The Past Life Analysis website offers you a chance to find out who you were in your past life. I entered my birthday, and this is what I got:
Interesting that I was a writer in my past life. Maybe I was the Pharaoh's Official Debunker of Legends and Hoaxes! Unfortunately, I remember none of it.

The disclaimer for the past life analysis admits that, "you should know that this software is only slightly more sophisticated than an electronic fortune cookie."

I received the following email from legendary hoaxer Joey Skaggs: Joey sent me a follow-up email to let me know that he'll be sending me a complimentary Bullshit Detector Watch. Yes, sometimes running a website about hoaxes has great benefits. I'm definitely looking forward to getting my hands on one of these. I can think of many uses for it. It also seems like it would make a great Christmas present for a skeptic. They cost $50, which is the same price as the Swatch watch I bought a few months ago.

Back in 1998 Psychic Dorothy Allison drew a sketch (on the left) during an appearance on the Leeza Gibbons show of what she thought JonBenet Ramsey's killer looked like. The sketch was posted online and distributed via flyers. Now that John Mark Karr has been arrested for the murder of JonBenet, some people are saying that the sketch looks an awful lot like him. Is this a case of a psychic making an accurate prediction?

First of all, the sketch looks vaguely similar, but not exactly like him. Her drawing would match up pretty well to any skinny, white guy. Second, although the guy has confessed, there seems to be some doubt about whether he's telling the truth, so he may not be the killer. Third, as the Amazing Randi always points out, only psychic's hits ever get counted. Never their misses. So how many completely bogus predictions did Dorothy Allison make? That needs to be considered in any evaluation of her ability as a psychic. However, in her favor, it seems that she really did produce this sketch in 1998. So this isn't a case of a Tamara Rand style prediction.

As a long-time Doctor Who fan, I couldn't resist posting about this. It seems there's some phony British currency circulating around on which the Queen has been replaced by Doctor Who. The faux £10 notes bear the inscription "I promise to pay the bearer on demand the sum of 10 satsumas." Apparently the notes were created by the BBC for use during a scene in which the Doctor causes an ATM machine to start spewing money out into the street. Instead of using real money, which would have been a bit expensive, they printed up some phony notes. But, of course, fans quickly grabbed the loose notes that were floating around. An article in the Western Mail quotes an onlooker who says: "From a distance they almost look like real notes but you'd never be able to use them in the pub." Well, you might be able to if the bartender was a Doctor Who fan. I'd give someone a beer for some Doctor Who currency (but maybe no change). I found scans of the notes on Doctor Who Online.

Via David Emery's Urban Legends blog I read about a Nostradamus prophecy now doing the email rounds which predicts a World Cup victory for Spain (never mind that Spain is no longer in the running):

At the end of the sixth month of 2006,
The King of Spain will cross the Pyrenees with his army.
The legions of Beelzebub await the battle on the central European plains.
Destruction and defeat will fall on the evil-doers.
The Holy Grail will be returned to Spain.

Nostradamus wrote no such thing. And as David points out, the World Cup final is in July, not June. But more importantly, when I was in Vegas over the weekend I placed a $20 bet on England to win, so I'm glad this prophecy has already proven false. Maybe what the prophecy really means is that The Da Vinci Code movie will open in Spanish theatres in June. (Can this be true?)

Of course, Nostradamus is famous for his sports-related prophecies. His most famous quatrain foretold the death of Henry II during a jousting contest (if you believe his supporters):

The young lion will overcome the old one,
On the field of battle in single combat:
He will burst his eyes in a cage of gold,
Two fleets one, then to die, a cruel death.

It sounds like gibberish to me. But then, all of Nostradamus's quatrains sound like gibberish to me.

When Sandeep was born, an astrologer predicted that he would have a short life. Recently another astrologer, on TV, seconded this prediction. In despair (whether because of the second prediction, or for some other reason, is not clear), Sandeep took his own life, thereby fulfilling the prophecy. This isn't the only self-fulfillment of a death prophecy that I'm aware of. The more famous case was the prediction of the 16th century astrologer Girolamo Cardan, who foretold that he would die in 1576. Sure enough he did, though it seems probable he took his own life to insure the accuracy of his prophecy. Seems like an extreme way to prove a prophecy correct.

Indigo Children is a new-age term for children whose aura is indigo colored. These are the kids whom medical science would diagnose as being hyperactive or having ADD (and many lay people might diagnose as spoiled brats). But according to the indigo-child theory, these are actually children with very special powers. Nancy Ann Tappe, the psychic who first described the concept, says that Indigo Children are "souls with an evolved consciousness who have come here to help change the vibrations of our lives and create one land, one globe and one species. They are our bridge to the future." The Skeptic's Dictionary has some good info on the subject.

According to an article from the Orange-County Register, one of the powers being attributed to Indigo Children is the ability to see the future. Take this example:

When Carolyn Kaufman was getting her daughter, Ariel Carreno, ready to go, Ariel had an unusual request.
"Mom, we need to take an orange," Ariel said.
"Why?" Carolyn asked. Carolyn explained that this was a pizza party, and that an orange would probably be out of place.But when Ariel insisted, Carolyn grabbed an orange and took it to the party... So Ariel carried her orange into Chuck E. Cheese. The party went just as planned. The kids ate pizza. The kids played games. The parents endured the noise. Then, the birthday girl asked for the strangest thing. An orange.

Wow! The kid brought an orange to a party. Try to explain that, skeptics! Carolyn Kaufman also offers an example about her sony Tomy:

After fights with his sister over what to watch on TV, Tomy has broken five VCRs in the family home using only his energy force, Kaufman said. In some families, kids might get grounded for breaking expensive electronics. Not in Kaufman's house.

I'm sensing it would be great to be a kid in the Kaufman house. You could get away with anything. "It wasn't my fault, Mom. It was my energy force."

The first ever time traveler convention is being hosted at MIT on May 7, 2005. Time travellers from all eras are invited to attend, if they haven't already. This will also be the last time travelers convention ever, since obviously only one is needed. The coordinates for this event will be: 42:21:36.025°N, 71:05:16.332°W. (via Boing Boing)

I have been asked to explain why I am still here. After all, South African psychic SilverJade predicted that a major earthquake was going to hit San Diego on February 23rd. I live in San Diego. So shouldn't I be buried under rubble by now? Well, as far as I know, no earthquake hit the city. However, we did get an awful lot of rain. So much rain that everything just seems to be sliding downhill, including the houses of many people. Maybe this is what SilverJade saw? She somehow mistook rain for the shaking of the earth? Or maybe not... What do I know? I'm not a psychic. Anyway, it does appear that I won't have to give up being a cynic and become her disciple.

A South African psychic by the name of 'SilverJade' is predicting that a series of earthquakes "and other natural disasters" will hit the west coast of America on February 23, and she's issued a press release to warn everyone. If you read through her website you'll discover that she learned this was all going to happen in a dream. In the dream she was stuck inside a building that was shaking. Then she woke up and saw that it was 1:23 am. She felt that there was some kind of significance to this time. She also had a strong feeling that the place she was seeing in her dream was San Diego. This is especially interesting to me since I live in San Diego. She came up with some kind of convoluted explanation to account for the significance of the number 1:23, but I'm at a loss to follow her reasoning. It has something to do with this: "Starting in San Diego take an Easterly heading and set your bearing to 312 degrees... Plotting a straight line at this bearing takes us right through the epicentre of the recent undersea quake off the coast of Indonesia." Anyway, if a major earthquake really does hit San Diego on February 23 I swear I'll give up being such a skeptic and become a disciple of SilverJade. (via Gullibility Isn't in the Dictionary)

Numerous bad loans to a polygamist sect that believes the end of the world is nigh has caused the 99-year-old Bank of Ephraim in Utah to go under. The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (a small Mormon sect a small splinter sect of the Mormon church, unaffiliated with the main church) was spending money like the end of the world was around the corner... because they thought the end of the world actually was around the corner. And happily funding this spending spree was the Bank of Ephraim. They approved loans for one bizarre project after another: a watermelon farm that didn't grow watermelons, a construction company that made a loss on everything it sold (materials, labor). The bank liked giving loans to the end-of-world sect because the end-of-worlders readily agreed to outrageously high interest rates (Why not? If the world ends tomorrow you don't have to pay it back). I'm trying to imagine how the interview to assess credit worthiness might have gone:
-'So you're a member of a sect whose members have sworn an oath to borrow as much money as possible before the world ends and all financial markets collapse. Is that right?'
-'That's right.'
-'Sounds good. You're approved.'
I like the understatement of Utah Banking Supervisor Jim Thomas who simply notes that the bank got in too deep with sect members who "didn't have much to lose".

Here's an interesting short crime report from the China Post:

Hong Kong customs officers have seized nearly 1,500 fake fortunetelling books that contain published predictions for the wrong year, a customs official said Sunday. The fake books, which were seized Friday, purport to offer predictions for the next Chinese calendar year, the Year of the Rooster, but their texts are lifted from published predictions for previous years, said Customs and Excise Department official Chiu Yuk-hung. The fakes were published under the names of local fortune tellers and legitimate publishers, he said.

I wonder if the police were most worried about the plagiarism, or protecting the public from potentially inaccurate predictions?