talkmagic.co.uk

that traditionally walked on glass, ate glass, walked on fire etc?

Are they referred to as yogis.


Expecting answers like

a) Nutter
b) Derren Brown

so lets get those out of the way first.

Wiki is your friend...

Firewalking is practiced by:

* Eastern Orthodox Christians in parts of Greece, (see Anastenaria), and Bulgaria (see nestinarstvo), during some popular religious feasts.
by fakirs and similar persons,

* !Kung Bushmen of the African Kalahari desert have practiced firewalking since their tribal beginnings. (The !Kung use fire in their healing ceremonies.)

* (mainly) Hindu Indians in South Asia and their diaspora in South Africa, Malaysia and Singapore who celebrate the Thimithi festival

* Japanese Taoists and Buddhists

* tribes throughout Polynesia

Wow thanks!! Just what I was looking for. Too bad my school blocks access to wiki, otherwise I would have found it myself.

BTW, I don't do magic, so whatever you don't reveal your secrets to me!!

I'm one of those people who joins this forum after watching a really "entertaining" episode of Derren Brown.

Firewalkers are also known as NLP zombies!

Apparently, if you get into the zone, your skin becomes fireproof.

Also known as Fakirs.

A school that blocks access to wiki?
They'll be banning books next...

Palmer Eldritch wrote:A school that blocks access to wiki?
They'll be banning books next...

not true actually. Wikipedia is available for anyone to edit. The information isn't verified. Books can not be published without the information verified.

HenryHoudini wrote:

Palmer Eldritch wrote:A school that blocks access to wiki?
They'll be banning books next...

not true actually. Wikipedia is available for anyone to edit. The information isn't verified. Books can not be published without the information verified.

Wow, I didn't realise that books had to be verified. So the DiVinci Code was real was it?

sorry Henry, must be the topic of this thread is turning me into a sarcastic Fakir.

anyone interested in this part of "magic" would be interested in watching the investigation conducted by Psychologist Richard Wiseman. Very interesting, I thought

Darrel wrote:

HenryHoudini wrote:

Palmer Eldritch wrote:A school that blocks access to wiki?
They'll be banning books next...

not true actually. Wikipedia is available for anyone to edit. The information isn't verified. Books can not be published without the information verified.

Wow, I didn't realise that books had to be verified. So the DiVinci Code was real was it?

sorry Henry, must be the topic of this thread is turning me into a sarcastic Fakir.

th-th-the D-D-Da Vinci Code wa-wa-wasn't real??? *starts to bawl*

NOTE: REFERENCE BOOKS CANNOT BE PUBLISHED WITHOUT THE INFORMATION VERIFIED.(I don't mean to shout.)

I guessed that about reference books, but I couldn't resist the comment.

Don't forget that reference books are often riddled with inaccuracy, conjecture and outright lies. How many verifiably accurate history books have you read? I'm certain there's a big difference depending on where in the world said history book was published and it's a relatively well known fact that (in terms of school books) much of the Germanic history of England has been altered or just plain ignored since the Second World War.
Having argued with many Americans in the past over such broad subjects as the genocidal Pilgrim Fathers to the downright hilarious debate on whether or not the Spartans were likely to be “gay”, I can only draw the conclusion that American history books are as prone to libellous editing as our own. (

They can’t be gay, they were heroes!

someone actually said that They then told me to go and read a history book; and there was I thinking that Herodotus of Halicarnassus was a pretty solid source - I guess the author of the book my peppy dissenter had been reading must have had access to a time machine)

Just because something claims to be factual does not make it so, regardless of whether it's up on wiki or printed in a tattered secondary school brainwashing book - I mean text book.
I maintain that the school in question is doing its inmates a great disservice by blocking a valuable online resource from them.

I find Wikipedia to be an exceptional reference source. If you look, you'll find that the overwhelming majority of articles on those pages include extensive research references and bibliographies.

Further, when there are "facts" that are open to argument, there is generally a footnote specifically stating that it is argumentative.

Even moreover, they have specific guidelines that should be followed in all articles and, if an article does not conform, there is a note about that, too. For example, if an article is strongly opinion over fact, it will be noted at the beginning of the article with a suggestion that it is rewritten without the opinion.

Yes, anyone can edit the information, but it is monitored. You'll find that if you go in and edit information with absurdities, it won't last more than an hour or two before the mods reset it and get rid of the "bullstuff" as it were.

Wikipedia is about as factual as you'll find on the internet, mainly because it is set up so that it can be edited when discrepencies are found.

I have conducted a large amount of research using Wikipedia and when I cross check the facts that Wiki suggests, I have yet to find where they were wrong.

Mike.