What is "accuracy" to you?

[triple_entendre]

Some readers also stray away from reading/making predictions and actually give advice. Thanks but no thanks!

The times, they're a-changing. Books on tarot and other divinations are really big on Free Will and the future being so very sensitive to influence, like butterfly-causing-a-hurricane kind of sensitive. So, readers seem to be less raring to go, "Your son will murder you, marry your wife, call down a plague upon your countrymen, and then have a popular psychologist's most famous theory named after him. What? Of course you can abandon him on a mountain as a baby in hopes that he'll die, if that makes you feel better-- it won't really change anything, though, that'll just make him surprised enough to gouge his eyes out when it actually does happen. No, I really did mean when. That'll be ten denarii."

 

[Carla]

The times, they're a-changing. Books on tarot and other divinations are really big on Free Will and the future being so very sensitive to influence, like butterfly-causing-a-hurricane kind of sensitive. So, readers seem to be less raring to go, "Your son will murder you, marry your wife, call down a plague upon your countrymen, and then have a popular psychologist's most famous theory named after him. What? Of course you can abandon him on a mountain as a baby in hopes that he'll die, if that makes you feel better-- it won't really change anything, though, that'll just make him surprised enough to gouge his eyes out when it actually does happen. No, I really did mean when. That'll be ten denarii."

I guess it all comes down to what the reader believes is possible. As I just flat out don't believe that cards can predict an inevitable future, I seldom see that sort of thing in a reading. And I would be skeptical if I received a reading from someone who seemed convinced that they could predict my future. But when I have seen it, I've said it, and have been right a couple of times. Chance? Self-fulfilling prophecy? Darn good guessing? Dunno.

 

[gregory]

Relative to readings I termed readers as accurate when that person was able to read events of the past (relative to the query) just as the event had happened. The person would then go on to describe the present situation in a manner which is consistent with reality and finally able to make predictions that actually materialize as stated during the reading.

There are readers who are too general for my liking. If I pay for a reading I don't want an answer that could apply to anyone's life given the scenario. Some readers also stray away from reading/making predictions and actually give advice. Thanks but no thanks!

What's "advice" ? What I like to get is things that will suggest a course of action I can take, not what WILL HAPPEN - that is self-fulfilling and also NEVER writ in stone, so....

 

[Nineveh]

What's "advice" ? What I like to get is things that will suggest a course of action I can take, not what WILL HAPPEN - that is self-fulfilling and also NEVER writ in stone, so....

Hi, Gregory!

My expectations of readings vary but at the end of the day, I want to KNOW. The readings I obtain are generally geared towards relationships whether romantic or not. I already know how to interact or "deal" with people of various personalities. Therefore, advice isn't really needed. I want the cut and dry..."What's going on?" "has this person gossiped...", "...intentions?", etc. I mainly receive readings to obtain confirmation of "hunches" or intuition. In a sense, the answer would assist me in taking a specific action but more often than not it provides confirmation.

Many tarot readers advertise that things are never written in stone and I often hear the prhase after a prediction had failed to manifest. Yet, there are readers whose predictions always manifest (for me anyway). At one point in my life, I was a phone reader and I would also call fellow readers for a reading. There was one thing I could not stand and that is to have someone to give me their opinion when I called for a TAROT reading, lol. I would find myself asking the person, "What are the cards showing?"

To answer your question, advice is any statement that begins with "I think you should...", "If I were you...". I have had a reader to start explaining the spread and upon evaluating the cards tell me, "This isn't gonna last..." and gathered up all of the cards and asked me if there was something else I'd like that person to read... I mean seriously just tell me what the cards are stating.

 

[gregory]

To answer your question, advice is any statement that begins with "I think you should...", "If I were you...". I have had a reader to start explaining the spread and upon evaluating the cards tell me, "This isn't gonna last..." and gathered up all of the cards and asked me if there was something else I'd like that person to read... I mean seriously just tell me what the cards are stating.

Hi back ! Fair enough - "I think you should..." would be a no no for me - because "I" has nothing to do with it. "The cards suggest you should consider..." would be OK by me. I must go look at some readings I have had and some I've done, see if I can explain better. But I don't want a full predictive. Then again - I don't generally ask for readings about relationships.

 

[Zephyros]

Again, as readers, I think we should know better than to expect Google-like answers from Tarot. I think the cards are never wrong (in a sense, they can't be "wrong" or "right" as they are just pictures on paper), only that we ask the wrong questions or interpret them wrongly.

Here's a little anecdote about accuracy, but be aware I'm not asking for sympathy in telling this, just telling it as I've been thinking about a certain reading, recently. I'm going through a weird time right now, being evicted from my apartment, staying with friends and looking for a job, but my biggest concern was my cat; I had nowhere to put him. A member on AT here did a reading for me about him, and I won't go on about the whole reading, but the final outcome, was the Fool, and that person interpreted him as a saying that in the end everything would work out for us, and that I wouldn't have to give him away and the surrounding cards certainly made sense in that prediction. Well, as it turned out, I left him with a friend who couldn't keep him as he already had a cat and they didn't get along, so I put him in a friends closed yard, where he stayed for a day while I was there, and then ran away when I went food shopping.

Now, in retrospect, I think the Fool fits the scenario perfectly, at least for him. What is more Fool than running away, especially for a cat? I think that reading was spot on, even though I didn't see how it would turn out at the time. And perhaps I did understand what I wished, since of all the ends I could foresee, I must admit I didn't see that coming, which, in a sense, only reinforces the Fool.

So, ultimately, I don't think readings can be measured for accuracy in a dry sense, especially not predictive readings, since we may not understand the reading at the time, and that misunderstanding is part of the future, so to speak. Readings can be measured for accuracy when dealing with the past, but again, it's never black and white. Like I said in an earlier post, Tarot at times shows us what was, but it also may show us what could have been; what is, or what should be. I trust it as far as I can, but in a sense it's like walking on light, not a solid earthen floor.

 

[Zephyros]

Just posting off-topic, that nothing is ever over till it's over, the cat just came back

So that's accuracy for you, or at least my own understanding of it is way off

 

[Alta]

In my working life, I was a weather forecaster, and of course verification of the forecasts was a huge deal for us. One of the big discussions that we had was 'accuracy vs. precision'.

I have struggled to find a way to explain this in tarot terms, and in searching on the Net found this example from archery (screen shot attached).

Accuracy, while it may have 'scatter', produces some useful information. Precision also provides some but also provides consistency, i.e. reliability.

 

[Grizabella]

Sometimes "nothing is set in stone" and "your actions or the actions of someone else could change the outcome" is timidity on the part of the reader and fear that they'll be wrong and they don't want to "look" wrong or "inaccurate" as a reader. It takes bravery to stick your neck out and then find out you're wrong, after all.

It's true that a person's actions might change the outcome of certain things. But it's also possible that Tarot is predictive and a reader just plain got it wrong. Or it could just be taking longer than expected for a prediction to manifest. Only time will tell. A reader just has to read the cards and see. But I'd much rather have my reading done by someone who leaves out "nothing is set in stone" or brags about their accuracy, to be honest. Maybe they believe those things, but just leave out verbalizing it if you read for me, okay? Time will tell the tale and we'll see.

It's not that I don't believe a person can change the outcome of certain things if they foresee and prepare for them. They can. But not always. And it's true that some readers do have a better track record than others but if they boast about some huge accuracy rate, then I tend to doubt it.

For me, accuracy is not generalizing and not "seeing" things that could just be good guesses based on human nature, it's actually stating things that couldn't be known otherwise. And it's seeing things ahead of time that couldn't have just come purely from a lucky guess or logical deduction.

Tarot is a wonderful and amazing tool. It's a lot of things to a lot of people depending on their personal belief system. I respect their right to use it as they see fit and and to believe what they want to about it. I appreciate it when they respect my right to do the same.

 

[nisaba]

Accuracy is not talking in generalities that could apply to a fifth of the world's population (you sometimes feel unappreciated ... you have talents nobody recognises ... if you were just given an even break you could succeed wildly ... you have a longing for more love than you currently have in your life ... etc etc).

Accuracy is exploring the cards in front of you so that by the end of the reading you know the client's inner world almost as well as they do.