PSYCHOKINESIS 91
barrassingly, each time he tried Geller failed to bend the spoons.
(Later, Randi appeared on the Johnny Carson show and successfully
performed the spoon-bending trick, but he was careful to say that his
art was pure magic, not the result of psychic power.)
The Amazing Randi has offered $1 million to anyone who can successfully demonstrate psychic power. So far no psychic has been able
to rise to his $1 million challenge.
PSYCHOKINESIS AND SCIENCE
One problem with analyzing psychokinesis scientifically is that scientists
are easily fooled by those claiming to have psychic power. Scientists are
trained to believe what they see in the lab. Magicians claiming psychic
powers, however, are trained to deceive others by fooling their visual
senses. As a result, scientists have been poor observers of psychic phenomena. For example, in 1982 parapsychologists were invited to analyze
two young boys who were thought to have extraordinary gifts: Michael
Edwards and Steve Shaw. These boys claimed to be able to bend metal,
create images on photographic film via their thoughts, move objects via
psychokinesis, and read minds. Parapsychologist Michael Thalbourne
was so impressed he invented the term "psychokinete" to describe these
boys. At the McDonnell Laboratory for Psychical Research in St. Louis,
Missouri, the parapsychologists were dazzled by the boys' abilities. The
parapsychologists believed they had genuine proof of the boys' psychic
power and began preparing a scientific paper on them. The next year the
boys announced that they were fakes and that their ''power" originated
from standard magic tricks, not supernatural power. (One of the youths,
Steve Shaw, would go on to become a prominent magician, often appearing on national television and being "buried alive" for days at a time.)
Extensive experiments on psychokinesis have been conducted at
the Rhine Institute at Duke University under controlled conditions, but
with mixed results. One pioneer in the subject, Professor Gertrude
Schmeidler, was a colleague of mine at the City University of New
York. A former editor of Parapsychology Magazine and a past president
barrassingly, each time he tried Geller failed to bend the spoons.
(Later, Randi appeared on the Johnny Carson show and successfully
performed the spoon-bending trick, but he was careful to say that his
art was pure magic, not the result of psychic power.)
The Amazing Randi has offered $1 million to anyone who can successfully demonstrate psychic power. So far no psychic has been able
to rise to his $1 million challenge.
PSYCHOKINESIS AND SCIENCE
One problem with analyzing psychokinesis scientifically is that scientists
are easily fooled by those claiming to have psychic power. Scientists are
trained to believe what they see in the lab. Magicians claiming psychic
powers, however, are trained to deceive others by fooling their visual
senses. As a result, scientists have been poor observers of psychic phenomena. For example, in 1982 parapsychologists were invited to analyze
two young boys who were thought to have extraordinary gifts: Michael
Edwards and Steve Shaw. These boys claimed to be able to bend metal,
create images on photographic film via their thoughts, move objects via
psychokinesis, and read minds. Parapsychologist Michael Thalbourne
was so impressed he invented the term "psychokinete" to describe these
boys. At the McDonnell Laboratory for Psychical Research in St. Louis,
Missouri, the parapsychologists were dazzled by the boys' abilities. The
parapsychologists believed they had genuine proof of the boys' psychic
power and began preparing a scientific paper on them. The next year the
boys announced that they were fakes and that their ''power" originated
from standard magic tricks, not supernatural power. (One of the youths,
Steve Shaw, would go on to become a prominent magician, often appearing on national television and being "buried alive" for days at a time.)
Extensive experiments on psychokinesis have been conducted at
the Rhine Institute at Duke University under controlled conditions, but
with mixed results. One pioneer in the subject, Professor Gertrude
Schmeidler, was a colleague of mine at the City University of New
York. A former editor of Parapsychology Magazine and a past president