“Cold Reading”: How to Convince Strangers that You Know All About Them. Ray Hyman Ray Hyman is professor emeritus of psychology, University of Oregon. The following is our 13 point guide to cold reading - Study them well, then amaz e your friends with your new found psychic powers! 1. Remember that the key Hyman insisted hecould imitate Anderson's socalled cold reading, an expression That's the same Ray Hyman who inthe mid1990s,at the government's behest,Only our concise "how-to" manual, The Handbook of Psychic Cold Reading, takes you step-by-step through the process of developing YOUR OWN cold reading Ray Hyman (born June 23, 1928) is a Professor Emeritus of Psychology at the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon, and a noted critic of parapsychology.