Hypnotism? Nonsense or fact?

frobisher

I don't doubt that that is happens, but I've always wondered if hypontism is something that can only really happen to a minority of people you are the type to give in to peer pressure and are easily lead. What do you reckon? Have you ever experienced it directly yourself?

Ruu_Old

Load of tosh I reckon (the television shows, not sure about the rest of it either) but I don't know anyone who has ever been hypnotised. Weak minds! *swings watch in front of eyes*

Sad Professor

It's certainly fact, but not the way you see it on tv performed by so-called magicians. That's all nonsense, it ain't mind control and must be voluntary.

Sam Vimes

hypnotism itself i think might be real but any of those shows are fake.

Black Swan

"Look into my eyes... Look into my eyes!"

Red Hand

"So...sleepy...."

DublinWriter

frobisher wrote:

What do you reckon? Have you ever experienced it directly yourself?

I've been at a couple of Barry Sinclair corporate gigs (by accident, not design) and I could safely say that 1 in 50 will be very susecptable to hypnotic suggestion and will do all the running-around-on-stage-pretending-to-be-a-chicken type stuff.

Typically Sinclair first gets the whole audience to put their hands up over their heads and hypnotises them so they can't seperate their hands. From that batch about 5% of the audience won't be able to seperate their hands.

He then gets that 5% up on stage and filters out the fakers by closely watching eye-lid movements while their eyes are shut. Usually about 2% remain.

Having been at a couple of his shows, I can say that he doesn't use 'stooges'.

astrofool

if it was real, and I was a hypnotist, I certainly wouldn't spend my time putting on shows for people (i.e it's complete and utter nonsense).

Hobbes

My late uncle was a professonal hypnotist. From what he told me and showed,

1. It is all based on the power of suggestion. If you believe it won't work then it won't work on you (as you have suggested this to yourself).

2. To put someone under properly to a point where they will take suggestions (in that totally subconscious) takes about 30 minutes or more.

3. Nearly all stage shows are faked or pick people who so want to believe they would just do anything.

4. If you don't know what your doing you shouldn't be trying to hypotise people.

5. It is almost impossible to make a person under suggestion do something they wouldn't do in real life. For example kill someone.

There are a couple of party tricks you can do which are related to hypnotism and work quite well. The "unable to move your hand" is such one.

Seth Brundle

DublinWriter wrote:

I've been at a couple of Barry Sinclair corporate gigs (by accident, not design) and I could safely say that 1 in 50 will be very susecptable to hypnotic suggestion and will do all the running-around-on-stage-pretending-to-be-a-chicken type stuff.

I remember seeing Barry Sinclair in UCD 15 years ago. He had a number of students on the stage doing stupid things. However, during the parts where the victims were supposed to be asleep, some of them were looking around and waving up at their mates.
Load of crap if you ask me!

bluto63

I've never had any experience with hypnotism, but I would assume it's all fake. I'm open to trying it though

Dave!

I'd love to being subjected to it, to give a first-hand opinion, but from the outside I would be of the opinion that it is a load of poopoo.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

DaveMcG wrote:

I'd love to being subjected to it, to give a first-hand opinion, but from the outside I would be of the opinion that it is a load of poopoo.

...which is exactly why you should never be hypnotized... It's a bit like asking Mary HAaney to keep goal for Ireland to prove that there are no good Irish goalkeepers.

Dave!

Ikky Poo2 wrote:

...which is exactly why you should never be hypnotized... It's a bit like asking Mary HAaney to keep goal for Ireland to prove that there are no good Irish goalkeepers.

Indeed. I can't be hypnotised because I don't believe in it. Reminds me of that argument creationists put forward, that mere mortals can't possibly understand the way god works, so there's no point in trying to.

iFight

I believe it, but would need to be be hypnotised myself to be sure. Looks cool on tv anyway

Basq

I think there's a certain amount of truth to it..

.. try a sample experiment here to see if you're susceptible to it!

Tomotronic

Hmmm... somebody before tried to explain it to me. Basically when you're hypnotized all your senses are focused on one thing. This doesn't mean that you can't get out of this state as you still have your free will. One can compare this to watching a very good film in the cinema. You kind of get sucked into it and you don't notice what's happening around you. Your visual and audible senses are entirely focused on the film (your smelling senses for example not, as you unpleasantly 'wake up' if your seat neighbour decides to let go of fart)
Of course when watching a film you can always 'release' yourself from this state of being dragged in. You might remember last time you watched a good film and somebody else disturbed you. Very annoying.
Being hypnotized is kind of similar, except that all your senses are focused on one thing and I think you have to want to stay 'hypnotized'. The person who's hypnotizing you would be using a signal for you to wake up, such as touching you or making an audible signal such as clapping his hands. I'm not sure but I think you can decide to stay hypnotised but it would be quite difficult, similar to the example of watching a movie and somebody disturbs you and you're trying to 'get back into it'. Another good example is self-hypnotising through reading forums. Your senses are focused on one thing and after a while of typing away you wake up an realise how much time you spent on a mediocre topic :eek:

Feral Mutant

From what I know about the subject, about 10% of people can't be hypnotised under any circumstances, there is a difference between being hypnotised and playing along, people hypnotised don't feel compelled to obey the hypnotist they just see no reason not to and you can't be hypnotised against your will.

Hobbes

basquille wrote:

here to see if you're susceptible to it!

Old and stupid joke and has absolutely nothing to do with the thread.

Here is how to test if you can be hypnotised.

Get something heavy and tie it to a piece of string or thread (something that can take the weight). Hold it out in front of you with your thumb and first finger. Make sure its not moving.

Now in your mind think it moving left to right (don't move your hand). It should move as you think it. Now try backwards and forwards then around and finally make it stop.

If it moves the way you will it then your capable of being hypnotised.

looksee

Sorry hobbes I don't see how that proves you can be hypnotised, I have come across it before, but not to do with hypnotism, I thought it was to do with dowsing. The other 'test' made me laugh after I jumped. I think all the stage stuff is rubbish, though I have been professionally hypnotised. It was interesting but I was 'conscious' the whole time, the person doing the hypnotising said this would be the case. I don't think it was very usefull really.

More interesting was a thing a group of us used do as teenagers. In a darkened room one person would lie on a table and 7 other people stood round, one at the head, two opposite each other at the shoulders, two at the waist and two at the ankles. The lifters each put our two index fingers just under the person on the table. We then did a chant led by the one at the head. If we could get through it without laughing we then lift all together and the person on the table could be easily lifted with no effort at least a foot or so. On one occasion when I was the liftee and I felt myself lifted, then I felt as though I carried on going up and drifted sideways across the room. That was the last time I did it! And no, we weren't on anything, not even alcohol. Then the 'authorities' heard about it and it was banned

faceman

There are varying levels of hypnotism but we're just used to the shoite we see on tv.

Dave!

looksee wrote:

More interesting was a thing a group of us used do as teenagers. In a darkened room one person would lie on a table and 7 other people stood round, one at the head, two opposite each other at the shoulders, two at the waist and two at the ankles. The lifters each put our two index fingers just under the person on the table. We then did a chant led by the one at the head. If we could get through it without laughing we then lift all together and the person on the table could be easily lifted with no effort at least a foot or so. On one occasion when I was the liftee and I felt myself lifted, then I felt as though I carried on going up and drifted sideways across the room. That was the last time I did it! And no, we weren't on anything, not even alcohol. Then the 'authorities' heard about it and it was banned

We used to do that too

The chant was somethin like "light as a feather, stiff as a board"

It worked too! There's pictures of me when I was ~9, and 3 women -- my sister, mam, and her friend, lifting a fully grown man with just our index fingers!

Probably somethin to do with the way the weight was distributed or whatever, but it was still impressive

daiixi

I've been hypnotised although I was very concious of what was going on. I felt uninhibited so if the therapist told me to act like a chicken I may have but it would have been my choice. I remember everything that was said to me during the process and was able to break out of it at any time. It's a weird experience, very relaxing.

Hobbes

looksee wrote:

Sorry hobbes I don't see how that proves you can be hypnotised

It is testing your subconscious for hypnosis. You are not moving your hand however you are telling the object to move, which in turn is telling your subconscious to make movements in your hand to force the weight to move.

Now if the person does not believe it will work then nothing will happen. It will not move at all, or won't move in the direction they want.

In a darkened room one person would lie on a table and 7 other people stood round

Actually you can do the same trick in a normal room with 1 person sitting in a chair and four people around them. It's a well known party trick.

http://www.lauralee.com/partylv3.htm (orientation of the chair has nothing to do with the trick).

It has less to do with hypnotism and more to do with how your muscles in your body work when people are given co-ordinated actions and the disperal of weight.

inode

there was a hypnotist in Derry about a year ago that was charged with using his power to take advantage of women and get them in the sack lol

biko

Hypnosis has been used successfully during surgery, as an analgesic and to decrease anxiety.

Innervision

I was hypnotised before, at one of those shows. It really only happens if you believe in it, and want to be hypnotised. It;s kind of wierd, when he hass you "asleep" and he's telling you what you'll do when you wake up, you're thinking, not a chance. But then when you wake up you just...do it, like it's perfectly natural. Kind of hard to explain but it does work! I'm a naturally shy person and never would've done some of the things I did on stage voluntarily!

exCrumlinBoyo

I believe….


I remember years ago when I was enjoying rag week down in Sligo with a bunch of mates. Great Craic. Anyway, they had this Hypnotist on stage doing his thing. There was this girl who I was mad about, but she was having none of it at all, after numerous tries and advances from myself, she basically told me to feck off. She was a friend of a friend. Anyhow, it turned out that we both got up on stage and the guy hypnotized this girl. He told her I was brad pitt and that she would do anything in order to “have me” being Brad Pitt.

I was thinking this wont work man… this is a bunch of c rap. Any way, he told me to reject her advances.. (It was great, it was like Karma was in my pocket that day) so I did. She was like, Oh my God I don’t believe its you and would I make suggestive advances and then decline her. We wanted to see how far she would go.

So after a few minutes of this and me feeling like Brad Pitt she got down on her knees and went to unzip my jeans, that’s they the hypnotist said sleep, sleep and she did. Man I was like what are you doing.. Only joking… No I’m not… he he

Anyway, I believe it’s real because that bird did not want to know me at all and as soon as the guy did his thing, she wanted to suck me off….. The proof is in the pudding as they say.

All my mates tooks pics of it and she could not believe she was going to unzip me.

Great days…

Dave!

exCrumlinBoyo wrote:

I believe….


I remember years ago when I was enjoying rag week down in Sligo with a bunch of mates. Great Craic. Anyway, they had this Hypnotist on stage doing his thing. There was this girl who I was mad about, but she was having none of it at all, after numerous tries and advances from myself, she basically told me to feck off. She was a friend of a friend. Anyhow, it turned out that we both got up on stage and the guy hypnotized this girl. He told her I was brad pitt and that she would do anything in order to “have me” being Brad Pitt.

I was thinking this wont work man… this is a bunch of c rap. Any way, he told me to reject her advances.. (It was great, it was like Karma was in my pocket that day) so I did. She was like, Oh my God I don’t believe its you and would I make suggestive advances and then decline her. We wanted to see how far she would go.

So after a few minutes of this and me feeling like Brad Pitt she got down on her knees and went to unzip my jeans, that’s they the hypnotist said sleep, sleep and she did. Man I was like what are you doing.. Only joking… No I’m not… he he

Anyway, I believe it’s real because that bird did not want to know me at all and as soon as the guy did his thing, she wanted to suck me off….. The proof is in the pudding as they say.

All my mates tooks pics of it and she could not believe she was going to unzip me.

Great days…

Quality!

chrismon

it does work
i was readin anarchist's cook book of all things one day with two of my friends a few years ago, and there was this bit about it.
So we said we would give it a go, and i managed to hypnotise my two friends. Couldnt get them to go hump pillows or anything :mad:
But i was able to ask them questions they would normally find it hard to answer, they said they knew everything that was going on and felt completly relaxed after it :cool: