Are Online Readings Accurate?

[Wise_Angel]

I know that traditional readings are the best, but What´s your opinion and experience on accuracy of automatical online readings. More than readings I am referring  to automatical selection of cards, which you can read after the software draws the cards.

[katrinka]

They work just as well as actual cards. It's a set of randomized images, there's no reason for them not to work. Same as the card apps on your phone.

The drawbacks are:
1. You don't get the tactile experience, the sound of the riffle, the feel of the cardstock.
2. Available spreads are generally very limited. Or they might have one that you normally use with your physical decks, but their version is altered and wonky, which is annoying.

3. A lot of these have altered, wonky card meanings, as well. It's not a problem if you don't feel the need to look at them, but if you do, be VERY picky about which scripts/apps you use.

 

But there can be advantages, too. The Bohemian Gothic looks even more beautiful and eerie backlit on a phone. (And the text that goes with that one is excellent.)
You can read cards in public spaces without attracting attention. You're just one more person staring into their device.
And there's portability to consider. I have seven decks installed on my phone. Imagine running around with six big Tarot bricks and a Kipper in your purse - it's not something I would care to do.

[Ariana]

Depends on whom you ask the question or whom you ask the reading of.You have to gave a sense of feeling on who is a good reader,however just online clicking won't do.You discover bit by bit whom is a good reader, who would like to practise and you navigate towards that 🙂

[Grizabella]

Usually katrinka and I think along pretty much the same lines but on this one I'm unsure. It's an energy thing with me.  I think there's nothing to beat an online or in person reading.  If you don't have your own deck and don't know anyone who reads, then I wouldn't put as much faith in the computer generated reading. But you can get one here in the forum in a Tarot exchange. They're free but you do have to give feedback because we don't do free readings here and the exchange is of value to both the reader and the person who is read  for.

 

The energy exchange is what makes Tarot work, in my opinion. I'm into quantum physics and the entangled universe/entangled minds thing. If you get an online, computer generated reading you're actually in touch with whoever created the website and the readings and that person might have believed Tarot is a tool of the devil or something. You don't get any energy from a real person, so how can it give you any reliable energy  exchange?

 

If you want to keep using the computer generated readings as a learning tool, there's certainly nothing wrong with that. It's a help in learning the cards but I think as katrinka said, the meanings of the cards in the computer-generated ones can be pretty wonky. So I just wouldn't put your faith in the meanings of the cards quite as much as face-to-face or online.

[ashwsh]

I agree with @Grizabella I feel that online readings don’t do justice to the question as much as physical reading would.

It is about the energy you imbibe into the cards, and your focus and meditation that gives you accurate results. I somehow am a bit vary of trusting readings on an app or by a software.

[Saturn Celeste]

On 7/29/2019 at 9:52 PM, Wise_Angel said:

I know that traditional readings are the best, but What´s your opinion and experience on accuracy of automatical online readings. More than readings I am referring  to automatical selection of cards, which you can read after the software draws the cards.

Better to learn how to read the cards for yourself than use the automated websites.  You don't get that mental connection that is so necessary to read cards.  Whether you read cards online through the mail, facebook or a forum is still a little different than face to face but I find reading online for others to work out well for me.  I put my heart and soul into my readings.  Face to face I am far to nervous and just don't have the solitude I need to read.  Besides, with automated readings you can just keep flipping through the sites and it will be just random cards working on an algorithm.  No heart, no soul. 😉 

[Wanderer]

I also don't really accept that the automated readings are particularly useful. Of course, I don't actually know how Tarot works, but for me it it seems to emerge from the interplay of the reader's consciousness with another unspecified factor... whether that is the collective unconscious, spirit guides, or whatever. It's theoretically possible that the same things are influencing the computer algorithms, or that the cards are only fixed when they interact with the brain of the person using the app (quantum non-determinism)... but that's not something I can easily accept. 

 

What's even more of a problem, though, is that the meanings that arise from the cards in a reading vary according to the sitter, the situation, and the reader's intuition. The overall meaning is simply an umbrella for the diverse range of insights that exist within it. Stock text, for me, can never capture the subtle (and even radical) differences that are specific to each reading. So, nah - I don't see them as anything more than a bit of fun, personally. Having said that, it's a very interesting exercise to see what the standard Tarot can do just by virtue of its innate wisdom. 

[katrinka]

Do you guys remember The Power of Myth? The part where Joseph Campbell was talking about computers and said, "Have you ever looked inside of one of these things?" And there was an image of a motherboard, with all the tiny capacitors and resistors and whatnot, and Campbell said, "Thousands of angels dancing on the head of a pin."

I maintain that it works just as well as a printed deck (which virtually always comes from a factory environment, just like your phone or laptop.) If it's not working as well, maybe that's because of the feelings people have about it. If you go into it thinking it's not as good, of course it won't be as good.

I'm not talking about those script meanings you get online ("stock text", as Wanderer calls it) like the ones that tell you Lenormand meanings without combining the cards or putting it all in context. I mean randomly generated card images that you already know how to read for yourself. They read the same as cards drawn from a pack. They're just as accurate.

Edited August 3, 2019 by katrinka

[Wanderer]

35 minutes ago, katrinka said:

Do you guys remember The Power of Myth? The part where Joseph Campbell was talking about computers and said, "Have you ever looked inside of one of these things?" And there was an image of a motherboard, with all the tiny capacitors and resistors and whatnot, and Campbell said, "Thousands of angels dancing on the head of a pin."

I maintain that it works just as well as a printed deck (which virtually always comes from a factory environment, just like your phone or laptop.) If it's not working as well, maybe that's because of the feelings people have about it. If you go into it thinking it's not as good, of course it won't be as good.

Interesting. It really does depend on how exactly the whole system works, doesn't it? Is consciousness required, and if so, do computers have it? If you're in the animist school (I have a lot of sympathy for that), then it's entirely possible, since we don't need to be animate to share a degree of consciousness. Or, alternatively, if the cards are shuffled to the point that the quantum world is convinced that all information on individual card identity has been erased (hmm... that's really dodgy!) then the cards may not be fixed until they are revealed, and the observer's consciousness is what matters. However... I know a bit about how computers work, and these 'random number generators' aren't random; they're just sufficiently complex that they go beyond the patterns we can easily see, and appear random. However again... obviously, the versions where the  computer shuffles and you pick the cards yourself override that problem.

     As I said, I'm sceptical but slightly on the fence on this aspect, and it does depend on both how Tarot works, and how the specific computer version is constructed. But yes, theoretically, I can see it as possible... in some cases.

35 minutes ago, katrinka said:

I'm not talking about those script meanings you get online ("stock text", as Wanderer calls it) like the ones that tell you Lenormand meanings without combining the cards or putting it all in context. I mean randomly generated card images that you already know how to read for yourself. They read the same as cards drawn from a pack. They're just as accurate.

Yes, the stock text is my main problem with the meaning coming from these readings. But if it's one of those formats where you choose the cards, and also interpret them, then I'm willing to go with it as possible that the same things are going on. Perhaps we had a different image of the programme in our heads!

 

Further to that, though, and starting from an assumption that ticks all these boxes... most people seem to feel that their decks have personality and a specific relationship to them (we've talked about this a bit for the Wildwood, for example, with different experiences for different people). Would a computer-generated deck have a personality of its own, that needs to be gotten used to before you can read with it reliably..? Or, given that there are no physical cards and the images are generated anew every time you visit the site, is its 'personality' randomly refreshed each time you use it, and if so, can we read with it effectively? I can imagine a whole suite of experiments using different formats to try to get some inkling into how the Tarot does what it does! 

 

Do we need a proper investigative thread on Tarot and Quantum Mechanics..?  

 

[DanielJUK]

I think this depends on your personal belief system, like @Wanderer suggested before. Some people believe that readings we do (or get) come from an energy in ourselves or maybe from spirits / angels or maybe from the universe but some people believe they are always just random cards that came up, but I would argue, how do people find they apply to specific things in that case but anyway. Then it depends on what you think about getting readings, is there a difference in the energy with actually touching the cards or using an app or a complete random generator that are on some websites.

 

I have tested this out a lot and I believe that mostly you will get the same reading, in person and using something to generate the cards but I have found those websites which give you a picked reading can be terrible. I have a phone with tarot apps, that phone is in my pocket and near me nearly all the time, my energy is all over that phone, in the same way as my decks, so in my belief, even though I am picking cards on a screen it is linked to me. But some websites allow you to generate a reading, sometimes by you picking the cards and sometimes entirely by themselves. I have had mixed success with those, I just don't think they are linked to me at all, they are just randomising the cards and in my eyes it's different from choosing / dealing cards yourself with a link to you.

 

If you can, find apps / sites where you shuffle the "virtual deck" and pick your own cards. Secondly whatever you do, don't use the awful generic meanings on some of those things, look at the card and take it for yourself, with your own interpretation. Very big commercial generating websites (not going to name them) charge for generated readings, I find them the worst form of reading, completely different from tarot apps. I do believe though you can read for people and get readings from non traditional tarot methods, you just have to choose your method carefully 🙂

[AnomalyTempest]

I have a little different take, I think. What I see in a picture is there whether it's online or in front of me. It's like looking at the Mona Lisa in a museum versus in a picture online. It's the same picture. You might feel more in the presence of the original but the picture is the picture.

 

I have a few apps from Fool's Dog and I have the Galaxy app but I use them like I use my "real" decks. Sometimes, I take all the "daily" cards and put them together in a kind of mixed deck reading. I look at the picture and get what I can, then maybe, I'll look at the text just to see if anything else comes up. It works as well as physical decks for me with the added bonus, that I can use expensive or OOP decks I could never afford in real life. I have the google rewards app and every time I get $4.00 on it I'm back at Fool's Dog picking a new deck. 😄

 

I feel with everything that you get what you believe you will get. Only you can decide what works for you and how. Your instincts are always right for you.

[katrinka]

On 8/3/2019 at 3:14 AM, Wanderer said:

Further to that, though, and starting from an assumption that ticks all these boxes... most people seem to feel that their decks have personality and a specific relationship to them (we've talked about this a bit for the Wildwood, for example, with different experiences for different people). Would a computer-generated deck have a personality of its own, that needs to be gotten used to before you can read with it reliably..?

That's an interesting concept. All the deck apps on my phone are decks that I also own in their pasteboard form, so even though I don't think of it in terms of "personality",  there may be something to this.
But it might be attributed to my own personal quirks, rather than something inherent in apps-vs.-pasteboard. If I really like using a deck, and I see it in app form, I grab that, too.
Or if I'm using an app and I just love the card images, I hunt the physical deck down. If I don't like the card images, I delete the app.

On 8/3/2019 at 3:14 AM, Wanderer said:

 I can imagine a whole suite of experiments using different formats to try to get some inkling into how the Tarot does what it does! 

We actually have enough people here for some kinds of controlled experiments.

On 8/3/2019 at 3:14 AM, Wanderer said:

 

Do we need a proper investigative thread on Tarot and Quantum Mechanics..?  

 

Are there any quantum physicists here?  LOL.

[chongjasmine]

Personally, I don't thibk online readings work. This is because the cards need the reader's energies to work.

[lfg2k]

Online readings do work well actually. It all depends on the reader's abilites and how well the app is designed. UI and UX is a big factor that brings to much value to the table.

[katrinka]

On 8/17/2019 at 3:29 PM, lfg2k said:

Online readings do work well actually. It all depends on the reader's abilites

Yes. This simple one, for example, works quite well. You get the cards and you don't even have to see the meanings if you don't scroll down. If you do want to check them, they're legit meanings. What it doesn't do is put them in context for you. You have to know how to do that. http://www.crowley-thoth.com/

On 8/17/2019 at 3:29 PM, lfg2k said:

and how well the app is designed. UI and UX is a big factor that brings to much value to the table.

Some of the apps on my phone let me "shuffle and cut" and "draw cards" instead of just throwing the images up there. I'm not sure this really adds anything to the reading except in a psychological sense - I'm still getting computer-randomized card images, and without being able to see the code, I can't be sure that my cards weren't already preselected when I chose a spread. It looks kind of cool, though.
  

[MysticMonkey]

On 8/19/2019 at 3:39 AM, katrinka said:

Some of the apps on my phone let me "shuffle and cut" and "draw cards" instead of just throwing the images up there. I'm not sure this really adds anything to the reading except in a psychological sense - I'm still getting computer-randomized card images, and without being able to see the code, I can't be sure that my cards weren't already preselected when I chose a spread. It looks kind of cool, though.
  

I agree, I would like to know if in those apps the shuffling actually reorders the deck or if it's just an animation for show.  When I shuffle a real deck I shuffle until it feels right but because I don't know if the shuffling in the app actually makes any difference I don't know if I'm just wasting my time waiting for them to shuffle and whether I should just pick out my cards from the start because either a) the deck order has already been randomly decided when I started the reading or b) the card is randomly selected at the moment that I click on it? 

I love my tarot apps but because of this I don't really have a shuffling method that I'm happy with.  It lacks that little bit of routine that I get into when sitting down with my cards. 

[Pollux]

Actually, for me, they are working as well as normal cards. But if you can hold them in your hands, you can think sometimes deeper, have more feeling - from my perspective. If I don´t have them with me, only my phone, it is a great opportunity to read cards also in public or where ever you are... I guess, it is a matter of taste, as well.

 

Best,

Pollux

 

[Barleywine]

It took me a very long time, but I finally came to the conclusion that it's intention that counts, so pushing a button and turning the chore of randomizing a deck over to an electronic random number generator isn't any different from randomizing it manually, only much more thorough. However, where I think they fall down is that the purpose of the manual shuffle and cut is to arrange the cards in the proper sequence for the reading after the deck has been randomized, and I don't see how a computer can do that for us. It's simply too impersonal, and expecting that degree of sensitivity out of a bunch of binary off/on switches is pushing it beyond its limits, no matter how delicately and judiciously or with how much purity of heart we push the button. A computer is a mathematical and scientific tool, not an empathic entity (at least not yet).