits in the beyond?

Get a few words written by someone not in the group, in other languages.
Label them by language (spanish, arabic, hebrew, etc).
Place the word open on the table where all the players can see it (but none speak the language).

Then ask for a spirit that speaks that language to look through the eyes of the players, and translate it?

An alternative would be instead of simple words, have entire questions written in the other language, and ask the spirit to answer.

[sadhatter]

I would try the following test.

Get your group of believers, now tell them you are going to write down a series of 4 numbers in the opposite room. Come back and tell them the numbers, and if they ask why, tell them that you are simply trying to see if the board will move, so no hidden numbers are required.

Now have them ask the numbers that are written in the next room.

The trick is, that you didn't write down the numbers you told them. If the board shows the numbers you told them ( they didn't understand you may be pulling a trick. ), or if it shows different numbers ( they caught onto the trick, but wanted to throw out a guess.) it is obvious it is the people doing the moving. If it shows the numbers you wrote down, then there may be something to it.

[Paradox74]

As a another thing for us to do, we should copy some of these experiments on a separate document for offline use so we can archive and review each one.

[Paradox74]

[quote=sadhatter;6940878]I would try the following test.

Get your group of believers, now tell them you are going to write down a series of 4 numbers in the opposite room. Come back and tell them the numbers, and if they ask why, tell them that you are simply trying to see if the board will move, so no hidden numbers are required.

Now have them ask the numbers that are written in the next room.

The trick is, that you didn't write down the numbers you told them. If the board shows the numbers you told them ( they didn't understand you may be pulling a trick. ), or if it shows different numbers ( they caught onto the trick, but wanted to throw out a guess.) it is obvious it is the people doing the moving. If it shows the numbers you wrote down, then there may be something to it.[/QUOTE]

You could have another experiment similar to that one by asking the believers about your own personal geneology or family history, such as asking them if Aunt Mary (who is related to you) knows where Uncle Max (who is completely unrelated) kept his diary.

[Ladewig]

[quote=Paradox74;6942335]

Originally Posted by sadhatter

I would try the following test.

Get your group of believers, now tell them you are going to write down a series of 4 numbers in the opposite room. Come back and tell them the numbers, and if they ask why, tell them that you are simply trying to see if the board will move, so no hidden numbers are required.

Now have them ask the numbers that are written in the next room.

The trick is, that you didn't write down the numbers you told them. If the board shows the numbers you told them ( they didn't understand you may be pulling a trick. ), or if it shows different numbers ( they caught onto the trick, but wanted to throw out a guess.) it is obvious it is the people doing the moving. If it shows the numbers you wrote down, then there may be something to it.[/QUOTE]

You could have another experiment similar to that one by asking the believers about your own personal geneology or family history, such as asking them if Aunt Mary (who is related to you) knows where Uncle Max (who is completely unrelated) kept his diary.

That reminds me, if I ever encounter a an After-Death Communicator, I will ask if Sophie and William ever made up in the after life because they fought so much during their lives. When the ADCer tells me yes and goes on and on about whatever message of love they have for me, I'll say that I am glad because those two dogs, while being my favorite pets, never could get along.

[Pup]

The way these things usually play out is:

Woo claims something paranormal (spirits communicate through ouija).

Skeptic designs test and proves it doesn't work (blindfolds participants).

Woo refines claim to explain failure (spirits needs to see through participants' eyes).

Lather, rinse, repeat.

To speed things up to a faster conclusion, seems like the first step would be to find out exactly what ouija believers are claiming. Are the "spirits" seeing through people's eyes, implanting thoughts in their minds, using the operators' physical abilities, limited by the operators' language skills, limited by their own personalities ("that one is so stubborn, and what a joker!"), or what?

Otherwise, you can devise a test for one thing and they'll simply claim that that's not how it works, because the spirits can't do that, don't always cooperate, play tricks, need to use the brain/body/language of the operator, etc....

[RayG]

Why wouldn't blindfolding the participants be effective? It doesn't have to be an actual blindfold, just some method of ensuring the participants can't see the board.

Since poking their eyes out with sharp sticks isn't an option, what about putting them in a dark room and filming the results with an infrared camera?

RayG

[Pup]

Originally Posted by RayG

Why wouldn't blindfolding the participants be effective? It doesn't have to be an actual blindfold, just some method of ensuring the participants can't see the board.

It'll stop the ouija board from working properly, but won't prove the operators' claims are false, if they claim that spirits need to see through their eyes to see the board.

[sadhatter]

[quote=Paradox74;6942335]

Originally Posted by sadhatter

I would try the following test.

Get your group of believers, now tell them you are going to write down a series of 4 numbers in the opposite room. Come back and tell them the numbers, and if they ask why, tell them that you are simply trying to see if the board will move, so no hidden numbers are required.

Now have them ask the numbers that are written in the next room.

The trick is, that you didn't write down the numbers you told them. If the board shows the numbers you told them ( they didn't understand you may be pulling a trick. ), or if it shows different numbers ( they caught onto the trick, but wanted to throw out a guess.) it is obvious it is the people doing the moving. If it shows the numbers you wrote down, then there may be something to it.[/QUOTE]

You could have another experiment similar to that one by asking the believers about your own personal geneology or family history, such as asking them if Aunt Mary (who is related to you) knows where Uncle Max (who is completely unrelated) kept his diary.

As i was thinking of this, i thought of a slightly less....sneaky way of doing it. Using the dice method another poster described.

Same basic premise, but don't introduce the " just trying to see if it works, no need for secrecy." bit.

You simply tell them you will be rolling 3 ( or more.) dice, and writing the total down. 9/10 ( possibly more.) will assume you were talking about your standard 6 sided dice.

What you do beforehand is buy a set of D&D dice at a local comics or games shop. this should give you at least one of teach of the following :

6 sided dice, 8 sided dice, 10 sided dice, 12 sided dice, 20 sided dice, 100 sided dice, 4 sided dice.

The beauty of this is that you have multiple opportunities to do this test with the same group. Even if you " reveal" after your first test, you still have 6 other kinds of dice you don't have to tell them about. And it will become apparent people are guessing the more different types you try.

My theory is that as you "reveal" your different dice, you will notice the guesses change based on what kind of dice has been used ( you could even throw a curveball and roll a 2 sided dice, commonly refereed to as a coin. ). If you have a quick d and d player in your group, they may inform the others of the types of dice ( you would be surprised as hell at how many people don't know 6 sided is not the only dice.), but this isn't a killer. It simply means that they know that there is a huge range of numbers ( on the high side, 3-300.) , and you will see the guesses be all over the place.

[Ladewig]

[quote=sadhatter;6943727]

Originally Posted by Paradox74

As i was thinking of this, i thought of a slightly less....sneaky way of doing it. Using the dice method another poster described.

Same basic premise, but don't introduce the " just trying to see if it works, no need for secrecy." bit.

You simply tell them you will be rolling 3 ( or more.) dice, and writing the total down. 9/10 ( possibly more.) will assume you were talking about your standard 6 sided dice.

What you do beforehand is buy a set of D&D dice at a local comics or games shop. this should give you at least one of teach of the following :

6 sided dice, 8 sided dice, 10 sided dice, 12 sided dice, 20 sided dice, 100 sided dice, 4 sided dice.

The beauty of this is that you have multiple opportunities to do this test with the same group. Even if you " reveal" after your first test, you still have 6 other kinds of dice you don't have to tell them about. And it will become apparent people are guessing the more different types you try.

My theory is that as you "reveal" your different dice, you will notice the guesses change based on what kind of dice has been used ( you could even throw a curveball and roll a 2 sided dice, commonly refereed to as a coin. ). If you have a quick d and d player in your group, they may inform the others of the types of dice ( you would be surprised as hell at how many people don't know 6 sided is not the only dice.), but this isn't a killer. It simply means that they know that there is a huge range of numbers ( on the high side, 3-300.) , and you will see the guesses be all over the place.

There is more than a little being a jerk there. Not that I am complaining. In fact your post inspired an idea. Tell the group that you'll throw the dice up there and then you'll look, write it down, and then they'll have a chance to oujia-ize the results through special spirit powers (obviously a bad a test because it isn't blinded). The jerk part comes in by the experimenter writing down the wrong number and "accidentally" letting the board operators see the written-down number. When they claim victory, ask them to look for themselves if they got it right.

[idoubtit]

Enjoying these suggestions. These are getting me thinking.

I have a question though... Lots of ghostie sites (probably about 30-40%) claim Ouija is a doorway to hell/portal for evil spirits/yada yada yada... Shouldn't that be a testable claim? I mean, if it allows all kinds of demonic rabble into the place, wouldn't we be able to see an increase in paranormal activity? This only happens in stories. But, if this is there claim, it seems like it would make a quite nice way to convert skeptics. Of course, it takes forever and no one is around the house all the time to see the stuff happening which again is based on stories.

I'll add this to the list of things to ask ghost hunters about...

[quarky]

A moment of Devil's advocate here:

Imagine if the board is doing what it claims to do by the woosters...then none of these exposes would work. The spirits would simply be confused and have nothing to report.

[RayG]

Originally Posted by Pup

It'll stop the ouija board from working properly, but won't prove the operators' claims are false, if they claim that spirits need to see through their eyes to see the board.

That excuse would negate just about any test devised. Why would spirits need to rely on the line of sight of the participants?

RayG

[Paradox74]

Here's another one that I just conjured up in less than a minute:

Ask quesitons about which celebrities or historical figures are in heaven. For an example, get a group of people who think that Napoleon was a hero and have those people ask the board whether or not he is in heaven. Now, ask another group of people who think otherwise and have them ask the same question.

Of course, this experiment requirest that you get two different groups of people with different metaphysical/philosophical/religious/political beliefs and have them ask quesitons that relate to those fields (excluding the existence of an afterlife and spirits because those are a given to people who believe in the board's powers). Such questions include:

Is there sex in heaven?

Does reincarnation exist and if so, then do we reincarnate into animals or space aliens?

Now, if one group's results are "Yes" to one question and the other group is "No" to the same one, then that's a fail for the Ouija Board.

[Sledge]

How is that a fail? That's just a mischievous spirit playing with the group.

[quarky]

If I was one of these spirits, I would totally mess with skeptic's heads.

Can that be factored in?

[GrandMasterFox]

Originally Posted by Paradox74

Now, if one group's results are "Yes" to one question and the other group is "No" to the same one, then that's a fail for the Ouija Board.

Sadly no. That would be like asking: "If 2 religious groups say different things about god, that proves that god is a false"

Isn't it more likely to say that odds are, the winning group will claim that the other one is wrong (and possibly vice versa)

Originally Posted by quarky

If I was one of these spirits, I would totally mess with skeptic's heads.

Can that be factored in?

When it comes to excuses of failure? Absolutely
Reminds me of that show Derren Brown did about ghosts and EVP. He was following a guy who was going around cemeteries and taping supposed EVPs.
He asked the guy if he could ask the ghost a question. The guy asked yes.

Derren asked: "If there is a ghost here, would you show to me you exist by keeping silent for the next minute or so?"
Naturally, when the tape was played, the usual static noise was caught.
And the guy started dishing out excuses such just because Derren asked, doesn't mean the ghost has to play along and such.

[Pup]

Originally Posted by RayG

That excuse would negate just about any test devised.

Of course. That's why woos use it.

To avoid an excuse-test arms-race (where woos come up with increasingly better excuses to thwart increasingly better tests), one needs to nail down exactly what the claim is first.

[TmoonII]

Originally Posted by Paradox74

Is there sex in heaven?

yes, that's where we get cherubs.

[Ladewig]

Originally Posted by quarky

A moment of Devil's advocate here:

Imagine if the board is doing what it claims to do by the woosters...then none of these exposes would work. The spirits would simply be confused and have nothing to report.

Why would the spirits be confused at being asked to add up some dice in a different part of the room?

[King of the Americas]

How about you make the 'piece' that everyone holds onto, have flexible tube-like ends so that no one can influence the movement...

[Paradox74]

Originally Posted by Ladewig

Why would the spirits be confused at being asked to add up some dice in a different part of the room?

You got a point.

Originally Posted by Pup

Of course. That's why woos use it.

To avoid an excuse-test arms-race (where woos come up with increasingly better excuses to thwart increasingly better tests), one needs to nail down exactly what the claim is first.

From:
http://www.omninerd.com/articles/Do_...ct_and_Fiction

Quote:

There are essentially three schools of thought concerning the matter:

•The ritual summons the spirit and the spirit moves the planchette. The participant’s hands simply follow.
•The spirit controls the planchette through the participant.
•The spirit’s energy communes with the participant’s energy and influences the participant to move the planchette.

There appears to be more than one claim to test out concerning the source of the supposed powers of the game. There's more information in that website if anyone is interested.

[quarky]

Originally Posted by Ladewig

Why would the spirits be confused at being asked to add up some dice in a different part of the room?

Because it would be meaningless for them. Why would they want to jump through hoops of that sort? Simple math quizzes? What is in it for them?

[Ladewig]

Originally Posted by quarky

Because it would be meaningless for them. Why would they want to jump through hoops of that sort? Simple math quizzes? What is in it for them?

Right, and answering the silly questions that the average Ouija boardist asks are much more meaningful.

[GrandMasterFox]

Originally Posted by quarky

Because it would be meaningless for them. Why would they want to jump through hoops of that sort? Simple math quizzes? What is in it for them?

It would prove they can truly comunicate with us. Therefore, if they want to ask us for additional favors (X is my killer, put him in jail) they better pass a simple test.

[quarky]

Originally Posted by GrandMasterFox

It would prove they can truly comunicate with us. Therefore, if they want to ask us for additional favors (X is my killer, put him in jail) they better pass a simple test.

Good point.

I am open to good points.

Yet, as potentially disembodied entity, I'm not sure that even matters.

Try to feel my dis-embodied-ness.
Try to relate with other dimensions, and the various agendas therein.

[Paradox74]

This came from the top of my head:

Alot of religious fundamentalists believe that Satan, or his demons, are behind this game so lets test that claim out.

Use the Ouija Board with a crucifix present and say, "Protect us Jesus from any unfortunate encounters etc." or something like that. Ask all kinds of questions (get creative) and record the results. I'll assume that Satan was able to communicate with the players.

Then, perform the blindfold experiment. If Satan was able to bypass Jesus, the son of God, but yet was stumped by the blindfold part, well...you get the idea. This experiment isn't really that different from the original one, but the operating premises makes it a valid one to test out.

[quarky]

I feel the spirit in this thread.

(don't wreck it for me again, science dorks)

[Ladewig]

Originally Posted by quarky

I feel the spirit in this thread.

(don't wreck it for me again, science dorks)

In the words of Ned Flanders: ""Science is like a blabbermouth who ruins a movie by telling you how it ends. Well I say that there are some things we don't want to know. Important things!"

[Paradox74]

Originally Posted by Denver

How about a test to see if there are any bilingual spirits in the beyond?

Get a few words written by someone not in the group, in other languages.
Label them by language (spanish, arabic, hebrew, etc).
Place the word open on the table where all the players can see it (but none speak the language).

Then ask for a spirit that speaks that language to look through the eyes of the players, and translate it?

An alternative would be instead of simple words, have entire questions written in the other language, and ask the spirit to answer.

That might be something to look into. One foreign language word that I can think of is "thanatos" which, upon doing some basic research, is a word that Greek spirits, or ghosts or souls or whatever, should be very familiar with.

[Paradox74]

Something came to my mind. Are there electronic devices out there that record the nerve signals in your arms when you move them or something like that?