Talk:Edgar Cayce - Misplaced Pages

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Feoffer (talk | contribs) at 11:00, 21 September 2024 (→Overall skepticism - too many things accepted un-critically: Reply). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Revision as of 11:00, 21 September 2024 by Feoffer (talk | contribs) (→Overall skepticism - too many things accepted un-critically: Reply)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Edgar Cayce article.
This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
New to Misplaced Pages? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help.

Article policies

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: 1, 2, 3Auto-archiving period: 12 months

A fact from this article was featured on Misplaced Pages's Main Page in the On this day section on March 18, 2018 and March 18, 2019.

This

level-5 vital article is rated B-class on Misplaced Pages's content assessment scale.
It is of interest to the following WikiProjects:

Religion: Interfaith / New religious movements Top‑importance

	Religion portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Religion, a project to improve Misplaced Pages's articles on Religion-related subjects. Please participate by editing the article, and help us assess and improve articles to good and 1.0 standards, or visit the wikiproject page for more details.ReligionWikipedia:WikiProject ReligionTemplate:WikiProject ReligionReligion
Top	This article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale.
	This article is within the scope of Interfaith work group, a work group which is currently considered to be inactive.
	This article is supported by New religious movements work group (assessed as Top-importance).

Paranormal Top‑importance

	This article falls under the scope of WikiProject Paranormal, which aims to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to the paranormal and related topics on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, you can edit the attached article, help with current tasks, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and discussions.ParanormalWikipedia:WikiProject ParanormalTemplate:WikiProject Paranormalparanormal
Top	This article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale.

Biography

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography, a collaborative effort to create, develop and organize Misplaced Pages's articles about people. All interested editors are invited to join the project and contribute to the discussion. For instructions on how to use this banner, please refer to the documentation.BiographyWikipedia:WikiProject BiographyTemplate:WikiProject Biographybiography

United States: Kentucky Low‑importance

This article is within the scope of WikiProject United States, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of topics relating to the United States of America on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the ongoing discussions.

United StatesWikipedia:WikiProject United StatesTemplate:WikiProject United StatesUnited States

Low

This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

This article is supported by WikiProject Kentucky (assessed as Low-importance).

Skepticism Low‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Skepticism, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of science, pseudoscience, pseudohistory and skepticism related articles on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.SkepticismWikipedia:WikiProject SkepticismTemplate:WikiProject SkepticismSkepticism
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Guild of Copy Editors

This article was copy edited by a member of the Guild of Copy Editors.Guild of Copy EditorsWikipedia:WikiProject Guild of Copy EditorsTemplate:WikiProject Guild of Copy EditorsGuild of Copy Editors

Overall skepticism - too many things accepted un-critically

Most of this article reeks of un-critically accepting hearsay. Here's the worst example:

 "When Gertrude became ill with tuberculosis, they used the readings after the doctor had given up and the treatment cured her."

Such a big bold statement requires some serious reference(s), or at least some weasel words like "apparently" or "according to ___".

And you can't just reference Sugrue & Cerminara: They didn't see Gertrude get cured. In fact, major sections of this whole article are simply summaries of Sugrue and Cerminara; they should simply be prefaced as such.

I'm thinking this whole article needs one of those tags at the top, that says "This article suffers from major weaknesses etc". Any reason not to do that?? Jjjoyride (talk) 20:24, 16 September 2024 (UTC)

Of course, it would be even better to improve the article, but that looks like a lot of work, probably with some opposition by people who like it uncritical. I notified WP:FTN. --Hob Gadling (talk) 08:13, 17 September 2024 (UTC)

I seem to recall reading that if a page is beyond repair delete and start again. Slatersteven (talk) 08:58, 17 September 2024 (UTC)

Have fixed the sentence concerning the op by adding "and she believed that she improved after using the treatment." An easy fix. Uncritical language is easily obtained while at the same time assuring that the topic is well-covered. Randy Kryn (talk) 11:27, 17 September 2024 (UTC)

Jjjoyride wrote, Here's the worst example. Okay, that was the first step.

The article is a conglomerate of tales about weird things and commonplace things happening to Cayce or being done by him. Saw a ghost, read the Bible a lot, saw a woman with wings, got knocked by teacher, fell asleep, knew all the answers, became the best student, got hit in the ass, diagnosed it in his sleep... Yes, adding attribution is marginally better, but that is not how an encyclopedic article should read. I can't tell which parts should remain. --Hob Gadling (talk) 11:52, 17 September 2024 (UTC)

The sourced material should all remain as part of Cayce's biographical history. He was researched by independent authors and journalists, and they reported on "what they found to be true", which is how journalists and historians should work. Randy Kryn (talk) 23:55, 17 September 2024 (UTC)

Your reasoning is invalid. Misplaced Pages is not obligated to add everything that any reliable source writes. Otherwise, many articles would be millions of characters long. We have to choose what to include and what not. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:32, 18 September 2024 (UTC)

Still getting my bearings, but obviously the text has been based on Sugrue, who is anything but an independent historian, closer to historic novel or something, describing the internal thoughts and feelings and direct quotes without sourcing.Feoffer (talk) 04:46, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Thomas Sugrue had been a reporter for the New York Herald Tribune and The American Magazine before writing the book on Cayce, written while living at Cayce's home and receiving "readings" and advice for his own illness. It seems that Sugrue was a legitimate journalist historian who interviewed and researched Cayce over a period of years in order to write his book. There is no indication he did so with bias as much as interviewing a research subject, witnessing him work, and preparing a book about what he had found. Cayce was a unique subject, and Sugrue, an experienced well-travelled journalist, became his biographer. The sourcing was Cayce himself, who likely read and discussed the manuscript with the author. In that respect the honesty of Cayce should be taken into account, who by all indications did not exaggerate or give Sugrue false information, but simply elaborated on his life as he lived it. The "readings" existed, Cayce's secretary Gladys Davis Turner, family members, and others, gave Sugrue background and real-time evidence of the viability and accuracy of the subject as he wrote and edited. Randy Kryn (talk) 10:31, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Sugrue isn't writing a biography so much as facilitating a memoir. It's a completely valid genre, and Sugrue isn't somehow 'wrong' to choose that style. But we can't just go from a line in Sugrue's narrative to knowing it's a fact. Rather, Sugrue's content really can be best understood as being prefaced with 'In the 1940s, Cayce told Sugrue...'. It makes a difference: Cayce can report recollections of seeing angels and ghosts as a child, but that doesn't tell us when those elements became part of the public narrative about his life. Would a follower from the 1920s have heard that story, or only someone who'd read Sugrue book? Feoffer (talk) 11:00, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Notes to Self and others

Find earliest dates of publication of claim of:

Ghost of grandfather
Encounter with 'woman with wings'
Magical learning
coccyx miracle cure
seeing aura
Encounter with Stanley Hart -- Hart wasn't in Kentucky in 1901 so far as I can tell. He was there in 1900 before April and again in 1903. If first recorded mention of Hart as being the hypnotist is 40 years later, questionable.
Claimed card game invention

Feoffer (talk) 06:31, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Categories: