The disagreement can go both ways…
there are a few on here that will poo-poo all over religion on various threads (and sometimes even start them) but yet will be believers on: Animal communication, hauntings/ghosts, auras, empaths to the nth degree, etc.
It’s hilariously ironic. 
I think ACs are fine as entertainment. I do not think they should be giving any type of medical advice at all. None, Zippo. Zilch, Nada.
And getting paid to give medical advice is…not exactly legal.
[QUOTE=Gestalt;8390411]
I have no idea what your question was and I wouldn’t attempt to answer it. You appear to never hear the answer unless it’s something you agree with. If you were five it might be cute.
To the poster that mentioned a horse that asked for a white sock… the ac might be all wet, or maybe the horse was showing the ac a white sock as in a leg wrap. Don’t know, I wasn’t there. And there are charlatans that take advantage of someone in emotional turmoil and there are intuitives that help with emotional healing. Don’t knock it if you haven’t needed it.[/QUOTE]
My question is “What would you say to a person who comes to your barn and asks to see the unicorns?” It’s a fair question because there is no proof of either “animal communicators” or unicorns.
As to being a five year old, I’m not the one advocating belief in some version of fantasy.
G.
[QUOTE=Countrywood;8377552]
I can not possibly see how an AC can “read” an animal by email/from a distance. They are picking up on cues the owner tells them over the phone or writes, and they put out some common themes that apply to nearly every horse…and depending how the person reacts, embellish or go on to the next…horse misses its former herdmate from way back when, horse once had an incident that scared it, horse likes its new home but worries about old owner or the like.
At least if an AC sees a horse, if they are experienced with horses, they might pick up on nervousness or signs of discomfort from the horse (but then nearly any experienced person would pick up on that)
You know who we should be consulting but almost never do? THE GROOMS, if the stable has them ( assuming boarding). The grooms spend time day in day out and may notice something but don’t say anything because it is not their place to do so.[/QUOTE]
Here was my experience. I had a “reading” by phone, it was from a friend that was just getting into it. When I say “friend” we know each other from another bulletin board. Never met her in person. We have IM’d each other maybe once or twice. She did a reading on my oldest horse. She’s in NY, I’m in AL. She’s never been to my farm.
Animal communicator: Do you have chickens?
Me: Yes
AC: Your horse said they need to leave him alone during feeding time.
[I had recently relocated him to the paddock near the coop, and they were indeed flocking around his food bowl in the evening]
AC: Do you have some sort of wooden structure in his paddock.
Me: I have a wooden round pen.
AC: Yeah, he’s just showing me his area. You guys have a lot of pine trees, too. (we do).
AC: So, your horse says he misses the young horse you used to have him out with. He kind of mentored him. He said he’s pretty lonely and wants his friend back.
Me: I moved him to the paddock by himself because he was hogging all the hay. He was out with my younger TB.
Now, get ready for this one:
AC: He’s mentioning a pony?
Me: yes there was a pony.
AC: OK, he’s telling me about an incident with a child where the pony took off with her and the child screamed?
Me": OMG. Yes, that happened! We were in the ring together and the pony took off with her. She managed to hang on but she did scream.
AC: Your horse said that pony was just ridiculous.
AC: Oh, he’s asking what happened to his red blanket.
Me: Sorry his blanket is brown plaid. The one before that was blue. The one before that was purple. No red blanket.
AC: Weird, he’s insisting he had it. He’s kind of fixating on it.
Me: Nope no red…oh wait. When I first got him as a two year old, I did have a red blanket for him. He outgrew it, no idea what I did with it.
AC: He would like it back.
I have absolutely NO idea of how she could EVER have known any of this. She is thousands of miles from me and NONE of these details were discussed with her or ever mentioned on Facebook, etc.
People who keep horses at home often have chickens, chickens often steal horse grain.
If you didn’t have chickens…then it would have been wild turkeys visiting when you weren’t around.
Wooden structure in paddocks: round pen, run-in, hay feeder, mounting block nearby, etc. Very common.
Having more than one horse together in a paddock is common. One will always be older or younger than the other.
Ponies bolting with small children who shriek…it’s what ponies all do.
Horses are incapable of seeing the color red. They’ve never seen the color red, it doesn’t exist for them. (same with bovines and deer, it’s why the safety color for hunting is bright orange. Many animals can’t see red, orange or pink)
Not to poo all over your fun experience, but that’s pretty much an identical reading my neighbor has had. All very likely and common scenerios and very easily changed if “wrong” to be explained in another way.
She’s had a bunch of readings. They all encompass the same “information” sent, just in different ways.
[QUOTE=Guilherme;8389362]
To those of you who feel that pointing out that criticizing “animal communication” by means other than hands on, observational effort is somehow “disrespectful” I have a question:
If a person were to walk into your barn and ask to see the unicorns how would you respond?
G.[/QUOTE] I would refer her to the woman who bought a large gray gelding from us, who refers to him as her unicorn. What’s your point?
Brocks,
The AC was not reading your horse over the phone, she was reading you.
She asked you common questions based on a farm based horse keeping and when you answered she threw out common scenarios and when you answered she threw out stuff that could apply to most horses…they miss a paddock friend at some point in their life, most horses have one period where they were sore or off and recovered etc.
Glad some of you think this is fun.
There may be some truly intuitive people but if they are legit they’d want to see the horse, how anyone can intuit about an animal over a phone ?? They are intuiting off of how you answer some leading questions, your general level of anxiety, tone of voice etc.
The stories people present as anecdotal evidence to me show it’s the reader cueing in on the person.
“I asked if there was one trainer my horse liked best, and I had to probe a lot to understand what the horse was trying to tell me”
Right, you had to keep giving the reader suggestions until she could hear in your voice which answer was correct.
As for the “red blanket” story, it’s pretty obvious the reader was going to probe and ask until you found some way of connecting a red blanket to this horse. Most horses have had a red blanket at some point in their lives. If you wouldn’t admit to the red blanket, then next step is, “maybe the horse had one before you owned it.”
The person getting the reading is already suggestible to making it a success, so all the reader has to do is keep probing and hone in on the answers that are correct.
These people are good at reading body language, tone of voice, and interpreting small signals.
Sorry guys, but I will remain a complete skeptic on this. I don’t really enjoy magicians or magic shows, either, but they bring a lot of awe, wonder, and entertainment to millions of people.
People see or hear what they want to, or have been led to expect. Much of the art of fencing consists of setting illusory “traps” for the unwary opponent to fall into. You show an opening in your guard as “bait,” the opponent lunges . . . and EST LA! Just like a bug in a Venus Flytrap.
This art can be extrapolated to much of life . . . :winkgrin:
[QUOTE=Kwill;8391294]
The person getting the reading is already suggestible to making it a success, so all the reader has to do is keep probing and hone in on the answers that are correct.
.[/QUOTE]
x 100.
Here’s my experience: I did it for fun, it was $20 at a horse show; nothing serious.
I had her look at his photo on my phone; I had kept him at home because he was acting colicky/not quite right.
Things she got right:
-He doesn’t like that you’re emotional
-He has some fluid around and in his lungs, and that’s why he’s sick, but he wants you to know he’ll be okay. (Vet called the next day saying his bloodwork was elevated, and lung sounds were crackly- so AC guess pneumonia)
^^ really spooked me. I mentioned he was sick, but pneumonia is a little out there.
-Don’t leave me again. (I had left him to lease another horse and went to undergrad)
-My back hurts
^^this one could have just been throwing out random facts for a cold read, but his saddle didn’t fit him at the time, and he has a history of hock problems.
Things she got completely wrong:
-“I don’t like showing, I want to be a trail horse.” I have NEVER met a horse who hates trails more; trails are merely walkways to the hay field where he could GALLOP.
Would I spend that money again? Eh, maybe. Do I think it was ~~mystical~~ or whatever? Not particularly. I think she did a very good reading from the photo, and some of the things she said were spot on, and helped me learn to ride him better, but as far as communicating, eh, I’m not so sure.
[QUOTE=Kwill;8391294]
The stories people present as anecdotal evidence to me show it’s the reader cueing in on the person.
“I asked if there was one trainer my horse liked best, and I had to probe a lot to understand what the horse was trying to tell me”
Right, you had to keep giving the reader suggestions until she could hear in your voice which answer was correct.
As for the “red blanket” story, it’s pretty obvious the reader was going to probe and ask until you found some way of connecting a red blanket to this horse. Most horses have had a red blanket at some point in their lives. If you wouldn’t admit to the red blanket, then next step is, “maybe the horse had one before you owned it.”
The person getting the reading is already suggestible to making it a success, so all the reader has to do is keep probing and hone in on the answers that are correct.
These people are good at reading body language, tone of voice, and interpreting small signals.
Sorry guys, but I will remain a complete skeptic on this. I don’t really enjoy magicians or magic shows, either, but they bring a lot of awe, wonder, and entertainment to millions of people.[/QUOTE]
well, as an animal communicator myself, I know it’s true. Do you want me to tell you when I was “right” about my impressions? How I knew things that i had NO early way of knowing?
Anyways, you want to pick apart my reading with others, fine, but I have had so many things said to me that no one else could know.
Besides, I use this for spiritual guidance, not “let’s see if we can make the AC mess up and call them a fraud!”.
Real readings are more about the relationship and journey, information gathering is just a part of the puzzle.
I wonder, really, if stuff like this is popular because people who didn’t grow up with horses, farm animals, and wildlife really don’t have much of a working grasp of animal instinct, body language, and interactive behavior. I see this with “dog people” all the time–subconsciously, they’re expecting the dog to be a “little person,” and when he behaves like a dog–they’re SHOCKED! :lol:
Perhaps the farther we take the HORSE away from his natural behaviors, also, the more mind/body stresses they have to absorb from humans. Left to their own devices, horses want to graze, wander, sleep, drink water, sunbathe and do horsey things with their own kind. Period. At the point where we’re denying them any opportunity to do ANY of that, or even to just “be themselves,” what can we expect but the animal equivalent of neuroses?
[QUOTE=TBROCKS;8390754]
Here was my experience. I had a “reading” by phone, it was from a friend that was just getting into it. When I say “friend” we know each other from another bulletin board. Never met her in person. We have IM’d each other maybe once or twice. She did a reading on my oldest horse. She’s in NY, I’m in AL. She’s never been to my farm.
Animal communicator: Do you have chickens?
Me: Yes
AC: Your horse said they need to leave him alone during feeding time.
[I had recently relocated him to the paddock near the coop, and they were indeed flocking around his food bowl in the evening]
AC: Do you have some sort of wooden structure in his paddock.
Me: I have a wooden round pen.
AC: Yeah, he’s just showing me his area. You guys have a lot of pine trees, too. (we do).
AC: So, your horse says he misses the young horse you used to have him out with. He kind of mentored him. He said he’s pretty lonely and wants his friend back.
Me: I moved him to the paddock by himself because he was hogging all the hay. He was out with my younger TB.
Now, get ready for this one:
AC: He’s mentioning a pony?
Me: yes there was a pony.
AC: OK, he’s telling me about an incident with a child where the pony took off with her and the child screamed?
Me": OMG. Yes, that happened! We were in the ring together and the pony took off with her. She managed to hang on but she did scream.
AC: Your horse said that pony was just ridiculous.
AC: Oh, he’s asking what happened to his red blanket.
Me: Sorry his blanket is brown plaid. The one before that was blue. The one before that was purple. No red blanket.
AC: Weird, he’s insisting he had it. He’s kind of fixating on it.
Me: Nope no red…oh wait. When I first got him as a two year old, I did have a red blanket for him. He outgrew it, no idea what I did with it.
AC: He would like it back.
I have absolutely NO idea of how she could EVER have known any of this. She is thousands of miles from me and NONE of these details were discussed with her or ever mentioned on Facebook, etc.[/QUOTE]
Two words for the first 3 questions: Google Maps. (Or Bing Maps with their birds-eye feature.)
I tried it once out of desperation for a horse with a who-knows-what weirdness (which even COTH couldn’t figure).
She sucked. Gave the wrong off side for one thing, kept on and on about a Paint in her field she doesn’t like (NOTHING had spots, there wasn’t even anything with tall socks), said she needs to be worked (she was lame…), and then started pushing a supplement from a vague company I had never heard of. For SnG I asked her to check my other horse. He likes me more than the person who feeds (emotional dribble), he wants me to carry a crop and rest it on his right shoulder (have never and don’t need, I think he would wig out actually), and he wants to be a jumper and not a hunter.
Psh. Not saying I won’t try it again, but psh.
[QUOTE=Lady Eboshi;8391299]
People see or hear what they want to, or have been led to expect. Much of the art of fencing consists of setting illusory “traps” for the unwary opponent to fall into. You show an opening in your guard as “bait,” the opponent lunges . . . and EST LA! Just like a bug in a Venus Flytrap.
This art can be extrapolated to much of life . . . :winkgrin:[/QUOTE]
The bolded part of your text is mine.What language do you mean to use here, when you write “EST LA”? 
I’d imagine French.
I wonder if Penn and Teller would take this on? 
G.
Why do these threads always become a lynch mob? If you don’t believe or agree then don’t reply or read. You aren’t going to sway the opinion of the believer, just like we aren’t going to sway the opinion of the non-believer.
Seriously! Some of you guys are awful.
Why does questioning the validity of AC make someone awful? Supporting an AC makes someone not awful?
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