Comments on: Derren Brown Investigates tonight 10pm Ch4

By: seveda

seveda — Sat, 22 May 2010 21:39:52 +0000

Doh – Lightning, not Lightening

By: seveda

seveda — Sat, 22 May 2010 21:38:45 +0000

How about the Lightening Process?

The former UK Health Minister was apparently keen on it, and the NHS is now planning to fund a study of children using it. It sounds like a marginally less barmy version of the Bronikov techniques with the same emphasis on self-belief and personal development. They claim to cure people, but you also have to agree that “I understand that the lightning process is a training program and not a therapy or treatment”

They seem to have the same fear of scepticism as a lot of woo too.

From their site:

“We consider you are probably not ready yet to take the training if:

1 You are cynical about the process.”

It would be great if Derren were to look at some of the quackery that is on the edge of mainstream medicine – Seeing With No Eyes is a bit too easy.

By: whodat

whodat — Fri, 21 May 2010 02:34:30 +0000

in the first episode of the current series i didn’t really dig the hint at a wavering position, when Derren said something like “well, this is what these people want to hear so maybe it’s not so bad afterall…” that frustrated me.

in episode two there was never really the feeling that the charade was OK, and it was abundantly clear that Brown was only playing along as a means to unveil the scene and score that sit down in the end. a style i preferred, but perhaps the situation as a whole lent itself to that particular sort of performance.

my guess as to what was in the box? prosthetic eyeballs, or something similar.

By: russianscambuster

russianscambuster — Thu, 20 May 2010 16:01:44 +0000

The Methods official site, I quote “Work with the global essences of the Earth, Heaven and Holy Spirit.” its clear that theyve created a religion of their own, talking absolute bull for wads of cash from the desperate/disabled by giving out false hope, to make them believe one day they will be better.

The whole blindfold exercise was laughable, with the energy “jump” at the end to see out of a gap! lol
Its was quite funny that the founder became so p*ssed off (unable to answer the straight questions that he was being given by Derren) for Bronnicough himself to start ironically stating that the docu must be being made for uk television to give the company a bad reputation, and that “the method” is NOT a real cure after all-the exact opposite of the Bronnikov methods advertising.

By: Bob

Bob — Thu, 20 May 2010 05:53:52 +0000

By half way you could not agree more with Derren, with the final show down, it had been plain evidence to Derren that the founder himself was a circus clown, it was a matter of time before Derren subtly asked if the entity was doing the right thing, and how it makes false claims and misleading points. This guy obviously knows nothing about Derren, and is just trying to insult Derren in order to protect his name/fraud methods. This is concluded to be an insult to certain beings, I’m not sure how this clown sleeps at night, I mean scamming a general audience is one thing, scamming a targeted audience through sly and deceiving exploits is another.

By: Bob

Bob — Thu, 20 May 2010 05:46:02 +0000

Great episode Derren, you did well. It is quite obvious these guys are a bunch of jokes, ripping people off with a deceiving self-improvement program, they are misdirecting their customers. Misleading everything, and Derren went there to prove it. The big man himself could only insult Derren with all he had rather than prove anything, because he knew he couldn’t prove himself, and that he in fact had no power and his teaching was full of ….

I doubt this will make it far anyway, people will just know when there’s no effects, but for the people who have been scammed already, I feel sorry for them, they’re wasting so much money on simply comfort and suggestion.

Businesses like this should cease to survive, hopefully the media gets onto this and exposes them as no one official can do that.

By: Steve

Steve — Wed, 19 May 2010 22:32:55 +0000

Agree. When watching, it reminded me of a scientology place in Amsterdam i went to in my younger days before i seen sense

By: Shane

Shane — Wed, 19 May 2010 22:28:02 +0000

Interesting show, but I wonder how much of the scepticism is knee jerk, I sensed Derren was uncomfortable dealing with Bronnikov, and I didn’t think it was purely because he thought him a charlatan.

Away from the cameras and the “appropriate” attitude required for his audience, I wonder what was going on in Derren’s head. Bronnikov has quite a business. Patents, customers, international programmes. Seems to me Derren thought scepticism was the easy and unsatisfactory choice. It also stopped him properly participating!!

By: messy

messy — Wed, 19 May 2010 19:39:21 +0000

From memory, the Bronnikov method appears to have similarities to a brilliant fictional short story by Roald Dahl called The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar, in which a shallow man (Henry Sugar) gains the supernatural ability to see through solid objects. It takes him a great deal of effort in an attempt to see through playing cards and gain an unfair advantage in casinos. It’s really worth reading.
If the Bronnikovs are able to see through solid objects and want money, why are they bothering with the effort needed to run these courses when they could simply visit Vegas? Their potential winnings would dwarf Randi’s million dollar prize. If their purpose is to help people advance spiritually surely this would still be possible as the courses could then be subsidised from their winnings?

By: Danny

Danny — Wed, 19 May 2010 15:12:24 +0000

A great episope! However, I have one small comment – this group displayed very many cult-like characteristics and it might have been beneficial to point this out, rather than simply look at them and say this isn’t scientific/rational. For example: revered leader-figure; confusing aims and methods; social and financial pressure to “get it”; ever increasing partication; breaking down someone emotionally and then giving them a path to get better (“you’re only 55%, if you practice every day you will get to 100%). For there are many other cultic groups operating on similar principles, and not all of them are so obvious, e.g. certain self-improvement & “philosophy” courses.