Over the course of human history many people have claimed to have powers of clairvoyance or divination. Fortune tellers will exclaim that they can tell you what is to come with a crystal ball or tarot cards. Psychics will tell you they can speak to a dead loved one. Mediums will take it one step further and claim that a spirit has taken control of their body.
These supernatural abilities are, of course, impossible to possess according to modern science. There are a lot of strange things going on in our universe. I'm not averse to the idea that there is a lot of untapped energy out there that we theoretically have access to, but one should always be skeptical of these con artists because they have something to gain. In fact, their primary skill is well documented. It's a technique called cold reading.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_reading
Surprisingly, South Park did a great episode about cold reading many years ago. Season 6 Episode 15: Biggest Douche in the Universe. They absolutely nailed John Edward to the wall for claiming he could talk to the dead on his TV show Crossing Over.
Perhaps you notice that there should be a wedding ring on someone's finger but instead all you see is a white band of untanned skin. This would compel you to lead with something like:
I'm sensing problems in your marriage.
If you're right, you look like a psychic. If you're wrong, you dismiss the wrong answer and transition to another topic entirely. Better yet, you can double down on a follow up statement:
If the problem isn't your marriage, there must be an important relationship that you're struggling with.
As you can see, this statement is way more vague than the previous one. It's almost impossible to be wrong here if the client isn't a skeptic. In addition, when you get a follow up question like this right, it corrects the one you got wrong. The client will assume the psychic sensed a problem with supernatural powers and was never wrong to begin with.
Cold reading is a very valuable skill to have and requires incredibly highly tuned intuition. You have to take all available knowledge you have and then start making guesses and extrapolations of things you don't know. It requires a certain confidence and is good for self-esteem. In fact, I try to use cold reading here at Steemit.
I make a lot of predictions about the blockchain market and where this is all going. If I'm wrong I'll simply let the wrong answer die, but if I'm right I get to go on an I-told-you-so spree. It's sort of the same attitude a compulsive gambler would have. Hype up all the times you won and stay silent all the times you lost. The people you talk to will think you made money on average. We all know that's not how it works.
I've been pushing this prediction for a while. Market pumps in summer and winter and dumps after. When big money comes into the space the volatility of blockchain price action is immense. I'd like to show people that while the blockchain is volatile, it is also predictable and can only go up on a year to year basis.
My other big prediction is that Ethereum will flash crash when all its top coins mainnet's come out next month. The weird thing is that I think this flash crash is going to be the catalyst for the summer bull run. EOS and Tron are going to pump the entire market.
If I'm wrong, I'll be silent. If I'm right, I'm a psychic.