Holy Crap! Or Myrna Nazzour - the Miracle Faker of Damascus

Take a look at the objects below. The first is the Holy Lance that is kept in the Schatzkammer of Vienna. Allegedly, this is the spear that was used to pierce Jesus on the cross. There are of course other relics like it and we don't even know for certain that the story of the crucifixion - or Jesus for that matter - is anything more than religious myth. But for our purpose, it is sufficient that if the incident took place at the time suggested, and if Jesus was pierced by a Roman spearhead, it would a have been roughly similar to the one below in shape.



What kind of wound would such a spear produce? What would a wound from a Roman spear look like? Painters and other artists have imagined and depicted it for centuries and if you google for "stab wound" or "knife wound", perhaps you can get a general idea. Now, would it look like on the picture below?





As you can see, this is not a cut and it is not an open wound. The shape of this wound to the side of the chest is irregular so it has not been produced by a blade pushed into the body and then pulled out. And even if the blade had been turned and twisted during the penetration, it would have produced a wound with totally different irregularities - and something of a mess. In addition, alongside the wound in the picture, there is coloring of the skin suggesting that it has been scratched rather than pierced. I think it is fair to say that a) this wound is not caused by a Roman spear and b) this wound is not what you would imagine that such a wound would look like. Why these two alternatives are equally important, I will explain later on.

The next object is a replica of a Roman nail as they were designed during the time of Jesus. It is fairly safe to say that nails had to be quite large and look something like this to hold a body in place on a cross. And it is a fact that crucifixions were Roman practice at the time.



We don't really know if it was the palm of the hand or the wrist that was spiked, or if the feet were penetrated on the instep or through the heel. Some suggest that the arms were tied to the cross with ropes. Regardless of which, you should be able to imagine what kind of wound a Roman nail would cause. And keep in mind that the nails were not withdrawn right after the penetration, but stayed in place for at least one or a couple of days. Now, is it probable that the wounds pictured below were caused by Roman nails?








If you saw these wounds out of context, would you suggest they were caused by a thick nail having been pierced through the limbs? Of course not. They are similar in type to the chest wound, only shorter. It is likely that these palm and instep wounds derive from the same source and it is fair to say that a) these wounds are not caused by Roman nails and b) these wounds are not what you would imagine that such wounds would look like.

Jesus is said to have been wearing a crown of thorn. The image below is just a costume replica and it is of course impossible to know exactly what such a headgear would have looked like but we do know thorn and it could have looked something like this. We can be certain that it would have had lots of thorns, since crucifixion and everything pertaining to it was intended to cause as much pain as possible, for as long time as possible.




Would a crown of thorn produce wounds like on the picture below?





This time, it's hard to tell because of the blood. But if you look carefully you see that just above where the blood seems to spring from, there is a scratch or irritation of the skin close to the wound. You can also see that there is only one wound, perhaps with the other, upper scratch being a failed attempt. But there are no other wounds around the head, just the one at the center of the forehead. So this stigmata corresponds with a crown of thorn with only one thorn. It is fair to say that a) this wound is not caused by a crown of thorn and b) this wound is not what you would imagine that such wounds would look like.

All the objects above are essential to the myth of the crucifixion of Jesus, and to the phenomena of stigmata, the appearance of bodily wounds, or sensing of pain, in locations corresponding to the wounds of Jesus on the cross. Apart from nail wounds to the palms and feet, a spear wound to the chest area or abdomen, and marks from the crown, stigmatics may also show wounds to the shoulders from carrying the cross or sweating or crying blood. The phenomena is regarded as a sign from God and stigmatic persons tend to be canonized by religious believers and sometimes even by the church - such a miracle is of course only displayed by someone who is pure in heart and faith.

There are three major suggested explanations for the phenomena of stigmata:

1. Wounds or other signs are produced by a suggested supreme being.

2. Wounds or other signs are produced through self-suggestion, i.e. the "victim" inflicts the wounds him- or herself by power of suggestion. The stigmatic has such a strong faith that it effects the physiology.

3. Wounds or other signs are faked.

In our case, the first option must be considered totally out of the question. If a supreme being would have the power to inflict wounds, it would surely not restrain itself to scratches -- we would see wounds that actually resemble what wounds would look like if they were caused by the objects suggested. In our case, they don't. Not by a long shot.

There is scientific evidence that lends support to the second option. There are studies suggesting that dermatological changes can occur as a result of suggestion (Spanos & Chaves, 1989). However, not in any case have such changes been in the form of scratches. Blisters, warts, hemorrhages, or burns may appear, but never scratches.

So none of the wounds above look like what might be expected if they were inflicted by a supreme being, or what might be expected if our imagination was aided by strong suggestion and the skin subject to change in accordance.

That leaves us with the third option: fake.

Myrna Nazzour of Damascus, Syriah, is stigmatic. The wounds you have seen so far are all pictures of Myrna. She is a fake. All her wounds appear when she is hiding under a blanket. Although there are a lot of footage of her, not one sequence shows a wound actually appearing. Myrna's case is similar to that of Therese Neumann, another stigmata faker (Spanos & Chaves, 1989).

In fairness, Myrna's wounds do derive from Jesus, just not in the way they are supposed to. Under the blanket, Myrna uses her crucifix pendant to produce the wounds. That is why she needs a blanket and that is why she keeps twisting and turning under it. That is why the wounds look like they have been caused by an object with features like those of a crucifix pendant.

Crucifix pendants are designed to hang from necklaces. They come in different sizes and models but the three pictured below are fairly common.





These pendants each have at least four points that would produce wounds such as Myrna's. There are the ends of the cross itself and then there is the attachment to the necklace. The ends of the cross can very easily be sharpened without making it visibly obvious. As you can see on the following pictures, Myrna wears her pendant at every time the wounds appear under the blanket. (Feel free to browse the internet for more pictures and footage.)









If the pendant doesn't show, it is concealed under Myrna's clothes. This is evident when you watch the following movie clip:

[Movie clip: watch closely from about 03:35 into the film] (opens in new window)

What you see in this clip is how a hand removes the crucifix pendant to make the wound visible. This tells us two things: if the necklace and pendant doesn't show, it is concealed under Myrna's clothes, and the necklace is of such length that it is more than possible for Myrna to produce wounds below her breasts.

This movie is the third part of a Swedish TV3 documentary, Reportage, televised 16 September 2004. Along with the TV-team, there was a team of Nordic scientists present at Easter that year, monitoring Myrna and the event. The research team was headed by Norwegian cardiothoracic surgeon Knut Kvernebo. No wounds appeared when the researchers were present, but when they all went shopping on the last day, a wound of course appeared. What a proud moment for the scientific community when research is conducted in this way. And what a proud moment for the Swedish skeptics, the VoF, when their chairman at the time, Dan Larhammar, suggests in an interview that the wounds may be caused by bacteria or blood vessels starting to bleed spontaneosly. Larhammar illustrates perfectly the fallacy of misplaced rationalism as described by Sheaffer in the July/August issue of Skeptical Inquirer:

"Before suggesting such a bizarre and complex yet still ultimately rational explanation, it would be more rational to inquire whether there is really any mystery in need of explaining." (Sheaffer, 2008)

In the case of Myrna Nazzour, there is no mystery - she is using jewelry to scratch her skin. It is obvious to anyone that cares to look. There is no need for far-fetched explanations. Skeptics that are afraid to state that fakers are fakers should not comment on fakers.

The simple and obvious explanation for Myrna Nazzour's alleged stigmata is this:





And should Myrna be deprived of her jewelry, and if her nails were checked properly, no wounds would appear. That such precautions are not taken by a research team is an outrage. The scientist's "testimonies" that they have "no explanation" for the wounds displayed by Myrna are now flaunted all over the internet in support for "miracles" that are nothing but fraud. Knut Kvernebo has prostituted science for the benefit of superstition. Hallelujah...


Swedish TV3 documentary: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.

Sheaffer, R., (2008). The Fallacy of Misplaced Rationalism in Skeptical Inquirer, 32, (4).

Spanos, N. P., & Chaves, J. F., (1989). Hypnosis. The Cognitive-Behavioral Perspective. New York: Prometheus.

Forgive them; for they know not what they do?

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The notion that cold reading is something that can be executed unconsciously seems to be almost as popular among skeptics as it is among the advocates of psychics and soothsayers. The general idea is that the psychic is so convinced of his or her authenticity that s/he is unaware of the fact that s/he is using a technique of psychological trickery to accomplish a so called "reading". Thus, it may very well be that psychics are using trickery, but they cannot be blamed for doing so, since the fraud is committed unconsciously. Believers of spirit communication use this line of thinking to excuse every debunked or busted psychic – often in combination with the old "using-deception-to-compensate-for-bad-days" argument. Skeptics use it as an excuse for treating psychics with respect and taking their claims seriously – a deceiver unaware of using deception cannot be blamed for deceit. This respectful approach seems more in line with the concept of a "curious" or "investigating" mind – it gives the skeptic an air of benevolence, which is more likeable than simply dismissing psychic readings as fraud.

One often cited example of this alleged unconsciousness is Ray Hyman's account in his classic The Zetetic article on cold reading from 1977:

"One danger of playing the role of reader is that you will persuade yourself that you really are divining true character. This happened to me. I started reading palms when I was in my teens as a way to supplement my income from doing magic and mental shows. When I started I did not believe in palmistry. But I knew that to 'sell' it I had to act as if I did. After a few years I became a firm believer in palmistry." (Hyman, 1996)

A more recent example is the "coming-out" of former New Ager Karla McLaren:

"I never knew what cold reading was, and until I saw professional magician and debunker Mark Edward use cold reading on an ABC News special last year, I didn't understand that I had long used a form of cold reading in my own work! I was never taught cold reading and I never intended to defraud anyone - I simply picked up the technique through cultural osmosis." (McLaren, 2004)

Now, Hyman's contribution to the skeptic movement is, without a doubt, monumental. Nevertheless, I suggest that there are fundamental differences between the fortune-telling of the 1940's and the psychic séances and private sittings of today. And although I have the greatest sympathy for McLaren's attempt to make two opposing sides reach out and touch, I think it is of some importance to note that even if McLaren did not identify what she was doing as 'cold reading', she was apparently aware that she was employing a technique. In addition, the lack of intention to defraud is a somewhat slippery argument; the ethical status of an act may very well be assessed according to its effect on the object – it cannot be fraud without an abused victim. Since the technique used by McLaren did not cause apparent damage to anyone, her unintention to deceive is irrelevant.

Whether a psychic knows that s/he is using something called 'cold reading' or not is of course of no importance. What is essential is if the psychic knows that s/he is doing something else than receiving messages from the dead or from some other supernatural source. The deception is not the use of 'cold reading', but the use of anything but supernatural means. Following hunches, intuition, guessing, or any means other than supernatural, is deception if you claim it is divination or talking to the departed.

There is no doubt that a fantasy-prone person may seriously believe that his or her intuition is in fact the voice of a spirit. But mistaking whatever pops into your head for divination is far from what today's psychics are doing. Let's first consider what 'cold reading' is, before deciding if it can be employed unconsciously.

The common definition of 'cold reading' is something in line with "a procedure by which a 'reader' is able to persuade a client whom he has never before met that he knows all about the client's personality and problems" (Hyman, 1996). Wikipedia suggests "a technique used to convince another person that the reader knows much more about the subject than they actually do" (Wikipedia). Both of these variations are misleading in that they suggest that 'cold reading' is a subject-object relation, when it in fact is a subject-subject interaction. Defining 'cold reading' as something an active agent (the psychic) delivers to a passive receiver (the "sitter") is simply not accurate. Instead, it must be defined as a joint effort by at least two persons to confirm one's belief in the other's supernatural knowledge or ability. For 'cold reading' to work, the client's desire for it to work and active participation in the process are absolutely necessary. Consider how a believer readily identifies stock spiel or some other cold reading tool when performed or exemplified by a skeptic. But when a psychic uses the exact same wording, the believer denies that it is cold reading. Thus, the client must have faith in the performer's authenticity for it to work. Skeptic demonstrations of cold reading are subsequently pointless; they will not work when used to refute beliefs, only to confirm them.

Faith is a primer even stronger than rational assessment. On two occasions, I have presented transcripts of actual séances to believers, without disclosing the name of the psychics at hand. On both occasions, believers easily identified the multitude of cold reading elements in the transcripts and dismissed the psychics as obvious frauds. However, when I told them the names of the psychics (both renowned TV-psychics), the believers immediately recanted. What they moments before considered to be cold reading was suddenly profound mediumship. So cold reading is not depending on how it is performed, but by whom.

Establishing cold reading as a subject-subject interaction, a joint social process towards a mutual goal, does not belittle the tools of the trade. If the context is a situation where a client has faith in a psychic, stock spiel and other techniques are very powerful. But can they be executed unconsciously? No, they cannot. Although the psychic session is a joint effort, the psychic and the client face different tasks - the medium that of suggestion, the client that of confirmation. Although the client tends to lend personal significance to very general suggestions, the medium still has the task of navigating through the client's responses and this navigation is an intellectual effort that demands conscious action and choice. It can not be done without knowing what you are doing, regardless of whether you call what you are doing cold reading or not.

Skilled pianists are able to play complicated pieces and participate in conversations at the same time. The conversations require their conscious awareness, the musical pieces does not. Is playing a piece on an instrument equal to executing cold reading? No, it is not, because playing complicated pieces on a piano does not offer an intellectual challenge for a skilled piano player in the way a psychic session does to a psychic, regardless of skill. There are no sudden interruptions when playing a piece of music you've played ten or hundreds of times before, demanding you to chose between one, two or more optional routes to continue. The psychic session is nothing but optional routes, nothing but adaptation to the client's responses. The psychic session is thus comparable to the pianist's conscious conversation rather than his unconscious playing.

Walking is done more or less unconsciously. You don't think of the steps you take and that works fine, until your path offers an obstacle, let's say a curb. If you are not conscious of the curb and adjust your steps to it, you will stumble on it. Your walking is unconscious but your adjustment to obstacles is not. If you don't become aware of the obstacle, your unconscious walking will be interrupted.

Unconscious actions are essential to us humans. We would not be able to cope with everyday life if everything we did demanded our conscious awareness. In fact, a great portion of our lives consists of performing unconscious acts. But convincing people that we are in contact with their departed loved ones is not one of those acts.

On February 26 and 27, 2005, I and a friend of mine recorded two séances held by self-proclaimed psychic Pehr Trollsveden. He is a peddler in superstition who, apart from doing psychic séances, operates a psychic hotline phone service and provides online shopping, should you be interested in buying crystals or other "spiritual" gadgets. I don't think he is held in high regard even in the psychic community, but he has a very interesting technique. He simply walks around among the sitters of the séance, stops behind a person, lays his hands on the client's shoulders and rattles off for three to five minutes about older women cleaning kitchen floors and ancient viking spirit guides. He has a flow of words comparable to that of John Edward, but unlike him, Trollsveden makes no room for client feedback. So when he is done with one person, he doesn't wait for confirmation or comments, he just goes on to the next client. In an hour, he works through an impressing amount of clients, finishes off making alleged contact with some dead pets, and that's it. The money, 100 Swedish Kronor (approx. $12) a head, is stuck right down his pocket.

This technique is a variation of what I call shotgun. You produce so many details and statements at a fast rate that the client will be hit by some detail or details that he or she is able to render personal significance and forget all the rest that have no significance at all. John Edward and many others use the same technique, I'm pretty sure that you're familiar with it. It enables the psychic to be more detailed than when using stock spiel, which is a set of general statements that fits most people. And when two such details out of 20 stick and the rest is forgotten, the client is convinced; if two features of a passed away grandmother fit and the rest is forgotten, the client is satisfied.

Trollsveden offers no opportunity for feedback; there is no interaction whatsoever in his sessions. Thus, it could be accomplished unconsciously (not that I think he doesn't know exactly what he is doing). Comparing the first day's session with that of the second day, it is also apparent that Trollsveden recycles the same statements over and over again. So it could in theory mean that he is unaware of what he is saying and just repeats often used phrases unconsciously.

But when John Edward is using the shotgun technique, he is doing it in interaction with the clients. He is constantly faced with feedback from the client that requires him to make choices, to adapt to what the client is saying. That is an intellectual task that demands conscious awareness, i.e. Edward must know what he is doing in order to accomplish anything (although we know much is accomplished during editing of his shows).

There is more to be said on this subject, but for now, I propose that the notion that psychics are unaware of what they are doing is an understandable fallacy among followers of psychics but an ignorant misconception among skeptics. The psychic session offers intellectual tasks that cannot be accomplished unconsciously. The notion persists among skeptics because they tend to read Hyman or McLaren instead of visiting a séance and see what is actually taking place during a psychic session.

I also propose that the definition of cold reading as a technique is at fault and does not sufficiently describe what a psychic session is about. It is better defined as a joint effort by at least two persons in social interaction to confirm one's belief in the other's supernatural knowledge or ability, employing one or more psychological methods of illusion or suggestion.

I see no reason to forgive psychics; for they know that they do not speak to the departed.


(Thanks to Mr. Jespert Jerkert for language corrections.)


References

Hyman, R., (1996). 'Cold Reading': How to Convince Strangers That You Know All About Them. In J. Nickell, B. Karr, & T. Genoni (Eds.), The Outer Edge. Classic Investigations of the Paranormal (pp. 71-84). New York: Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal, Inc.

McLaren, K., (2004). Bridging the Chasm between Two Cultures. Skeptical Inquirer, 28, (3).

Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_reading