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Fortune-telling

Fortune telling is the unproven spiritual practice of predicting information about a person's life.[1] The scope of fortune telling is in principle identical with the practice of divination. The difference is that divination is the term used for predictions considered part of a religious ritual, invoking deities or spirits, while the term fortune telling implies a less serious or formal setting, even one of popular culture, where belief in occult workings behind the prediction is less prominent than the concept of suggestion, spiritual or practical advisory or affirmation.

"Fortune teller" redirects here. For the form of origami, see Paper fortune teller. For other uses, see Fortune teller (disambiguation).

Historically, Pliny the Elder describes use of the crystal ball in the 1st century CE by soothsayers ("crystallum orbis", later written in Medieval Latin by scribes as orbuculum).[2] Contemporary Western images of fortune telling grow out of folkloristic reception of Renaissance magic, specifically associated with Romani people.[1] During the 19th and 20th century, methods of divination from non-Western cultures, such as the I Ching, were also adopted as methods of fortune telling in western popular culture.


An example of divination or fortune telling as purely an item of pop culture, with little or no vestiges of belief in the occult, would be the Magic 8-Ball sold as a toy by Mattel, or Paul the Octopus, an octopus at the Sea Life Aquarium at Oberhausen used to predict the outcome of matches played by the Germany national football team.[3] There is opposition to fortune telling in Christianity, Islam, Baháʼísm and Judaism based on scriptural prohibitions against divination. Terms for one who claims to see into the future include fortune teller, crystal-gazer, spaewife, seer, soothsayer, sibyl, clairvoyant, and prophet; related terms which might include this among other abilities are oracle, augur, and visionary. Fortune telling is dismissed by skeptics as being based on pseudoscience, magical thinking and superstition.

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: by interpreting atmospheric conditions.

Aeromancy

: by observation of a rooster pecking at grain.

Alectromancy

: by flour.

Aleuromancy

: by the movements of celestial bodies.

Astrology

: by the stars.

Astromancy

: by the flight of birds.

Augury

by someone's aura or feelings

Auramancy

: by hour, day, month, and year of birth.

Bazi or four pillars

: by books; frequently, but not always, religious texts.

Bibliomancy

: by playing cards, tarot cards, or oracle cards.

Cartomancy

: by patterns in melting or dripping wax.

Ceromancy

: by the shape of the hands and lines in the palms.

Chiromancy

: by determination of lucky and unlucky days.

Chronomancy

: by spiritual vision or inner sight.

Clairvoyance

: by casting of lots, or casting bones or stones.

Cleromancy

: by using visual and aural clues.

Cold reading

: by crystal ball also called scrying.

Crystallomancy

: by the entrails of animals.

Extispicy

: by means of variations in face and head shape.

Face reading

: by earthen harmony.

Feng shui

: by stomach-based ventriloquism (historically).

Gastromancy

: by markings in the ground, sand, earth, or soil.

Geomancy

: by the livers of sacrificed animals.

Haruspicy

: the astrology of the time the question was asked.

Horary astrology

: by water.

Hydromancy

: by yarrow stalks or coins and the I Ching.

I Ching divination

by means of numbered bamboo sticks shaken from a tube.

Kau cim

: by stones or gems.

Lithomancy

: by molten metal after dumped in cold water.

Molybdomancy

: by moles, scars, or other bodily marks.

Naeviology

: by the dead, or by spirits or souls of the dead.

Necromancy

: by shapes of clouds.

Nephomancy

: by numbers.

Numerology

: by dreams.

Oneiromancy

: by names.

Onomancy

: by a form of palmistry looking at the fingernails.

Onychomancy

: by lines and mounds on the hand.

Palmistry

: by parakeets picking up fortune cards

Parrot astrology

: origami used in fortune-telling games.

Paper fortune teller

reading: by the movements of a suspended object.

Pendulum

: by gazing into fire.

Pyromancy

: divination by rods.

Rhabdomancy

or Runic divination: by runes.

Runecasting

: by looking at or into reflective objects.

Scrying

: by planchette or talking board.

Spirit board

: by a form of cartomancy using tarot cards.

Taromancy

or tasseomancy: by tea leaves or coffee grounds.

Tasseography

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Common methods used for fortune telling in Europe and the Americas include astromancy, horary astrology, pendulum reading, spirit board reading, tasseography (reading tea leaves in a cup), cartomancy (fortune telling with cards), tarot card reading, crystallomancy (reading of a crystal sphere), and chiromancy (palmistry, reading of the palms). The last three have traditional associations in the popular mind with the Roma and Sinti people.


Another form of fortune telling, sometimes called "reading" or "spiritual consultation", does not rely on specific devices or methods, but rather the practitioner gives the client advice and predictions which are said to have come from spirits or in visions:

Critical analysis[edit]

Fortune telling is easily dismissed by critics as magical thinking and superstition.[26][27][28]


Skeptic Bergen Evans suggested that fortune telling is the result of a "naïve selection of something that have happened from a mass of things that haven't, the clever interpretation of ambiguities, or a brazen announcement of the inevitable."[29] Other skeptics claim that fortune telling is nothing more than cold reading.[30]


A large amount of fraud has been proven in the practice of fortune telling.[31]


Fortune telling and how it works raises many critical questions. For example, fortune-telling occurs through various methods such as psychic readings and tarot cards. Similarly, these methods are largely based on random phenomena. For example, astrologers believe that the movement of stars in the sky can have implications on one's life.[32] In the case of tarot cards, people believe that images displayed on the cards have significant meanings on their lives. However, there is a lack of evidence to support why such things, such as the stars, would have any implications on our lives.


Additionally, fortune-telling readings and predictions made by horoscopes, for example, are often general enough to apply to anyone. In cold reading, for example, readers often begin by stating general descriptions and continuing to make specifics based on the reactions they receive from the person whose life they are predicting.[33] The tendency for people to deem general descriptions as being representative to themselves has been termed the Barnum effect and has been studied by psychologists for many years.[33]


Nonetheless, even with a lack of evidence supporting the various methods of fortune-telling and the many frauds that have occurred by psychic readers, amongst others, fortune-telling continues to become popular around the world. There are many reasons for the appealing nature of fortune-telling such as that people often experience stress when there is uncertainty and thus seek to gain deeper insight into their lives.

(1995), "OU: Interactivity as Divination as Vending Machine", Leonardo, Third Annual New York Digital Salon, 28 (5): 399–402, doi:10.2307/1576224, JSTOR 1576224, S2CID 61727726

Feingold, Ken

Hughes, M., Behanna, R; Signorella, M. (2001). Perceived Accuracy of Fortune Telling and Belief in the Paranormal. Journal of Social Psychology 141: 159–160.

; Jorgensen, Lin (1982), "Social Meanings of the Occult", The Sociological Quarterly, 23 (3): 373–389, doi:10.1111/j.1533-8525.1982.tb01019.x.

Jorgensen, Danny L.

Zane, J. Peder (11 September 1994), , The New York Times.

"Soothsayers as Business Advisers; You Are Going to Go on a Long Trip…"

Media related to Fortune-telling at Wikimedia Commons

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