Dog Psychic or Dog Poop?

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October 30, 2003

Opinion Editorial

By Barry Fagin

Former fashion model turned TV celebrity Sonya Fitzpatrick will be visiting Colorado Springs next month. Using her gift for "animal telepathy", she'll look at pictures of pets and tell us what they're thinking. All for about twenty-five bucks a head.

Hey, America's a free country. I'm the last guy on earth who'd tell people how to spend their money. But living in a free country also means being able to speak your mind. And when an "animal psychic" wants to peddle a puddle of poodle piddle, you can count on my exercising my First Amendment rights.

I believe Ms. Fitzpatrick is a "cold reader", pure and simple. That's someone who picks an audience receptive to her message, throws out a bunch of guesses, and zooms in on the hits to tell people what they want to hear. It's the same technique that TV psychics like James Van Praagh use. It's as old as gypsy fortune telling, and just as honest.

Of course, I might be wrong. Maybe Sonya truly believes that she can communicate with animals by looking at a picture. If that's true, then I'm doing her a great wrong in my accusation of deceit. In that case, I apologize.

But it's hard for me to know what Ms. Fitzpatrick thinks, since I don't have her gift of telepathy. Only she knows what's going on inside her head. Or the head of my dog, for that matter.

There is, of course, a third possibility. Perhaps animal telepathy is real. Perhaps certain people, through a part of reality that science has somehow missed, can receive thoughts from other beings. Perhaps, in contradiction to everything we know, animals can really communicate with people in supernatural ways.

If that's true, what an amazing discovery that would be! Not since Einstein turned physics on their ear, would we have seen such a dramatic reshaping of our world. It'd be such an incredible, earthshaking event, who wouldn't want to be a part of it? I certainly would. It'd be the greatest thing I've ever done as a scientist.

So let's find out!

I challenge Ms. Fitzpatrick to a contest. It's basically an experiment, designed to shed some light on the reality of animal telepathy. Here's what I propose:

1) Readers of this newspaper will submit two identical pictures of their pets. The editorial staff will select nine pairs at random for psychic readings from both the Animal Psychic and myself.

2) In addition to the nine living animals, readers will also be asked to submit photos of a deceased pet. One such pet will also be selected.

3) These pictures will be made available for psychic readings from both Sonya and myself. We'll also attempt to identify the deceased pet. We'll lock ourselves in separate rooms for an hour, and write down our thoughts.

4) We'll return our readings to the editors, who will return them to the appropriate pet owners. They'll compare our work, and evaluate it as "more accurate", "less accurate", or "no difference". Or they could grade us on a numeric scale; it's all the same to me.

5) The experiment will be "double blind". One person at the paper will keep track of readers and pictures. A second will connect pictures to our psychic readings. No single person will be able to connect all three. We will deal only with the second staffer, and have no contact with the first.

6) The results will be published in the paper as soon as they are available. We'll let people decide for themselves whether or not they think animal telepathy is real.

As long as these or similar rules are followed (rules designed to improve accuracy, eliminate self-deception, and reduce the possibility of cheating) I'm happy to work with Ms. Fitzpatrick on any other conditions she requires.

I eagerly await her answer. Although I suspect I know what it will be.