54
Barcellos, 1979, p. 243.
Parapsychology has suffered a long history of invalid statistical criticisms. Even back in the 1930s Rhine was subjected to attacks from ignorant psychologists. Professional statisticians, who were not as well established as they are today, became alarmed because they recognized that the attacks on Rhine also besmirched their own discipline. Eminent statisticians Thornton Fry, S. S. Wilks, Edward Huntington, and Burton Camp were in touch with Rhine. A statement was prepared and issued by Camp, president of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics, defending Rhine’s statistics. For more on this see Mauskopf and McVaugh’s The Elusive Science, p. 258.
Gardner, 1977/ 1981b, A Skeptic’s View of Parapsychology, Science: Good, Bad and Bogus, p. 141.
57 His statement about the inability to evaluate the Honorton and Schmidt experiments was made 12 years before he published his Stepanek critique. Presumably Gardner would not make such a statement now.
58 Pinch and Collins, 1984. For CSICOP policy, see Policy on Sponsoring Research, Testing Individual Claims, and Conducting Investigations of Alleged Paranormal Powers and Phenomena, Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. 6, No. 3, 1982, p. 9.
59 Gardner, 1983/1988, Fool’s Paradigms, The New Age: Notes of a Fringe Watcher, pp. 184-187.
60 The quote is from How Not to Test a Psychic, p. 56. Gardner also raised the point earlier in lengthy a debate on parapsychology in the pages of Behavioral and Brain Sciences, Vol. 10, No. 4, 1987, see p. 587.
61 Gardner, 1988, p. 18.
62 See the earlier chapter Conjurors and the Paranormal; Truzzi, 1997; Hansen, Magicians Who Endorsed Psychic Phenomena, 1990, Magicians on the Paranormal, 1992.
63 Order and Surprise by Martin Gardner, Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1983, p. 213.
64 Prince, 1930.
65 The two quotes are from pages 57 and 58 of The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener.
66 Gardner, 1983, p. 239.
67 Ibid. p. 232.
68 A Mind at Play: An Interview with Martin Gardner by Kendrick Frazier, Skeptical Inquirer, March/April, 1998, pp. 34-39, see p. 38.
69 Gardner, 1983, p. 330.
70 Ibid. p. 331.
71 Though The Flight of Peter Fromm was narrated by a secular humanist professor, the author’s sympathies were more with his young protagonist who maintained a belief in God. Not everyone understood this, but one who did was Phillip E. Johnson, a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley and a prominent Christian creationist. Johnson bought a dozen of Gardner’s remaining copies of the 1973 edition of the novel and gave them to students and friends, resulting in a surprising, almost paradoxical, audience. Paul Kurtz’s publishing house, Prometheus Books, reprinted the novel in 1994, and one wonders whether Kurtz understood Gardner’s message and whether he was pleased with the readership. Johnson’s interactions with Gardner are described in Reason in the Balance: The Case Against Naturalism in Science, Law & Education (1995), Downers Grove, Illinois, InterVarsity Press, pp. 236-238.
72 Latour, 1988, p. 168.
73 Ibid. p. 167.
74 Gatling and Rhine, 1946.
75 Rhine made it clear that experimental parapsychology had implications for religion, and he included a full chapter on it in The New World of the Mind (1953).
76 Gardner, 1988, pp. 57-64.
77 Gardner, 1992, pp. 111-117.
78 Harper’s magazine (March 1991, pp. 28-31) carried a transcript of a telephone conversation between Mims and Jonathan Piel, editor of Scientific American, which demonstrated the overt religious discrimination by Scientific American.
In an article he wrote under the pseudonym of George Groth for the October 1952 issue of Fate magazine. (He Writes with Your Hand, by George Groth, Fate, Vol. 5, pp. 39-43.) That issue of Fate also carried an article by J. B. Rhine.
80 Ashmore, 1989, p. 21.
81 Ashmore, 1989, p. 42.
82 Mehan and Wood, 1975, p. 159.
Chapter 21—Laboratory Research on Psi
1 Broad, 1949/1976, p. 10.
2
Parapsychological Association, 1988, p. 353.
3
Zoltan Vassy, a Hungarian physicist who has conducted psi experiments, pointed out that several studies show that distance does affect scoring: “Distance, ESP, and Ideology” by Z. Vassy, Behavioral and Brain Sciences, Vol. 10, 1987, pp. 616-617. Charles Tart argues that precognition results are weaker than real-time ESP, which would indicate some, though not absolute, limits. See “Information Acquisition Rates in Forced-Choice ESP Experiments: Precognition Does Not Work as Well as Present-Time ESP” by Charles T. Tart, Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, Vol. 77, 1983, 293-310.
Telepathy: Origins of Randomization in Experimental Design by Ian Hacking (1988, see p. 427).
Use of statistics is also seen in the 1885 Proceedings of the American Society for Psychical Research, Vol. 1, Report of the Committee on Thought-Transference by H. P. Bowditch, Edward C. Pickering, C. C. Jackson, Wm. Watson, Charles Sedgewick Minot, N. D. C. Hodges, & J. M. Peirce, see pp. 6-49. J. M. Peirce was a Harvard professor and brother of Charles Sanders Peirce.
For an autobiographical account see The Song of the Siren by Stanley Krippner (1975).
Most RNGs in parapsychology incorporate a true source of randomness such as radioactive decay or a noise diode. Some work is done with pseudorandom algorithms.
If exactly 50 ones were produced, no decision was made, and another sample was taken.
9
For example, see Parapsychology: Frontier Science of the Mind by Rhine and Pratt (1957, pp. 131-132). See also Rhine’s comment “Frustrations over Research Failures” in the Journal of Parapsychology, Vol. 37, 1973, pp. 357-360.
A Dual Experiment with Clock Cards by West and Fisk, 1953.
11 Ibid. p. 185.
12
After the West and Fisk study, others found that people who checked data could sometimes affect the outcome, and this was dubbed the “checker effect.” The overall results are not clear, but there is sufficient evidence to suggest that a checker (even one who has no contact with the subjects) must be considered as a
potential source of an extra-chance scoring effect. The experiments are a bit too involved to present here, but they incorporated a variety of precautions to exclude unconscious, non-psi bias by the checkers. See “The Possible Effect of the Checker in Precognition Tests” by Sara R. Feather and Robert Brier, Journal of Parapsychology, Vol. 32, 1968, pp. 166-175. For more on the checker effect, see “The Checker Effect Revisited” by Debra H. Weiner and Nancy L. Zingrone in the Journal of Parapsychology, Vol. 50, 1986, pp. 85-121.
A third paper on experimenter effects was published that year by Robert H. Thouless in the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, Vol. 48, pp. 261-266, entitled “The Effect of the Experimenter’s Attitude on Experimental Results in Parapsychology.” It is of minor importance, but it demonstrates the salience of the
issue at that time.
Psychokinesis as Psi-Mediated Instrumental Response by Rex G. Stanford, et al, 1975.
A New Technique of Testing ESP in a Real-Life, High-Motivational Context by Martin Johnson, 1973.
A Test of the Relationship Between ESP and PK by Karlis Osis, 1953. Dream Studies and Telepathy: An Experimental Approach, by Montague Ullman & Stanley Krippner, 1970, see pp. 12, 31.
Deathbed Observations by Physicians and Nurses, Parapsychological Monographs No. 3, by Karlis Osis, New York: Parapsychology Foundation, 1961.
19
For some additional personal information on Osis, see his chapter “The Paranormal: My Window on Something More” in Men and Women of Parapsychology: Personal Reflections edited by Rosemarie Pilkington, Jefferson, NC:
McFarland & Company, 1987.
20
A. A. Foster made a similar point in 1940 in regard to blind matching ESP tests in “Is ESP Diametric?” in the Journal of Parapsychology, Vol. 4, No. 2, December 1940, pp. 3
25-328.
21
“Psychokinesis” by Helmut Schmidt, in Psychic Exploration: A Challenge for
Science edited by Edgar D. Mitchell and John White, 1974. See p. 190.
22
Redundancy in Psi Information: Implications for the Goal-Oriented Hypothesis and for the Application of Psi by J. E. Kennedy, 1979.
23
PK Effect on Pre-Recorded Targets by Helmut Schmidt, 1976. The retroactive PK experiment described here is covered on pages 279-281 of Schmidt’s
paper, which reported additional experiments.
24
Channeling Evidence for a PK Effect to Independent Observers by Schmidt, Morris, and Rudolph, 1986.
25
For more on such experiments, see “PK With Prerecorded Random Events and the Effects of Preobservation” by Helmut Schmidt and Henry Stapp and “Observation of a Psychokinetic Effect Under Highly Controlled Conditions” by Helmut Schmidt, both in the December 1993 Journal of Parapsychology.
26 PK Effects on Pre-Recorded Group Behavior of Living Systems by Elmar R. Gruber, 1980.
27
Quantum Physics and Parapsychology by C. T. K. Chari, Journal of Parapsychology, Vol. 20, 1956, pp. 166-183.
Parapsychological Implications of Research in Atomic Physics by Pascual Jordan, International Journal of Parapsychology, 2(4), pp. 5-16.
29
In a later article Walker revised and extended his discussion of quantum tunneling at synapses. See Quantum Mechanical Tunneling in Synaptic and
Ephaptic Transmission by Evan Harris Walker, 1977.
30
Parapsychology and Quantum Mechanics by Martin Gardner, 1981.
31
3 Ibid. p. 62.
32
Remarks on the Mind-Body Question by Eugene P. Wigner, 1962.
33
Interview in the Fall 1997 Mathematical Intelligencer (p. 39) “A Great Communicator of Mathematics and Other Games: A Conversation with Martin Gardner” by Istvan Hargittai, Vol. 19, pp. 36-40. See also “Quantum Weirdness” by Martin Gardner, Discover, October 1982, pp. 69-76.
34 “
Gardner, “Parapsychology and Quantum Mechanics,” 1981, p. 64.
35
35 Ibid. p. 64.
Random Fluctuation Theory of Psychokinesis: Thermal Noise Model by Mattuck, 1977. Thermal Noise Theory of Psychokinesis: Modified Walker Model with Pulsed Information Rate by Mattuck, 1979. The Action of Consciousness on Matter: A Quantum Mechanical Theory of Psychokinesis by Mattuck and Walker, 1979.
37
In addition to Giesler (1994), see Contributions to the Theory of PK Induction from Sitter-Group Work by Batcheldor, 1984.
38
Toward a Mathematical Theory of Psi by Schmidt, 1975.
39
Comparison of a Teleological Model with a Quantum Collapse Model of Psi by Schmidt, 1984. See p. 263.
40
Comparison of Some Theoretical Predictions of Schmidt’s Mathematical Theory and Walker’s Quantum Mechanical Theory of Psi by Walker, 1977.
41
Comparison of Some Theoretical Predictions of Schmidt’s Mathematical Theory and Walker’s Quantum Mechanical Theory of Psi by Walker, 1977, p. 64.
42
Are Parapsychologists Paradigmless in Psiland? by Rex G. Stanford, 1977. See also Toward Reinterpreting Psi Events by Rex G. Stanford, 1978.
43
See The Time Sequence of Psi-Ganzfeld Experimentation (Letter to the editor) by William G. Braud, Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, Vol. 76, 1982, pp. 194-195.
44
Braud, 1981, p. 1.
45
Lability and Inertia in Conformance Behavior by William G. Braud, 1980. See also Lability and Inertia in Psychic Functioning by William Braud, 1981.
46 For a review of some of that see Distant Intentionality and Healing: Assessing the Evidence by Schlitz and Braud, 1997.
Chapter 22—Totemism and the Primitive Mind
1 Duff-Cooper, 1994, p. xv.
2
Needham, 1963/1975, p. xxxix.
3
Although Needham discussed Arnold van Gennep in that volume, he mentioned neither Victor Turner nor Edmund Leach, whose works were directly relevant.
4
Reversal is another form of anti-structure, for instance, giving greater privilege to women than men, or paupers over kings.
Frazer’s output was massive; a hundred-page bibliography of his works was compiled by Theodore Besterman (A Bibliography of Sir James George Frazer, 1934). As a matter of historical interest, during the time he prepared that bibliography, Besterman was also serving as the librarian and investigations officer of the Society for Psychical Research. Besterman went on to become an eminent bibliographer. For more on Besterman, see The Age of The Enlightenment: Studies Presented to Theodore Besterman, Edited by W. H. Barber, J. H. Brumfitt, R. A. Leigh, R. Shackleton, and S. S. B. Taylor, Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd, 1967. See especially the final chapter by Sir Frank Francis, director and principal librarian of the British Museum. See also Theodore Besterman, Bibliographer And Editor: A Selection of Representative Texts edited by Fransesco Cordasco, The Scarecrow Press, 1992.
Anthropology and the Humanities by Ruth Benedict, American Anthropologist, Vol. 50, 1948, p. 587. Frazer’s remark needs to be understood in light of his personality. He was quite solitary, and normal social relations were difficult for him. He worked in his library 12 hours a day, seven days a week, did only limited lecturing and played almost no active role in professional societies. His individualistic rationalism seems suited for someone so isolated from usual human contact. Bronislaw Malinowski knew Frazer for over 30 years and described some of his peculiarities in the chapter “The Paradox of Frazer’s Personality and Work” in A Scientific Theory of Culture and Other Essays, 1944, see especially pp. 181-183.
Edmund Leach’s essay, “Golden Bough or Gilded Twig?” (1961), provides an assessment of Frazer’s contributions. Leach noted that when the available sources were insufficient for Frazer, he would invent facts to insure a pleasing literary effect.
8 For a historical perspective on these debates see Robert Fraser’s The Making of the Golden Bough (1990).
9
Alan Gauld, The Founders of Psychical Research, 1968.
10 Presidential Address by E. Clodd, Folk-Lore, Vol. 6, 1895, pp. 54-81. See pp. 78-81. For follow-up see Protest of a Psycho-Folklorist by Andrew Lang, FolkLore, Vol. 6, 1895, pp. 236-248, and Clodd’s immediate reply on pp. 248-258.
Not all members of the RPA were antagonistic, a few were psychical researchers. 12
Frazer is invoked in Paul Kurtz’s The Transcendental Temptation (1986) and Richard Dawkins’ Unweaving the Rainbow: Science, Delusion and the Appetite for Wonder, Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1998.
13
Bronislaw Malinowski reported that Lang’s criticism of Frazer’s The Golden Bough “so deeply upset and irritated Frazer that, as he told me, he had to interrupt his work on the subject for several months. After that experience Frazer
never read adverse criticisms or reviews of his books” (Malinowski, 1944, p. 183).
14
Lang was not the only anthropologist and psychical researcher involved in the debates on totemism; another was Northcote W. Thomas. See the bibliography of Andrew Duff-Cooper’s Andrew Lang on Totemism (1994) for a listing of some of Thomas’s works. Psychologist William McDougall also wrote on totem-ism (e.g., “The Relations Between Men and Animals in Sarawak” by Charles Hose and W. McDougall, Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. 31, 1901, pp. 173-213. McDougall later served as president of the SPR and mentor to J. B. Rhine.
Needham was instrumental in the publication of Duff-Cooper’s work on
Lang.
“Andrew Lang: Folklorist and Critic” (in French), Folklore, Vol. 23, 1912, pp. 366-369. See also Rodney Needham’s 1967 Introduction to van Gennep’s T
he Semi-Scholars, p. xiii.
17 Durkheim, 1912/1965, p. 170. Durkheim in American Sociology, by Roscoe C. Hinkle, Jr., (1960/1964,
p. 269).
19
Main Currents in Sociological Thought: Volume II: Durkheim, Pareto, Weber
by Raymond Aron (1967/1970, p. 64).
20
For some discussion of this idea, see Emile Durkheim and C. G. Jung:
Structuring a Transpersonal Sociology of Religion by Susan F. Greenwood, 1990.
21
William McDougall’s The Group Mind (1920, New York: Putnam’s) was poorly received. For a more recent comment on the idea group minds, see Mary Douglas’ How Institutions Think (1987). Freud’s concept of the superego is by no means identical with these ideas, but it is related. Similarly, it gets little note today. A number of commentators have discussed its decline (e.g., Alexander Mitscher-lich’s Society Without the Father: A Contribution to Social Psychology, Translated by Eric Mosbacher, New York: Schocken Books, 1970 (Originally published in 1963), and Allen Wheelis’ The Quest for Identity, New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1958).
22
Freud, 1913/1961, p. 26.
23
See Doty, 1986; Evans-Pritchard, 1965/1972. Despite Freud’s flawed explanation, he did recognize an important conjunction of features that many others did not wish to acknowledge. More recently Rene Girard has addressed some of these fundamental issues of violence, sexuality, and authority in terms of mimesis. For an attempted revival of some of Freud’s ideas, see Robin Fox’s The Red Lamp
of Incest (1980), New York: E. P. Dutton.
24
The trickster is particularly relevant to psychoanalytic theories because he violates incest prohibitions. Further, the African trickster god Eshu-Elegba is at
times associated with long hair, a symbol of magical and sexual power.
25
Memories, Dreams, Reflections by C. G. Jung, 1962/1963, p. 150. For more on this exchange, see C. G. Jung’s Psychology of Religion and Synchronicity by Robert Aziz, 1990, pp. 93-110.
26 Levy-Bruhl, 1910/1985, p. 306.
27
Ibid. p. 302.
28 Ibid. p. 127.
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