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Apophenia is seeing patterns that don't exist. The practice of Numerology is text book apophenia. This article about Psychics and their thoughts on Michael Jackson is a classic example.

I have a friend who is sometimes afflicted with Apophenia. She once told me about a period in her life when lots of bad stuff was happening to her, and every time a new bad event happened, she'd look up and see a raven. "The raven is a symbol of death," she told me. I challenged her to look for ravens any time ANY significant (or insignificant, for that matter) event happened and see if she could find one. Needless to say, she became aware of the abundance of ravens.

The psychics interviewed also use the technique of using jargon (His was "six life path," she said, meaning he was magnetic and drew people to him.) to try and gain credibility.

And who can spot the oxymoron in this quote from the article:

Rourke said he fully expects people to come forward claiming to have communicated with Jackson, but that any credible professional psychic or medium will not attempt to connect with Jackson for at least six months to a year and will only do so at the behest of a family member or an intimate friend of the singer.

Classic Flim-Flam artistry!