Wheeler’s error is somewhat understandable given the media’s massive attention to the paranormal. His ignorance is typical, and his vehement assault is important. The irrational antipathy coming from the very highest echelon of the scientific establishment deserves notice.
Parapsychology is tiny. To put it in context, it can be compared with the field of psychology, and Sybo Schouten, a Dutch researcher, presented some useful figures on the two. Drawing upon a survey done in 1983 and 1984, he reported that approximately 34,000 psychologists were employed in research activities in the U.S. (several times that many are involved in teaching, counseling, etc.). In contrast, for most of the past 100 years in parapsychology, there have been no more than 5 to 10 persons employed in full-time research at any one point.38 The Parapsychological Association is the professional organization of the field, and in 1991 it had 251 members. In contrast, the 1991 membership of the American Psychological Association (APA) was 72,202. But these comparisons don’t tell the entire story, because the vast majority of APA members are, or have worked as, full-time professionals in the field. They have extensive training in it and spent years of their lives pursuing advanced degrees from accredited institutions. This is not true for parapsychology, which has no degree-granting programs. Virtually all of its researchers are professionally trained in other disciplines. The level of institutionalization and bureaucratization of parapsychology is miniscule compared with other sciences, but the hostility it provokes is extraordinary.
The 1970s
The progress of parapsychology needs to be understood in the context of larger cultural forces. The 1960s and early 1970s are instructive. Those years were marked by social tumult. Civil rights and anti-war protests were frequent; the environmental movement was beginning, manned space flight was underway, and the sexual revolution was in full swing. The baby-boomers were coming of age. It was a time of idealism, particularly for those from the college-educated middle class in their late teens and early 20s. A counter-culture was thriving; that was a liminal phenomenon, and not surprisingly, it included a paranormal component. Those same years were ones of growth and innovation for parapsychology, but also ones of instability.
The 1970s had a wide general interest in the paranormal, even outside the counter-culture. Movies, TV programs, books, and adult education courses all reflected the popularity. The movie The Exorcist (1973) did surprisingly well at the box office, and books such as The Secret Life of Plants (1973) and Psychic Discoveries Behind the Iron Curtain (1970) were bestsellers. Adult education programs had courses on witchcraft and psychic development. Interest in direct, overt use of psi was widespread; the CIA began funding research to develop psychic spies. Psychic magazine had begun in 1969, and it flourished in the 1970s. It was a popular bimonthly on slick paper, something of an upscale version of Fate magazine. It regularly carried interviews with parapsychologists and reported on their work. There were also several similar, more short-lived, newsstand periodicals. Uri Geller received enormous media attention for bending spoons and keys, and in 1976 CSICOP was founded.
In 1978 Tart identified 14 parapsychological research centers (13 of which responded to his questionnaire); this might seem promising until ones learns that half of them had budgets less than $17,000 per year. Some centers had only one researcher funded for full-time work, and many were staffed with volunteers or with workers paid exceptionally poorly (I knew people who made less than $300 per month for nearly full-time work). Some volunteered for months for free, and not surprisingly there was a high turnover of personnel.
In the 1970s, professors, their associates, and students were major contributors to the research effort. Some of the more notable included: John Bisaha at Mundelein College in Chicago, Charles Tart at the University of California at Davis, Robert Morris at the University of California at Irvine and, earlier in the decade, at Santa Barbara, Gertrude Schmeidler at the City College of New York, Douglas Dean at Newark College of Engineering, Ian Stevenson and J. G. Pratt at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Carroll Nash at St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, Lendell Braud at Texas Southern University, Rex Stanford at St. John’s University in New York, John Palmer at John F. Kennedy University in Orinda, California, Irvin Child at Yale. These professors and their students made substantial contributions to the literature. Some of the students, particularly those of Bisaha, Morris, Palmer, and Schmeidler continued to be active in the field and became leaders in it.
There were also several laboratories not affiliated with academic institutions. Some that employed full-time researchers were: the Foundation for Research on the Nature of Man (FRNM) and the Psychical Research Foundation (PRF) both of Durham, North Carolina, the American Society for Psychical Research (ASPR) in New York City, the Division of Parapsychology and Psychophysics at Maimonides
Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York, Stanford Research Institute in Menlo Park, California, and Mind Science Foundation in San Antonio, Texas.
A sizeable number of individuals and small informal groups also carried out research in a grass-roots effort. The quality varied enormously; much of it lacked controls or appropriate statistical analyses, but some of these independent efforts produced creditable studies.
New scholarly journals became available. In 1974 Psychoenergetic Systems was begun under the editorship of Stanley Krippner and was produced by Gordon and Breach, a major scientific publisher. In 1978, after breaking from CSICOP, Marcello Truzzi founded Zetetic Scholar to provide a forum for debate for both proponents and skeptics of the paranormal. Parapsychology Review started in 1970 as a means for parapsychologists to communicate with their colleagues as well as with an audience of interested laypersons who might not read the technical journals. This growth and diversity seemed propitious.
The 1970s were a time of innovation; many new experimental procedures and theoretical models were developed. Remote viewing, the ganzfeld technique, and electronic random number generators became widely used. The major theoretical work included: retroactive PK, task-complexity independence, observer effects, quantum mechanical theories, conformance behavior, and lability and inertia. These theoretical efforts remain crucial to understanding psi but are virtually unknown outside the field. They will be discussed in a later chapter.
Before 1970, when Rhine dominated the field, much research was directed at the psychic abilities of ordinary people. In the 1970s more effort was devoted to talented individuals. These included: Uri Geller, now the most famous, Lalsingh Harribance, Bill Delmore, Ingo Swann, Pat Price, Felicia Parise, Hella Hammid, Malcolm Bessent, Blue Harary, Alexander Tanous, Olga Worrall. With very few exceptions, researchers were extremely naive regarding trickery. Both Geller and Delmore later admitted to being adept at magic tricks, and research done with them had serious flaws.
The 1980s
The cultural tenor of the 1980s was decidedly different than that of the 1970s, and parapsychology felt it. In society, business success became more highly valued among the middle class baby-boomers. Less idealism was evident, and corporate and individual greed were frequent topics of pundits. The baby-boomers were sometimes referred
to as the “Me Generation.” The number of volunteer workers at parapsychology laboratories dwindled rapidly.
The 1980s saw a move away from popular interest in the paranormal in the larger society, and that was accompanied by a decided change within the New Age and psychic subcultures. Those who had previously been interested in psychic matters shifted their attention to more “spiritual” concerns that might be characterized as “a search for meaning.” This was subtly foreshadowed when California-based Psychic magazine changed its name to New Realities in 1977. Channeling came in to vogue, but unlike spiritualism, there was little emphasis on verifiable information or physical phenomena. Channelers spouted “philosophy,” made dire predictions of earth changes, and gave general advice, but that was about all. The number of books published on
39
paranormal topi
cs dropped precipitously between 1980 and 1982. With the general shift away from psychism and toward the search for meaning, the books of Joseph Campbell became popular. There were new magazines, printed on high quality paper, catering to that general trend.
The beginning of the 1980s appeared extremely promising for parapsychology. The 1970s had produced a number of innovative lines of research. The field had attracted new researchers, greater attention, and more financial resources than ever before.
Academe seemed receptive. During the first years of the 1980s there were four laboratories affiliated with universities and staffed with full-time researchers. These included the Experiential Learning Laboratory in the Electrical Engineering department at Duke University, headed by psychologist Edward F. Kelly; the Communication Studies Laboratory in the School of Computer and Information Science at Syracuse University with psychologist Robert L. Morris; the McDonnell Laboratory for Psychical Research at Washington University, St. Louis, led by physicist Peter Phillips; and the Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research (PEAR) laboratory headed by Robert G. Jahn.
By 1986 only one remained. The Duke laboratory was unceremoniously closed. Robert Morris moved to Edinburgh, Scotland. The MacLab, which had focused primarily on macro-PK, met the most ignominious fate. It was a victim of James Randi’s highly publicized
40
Project Alpha and closed shortly thereafter. Only the Princeton University lab stayed the decade. Robert Jahn was the dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Science at Princeton, and undoubtedly it was his personal clout and connections that kept the laboratory alive.
There was opposition to his work at Princeton, and Philip Anderson, a Nobel laureate in physics, was a particularly vocal detractor.
Professors at other schools continued to contribute, but the level of their efforts began to decline. Gertrude Schmeidler, Irvin Child, and Carroll Nash retired. Charles Tart, Rex Stanford, and Lendell Braud were not as active as they had been in the 1970s. John Palmer left John F. Kennedy University in Orinda, California, and it was generally agreed that after his departure the University did not attract the quality of students that it had in the 1970s, some of whom are still active in the field today. James Crandall at the University of Idaho conducted studies. Stanley Krippner at Saybrook Institute in San Francisco had a few graduate students with an interest in the field. Norman S. Don, Charles Warren, and Bruce McDonough at the University of Illinois at Chicago began carrying out research, but they had no students as collaborators. Student research dropped dramatically. Overall, professors had less prominence in the field than they did in the 1970s, and no one was taking the place of those who retired.
The laboratories dominated the decade. There were six labs active through the decade that employed two or more full-time researchers. Four of the laboratories were independent, and only two were affiliated with larger institutions, a subtle, continuing indication of the anti-structural nature of the field. Conferences and journals were heavily influenced, even dominated, by personnel from these laboratories. Experimental research was at center stage, and field studies and theoretical development played a minor role.
The following briefly describes the six major laboratories of the 1980s.
Mind Science Foundation (MSF), in San Antonio, Texas, was founded in 1957 by Thomas Baker Slick, Jr., a businessman with inherited wealth from oil. During the 1980s William Braud, Helmut Schmidt, and Marilyn Schlitz were the most well known psi researchers affiliated with that foundation. Schmidt was the father of random number generator (RNG) research in parapsychology. Braud did extensive work on psi and biological organisms. Both were exceptionally innovative, and their work will be discussed in a later chapter. The parapsychology budget for MSF was on the order of $300,000 per year in the 1980s. Despite the substantial contributions of the MSF researchers, in the early 1990s the Foundation shifted support away from parapsychology. Schmidt retired, and Braud and Schlitz moved to California.
Science Unlimited Research Foundation (SURF) was also in San Antonio, Texas. It was funded by George W. Church, Jr. of Church’s Fried Chicken, a fast-food chain located in the southern part of the U.S. Gary Heseltine and Rick Berger were the best known researchers affiliated with SURF in the 1980s. Much of their work used electronic random number generators. The budget was approximately $100,000 per year.43 This was the smallest of the six labs discussed here, and SURF was not exclusively devoted to parapsychology. Some of He-seltine’s time was spent developing computer technology for people with disabilities.
Psychophysical Research Laboratories (PRL) was in Princeton, New Jersey, and I mentioned it briefly earlier. It was funded primarily by the James S. McDonnell Foundation. At its peak, the laboratory had seven full-time employees and annual expenditures of approximately $300,000. The main researchers included: Rick Berger, Pat Barker, Charles Honorton, Marta Quant, Ephraim Schechter, Mario Varvoglis, and myself. PRL was the leader in ESP ganzfeld research, and it also developed a standardized random number generator and testing package for Apple II computers.
Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research (PEAR) laboratory is at Princeton University. Its best known researchers have been Angela Thompson, Brenda J. Dunne, York H. Dobyns, Roger D. Nelson, and Robert G. Jahn, who was dean of Princeton’s School of Engineering and Applied Science. The laboratory is housed in a few small offices in the basement of the engineering building. A New York Times Magazine article reported that its 1989 budget was $250,000. 5 PEAR primarily focuses on PK effects on delicate physical systems. Its prestigious Princeton affiliation gives PEAR high public visibility, but within the field the poor quality of its remote-viewing research is notorious.
The Foundation for Research on the Nature of Man (FRNM) in Durham, North Carolina was founded by J. B. Rhine, and in 1995, 15 years after his death, it changed its name to the Rhine Research Center. In the 1980s K. Ramakrishna Rao served as director. The major researchers during that period included John A. Palmer, H. Kantha-mani, Richard S. Broughton, Debra H. Weiner, Shanti Krishna, James R. Perlstrom, and Nancy L. Zingrone. I was there in the early 1980s as a research fellow, as were Leonard George and Marilyn J. Schlitz. The primary research included testing of children in classroom situations, ganzfeld, and RNG studies. During the 1980s the FRNM’s approximate annual expenditures ranged from $250,000 to $300,000.47 The
Center also publishes the Journal of Parapsychology, which is included in its budget.
SRI International (formerly Stanford Research Institute) in Menlo Park, California had a parapsychology program that was headed by Hal Puthoff until 1985, at which point Edwin C. May took over. Russell Targ was there early in the decade. Other researchers included Nevin D. Lantz, Beverly S. Humphrey, G. Scott Hubbard, Wanda L. W. Luke, James P. Spottiswoode, Christine L. James, Larissa Vilenskaya, Dean Radin and Keith Harary. Much of the work was classified, but based on that which had been released, the focus was on remote viewing and RNG research. Its history, funding, and demise were discussed earlier.
At the peak, in the mid 1980s, these six laboratories probably employed no more than 25 to 30 full-time researchers. Four of the laboratories (PRL, MSF, SRI, PEAR) had facilities comparable to research centers for other sciences. The FRNM remained in an old house across from the Duke campus. SURF was in a converted warehouse in a commercial/industrial park.
The 1980s provided the opportunity to build a more professional community. The quality of the research substantially improved in terms of methodology, peer review, sophistication of analysis, and controls against deception. Studies became more technically advanced. For instance, meta-analysis, a technique for evaluating groups of statistical studies, was introduced and widely used. The development and testing of electronic random number generators were taken to new levels. Theoretical issues received less attention than in the 1970s as more focus was placed on methodological improvements.
During the 1980s the field became more attuned to issues of deception, and researchers generally shifted away from
high-profile special subjects who might bring taint of fraud. Researchers tested ordinary people with efforts aimed at improving replication rates of experiments. The period was marked by steadily improving methods and more stable infrastructure to support the research.
There were, however, drawbacks to the advances. The growing sophistication meant fewer people could follow the research and understand it. Reports and discussions grew increasingly technical, and they seemed distant from real-world concerns. This is not a problem in normal science where funding comes from institutions that call upon other scientists for evaluation and recommendations, but much of parapsychology’s support came from wealthy individuals who were not scientists.
Around 1989 two of the laboratories (PRL, SURF) closed, and the SRI work was curtailed and then revived and moved to SAIC in
1991. Mind Science Foundation’s parapsychology researchers left in
1992. Ed May resigned from SAIC in 1995 just before massive news coverage was given to the government’s psychic spying program. Despite the publicity, funding was nowhere in sight to support his research.
The same general decline was also seen in the publications of the field. Truzzi’s Zetetic Scholar stopped in 1987. Psychoenergetic Systems changed its name to Psychoenergetics in 1981 (Volume 4), and the last issue (Volume 6, No. 1) appeared in 1988 with yet another name, Theoretical Parapsychology. Parapsychology Review ceased in 1990. Even the circulation of the long-established Journal of Parapsychology declined from 1311 in 1979 to 904 in 1990.
The Trickster and the Paranormal Page 24
