'Heart of the Matter' was a BBC TV documentary series addressing issues of belief. One programme in the series looked at many facets of astrology. I was invited to demonstrate 'cold reading' under test conditions. In other words, I pretended to be an astrologer who had prepared astrological readings based on the birth dates of two strangers chosen by the production team, not me. I presented these readings to the two subjects, as shown below. They were then interviewed independently by the show's presenter and asked how 'accurate' my readings were.

In actual fact, the readings was not based on any astrological knowledge or information whatsoever - I just made it all up the night before, using my knowledge of cold reading.

One of the two women rated my reading as "95%" accurate. The other said it was "99.9%" right. A complete transcript of the reading is included in my book, the Full Facts Book of Cold Reading.

[ 'Heart Of The Matter', BBC Television ]

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