by Will Storr
228 On the website of an obscure publishing group: Alex Kurtagic, ‘Interview with Jaenelle Antas’, 9 January 2011, Wermod and Wermod Publishing Group.
229 he ‘believed that there had been something like a Holocaust’: Speech, Calgary, Alberta, 29 September 1991, quoted in libel judgment.
229 His denial came in 1989: D. D. Guttenplan, The Holocaust on Trial, Granta, 2001, p. 53.
229 flawed study by a man named Fred Leuchter: Deborah E. Lipstadt, History on Trial, Harper Perennial, 2005, p. 35.
230 ‘the biggest calibre shell that has yet hit the battleship Auschwitz’: Deborah E. Lipstadt, History on Trial, Harper Perennial, 2005, p. 83.
230 In 1991 he reissued his most lauded book: Deborah E. Lipstadt, History on Trial, Harper Perennial, 2005, p. 84.
230 He had some advice for the Jewish people: [Irving’s website]: http://www.fpp.co.uk/docs/ADL/ADLQandA.html.
230 he was fined 3,000 marks in Germany for ‘defaming the memory’: Michael Shermer, Why People Believe Weird Things, Souvenir Press, 1997, p. 196.
230 ‘never adopted the narrow-minded approach’: Michael Shermer, Why People Believe Weird Things, Souvenir Press, 1997, p. 195.
230 The following year he told an Australian radio host: Michael Shermer, Why People Believe Weird Things, Souvenir Press, 1997, p. 195.
230 In 1996 he admitted some Jews were systematically killed: Ron Rosenbaum, Explaining Hitler, Faber and Faber, 1998, p. 238.
230 Over the same period, he was banned from Germany: [Irving’s website]: http://www.fpp.co.uk/Germany/docs/index.html.
230 and Australia: [Irving’s website]: http://www.fpp.co.uk/Australia/index.html.
230 deported from Canada: [Irving’s website]: http://www.fpp.co.uk/Canada/Legal/NiagFallsAdjudication.html.
230 spent a short period in a Munich prison: Ron Rosenbaum, Explaining Hitler, Faber and Faber, 1998, p. 224.
230 dropped by his publishers in Britain and the US: D. D. Guttenplan, The Holocaust on Trial, Granta, 2001, pp. 54, 55.
230 his ‘life has come under a gradually mounting attack’: Robert J. Van Pelt, The Case for Auschwitz: Evidence from the Irving Trial, Indiana University Press, 2002, p. 56.
231 he had a long-standing offer of $1,000: Michael Shermer, Why People Believe Weird Things, Souvenir Press, 1997, p. 195.
231 After all, he comes from a patriotic British military family: Miscellaneous biographical details from interview with author.
231 need to be an ‘ambassador to Hitler’: Richard J. Evans, Telling Lies About Hitler, Verso, 2002, p. 48.
232 It was 1955, and the seventeen-year-old was told: Interview with author.
232 one issue of which was said to contain a tribute to Hitler’s Germany: Rosie Waterhouse, ‘From Brentwood to Berchtesgaden. Rosie Waterhouse traces the disturbing story of the “revisionist” David Irving’, Independent, 11 July 1992.
232 to the Daily Mail, in comments he has since denied making: [Irving’s website] http://www.fpp.co.uk/docs/Irving/cesspit/mild/fascist.html.
232 saw the fascist Sir Oswald Mosley speak at a rally: D. D. Guttenplan, The Holocaust on Trial, Granta, 2001, p. 42.
232 ‘The Nottingham race disturbances were caused by coloured wide boys’: University College Newspaper, 2 February 1961, p. 1.
233 he suspected that he had been mismarked: D. D. Guttenplan, The Holocaust on Trial, Granta, 2001, p. 41.
233 he wrote to Krupp, the Nazi armaments manufacturer: D. D. Guttenplan, The Holocaust on Trial, Granta, 2001, p. 42.
243 historians ‘do not, as Irving kept demanding, seek a “smoking gun”‘: Deborah E. Lipstadt, History on Trial, Harper Perennial, 2005, p. 133.
243 ‘Confirmation bias even sees to it that no evidence’: Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson, Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me), Pinter and Martin, 2007, p. 20.
243 An interview with Irving’s brother Nicholas: Olga Craig, ‘David, what on earth would Mother think?’, Daily Telegraph, 26 February 2006.
243 ‘Earlier experiences had persuaded me’: John Keegan, ‘The trial of David Irving – and my part in his downfall’, Daily Telegraph, 12 April 2000.
244 Psychologist David Perkins conducted a simple study: Jonathan Haidt, The Righteous Mind, Allen Lane, 2012, pp. 80, 81.
244 What if Hitler hadn’t known about the Holocaust? Interview with author.
245 Around the period in which Irving was considering this find: Ron Rosenbaum, Explaining Hitler, Faber and Faber, 1998, p. 224.
14: ‘That one you just go, “Eeerrrr” ’
Following the first publication of this book, Professor Wiseman contacted me with some objections to this chapter.
Two of his objections resulted in small changes to the text. The first is about the timing of Wiseman’s tests on Jaytee the ‘psychic’ dog, and where they came in the study period. The second is about where I obtained a particular scientific paper.
During our interview, Professor Wiseman said his work was carried out ‘very, very early on.’ He also denied that Rupert Sheldrake had invited him to test Jaytee. During the second phase of my reporting (when I was adapting what had been an Esquire article into a chapter of The Unpersuadables), I read a paper co-written by Wiseman in which it is acknowledged that Wiseman was working at the invitation of Sheldrake, and that Sheldrake’s tests on Jaytee the dog began before Wiseman’s tests.
The original wording, which I have altered in this edition, was ‘Later, I find a paper …’ Wiseman pointed out that he, in fact, sent me this paper very shortly after our interview. Unfortunately, as this all happened some time ago, I can’t recall where I found the version I used during the second period of research. However, as my PDF is called ‘psychicdogreply’ and the file that Wiseman emailed to me was called ‘pets1’, I believe I independently sourced the paper via Google, from Wiseman’s website, as the version contained there is called ‘psychicdogreply’. [http://www.richardwiseman.com/resources/psychicdogreply.pdf])
All that said, had I realised that Professor Wiseman had volunteered that same paper earlier, I would certainly have noted it in the text. For the oversight, I sincerely apologise.
In the original text, in the passage in which I discussed this paper, I made the following claim. ‘It confirms that Sheldrake “kindly invited [Wiseman] to conduct his own investigations of Jaytee”, and that they took place thirteen months after Sheldrake’s experiments began.’
Wiseman’s position is that this is an error on my part. He notes that the experiments Sheldrake started doing thirteen months before his did not involve making video recordings of the dog and only constituted observations that were recorded manually. Wiseman carried out two videotaped tests in June 1995 and two in December 1995. Sheldrake’s preliminary experiments that specifically used video cameras began in April 1995, around two months before Wiseman’s. His formal video experiments began in May 1995, one month before Wiseman’s. In the text, I use the plural ‘experiments’ in reference to all of Sheldrake’s experiments. Sheldrake first began studying Jaytee in May 1994, thirteen months before Wiseman.
Video cameras or not, all of Wiseman’s and Sheldrake’s testing protocols were different, which I believe underlines the notion that the various forms in which these experiments took place is not relevant. The material point – and their essential commonality – is that they were all experiments on Jaytee’s purported psychic abilities.
Wiseman says this misses the point because the book only discusses the studies which emerge from the video phase and that Sheldrake’s claim about Wiseman analysing his data differently only makes sense within the context of these specific studies. In his view, therefore, the book clearly implies that Sheldrake started the videotape phase of his studies thirteen months before Wiseman did his.
Even if we accept Wiseman’s position, the fact that he began his video camera tests a month after Sheldrake began his formal video phase (and two months after his preliminary video tests) and completed them seven months afterward
s, it still seems to me to be not wholly consistent with his claim to have carried out his work, ‘very, very early on.’ Furthermore, the broader point – that Wiseman didn’t replicate Sheldrake’s videotaped tests partly because his work was carried out so early that Sheldrake’s protocol didn’t yet exist – is directly disputed by Sheldrake, who insists that it did, in fact, exist when Wiseman was doing his work. He says he began plotting and analysing his video data in this way immediately, in April, two months before Wiseman’s arrival. Wiseman, it seems, didn’t ask Sheldrake and Sheldrake, it seems, didn’t tell him at that time.
I don’t agree that the original text was erroneous, but I have altered the text to clarify Professor Wiseman’s point. It now reads, ‘… they took place a month after Sheldrake started his video tests and more than a year after his studies of Jaytee’s purported psychic abilities actually began.’
Wiseman had two further objections that did not lead to material changes, but which I wish to note.
He objects to my quoting him telling a newspaper, ‘I agree that by the standards of any other area of science that [psi] is proven.’
He complains that I have truncated the quote which, in full, reads as follows: ‘I agree that by the standards of any other area of science that [psi] is proven, but that begs the question: do we need higher standards of evidence when we study the paranormal? I think we do. If I said that there is a red car outside my house, you would probably believe me. But if I said that a UFO had just landed, you’d probably want a lot more evidence. Because [psi] is such an outlandish claim that will revolutionise the world, we need overwhelming evidence before we draw any conclusions. Right now we don’t have that evidence.’
Wiseman complained that, by omitting this section, I have ‘reversed the meaning’ of what he was saying.
I did truncate his quote – not to distort his position, but to explain it concisely, whilst contextualising it as a view shared by various estimable scientists. The section that immediately follows his quote unambiguously defines his position, explaining that Wiseman and Skeptics like him, ‘reject psi … because what’s more likely? That parapsychologists are mistaken or fraudulent? Or that a psychic terrier from Ramsbottom has proved that a foundational principle of science is wrong? A common materialist slogan … says “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.” As Wiseman tells me, “A lot of physics and psychology will be called into question the moment you accept psi. Therefore, it’s reasonable to say that the weight of evidence for it must be much greater”.’
Finally, Professor Wiseman would like me to note that our interview was conducted for an article I wrote about Jaytee in Esquire magazine, an article I subsequently expanded into a chapter of this book.
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255 compiled the data from more than thirty thousand trials like this: Actual number: 30,803.
255 mysterious ‘sense of being stared at’: Rupert Sheldrake, ‘The Sense of Being Stared At Part 1: Is it Real or Illusory?’, Journal of Consciousness Studies 12, no. 6 (2005), p. 15.
255 Sheldrake grew up in a herbalist’s shop: Biographical information from interview with author.
257 the Observer had called it ‘fascinating and far-reaching’: Rupert Sheldrake, A New Science of Life, Blond and Briggs, 1981. [Reviews excerpted from Icon Books, 2009 edition.]
257 ‘A Book for Burning?’: ‘A book for burning?’, Nature 293, 24 September 1981, pp. 245–46.
258 Nobel Prize–winner Francis Crick, who wrote: Francis Crick, The Astonishing Hypothesis: The Scientific Search For The Soul, Scribner, 1995.
258 Sheldrake’s explorations into telepathy: Rupert Sheldrake, ‘The “Sense of Being Stared At” Confirmed by Simple Experiments’, Biology Forum 92 (1999), pp. 53–76.
258 one in ten thousand billion billion: Rupert Sheldrake, ‘The Sense of Being Stared At Part 1: Is it Real or Illusory?’, Journal of Consciousness Studies 12, no. 6 (2005), p. 15.
258 Next, he studied a psychic terrier from Ramsbottom: Rupert Sheldrake and Pamela Smart, ‘A Dog That Seems To Know When His Owner is Coming Home: Videotaped Experiments and Observations’, Journal of Scientific Exploration 14 (2000), pp. 233–55.
259 Lewis Wolpert, who described telepathy research as ‘pathological science’: The RSA Telepathy Debate, Royal Society of Arts, London, 15 January 2004.
259 tapping his pencil, ‘looking bored’: Philip Stevens, ‘Rupert Sheldrake and the wider scientific community’, dissertation, London Centre for the History of Science, Medicine and Technology 2008/09.
259 asked to speak at the 2006 Festival of Science, his presence was denounced: Mark Henderson, ‘Theories of telepathy and afterlife cause uproar at top science forum’, The Times, 6 September 2006.
259 ‘No, but I would be very suspicious of it’: BBC Radio Five Live debate, 6 September 2006.
260 The first paragraph of Wiseman’s bestseller: Richard Wiseman, 260 Why We See What Isn’t There, Macmillan, 2011.
260 In 2006 Rupert Sheldrake was given a ‘Pigasus’ award: The 11th Annual Pigasus Awards, awarded 1 April 2007, http://www.randi.org/pigasus/index.html.
260 Randi writes, somewhat cryptically: James Randi’s Swift blog, 8 September 2006, www.randi.org/jr/2006-09/09806guess.html.
261 It began, for Richard Wiseman, when he was eight: Biographical information from interview with author and from Richard Wiseman, Paranormality: Why We See What Isn’t There, Macmillan, 2011.
262 a German academic named Stefan Schmidt: Stefan Schmidt et al., ‘Distant intentionality and the feeling of being stared at: Two meta-analyses’, British Journal of Psychology 95 (2004), pp. 235–47.
262 a study by academics at the University of Amsterdam: Eva Lobach and Dick J. Bierman, ‘Who’s Calling At This Hour? Local Sidereal Time And Telephone Telepathy’, University of Amsterdam, Parapsychological Association Convention 2004.
262 to replicate Sheldrake’s staring tests with parapsychologist Marilyn Schlitz: R. Wiseman and M. Schlitz, ‘Experimenter effects and the remote detection of staring’, Journal of Parapsychology 61 (1997), pp. 199–207.
263 Wiseman went on to conduct four tests on Jaytee the dog: R. Wiseman, M. Smith, and J. Milton, ‘Can animals detect when their owners are returning home? An experimental test of the “psychic pet” phenomenon’, British Journal of Psychology 89 (1998), pp. 453–62.
263 ‘Psychic dog is no more than a chancer’: The Times, 21 August 1998.
263 ‘Psychic pets are exposed as a myth’: Daily Telegraph, 22 August 1998.
263 While Wiseman admits this is true: ‘Collaboration Between Skeptics and Paranormal Researchers’, Skeptiko, 17 April 2007.
264 Later I find the paper Wiseman had sent me: Richard Wiseman, Matthew Smith and Julie Milton, ‘The “Psychic Pet” Phenomenon: A reply to Rupert Sheldrake’, accessed on Wiseman’s website: http://www.richardwiseman.com/resources/psychicdogreply.pdf.
265 another that was proposed by Wiseman himself: Rupert Sheldrake, ‘The Sense of Being Stared At Part 1: Is it Real or Illusory?’, Journal of Consciousness Studies 12, no. 6 (2005), p. 24.
265 the authors of the University of Amsterdam study … admit: From the above study: ‘These simulations show that the effects found in staring studies involving feedback to the staree might explain the difference between the effects reported by Sheldrake and the absence of those effects in ours. However, as we noted above, Sheldrake has since reported quite a number of studies that do not provide feedback to the staree, and these show somewhat smaller, but still large effects (Sheldrake, 2001b), unlike our three studies, so it leaves our question in part still unanswered’.
265 But then Wiseman sends more concerns. And Sheldrake counters them: For those interested, I’ll note a brief summary of these concerns and Sheldrake’s responses:
Wiseman’s concerns about the dog trials: The first series of thirty dog trials wasn’t randomised, therefore the dog might know from Pam’s routine or dress or reactions of other people.
S
heldrake’s response: The first series did have Pam returning at a wide variety of times. Jaytee had already been observed to wait at the window when Pam was on the way home at different times of day when she was returning in a non-routine manner. These data were documented in the part of the paper that described preliminary investigations [http://www.sheldrake.org/Articles&Papers/papers/animals/pdf/dogknows.pdf]. The distribution of return times is shown in Fig. 1 and the details of each journey, including the distances are given in Table 1, and show that Jaytee anticipated Pam’s return on 85 out of 100 occasions, irrespective of the time of day and mode of transport.
Says Sheldrake, ‘We had documented his behaviour, and done some experiments on random return times and modes of transport in considerable detail before we began our filmed tests. We already knew from these observations that this was not a matter of routine, and that Jaytee’s responses could not be explained in terms of hearing familiar vehicles. The 30 filmed tests took further this series of observations under real-life conditions. Only by disregarding all the details can Wiseman suggest that these could be explained in terms of routine anticipations of Pam’s patterns of behaviour.’
Another concern about the dog trials: The second series of trials was randomised. But in these, the dog might simply be going to the window more and more over time (and therefore is there most when Pam returns).
The way to assess this is to compare short, medium and long trials. There are not enough of them in the random series to do this. Sheldrake does do this with the non-random homecomings, but that isn’t of any use because they might have cues regarding when Pam might return (see above).
Sheldrake’s response: The complaint that Jaytee might have been simply going to the window more and more over time had been controlled for.
Sheldrake: ‘The reason we did the control trials when Pam was not coming home was precisely to address the question that Wiseman raises as to whether Jaytee went to the door more and more the longer Pam was out. We had already shown he did not do that in the 30 trials, comparing long, medium and short, and there is no suggestion he was doing that in the randomised trials. But the control data show clearly that there was no such pattern. Wiseman simply ignores these data. You can see these in Fig. 5 of this paper: http://www.sheldrake.org/Articles&Papers/papers/animals/pdf/dog_video.pdf.’
