Uri Gellar achieved fame and fortune in the ’70s by performing a series of televised demonstrations which he claimed were paranormal performances of psychokinesis, dowsing and telepathy. His most famous demonstration was the ability to bend spoons, seemingly by mind control. He claims his supernatural feats were accomplished by using willpower and the strength of his mind. Skeptics, such as James Randi, and professional stage magicians disagree.

The link below not only shows several television shows of Uri’s talents, but Randi’s demonstration on how to bend a key and a spoon. Although his demonstration was sound and rational, it was Uri’s appearance on Johnny Carson that convinced me that Randi just may be telling the truth.

The second segment involved Peter Popoff, an evangelist who earned $4M dollars a year by defrauding people with his faith healing scam until Randi exposed him. I’m not sure which disturbed me the most–the desperate looks on the faces of his audience or the static voice of Popoff’s wife, giving previously gleaned information on an elderly woman who nearly fell after he pronounced her “healed,” or the emotional belief of a daughter whose mother was “freed of her cancer.”

While I had almost no reaction to the Gellar segment, I was appalled and frightened by the way Popoff manipulated those people out of their money and possibly their lives. Shortly after Popoff was exposed, he was forced to declare bankruptcy. So, I guess he received some due justice.

James Randi exposed Uri Gellar and Peter Popoff