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Scrying
Putting the psycho in Parapsychology |
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Men who stare at goats |
By the powers of tinfoil |
Scrying is the practice of looking into a reflective surface (such as a crystal ball, mirror or the surface of a liquid) in order to see visions of events that happened in the past or will happen in the future (or are currently happening somewhere else), usually as some kind of divination, magic, or religious ritual. The most common example is the stereotypical fortune-teller's crystal ball, but depending on how much you stretch the definition, the term may also cover such things as the "spooky" children's games/superstitions involving seeing "ghosts" or "your future husband" in a mirror. Reports of seeing a large flaming eye appear to be fictional.
Nostradamus was allegedly a famous scryer, though Joseph Smith also tried his hands at it.[1]