18. If you wanted to pretend that you could do psychic readings, you could perform

“cold readings” by inviting people you do not know to allow you to tell them about themselves. You would then make a series of statements like

“I see that there is some distance between you and your mother that bothers you.”

“It seems that you are sometimes less sure of yourself than you indicate.”

“You are thinking of two men in your life [or two women, for a male client], one of whom is sort of light-complexioned and the other of whom is slightly darker. Do you know who I mean?”

In the context of the material in this chapter, explain why this trick would often work to convince people that you are indeed psychic.