Jeane Dixon Was a Coward
Forty spectacular and unlikely prognosticationsfor Year One of the Third Millennium
By: The Mystic | 01Jan2001
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Introduction
Besides engaging in disinformation for J. Edgar Hoover's FBI (she claimed Russia was behind the
civil rights movement on college campuses), Jeane Dixon was a popular tabloid astrologer and
psychic with a reputation for accuracy. Unfortunately, a rep isn't always equal to reality.
Ms Dixon predicted that World War III would begin in 1958 (it didn't), that labor leader Walter Reuther would run for US president in 1964 (he didn't) and that the Soviets would win the space race to the moon (they didn't). In 1956, she said that the 1960 presidential election would be won by a Democrat and that he would die in office "although not necessarily in his first term". However in 1960, she predicted that "John F. Kennedy would fail to win the presidency." (He won.) In spite of her false prophecies, she continued to maintain a reputation for accuracy. Most of her predictions were so vague, they couldn't be false. For example, "A shipping accident will make headlines in the spring" is a pretty safe prediction, whereas nearly every spring a shipping accident of some kind is bound to make headlines somewhere. (Happily for Ms Dixon's reputation, the Exxon Valdez incident occurred that spring.) If a psychic makes enough predictions, and if the majority of them are as vague as the common newspaper horoscope, it approaches certainty that some will come true...some spectacularly so. People tend to remember predictions that come true and ignore those that don't. Temple University mathematician John Allen Paulos coined the term for this, the "Jeane Dixon effect". Twice now, I've published new year's predictions on this web site. In spite of their inaccuracy -- nearly 100% wrong -- my reputation as a psychic hasn't been damaged in the slightest. When I was right, or close enough, I was merely extrapolating from obvious trends. That's good for a reputation, but as boring as watching television with the grandparents. Jeane Dixon was a coward! If all of her soothsaying had been as bold and specific and bold as her prognostication of WW3 in '58, instead of the soppy can't-miss astrological generalities that she mostly cranked out, she might have gotten a few significant ones right. The vast majority would have still been as wrong as a flower child carrying a grenade, but that sub-breed of humanity who regularly purchases and reads grocery-store tabloids would have continued to overlook her inaccuracies.
However, if any part of my soothsaying turns out to be on-the-money sooth, faithful readers (all four or five of them) will notice, and will start a whisper campaign of a great Internet psychic will start. I'll be recruited to write weekly columns for the Star or National Enquirer. Eventually, as my reputation grows, I'll sell a few books, be seen on the talk shows and finally become personal adviser to an empty-headed First Lady a la Nancy Reagan or Mary Todd Lincoln (both of whom regularly consulted psychics). Or not. So, the lights have been dimmed. Celtic music softly plays in the background. My crystal ball and Tarot cards are within reach. On my desk burns mysterious oriental incense. Professor Oberon Kath is curled up on his kitty couch next to me. In the distance of everything and nothing of the veil between worlds, I think I see something...
Predictions 1-10 |
This year, in celebration of the turning of the wheel of the millennium (as opposed to the
odometer effect many celebrated twelve months ago), I'm going to completely reject the safe
projections from current trends and indulge in wild speculation. If my necromancy bears no fruit,
nobody will notice.
| Intro | | | i-x | | | xi-xx | | | xxi-xxx | | | xxxi-xl |
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