REPORT OF ESP RESEARCH IN ENGLAND AND RUSSIA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: STARGATE
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): NSA-RDP96X00790R000100010040-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 23
• Document Creation Date: November 4, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 1, 2011
• Sequence Number: 40
• Publication Date: July 19, 1962
• Content Type: REPORT

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Report of ESP Research in England and Russia
(b)(1)
The purpose of the trip was to discuss with Stephen Abrams(b)(3)
and his colleagues the progress of psychical research in England
and the methods of investigation of these phenomena.
Mr. Stephen Abrams proved to be an excellent host. Not only
was he a most capable guide, but also in his time at Oxford he has
earned the respect and affection of a large part of British society
concerned with this field.
Our first visit on Monday was to Oxford in the offices of
Mr. Abrams at 7 Keble Road, in the building housing the Unit of
Biometry. Mr. Abrams seems to be well housed with plenty of space
for his experimental endeavors. Mr. John Scott, presently super-
vising for Mr. Abrams' Ph.D., is a lecturer in statistics.
Mr. Jack Good, a better known Oxford statistician, is Mr. Abrams
permanent adviser. He is presently visiting the United States as
a consultant to IDA at Princeton. Mr. Scott spoke highly of
Mr. Abrams' work, but I suspect this may have been more courtesy
than knowledge, since he is only temporarily assigned the responsi-
bility of thesis guidance.
We lunched with Mr. Theodore Crossman, Assistant Professor in
the Psychology Department at Oxford, whose main interest is
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(b)(1)
(b)(3)
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it
industrial psychology. He is presently developing models which
will deal with judgment inputs for systems with lag in feedback.
He has compared human judgment and actionsoin'a factory situation
with programs on a computer. The research shows considerable
promise for automation of complex human judgments. His approach is
related to that of Taylor at the Naval Research Laboratories in
Washington.
Mr. Crossman and his associates seem quite interested in the
Fund's research in diagnosis and sensitivity.in interpersonal
relations. He indicated that Van Lennep at the University of Utrecht
had done some categorization of scientists also.
There was time for only a brief visit with Michael Argyle, who
is concerned with juvenile delinquency and the concept of conscience.
He said he might be interested in submitting a proposal to the Fund.
Conversation with Mr. Babington-Smith
Mr. Abrams and I chatted with Mr. Babington-Smith, who is one
of the more senior professors of psychology at Oxford. Mr. Babington-
Smith is very much interested in ESP work, particularly thought
transference as it relates to Professor Jung's theories. Mr. Babington-
Smith is quite well known for his work in perception. He feels, as
do I. that card reading is not the most productive approach to the
phenomena of ESP. We discussed the need for a different methodology
to approach the problem besides the standard physical science methods. )
Although these methods may lend some authenticity to the research,
they may also strangle the subject's sensitivity. We were not
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saying that ESP experiments were too scientific, but rather that
like experiments in olfaction or gustation, the fragileness of
the experience may be destroyed by too rigorous and sterile techniques.
Mr. Babington-Smith is not doing any formal experimentation at this
time in ESP, but obviously has strong interest in Steve's work and
has served as a consultant to him.
Experimental Session with Goggin and Aldred
Monday evening, Mr. Abrams invited two of his colleagues,
Peter Coggin, a chemist, and John Aldred, a physicist, for an experi-
mental session. Mr. Aldred very easily hypnotized Mr. Coggin. I
suspect that their relationship is more than one of friendship.
In fact, the control that Mr. Aldred influences over Mr. Coggin is
somewhat "sick." Mr. Coggin, put into a trance, was first-asked to
follow instructions, such as clapping his hands when Mr. Abrams
put his-hand on his own knee. This was continued until the pattern
was successful, and then he was asked to do it when Mr. Abrams
merely thought of putting his hand on his knee. It is impossible
to say whether or not Mr. Coggin was able to do this consistently
on a thought command because we had no means of knowing exactly
when Mr. Abrams was thinking a command. (Mr. Abrams said that
Goggin's responses followed close on his thoughts.) We tried a
series of experiments utilizing posthypnotic suggestions, which
convinced me of two things: (1) that Mr. Coggin was extremely
sensitive to other people's "thoughts" and (2) that we were not
using a really systematic approach. Mr. Coggin is an excellent
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subject but needs to be run under conditions, or methods, that
protect his sensitivity and yet, at the same time, allow for proper
measurement of the phenomenon. The instability of the subject, and
his "control" (i.e. Mr. Goggin), caused me some concern, but evidently
at Oxford one can accomplish such borderline research with less
anxiety than one could here in the United States.
The use of hypnosis to investigate these phenomena seems to be'
an effective technique. We suggested that in the future one might
be able to increase the sensitivity of the subject through hypnosis
by leading him to "believe" he was in the most favorable environment
for demonstrating his sensitivity, thus eliminating some of the
sterile laboratory atmosphere. The potential of this technique needs
to be explored, but I am not sure that Mr. Abrams has the self-
discipline, or the inclination, to be sufficiently systematic to
do this'research. I cautioned him on the dangers of engaging in
research with such unstable individuals because of the potential
aftermath of such a session, that is, anything that happens after
the session, such as an automobile accident, might be blamed on
hypnosis. Mr. Abrams is aware of this problem and.said he would
take steps to protect himself legally. I believe these unorthodox
people and sessions are essential to explore the potential of such
individuals, but eventually more systematic and controlled conditions
must be utilized to determine the repeatability of the phenomena.
I remained until well after midnight with the two subjects and
found them extremely bright and interesting college students.
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Meeting with Professor Price and Mr. Devlin
Tuesday afternoon, Mr. Abrams and I met with Professor
H. H. Price and Mr. Peter S. Devlin. Professor Price is an ex-
tremely well known philosopher whose publications deal with
perception, thinking and Hume's theory of the external world.
He has long been interested in ESP and has served as an adviser
to most of the research people at Oxford dealing in this area.
We discussed the possibility of reconceptualizing ESP phenomena
in a motivation model, rather than the thinking model proposed by
S. G. Soal. Professor Price seemed interested and indicated he
would write to me about it at a later time. He seems to put great
stock into Steve's work, particularly the Shackleton studies that
were conducted in the?last five months. Price worked with
Shackleton previously and believes he is one of the most sensitive
subjects he has known in the last 40 years. (A later section of
this report describes Abrams' work with Shackleton.)
Also present was Peter S. Devlin, a Ph.D. candidate in
psychology at Oxford under Michael Argyle. He is on a Government
grant as a research assistant to Argyle in juvenile delinquency
work. This allows him little time for his own research. Devlin
is-one of the brightest students I met at Oxford. He has a good
background in philosophy and social psychology, and considers
himself a "psychocosmologist." Strongly interested in ESP
phenomena, he has done some outstanding thinking in the area.
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k
He promised to send me copies of his presentations to the experi-
mentalists meetings at Oxford.
I think Devlin would like to get out of Oxford, since he is
not a great admirer of Argyle's. Although a man of wild demeanor --
intense, garrulous, with unruly red hair -- he has the type of
mentality that I think is worth backing for a year or two. He
has an inquiring mind. In discussions with Professor Price and
myself, I found him stimulating, even brilliant. We agreed in
this discussion that ESP research has less need to appear respect-
able by adopting the methods of the physical and social sciences,
than to concentrate on developing methodology that would permit
the exploration of ESP in its natural and unique environment.
Devlin did a beautiful job of describing Soal's conceptualization
of ESP, to which Price seemed to concur.
Later in the evening, Celia Green and a compatriot, joined
the group. These two young ladies were former candidates for
doctorates in Zoology. Both failed their examinations because of
extreme interest in ESP work. Miss Green appears to be interested
in setting up a laboratory similar to Dement's in New York, utiliz-
ing the Kleitman technique for measuring dream behavior through
eye movements. She professes to be concerned with ESP in the
dream state, but to the embarrassment of all of us flatly refused
to discuss her research plans. She seems to be well regarded, in
spite of domineering her female associates. (Professor Price
characterizes her influence over female associates as "maniacal." )
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She is entranced with ESP, but seems to have little training,
or experience, in conducting the types of studies in which she
seems interested. Even Sir Alister Hardy seemed upset that she
had sacrificed her degree for ESP research.
Visit to the Society for Psychical Research
On Wednesday morning we visited the Society for Psychical
Research in London. The principal administrator, Sir George Joy,
discussed the history underlying the Society's present endeavors.
Sir George is the retired Governor of the Island of St. Helena,
and volunteers his services to SPR. During his civil service
career, he became impressed with many unexplained incidences of
ESP-type experience, particularly among primitive cultures. He
was honest enough to say that he did not believe that irrefutable
evidence of these phenomena exist, but the Society has tons of
reports which indicate that such phenomena probably exist. For
some reason or other, Sir-George finds few good subjects today in
comparison with 10 years ago, and therefore, at present, the Society
is conducting few serious investigations. It was my impression
that the Society is effectively administered and that investigations
are conducted conscientiously and with the best scientific advice
available. W. Grey Walter is on the advisory staff, along with
C. D. Broad. This organization is probably financially poorer now
than it has been in a number of years, but is still able to serve
as a repository of the history of psychical research in England.
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Conversation with Mrs. Rosalind Heywood
Wednesday afternoon was spent with Mrs. Rosalind Heywood,
author of the book, Beyond the Reach of Sense: An Inquiry into
Extra-Sensory Perception, recently reviewed favorably in
"Contemporary Psychology." Mrs. Heywood is an eminently sensible
and cautious lay investigator of ESP phenomena. She makes no claim
to being a scientist but has been interested in this area for 30
or 40 years, and has an extensive background dealing with individuals
who have had unusual experiences. She is considered an expert in
this area and has conducted many of the investigations for the SPR
and other organizations interested in this work. She obviously
believes in clairvoyance and thought transference, and evidently is
a fairly sensitive subject herself. She related several examples
of the difficulties involved in investigating spontaneous cases of
ESP. At times one deals with neurotic and psychotic individuals
experiencing delusions, not ESP. She is a compassionate person,
who knows the danger of rejecting sensitive subjects and the need
for guiding them to appropriate expression of their experiences while
sparing them exposure to unscrupulous or jeering individuals.
We discussed Mr. Abrams' experiences with commercial television.
He was featured on a program devoted to ESP, and has an offer to do
three additional half-hour shows. His first show dealt with the
Russian research in distance hypnosis, as well as a general history
of ESP research. Mr. Abrams received international publicity on
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this first program and appears enamored with the prospect of
greater recognition and financial reward. Mrs. Heywood and I
were in complete agreement -- Mr. Abrams is neither qualified,
nor prepared, to handle three more programs without resorting to
stage demonstrations potentially damaging to the cause of legitimate
ESP research. Mrs. Heywood was particularly concerned that such
programs would encourage a multitude of letters from people who
think they have ESP powers, or experiences, and that Steve would
be unable to give the time, energy, understanding and skill necessary
to follow up these cases effectively. Mrs. Heywood, always charming,
was extremely blunt with.Steve on this matter. I believe she dis-
suaded him from making a mistake which might remove him from the
category of scientist to that of a performer, or stage hypnotist.
Mrs. Heywood obviously thinks a good deal of Steve, and would like
to help him to do serious scientific research rather than play the
fool for commercial television. We are fortunate that Mr. Abrams
has such sensible advisers to guide him through this morass of
all types of individuals connected with ESP.
Mrs. Heywood later tried to arrange for me to see Francis Huxley,
the son of Julian, but he was not in town. She expressed great
interest in the concept of human ecology and felt that the Fund's
support of Steve was most excellent, particularly if we would
continue to guide him scientifically, as well as financially.
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Visit with Professor Eysenck
Thursday morning we called on Professor Eysenck at Maudsley-
Hospital outside of London. Professor Eysenck, an extremely
gracious individual, discussed at length the research project
supported by the Human Ecology Fund. We went over the general
plan of the study, which involves differentiation of performance
of high and low motivated trainees of one of the local factories.
The data Dr. Eysenck showed me are most impressive. I think, in
general, his work shows a unique approach to the problem of moti-
vation in a fairly applied situation. The motivation is not
artificially bought but is rather subtlety built into the training
program of the factory. The findings are not consistent with
lull's theory. I am not sure at the moment Professor Eysenck has
developed a theory that fully explains his results, but I would say
that the work has been well worthwhile supporting as a scientific
endeavor. Next year he hopes to get into more careful analysis of
individual differences in motivation, and although we did not dis-
cuss it, I suspect he would like to have Fund support continued.
Certainly, if we are interested in having an illustrious scientist
in our grant program, this gentleman is a good candidate. It was
a most rewarding hour of pure science. There was little time,
because of the difficulties of driving out to Maudsley, to see more
of the hospital. Professor Eysenck seems to be interested in
Steve's work, and has offered to collaborate on an experiment with
him next year.
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Meeting with Dr. John Rees
I had lunch with Dr. John Rees, psychiatrist, former Director
of World Federation of Mental Health. We discussed H. P. David's
research proposal, which Dr. Rees fully supports and believes to be
original in, this area. I suspect the World Federation will offer
all the encouragement possible to David, but as usual, they are
short of research funds.
Dr. Rees asked if we were interested in supporting psychiatric
studies in Africa in an attempt to learn more about pure African
psychiatry and medicine while it still exists. I told him about
Dr. Prince's study, and although he knew of the work, he did not
know we were furnishing funds. I indicated that because of our
effort with Prince I doubted that we could contribute much more
money for the study of psychiatry in Africa.
Dr. Rees has retired from full time activities with the
Federation but continues as one of their more prominent consultants.
He is presently back in private psychiatric practice and is being
encouraged by his many international associates to write his memoirs.
He probably knows more about international mental health problems
than any other single individual. Dr. Rees is not well physically,
and appears to be at loose ends since his retirement. A man with
amazing experience in mental health, he served as psychiatrist to
Rudolf Hess during his incarceration in England. Out of this
experience, he wrote a book, The Case of Rudolf Hess. It was a
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pleasant but somewhat sad lunch to see such a great man in retirement.
An evening with Sir Cyril Burt
Thursday evening I paid a visit to Sir Cyril Burt, one of
.England's finest statisticians and an expert in exceptional children.
As it turned out, we had many mutual friends among his former students.
It was fascinating to discuss McDougall's research in thought transfer-
ence with an individual who had actually been McDougall.'s co-worker.
Sir Cyril, although extremely active in teaching and writing at the
University of London, is 82 years old and has lived much of the
history of psychology about which we read. He has written broadly in
the area of telepathy in children and still retains a keen interest
in ESP research. He seems thoroughly convinced that the phenomenon
exists and believes that Steve's general approach, through hypnosis,
is a good one. Interestingly enough this technique was used by
McDougall and Burt 50 years ago. Sir Cyril is fully acquainted with
Steve's research and has arranged for access to all the experts in
the area. He works very closely with Mrs. Heywood in the investiga-
tion of spontaneous cases. Plans are on foot to invite Sir Cyril on
a scholar program to the Parapsychology Laboratory at Duke next year,
but he is not quite sure he is up to the trip. This was a most
rewarding visit. Saturday on my return to London, I found a letter
and reprint at the hotel from him encouraging our interest in the
general field.
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Visit with Mr. Ronald West
Friday Mr. Abrams and I drove from London to Cambridge. We
visited Mr. Ronald West at The Institute of Criminology (formerly
with SPR). Dr. West, a psychiatrist principally interested in
criminology, has for some time been concerned with ESP and has
actually done some experimental work. West worked in collaboration
with G. W. Fisk. Fisk was very partial to ESP, and a sensitive
subject himself. Dr. West felt he was more objective, and unlike
Fisk, was an extremely poor ESP subject. They both ran the same
subjects on card sorting and obtained significant differences in
their results -- West's showing no ESP, Fisk's showing significant
success in sortings. Participation of the investigators was
limited to arranging the cards randomly (both doing it the'same
way), handing the cards to the subjects and recording their responses.
West claims complete integrity on the part of Fisk and, of course,
on his own part. Unfortunately, West never followed this experiment
with others. These results appear to be most intriguing and, I
believe, should be re-investigated. If the study was conducted as
reported, it would seem to indicate a relationship between subject
and experimenter akin either to thought transference or to the type
of experimenter bias or influence Martin Orne has been investigating.'
West is writing a book on the status of ESP to be published in
England in six or eight months. He seems to be a serious investigator
and yet the fact he did not follow up such a promising lead confuses
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my image of hir!. When I tried to dig into the experiment a bit,
he seemed to not care to discuss it. This attitude, I found, is
fairly general. The people I interviewed are interested in dis-
cussing, ESP, but they are not willing to get down to the nuts and
bolts of the individual experiments or experiences. They prefer to
treat the topic conceptually or philosophically. Steve feels this
maybe due to shyness, but I get the impression that detailed dis-
cussion of experimental procedures is not customary. I would not
question their sensitivity nor their desire to reach the truth in
these matters, but I suspect such detail bores them. The remainder
of my conversation with West concerned the work of others, but the
comments were too general to merit reporting here.
Tea with Professor Broad
Professor C. D. Broad invited Steve and me to tea, a very
formal and interesting experience. Professor Broad completely
dominated the entire meeting, even to the choice of jam for our.-
toast and the strength of our tea. The Professor chose the topics
for discussion, dwelling principally on. Russian ESP work. He asked
insightful questions and obviously was much interested in trying to
understand why the Russians should be concerned with this area.
By the end of the tea, Steve and I felt a bit as though we had taken
our Ph.D. orals. The only other topic discussed was the Cambridge
scholarship for psychical research, which has existed for a number
of years. A recent endowment has increased the stipends considerably.
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I think Broad was interrogating Steve and myself mainly to evaluate
Steve's qualifications for this appointment in a year or so. The
amount of money is not large, but evidently ttie appointment carries
considerable prestige. Steve could accept the appointment without
-having to move to Cambridge, and thus could retain his position at
.Oxford. Professor Broad is deeply concerned with ESP phenomena
from a philosophical point of view. He is a member of the Advisory
Board for SPR, and I suspect, is a rigorous critic of ESP research
and spontaneous cases. He seemed quite impressed with Steve's work
.and has obviously kept up with his endeavors. I did not feel I
gained any great insight into Broad's philosophical attitude toward
ESP, but I suspect this can be obtained through reading his publica-
tions. The experience of spending a few hours with Professor Broad
was worthwhile.
Arrival of Dr. Joseph Pratt
On Saturday, Dr. Joseph Pratt, Dr. J. B. Rhine's chief associate
at Duke, arrived at Oxford to visit with Steve and some of the people
I had already seen. Hopefully, he was to leave for Leningrad (if
he could get a visa) the following Thursday. Steve's trip to the
Soviet Union had made such an impression that Professor Rhine felt
that the parapsychology laboratory at Duke should also send a
representative. Dr. Pratt, a very congenial person, has been working
in Rhine's laboratory since 1946. He has a Ph.D. in psychology from
Duke ('36), and has been associated with General Motors and the
Bureau of Personnel, United States Navy Department.
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Besides his interest in parapsychology, he has done considerable
work in animal orientation. He has had,. for some time, a grant
from ONR for studying pigeon navigation. He seems to be a reput-
able scientist,. seriously investigating ESP phenomena. I was
interested that on meeting me he immediately extended Dr. Rhine's
personal greetings and an invitation to attend the Parapsychological
Association meetings at Duke in September. Our support of Steve's
work seems to have accredited us to the closed circle of the ESP
.world.
Our discussions with Dr. Pratt that day concerned Steve's work,
Pratt's pigeon work and Russian ESP research. Dr. Pratt privately
.indicated that he had considerable respect for Steve, but was con-
cerned that his efforts were terribly diffuse. He would like to
see Steve approach ESP in a systematic and perhaps narrower fashion
with one well planned experiment, followed by the programming of
others. To many of Steve's associates this general pattern of
dillettantism is obvious and they seem concerned that his capa-
bilities and talents are not as yet sharply focused. They promised
to chat with Steve after I left to help orient him toward a few
solid experiments.
Dr. Pratt told of an experiment at the University of London
employing a tachistoscope to present visual stimuli subliminally.
The experimenter, a girl, first presents visual stimuli, conditions
the subjects to certain of these, and then presents the stimuli
subliminally to determine whether they elicit conditioned responses.
Dr. Pratt indicated that the methodology had some wealmesses,
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particularly in the subliminal presentations. The investigator will
continue this work next year at Stanford University under a Stanford
Psychical Research Grant. Accounts of her research indicate compe-
tence, and I believe her work should be followed up next year.
We also discussed the trip to Russia by Mr. Ebon, administrator
for the Parapsychology Foundation in New York City. Mr. Ebon has
no professional training as a psychologist, but has been a prominent
member of the Foundation staff for some time. I have gathered that
his reputation is somewhat unsavory. His recently published article
on the trip to the Soviet Union received adverse comment both from
Dr. Pratt and Mr. Abrams. The article was published in Parapsychology
Foundation Journal called "Tomorrow." I will attempt to obtain a
copy of it soon.
Dr. Pratt informed me that Dr. Karlis Osis, Director of Research
of the Parapsychology Foundation, and Mr. Douglas Dean, his associate,
are both leaving the Foundation this summer. I understand Osis will
join the research staff of the Society of Psychical Study in New York'
City. (Mr. Dean's plans are not known.) It is fairly evident that
the Parapsychological Foundation is not greatly respected in England
or America. Mrs. Garrett, who heads the Foundation, appears to be
an unstable former medium who receives funds from a wealthy woman --
a Mrs. Bolton, I believe. These funds may be short-lived and the
Foundation will probably collapse upon the loss of Mrs. Bolton's
support.
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Sir Alister Hardy
In the afternoon, Dr. Pratt, Mr. Abrams and I had tea with
Sir Alister Hardy, one of England's most noted biologists and
recently-retired Professor of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy at
.Oxford. Sir Alister participated actively in the Shackleton
experiments with Mr. Abrams. He drew the pictures and attempted to
transmit his sketches to Shackleton in another room. He is very
enthusiastic about this particular technique, and about experimenta-
tion with thought transference. Next year he plans to do a series
of experiments again using the transmission-of-sketches technique.
He has less faith in other aspects of ESP, but feels strongly that
the evidence for thought transference is irrefutable.
Most of the discussion concerned Shackleton and his experiments,
although Sir Alister did go into his work in marine ecology in some
detail. He was very interested in the Human Ecology Fund and its
objectives, and wrote later to indicate further enthusiasm.
Sir Alister appears to be an extremely capable, serious scientist.
He feels that Steve's general approach will eventually bear fruit.
He called my attention to earlier studies in the area of thought
transference that he believes are extremely sigaaificant. More than
anyone else, he was willing to discuss experimental procedures in
detail. He has been invited to the University of Miami next year,
but it is doubtful that his research will permit him to come.
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Soviet Research
Interlaced with the meetings reported above, Steve and I
chatted about his efforts in considerable detail. Probably the
most critical part of our discussion concerned Soviet research in
.the area of hypnosis at a distance, thought transference, and
general ESP studies. I encouraged Steve to send us a full report
of his trip within the next couple of weeks. He had indicated in
his letters that such a report was being written, but I find he has
done nothing on it. He promised to send it to us shortly.
I will attempt to summarize some of the things that he told
.C. D. Broad and me about the Russian work. First of all, I don't
think Steve feels that a great deal is being done, but there is
considerable interest in the general ESP area. Most of it seems to
be done in Leningrad, although there are small groups looking into
the problem in Moscow, as well. The principal investigator seems to
be L. L. Vasiliev, Professor of Physiology at the University of
.Leningrad, a former student of Bekhterev's. A. Alexandrov, Director
of the University of Leningrad established the laboratory for para-
psychology for Vasiliev. It is associated with the Laboratory of
Biological Electronics in the Physiological Institute. Because the
.Academy of Science doubted the value of his work, a committee was
formed to determine whether such research should be supported.
E. A. Asratian, Director of the Institute of Higher Nervous Activity
and Neurophysiology of the Academy of Sciences, headed the committee.
A decision was made to support the work, and the parapsychological
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laboratory was established officially in 1962. The research funda-
mentally has a physiological orientation. The staff consists of
physiologists, electronic specialists, physicists, cyberneticists
(Goulyaev), and a psychiatrist. No psychologists are known to be
on the staff.
One of two important persons associated with this research is
Juri Tupitsin, a psychiatrist with a recent doctorate from the
University of Leningrad. Steve predicts he will succeed Vasiliev.
Steve is arranging to invite Tupitsin to lecture at Oxford, and he
hopes to have Pratt and Rhine invite him to spend some time at Duke.
Pavel Terentiev, Professor of Statistics - Biometry, is also connected
with this research and is considered a key man. The administrator of
the laboratory is Olga Lenz, a "hard nosed" woman, quite a Party
type. All Vasiliev's letters go through her and she seems to run
.the laboratory directly.
The Russians appear to Steve to be reasonably well acquainted
with the American research. However, a great influence on their
approach is the early French, since Bekhterev was a student of the
French school, a protege of Charcot's. They use ESP cards empha-
sizing moods and colors rather than symbols. They are most interest-
ed in measuring ESP directly in the form of radiated energy from
the brain. They plan to use an electroscope similar to the Gray-
Walter toposcope, where up to a hundred measurements are made on the
cranium.
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Because of their interest in radiated energy aspects of the
problem, the Russians have gone to great lengths to encase their
experimenters in shielded rooms during experiments in hypnosis at
a distance. This appears to have no effect. Individuals who have
been previously hypnotized can be placed in nonadjoining rooms at
various distances from the hypnotist and sink into trance upon
thought command. This ability evidently can be transferred to other
hypnotists, but they must have met the subject. This does not appear
to be the result of a simple posthypnotic suggestion. Shielding the
hypnotist has no effect. What seems to be involved until more
adequately explained is some type of thought transmission. There
is absolutely no evidence that a person not previously hypnotized
can be induced into a trance.
Persons interested in ESP in Moscow, where the electroscope
equipment is located, are: B. B. Kazhinski, a physicist, who is
working with the Faraday Cage. Mirza of the Institute of Neuro-
physiology is concerned particularly with subjective states.
Fadeev gives lectures on telepathy. It seems to be Steve's opinion
that the Russians believe that they have evidence for ESP phenomena.
Steve is getting along extremely well with Vasiliev. He is
writing an article for the proceedings of the Leningrad Institute
and hopes to'be invited to spend a month at Leningrad in research
before Tupitsin comes to Oxford. I asked Steve whether he had any
indication that the Russians were using hypnosis in the training of
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astronauts. He said he did not believe that they were. However,
they did tell him they were using yoga training, which would seem
perfectly logical.
The Experiments with Shackleton
The most significant thing that Steve has done from a research
point of view are the Shackleton experiments. Shackleton is a
middle-aged photographer-adventurer well known evidently for his
ESP sensitivity. He has been utilized and studied at least informal-
ly by most of the people I visited. Steve's experiments, although
not too systematic, are probably as good as any done with Shackleton.
Unfortunately, the.data have not been analyzed and may very well
defy analysis by any method now known. As mentioned previously,
.the principal experiments consisted of Sir Alister drawing pictures
representing words selected at random from the dictionary. The
pictures were drawn in one of four quadrants on a sheet of paper.
Shackleton, in another room, was to reproduce in the appropriate
quadrant the picture that Sir Alister drew. Going over the data,
there are some interesting similiarities, or possibly coincidences,
but when one starts to determine criteria of reproduction of a
drawing, I suspect we run into several imponderables. Steve has
several statisticians working on the problem and hopes to write
up this work in the near future.
In addition to the Shackleton work, Steve has been testing
his hypnotic technique on various subjects to determine the extent
to which one may isolate or reproduce sensitivity through hypnotic
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control. The ESP phenomena must occur under certain conditions
and with appropriate substrata. The ecology or environment ap-
propriate to maximizing sensitivity needs much more systematic study
than it is receiving at the moment. I believe Steve's dilettante
approach has been fully appropriate up to now. He has worked intense-
ly with a few sensitive people. Now, however, as I recommended to
him, he needs to sit back and to program his research to discover
the ecology of this sensitivity and'to approach each-variable, or
set of variables, methodically to determine those that are truly
critical. It is my personal opinion the sterile laboratory con-
ditions with dice shaking, card sorting, as demonstrated by Rhine's
approach will not pay off. The artist to create a beautiful painting
needs the appropriate physical setting, psychological mood, lighting
and perhaps even a degree of suffering before his sensitivity can
be felt and demonstrated. We do not smell the essence of the flower
in a pigpen. ESP, if it exists, must also have its optimal ecology,
and I suspect the antiseptic atmosphere of the laboratory is not it.
It is possible, through hypnosis, drugs, sleep, alcohol, abnormal
emotional tone, or even extreme rapport conditions, to enhance this
perception. Once we-can identify and control these variables we
can, perhaps, begin to apply an appropriate methodology to the
experimentation of the phenomenon itself. Those skeptics who say
that acceptable proof of ESP lies in demonstrating its existence
under all conditions -- anywhere and at any time -- are confusing
scientific method with control of environmental variables contribut-.
ing to the essence of the experience.
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