journal of scientific exploration (obe)

Is1 JOURNAL OF SCIENTIFIC EXPLORATION A Publication of the Society for Scientific Exploration

Volume 3, Number 1 1989

CONTENTS

Page

Invited Essays

1 Arguments Over Anomalies: 11. Polemics Henry H. Bauer

) 15 Anomalies: Analysis and Aesthetics Robert G. Jahn

Research Articles

27 Trends in the study of Out-of-Body Experiences: Carlos S. Alvarado An Overview of Developments Since the Nineteenth Century

43 A Methodology for the Objective Study of William Braud I Transpersonal Imagery Marilyn Schlitz

65 Experiments Investigating the Influence of Intention Dean Radin on Random and Pseudorandom Events Jessica Utts

8 1 A Case of the Possession Type in India With Ian Stevenson Evidence of Paranormal Knowledge Satwant Pasricha

I Nicholas McClean-Rice

Indexed in CABS ISSN 0892-33 10 (836)

Esi JOURNAL OF SCIENTIFIC EXPLORATION A Publication of the Society for Scientific Exploration

Volume 3, Number 2 1989

CONTENTS

I Page

I Invited Essay

1 103 New Ideas in Science Thomas Gold

Research Articles

1 13 Photo Analysis of an Aerial Disc Over Costa Rica Richard F. Haines Jacques F. Vallee

133 A Replication Study: Three Cases of Children in Antonia Mills Northern India Who Are Said to Remember a Previous Life

185 Searching for "Signatures" in Anomalous Human- Dean I. Radin Machine Interaction Data: A Neural Network Approach

20 1 A Case of Severe Birth Defects Possibly Due to Ian Stevenson Cursing

Letter to the Editor

2 1 3 Comments on Slanger's "Internal Clock"

Book Review

I 2 17 The Relativity Question, by Ian McCausland

I List of Contents and Author Index Volume 3, 1989

C. M. Pleass

Henry H. Bauer

i Indexed in CABS ISSN 0892-3310 (836)

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INVITED ESSA Y

Arguments Over Anomalies: 11. Polemics

HENRY H. BAUER

Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University, Blacksburg, VA 24061

Abstract-Arguments over different anomalies have common elements. An awareness of those commonalities can be useful in considering the possible reality of a particular anomaly. As in all arguments, beliefs and not facts are at issue; but the participants do not recognize that, and so red henings abound and opponents are not persuaded. Again as in all disputes, the longer the disagreement persists, the more polarized the issue becomes, which further encourages the antagonists to become preoccupied with irre- levancies. Within science, disputes are to some degree constrained by the existence of a widely shared paradigm and by widely accepted conventions, supported by entrenched institutions and by consensus over how and when disputes become settled; but arguments over anomalies are not so constrained: they are messy and may continue long after they-on purely epistemic grounds-"should". Insofar as arguments over anomalies take place in the public domain, they involve not only proponents and opponents but also pundits and an audience; however, a purported pundit may behave more like a disbeliever (or, more rarely, like a proponent). Some features of these arguments result from the fact that the believers are usually amateurs (though they commonly include a few maverick experts in the presumptively relevant fields of mainstream science). Although most of the experts tend to be disbelievers or at least non-believers in a given anomaly, the converse is by no means true-most of the disbelievers have little or no expertise in related areas, and they may not even be particularly knowledgeable about the given anomaly. Typically, both sides claim that the evidence is already conclusive when-virtually by definition-it is evidently not. Believers tend to close ranks, even with quite unwelcome bed- fellows, for fear that their subject will seem even less respectable if the existence of frauds or hoaxes or incompetence becomes widely known; and that enhances the tendency for outsiders to view the believers as unani- mous on all major points, which is anything but true. Both sides (and also the pundits) typically appeal to the authority of science; and typically they misunderstand the nature of science. Also characteristic of these arguments is ignorance of matters that (but only by hindsight) are highly relevant.

Introduction

If one's interest is in the truth about a given anomaly, is there any reason why one would take an interest in what may be common with other anomalies? Is not the possible reality of a Loch Ness Monster quite unrelated to the possible reality of a Bigfoot, let alone to the possible reality of clairvoyance, say?

2 H. H. Bauer

Quite generally, recognition of commonalities can deepen one's understanding of singularities. In chemistry, for example, an appreciation of the periodic law provided firm ground for deciding whether a claimed new element was real or only a pseudo-element, for predicting the existence of yet undiscovered elements, for understanding chemical behavior and atomic structure: knowing what is common to elements results also in a deeper understanding of individual elements. So too can knowledge of what is common among anomalies help in the study of any given anomalous claim. The study of anomalies as a class was dubbed by Wescott (1980) "anomalistics"; but this seemingly useful term has not come into general usage. A number of important generalizations within anomalistics have been ventured, notably by Truzzi (1 977, 1987) and Westrum (1 976, 1978 [with Truzzi], 1982).

Arguments over anomalies have in common that they are controversial (Bauer, 1988); and they exemplify misunderstanding of scientific activity and certain typical illogicalities.

In "scientifically exploring" anomalous phenomena, it is well to recognize that controversiality has different consequences in these matters than in the intra-scientific disputes with which scientists are familiar. For instance, in science there is always tacit agreement that any matter will ultimately be settled when enough of Nature's facts become understood, and so there can often be a consensus to leave the matter undecided until then; whereas with anomalous phenomena one finds both sides arguing that the crucial facts are already in. In science, resolving controversial issues involves chiefly substantive matters of method and theory and data; over anomalies, resolving the issues means chiefly or primarily disentangling arguments. In science, the relevant data are accessible to all, whereas with anomalies one often has to be content with the hearsay of others about the data that are claimed to exist (or to have once existed). In science, the experts are readily identified and are (within their specific specialties) generally trustworthy, whereas with anomalies it is never obvious who is expert, and some of the most knowledgeable about a given matter may be quite untrustworthy and not even particularly competent in their knowledge.

Arguments in General

Beliefs, not Facts are at Issue

Arguments are over differences in belief but are carried on as though they were over facts. Arguments are attempts to persuade people to change their opinions, but the protagonists typically seem not to understand what must happen if beliefs are to change. Most of us know little about how human beings acquire beliefs or about what causes us to maintain or to change beliefs once we have them. We tend to assume that we believe a thing because it is true and we tend further to assume that the truth of the matter is

Arguments over anomalies 3

convincingly demonstrated by looking at the facts. Consequently we cannot comprehend how other people can fail to share our own convictions.

Forming Beliefs

In actuality, however, our beliefs are formed under a variety of influences. At first, we are enormously influenced by parents, peers, and teachers, and we act and react out of emotion rather than intellect; only after a time do we learn to become somewhat analytical and critical, to choose opinions for ourselves among the available alternatives or to generate genuinely individual ones. Thus at first we typically follow our parents' and our society's religious and political and social inclinations-or we reject them and embrace diametrically opposite views; only later and only occasionally do we evolve significantly individual opinions through judicious thought. So too in formal and higher education, we begin by accepting what the instructors and the texts say and only later become able to judge and to investigate matters for ourselves. (And even then we usually maintain to some degree the biases of those with whom we learned: that is why, for instance, one can identify research traditions associated with particular laboratories or emi- nent individuals, and why scientific genealogies are constructed and are instructive.)

Beliefs and Evidence

Since each of us grows and learns under a unique set of circumstances, we become predisposed to find plausible different things, or a given thing to different degrees. Each of us forms opinions on specific issues through some interplay between individual predispositions and the available evidence; since the predispositions vary, we reach different conclusions on the basis of the same evidence. Yet, because we harbor the illusion that our opinions are formed by the evidence, we argue as though only the evidence were at issue; simply because we happen to believe, we assume that we have only to make the evidence clear whereupon others will adopt the same belief. Therefore arguments typically focus overtly or apparently on the evidence; yet that is only one of the factors that influences belief and often not the decisive one. That has important consequences. For participants, it means that they usually argue ineffectively: to alter the antagonists' opinion, it would need to be shown that the evidence as seen in the light of their own prejudices can lead to our conclusion; or that their prejudices are inappropriate in this instance; or that their prejudices should altogether be altered (and none of those would be easy, of course). For observers or analysts of arguments, it is necessary to look not only at the purported evidence but also to identify the biases that inform the opposing sides; without that, it may not even be possible to determine what the actual evidence is.

In considering the available evidence we usually fail to make the crucially important distinction between weight of evidence adequate to support one's

4 H. H. Bauer

own belief and weight of evidence adequate to convince others. Since preconceptions vary, estimates of plausibility and probability also vary: what seems likely to some seems quite unlikely to others-for example that human behavior is genetically controlled, or that God exists, or that acupuncture could work. When something occurs that seems to us plausible, we accept it even on quite slender evidence (or actually no evidence at all, for example the pre-1956 belief that parity would be conserved [Bernstein, 1967, p. 521); when however a thing seems implausible to us, we demand a mass of proof before accepting it and may even then remain unconvinced, as for example those who still hold that the Earth has existed for only some thousands rather than billions of years. So two people can look at the same evidence and reach opposite conclusions because their initial estimates of probability differed; even more to be emphasized, they can disagree over whether the evidence is slender or compelling, superficially an "objective" point over which antagonists ought easily to be able to agree.

On the whole, those who accept the reality of an anomaly (the "believers") and those who do not (the "disbelievers" or "debunkers") have characteristically different preconceptions: for instance, the believers are somewhat predisposed to doubt the conventional wisdom whereas the debunkers tend to feel (0ver)confident that the conventional scientific wisdom is correct. In well-known consequence, believers tend to judge compelling an array of evidence that others find less than compelling; whereas debunkers tend to dismiss entirely an array of evidence that others find at least suggestive.

To make sense of these arguments, one needs to realize that the antagonists are always to a certain extent talking past one another: the manifest issue may be a proximate cause of the argument, but the real cause is a different set of preconceptions; the prime mover in a dispute is often a clash of ideologies, a struggle for power, or the like. Thus two siblings are not concerned fundamentally with the toy over which they seem to be fighting but rather with their relative status within the family-no matter what the toy or the issue, they are likely to find themselves in dispute; again, strikes by militant unions may be less about working conditions (economics, the manifest issue) and more about the class struggle-no matter what the wages and benefits and working conditions happen to be, there will be dispute about them. Similarly one can often predict what attitude a given person will take toward anything to do with anomalies: there are inveterate believers and inveterate debunkers.

The influence of preconception concerning anomalies was recently illustrated for this author in the reviewing of his book, The Enigma of Loch Ness: Making Sense of a Mystery (Bauer, 1986), which is explicitly an examination of the controversy and not an argument that these creatures do exist or that they do not exist. Reviewers with no great preconceptions (Atlantic, 1987; Coburn, 1987; Gragg, 1987; Kirkus Reviews, 1986; Martin, 1987; McMahon, 1987; Oldberg, 1986; Snowy Egret, 1987; Stein, 1987;


Williamson, 1987) commented on the impartiality of the discussion as an analysis of the controversy; but believers in UFOs thought they found dis- paragement of the believers' viewpoint (Clark, 1987; Earley, 1987) while inveterate debunkers (Kelly, 1987) were offended by the author's admission that in his personal opinion there are strange, large creatures in Loch Ness.

For all these reasons, an observer rarely finds the antagonists' arguments to clarify an issue: the antagonists are primarily concerned to make their point, to win the argument, to win converts, even when they claim to be attempting clarification-a claim they may quite honestly believe. Again, this is why arguments are replete with what are evidently to observers (but not to the participants) red herrings, non sequitur, illogicalities of all sorts, arguments ad horninern.

Polarization

Characteristically, arguments become entrenched and polarization grows rather than lessens as time goes by. The nominal issue becomes spoken of increasingly in terms of "either-or", and the antagonists come to feel that those who are not explicitly for them are assuredly against them. Every small detail becomes controversial, and no one will yield an inch lest that lead further; thus in the Velikovsky affair not only did the antagonists go to specious lengths to avoid acknowledging errors, they made much of such trivialities as their opponents' mistakes in punctuation when giving quotes (Bauer, 1984a, pp. 196- 198,24 1-242). Arguments may begin as attempts to establish the objective soundness of (two opposing) positions; but after a while, the antagonists' purpose becomes to discredit their opposition.

The tendency to polarization can seriously obfuscate significant points through the creation of false dichotomies (whose falsity of course is not evident to the disputants). In cryptozoology there is a characteristic argument about folkloric references: are they symbolic and mythic or are they founded on snippets of information about real animals? That is a false dichotomy, for it is patently possible for real animals to have symbolic and mythic attributes, the Biblical serpent for example. (Indeed, as Bayanov [I9821 has pointed out, ape-men or wild-men would almost inevitably, if they exist, become incorporated into folklore, legend, and myth: their absence from folklore would speak against their actual existence.) Similarly with the Loch Ness monster, it is often asked, is the monster real or is it an invention of journalists and tourist entrepreneurs? Again a false dichotomy, for both may be true: if such rarely seen creatures exist, entrepreneurs would surely seek to exploit them, and some might actually come to believe that they had invented them (Bauer, 1986, pp. 155-1 56).

Committed believers or debunkers may not even be willing to acknowledge that polarization and false dichotomies are undesirable. Thus Gardner (1983a; 1983b, p. 55) argues for making sharply polar distinctions between science and pseudo-science: that night slowly gives way to day does not

6 H. H. Bauer

vitiate the distinction between night and day, he says, and that unorthodox- yet-legitimate science and pseudo-science are but extremes of a continuum still leaves it possible legitimately to call some things pseudo-science. This might well be called the Gardner non-sequitur (by analogy with the Fulton non-sequitur [Gruenberger, 19641): there is never significant disagreement over whether it is night or day, but there is typically disagreement over what can legitimately be called pseudo-science. That extreme instances of rank pseudo-science do exist cannot validate the labeling as pseudo-science of matters that are highly and contemporaneously controversial and that therefore seem only to some people and not to others to be pseudo-science (Bauer, 1984b); it is as though someone were to comment on the beauty of the evening twilight and Gardner would seek to brush that aside by insisting that it is already night-time-that Gardner can see things as black or white hardly excludes others from perceiving greys. The Gardner non-sequitur is common in disputes over anomalies (though it is not so commonly defended): one side alleges that the other fails to accept some unexceptionable generality, whereas the quarrel actually is over whether that generality can be applied to the specific instance at hand. Steuart Campbell (1988), for instance, accuses others of not invoking Occam's Razor when the difference of opinion is actually over which of the several explanations really is the simplest one.

The degree of polarization that occurs has been nicely illustrated by Howe (1 983) for the case of parapsychology; the fervent skeptic cites only skeptical sources; asserts parapsychology to be a pseudo-science; considers only normal explanations or resorts to personal attack, ridicule, or evasion ("we will never know the answer"); asserts that the acceptance of psychic phenomena will let loose a tide of irrationality that will lead to a collapse of society; applauds the description of the typical fervent proponent but is irate over this characterization of the fervent skeptic; has more dogmatic humanist or philosophic beliefs than the average humanist or philosopher. On the other hand, the fervent proponent cites only psychic or parapsychological sources; asserts parapsychology to be a radically new science; considers only paranormal explanations without first evaluating normal ones; asserts that acceptance of psychic phenomena will revolutionize society for the better; applauds the description of the typical fervent skeptic but is irate over this characterization of the fervent proponent; has more dogmatic religious beliefs than the average religious person.

The fierceness of an argument does not necessarily parallel the degree to which the opposing viewpoints differ; indeed, the most spirited battles take place between individuals or groups whose views differ relatively little, a phenomenon classically termed "odium theologicum" (I. J. Good, personal communication, June 1 1, 1986) since the Church has so often been more tolerant of heathens than of schismatics; so too, most homicides in the U.S. are committed by relatives or friends; Australian or British travelers tend to be more critical of what they encounter in the U.S. than of what they


experience in Asia; the Soviet Union finds it easier to strike accommoda- tions with the West than with China or its Eastern European fellow-travelers; the Velikovskian journal Kronos will at least argue with those who reject Velikovsky's ideas entirely but treats as beneath contempt and ignores Velikovskian deviationists. Once this tendency has been recognized, for passions to be exacerbated by closeness rather than by distance, it can be readily enough understood. One tends to assume implicitly that another person's similar views are actually identical views, and when the recognition comes that this is not so, the disappointment can be shocking and can produce a violent reaction. Moreover, those who are closest can thereby seem the most threatening: given that our differences are so slight, might that not make it very easy for them to syphon support and supporters away from us? And perhaps, as we compare our opinions with only slightly different ones, there comes the fear that we ourselves might be mistaken-for it is surely easier to entertain the notion that we may be slightly wrong than that we might be grossly wrong (yet it is still unpalatable to admit it).

In the rare cases when true believers (Hoffer, 195 1) do happen to recognize their error, they do not then adopt a more balanced or judicious stance, rather they typically go to the other extreme. Arthur Koestler's disillusion- ment with Communism left him implacably anti-Communist; Whittaker Chambers coupled that shift with conversion from atheism to Catholicism. Maurice Burton gave credence to the Loch Ness monsters for nearly three decades and then became a determined debunker; Razdan and Kielar (1984-1985) became injudiciously critical after their own search for the monster was unsuccessful. The switch from believer to debunker is easier than from either of those stances to uncommitted, because the extreme positions are so similar to one another, psychologically and (i1)logically. Thus the believers and the debunkers are equally dogmatic-for example, that the scientific method exists and that they know precisely what it is; and they can be incisively logical about their opponents' fallacies while themselves committing similar ones (Bauer, 1984a, pp. 223-250). Debunkers, in fact, just as much as believers belong to the type described by Hoffer (1 95 1).

Arguments Within Scientific Disciplines

Though the points just made apply to all arguments, including controversies within science ("intra-scientific" ones) as well as those about claimed anomalies, there are quite important differences in degree. The conventions of science serve to moderate the non-rational aspects of intra-scientific dispute, whereas arguments over anomalies are not so constrained.

In intra-scientific disputes, there is less opportunity for covert ideologies to influence the general course and particular events of a controversy. Most such arguments concern quite well-defined, specific issues: a particular observation or set of results, the efficacy of an instrument or method, the fit of

8 H. H. Bauer

digm. All the disputants approach the manifest issue in much the same way, with much the same biases and preconceptions about them and with much the same goals: to resolve the dispute and thereby get past that impediment to further progress. Moreover, continuing and explicit lip-service is paid to the ideals of objectivity and empiricism, and consequently there is more opportunity for logic and data actually to be taken seriously.

Scientists are trained not only to discover but also to find sponsors for their work and to publish their discoveries; and getting support and getting published means impressing and convincing others. Through early training, therefore, scientists learn something of the difference between personally holding beliefs and convincing others; they learn to be aware of and to deploy themselves the criteria that others will apply to their proposals and manuscripts. So scientists are trained to become their own critics and learn to become relatively logical and empirical in their work; within science, convincing oneself becomes not so different from convincing others.

Pieces of science ultimately must pass the test of Nature itself. Scientists take enormous risks if personal or ideologic motives lead them into logical fallacy or into ignoring or fudging data; at any time the honest work of others, in the same or in a similar field, could expose them as incompetent or dishonest and their whole career could be ruined. Adherence to the ideals of science, to the extent humanly possible, is for scientists a plain matter of self-interest.

Arguments within science, then, are somewhat less at the mercy of human vagaries than are other arguments. When scientists become involved in disputes about anomalies (or in other public arguments, or in arguments about politics or social questions), their experience of intra-scientific dispute can prove to be a handicap: they are not aware that there exists no shared paradigm, and so they are not prepared for the degree to which the disputes are actually about other things than the nominal question, they are not accustomed to disputes that are so much over beliefs and so little over facts; they do not understand why or how there can be such a multitude of illogicalities and red herrings. And so scientists are often ineffective in such arguments: over creationism, over Velikovsky, over Star Wars.

It is not being suggested that intra-scientific disputes are less intemperate or raucous than others, only that within science the arguments stick more closely to the manifest issues and are quickly settled once the relevant facts are in. By contrast, arguments over anomalies can persist, through the activities of small groups of proponents, long after the objective facts are in: to take an extreme case, there still exist Flat-Earth societies. Outside the disciplines, there is no system or authority to settle intellectual disagreements and to keep them settled.

Public Arguments

In public arguments as in all others one finds ideologic differences behind the manifest issues, one finds the antagonists seeking to win the argument


rather than to clarify the matter, and one finds progressively greater polarization over time. In public debates, though, one's ego may seem even more at risk than in private argument and saving face may become even more essential. It would make sense, therefore, for antagonists in public debate to look for ways by which it might become easier and less self-threatening for their opponents to recant; but examples of that seem to be rare. Thus Velikovsky was ridiculed harshly, misrepresented sloppily, paid scant respect; and so-if for no other reason-Velikovsky's critics were quite ineffective in swaying Velikovsky or his supporters.

Speaking to an Audience

A partial explanation for such apparently inept behavior as that of Veli- kovsky's critics is that they were not in fact trying to persuade Velikovsky or his followers; the aim was to discredit Velikovsky in the eyes of the public. In all arguments there are proponents and opponents, but in public arguments there is also an audience to be reckoned with. Most commonly, what the disputants say is actually addressed to that audience, the public, even when they may seem to be addressing one another; and things are said differently -or different things are said-than when it is the opponents who are being directly addressed. Sometimes, to be sure, the disputants do substantively address one another; but at other times again they appear to be talking only to themselves. Thus the typical publication by believers (for example, MUFON Journal, Kronos, Nessletter) or by debunkers (for example, Skep- tical Inquirer) serves only the purpose of speaking to the already converted: those writings, as also conferences arranged by such groups, are better understood as rituals of self-motivation and self-reassurance than as attempts to make a case that might persuade opponents or the general public, let alone as attempts to clarify the substantive issue. For example, Skeptical Inquirer has published several debunking pieces about the Loch Ness controversy but was not interested in a survey of the strongest evidence, giving as reason that the magazine's purpose is not to consider what the best evidence for anomalous claims might be but to argue against them (Ken- drick Frazier, personal communications, February 26 and October 6, 1984).

Pundits

In public debates one also encounters another type of role besides those of proponent and opponent: that of the observer or pundit, who takes an active part in the argument as an explicator of the issues or as a mediator between the extremes: ideally, the pundit serves to educate the public and to help it reach the truth of the matter. But pundits have their own opinions too, and those are likely to be more to one side of the issue than the other, and so it is by no means always easy to distinguish pundits from disputants-as for instance with the social scientists and humanists who entered the Veli- kovsky debate in the 1960s (Bauer, 1984a, pp. 52-56).

10 H. H. Bauer

A common ploy by debunkers masquerading as uncommitted observers is to declare that educating the public is the same as having the public accept the debunking view: for example, in several instances the only criterion used by debunkers to judge whether students had become critically minded was whether they had lost their willingness to contemplate the possible reality of certain anomalies (Bainbridge, 1 988; Blackmore, 1 984- 1 985; Lee, 1 98 5). That illustrates the fact that in intellectual disputes (as generally in demo- cratic societies) lip-service only is paid to the notion that all are entitled to their own opinions: in practice, on any given issue one finds few people actually content to have others believe differently from themselves. Thus liberals tend to doubt that free speech for fascists or creationists is really good for society-or, what has the same effect, liberals become very agitated when widespread credence is given to, say, creationist views. Again, science popularizers tend to doubt that publishers should put out books like those of Charles Berlitz or Eric von Daniken. Liberals, scientists, and science writers profess to believe that aberrant views ("'error") would disappear if only the public were well enough educated, in particular in science; yet they usually take part in public dispute not as educators and uncommitted explicators but as proponents of specific views, and they tend to view the public as "educated" only to the extent that it accepts their opinions.

Arguments About Anomalies

Controversies over anomalies are often public arguments, so what has just been said applies here too; but one can be more specific about who are the adversaries, about typical overstatements, and about the manner in which science is brought into the dispute.

The Disputants

Those who push the reality of an anomaly are typically amateurs or laymen with respect to the most apparently relevant disciplines, as are some of the most vociferous of their opponents. The experts and professionals are almost all skeptics or opponents or debunkers: thus physicians typically do not practice faith-healing or homeopathy or acupuncture (although some do); nor are many psychologists active in parapsychology (though a few are). That many of the proponents of an anomaly are amateurs has corollaries that make widespread acceptance of the anomaly more difficult (Bauer, 1984a, pp. 189- 193; 1986, pp. 77-98): their work is not coordinated, many are less than competent, their reports are not rigorously refereed, the literature is inchoate; studying an anomaly is not doing science, and the investigations cannot realistically be judged as pieces of science.

Although most of the experts are skeptics or debunkers, one usually finds a few maverick professionals who espouse an anomaly or call for further investigation of it: Wilhelm Reich has followers among physicians and so-

Arguments over anomalies 1 1

cia1 scientists, Hynek was an astronomer and ufologist, Grover Krantz is an anthropologist who believes Bigfoot to be real; Velikovskians counted some physicists among their number; biologists Roy Mackal and Denys Tucker (among others) believe that Loch Ness monsters are real. There is almost always a distribution of belief among the experts about the reality of an anomaly; and that is one reason why anomalies cannot be dismissed simply by reliance on intellectual authority-that authority, insofar as it exists, is not sufficiently consensual on the matter.

I Overstating the Cases

Disputants in all arguments tend to overstate their cases. With anomalies, the claimants typically say, "It is so", when it should be patently obvious that the evidence is insufficient to convince many intelligent, educated, appopriately qualified people, among them most of the professional experts. It would be more palatable to the pundits and even to the experts if the proponents were merely to say, "There is good evidence for this, it is not unreasonable to entertain the possibility". Here is an instance where the distinction between personal belief and demonstrable proof cries out to be applied: it may often be quite reasonable for the proponents to believe the anomaly to be real, but that does not necessarily make it reasonable for them to attempt to convince others of that or it (Bauer, 1986, Ch. 10).

The opponents, on the other hand, do not content themselves with making the eminently reasonable statement, "The evidence is not strong enough; and anyway the matter is implausible in the extreme; there is no reason for me to take an interest". No: they typically say, "It is not so, because it cannot be so"; and thus they lend support to the charges typically brought by the proponents, that scientists are arrogantly dogmatic, unwill- ing to examine revolutionary new phenomena or theories, and (unwarran- tedly) confident that science already knows all the important things.

Deceptive Unity

Because the proponents of an anomaly can readily see themselves as a beleaguered minority, there is a tendency to close ranks against the debunkers even when the ranks are then closed on bed-fellows that the proponents would rather not have. For that phenomenon in the Loch Ness controversy, see Bauer ( 1986, pp. 76-77, 8 1-84); similarly in parapsychology (Hoebens, 198 1 - 1982, p. 39): "The psi community has never completely freed itself from the pernicious i d i e j x e that overt criticism of a colleague may damage the cause and play into the hands of the enemies of parapsychology. Some parapsychological researchers began to suspect Tenhaeff long ago. Seldom, however, did they voice their doubts openly. And, when they did, some sociological mechanism seems to have prevented an adequate follow-up". Surely the cause is damaged more in the long run when

12 H. H. Bauer

that some participants cannot be relied upon. On the other hand, since there is no overarching community of proponents of any anomaly-all are free publicly to declare themselves believers or investigators-no discipline can effectively be enforced, and the attempt to keep out undesirables may become hopelessly ineffective as well as unpleasant. It is a typical dilemma: the believers tend to close ranks because they do not trust outsiders to be capa- ble of distinguishing-or even willing to distinguish-honest from fraudu- lent or competent from incompetent anomalists; but as the ranks are closed it becomes even more unlikely that such distinctions will in fact be made by anyone.

At any rate, one ought to be clear that-quite apart from instances of dishonesty or incompetence-sharp internal disagreements, both intellectual and personal, commonly exist among proponents of a given anomaly even when there are no obvious external signs of it. Thus much of the tension among Velikovskians was long known only to insiders; and though the monster-hunters at Loch Ness indulge in little public criticism of one another, in private it is quite a different matter, and one soon finds that there is little mutual respect or trust-let alone practical cooperation- among a number of competing individuals and groups. The penchant that debunkers and the media have for lumping together all proponents of a given anomaly reveals a lack of knowledge and understanding.

The Role of Science

In arguments over anomalies, science is typically appealed to: the claimants think that science ought to accept the existence of the anomaly sufficiently to study it, while the debunkers call the anomaly pseudo-science. That issue, in point of fact, is a red herring: the question, after all, is not what science should do or say but whether or not the anomaly is real. By insisting that science ought to take an interest, the claimants imply that science ought to study something simply because it may be real, despite the fact that it appears not to be consonant with the prevailing state-of-the-art, and despite the fact that there is no obvious way efficiently to obtain useful data about the matter; thus they display a misunderstanding of the way science actually works. For their part, the disbelievers also misunderstand the nature of science when they label an anomaly pseudo-science just because they think it is not real: as though science only studied matters known beforehand to be real! That both sides-and also the pundits and the media and the public- so readily succumb to this red herring of appeal to science illustrates that this is an age of scientism (whether or not it be, as so often claimed, an age of science).

Scientism means taking science as the arbiter of truth, and nowadays we all do that though we are not necessarily aware of it. The public is assured by advertisers and by politicians that what is being pushed has been scientifically shown or tested-"scientific tests have shown . . ."; what function is served by "scientific" or "scientifically" in such a context except to deliver the seal of certainty?


No one disputes the power or truthfulness of science. The believers insist that science should enter the picture because, perhaps without even knowing it, they believe the imprimatur of science to be the ultimate guarantee that they are not mistaken. The believers may often seem to be moved by re- sentment of science, and they may often seem to be criticizing it harshly, but the criticism turns out on closer examination to be only that science has gone wrong in this particular instance, science would be quite all right if only it rectified that error: so Velikovskians sought reform of science, and saw themselves as building a correct Velikovskian science; and fundamen- talists are not content to have the divine revelation of creation, they require the reassurance of "creation science".

Misconceptions About Science

Arguing over whether an anomaly is pseudo-science, and appealing to science as the arbiter of truth, though actually a red herring nevertheless serves to make the nature of science a common theme in these arguments, one about which wide ignorance and confusion are then displayed: over whether science is a quest, or the application of a defined method, or a body of reliable knowledge, or an aristocratic pursuit; over how reliable scientific knowledge actually is, especially when laws or theories are applied under novel circumstances; and, in consequence, over how applicable "science" may be to such fields as history, or in everyday life, or in particular to discussions of anomalies. And always there arises the question, who can legitimately claim to speak in the name of science? In fact, one of the most indubitably instructive consequences of looking at arguments over anomalies is that one becomes aware of how little understood is science, never mind that it is universally appealed to.

Ignorance

Ignorance of various sorts, not only about science, plays an important role in arguments over anomalies. By definition, of course, we are ignorant about the main question, whether the anomaly is real or only apparent; but we are also usually ignorant about what sort of knowledge might actually help to answer the question, and certainly we are ignorant about how to obtain that knowledge. Since we are ignorant about whicli discipline might be relevant, it can happen that useful information exists without the disputants being aware of it: for instance that some species of spiders let masses of web fall from high in the atmosphere. Ignorance is a central characteristic of arguments over anomalies. The ignorance may be chiefly on one side or the other: for instance on matters of physics in respect of the flat-earthers or (specifically regarding electromagnetism and gravity) the Velikovskians. Or, both sides may be ignorant: for instance about what science is and how it works, where both Velikovskians and their critics were notably wrong, albeit in different ways.

14 H. H. Bauer

Most interesting, of course, are those anomalies over which argument persists because we all-humankind-are still ignorant of what is needed to settle the argument; and that ignorance is surely sufficient reason to explore, as scientifically as is feasible, the domain of anomalous phenomena.

References

Atlantic. (1987, February), p. 94. Bainbridge, W. S. (1988). Rejected enlightenment (review of Cult archaeology and creation-

ism). Science, 240, 1048. Bauer, H. H. (1984a). Beyond Velikovsky: The history of a public controversy. Urbana &

Chicago: University of Illinois Press. Bauer, H. H. (1984b, July). Letter to the editor. Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, p. 13. Bauer, H. H. ( 1986). The enigma of Loch Ness: Making sense of a mystery. Urbana & Chicago:

University of Illinois Press. Bauer, H. H. (1988). Commonalities in arguments over anomalies. Journal of Scientific Explo-

ration, 2(1), 1-1 1. Bayanov, D. (1982). A note on folklore in hominology. Cryptozoology, 1, 46-48. Bernstein, J. (1967). A comprehensible world. New York: Random House. Blackmore, S. (1984-1985). Aim to educate, not to reduce belief (letter). Skeptical Inquirer,

9(2), 185- 186. Campbell, S. (1988). Knock (letter). British & Irish Skeptic, II(2), 28-29. Clark, J. (1 987). Ness sense and nonsense. Fate, 40(2), 99-105. Coburn, J. A. (1 987). Explorer, Spring, p. 12. Earley, G. W. (1 987). The Gate, 2(4), 13. Gardner, M. ( 1983a, July). Great moments in pseudo-science. Isaac Asimov S Science Fiction

Magazine, pp. 66-77. Gardner, M. (1983b). The whys of a philosophical scrivener, New York: Morrow. Gragg, R. (1987, April 19). Both sides of monster 'Nessie'. Sun-News (Myrtle Beach, SC). Gruenberger, F. J. (1 964). A measure for crackpots. Science, 145, 14 13- 14 15. Hoebens, P. H. ( 198 1 - 1982). Croiset and Professor TenhaeE Discrepancies in claims of clair-

voyance. Skeptical Inquirer, 6(2), 32-40. Hoffer, E. (195 1). The true believer. New York: Harper & Row. Howe, M. (1 983, December) AIPR Bulletin, 2, 16. Kelly, E. (1987). A too willing suspension of disbelief. Skeptical Inquirer, II(Spring), 293-296. Kirkus Reviews. ( 1986, December 15). Lee, C. W. (1985). Some questions about study (letter). Skeptical Inquirer, 9(3), 300. Martin, S. (1987, February). Wilson Library Bulletin, p. 70. McMahon, W. (1987, February 15). Study takes a dip into Loch Ness in search of the famed

'monster'. Sunday Press (Atlantic City, NJ), p. D l 1. Oldberg, K. (1 986, December 29). Grinnell Herald-Register, p. 5. Razdan, R., & Kielar, A. (1984-1985). Sonar and photographic searches for the Loch Ness

monster: A reassessment. Skeptical Inquirer, 9(2), 147- 1 5 8. Stein, G. (1987). American Rationalist, XXXII(3), 44. Snowy Egret. ( 1987). Spring, p. 36. Truzzi, M. (1977). From the editor: Parameters of the paranormal. The Zetetic, 1(2), 4-8. Truzzi, M. ( 1987). Zetetic ruminations on skepticism and anomalies in science. Zetetic Scholar,

12/13, 7-20. Wescott, R. (1980). Introducing anomalistics: A new field of interdisciplinary study. Kronos,

V(3), 36-50. Westrum, R. ( 1976). Scientists as experts: Observations on "Objections to Astrology." The

Zetetic, 1(1), 34-46. Westrum, R. (1 982). Social intelligence about hidden events. Knowledge: Creation, Dzflusion,

Utilization, 3, 38 1-400. Westrum, R., & Truzzi, M. (1978). Anomalies: A bibliographic introduction with some cau-

tionary remarks. Zetetic Scholar, 1(2), 69-78. Williamson, S. (1987, February 5). Bauer examines Loch Ness monster controversy. Roanoke

Times & World-News, p. C4.

JournalofScientiJic Exploration, Vol. 3, No. 1, pp. !5-26, 1989 Pergamon Press plc. Printed in the USA.

0892-33 10189 $3.00+.00 0 1989 Society for Scientific Exploration

INVITED ESSA Y

Anomalies: Analysis and Aesthetics

ROBERT G. J A H N

School of Engineering and Applied Science, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544

Abstract-In properly allying itself with traditional scientific tenets and procedures, anomalies research also risks encumbrance by scientific stodginess, scientific segregation, and scientific secularity. In particular, the contemporary rejection by established science of its own metaphysical heritage and essence precludes its further evolution into physical and biological domains where consciousness plays demonstrably active roles. Some or- derly rapprochement of subjective and objective experience and representation within the scientific paradigm will be required to make it effective in such arenas.

Three epistemological premises prompted the conception and birth of our Society for Scientific Exploration, and have guided its early life:

1. Empirical anomalies in any scientific sector can be precious indicators of the limits of established wisdom and can open trails to better understanding.

2. Study of such anomalies must be pursued with uncompromising rigor and critical conservatism.

3. Contemporary anomalies research needs an objective interdisciplinary forum for comfortable professional discussion of the phenomena and their implications.

By our membership policies, the structure and conduct of our meetings, and the design of our publications, we have attempted to implement these ideals to insure that SSE shall indeed propagate its research with at least as high a level of technical rigor and critical judgment as prevail in most mainstream scientific organizations. Yet, in this lofty commitment there lurk possibilities for severe pragmatic tensions, if the premises are not profoundly interpreted and carefully balanced.

The problem, of course, is not with the principles, per se, but with their abuse. As Dorothy Sayers reminds us, the familiar adage "the road to hell is paved with good intentions" may not so much refer to noble aspirations left unfulfilled by neglect, distraction, or incompetence, as to those pursued so slavishly that they become ends in themselves, to the point of negating, or even inverting, their original virtues. The sacred tenets of science are by no means invulnerable to such distortion by excess. As a present and pertinent

15

16 R. G. Jahn

example, we might point to the prevailing plethora of criticism concerning the conduct and interpretation of the various forms of anomalies research in which we are engaged. To the extent that such commentary is informed, fair, and constructive, it provides important restraints along the paths of understanding, and nothing that follows here should be construed to contradict the essential role of such critical analysis in the scholarly progress of our Society. But in its uninformed, unfair, or self-serving misapplication, such criticism becomes distracting, divisive, and counterproductive, and must be courageously resisted.

So also with excessive deference to other canons of the scientific process. In allying ourselves too assiduously with the prevailing content, methodology, and standards of science, we can become bound by its dogma and limited by its self-imposed horizons; in over-valuing scientific caution, we can become mired in scientific inertia. Three categories of such encumbrance that bear quite directly on the SSE situation might be termed "scientific stodginess," "scientific segregation," and "scientific secularity." Let us consider the first two very briefly, and the third in more detail.

Scientific Stodginess

Many of us have witnessed, and possibly even contributed to, legitimate professional disagreements that have escalated to matters of principle, then into ad hominem personal conflicts, and thence to outright bigotry and inanity. Many of the greatest minds of science have similarly blundered into such foibles. History records a dreary sequence of cases where scholars of immense stature, themselves having broken through entrenched pedantry to open new horizons, later obstructed scientific progress with their own brands of bombast. We think of Ernest Rutherford, who first showed the world the nuclear atom, subsequently fulminating:

It is a very poor and inefficient way of producing energy, and anyone who looks for a source of power in the transformation of atoms is talking moonshine. (Rowland, 1957, p. 129)

With equally misplaced authority, the Astronomer Royal, Richard Wooley, proclaimed one year before Sputnick, that "space travel is utter bilge." Lord Kelvin assured us that x-rays would prove a hoax and that heavier-than-air travel was impossible. Ernst Mach decried both atoms and relativity. D'Alembert distrusted probability theory, and Lavoisier and Ostwald dis- puted atomic chemistry. The list of such derailments of scholarly judgment is long and humbling.

More modern examples of similar abuse of scientific conservatism also abound. In the particular fields of our interest, we find them displayed not only by individual critics, but by a number of fully-blown professional organizations. And the tragedy lies not only in the direct encumbrance of

Anomalies: Analysis and aesthetics 17

the research they decry, but even more seriously in the adulteration of legitimate criticism that could constructively separate valid evidence from fantasy.

One obviously should not claim that short-sighted authoritarian opposition of this sort automatically guarantees the validity of the concept criticized. Nonetheless, there may well be some subtle correlation between the emotionality of a critical reaction and the viability of its target, especially when the latter seriously threatens some deeply entrenched professional or personal position. In this respect, "the lady protesteth too much" criterion may occasionally apply to Madame Science, as well.

Scientific Segregation

Modern science has proven supremely effective in systematically subdi- viding complex problems into more manageable portions, discriminating among potential mechanisms and competing concepts, analyzing elemental processes, and cataloging the results. In general, however, it has proven considerably less effective in putting the pieces back together-in synthesiz- ing new systems and unfamiliar interactions, especially when these have involved multidisciplinary aspects. To confirm this imbalance of competence, one need look no further than the number of extant specialist and sub-specialist professional societies and journals compared to those addressing interdisciplinary topics or strategies, or examine the relatively primitive states of such fields as human factors engineering, operations research, complex systems analysis, etc., or note the essential absence of any basic discipline that might qualify as "systems science."

Along with this severe conceptual subdivision come equally esoteric lan- guages that further inhibit transdisciplinary dialogues, engender professional chauvinisms, and even raise suspicions fostered by unfamiliarity and exclusion. This "Babel" of hyperspecialization is becoming a progressively greater obstruction to the comprehension and application of much conventional modern science; in the fields of research that our society encom- passes, it could be quite fatal to the entire enterprise. The cartoon of Figure 1 (courtesy of Henry H. Bauer) is a reasonably apt caricature of some comments overheard in the corridors of SSE annual meetings and, if we are totally honest, of our own private hierarchies of credibility. How often do we feel that the courageous experimentation and blazing insight featured in our own research deserves the most broad-minded respect and admiration from our colleagues, while the work some of them pursue is just too controversial and too extreme to be fully credible? Yet it is quite possible that each of our topics remains anomalous precisely because we lack the breadth of perspective to put it in that larger context of understanding wherein the phenomena can be accommodated naturally, and wherein more comprehensive theoretical models could pertain. Are we not more likely to unfold that broader

18 R. G. Jahn

Fig. 1 .*

comprehension collectively, rather than individually? And do we not need to learn how to converse collectively before we can reason collectively?

Scientific Secularity The third, and possibly most severe, class of impediment imposed by the

excessively rigid stance of modern science, and the one on which we shall dwell a bit, devolves from its categorical and contradictory denial of its own metaphysical essence and heritage. The very word "metaphysical" has come to carry distasteful or suspicious connotations for most scientific purists, and is usually applied pejoratively in any research context. As we use the term here, however, it is simply meant to encompass all subjective, intuitive, impressionistic, or aesthetic aspects of a scientific situation which, while not submitting comfortably to prevailing catalogues and formalisms, nonetheless are found empirically, or hypothesized heuristically, to be relevant to the given event or process. The historical precedents for inclusion of such factors in scientific study and applications are floribundant beyond question. Ancient science, from prehistoric civilizations through the Egyptians, Babylonians, Orientals, and classical Greeks, was an inextricable admixture of mystical, magical, and analytical manipulation that served for millennia to undergird the technological needs of those societies. Medieval alchemy likewise propagated as a sacred marriage of the Hermetic philosophical tradition with the early methods of analytical chemistry. Even the first

-- - -

* Reproduced with the permission of, and appreciation to, Professor Henry H. Bauer.


echelon of the analytical astronomers-Copernicus, Tycho Brahe, Kepler, Galileo-now popularly represented as breaking through the suffocating fog of theological dogma with sound scientific methodology, actually carried forth much of the same metaphysical tradition. Note how Copernicus justified his heliocentric universe:

In the middle of all sits the Sun enthroned. In this most beautiful temple, could we place this luminary in any better position from which he can illuminate the whole at once? He is rightly called the Lamp, the Mind, the Ruler of the Universe: Hermes Trismegistus names him the Visible God, Sophocles' Electra calls him the All-See- ing. So the Sun sits as upon a royal throne, ruling his children, the planets which circle around him. (Bronowski, 1973, pp. 196- 197)

Kepler similarly rationalized his orbital geometry:

. . . when intersected by a plane, the sphere displays in this section the circle, the genuine image of the created mind, placed in command of the body which it is appointed to rule; and this circle is to the sphere as the human mind is to the Mind Divine . . . (Pauli, 1955, p. 16 1 )

Even the mighty Isaac Newton, on whose classical mechanics and optics modern science is irrevocably based, has been accurately described by one biographer as:

. . . not the first of the age of reason. He was the last of the magicians, the last of the Babylonians and Sumerians, the last great mind which looked out on the visible and intellectual world with the same eyes as those who began to build our intellectual inheritance rather less than 10,000 years ago. (Keynes, 1963, p. 3 11)

and by another as that premier scientist who regarded the ultimate mechanism of change in the universe to reside in the "mystery by which mind could control matter" (Kubrin, 198 1, p. 1 1 3).

Ah, we say, but did not Sir Francis Bacon, the Age of Enlightenment, the Scientific Revolution, and the formation of the Royal Society clean all of this naive metaphysical junk off of the work tables of modern science? Not quite. It is true that Bacon, the acknowledged father of the modern scientific method, insisted on a critical dialogue between hard empirical evidence and sound analytical logic, but he then proceeded to apply such methods to the study of telepathic dreams, psychic healing, and "experiments touching transmission of spirits and the force of the imagination" (Walker, 1972, p. 127). In his Charter for the Royal Society, Robert Hooke indeed rejected "meddling with Divinity, Metaphysics, Moralls, Politicks, Grammar, Rhet- oric, or Logick" (Lyons, 1944, p. 41), but then went on himself to study, write, and lecture on keenly metaphysical topics. His colleague Robert Boyle, author of "The Skeptical Chymist," retained an intense commitment to the Hermetic heritage (More, 1962), and the Royal Society as a whole

20 R. G. Jahn

promoted scientific study of astrology, alchemy, prophecy, magic, and witchcraft.

To be sure, toward the close of the 19th century, the profound triumphs of electromagnetic wave theory prompted the prevailing physics establishment to wax rather smug about the omnipotence of deterministic, causal science, apparently overlooking the intuitive conviction of natural symmetry that had led Maxwell to propose his subtle, but all-important, displacement current. But the complacency was short-lived, for over the following decades there erupted a host of new physical anomalies-black-body radiation, atomic and molecular line spectra, photoelectric and Compton effects, specific heats of solids, and numerous others, that simply could not be swept under the classical scientific rug, and the enigmatic era of modern physics was at hand.

An enigmatic era indeed, featuring quanta and photons, wave/particle dualities, uncertainty and exclusion principles, probability-of-observation wave mechanics, and countless other counter-intuitive concepts that reim- bued physical science with a distinctly metaphysical aroma. And none recognized the philosophical inescapability and pragmatic impact of this dimension more profoundly than the patriarchs of modern physics themselves. The father of their clan, Max Planck, courageously broached the fundamental issue:

Once we have decided that the law of causality is by no means a necessary element in the process of human thought, we have made a mental clearance for the approach to the question of its validity in the world of reality. (Planck, 1932, p. 1 17)

Neils Bohr responded with his own radical conviction:

. . . causality may be considered as a mode of perception by which we reduce our sense impressions to order. (Bohr, 196 1 , p. 1 16)

Erwin Schrodinger took a yet more vigorous metaphysical position:

The world is given to me only once, not one existing and one perceived. Subject and object are only one. The barrier between them cannot be said to have broken down as a result of recent experience in the physical sciences, for this barrier does not exist. . . . Mind has erected the objective outside world of the natural philosopher out of its own stuff. (Schrodinger, 1967, p. 137 and p. 13 1 )

And Louis de Broglie, the Prince of particulate probability, closely presaged our own present convictions about the role of consciousness in the establishment of reality:

Science is therefore a strange sort of penetration into a world which through human consciousness and reason has learned to become aware of itself. (de Broglie, 1962, p. 220)

Anomalies: Analysis and aesthetics 2 1

Even in the most exact of all the natural sciences, in Physics, the need for margins of indeterminateness has repeatedly become apparent-a fact which, it seems to us, is worthy of the attention of philosophers, since it may throw a new and illuminating light on the way in which the idealizations formed by our reason become adaptable to Reality. (de Broglie, 1939, pp. 28 1-282)

There is no substitute for thorough reading of the extensive personal writings of these and the other pioneers of modern physics to acquire full appreciation of the implicit and explicit mystical dimensions of this era of science. And it is an era that is far from closed. Even now, we continue to be confronted by latter-day EPR paradoxes and action-at-a-distance experiments that severely contradict the premises of local causality. In our concep- tualization and linguistic representation of sub-nuclear phenomena on one extreme-quarks, gluons, strangeness, charm, and so on-and of astro- physical and cosmological processes on the other-quasars, black holes, cosmic strings, pulsating bubble universes, etc.-there smolder some of the same metaphysical propensities that were more explicitly enflamed in Hermes's precepts or the alchemist's forge.

And we certainly must include in this list the research encompassed by this Society, which in many of its projects addresses frankly metaphysical effects. For example, data on manlmachine anomalies like those shown in Figure 2 have been presented in this forum on several occasions (Jahn, Dunne, & Nelson, 1987). The particular case shown pertains to the interaction of one human operator with a microelectronic random event generator (REG) in a very carefully controlled sequence of experiments extending over nine years. Plotted are the accumulated deviations of the output of the machine from chance expectation, obtained under a tripolar protocol wherein the operator alternately attempted to achieve a high number of

Fig. 2. REG cumulative deviations from chance, one operator.

- 10 - 5

-8000 I I 1 I I

10000 20000 30000 40000 50000 55100 NUMBER OF TRIALS

2 2 R. G. Jahn

counts (HI), a low number of counts (LO), or the chance number of counts (BL), interspersed in a random sequence of efforts, with all other technical and procedural aspects of the experiment held identical. As can be seen from the figure, the null-intention or baseline effort yields a string of data oscil- lating stochastically about the theoretical chance mean. The high-intention efforts produce results displaying the same sort of stochastic oscillations, but now superimposed on a systematic trend toward ever increasing excess above chance. The low-intention efforts show a similar, but even more substantial trend in the opposite direction. On this figure, the dashed parab- olas represent the loci of .05 likelihood of achieving the given excursions by chance, and the scale on the right ordinate shows the full range of terminal probabilities against chance for this huge sequence of data. Specifically, for the more than 30,000,000 bits processed in the more than 50,000 tripolar trials of this operator's program, the likelihood of obtaining the displayed split of the HI and LO data by chance is less than a few parts per million.

More than 30 other operators have performed this same experiment. Some achieve much like the example shown in Figure 2; some are successful in only one direction of effort, or in the other; some display only chance results; a few achieve extra-chance results in directions opposite to their intentions. But despite these major differences in detail, in most cases each operator's pattern is serially consistent with itself, i.e., internally replicable in the statistical sense, so much so that we refer to the individual cumulative deviation graphs as operator "signatures."

In some cases, these signatures are sensitive to secondary technical parameters of the experiment, such as whether the operator is allowed to choose the direction of effort or is instructed by some randomization criterion, or whether the operator is allowed to initiate each trial at his comfort or is presented with a regularly spaced sequence of automatic trials, or whether on-line feedback is provided and in what form. In other cases, however, the signatures appear insensitive to such options. Nonetheless, if the results of all operators, obtained under all permutations of these secondary parameters, are combined in a grand concatenation, the cumulative deviations still compound to highly significant statistical departures from chance behavior (Figure 3).

Although these REG data are clearly operator-specific, intention-specific, and in some cases parameter-specific, curiously they seem to be much less device-specific. Several other similarly extensive experiments have been performed using different microelectronic noise sources, pseudo-random sources constructed from arrays of microelectronic shift registers, pro- grammed computer algorithms, and even macroscopic mechanical ana- logue devices. In a number of cases, an operator's signature of performance is found to transfer with remarkable similarity from one class of device to another. For example, Figure 4 shows a comparison of the cumulative deviation signature of one operator on a microelectronic REG, a shift-register pseudo REG, and a macroscopic Random Mechanical Cascade (RMC)

Anomalies: Analysis and aesthetics 2 3

- 10000 1 I I I I I

50000 100000 150000 200000 250000 NUMBER OF TRIALS

Fig. 3. REG cumulative deviations from chance, all operators.

respectively. Note the perseverance of the substantial low-intention efforts, the less substantial but characteristic high-intention trace with its initial strength and subsequent decline, and the well-behaved null-intention results.

A great deal more data from experiments of this sort could be shown, where the only independent variables of consequence are the individual operators and their directions of effort (Dunne, Nelson, & Jahn, 1988). Although these illustrations have been drawn from our own research base, many other studies (referenced in Jahn, Dunne, & Nelson, 1987), including some presented to this Society over the past several years, would seem to lead toward similar conclusions. Obviously, many more experiments of this class, including independent replications of those already reported, are now required, for unless such results can be directly discredited, the need for some metaphysical component in any model attempting to explicate, or even to correlate, the data seems unavoidable.

Summary

What is the point of this potpourri of historical, philosophical, and scientific musing? It is not, of course, a plea for return to blind superstition or superficial mysticism, nor for compromise with soft-shell science of any form. Rather, it is a suggestion that research such as our society fosters would be better served by a more complementary balance between our objective and subjective perspectives, of much the same sort that Bohr proposed:

. . . we must, indeed, remember that the nature of our consciousness brings about a complementary relationship, in all domains of knowledge, between the analysis of a

R. G. Jahn

I a ) REG 4 10-4

NUMBER OF TRIALS

1 b) PSEUDO - REG -I .OO I

2000 -

--------_______ ------*_____ -------___ - .05 - 2000-

-4000 0 5000 10000 15000 20000

NUMBER OF TRIALS

0 50 100 150 200 250 RUN NUMBER

Fig. 4. Cumulative deviations, one operator on three experiments.


concept and its immediate application. . . . in associating the psychical and physical aspects of existence, we are concerned with a special relationship of complementarity which it is not possible thoroughly to understand by one-sided application either of physical or psychological laws. . . . only a renunciation in this respect will enable us to comprehend . . . that harmony which is experienced as free will and analyzed in terms of causality. (Bohr, 196 1 , pp. 20-24)

Heisenberg also offered a similar generalization of the complementarity principle:

We realize that the situation of complementarity is not confined to the atomic world alone; we meet it when we reflect about a decision and the motives for our decision or when we have the choice between enjoying music and analyzing its structure. (Heisenberg, 1 95 8, p. 179)

and Pauli specifically addressed it to our context:

On the one hand, the idea of complementarity in modern physics has demonstrated to us, in a new kind of synthesis, that the contradiction in the applications of old contrasting conceptions (such as particle and wave) is only apparent; on the other hand the employability of old alchemical ideas in the psychology of Jung points to a deeper unity of psychical and physical occurrences. To us . . . the only acceptable point of view appears to be the one that recognizes both sides of reality-the quantitative and the qualitative, the physical and the psychical-as compatible with each other, and can embrace them simultaneously. . . . It would be most satisfactory of all if physics and psyche could be seen as complementary aspects of the same reality. (Pauli, 1955, pp. 208-2 10)

In short, our plea is for more formal acknowledgement of the pervasive metaphysical stream that continues to permeate and nourish much of our contemporary science and technology. This acknowledgement is not likely to be initiated by any of the well-established sectors of modern analytical research. These are too structured and hierarchical, too busy and comfortable, and admittedly too effective, to confront this dimension without considerably greater demonstration of its local relevance and provincial benefits. But within the traffic pattern of SSE, we not only have the opportunity and the disposition, but very possibly the necessity, of reengaging the analytical and the aesthetic aspects of scholarly science. Manlmachine anomalies like those displayed in Figures 2-4, for example, are not likely to be ren- dered theoretically comprehensible without some disciplined inclusion of the role of consciousness as an active ingredient in the establishment of reality. One modest attempt at such a model, presented earlier to SSE, allows consciousness the same wavelparticle duality it has ascribed to various physical systems, and then invokes the formalisms of quantum wave mechanics to represent interactions of consciousness with its environment (Jahn & Dunne, 1986, 1987).

Clearly, any attempt to generalize the analytical mechanics of science to encompass the metaphysical mechanics of consciousness is a monumental

26 R. G. Jahn

task, fraught with all manner of seductive and dangerous sinkholes of naivetk. But it is a task that is ultimately unavoidable. As Carl Friedrich von Weizsacker put it nearly 50 years ago:

Two fundamental functions of consciousness underlie every statement of physics: cognition and volition. (von Weizsacker, 194 1, p. 489)

We can and, wherever possible, we should keep trying to accommodate our growing assortment of empirical anomalies within the concepts and formalisms of established science. But when this fails, and when all legitimate attempts to disqualify the anomalous data subside, there is no alternative but to expand the conceptual base. Like Sherlock Holmes, when confronted by an array of valid but irreconcilable evidence, we must boldly and cleverly redefine the question. In so doing, however primitively and incompletely, we shall not only enlighten some of our own enigmas and advance our parochial understanding, but we may well offer all of science a precious key to a more powerful future paradigm for many other areas of its endeavor.

References

Bohr, N. ( 196 1 ). Atomic theory and the description of nature. Cambridge: The University Press. Bronowski, J. (1973). The ascent qfman. Boston and Toronto: Little Brown and Co. de Broglie, L. (1939). Matter and light: The new physics. New York: W. W. Norton. de Broglie, L. (1962). New perspectives in physics (trans.. A. J. Pomerans). New York: Basic

Books. Dunne, B. J., Nelson, R. D., & Jahn, R. G. (1988). Operator-related anomalies in a random

mechanical cascade. Journal of Scientljc Exploration, 2(2), pp. 155-1 79. Heisenberg, W. (1958). Physics and philosophy: The revolution in modern physics. New York:

Harper and Row, Harper Torchbooks. Jahn, R. G., & Dunne, B. J. (1986). On the quantum mechanics of consciousness, with appli-

cation to anomalous phenomena. Foundations of Physics, 16, 72 1-772. Jahn, R. G., & Dunne, B. J. (1987). Margins qfreality: The role ofconsciousness in thephysical

world. San Diego, New York, London: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. Jahn, R. G., Dunne, B. J., & Nelson, R. D. (1987). Engineering anomalies research. Journal of

Scient$c Exploration, 1(1), pp. 21-50. Keynes, J. M. ( 1963). Newton, the man. In G. Keynes (Ed.), Essays in biography(pp. 3 10-323).

New York: W. W. Norton & Co. Kubrin, D. (1 98 1). Newton's inside out! Magic, class struggle, and the rise of mechanism in the

west. In H. Woolf (Ed.), The anal-vtic spirit: Essays in the history of science (pp. 96-12 1). Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press.

Lyons, H. (1944). The Royal Society 1660-1940. Cambridge: The University Press. More, L. T. (1962). Isaac Newton: A biography. New York: Dover Publications. Planck, M. (1932). Where is sciencegoing?(trans., J. Murphy). New York: W. W. Norton & Co. Pauli, W. (1955). The influence of archetypal ideas on Kepler's theories. In C. G. Jung & W.

Pauli, The interpretation of nature and thepsyche(pp. 147-240). (trans., R. F. C. Hull). New York: Pantheon Books (Bollingen Series LI).

Rowland, J. ( 1 957). Ernest Rutherford. New York: The Philosophical Library. Schrodinger, E. (1967). Mind and matter. In What is life? and Mind and matter. Cambridge:

The University Press. Walker, D. P. (1972). Francis Bacon and Spiritus. In A. G. Debus (Ed.), Science, medicine and

society in the renaissance (pp. 12 1 - 1 30). New York: Neale Watson Academic Publications, Inc. (Science History Publications).

von Weizdcker, C. F. ( 194 1-42). Zur deutung der Quantenmechanik. Zeitschrzfi fur Physik, 11 8,489-509.

Journul c!f'Screntifrr Explorulion. Vol. 3, No. I , pp. 27-42, 1989 Pergamon Press plc. Printed in the USA.


Trends in the Study of Out-of-Body Experiences: An Overview of Developments Since the Nineteenth Century

CARLOS S. ALVARADO

Institute for Parapsychology, Box 684 7, College Station, Durham, NC 2 7708

Abstract-A review of conceptual and research trends in the literature on out-of-body experiences is presented for the period of mid-nineteenth century to 1987. The discussion emphasizes psychological, psychiatric, and parapsychological publications. The material shows recurrent topics, but there are also some differences, particularly regarding more detailed conceptual discussions and a higher frequency of research projects in recent times. Systematic research and testable theories have been presented mainly in the last two decades. This may be related to the revival of interest in cognitive variables and altered states of consciousness in psychology during the same time period.

Out-of-body experiences (OBEs), defined as "an experience in which a person seems to perceive the world from a location outside his physical body" (Blackmore, 1982a, p. I), have received considerable attention in recent years. This is evident in a variety of books (e.g., Gabbard & Twemlow, 1984; Irwin, 1985), and articles in psychiatry (e.g., Tobacyk & Mitchell, 1987; Twemlow, Gabbard, & Jones, 1982), and parapsychology journals (e.g., Blackmore, 1984a; Stanford, 1987).

Although a number of publications present reviews of OBE research findings and concepts (e.g., Alvarado, 1986b; Blackmore, 1982a; Irwin, 1985), there is a need for a briefer and more systematic discussion of the development of research trends and concepts as opposed to more summaries of research findings. Accordingly, in the present paper I will focus on trends, as opposed to findings, in publications on OBEs published since the middle of the nineteenth century. I hope that this general, and admittedly brief, review will be helpful to convey to the reader a sense of the main ideas and literature of the field. For convenience I have organized the material into four chronological periods: ( 1) the nineteenth century; (2) 1900- 1939; (3 ) 1940- 1969; (4) 1970- 1987. These division are to some extent arbitrary and should not be taken to represent literal epochs, only general trends.

In this paper I will emphasize some aspects to the exclusion of others. The following material will not be included: ( 1 ) the experiences and theoretical

Acknowledgements. Research for the completion of this paper was supported in part by a grant from the Parapsychology Foundation. I wish to thank Nancy L. Zingrone for useful editorial suggestions.

2 8 C. S. Alvarado

ideas of persons who have had multiple OBEs or who claim to be able to have them at will (e.g., Muldoon & Carrington, 1929); (2) discussions based on "psychic" sources of information (e.g., Crookall, 1960); (3) discussions of ideas on the existence and nature of subtle bodies unrelated to OBEs (e.g., Poortman, 19541 1978); (4) accounts of attempts to detect subtle bodies when it is not clear if the subject had the experience of being out of the body (e.g., Durville, 1909); (5) anthropological discussions of belief in OBEs (e.g., Sheils, 1978); (6) discussions of autoscopy-or seeing an apparition of oneself-with no OBE elements (e.g., Lhermitte, 195 1); and (7) studies of depersonalization experiences when it is not clear that OBEs are involved (e.g., Noyes et a]., 1977).

Nineteenth Century

Most of the early (pre-1880s) views on OBEs emphasized the idea that something-the spirit or the soul-exteriorized from the body and either stayed close to the physical body or visited distant locations or dimensions.' An anonymous (1 853, 1854) writer expressed this viewpoint in the Ameri- can Phrenological Journal. In the writer's view the OBE may have indicated "that while the soul is normally connected with the body, and is in a great degree dependent upon it, it still may exist as a separate entity, entirely independent of the physical organism" (Anonymous, 1854, p. 8 1). Similar ideas were presented by Owen (1 860), who wrote about the projection of a "spiritual portion" (p. 347) of the body, and by many other writers (e.g., Brittan, 1864; Cahagnet, 1847- 18481 1850; Crowe, 1848; Jung-Stilling, 1808/185 1).

The concept of the "double" or subtle body was used by many writers to explain spontaneous psychic phenomena during this period. Some of the phenomena accounted by the presumed action of this agent were apparitions of living persons (e.g., Aksakof, 1895; D'Assier, 1887; Kardec, 186 1 ; Stead, 1896). These apparitions sometimes have an OBE component.

In his discussion of theoretical problems to account for apparitions and particularly collectively perceived ones, Frederic W. H. Myers, a classical scholar and psychical researcher, proposed that persons having OBEs may be perceived as apparitions by some sort of nonphysical modification of space. The apparition, according to Myers, appeared to be "diffused from a 'radiant point,' or phantasmogenetic focus, corresponding with that region of space where the distant agent conceives himself to be exercising his supernormal perception" (Myers, 1886, p. 29 1).

Myers' ideas, to which he returned later (Myers, 1903), were a reaction to Edmund Gurney's concepts of apparitions. Gurney regarded the OBE as an hallucination of the pathological type and proposed and developed the concept of telepathically induced hallucinations to explain diverse types of spontaneous ESP experiences, particularly apparitions of the living and

Trends in the study of OBEs 29

reciprocal apparitions2 (Gurney, Myers, & Podmore, 1886). Others, such as Podmore ( 1 894) and Mrs. Sidgwick ( 189 1) also supported telepathic hallucinatory explanation^.^

This period presented little systematic research. Exceptions are Gurney's case collection of reciprocal apparition cases and attempts at presenting an analysis of case characteristics (Gurney, Myers, & Podmore, 1886), and the induction under hypnosis of so-called "travelling clairvoyance" by others. The latter were cases in which hypnotized subjects were instructed to visit a distant location and report events occurring there, or describe the location itself. This type of "experiment" may be considered as early attempts to test for ESP during OBEs (e.g., Backman, 189 1 ; Barth, 1849; Elliotson, 1845; Haddock, 185 1).

While some, like Cahagnet ( 1847- 18481 1850), believed that the exteriorization of some aspect of the subjects explained travelling clairvoyance, others proposed different explanations. Richet (1 887) held the opinion that the experience was created by the subject's memory and imagination processes. Podmore (1 894) felt that instructions given to the subjects shaped the report into "travelling" imagery.

Overview

The nineteenth century writings on OBEs were characterized by theoretical concepts, particularly those postulating the exteriorization of some aspect of the person having the experience (the spirit, double, or subtle body). However, alternate explanations postulating the concept of telepathic hallucinations were also defended. Gurney's case collection and the attempts of others to induce travelling clairvoyance by hypnosis present the first efforts towards research on OBEs.

While numerous case reports (e.g., Anonymous, 1929; Haning, 1932), case collections, and discussions of specific groups of cases were published during this period (e.g., Bozzano, 19341 1937; Leaning, 1928; Mattisien, 193 1 ; Muldoon, 1936), there was practically no empirical research on the phenomena. Possible exceptions are Cornillier's ( 192 1 ) travelling clairvoyance studies, and Wallace's (1925) report of attempts to move objects during OBEs.

Also interesting was a paper by Hart and Hart (1933) presenting previously published cases of OBE apparitions and comparing them to cases of apparitions of deceased persons. They wrote, "some apparitions of living persons seem to have been self-conscious personalities, while others seem to have retained only vague memories, or no memories whatever, of their

30 C. S. Alvarado

As will be seen in the following discussion this period is an extension and development of previous theoretical concepts proposed as explanations of OBEs.

The concept of projection of a subtle body received considerable attention. This interest was kindled by, among other factors, the attempts at the physical detection of subtle bodies (e.g., Durville, 1909; deRochas, 1908; see also Alvarado, 1980), and by numerous publications of autobiographical accounts of persons who claimed the ability to induce the experience. These writings emphasized phenomenological aspects of the experience such as travels to distant places and "dimensions" (e.g., Fox, 1939; Lancelin, n.d.; Muldoon & Carrington, 1929; Turvey, 19 1 1).

Funk (1907) wrote that OBE apparitions indicated the "power of the , human ego to manifest itself objectively at a distance" (p. 179). Hans I Driesch (193211933) seemed to be open to the concept in one of his books.

Other authors such as Bret (1939), Mattisien (193 l), and Muldoon (1936) embraced the concept of the double to explain OBEs as well as other psychic phenomena.

The work of Italian psychical researcher Ernesto Bozzano is of particular interest in this regard. In a series of publications Bozzano ( 19 1 1, 19341 1 937, 1938) presented a classification of aspects of the phenomena - of "bilocation," by which he meant a variety of manifestations for which the concept of an externalization of or action by a subtle body was offered as an explanation. The classification included OBEs, the phantom limb sensation of am- putees, autoscopy, observations of OBE apparitions, and observations of other apparitions of the living, and apparitions and luminous phenomena observed at deathbeds. As Bozzano (1938) wrote:

The phenomena of bilocation demonstrate that within the "somatic body" there exists an indwelling "etheric body," which in rare circumstances is able to release itself temporarily from the "somatic body". The inevitable inference follows that if the etheric body is able to separate temporarily preserving its consciousness intact, we must end by recognizing that when it separates definitively at the crisis of death, the individual spirit will continue to exist. (p. 10

Bozzano's concern with the implications of the OBE to the subject of survival of bodily death5 can be found in many other publications in the psychical research literature (e.g., Hill, 19 18; Mattisien, 193 1 ; Myers, 1903).

Psychological explanations of OBEs were proposed by other researchers. Hyslop ( 19 12) accepted the ESP component of the experience but attributed the OB sensation to the tendency of the subconscious mind to dramatize images of locality that give the impression that the subject was in a different physical location. Others considered the OBE a mere dream (Richet, 1922), and a hallucination or the product of the imagination (Osty, 1930).6

Bret ( 1 939) accepted the idea of a subtle body to explain some OBEs, but conceded that some specific cases were dreams or fantasies. Watters (1 935)

Trends in the study of OBEs 3 1

also accepted the projection of a subtle body (or, as he called it, the "intra- atomic quantity"), but argued that this could only occur at death. In his opinion accounts of OBEs were to be explained as imagination and hallucinations.

Psychophysiological explanations were proposed by a few writers. Schmeing (1 938) explained flying dreams by external physical stimuli perceived during sleep by withdrawal of blood from the brain that lowered the body's pressure and produced a sensation of lightness. He believed that similar factors of a greater magnitude could induce an OBE. Also, psychological aspects such as the realization that the body was no longer functional helped to induce the experience.

In trying to make sense of an OBE he experienced, Charles Quartier (in Osty, 1930) speculated on the importance of internal bodily sensations when he wrote that the OBE was "the dramatization, in visual form, of cenesthesic sensations" (p. 19 1, my translation). Mairie ( 1933) agreed with this hypothesis.

Overview

As in the previous years, there was little by way of research, and conceptual discussions predominated. In depth discussions of specific cases, or groups of cases, was also an important development. Although concepts discussed in this period were similar to those of the nineteenth century, they were somewhat more detailed in their propositions, particularly regarding supposed psychological aspects of the phenomena. Another important development was the introduction of psychophysiological theorizing.

In these years the trend towards more systematic study increased. Case collections of OBEs and surveys of published cases were used to study phenomenological aspects of the OBE and to argue for the objective nature of the experience (e.g., Battersby, 1942; Crookall, 196 1 ; Hart, 1954; Muld- don & Carrington, 195 1).

Particularly important and influential were the publications of American sociologist Hornell Hart and English geologist Robert Crookall. Hart focused on OBE cases with ostensibly veridical or ESP elements published mainly in the psychical research literature (Hart, 1954).7 An important methodological development was the use of a scale to measure the level of evidentiality of the reports. In Hart's words: "The scale developed rules out at the start all cases which do not present evidence that the individual who had the psychic experience reported its details before receiving evidence of their veridicality" (p. 125). The cases were classified under the following categories: ( I ) cases induced by hypnosis; (2) willful projection by concen-

3 2 C. S. Alvarado

tration; (3) projection by methods more complex than concentration; (4) spontaneous apparitions of the living corresponding to OB sensations or visions of the experiencer; (5) other cases. Hart listed eight characteristics of OBEs in his collection, and suggested that hypnosis should be seriously considered as a means to induce OBES,' since it seemed to be "the method most likely to produce full and verifiable" (p. 144) experiences. In later publications Hart (1957; Hart & Collaborators, 1956) returned to similar topics and compared the phenomenology of OB apparitions (conscious apparitions of the living) with apparitions of deceased persons. In one of these papers he published the first systematic percentage breakdown of OBE case characteristics (Hart & Collaborators, 1 956).

Crookall's work, published in a series of papers (e.g., 1963, 1966, 1967a), and books (e.g., 196 1, 1964, 1965) was an attempt to support subtle body concepts of OBEs by analyzing phenomenological aspects of OBE reports obtained mainly from the spiritualist, psychical research, and occult litera- t u r e ~ . ~ Crookall alleged that he had found specific OBE characteristics that differentiated the experience from hallucinations, dreams, and other subjective phenomena.

The first survey on OBE incidence was conducted by Hart ( 1954) with a college student sample. His study was followed by surveys done by Banks (1 962), and Green (1 960, 1966, 1967, 1968). Green's work is particularly important because she tried to see if there was any relationship between OBEs, sex, and academic background ( 1966, 1967). She also studied OBE phenomenology with new cases, as opposed to reanalysing previously published ones ( 1968).

In 1942 Collins commented that the study of OBEs was "a field for experimental research, which so far has been strangely neglected" (Collins, 1942, p. 74). However, soon after some studies were reported, among them the observations of "bilocation" phenomena with Italian subject Pasqualina Pezzola (Cassoli, 1954), and attempts to study ESP during hypnotically induced OBEs (e.g., Bulford, n.d.; Roll, 1975). Charles T. Tart (1 967, 1968, 1969b) conducted the most important and influential studies of the period. Subjects who claimed to have frequent spontaneous OBEs or to be able to induce the experience at will were tested for ESP and monitored on psychophysiological variables such as EEG, EKG, and REM. These studies represented a transition from older and simpler to newer and more sophisticated approaches. As Irwin (1985) stated, Tart's studies "often are regarded as seminal in restoring modern parapsychologists' attention to the phenomenon of the OBE" (p. 66).1°

Conceptually, many writers speculated on OBEs implications for survival research. While Hart (1967) and Whiteman (1965) argued for the OBE's importance as an indication of survival, others like Ducasse (1 96 1) and J. B. Rhine (1960) argued that the experience was inconclusive evidence of sur-


idea that the phenomenon was dependent on the physical body for its manifestation.

Other conceptual issues included discussions of the projection of subtle bodies and purely psychological explanations. Crookall (1967b), Hart (1967), and other writers (e.g., De Boni, 1960; Dumas, 1947) speculated on the existence of a subtle body (see also Whiteman's [I9671 concepts of non-physical dimensions). But others, like Louisa E. Rhine (1958) were not convinced. Rhine reacted to Hart's ideas by maintaining that the explanation of OBEs was "still in question and certainly open to more than one interpretation" (p. 65). Both Broad (1959) and Eastman (1962) showed skepticism to subtle body ideas. In Gardner Murphy's opinion OBEs were "not very far from the known terrain of general psychology, which we are beginning to understand more and more without recourse to the paranormal" (Murphy with Dale, 196 1, p. 287).

Among specific psychological concepts offered by other writers, Tyrrell (1 9421 1953) interpreted OBEs as hallucinatory constructs of the subconscious levels of personality of two or more persons working together, at a distance, through ESP means. (Tyrrell's ideas were an extension and further elaboration of the old telepathic concepts to explain reciprocal apparitions.)

Aspects such as body image (Webb, 1960), vividness of visual imagery (Burt, 1968), and psychodynamic workings such as dramatization of the fear of death and reenactment of birth fantasies (Fodor, 1959), were also discussed. (See also the publications of J a E [ 19631, Menninger-Lerchenthal [ 19541, and Rawcliffe [ 19521).

Equally interesting was the treatment of physiological variables by Burt (1968), Jung (Jung & Pauli, 1955), and Lippman (1953).

Overview

Attempts to conduct systematic research were more frequent in these years than in previous ones, as can be seen by the appearance of the first surveys, systematic case collections analyses, and psychophysiological experiments. Conceptual issues continued relatively unchanged, although there was a slight increase of psychological speculations.

The level of activity in these years was unprecedented. Obvious evidence are two symposia on the topic in parapsychology conventions (Morris et al., 1978; Palmer, et al., 1974), and the publication of the first specialized scientifically oriented monographs on the topic (Gabbard & Twemlow, 1984; Irwin, 1985).

The psychological approach has predominated but not to the complete exclusion of other ideas. Some writers have continued to present ideas based

34 C. S. Alvarado

on supposed projection of subtle bodies or on other aspects of personality (e.g., Becker, 1983; Giovetti, 1983; Tart, 1979; Vieira, 1986). This type of theorizing, however, is in minority in academic circles (for criticisms see Blackmore, 1 982a; Irwin, 1 985; and J. B. Rhine, 1974). ' ' Some variations of these concepts have included ideas of a nonphysical or "higher space" dimension, as seen in the papers published by Greene ( 1983), Poynton ( 19-75), and Whiteman (1975).

A great number of authors have offered psychological concepts to explain OBEs. Some proposed that the OBE is a defense mechanism designed to deal with the threat of death (Ehrenwald, 1974), or the loss of love (Reed, 1974). Others discussed the phenomenon in terms of archetypal images (Fisher, 1975), distortion of the body image (Horowitz, 1970), depersonalization (Whitlock, 1978), lucid dreams (LaBerge, 1985), or a variety of concepts basically postulating that the OBE is a hallucinatory creation aris- ing under different psychological factors (e.g., Brent, 1979; Capel, 1978; Gabbard & Twemlow, 1984; Zusne & Jones, 1982).

Three writers have proposed the most important psychological ideas of the period. John Palmer (1978) conceptualized the OBE basically as a response to a body image change causing a threat to individual identity. Susan J. Blackmore (1 984b) proposed that OBEs were a model of reality created by the organism using internal cognitive resources when the models dependent on sensory input were disrupted. Finally, Harvey J. Irwin (1985) emphasized attentional cognitive processes and attenuation of somatic sensory input, as well as a hypothetical synesthetic process accounting for a transformation of one sensory mode experience for another. These ideas were more detailed than the rest of the above mentioned speculations and presented testable predictions.

During these years there was also an unprecedented level of research following some of the above mentioned psychological concepts. In several surveys researchers explored possible relationships of OBEs to imagery and attentional capacities (e.g., Blackmore, 1982c, 1987; Irwin, 1980; Myers et al., 1983), to altered states of consciousness and related practices and experiences (e.g., Blackmore, 1982b; Kohr, 1980; Palmer, 1979), and to personality variables (e.g., Irwin, 198 1, Jones, Gabbard, & Twemlow, 1984; Myers et al., 1983; Tobacyk & Mitchell, 1987). In other studies attempts were made to obtain increasingly detailed information on OBE phenomenological characteristics (e.g., Alvarado, 1984; Blackmore, 1984a; Giovetti, 1983; Poynton, 1973, including ESP claims (e.g., Alvarado, 1986a).

Information on demographic aspects (e.g., Kohr, 1980; Palmer, 1979), and physiological variables such as form of birth (Blackmore, 1983b), and proneness to migraine (Irwin, 1983), was also collected. ' *

Interest in experimentation also followed the predominantly psychological approach. Researchers explored ESP scores during claimed laboratory OBEs (e.g., Harary & Solfvin, 1977; Palmer & Vassar, 1974), as well as different psychological variables such as expectation, the effect of induction


procedures (e.g., Palmer & Lieberman, 1975; Palmer & Vassar, 1974), and other factors (e.g., Smith & Irwin, 198 1 ; Nash, Lynn, & Stanley, 1984).

Experimental attempts to measure psychophysiological correlates of the experience (e.g., Morris et al., 1978; Osis & Mitchell, 1977), and to test in a physical way (e.g., by vibrations or the detection of electromagnetic activity) projection models of OBEs have also been published (Morris et al., 1978; Osis & McCormick, 1980).

Overview

While most of the elements found in previous years were present in the last period, the amount of serious and organized research and theory building was unprecedented. The psychological approach predominated in both conceptual and research developments. Additionally, the first psychological OBE theories with clearly testable predictions were presented.

Discussion

In this paper I have outlined briefly the trends of over a century of OBE research and theorization. Although several features have recurred throughout the periods discussed (such as the use of subtle bodies and psychological constructs as explanatory concepts), there have been differences in the frequency of systematic and empirical studies in different time periods. Partic- ularly noticeable are the differences between the more recent years and previous ones. The modern period has a higher frequency of psychological concepts and empirical research, and consequently, has seen an increase in publications on OBEs in parapsychology and in the journals of other disciplines (e.g., Nash, Lynn, & Stanley, 1984; Twemlow, Gabbard, & Jones, 1982). This last development suggests that the OBE is no longer of interest only to parapsychologists but, as other human experiences and altered states of consciousness, it is beginning to pique the interest of a variety of disciplines that deal with anomalous psychological behaviors and reported experiences.

To some extent interest in OBEs in recent years may be seen as the consequence of conceptual changes during the 1960s and the 1970s in psychology (e.g., Holt, 1964; Tart, 1969a), and parapsychology (e.g., George & Krippner, 1984; Honorton, 1977) that brought increased attention and research on cognitive processes and altered states of consciousness. OBEs constituted a logical and appropriate subset of the general problem area of imagery and altered states of consciousness such as dreams, meditation, and drug-induced states.

Regardless of the reasons for the current shift of interests (and we could certainly speculate on the increasing influence of occultism in general, as well as on the impact of oriental philosophy) there may be benefits for modern researchers in realizing that OBE studies have a long and varied

36 C . S. Alvarado

history. A good grounding in this literature may be useful to the pragmatic goals of future researchers.

Endnotes

These views are intimately related to ancient concepts of subtle bodies in religious and occult literatures (e.g., Mead, 19 19; Poortman, 19541 1978) and to speculations on the "seat of the soul" (e.g., Bruyn, 1982).

These are cases "in which a person who is undergoing an OBE, and finds himself at or 'projects' himself to a particular spot distant from his physical body, has been seen at that very spot by some person present there" (Gauld, 1982, p. 222).

All the persons mentioned in this paragraph were members of the Society for Psychical Research (SPR), founded in London in 1882 to study anomalous psychological and physical phenomena (Gauld, 1968). The ideas mentioned here may be seen in the context of the work and concepts of some early SPR members regarding the study of "thought-transference" as a human ability and as the explanation of apparitions of the living and phenomena produced by mental mediums, as opposed to ideas involving the concepts of subtle bodies and spirit communication (Cerullo, 1982; Gauld, 1968). Myers was the only leading SPR member to challenge such concepts in relation to apparitions, particularly reciprocal ones.

For a criticism of some of Bozzano's assumptions and conclusions see de Vesme (1934a, 1934b). Odeberg (1938) seems to agree with Bozzano's methods and concepts.

The study of phenomena that may suggest the possibility of survival of death, such as communications received through mediums and apparitions of deceased persons, has tradi- tionally been an area of parapsychological research (for reviews see Gauld, 1982, and Stevenson, 1977).

For criticisms of Osty's views on the grounds that he ignored aspects of OBEs suggestive of the action of an objective subtle body, and for the general weakness of his arguments and assumptions see Bozzano (1 9341 1937) and Mattisien (1932).

' Soon after the First International Conference of Parapsychological Studies, held in Utrecht in 1953, at which Hart presented a few papers (e.g., Hart, 1955), Hart initiated an International Project on ESP Projection to work on OBEs and apparitions through correspondence with other researchers (Hart and Collaborators, 1956).

See also C. D. Broad's (1948) remarks on the subject.

Irwin (1985) published several important methodological criticisms of Crookall's work. Among them, he pointed out that Crookall's classificatory scheme was unsystematic and extremely subjective.

l o Tart's attention to the psychophysiology of the OBE may be seen as a natural extension of previous developments in the study of the psychophysiology of diverse altered states of consciousness (e.g., Anand, Chhina, & Singh, 1961; Aserinsky & Kleitman, 1953).


' I Also in the minority were defences of the importance of OBEs to the issue of survival of bodily death (e.g., Becker, 1983; Crookall, 1973), since most discussions on the topic during this period were skeptical on the issue (e.g., Blackmore, 1983a; Gauld, 1982; Moore, 1981). An important exception was Di Simone's (1 984) attempts to compare the accounts of a subject's OBEs with the accounts of a supposed spiritual entity communicating through a medium relating encounters in a spiritual dimension.

I' This period also presents much research on the so-called near-death experience (e.g., Greyson & Stevenson, 1980; Ring, 1980; Sabom, 198 1 ; Twemlow & Gabbard, 1984- 1985). A useful overview of the field appears in Greyson and Flynn's (1984) anthology.

References

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Alvarado, C. S. (1986a). ESP during spontaneous out-of-body experiences: A research and methodological note. Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 53, 393-397.

Alvarado, C. S. (1986b). Research on spontaneous out-of-body experiences: A review of modern developments, 1960-1 984. In B. Shapin & L. Coly (Eds.), Current trends in psi research (pp. 140- 167). New York: Parapsychology Foundation.

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A Methodology for the Objective Study of Transpersonal Imagery*

WILLIAM BRAUD and MARILYN SCHLITZ

Psyc.hology Laboratory, Mind Science Foundation, 8301 Broadway, Suite 100, San Antonio, Texas 78209

Abstract-Abundant methodologies already exist for the study ofpreverbal imagery, in which one's imagery acts upon one's own cellular, biochemical, and physiological activity. This paper reports a new methodology for the objective study of transpersonal imagery, in which one person's imagery may influence the physical reactions of another person. The method involves the instructed generation of specific imagery by one person and the concurrent measurement of psychophysiological changes in another person who is isolated in a distant room to eliminate all conventional sensorimotor communication. Thirteen experiments were conducted using this methodology. A significant relationship was found between the calming or activating imagery of one person and the electrodermal activity of another person who was isolated at a distance (overall z = 4.08, p = .000023, mean effect size = 0.29). Potential artifacts which might account for the results are considered and discounted. The findings demonstrate reliable and relatively robust anomalous interactions between living systems at a distance. The effects may be interpreted as instances of an anomalous "causal" influence by one person directly upon the physiological activity of another person. An alternative interpretation is one of an anomalous informational process, combined with unconscious physiological self-regulation on the part of the influenced person. Additional research is being conducted in an attempt to increase our understanding of the processes involved, as well as to learn the various physical, physiological and psychological factors that may increase or decrease the likelihood of occurrence of the effect.

Introduction

In her book Imagery in Healing (Achterberg, 1985), psychologist Jeanne Achterberg distinguished two types of imagery which may have positive impacts upon health. In preverbal imagery, the imagination acts upon one's own physical being to alter cellular, biochemical, and physiological activity. The study of such imagery has a long history, and there exist a variety of successful methodologies for its objective evaluation. The second type of imagery that Achterberg identified is transpersonal imagery, which "embod-

* A condensed version of this paper was presented at the Second World Conference on Imagery, Toronto, Canada, June 25-28, 1987.

Acknowledgement. We are grateful to Dr. Dean Radin for his helpful suggestions and comments on this paper.

44 W. Braud and M. Schlitz

ies the assumption that information can be transmitted from the consciousness of one person to the physical substrate of others" (p. 5). She suggested that the validation of transpersonal imagery must be sought in the more qualitative types of observational data gathered by anthropologists, theolo- gians, and medical historians, and in intuitive philosophical speculation.

Indeed, the power of preverbal imagery in influencing one's own chemical, cellular, physiological and behavioral reactions has been well documented. We find extensive evidence for such psychosomatic influences in the areas of dreaming, hypnosis, relaxation, autogenic training, biofeedback, meditation, therapeutic imagery, mental rehearsal, and placebo effects. Some of the most exciting (and potentially useful) findings regarding the influence of imagery on somatic functioning are now being reported by researchers within the new interdisciplinary field of psychoneuroimmunol- ogy, in which it is being discovered that individuals, through use of relaxation, hypnosis, and imagery techniques, may be able to exert rapid and quite specific influences upon certain subpopulations of their white blood cells [see, for example, Hall ( 1984a, 1984b, 1987); Peavey (1 982); Schneider, Smith, & Whitcher (1984)l.

Less well known are the various observations which tend to support the reality and effectiveness of transpersonal imagery effects. There are, of course, abundant anecdotes and field observations that the sensations, thoughts, feelings and images of one person may, under certain conditions, directly affect the bodily reactions of another person, even when the two persons are separated by great distance, and when the influenced person is not aware that an influence attempt is being made. Observations of ostensible distant mental influence in the context of anthropology have been reviewed by Angoff and Barth (1 974), Long (1 977) and Van de Castle (1 977). The late Eric Dingwall, in his four-volume work, Abnormal Hypnotic Phe- nomena (1 968), surveyed many cases of putative distant mental influence which occurred in 19th-century practices of hypnosis (or "mesmerism," as it was then called). Two of the more interesting of these "higher phenomena of hypnosis" were (a) community of sensation, in which hypnotized subjects were reported to have responded appropriately to sensory stimuli presented to a distantly located hypnotist, and (b) mental suggestion, in which the hypnotist was alleged to have exerted an influence upon a distant subject's behavior (while the latter was in a hypnotic "trance") or even to have induced hypnosis itself at a distance. These phenomena, as well as the results of more modern hypnotic investigations, have been examined by Honorton ( 1 974, 1977). Finally, possible distant mental influence effects occurring within the context of mental healing have been reviewed by Ehrenwald ( 1977) and by Solfvin (1984).

The possibility of distant somatic effects of imagery is also suggested by anecdotal reports of various investigators involved in clinical biofeedback applications who sometimes observed unusual correlations between the changes in electrophysiological activity of one client and those of another

Objective study of transpersonal imagery 45

client (in group biofeedback training sessions) or between the client's activity and that of the investigator himself or herself. If such coincident physiological patterns are reliable and replicable, they might be explained most parsimoniously by assuming that they result from either (a) gross or subtle external stimuli that influence both persons in the same manner, or (b) internal rhythms that happen to be in phase in the two persons and interact with the monitored activities in identical ways. A third possibility, however, is that at least some proportion of these physiological congruences may be attributable to transpersonal imagery effects. Such a possibility would be highly speculative were it not for several reports of experimental findings of similar interactions between, for example, the electroencephalic (Duane & Behrendt, 1965; Puthoff & Targ, 1976; Targ & Puthoff, 1974) or autonomic (Dean, 1966) activity of one person and that of another person, when those persons were remotely situated, shielded, and the possibility of conventional energetic and informational exchanges between them had been eliminated. Indeed, the entire body of research findings in the areas of psychical research and of parapsychology is relevant to and supportive of the notion that the mental activity of one person may influence the bodily activity of another person at a distance. Quite complete and useful reviews of the concepts, methods, findings, and theories of modern parapsychology may be found in Edge, Morris, Palmer and Rush ( 1986); Krippner (1 977, 1978, 1 982, 1 984); Nash (1986); and Wolman (1 977).

The Present Research Program: Purpose and Overview

In this paper, we describe an objective, quantitative methodology for the study of transpersonal imagery which allows the investigation of the latter within the framework of experimental psychology. In addition to the methodology itself, we shall present the promising results of 13 experiments that we already have conducted in order to test the usefulness of the procedure.

The method involves the instructed generation of specific imagery by one person, and the concurrent measurement of psychophysiological changes in another person. Throughout the experiment, the two persons occupy separate, isolated rooms, and all conventional sensorimotor communication between the two persons is eliminated in order to insure that any obtained effects are truly transpersonal. In a typical experiment, Person A is instructed to use specific mental imagery in order to induce a specific physiological change in Person B, who is isolated in a distant room. The expected psychophysiological effect is assessed by measuring the spontaneous electrodermal activity (skin resistance responses, SRR) of Person B during 20 30-second recording epochs. During 10 of these epochs, interspersed randomly throughout the sequence of 20 epochs, Person A generates imagery designed to produce a specific somatic effect (decreased sympathetic nervous system activity in some cases, increased sympathetic activation in other cases); the remaining 10 epochs serve as Control periods during which


Person A does not generate the relevant imagery. Person B is, of course, unaware of the sequence of the two types of epochs (the sequence is randomly determined) and is also "blind" to the exact starting time of the experiment, the number and timing of the various periods, etc. Electroder- ma1 activity is objectively assessed by an electrodermal amplifier interfaced with an analog-to-digital converter and a microcomputer. The amount of electrodermal activity during the Imagery epochs is compared with that of the Control epochs using conventional parametric statistical techniques.

If the experimental protocol just described is not violated, and yet it is found that significantly greater somatic activity of an appropriate, imagery- relevant type is found to occur during the Imagery periods than during the Control periods, we can conclude with confidence that a transpersonal imagery effect (TIE) has occurred, and that the results cannot be attributed to (a) conventional communication channels or cues (since the two parties are isolated from contact with each other through the use of distant, isolated rooms), (b) common external signals, common internal rhythms, or rational inference of the imagerylnonimagery schedule and resultant appropriate self-regulation (since the imagerylnonimagery schedule is truly randomly determined and is unknown to Person B), or (c) "chance coincidence" (since the level of responding to be expected on the basis of chance alone may actually be determined and compared statistically with the obtained response levels).

Method

The experiments involved the participation of unpaid male and female volunteer subjects, ranging in age from 16 to 65 years. Participants were selected from a pool of volunteers from the San Antonio community who had learned about the Foundation's experiments through local newspaper advertisements and articles, notices posted throughout the city, lectures given by Foundation staff at local colleges and universities, and comments from other participants, and whose interest in the experiments and time schedules permitted participation. Approximately equal numbers of males and females participated in the various studies. In most cases, participants were not selected on the basis of any special physical, physiological, or psychological characteristics, and could best be described as "self-selected" on the basis of their interest in the topics being researched. In only one experiment were "special" subjects recruited and selected. This was an experiment in which we were interested in whether persons having a greater "need" for a possible calrning influence would evidence stronger results than persons without such a need. Therefore, for that experiment, we selected individuals who self-reported symptoms of greater than usual sympathetic autonomic activation-i.e., stress-related complaints, excessive emo-


tionality, excessive anxiety, tension headaches, high blood pressure, ulcers, or mental or physical hyperactivity. The subjects for this experiment were also screened in an initial electrodermal activity recording session to guarantee that they did in fact exhibit greater than average sympathetic autonomic activity.

The persons who served as "influencers" in these experiments (i.e., those who regulated their own images and intentions in order to influence the subjects at a distance) were selected from a similar pool of volunteers. In some experiments, the experimenters themselves served as influencers. In still other experiments, the influencers were individuals who were interested in unorthodox healing and who themselves practiced certain mental healing techniques, such as "therapeutic touch" (see Borelli & Heidt, 1982; Krieger, 1979; Kunz, 1985) or "Reiki healing" (see Schlitz & Braud, 1985). Many of the influencers were practitioners of various forms of meditation and self- exploration. In most cases, however, the influencers were simply interested persons from the local community who wished to give the experiments a try.

The authors served as the experimenters for the series of studies, assisted in some experiments by two other experimenters, J. C. and H. K. The first author had extensive research experience in the areas of experimental psychology, physiological psychology, and parapsychology. The second author had extensive experience in parapsychological and anthropological research. The third experimenter, J. C., had research experience in the area of nurs- ing. The fourth experimenter, H. K., was a student at a local college who was participating in a research practicum at the Foundation.

In all, 337 persons participated in these experiments. Of these participants, 27 1 served as subjects, 62 as influencers, and 4 as experimenters.

Procedure

Physical Layout. During the experimental sessions, it was essential to guarantee that the influencer and the experimenter would not be able to communicate with the subject via conventional sensorimotor channels. This was accomplished by situating the experimenter and the influencer in one closed room, while the subject occupied a distant second room, which was also closed. Figure 1 illustrates the floor plan of the rooms used in Experiments 1 through 10. The rooms used in Experiments 1 1 through 13 are shown in Figure 2. The distance (20 meters or more) between the two rooms used in an experiment, and the presence of several intervening closed doors and corridors, isolated the participants from possible sensory interaction. Addi- tionally, verbalization of any information regarding the imagerylnonimagery schedule (see below) by the influencer or the experimenter was not allowed during the experimental sessions. There were no active microphones in either room, through which participants could communicate. The headphones through which the participants in the two rooms received required auditory information were attached to independent electrical circuits

4 8 W. Braud and M. Schlitz

Fig. 1 . Laboratory floor plan showing locations of subject and influencer for Experiments 1 through 10.

IXI SUBJECT

(Exp 1-4)

so that possible "crosstalk" between two sets of headphones was eliminated (i.e., it was impossible for one person's headphone to function as a micro- phone for the other person's headset).

I

-

INFLUENCER

\

1


Fig. 2. Laboratory floor plan showing locations of subject and influencer for Experiments 1 1 through 13; subject and influencer rooms are in separate suites of the same building, separated by an outside corridor and several closed doors.

Subject's Instructions and Activities. Throughout an experimental session, the subject sat in a comfortable armchair in a dimly illuminated, closed . room. In Experiments 1 and 3, the subject was exposed to visual and acous- tic ganzfeld stimulation throughout the session (see Bertini, Lewis, & Wit- kin, 1964; Schacter, 1976); this was accomplished by having the subject view a uniform red light field through translucent, hemispherical acetate eye covers while listening to moderately loud white noise through headphones. In Experiments 2 and 4, ganzfeld stimulation was not employed; rather, the subject simply sat quietly in the dim room, with freedom to open or close the eyes as desired. In Experiments 5 through 13, the subject watched randomly changing patterns of colored lights on a 12-inch display screen 2 meters away, while listening to computer-generated random sounds through headphones. The subject was instructed to make no deliberate effort to relax or to become more active, but rather to remain in as ordinary a condition as ~ possible and to be open to and accepting of a possible influence from the distant influencer whom he or she had already met. The subject remained unaware of the number, timing or scheduling of the various influence attempts, and was instructed not to try to guess consciously when influence attempts might be made. The subject was asked to allow his or her thought


processes to be as variable or random as possible and to simply observe the various thoughts, images, sensations, and feelings that came to mind without attempting to control, force, or cling to any of them.

Influencer's Instructions and Activities. The influencer sat in a comfortable chair in front of a polygraph in another closed room. The polygraph provided a graphic analog readout of the concurrent electrodermal activity of the distant subject. For half of each session for Experiment 6, this polygraph was turned off and no feedback was allowed. For all other sessions of all other experiments, polygraph feedback information about the momentary physiological activity of the subject was available to the influencer. The influencer had the option of attending to this polygraph feedback or ignoring it. In most cases, the influencer watched the polygraph tracing throughout a session. In some cases, the influencer closed his or her eyes and ignored the polygraph tracing during the actual 30-second imagery or nonimagery periods (see below), but looked at the tracings following those periods in order to learn of the success or failure of the influence attempts.

An experimental session contained 20 30-second recording periods or epochs. Each epoch was signaled to the experimenter and to the influencer by an auditory signal that could not be heard by the distant subject. Immedi- ately before each signal, the experimenter exposed a card to the influencer. This card contained an instruction for the upcoming epoch. The word "influence" indicated that the next 30-second period was to be an imagery epoch during which the influencer would attempt to influence the distant subject; the word "control" indicated a nonimagery or noninfluence period. The influencer had been instructed beforehand that during each influence period, he or she was to attempt to influence the electrodermal activity of the distant subject through the use of self-generated imagery. In some experiments (Experiments 5,6,8, 10 and 1 I), the goal of the imagery influence attempts was the calming of the distant subject-the reduction of the subject's sympathetic autonomic nervous system activity and hence the reduction of the frequency and magnitude of spontaneous skin resistance responses. In other experiments (Experiments 2, 4, and 7), the goal of the imagery influence attempts was the activation of the distant subject-an increase in the subject's sympathetic autonomic nervous system activity and hence an increase in the frequency and magnitude of spontaneous skin resistance responses. In still other experiments (Experiments 1, 3, 9, 12 and 13), both calming and activation strategies were used within a single session; in those experiments, there were 10 calm-aim periods and 10 activate-aim periods.

During control periods, the influencer attempted not to think about the subject or about the experiment, and to think of other matters. During influence periods, the influencer used the following strategies (either alone or in combination) in an attempt to influence the somatic activity of the

Objective study of transpersonal imagery 5 1

1. The influencer used imagery and self-regulation techniques in order to induce the intended condition (either relaxation or activation, as demanded by the experimental protocol) in hilnsc/f or herse/L and imagined (and intended for) a corresponding change in the distant subject.

2. The influencer imagined the ofllcv- person in appropriate relaxing or activating settings.

3. The influencer imagined the desired outcomes of the polygraph pen tracings-i.e., imagined few and small pen deflections for calming periods and many and large pen deflections for activation periods.

There were rest periods, ranging in duration from 15 seconds to 2 minutes in the various experiments, between the 30-second recording epochs. Dur- ing those periods, the influencer was able to rest and to prepare for the upcoming epoch.

Sc./lc~dlrlir~,q c?f'Ir!fllrcvlc*~ .-lttc.r~~pt.s. In order to eliminate the possible influence of common internal rhythms and to remove the possibility that the influencer and the subject just happened to respond at whim in the same manner and at the same times, it was necessary to ji,rrnal/j7 assign to the influencer specific times for engaging in imagery: such assignments had to be truly random and, of course, could not be known to the subject (lest the subject self-regulate his or her own physiology on the basis of such knowledge. in order to confirm the expectations of the experimenter). The subject's blindness with respect to the imagery/nonimagery sequence was maintained by keeping all participants (including the experimenter) blind regarding the sequence until preparatory interactions with the subject had been completed and the session was about to begin. Only then, when the subject and the influencer/experimenter team were stationed in their separate rooms, did the experimenter become aware of the proper epoch sequence for that session. In Experiments I and 3, the epochs were scheduled in a truly random manner by means of an electronic binary random event generator (see Schmidt. 1970). In Experiments 2 and 4. the epochs were randomly scheduled by means of a set of 20 cards ( 10 influence and 10 control cards) which were shuffled by the experimenter 20 times before each session. In the remainder of the experiments. the epochs were scheduled in an ABBA or BAAB sequence: the experimenter learned whether a particular session's sequence was to be ABBA or BAAB by consulting a sealed envelope immediately before the beginning of each session. The envelopes had been prepared beforehand by someone who had no further role in the experiments. The "preparer" had prepared each session's sequence envelope through the use of a table of random numbers. with the only restriction for its use being the occurrence of equal numbers of ABBA and BAAB sequences in an experiment. [We used an ABBA design in order to minimize possible progressive error in the experiments: such a design allows any progressive error (i.e.. the contribution of any extraneous variable which


varies systematically with time) which may have autonomic concomitants to contribute equally to the A and B periods, thus avoiding a biasing contribution to any one condition alone.]

Monitoring of Electrophvsiological Activity. The subject's sympathetic autonomic nervous system activity was assessed by monitoring his or her spontaneous skin resistance responses (SRR) on a continuous basis throughout the 20 minutes of an experimental session. In Experiments 1 and 3, SRR activity was recorded by means of silver/silver chloride electrodes (7.0 mm in diameter) with partially conductive electrode gel, attached by adhesive col- lars to the subject's right palm. Phasic electrodermal activity was recorded by means of a Stoelting Model SA 1473 GSR amplifier and a Stoelting Model 22656 Multigraphic Recorder. Sensitivity was adjusted so that an internal calibrating signal of 1.0 kilohm resulted in a 10.0 mm recording pen deflection. In Experiments 2 and 4, a Lafayette Model 76405 multiplex GSR amplifier was used, along with the Stoelting chart-mover/penwriter described above; chrome-plated stainless steel finger electrodes (each with a surface area of 585 mm2) without electrode paste were attached to the first and third fingers of the left hand by means of Velcro bands. In Experiments 5, 6, and 7, the Lafayette amplifier was used along with a Harvard Appara- tus chart mover and pen writers; the steel/pasteless finger electrodes were attached to the subject's right hand. In Experiments 8 through 13, the Lafayette amplifier and Harvard chart recorder were used, but with silver/ silver chloride electrodes and partially conductive gel; electrodes were attached to the subject's right palm. For Experiments 1 through 4, electroder- ma1 activity was evaluated by blind-scoring of pen tracings by someone who had no other role in the experiments.' For Experiments 5 through 13, scoring was automated through the addition of an analog-to-digital converter interfaced with a microcomputer. This equipment sampled the subject's SRR activity 10 times each second for the 30 seconds of a recording epoch and averaged these measures, providing what is virtually a measure of the area under the curve described by the fluctuation of electrodermal activity over time (i.e., the mathematically integrated activity). The computer provided a paper printout of the results at the end of the session. For all experiments, with the exception of Experiment 13, a 5-minute adaptation/ habituation period for the subject preceded the actual experimental session. For Experiment 8, other physiological measures were recorded in addition to electrodermal activity (viz., pulse rate, hand temperature, breathing rate, and electromyographic activity of the frontalis muscle group); those measures, however, will not be described in this paper.

Assessment o f Phj?siological Responses. Each session of each experiment yielded 10 assessments of electrodermal (SRR) activity recorded during an influencer's attempts to influence that activity in a specific direction using specific imagery, and 10 assessments of activity recorded in the absence of such attempts. (The sole exception to this occurred in Experiment 13, in


which there was a total of only 12 recording e p ~ c h s for each session, rather than the usual 20.) Our evaluation of whether the influencer's imagery influenced the subject's somatic activity was carried out on a session-by-session basis, and involved a determination of the proportion of somatic activity in the prescribed direction which occurred during the influence periods, relative to its occurrence during control periods. For each session, we calculated the total activity for that session by summing the SRR scores for all 20 30-second recording epochs (or for all 12 epochs, in the case of Experiment 13). Next, we calculated the activity that occurred during the 10 30-second influence or imagery epochs of a session by summing those I0 scores; sepa- rately, we calculated the activity occurring during the 10 30-second control (i.e., noninfluence or nonimagery) epochs of the session by summing those I0 scores. Dividing the influence and control sums, respectively, by the total activity yielded two activity proportions. In the absence of a transpersonal imagery effect (TIE), each of these two proportions would be expected to approximate 0.50; i-e., on the basis of chance alone, half of a subject's total electrodermal activity would be expected to occur during the influence periods and half during the control periods. A significant departure of these proportions from 0.50, in the appropriate predicted direction, would constitute evidence for the presence of a transpersonal imagery effect.

Results

We have completed 13 experiments using the methodology described above. Experiments 1 , 2, 3, 4, and 1 1 were "demonstration studies" conducted to test the effectiveness of the method with different samples of subjects and influencers. In the remaining eight experiments, we sought to' determine how the transpersonal imagery effect might be influenced by various psychological factors. Since our purpose in this paper is to describe the method itself, we shall not present the rationales, details, or specific outcomes of the individual experiments, but will limit our remarks to the common features of the studies and to their overall results.

In each experiment, the primary method of analysis involved a comparison of the proportion of electrodermal activity which occurred during the imagery influence epochs of a session with the proportion expected on the basis of chance alone, i.e., 0.50. Chi-square goodness of fit tests indicated that the distribution of obtained session scores did not differ significantly from a normal distribution; therefore, parametric statistical tests were used for their evaluation. Single-mean t tests were used to compare the obtained session scores with an expected mean of 0.50.

Summary statistics for the 1 3 experiments are presented in Table I. For experiments (such as Experiments 5 and 13) in which significant

differences obtained between different subconditions and/or in cases in which a priori decisions had been made to evaluate certain groups sepa- rately, scores are presented for each subcondition; otherwise, scores of sub-

5 4 W. Braud and M. Schiitz

TABLE 1 Quantitative summary of transpersonal imagery experiments

Exper- Number of Hit Mean ?h iment Influencer(s) Sessions Sessions Influence 1 p z d Type of Study

- -

Experimenter M. M. 10 unselected

volunteers 10 unselected

volunteers Experimenters Experimenters 24 unselected

volunteers Experimenters Experimenters Experimenters Experimenters

3 healing practitioners

5 selected volunteers



Demonstration Demonstration Demonstration

Demonstration

Need (greater)4 Need (le~ser)~ Feedback

(within)' Blockings

SpecificityS

Direction6

Magnitude ( ~ i t h i n ) ~

Demonstration (Reiki r n e t h ~ d ) ~

IDS pilot (within)'

IDS confirmation single seed ( ~ i t h i n ) ~

IDS confirmation multiple seeds (within)'

conditions are combined and presented for the experiment as a whole. The number of sessions contributing to each experiment varied from 10 to 40. The single-mean t tests produced independently significant evidence for the transpersonal imagery effect (i.e., an associated p of 0.05 or less) in 6 of the possible 15 cases, yielding an experimental success rate of 40%. The experimental success rate expected on the basis of chance alone is, of course, 5%.

Results for the 13 experiments are presented in another form in Figure 3. For this presentation, we calculated z scores and effect size scores for the overall results of each experiment. The z scores were calculated according to the Stouffer method [see Rosenthal ( 1 984)] which involves converting the studies' obtained p values into z scores, summing these z scores, and dividing by the square root of the number of studies being combined; the result is itself a z score that can be evaluated by means of an associated p value. For Figure 3, this method was used to provide an overall or combined z score for each of the 13 experiments, for ease of graphical portrayal. The effect sizes shown in Figure 3 are "Cohen d" measures which are recommended by those interested in meta-analyses of scientific experiments [see Cohen (1969); Glass, McGaw, & Smith (1 98 1); Rosenthal (1984)l; the effect sizes


Fig. 3. Overall z scores and effect sizes (Cohen's d measures) for the 13 successive transpersonal imagery experiments.

were calculated according to the formula d = t\il/n. These effect sizes varied from -0.24 to 0.97, with a mean d = 0.29, and compare favorably with effect sizes typically found in traditional behavioral research.

A global analysis of the 13 experiments is presented in Table 2. There were 15 assessments of the transpersonal imagery effect. Contributing to those assessments were 323 sessions conducted with 27 1 different subjects, 62 influencers, and 4 experimenters. Six of the 15 assessments (40%) were independently significant statistically (p < .05); this is to be compared with the 5% experimental success rate expected by chance. Fifty-seven percent of the sessions were successful (i.e., these were sessions in which the influence imagery epochs accounted for more than 50% of the subject's electrodermal activity during activation attempts and less than 50% of the total activity during calming attempts); this is to be compared with the 50% session success rate to be expected on the basis of chance. The overall mean magnitude of the TIE for all experiments differed from chance expectation by

I 3.73%; when only the six independently significant experiments are considered, the obtained mean TIE had a magnitude of 8.33%. The two most important entries of Table 2 are the combined z score (for the experimental series as a whole, calculated according to the Stouffer method) and the mean effect size (Cohen's d, for the entire series). The overall z is 4.08 and has an associated p = ,000023; the average effect size for all 13 experiments is 0.29.

Inspection of Table 1, Figure 3, and Table 2 indicates that the effect occurring in these 13 experiments is a relatively consistent, replicable, and robust one. It should also be pointed out that, in terms of its magnitude, the effect is not a negligible one. Under certain conditions, the transpersonal imagery effect can compare favorably with an imagery effect upon one's


TABLE 2 Summary statistics for transpersonal imagery experiments

Total Psi Number of Number of Number of Experiments Assessments Sessions Subjects Influencers

Mean Percent Influence

Successful Successful Combined Overall Mean Effect Studies Sessions All Successful z P Size (d) - - - - -

6/15 (40%) 1831321 (57%) 3.73% 8.33% 4.08 .000023 .29 (MCE = 5%) (MCE = 50%)

own physiological activity. Although it is not reviewed in this paper, an autonomic self-control experiment was conducted immediately following Experiment 5. In the self-control study, volunteer subjects attempted to calm themselves using relaxing imagery during 10 30-second periods, and their SRR activity during those periods was compared with activity levels during 10 interspersed nonimagery control periods. The strength of the self-control imagery effect in that study (an 18.67% deviation) did not differ significantly from the strongest transpersonal imagery effect of Experiment 5 (a 10% deviation).

Discussion

The results of this series of 13 experiments indicate that the present methodology is effective for the objective assessment of transpersonal imagery effects. It was demonstrated that the psychophysiological activity of one person varied, to a significant degree, with the imagery content of another person. The experimental design guaranteed that the effect could not be attributed to conventional sensorimotor cues, common external stimuli, common internal rhythms, or chance coincidence. A number of additional potential artifacts can be mentioned here and can be effectively dismissed.

I . Thejndings are the result of recording errors and motivated misreadings of polygraph records. This explanation is rejected on the basis of blind-scoring of polygraph records (see Figure 4 for sample record) and, later, by the use of completely automated assessment techniques and computer-scoring of response activity.

2. The subjects knew beforehand when influence attempts were to be made and "cooperated" by changing their own autonomic activity when appropriate. This explanation may be rejected because the subjects were not told when or how many influence attempts would be made, nor was the experimenter aware of the influence/control epoch schedule until all preliminary


Fig. 4. Sample of polygraph tracing of electrodermal activity.

interactions with the subject had been completed. Subjects did not know of the existence of, or have access to, the envelopes containing schedule information.

3. Subjects could have become aware during the experimentul sessions themselves of when influence epochs were in progress and could have altered their own physiological reactions during those periods. This possibility was eliminated by isolating the subject from any such cues from the influencer. Subject and influencer were in separate, closed rooms at least 20 meters apart. No auditory cues could have impinged upon the subject to indicate when recording epochs were in progress or whether such epochs were influence or control periods. Neither the influencer nor the experimenter made any vocalizations that could have informed the subject about whether influence or control periods were in progress. The epoch-indicating tones heard by the influencer and experimenter, and the random tones heard by the subject, were provided by independent audio systems which eliminated the possibility of electrical crosstalk and also the possibility of headphones functioning as microphones and inadvertently cueing the subject.

4. Dzflerences in autonomic activity bet ween influence and control periods are due to systematic error-i.e., some progressive change in electrodermal activity over time. This objection may be rejected. Progressive (time-based) errors could have been contributed by (a) changes in equipment sensitivity as the equipment warmed up, (b) changes in electrodermal activity due to adaptation or habituation to the experimental environment, or (c) changes in electrodermal activity due to polarization of the recording electrodes. Equipment was allowed to warm up for 15 to 20 minutes prior to the beginning of a session and therefore had become thermally stable before the experiment began. The use of electrodes with large surface areas, and the use of a constant-current electrodermal recording device reduced the possibility of polarization problems. The use of silver/silver chloride electrodes and partially conductive paste in other experiments further minimized a polarization problem. A special analysis of the data from Experiment 5 is relevant to the habituation question. Statistical evaluation of total electrodermal activity for the first halves vcrsrrs the second halves of the sessions indicated no evidence of an habituation effect. This absence of habituation could be


attributed to the use of an adaptation period before the actual recording session began, and to the use of constantly changing auditory and visual stimulation of the subject (i.e., the use of the random tones and colored lights display). Thus, there was no progressive change in electrodermal activity due to any of the three possible processes mentioned above. However, even if a progressive change had occurred, the use of the ABBA counterbal- anced design and the use of truly random influence/control sequencing in other experiments would have prevented this error from contributing differentially to influence versus control epochs.

5. Thefindings are due to arbitrary selection of data. This explanation may be rejected since total numbers of subjects and trials were prespecified, and the analyses reported include all recorded data.

6. The results are due to-fraud on the part oj'the subjects. This explanation may be rejected. The subjects were unselected volunteers; it may be assumed that such subjects had no motive for trickery. However, even if a subject were motivated to cheat, such an opportunity was not present. Cheating would have required knowledge of a session's influence/control epoch sequence and of the precise starting time for the session, or the assistance of an accomplice. Both of these requirements were eliminated.

7. The results are due to-fi-aud on the part of the experimenters. No experiment, however sophisticated, can ever be absolutely safe from experimenter fraud. Even if an experiment were controlled by an outside panel of disinter- ested persons, a hostile critic could still argue that collusion was involved. The imagined extent of such a conspiracy would be limited only by the imagination and degree of paranoia of the critic. We can only state that we used multiple-experimenter designs so that one experimenter's portion of the experiment served as a kind of control for another experimenter's portion. Only the successful replication of these findings by investigators in other laboratories would reduce experimenter fraud to a non-issue. We hope that this report will stimulate such replication attempts.

We conclude that our results cannot be attributed to any of the various potential artifacts or confounds mentioned above, and therefore are not spurious. Rather, the results reflect an anomalous psychophysical interaction between two individuals separated from one another in space.

A Range of Reactions

In addition to responding physiologically in a manner consistent with the imagery of the distant influencer, subjects often reported subjective responses which corresponded to the influencers' images. Sometimes these reports were of relatively vague feelings of relaxation or activation. How- ever, there were also reports of extremely specijc thoughts, feelings, and sensations which strikingly matched the imagery employed by the influencer. For example, a subject reported spontaneously that during the session he had a very vivid impression of the influencer coming into his


room, walking behind his chair, and vigorously shaking the chair; the impression was so strong that he found it difficult to believe that the event had not happened in reality. This session was one in which the influencer had employed just such an image in order to activate the subject from afar.

Subjects sometimes spontaneously reported mentation which corresponded closely to that of the influencer or the experimenter, even when that mentation was incidental and not employed consciously as part of an influence strategy. For example, at the beginning of one session, the experimenter remarked to an influencer that the electrodermal tracings of the subject were very precise and regimented and that they reminded him of the German techno-pop instrumental musical group, Kraftwerk. When the experimenter went to the subject's room at the end of the session, the subject's first comment was that early in the session, for some unknown reason, thoughts of the group Kraftwerk had come into her mind. The subject could not have overheard the experimenter's earlier comment to the influencer. Such correspondences were not rare.

There appeared to be a continuum of reactions possible for the subject. At one extreme, there would be no resemblance whatsoever between the imagery of the influencer and the imagery and physiological reactions of the subject. Next on the continuum would be cases in which autonomic reactions occurred which were appropriate to the influencer's imagery, but the subject was completely unaware of those reactions. Next were appropriate physiological reactions of which the subject was only vaguely aware, and next would be reactions accompanied by very definite subjective experiences. Closer to the "resemblance" end of this continuum would be cases of reactions accompanied by images in the subject which were virtually identical to those of the influencer. Even closer to the resemblance end would be cases of appropriate electrodermal activity, quite similar imagery, plus behavioral and/or gross physical changes consistent with the influencer's imagery. An example of the latter occurred in a subject who experienced a dramatic reddening of the face and neck during a session. Other subjects experienced muscle tremors, tingling of body parts, awareness of a pounding heart and rushing blood, a felt need to take deep breaths, decreased awareness of body parts, etc. Although our overall statistical findings leave no doubt that the subjects' recorded autonomic reactions were in fact related to the imagery of the influencers, such certainty is not possible in the case of these subjective or physical reactions, since no time-correlated records of those latter reactions were kept. Some of the physical symptoms observed may simply have been bodily conditions that were present all along, but which were brought to the subjects' awareness more forcefully during the experimental sessions due to the demand characteristics of the study. How- ever, some reactions may have been directly influenced or even brought about by the influencers' imagery. We intend to pursue this issue more analytically in future studies in which the temporal distribution of such reactions will be monitored by having subjects verbalize their reactions as they are occurring, or indicate unusual or noteworthy feelings by pressing a


button that will mark an event channel of the polygraph. This will allow a determination of whether particular experiences or reactions of subjects are "time-locked" to specific images used by influencers during the sessions. A similar monitoring of the details of the influencers' imagery would permit a determination of the most and least effective forms of imagery, and could teach us a great deal about the varieties and manifestations of transpersonal imagery.

Some Preliminary Findings

We indicated earlier that we did not intend to describe specific details of the various 13 experiments in this paper. However, it does seem appropriate to mention some of our preliminary findings and tentative conclusions at this point.

The transpersonal imagery effect (TIE) is a relatively reliable and robust phenomenon; this conclusion is based upon overall statistical results. The magnitude of the effect is not trivial, and under certain conditions it compares favorably with the magnitude of a self-regulation effect. The ability to manifest the effect is apparently widely distributed in the population. Sensitivity to the effects appears to be normally distributed among the 271 volunteer subjects tested in these experiments. Alto- gether, 62 different influencers were able to produce the effect, with varying degrees of success. Many persons were able to produce the effect, including unselected volunteers attempting it for the first time. More practiced individuals seem able to produce the effect more con- sistently. There are indications of improvements with practice for some in fluencers. The TIE can occur at a distance, typically 20 meters; greater distances have not yet been explored. Subjects with a greater need to be influenced (i.e., those for whom the influence is more beneficial) seem more susceptible to the effect. Immediate, trial-by-trial analog sensory feedback is not essential to the occurrence of the effect; intention/visualization of the desired outcome is effective. The TIE can occur without the subject's knowledge that such an influence is being attempted. It may be possible for the subject to block or prevent an unwanted influence upon his or her own physiological activity; psychological shielding strategies in which one visualizes protective surrounding shields, screens, or barriers may be effe~tive.~ Generally, our volunteer participants have not evidenced concern over the idea of influencing or being influenced by another person. The TIE may generalize to other physiological measures (such as heart rate), but the effect may also be intentionally focused or restricted to


1 1. The TIE does not always occur. The reasons for the absence of a significant effect in some experiments of a series which is otherwise successful are not clear. We suspect that the likelihood of a successful TIE may depend upon the presence of certain psychological conditions, in both influencer and subject (and perhaps even in the experimenter), which are not always present. Possible success-enhancing factors may include belief, confidence, positive expectation, and appropriate motivation. Possible success-hindering factors may include boredom, absence of spontaneity, poor mood of influencer or subject, poor interactions or poor rapport between influencer and subject, and excessive egocentric effort (excessive pressure or striving to succeed) on the part of participants. We suspect that the effect occurs most readily in subjects whose nervous systems are relatively "labile" (i.e., characterized by free vari- ability) and are momentarily free from external and internal con- straints. Perhaps fullness of intention and intensity or vividness of visualization in the influencer facilitate the effect.

Additional research is needed to determine the validity of these conclusions, and to explore more thoroughly the various physiological and psychological factors which are favorable or antagonistic to the occurrence of the TIE.

Implications and Applications

The methodology employed in these experiments reveals that, under certain conditions, mental imagery does indeed have a transpersonal aspect. The results suggest a fundamental inter-connectedness among people through which the transpersonal imagery effect may be mediated. The findings provide an additional illustration of the power of the imagination. The method extends research possibilities for the further laboratory study of imagery, transpersonal functioning, psychic functioning, emotional conta- gion, and other related processes.

If the effects of transpersonal imagery prove to be sufficiently strong and robust, it is not inconceivable that the phenomenon could be practically applied. Possible applications include the use of transpersonal imagery as an adjunct in medical and psychological healing practices; as an aid in therapy, counseling, and training for biofeedback, hypnosis, and meditation; and as an additional educational tool. Each of the processes just mentioned could conceivably be facilitated in one person (the learner or client) if appropriate and powerful images are held concurrently in the mind of another person (the teacher or therapist).

We hope this presentation of our methodology and preliminary findings will prompt other researchers and practitioners to conduct further experimental, theoretical, and applied investigations of the important but relatively ignored phenomenon of transpersonal imagery.


Endnotes

' The scorer measured, to the nearest millimeter, the amplitudes of all skin resistance responses greater than 2 mm. The amplitudes of all reactions during a 30-second epoch were summed, yielding a total SRR activity score for that period. This was done for each of the 20 30-second trial epochs. The trial sequence was then decoded and the SRR activity was summed for the 10 control and for the 10 influence periods. The scorer, of course, had been blind during the measurement phase.

* This tentative conclusion derives from certain segments of Experiment 7; the reader should consult Braud, Schlitz, Collins and Klitch (1985) for details.

This tentative conclusion derives from certain segments of Experiment 8; see Braud, Schlitz, Collins and Klitch (1 985) for further details.

In Experiment 5, we studied the influence of the strength of "need" or motivation; for further details see Braud and Schlitz ( 1983).

For additional information about Experiments 6, 7, and 8, see Braud, Schlitz, Collins and Klitch (1 985).

In Experiment 9, we sought to determine whether increments or decrements in SRR activity might be easier to produce via distant mental influence; in Experiment 10, we sought to determine whether the magnitude of a distant mental influence effect could be self-modulated by the influencer. Detailed results of these experiments will be published at a later date.

' The influencers for Experiment 1 1 were practitioners of a Reiki healing method; see Schlitz and Braud (1985) for details.

Experiments 12 and 13 were conducted to examine the possible role of "intuitive data sorting" (IDS) in these experiments; details may be found in Braud and Schlitz (1988).

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Braud, W., Schlitz, M., Collins, J., & Klitch, H. (1985). Further studies of the bio-PK effect: Feedback, blocking, specificity/generality. In R. White & J. Solfvin (Eds.), Rerearch in paraps~~chologj~ 1984 (pp. 45-48). Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press.

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Honorton, C. (1 974). Psi-conducive states of awareness. In E. Mitchell (J. White, Ed.), Psychic exploration: A challenge for science (pp. 6 16-638). New York: Putnam.

Honorton, C. (1977). Psi and internal attention states. In B. Wolman (Ed.), Handbook of parapsychology (pp. 435-472). New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold.

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Jorrrr~ul o/ S[,icw/i//c, b,':'\plorci/ion. Vol. 3, No. I, pp. 65-79. 19x9 Pergamon Press pic. Printcd in the IJSA.

0892-33 10189 $3.00+.00 0 10 89 Soclety for Sc~ent~tic Explorat~on

Experiments Investigating the Influence of Intention on Random and Pseudorandom Events*

DEAN R A D I N ~

Princt7ton Univer.sit.v, Princeton, NJ 08544

and

JESSICA UTT'S

Univer.silj~ c?/'Cu/ifi)rniu, Davis, C:4 9.56 16

Abstract-Eight of 27 experiments using a random event generator provided statistical evidence supporting a claimed correlation between intention and the distribution of random events. Twelve control tests produced results conforming closely to chance expectation.

Introduction

Over the last three decades, some 68 researchers have reported more than 800 experiments investigating the possibility that people may have an ability to influence simple random systems solely through the application of mental intention (Radin & Nelson, 1987; Radin & Nelson, in press). Overall, the results of these experiments provide evidence for the existence of a correlation between intention and the statistical behavior of electronic random event generators (REG). The claimed effects are relatively weak in absolute magnitude, and are evidenced by small shifts of various distribution parameters from chance expectation (usually the mean or the variance). In such experiments, participants attempt to influence sequences of random or pseudorandom events produced by electronic REGS by assigned or opera- tionally defined mental intention. REGS are based upon truly random events such as radioactive decay or electronic noise, or use pseudorandom algorithms seeded with truly random numbers.

One of the first investigations of the possible influence of intention on radioactive decay rates was reported by Beloff and Evans ( 196 1 ). They asked people to alternatively increase or decrease the count rate of a Geiger

* This paper is a revised version of a technical report presented by the first author at a conference in 198 1 (Radin, 1982). Prompted by Schmidt's ( 1987) reference to that report in this Journal, we decided to reanalyze and publish the data reported in the Radin (1982) paper, including several. previously unpublished experiments performed with the same random event generator.

t Present address: Contel Technology Center, 15000 Conference Center Drive, P.O. Box 108 14, Chantilly, VA 2202 1-3808.

66 D. adi in and J . Utts

counter subjected to a source of alpha particles. The study was not statistically successful. Participants in several other studies in the 1960's had varying degrees of success in attempting to influence alpha, beta, and gamma particles (e.g., Chauvin & Genthon, 1 965).

In the late 1960's, Helmut Schmidt developed a random event generator (REG) based upon the random waiting times between successive emission of beta particles from strontium 90 (e.g., Schmidt, 1970, 197 1). Schmidt's REG generated random events by stopping a fast (one megahertz) binary counter when a Geiger tube detected a beta particle. Since radioactive sources theoretically emit particles at random time intervals, the probability that a binary switch would stop at a " 1" would be the same as a "0."

The present paper reports a series of experiments conducted using an REG designed and constructed by Schmidt, and kindly loaned to the first author. In the studies described below, the random element in the REG was based upon the waiting times between successive emissions of gamma particles from radioactive ore (pitchblende). Volunteers were asked to concentrate on audio and/or visual feedback in a task that, if successful, would affect the statistical properties of the random events.

Method

Random Event Generator

The test machine is illustrated in Figures I and 2. The functions of the machine are controlled by a microprocessor (INTEL 8035) and several external switches and controls. Data reported in the studies below were automatically collected by the microprocessor and stored in a memory chip (INTEL 27 16 PROM).' The automatic data recording method enabled the experimenter to double-check and allow independent verification of the data.

To prevent a participant from erasing the results of a poor run by turning the machine's power off during such a run, the microprocessor was pro- grammed to increment the data storage counter at the beginning of each run, and record this number in the PROM. Thus, if the power was turned off, the data chip would record a zero score in that memory slot. Later, when the experimenter read the run scores off the data chip, the empty memory slots would be immediately a ~ p a r e n t . ~

The face of the machine shows 16 lamps arranged in a circle (Figure I) . When the microprocessor is reset, and the "PUSH" button is pressed, a program on a PROM chip starts running in the "direct" mode or "seed" mode, depending on how an external switch has been set.

Direct Mode. In the "direct" mode of generating random events, lamps starting at the top of the circle are sequentially illuminated in the clockwise (CW) direction at a rate of 4 Hz such that one light is lit at any one time. With each jump, a "hit" counter records the total number of CW steps.

Random and pseudorandom events 67

/. Mode Sw~tch

DIRECT 0 O 0

SEEDNUMBER 0 0

0 0

0 0

0 0 r Lamp

J ub

0 0 0 0 Test vs Pract~ce Switch

0 PLAY LED Test Lamp -'

0 0 Stan Button <uSH RESET

Fig. I . Front view of random event generator

microprocessor, which stops the CW pattern of the lights and begins a counter-clockwise (CCW) sequence. A "miss" counter records the number of CCW steps. When another gamma particle is detected, the lights start moving CW again, and so on.

This alternating CW-CCW illumination sequence is repeated until a prespecified number (e.g.. 16, 32, 64) of CW-CCW pairs have been completed. A thumbwheel switch on the face of the machine is used to specify the number of pairs. At the end of one run of say. 16 pairs, an LED display shows the total number of CW and CCW steps and the data is stored in the memory chip.

Scod Aloc/o. In this mode, a 19-bit seed is generated by stopping a one megahertz counter when the Geiger tube detects a gamma particle. The

6 8 D. Radin and J. Utts

Fig. 2. Inside view of random event generator, viewed from the back.

microprocessor uses this 19-bit seed to initiate a sequence of 19-bit pseudorandom numbers such that the sequence contains every possible 19-bit number. This particular algorithm generates over a half million different numbers before r e~ea t ing .~ The four least significant bits of each pseudorandom number are used to determine one number in the range 1 to 16. During test runs, numbers are generated at a typical rate of 8 per second. With each generated random number (RN), a light jumps CW until RN = 3 has been obtained. Then the lights move CCW until a RN = 12 has been generated. This process continues until 16 CW-CCW pairs have been completed.

Random and pseudorandom events 6 9

As in the direct method, the experimental participant tries to make the lights move CW more than CCW, thus extending the time periods of CW illumination and shortening the periods of CCW illumination.

Note that both methods have a built-in control feature-reversing the lamp illumination direction on successive "hits" (i.e., gamma particle in the direct mode and a specified pseudorandom number in the seed mode). For this control to be defeated, a long-waiting-time followed by short-waiting- time periodicity must be systematically present throughout all runs. Any such periodicities should become immediately apparent upon running control tests in which the REG is set up to run without human intervention. Studies I , 3, 4, 5, 6, and 8 (described below) employed such control tests.

In addition to the flashing lights, audio feedback was provided by a tone generator. Whenever the lights started moving CW, the tone generator produced a gong-like tone. This tone persisted until the lights started moving CCW, then no tone was generated. Audio feedback was provided through headphones connected to the test machine.

In all of the experiments reported here, rather than show CW-CCW mo- tions, an optional feedback mode was employed, which was to show CW motion as usual, but no motion instead of CCW motion. This feedback was chosen because in pilot tests it was found to be less distracting than the constant motion provided in the CW-CCW feedback.

The subject's task, then, was to try to maintain the CW "hit" state for as long as possible and the stopped "miss" state for as short a time as possible. The visual task was to keep the lights moving, and the audio task, to keep the sound going.

Comparison oJ'Dirocb/ and Soc>d Modc>..s.

In one respect, the seed mode is superior to the direct mode in generating random events because it relies upon a mathematical algorithm rather than a naturally occurring random event. Compared to a Geiger tube, for example, an algorithm is relatively insensitive to extraneous radiation and electrical disturbances. However, the deterministic nature of pseudorandom number generation makes interpretation of successful experiments somewhat more complex. Because an algorithm completely determines the results of a run once the starting seed has been selected, it would seem that any mental effort applied during a seed mode run would have to be focused "backwards" in time in order to influence the selection of a favorable seed. Although the existence of such a backwards effect defies common sense, mathematical models have been proposed that support such a focusing concept and predict the effect to operate backwards in time as efficiently as in present time (Schmidt, 1975, 1976, 1978).

Another way of interpreting positive results observed in the seed mode is

70 D. Radin and J . Utts

to postulate that precognition is the mediating factor. Precognition4 would be used to select favorable, future moments in which to start a seed mode run. Under this interpretation, if a person could "see" the result of a future run before actually starting it, he or she would simply wait for a propitious time that would result in selection of a particular seed, which would in turn produce the desired result (e.g., more hits than misses). An analysis of existing RNG experiments provides some support for the precognition interpretation (May, Radin, Hubbard, Humphrey, & Utts, 1986).

A third interpretation is that positive effects are due to subtle strategies developed by the subjects, consciously or unconsciously, that somehow take advantage of inherent periodicities in pseudorandom number sequences. Such strategies, even if they were possible to develop and apply systematically, could not be used with the present REG because the selection of the seed number is based upon a truly random event, i.e., radioactive decay. And as we have mentioncd above, once the seed is selected, the rest of the random generation process is completely determined. Thus, no normal strategy could be employed to influence results produced in the seed mode.

IIj~pothc~,sr.v and Stntistic,al Mothodc

The hypothesis for each experiment was simple: If intention can affect the distribution of random events, then the total number of CW steps, defined as hits in many of these experiments. would be greater than the total number of CCW steps. This hypothesis was tested with the formula5

( H - M ) V 2 N Z =

V ( H + M - ~ N ) ( H + M) '

where I I = total number of CW counts, M = total number of CCW counts, N = total number of samples in the CW direction16 and Z is a standard normal deviate. Because a directional hypothesis was postulated, probabilities are reported one-tailed.

Results

Table 1 summarizes results of all experiments conducted by the first author using the same REG. They range from Study 1, conducted in No- vember, 1980, to Study 12, conducted in December, 1983. Short descriptions of each test follow:

The first experiment consisted of the first author (DR) as subject, running the REG for a preset total of 60 direct mode runs of 16 CW-CCW pairs per run, in three daily sessions of 20 runs each. This test was performed in the evenings, in a secure location, in a relaxed setting, and with no distractions. After each run the number of hits and misses was manually r e~orded .~

Random and pseudorandom events

TABLE l Results of experimental and control tests

Subject Mode Condition Hits Misses Runs" Z

Stud-v I DRh direct E ' 14896 13644 60 1 . 9 0 t DR direct C 13135 13729 60 - 1.005

direct direct direct direct direct direct direct direct direct direct

Study 3 AK AK C Y CY MD MD RW RW SR SR

direct direct direct direct direct direct direct direct direct direct

-

Study 4 DR direct E 11963 10936 50 1.860* DR direct C 11926 11540 50 0.682

St udv 5 DR seed E 12236 12780 50 -0.899 DR seed C 12600 12176 5 0 0.708

Study 6 DR seed E 13251 12086 50 1.900* DR seed C 12223 12696 50 -0.785

Study 7 DR seed E 13361 12235 50 1.8 17* DR seed C 12611 12985 50 -0.604

Study 8 DR seed E 11844 13062 50 -2.0227 DR seed C 12169 12737 50 -0.943

St ud-v 9 DR seed E 26835 25018 100 2.0461- DR seed C 25822 26031 100 -0.235

Study 10 RS direct E 2445 2197 10 0.990 RS seed E 2319 2251 10 0.276

Study 1 1 BJ seed E 33520 33676 128 -0.153 BJ direct E 30557 29539 128 1.123

Study12 BN direct E 13326 13159 64 0.297

* Significant at p < .05, one-tailed. 7 Significant at p < .05, two-tailed. " There were 16 clockwise (and counter-clockwise) samples per run.

DR is the first author. Excepting BN, all other subjects were unselected volunteers claiming no special abilities. ' E = experimental, C = control condition.


After completing the 60 test runs, a series of 60 control runs was performed in which the lights were covered and the headphones unplugged. The machine was located in the same place and under the same conditions as in the experimental condition. During control runs DR engaged in other tasks. pausing every so often to begin the next run. When each control run had completed, the number of hits and misses was manually recorded.

In this experiment, DR recruited 10 volunteers from AT&T Bell Labora- tories, Columbus, Ohio. Each participant performed 15 runs in the direct mode for a total of 150 runs pooled across subjects. The experimental runs took place in the Human Factors Laboratory at the Columbus Labs. Each subject was instructed in the use of the machine, and each was allowed to perform as many practice runs as he or she wished before beginning the formal data collection. Because Study 1 showed no systematic (first-order) bias in the control condition, no separate control condition was included in this study.

This experiment consisted of rerunning the top five scorers from Study 2, where top scorers were defined as those persons obtaining the top five greatest excesses of hits over misses. This process was intended to select the more "talented" subjects from Study 2, even though it was recognized that those subjects could have obtained their higher scores by chance. Each individual performed 15 direct mode runs in the Human Factors Labora- tory, for a total of 75 pooled runs. Immediately after each subject's 15-run session, DR ran a 15-run control session. During the control runs the face of the test machine was covered and the headphones unplugged, as in the first control study, so no feedback could be heard or seen.

This test was an attempt to replicate the results of the first experiment. The experiment was performed by DR in the direct mode, in the same relaxed, undisturbed setting as in Study 1. This time, however, 5 sessions of 1 0 runs each were performed over 5 successive days, for a total of 50 runs in experimental and control conditions.

In this study, DR ran the REG in the seed mode. The setting was quiet and undisturbed, and one or two sessions of 10 runs each were performed per day until 50 test runs were completed. Immediately after completing the 50 test runs, 50 control runs were performed. The test procedure was to reset the microprocessor, wait for a seed to be generated (this random waiting


time was usually between 1 and 5 seconds), then try to influence the REG to produce more clockwise motion than no motion. The control procedure was identical except that no directional intention was applied, the face of the test machine was covered, and the headphones unplugged.

Study 6

In this study, DR tested a possible time-displaced effect. Conditions of the test were the same as in Study 5, except that several seconds after the REG generated the seed for a run, a task was randomly selected by stopping a digital stopwatch and examining the hundreds-place digit. If the digit was even, the task was to try for as much clockwise motion as possible. If the digit was odd, the task was to try for as much "no motion" as possible. That is, what counted as success on each run was randomly selected between clockwise motion and no motion (recall that a feedback option allowed CCW motion to be reset into no motion).

It is important to realize that at the moment the seed was generated, DR did not know what would constitute success (i.e., CW motion or no motion). Thus, the momentary generation of the seed could not be "influenced" as might be the case in other studies reporting time-displaced effects (e.g., Schmidt, 1975, 1976). The distribution of randomly assigned tasks in the experimental and control conditions showed 27/50 even tasks (i.e., try for CW motion tasks) in the experimental condition and 23/50 even tasks in the control condition.

Study 7

This study was a replication of the previous study, except that the control condition was performed by generating 50 new tasks. In the experimental condition, 22/50 tasks were even (i.e., try for CW motion), and in the control condition, 24/50 were even.

Study 8

A few REG experiments have provided evidence that subjects may be able to influence REG statistics even when they are unaware of the task (e.g., Stanford, Zenhausern, Taylor, & Dwyer, 1975). This study investigated whether the effect observed in the previous two studies could be achieved when the task was unknown. The experimental procedure was similar to that in Studies 6 and 7, except that instead of looking at the random task before the feedback, DR looked at it after the feedback. In this way, tasks remained hidden during the test runs.

Study 9

Because Studies 6 and 7 were successful (see Table l), but Study 8 was not (at least, not in the directional sense), an experiment was planned as a

7 4 D. Radin and J. Utts

replication of Studies 6 and 7. Preset at 100 runs, the experimental procedure was the same as in Studies 6 and 7, but the following method was used as a control: The sum of all CW counts was taken as the control score for hits, and the sum of all CCW counts was taken as the control for misses. Recall that the definition of "hits" and "misses" in this study, and in Studies 6 and 7, depended on the assigned directional task for each run. These tasks (aim for CW or CCW counts) were generated after the seed numbers were selected, but before the feedback was presented. Thus, experimental hits and misses consisted of combinations of CW and CCW counts, depending on the task for each successive run.

It is important to note that the directional tasks generated from one run to the next (by the method described in Study 6, above) were recorded manually. While it is unlikely that systematic recording biases could have influenced the data given that the task was generated before the results of a run were known, manual recordings are less certain than automatic recordings, and thus results of Studies 6-9 should be considered as tentative only.

Study 10

Subject RS, a surgeon highly skeptical of psi phenomena, contributed 10 runs in both direct and seed modes, in the first author's presence.

Study I I

Subject BJ, a homemaker, claimed no special abilities but was interested in participating in the experiment. She was allowed to keep the REG for one month at home, and was instructed to perform 128 runs in both the seed and direct modes. Upon reading out the scores on the PROM chip, no instances of data selection or turning off the REG'S power during a run were detected.

Study 12

Subject BN, a homemaker, claimed a variety of psychic abilities. She was allowed to keep the REG for one month, at her home, and was instructed to perform 64 runs in the direct mode. No attempts at data selection were detected upon reading out the scores on the PROM chip.

Discussion

Figure 3 shows the same information as Table 1, but in the form of cumulative deviation curves for experimental and control studies. Figure 4 shows these curves separated by direct or seed mode of operation.

Figure 3 reveals that the experimental condition produced a significant deviation from chance (terminal Z = 2.941, p = .002) and that the control condition remained within the chance expectation envelope (terminal Z


Samples

Fig. 3. Cumulative deviation of hits-misses from chance expectation (as defined by the assigned directional task) for all experimental and control tests. The parabola shows the p = .05 level.

Experimental

chance expectation

1 I I I I I I

Samples

Fig. 4. Cumulative deviation of hits-misses from chance expectation, separated according to experimental condition and mode. "E" indicates the experimental condition and "C" the control condition. The parabola shows the p = .05 level.

76 D. Radin and J. Utts

= - 1.005, p = 343). Figure 4 indicates that the primary significance was obtained in the direct mode (terminal Z = 2.754), but the seed mode also contributed to the positive trend (terminal Z = 1.12 1).

In Table 1 we see that 8 of 27 experiments and 0 of 12 control tests were significant at p < .05, one-tailed. This corresponds to p = 3.67 X one-tailed, and p = .540, respectively.~ecause the first author, DR, was subject in 7 of the 12 Studies, it is instructive to examine the results when other individuals participated as subjects. From Table 1 it can be seen that 3 of 20 experimental tests not involving DR as subject produced results with p I .05 (p = .076), 5 of 20 tests resulted in p I -10 (p = .043), 7 of 20 resulted in p I .15 ( p = .022), and 9 of 20 resulted in p I .20 ( p = .0099). This suggests that the overall level of significance is not only due to DR's contri- butions.

Conclusion

Eight of 27 experiments using a random event generator constructed by Helmut Schmidt, and independently tested by the first author, confirmed a claimed correlation between intention and the statistical distribution of random events. Twelve control tests were non-significant.

In isolation, the anomaly observed in this experiment would be interesting, but not particularly persuasive. This is because there are, at present, no compelling theoretical reasons to predict the existence of such an effect. However, in spite of prevailing theory, three independent reviews of experiments using REGS have agreed that the aggregate evidence for this effect is exceptionally persuasive (Honorton, 1978; May, Humphrey, & Hubbard, 1980; Radin & Nelson, 1987; Radin & Nelson, in press). The anomaly has resisted repeated efforts to "explain-away" the evidence as being due solely to methodological artifact, statistical problems, or experimenter or subject fraud.

Numerous theorists have proposed mathematical, physical, and psychological models to explain how such effects might be possible (e.g., Bastin, 1977; Costa de Beauregard, 1979; Jahn & Dunne, 1986; Schmidt, 1975; Walker, 1974). These models attempt to provide world views which encompass concepts such as acausality and time-displacement. Some of these efforts have been inspired by interpretations of quantum mechanics which suggest that objects in the world may not be completely independent of consciousness or observation (e.g., d'Espagnat, 1979; Hall, Kim, McElroy, & Shimony, 1977; Mermin, 1985; Shimony, 1963; Squires, 1987, in press; Trefil, 1987; Wigner, 1963). Some theorists argue that rather than being paradoxical or contrary to theoretical expectation, some form of mental influence on physical objects should in fact be expected. We close with the intriguing thoughts of the physicist, Costa de Beauregard (1 979, p. 186):

My thesis is that [these phenomena] are postulated by the very symmetries of the mathematical formalism [of quantum theory] and should be predicted for reasons


completely akin to those that led Einstein to enunciate the principle of special relativity, de Broglie to produce the concept of matter waves, and Dirac to (almost) predict the positron.

Endnotes

' With one exception, as noted below.

No cases of attempted data selection were detected in these experiments.

The algorithm is r(n + I) = [B X r(n)][modp], wherep = 219 - 1 and B = 243'. See Hardy and Wright ( 1945) or Radin ( 1 985) for further details on generation of pseudorandom number sequences.

"recognition is defined here as non-inferential prediction or perception of future events.

See the Appendix for a derivation of this formula.

' There were 16 CW and 16 CCW samples per run, thus N = total number of runs* 16.

' A hardware problem disabled the fully automatic recording mode in this study, thus the recorded numbers of hits and misses in Study 1 are not as dependable as those in succeeding experiments. All other studies were recorded both manually and automatically on the PROM. No discrepancies were detected when manual and automatic recordings were compared.

Exact binomial probabilities.

References

Bastin, T. A. ( 1977). A clash of paradigms in physics. In R. Duncan & M. Weston-Smith (Eds.), T l ~ e c~ncj~c1opc)dia of'ignorance (pp. 1 19- 127). New York: Pergamon Press, Inc.

Beloff, J., & Evans, L. A. (196 1). A radioactivity test of PK. Jolrrnal ~ f t h e Societj9.for Psychical R~~.sc~arc~l~, 41, 4 1-46.

Chauvin, R., & Genthon, J. ( 1965). Eine Untersuchung uber die Moglichkeit psychokinetischer Experimente mit Uranium und Geigerzahler. Zeir.schr~/f.fitr Paraps~~chologie zrnd Grenzge- bictc d m Psycliologic, 8, 140- 147.

Costa de Beauregard, 0 . (1979). Quantum paradoxes and Aristotle's twofold information concept. In C. T. Tart, H. E. Puthoff, & R. Targ (Eds.), Mind ut large. Institzrte of'Elecrrica1 and Elccrronic Engineers Sj,rnposiu on the> Nurzire ~~f 'E .~- /ras~~nsor j~ Perc7c~ption ( pp. 1 77- 1 87). New York: Praeger Publishers.

d'Espagnat, B. (1979, November). The quantum theory and reality. Scirnl~/ic'Arnc~rican, 250, 158-181.

Hall, J., Kim, C., McElroy, B., & Shimony, A. (1977). Wave-packet reduction as a medium of communication. Folrndution.~ c?f'P/ij:sics, 7, 759-767.

Hardy, G. H., & Wright, E. M. (1945). An introdlrcrion to /lie theor!. c?f'n~rmbers. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Honorton, C. (1 978). Replicability, experimenter influence, and parapsychology: An empirical context for the study of mind. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the AAAS, Wash- ington, D. C.

Jahn, R. G., & Dunne, B. J . (1986). On the quantum mechanics of consciousness, with application to anomalous phenomena. Fozrndations c~/'PI~j~.sics, 16, 72 1-772.


May, E. C., Humphrey, B. S., & Hubbard, G. S. (1980, September 30). Electronic system perturbation techniques. SRI International Final Report.

May, E. C., Radin, D. I., Hubbard, G. S., Humphrey, B. S., & Utts, J. M. (1986). Psi experiments with random number generators: An informational model. In D. H. Weiner & D. I. Radin (Eds.), Research in parapsychologj~ 1985. (pp. 1 19-120). Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press.

Mermin, N. D. ( 1985, April). Is the moon there when nobody looks? Reality and the quantum theory. Physics Today, 38-47.

Radin, D. I., & Nelson, R. D. (in press). Evidence for consciousness-related anomalies in random physical systems. Foundations of Physics, 20.

Radin, D. I., & Nelson, R. D. (1987, August). Replication in random event generator experiments: A meta-analysis and quality assessment. Human Information Processing Group Technical Report 8700 1, Princeton University.

Radin, D. I. (1982). Mental influence on random events. In R. White & R. L. Morris (Eds.), Research in parapsychology 1981 (pp. 14 1 - 142). Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press.

Radin, D. I. (1985). Pseudorandom number generators in psi research. Journal of Parapsychol- ogy, 49, 303-328.

Schmidt, H. (1970). Quantum mechanical random number generator. Journal of Applied Physics, 41, 462.

Schmidt, H. ( 197 1). Mental influence on random events. New Scientist and Science Journal, 757.

Schmidt, H. (1975). Toward a mathematical theory of psi. Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, 69, 30 1-3 19.

Schmidt, H. (1976). PK effect of pre-recorded targets. Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, 70, 267-29 1 .

Schmidt, H. (1978). Can an effect precede its cause? A model of a noncausal world. Founda- tions of Physics, 8, 463-480.

Schmidt, H. (1987). The strange properties of psychokinesis. Journal of Scientific Exploration, 1(2), 103-1 18.

Shimony, A. (1963). Role of the observer in quantum theory. American Journal of Physics, 31, 755-773.

Squires, E. J. (1987). Many views of one world-an interpretation of quantum theory. Euro- pean Journal of Physics, 8, 17 1 - 174.

Squires, E. J. (in press). The unique world of the Everett version of quantum theory. Founda- tions of Physics.

Stanford, R. G., Zenhausern, R., Taylor, A., & Dwyer, M. A. (1975). Psychokinesis as psi-mediated instrumental response. Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, 69, 127- 133.

Trefil, J. (1987, August). Quantum physics' world: Now you see it, now you don't. Smithsonian, 67-75.

Walker, E. H. (1974). Foundations of paraphysical and parapsychological phenomena. In L. Oteri (Ed.), Quantum physics and parapsychology. (pp. 1-53). New York: Parapsychology Foundation.

Wigner, E. P. ( 1963). The problem of measurement. American Journal of Physics, 31, 6-1 5.

Appendix

We assume there is a fixed probability that the random process will cause the REG to reverse the lamps' direction while any specific lamp is "moving" in the clockwise (CW) or counter-clockwise (CCW) direction. If we call the CW probability PH and the CCW probability PM, then the null hypothesis of interest is P, = P,,.

Let X, and Y, be the number of lamps lit in the CW and CCW directions, respectively, for sample i, where i = 1 , . . . , N. Then P(X, = I) = pH, P(Xi = 2) = (I - Pf,)PH, P(X, = 3) = ( 1 - PH)*PH, and in general, P(X, = x) = ( 1


- P1,)"-'P1,. This is known as a geometric distribution with parameter P,. Similarly, Y, follows a geometric distribution with parameter PM.

N N

Let H = C X I , and M = C Y,, where N is the total number of samples in I= l I= l

the experiment. (In the current experiment, one "run," initiated with a single button press, produced 16 CW and CCW samples.) Since H and M are each sums of independent geometric random variables, they have negative binomial distributions with parameters (N, P,) and (N, PM), respectively. Thus, E(H) = NIPH and Var(H) = N(1 - PH)/P$. Similar results hold for M.

Instead of testing the null hypothesis, Ho:PH = PM, directly, we test the equivalent but intuitively more appealing hypothesis, Ho:E(H) = E(M). Relying on the Central Limit Theorem, we use the standardized version of H - M as our test statistic.

When Ho is true, E(H - M ) = 0 and Var(H - M) = Var(H) + Var(M) = 2N[(1 - p)/p2], where p = PH = PM. TO estimate Var(H - M), substitute p ̂= 2N/(H + M ) for p. Thus, the test statistic, which should be compared to the standard normal table, is:

Journal o[Scic.icwt~fic .Explorulion. Vol. 3 , No. I, pp. 8 1 - 10 1 , 1989 Pergamon Press plc. Printed in the USA.


A Case of the Possession Type in India With Evidence of Paranormal Knowledge

Department of Behavioral Medicine and Psychiatry, University of Virginia, Charlottesvill~: VA 22908

Department of Clinical Psychology, National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS), Bangalore, India

5epartment of Behavioral Medicine and Psychiatry, Universily of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22908

Abstract-A young married woman, Sumitra, in a village of northern India, apparently died and then revived. After a period of confusion she stated that she was one Shiva who had been murdered in another village. She gave enough details to permit verification of her statements, which corresponded to facts in the life of another young married woman called Shiva. Shiva had lived in a place about 100 km away, and she had died violently there-either by suicide or murder-about two months before Sumitra's apparent death and revival. Subsequently, Sumitra recognized 23 persons (in person or in photographs) known to Shiva. She also showed in several respects new behavior that accorded with Shiva's personality and attainments. For example, Shiva's family were Brahmins (high caste), whereas Sumitra's were Thakurs (second caste); after the change in her personality Sumitra showed Brahmin habits that were strange in her family. Extensive interviews with 53 informants satisfied the investigators that the families concerned had been, as they claimed, completely unknown to each other before the case developed and that Sumitra had had no normal knowledge of the people and events in Shiva's life. The authors conclude that the subject demonstrated knowledge of another person's life obtained paranormally.

K. S. Rawat accompanied us on one of the field trips of this investigation and participated in some of the interpreting. Satwant Pasricha wishes to thank the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences for support. Emily Williams Cook read a draft of this paper critically and helped us to clarify and amplify our report of some details of the case. Thanks are also due to Susan Adams for assistance in the preparation of this paper.

Correspondence and requests for reprints should be addressed to Ian Stevenson, M.D., Box 152, Health Sciences Center, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22908, U.S.A.

82 I. Stevenson, S. Pasricha, and N. McClean-Rice

The word possession designates a wide variety of conditions that psychiatrists, psychologists, and anthropologists describe. It indicates that a person has undergone such a marked change of behavior that other persons seem no longer to be in contact with the ordinary personality of the affected person.

Possession states occur widely in India (Carstairs & Kapur, 1976; Teja, Khanna, & Subrahmanyam, 1970). ' Most psychiatrists, psychologists, and anthropologists have emphasized the similarities between cases of the possession type and diagnostic entities recognized in the West, such as multiple personality and hysteria. Accordingly, they tend to use phrases such as "possession syndrome" and "hysterical possession." They also, in varying degrees, offer motivational explanations of the condition that depict it as beneficial to the affected person in improving his status and perhaps resolving internal and external conflicts. However, Claus ( 1979) cautioned against psychological and sociological interpretations for all cases until we have more information. Along the same line, Lewis (1 97 1, pp. 178- 179) wrote: "Nothing after all is easier than leaping to conclusions and projecting our own psychological assumptions and interpretations onto exotic evidence which may correspond only in superficial detail with apparently similar data in our own culture."

The question arises of whether some ostensibly possessed persons show knowledge about the life of a deceased person that they could not have obtained normally. We think that in a small number of cases the subjects do show such knowledge. Cases of this kind are rare, and yet sufficiently well known in India so that the Hindi word parakayapravesh ("entering into another body") exists for designating them. One of us (I.S.) has studied several cases of the type with evidence of paranormal knowledge2 and has published reports of two of them (Stevenson, 19661 1 974a, 1983a). Their occurrence and that of occasional other cases of ostensible possession with evidence of paranormal processes, such as the case of Uttara Huddar (in which the subject spoke a language she had not learned and assumed the personality of a deceased woman completely unknown to her family) (Ste- venson & Pasricha, 1979; Stevenson, 1984), have encouraged us to search for new cases of the possession type with evidence of paranormal processes.

Such evidence is not easily obtained. The ostensibly possessing personalities (when not gods or godlings) are usually persons known to the subject or about whom the subject may easily have learned normally. In cases of this type it is difficult to obtain satisfactory evidence of the subject's having knowledge paranormally acquired. We believe we have satisfied this criterion in the case we now report. It involves two completely unrelated and unacquainted persons. Their families lived in widely separated towns and villages, and the informants' testimony warrants believing that they had had

Possession type case in India 83

Case Report

Summary of the Case and its Investigation

When this case developed, the subject, Sumitra Singh, was a young married woman of about 17. She was living with her husband and their one child in her husband's family home (according to the custom in India) in the village of Sharifpura, in the Farrukhabad District of the State of Uttar Pradesh, India. Early in 1985 she began to develop episodes of loss of consciousness with eye-roll movements and clenching of the teeth. Some- times she would speak during these trance-like states, and one day in July she predicted that she would die three days later. When the predicted day (July 19) came, she seemed to die. At least members of her family and other villagers considered her dead, because she was pulseless and apneic, and her face was drained of blood like that of a dead person. They had begun grieving and also preparing for Sumitra's funeral, when she unexpectedly revived.

Following a brief period of confusion Sumitra began to behave like a different person. She did not recognize the people around her and said that her name was Shiva and that she had been murdered by her in-laws at a place called Dibiyapur. She rejected Sumitra's husband and child and asked to be taken to Shiva's two children. She stated many details that were subsequently found to correspond with the life of another young married woman, Shiva Diwedi, who had died violently-whether from murder or suicide is still unclear-at Dibiyapur on the night of May 18- 19, 1985, that is, two months before Sumitra's apparent death and revival. Shiva's parental family believed that her in-laws had murdered her and then attempted to simulate suicide by laying her body on railway tracks nearby. Her father, Ram Siya Tripathi, filed a complaint, and this instituted a judicial inquiry. Reports of Shiva's death and of the legal proceedings appeared in newspapers published in Etawah, the district town where Ram Siya Tri- pathi lived.

Sumitra's in-laws said that they knew nothing of a Shiva who had died at a place called Dibiyapur. At first they thought that Sumitra had gone mad and later that she had become possessed by a discarnate spirit; but they made no attempt to verify what she was saying. It was about a month before Ram Siya Tripathi learned about Sumitra's statements. This occurred, almost accidentally, when he heard a rumor, while he was visiting Dibiyapur, that his deceased daughter had taken possession of a girl in a distant village. Nearly two more months elapsed before he was able to verify this information by having someone from a village called Murra, which is close to Sharifpura, visit Sumitra and her family.

The information gathered corresponded to facts in the life of Ram Siya's deceased daughter, Shiva, and so on October 20, 1985 Ram Siya went

8 4 I. Stevenson, S. Pasricha, and N. McClean-Rice

himself (accompanied by a relative) to Sharifpura, where Sumitra recognized him and said she was his daughter. Sumitra also recognized in Sharif- pura and Etawah (where she visited Ram Siya during the following days) at least 13 members of Shiva's family and circle of friends.

In addition to Sumitra's statements about the life of Shiva and her recognitions of persons Shiva had known, she showed a marked change in behavior. Sumitra's family belonged to the Thakur caste and they were villagers with almost no education; Sumitra herself had had no formal education, although she could read and write a little. The Tripathis, on the other hand, were Brahmins and middle-class urbanites. Ram Siya was a lecturer in a college, and Shiva had been educated up to the level of earning a B.A. degree. After her revival, Sumitra's behavior changed from that of a simple village girl to that of a moderately well-educated woman of higher caste and more urban manners, who could now read and write Hindi fluently.

The case came to our attention soon after the first exchanges of visits between the families concerned. The Indian Express published a report of the case on October 26, 1985. One of I.S.'s correspondents in India noticed this and sent a copy of the report to him. At about the same time a corre- spondent in northern India sent to S.P. a copy of a report of the case in a Hindi newspaper, Dainik Jagran, that had appeared on October 23, 1985.

Methods of Investigation

Our principal method of investigation was interviews with informants, particularly firsthand witnesses of the apparent death of Sumitra and the change in her personality that followed her revival; but we spent almost as much time interviewing the members of Shiva's family.

We were able to begin our interviews within three weeks of learning about the case. In November 1985, S.P. conducted a series of interviews with some of the principal informants for it. These included Sumitra and her mother- in-law, Shiva's parents, and one of Shiva's maternal uncles.

In February and March 1986, we worked together on the case for seven days. We interviewed again all but one of the persons S.P. had interviewed earlier. In addition, we interviewed numerous other informants for the case, especially in Sumitra's village of Sharifpura. We met her father in his village, Angad ka Nagla. We had to seek out other informants in four other towns and villages of the Farrukhabad District and the neighboring districts of Etawah, Mainpuri, and Hardoi.

In November 1986, February 1 987, and October 1987 two of us (I.S. and S.P.) spent another 10 days on fieldwork for the case. During these three periods we interviewed (in Dibiyapur) Shiva's husband and father-in-law, whom we had not met earlier. We also interviewed informants who had connections through marriage or trade with more than one of the communities involved in the case; we intended these interviews to help us to assess the


likelihood that information about Shiva's life and death could have reached Sumitra's family along normal lines of communication. We also, during this later phase of the investigation, had new interviews with some previous informants, including Sumitra and her husband and Shiva's parents.

By the end of our investigation in October 1987 we had interviewed 24 members of Sumitra's and Shiva's families, and we had interviewed all the more important witnesses among these persons two or more times. In addition, we had interviewed another 29 persons who were able to furnish background information, especially that mentioned above concerning communications between the communities involved in the case.

During the interviews S.P. made notes, mostly in Hindi, and also acted as principal interpreter for I.S. and N.McC-R., both of whom made notes in English, as nearly verbatim as possible. During a few special interviews we made tape recordings only, or in addition to making notes.

In our interviews we gave particular attention to the following aspects of the case: the preceding illness, apparent death, and revival of Sumitra; the possibilities for normal communication of information about Shiva's life and death to Sumitra and her family; and the circumstances under which Sumitra, after her revival, identified Shiva's family in person and in photographs.

In addition to our interviews we obtained copies of newspaper reports (published in Etawah) of Shiva's death and of Ram Siya Tripathi's allegations that her in-laws had murdered her. We also obtained copies of the photographs of Shiva's family in which Sumitra had correctly identified persons normally unknown to her before the change in her personality.

One of us (I.S.) has published elsewhere further details of the methods followed (Stevenson, 19661 1974a, 1975).

Relevant Facts of Geography and Possibilities for Normal Communication Bet ween the Families Concerned

This case occurred in the Farrukhabad and Etawah Districts of the State of Uttar Pradesh. Etawah is a small city of about 100,000 inhabitants located approximately 500 km southeast of Delhi. It is a district town on the main line of the railway that joins Delhi to Kanpur (about 250 km east of Etawah) and, ultimately, to Calcutta. Shiva's parents lived in Etawah from the time she was three years old until the case developed.

After her marriage Shiva moved to the home of her in-laws at Dibiyapur, which is about 55 km east of Etawah. Almost adjoining Dibiyapur is the railway station of Phaphoond, which is on the main railway line linking Etawah and Kanpur.

Sharifpura, the village where Sumitra was living when the case developed, is just outside the Etawah District in the Farrukhabad District, about 65 km

86 I. Stevenson, S. Pasricha, and N. McClean-Rice ~ of Sumitra's in-laws lived in the town of Sikandarpur, which is about 30 km farther north and west from Sharifpura, in the Farrukhabad District.

Angad ka Nagla, where Sumitra's father lived, is about 15 km east of Sharifpura and perhaps slightly south.

Informants for Sumitra's side of the case said that they had no previous acquaintance with Shiva's family, and members of Shiva's family similarly said they were completely ignorant of Sumitra's family before the case developed. Apart from the long (for India) geographical distances between the families, they were further separated by significant differences of caste, education, and economic position.

Strong support for the informants' denial of prior acquaintance (or knowledge about each other) comes from the slow and roundabout manner in which Shiva's family learned about the personality change in Sumitra. Sumitra's father and her in-laws made no attempt to verify her statements about Shiva. Word about them first reached the neighboring village of Murra, which is 2 km from Sharifpura. From there it traveled to Dibiyapur apparently conveyed by women of Murra who had married and were living there. Ram Siya Tripathi, on a visit to Dibiyapur, heard a rumor that his dead daughter had taken possession of a girl in a distant village called Sharifpura. However, he had never been to Sharifpura and did not even know where it was located. After another two weeks he learned about a man called Ram Prakash Dube, a native of Murra who was living in Etawah, but whom he had not previously known. He asked Ram Prakash Dube to inquire in Murra about the truth of the account he had heard in Dibiyapur. The monsoon rains led to further delays. When Ram Prakash Dube next visited Murra, he looked into the story and confirmed its main outlines to Ram Siya Tripathi, who, as we have mentioned, then went to Sharifpura and had his first meeting with Sumitra on October 20, 1985. This was exactly three months after Sumitra's apparent death and revival. We believe that if the families concerned had been previously acquainted or had had any lines of communication through mutual acquaintances, they would have exchanged information about Sumitra's change of personality much sooner than they did.

If Ram Siya Tripathi had not complained to the police about the un- seemly haste with which his daughter's body had been cremated (as we shall describe below), few persons outside those immediately concerned would have heard about her death. However, when the police began to investigate the matter, the newspapers of Etawah took notice and published accounts of Shiva's death and of the judicial inquiry. Some of the newspapers carrying these reports reached Sikandarpur, where persons who might have come in contact with the family of Sumitra's mother-in-law read them. At least one newspaper with a report also reached a reader of Sharifpura. The brother of the headman of Sharifpura said that he had read about Shiva's death in a newspaper before the change in Sumitra; but he gave the matter little attention at the time. The headman himself, a schoolteacher, said that he learned

Possession type case in India 8 7

about Shiva's death only after Sumitra's changeover. In addition, we learned of two traders who went regularly between Sharifpura and Etawah on business. After the case developed one of them became acquainted with Ram Siya Tripathi, but had not known him earlier.

Members of Sumitra's family said that they had heard nothing about Shiva's death before Sumitra's death, revival, and personality change. How- ever, in view of the circulation of some newspapers in their area, and of some trading between Sharifpura and Etawah, it is best to assume that they might have learned of Shiva's death and perhaps also learned about some of the allegations of suicide and homicide that figured in the newspaper reports. (There was no radio station in the area. Some television had been introduced at Etawah only [Sharifpura had no electricity], but it only re- layed programs from Delhi and broadcast no local news.) The newspaper reports included some of the names of Shiva's parental family and in-laws. The important question remaining is, therefore, whether Sumitra, after the change in her personality, demonstrated knowledge and behavior corresponding to Shiva's life that went beyond the information available in the newspapers reporting the death of Shiva and the related judicial inquiry.

The Life, Last Illness, Apparent Death, and Revival of Sumitra

Sumitra was born in (probably) 196S3 in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, where her father, Chotte Singh, had gone for employment in one of the many textile mills there. He was a native of Angad ka Nagla, a village of the Etawah District. He and other members of his family belonged to the Thakur caste.

Sumitra's early life was unusual in the degree to which she lived separated from one or both of her parents. The separations reflected her father's efforts to break out of the life of a village cultivator and become a steady wage- earner.

Because of her parents' movements Sumitra lived for about eight years with an older cousin, Phool Mala, in the village of Birpur, in the neighboring district of Mainpuri. Sumitra never attended school, but Phool Mala taught her the elements of reading and writing. Phool Mala herself had gone to a primary school only for a year or two, and she had mainly learned to read and write at home. She taught Sumitra as much as she knew. She said that Sumitra could read the Ramayana and was able to write a letter. Sumitra's father told us (incorrectly) that she could not write at all, and her husband said that she could write "a very little like a child in kindergarten." He thought that she was (when he knew her) unable to write a letter, but we learned that she had occasionally done this.

Sumitra's mother, Ganga Devi, died in 1979, when Sumitra was about 1 1. In childhood Sumitra enjoyed good physical health. When she was about

13 (in 198 l), she was married (in the Indian style of arranged marriages) to Jagdish Singh and moved to her husband's village of Sharifpura, which is about 15 km from Angad ka Nagla, where her father was then living. Sumi-


tra's marriage to a considerable extent repeated the pattern of separations that she had experienced in childhood, because her husband, like her father, went to a city (in his case, Delhi) trying to obtain regular employment, and he was often away from Sharifpura for months at a time. After three years of marriage, Sumitra gave birth to a baby boy in December, 1984. A month or two later, early in 1985, she began to suffer from periods of loss of consciousness or trance in which her eyes would roll upwards and she would clench her teeth. She seemed not to have fallen suddenly in any of these episodes. The spells lasted varying times-from a few minutes to a whole day. Sometimes Sumitra would say afterward that Santoshi Ma4 had possessed her. On two occasions she was seemingly possessed briefly by discarnate personalities. One of these communicating personalities said that she had been a woman of Sharifpura who had drowned herself in a well; the other (a male) said that he had been a man of another state in India. She gave some particulars about this latter life that have not been verified and are probably unverifiable.

During these episodes of apparent possession, Sumitra's condition sufficiently troubled her family so that they consulted local healers. Of these the most prominent was a man called Vishwa Nath. He was a distant relative of the family, a cultivator regularly, and without experience in other cases like Sumitra's. Nevertheless. he seemed to have a pacifying influence on her. He himself at times went into trances when he would be possessed, as he would say afterward, by the Hindu god Hanuman.

Vishwa Nath's intervention did not arrest Sumitra's episodes of trance; and, as we described earlier, she predicted her death, and three days later (on July 19, 1985) she lost consciousness and seemed to die. We questioned several eyewitnesses of this event. Her respiration and pulse stopped and her face became drained of blood like that of a dead person. A considerable group of persons surrounding Sumitra were convinced that she had died, and some began to cry. It was proposed to put her body on the ground (a Hindu ritual performed for persons who are thought about to die or who have died). Sumitra seemed to be dead for a period estimated by her father- in-law and brother-in-law as about five minutes. Some other informants thought that she had been dead for much longer than five minutes before she revived, but we think they may have estimated the onset of death from a time when her breathing became shallow and barely perceptible. No doctor was in or near the village, so Sumitra's heart was not auscultated, and we have reported the villagers' judgment that Sumitra was dead without assert- ing ourselves that she was.

When Sumitra revived she did not recognize her surroundings including the people of her husband's family. She said little or nothing for a day after her revival. Then she began to say that she was Shiva and to describe details of the life and death of Shiva. We shall summarize her statements about Shiva's life in a later section of this report, after we describe what we could learn about Shiva's death.


Upon hearing Sumitra's statements about Shiva's life and death, her in- laws thought first that she had gone mad and then that she had become possessed by a wandering discarnate personality who could be exorcised away or might leave spontaneously as had the ones previously manifesting in Sumitra.

In the autumn of 1986 Sumitra became confused for a few hours and seemed to resume her ordinary personality. Then the Shiva personality resumed control and was still dominant at the time of our last interviews in October 1987. By this time the Shiva personality had been dominant-with the single brief exception just noted-for more than two years.

The Life and Death of Shiva

Shiva Tripathi was born in Sevpur in the Etawah District on October 24, 1962. Her parents were members of the Brahmin caste and her father, Ram Siya Tripathi, was a lecturer in a college. After 1965 the family lived in Etawah, and Shiva grew up there along with five brothers and sisters. She attended school and then college from which she graduated with a B.A. in Home Economics.

At the age of 18 and a half she was married to a man called Chhedi Lal, who lived in the village or small town of Dibiyapur.

Shiva gave birth to two children who became known by the nicknames of Tinku and Rinku. (Tinku was about 18 months old and Rinku less than 6 months old when Shiva died.) Shiva was living (according to the custom of joint households in India) in her in-laws' house. Friction developed between Shiva and her in-laws. It is possible that Shiva's superior education and more urban manners irritated her in-laws. They grumbled when Shiva returned to Etawah in order to write final examinations for her college degree. Shiva complained that her mother-in-law had told her to go and hang herself. At one stage her father-in-law wrote to Shiva's father and suggested that he take her back, but nothing came of this.

A more serious quarrel developed in the second half of May 1985. Shiva was invited to attend the wedding of a member of her family, and her in-laws, after at first agreeing to her absence for this function, changed their minds and forbade her to leave the house. On the evening of May 18, 1985 Shiva's maternal uncle by marriage, Brijesh Pathak, who lived in a village (Kainjari) about a kilometer from Dibiyapur, called on the family and learned from Shiva about the quarrel she had had with her in-laws. Shiva was crying and told him that her mother-in-law and one of her sisters-in-law had beaten her. She did not seem depressed, and she did not talk of suicide. Her uncle tried to calm the family members and advised them to ask Shiva's father to come and arrange a more durable peace.

The next morning Brijesh Pathak and his brothers learned that Shiva had died in an "accident." Her dead body had been found on the railway tracks, and her in-laws said that she had thrown herself in front of a train. We

90 I . Stevenson, S. Pasricha, and N. McClean-Rice

interviewed five persons who saw Shiva's body on the morning of May 19 before it was cremated. When discovered, it lay between two rails of a track at the railway station of Phaphoond (which adjoins Dibiyapur). The body was intact and therefore had not been run over by the wheels of a train; several trains had passed the station during the night.

Brijesh Pathak, remembering the quarrel between Shiva and her in-laws of the night before, asked them to delay cremation of the body until he could go to Etawah and bring Shiva's father (which would take only four hours, because the railway stations of Dibiyapur and Etawah are both on the main railway line). However, Shiva's in-laws ignored his pleas, obtained permission from local authorities to cremate her body,5 and lit the fire at about 11:OO a.m. To make it burn more quickly they had poured fuel oil on the wood.

Shiva's in-laws said that they had noticed her unexpected absence from the house and had gone in search of her. Her body had been found on the railway tracks at the railway station, and they concluded that she had thrown herself in front of a train. They presented this account of Shiva's death during judicial inquiries and also in our interviews with them.

Although it is not uncommon for young married women in India who are harassed by their in-laws to commit suicide, several circumstances in the death of Shiva pointed away from suicide and raised a suspicion of murder. First, there was the history of the quarrel on the evening of May 18, when Shiva had told her uncle that her in-laws had been beating her. Second, rumors began to circulate in Dibiyapur about persons having seen Shiva's in-laws carrying her during the night to the railway station at Phaphoond (just a few hundred meters from their home). They were said to have explained that they were taking her to the hospital. Although there were people around the railway station, it was night, and at one point the lights in the station failed; it would then have been dark, so that a dead body might have been placed on the tracks unobserved. (Firsthand confirmation of this report would have been of critical importance, but we were unable to learn even the name of a firsthand informant.) Third, Brijesh Pathak, who saw his niece's body lying on the platform of the railway station before it was taken away by her in-laws, remarked that only the head was injured; he thought it suspicious that a body knocked down by a train was not more extensively damaged.6 Fourth, although it is customary to have an inquest and autopsy after any accidental death, the panchnama was signed with suspicious haste, the expressed wishes of Shiva's uncle to delay the cremation until her father could arrive were ignored, and the cremation proceeded with hurriedly.

Ram Siya Tripathi arrived at Dibiyapur around 2:00 in the afternoon of May 19. By that time the cremation fire had reduced his daughter's body to ashes. After considering all that he could learn about the circumstances of her death, he complained to the police, and they began a belated inquiry. Later, he filed a formal charge of murder against Shiva's in-laws. Shiva's husband and father-in-law were arrested and then released for lack of evidence. Her mother-in-law and sister-in-law absconded and remained in


hiding for some months. In 1986 they returned to their home, were arrested, and then released pending an expected trial. In October 1987 the judicial inquiry was continuing with the usual delays of such proceedings.

On the facts available to us, we must suspend judgment about how Shiva died. That she died violently and after a quarrel with her in-laws on the night of May 1 8- 19, 1985 is established. Her in-laws may have killed her and put her body on the railway tracks to simulate a suicide; or she may have thrown herself in front of a train during a trough of depression following the quarrel with her in-laws.

Sumitra's Statements About the Life and Death of Shiva

Sumitra's statements made after her revival may be divided into three groups. The first group consists of names of persons and places that the newspaper accounts of Shiva's death and her father's lawsuit had published. We think it extremely unlikely that anyone communicated even the fact of Shiva's death, to say nothing of its details, to Sumitra or her family. How- ever, as we have mentioned, some newspapers were circulated in the general area of Sharifpura, and so we must assume that Sumitra's family might have learned about Shiva's death normally. This means we cannot count as paranormally derived any of the names Sumitra stated that had appeared in newspaper accounts.

A second group of Sumitra's statements remains unverified. We refer to her account of Shiva's final quarrel with her in-laws and of how her sister- in-law had hit her on the head with a brick, after which her body was laid on the tracks at the railway station to simulate suicide. Nothing refutes these statements, but they remain unverified and may be wrong.

A third group of statements, those concerned with nicknames and private affairs not published in the newspapers, includes statements that we think contain information Sumitra could not have obtained normally. We learned of 19 items that we felt justified in placing in this, the most important group. These showed that Sumitra had knowledge of: a particular yellow sari that Shiva had owned, a watch that had belonged to Shiva and the box (in the Tripathi home) in which it was kept, the respective order of birth of Shiva's maternal uncles (although one who was younger actually looked older than one of the older uncles), one of Shiva's nicknames familiarly used in the home (Shiv Shanker), the names of two educational institutions where Shiva had studied (Sarvodya College and Sorawal Intermediate College), the pet names of Shiva's two children (Rinku and Tinku), the names of two friends of Shiva who happened to have the same name, and the names of Shiva's two brothers, two of her sisters, two of her maternal uncles, a maternal aunt (by marriage), and a nephew.

Sumitra 's .Recognitions of Shiva 's Family Members and Friends

Observers of recognitions in cases suggestive of reincarnation-of which the present case may be considered a variant-frequently vitiate them by


asking leading questions or by cueing the subject with glances directed toward the person to be recognized (Stevenson, 1975, pp. 39-40). Neverthe- less, there remain several circumstances in which recognitions may occur that deserve credit as showing paranormal knowledge on the part of the subject. These are: recognitions that the subject makes spontaneously without anyone's having asked him or her to identify another person; recognitions that occur when the subject is confronted with a person and asked a question like: "Do you know who this person is?" or "Tell me who I am"; and recognitions in which the subject immediately afterward adds a statement about some intimate detail, perhaps a nickname, not known outside a small circle of family and friends. We learned of 12 members of Shiva's family and circle of friends whom Sumitra recognized under conditions that we believe excluded cueing. We shall describe the circumstances of seven of Sumitra's recognitions, including one in which cueing might have played a part and six in which we think it did not.

1. Ram Siya Tripathi, Shiva's father. When he first went to Sharifpura, he introduced himself outside the house and someone told Sumitra, who was then inside, that "her father" (that is, Shiva's) had come to the house. We therefore attach no significance to Sumitra's telling Ram Siya Tripathi what his name was. However, she called him "Papa" (as Shiva had) and wept. Also, when Ram Siya Tripathi asked her, Sumitra immediately stated two pet names by which Shiva was sometimes called in her family: Aruna and Shiv Shanker. The first of these names, Aruna, had been published in a newspaper report of Shiva's death, but the second had not.

2. Baleshwar Prasad Chaturvedi, Shiva's maternal uncle by marriage. Su- mitra recognized him at the time he accompanied Ram Siya Tripathi to Sharifpura. Asked who he was, Sumitra at first said he was Arvind's father. (Arvind was one of Shiva's maternal uncles.) Asked to try again, Sumitra then said that Baleshwar Prasad Chaturvedi was the father of Arvind's wife. This was correct.

3. Ram Rani, Shiva's mother. This recognition occurred at the time of Sumitra's first visit to Etawah. Ram Siya tried to mislead Sumitra by telling her that her (Shiva's) mother was standing in a group of other women at the Tripathi house. In fact, Ram Rani had gone inside the house and was not in this group of women. Sumitra insisted that her (that is, Shiva's) mother was not among the group of other women; she then went into the house and searched for Shiva's mother whom she found and embraced tearfully. (Attempts were also made in another instance to mislead Sumitra deliberately, but failed.) In connection with this recognition we should note that Ram Siya Tripathi had already shown Sumitra a photograph of Ram Rani (see below).

4. Ram Naresh, another of Shiva's maternal uncles. This recognition occurred at the time of Sumitra's first visit to Etawah. Ram Naresh pre-


sented himself to Sumitra and said: "Who am I?" Sumitra said: "You are my mother's brother." He said: "Which one?" She replied: "Ram Naresh of Kanpur." He had formerly lived in Kanpur, and had moved to Etawah after Shiva's death.

5. Ram Prakash Dixit, another of Shiva's maternal uncles. He went to Sharifpura (at the end of October, less than 10 days after Ram Siya Tripathi had first met Sumitra). He had grown a beard, which Shiva had never seen. When Sumitra first saw him, he was sitting in front of her and remained silent. She recognized him as Shiva's mother's brother, but was at first unable to give his name. He then spoke a few words, and she immediately recognized his voice and stated his name.

6. Manish, Shiva's nephew (the son of her sister Uma). This recognition occurred in Etawah on November 22, 1985. Sumitra was at the Tripathi house on an upstairs terrace. One of Shiva's brothers, noticing Uma and Manish approaching, drew Sumitra's attention to them. Sumitra looked down and said "Manish has come." Sumitra went down from the terrace, hugged Uma, and called her "sister." However, this cannot count as a flawless recognition, because Ram Siya Tripathi had already shown Sumitra a photograph of Uma (see below).

7. Krishna Devi Dube, a friend of Shiva's youth. This recognition occurred at Sikandarpur when Sumitra visited her mother-in-law's family, in February 1986. More than eight years earlier, Krishna Devi and Shiva had known each other when Shiva used to visit one of her maternal uncles (Brijesh Pathak) in the village of Kainjari, Krishna Devi's native place. When Krishna Devi married, she moved to Sikandarpur and had not met Shiva for more than eight years prior to Shiva's death. When Sumitra saw Krishna Devi, she said: "Jiji! How come you are here? I died and have come into a Thakur's family and am helpless." Shiva would have known normally that Krishna Devi had married and moved to Sikandarpur; nevertheless, the Shiva personality of Sumitra -if we may use that expression here-seemed surprised to meet Krishna Devi in Sikandarpur. Shiva, when alive, had called Krishna Devi "Jiji." This word means "sister," and although Shiva and Krishna Devi were not real sisters, close female friends in India may use this form of address with each other.

In addition to the above mentioned and other recognitions of living persons, Sumitra was able to recognize 15 members of Shiva's family in photographs. When Ram Siya Tripathi first met Sumitra in Sharifpura, he showed her eight photographs in an album that he had brought. One was of his wife and children that was taken in 1967, that is, about 18 years earlier. Sumitra correctly identified all six persons in the photograph: Ram Siya Tripathi, his wife, his mother, his daughter Uma, his son Raman, and his daughter Shiva. Of the last, Sumitra said: "This is me."


Sumitra correctly identified and named all the persons in the photograph. (Some of these persons figured in the previous photograph and in others shown to Sumitra.)

Another photograph showed three adult women, two of them holding infants. Sumitra identified Shiva's mother in it and said the child on her lap was Shiva's brother Raman. She then said that one of the other women was a maternal aunt. She said the third woman was possibly another aunt, but she was unsure of this, and she could not recognize the child on this woman's lap.

Upon seeing a photograph of Shiva's young son Tinku, Sumitra began to cry, said the photograph was of Tinku, and asked where Tinku and Rinku then were.

When a photograph of Shiva's sister-in-law Rama Kanti was shown to Sumitra, she said: "This is Rama Kanti who hit me with a brick." (Ram Siya Tripathi said Sumitra's recognition of this photograph dispelled his remaining doubts about whether his daughter Shiva was possessing her.)

In showing the photographs to Sumitra, Ram Siya Tripathi's attitude appears to have been one of keen interest mixed with skepticism. He said that as he showed Sumitra the photographs in the album, he asked her to identify the persons in them and gave her no cues. She gave the name of each person and usually the relationship of the person to Shiva. The villager, La1 Man Dube, who escorted Ram Siya Tripathi and his relative Baleshwar Prasad Chaturvedi to the house of Sumitra's in-laws in Sharifpura, witnessed Sumitra's recognitions of the photographs as Ram Siya Tripathi showed them to her. He confirmed that her recognizing statements about them were entirely spontaneous and not cued by any remarks the visitors made. We have described only a portion of the photographs she recognized, and we have examined the photographs ourselves. Excluding repetitions- of the same person appearing in more than one of the photographs-sumitra was asked to identify 17 persons in the photographs. She unhesitatingly ' identified 12 of them, identified another three after some hesitation, and

~ failed to recognize two persons. Ram Siya Tripathi showed the album of photographs to Sumitra when he

first met her on October 20, 1985. Although he did not give her cues before she recognized each photograph, he did tell her after she had finished that she had recognized all the people in them correctly. We think it likely also that he communicated to her, if only nonverbally, that she was correct after her statements about each photograph, if not about each person in a photograph. Under these circumstances, Sumitra had some advantage in recognizing persons she met later in Etawah whose faces she had already seen in the photographs. (We have referred to two of these persons above, Shiva's mother and sister.) However, Sumitra was credited with recognizing and identifying (usually by name) eight members of the family or their circle of


Some of the newspaper accounts of the death of Shiva and of the subsequent judicial inquiry included photographs of Shiva, but these were taken in 1979. The photographs of her as a child (which Sumitra recognized) and the photographs of other members of the Tripathi family had not been published.

In sum, Sumitra recognized 23 members of Shiva's family and acquaintances either in person or in photographs, some of them in both ways.

Sumitra's Failure to Recognize People and Places Familiar to Her

After her revival from apparent death Sumitra could not recognize the people around her in Sharifpura, such as her husband and her in-laws; they all seemed complete strangers to her. Similarly, when her father came from Angad ka Nagla to see her, she did not recognize him. Ordinarily, she would have greeted him and called him "Father," but instead she said of him: "I do not know him." She was persuaded to go to Angad ka Nagla, and somewhat reluctantly agreed to do so. She said that she had no connections there and no interest in the place. In the village she recognized no one and seemed not to recognize any of the places with which Sumitra would have been familiar.

Similarly, when Phool Mala, Sumitra's older cousin who had in effect raised her from the age of five, went to see her in Sharifpura, she did not recognize her; nor did she recognize Phool Mala's husband, Risal Singh.

Sumitra, after her revival, showed no interest in her husband and child. She refused her husband's amatory advances for some time and did not acknowledge that her child was hers. Instead, she asked about Shiva's two children. Over a period of some days and weeks, she gradually came to accept her husband and son and to respond appropriately to them. Of her child she said (while still insisting that she was Shiva, not Sumitra): "If I look after this child [meaning Sumitra's son] God will take care of them [meaning Shiva's children]. If I neglect this child, would God not punish me?"

Under this heading we may mention also Sumitra's disorientation for place. For example, when her mother-in-law took her out to the fields for natural functions-the usual site for these in Indian villages-she seemed nonplussed and asked what they were doing in the fields. When her mother-in-law explained, she said: "We have a latrine inside the house [meaning in Etawah and Dibiyapur]." This was correct for both the house of Shiva's parents and that of her in-laws.

Sumitra's Changed Behavior After Reviving

We have already described Sumitra's initial failure (after her revival) to recognize the people around her in Sharifpura, and how, after neglecting her husband and child, she gradually resumed more or less normal relations with them. However, she said that her son was Jagdish Singh's child from his first marriage. Her attitude toward members of the family of her in-laws was


that they were good people and, as she was thrust among them, she would be as gracious about the necessary adjustment as she could be. Nevertheless, there remained important differences in her behavior compared with that before her apparent death and revival. We shall now describe some of these changed behaviors.

Sum itra 's Dzflerent Ident $cation of Herself and Modes of Addressing Other Persons. Sumitra obstinately insisted that she was Shiva and sometimes would not respond or carry out a request unless she was called Shiva. She addressed her husband, Jagdish Singh, as "Thakur Sahib," showing respect, but distance. Previously she had called him (with the indirection Indian wives commonly use) "Guddi's brother." (Guddi was Jagdish's sister.) For- merly Sumitra had called her father-in-law by a Hindi word "chacha," meaning an uncle; now she called him "Father." Formerly she had called her mother-in-law by a word, "Amma," for mother; now she addressed her by another, more respectful word for mother, "Mataji."

In the month following Sumitra's apparent death and revival, a particularly poignant episode occurred. At that season (August) it is customary in northern India for women to show their loyalty to their brothers by tying a short length of string around a brother's wrist. This is known as the rakhi ceremony, and Hindus attach great importance to it. When Sumitra's brother came to Sharifpura and asked her to return with him to Angad ka Nagla for the rakhi ceremony, she refused saying she knew no one at Angad ka Nagla. The brother began weeping and begged her to tie the rakhi string on him. She still refused and began to weep herself saying that she had no brothers near her to whom she could tie the rakhi string. (We have our account of this episode only from Sumitra and have not learned about it from Sumitra's family.)

Dzflerent Style of Dress. Sumitra changed her style of dress. She wore her sari in a different manner and put on sandals, which Sumitra, like most village women, had rarely worn. Her new habits of dressing accorded with Shiva's style.

Caste Snobbery. After her revival Sumitra showed, for a time, a definite hauteur toward her in-laws, the Singhs. Thinking of herself as Shiva, a Brahmin, she regarded them, Thakurs, as inferior.

On the occasion of Sumitra's first journey to Etawah with Shiva's father, Ram Siya Tripathi, and her husband, Jagdish Singh, the group stopped at the home of Baleshwar Prasad Chaturvedi in the village of Umrain. After they had eaten a meal, Sumitra told Jagdish Singh: "Please wash the plates and utensils you used. You are a Thakur and they are Brahmins. It does not matter for me [meaning about her plates and utensils], because I am one of them."

Sumitra's Increased Literacy. Sumitra could read a little, and she was able to write letters and occasionally did so. However, the testimony of infor-


mants was concordant that she had never attended school and had attained only a very limited knowledge of reading and writing. After her revival she showed a marked improvement in her ability to read and write. We observed her in both of these activities and found her able to read and write Hindi with great facility. However, we wish to emphasize that the significant change in Sumitra's literacy was not in her basic ability to read and write but in her fluency in these activities and in her interest in writing. Whereas formerly she only wrote a letter occasionally, after the change in her personality she wrote letters and postcards often to Shiva's family in Etawah.

Other Unusual Behavior. Ram Siya Tripathi said that he noticed in Sumitra some behavior that he regarded as characteristic of Shiva, such as a certain boldness and a tendency to joke. Her husband said that Sumitra, before her apparent death and revival, would usually get up at about 6:00 a.m.; after her death and revival she got up much earlier, at about 4:00 a.m. Shiva had been an early riser; her father said that she used to get up at 5:00 to 5:30 a.m. and even earlier in the summers. One of her uncles commented to us that Shiva used to go to bed earlier and get up earlier than other members of the family. However, we recognize that traits such as we have mentioned in this section are difficult to appraise, and we think they are less important than the others we have mentioned.

Discussion

We propose to discuss what we believe are the four principal interpretations of the case: fraud; cryptomnesia (source amnesia) with secondary personality; secondary personality having paranormal knowledge; and possession of Sumitra's body by the deceased Shiva.

Fraud

We think we can exclude a hoax perpetrated by Sumitra alone. A barely literate village woman in India could not have obtained detailed accurate information about another woman who lived 100 km away without assistance. If there was a hoaxing team, who composed it? Sumitra's husband, as a man, could move around more easily than Sumitra, but he was not in a position to go to places like Dibiyapur and Etawah in order to search out unpublished details about the life of Shiva. It has been suggested that the exorcist Vishwa Nath, who had access to Sumitra (although probably never alone) before and after her apparent death and recovery, might have obtained information about Shiva and coached Sumitra with the details of which he had knowledge. However, this suggestion also, in our view, fails to take account of the information Sumitra had of the private life of the Tri- pathi family, and it fails to explain her ability to recognize 23 strange persons in person or in photographs.

9 8 I. Stevenson, S. Pasricha, and N. McClean-Rice

Shiva's in-laws at Dibiyapur had all the information included in Sumitra's statements about Shiva's life and death, but they were already incriminated in Shiva's death and had an interest, therefore, in Sumitra's silence. Sumi- tra's "Shiva personality" was saying publicly that Shiva's in-laws had murdered her, and the in-laws could not be suspected of promoting this view of Shiva's death.

Shiva's parental family also had the information included in Sumitra's statements. Ram Siya Tripathi might have collaborated in a hoax. In talking with us, he himself mentioned this possibility. When we asked him whether he thought Sumitra might have learned normally about Shiva he said: "No. If she had done that how could she recognize me and members of my family?'Then he spontaneously added: "People say I have made this case up, but why would I do that? I am gaining nothing, and my [legal] case [against Shiva's in-laws] will not be improved. Sumitra cannot be a witness. I am not getting my daughter back." We think he is correct on these points.

Sumitra and her in-laws might have gained a little status from the change in her behavior and from the social elevation of a "new" family member from the Thakur caste to the Brahmin one. In addition, her husband, who had been away a lot prior to the change, was staying at home more than he had before and presumably giving her more attention. However, all these possible gains seem to us minuscule.

Cryptomnesia

The interpretation of cryptomnesia with secondary personality suggests that Sumitra somehow obtained information about Shiva's life normally without being aware that she had done so and also without her family being aware of this. She would then have used the information in the construction of a secondary personality (Stevenson, 1983b). As mentioned, information published in the newspapers about Shiva's death may have reached persons in Sharifpura, even though we found no evidence that it had. The next steps are, however, difficult to imagine. How could the published information- and much else besides-have been passed on to Sumitra without others being aware that this had happened? Moreover, how could information in a verbal form have enabled Sumitra to recognize many members of Shiva's family in person and in old photographs? Such recognitions depend on tacit knowing that cannot be conveyed in words (Polanyi, 1966).'

Apart from the newspapers there were the traders who went between Sharifpura and Etawah and the women of the neighboring village of Murra who were married in Dibiyapur or nearby. The latter group particularly drew our attention. If one or two of them had brought the news of Sumitra's death, revival, and changed personality to Dibiyapur, could they not also have been conduits for information from Dibiyapur about Shiva's death and other details of her life? We spent considerable time both at Dibiyapur and Murra in probing for ways in which this might have happened, and we


cannot see any way in which it could. Although Murra and Sharifpura are only 2 km apart by road (and closer across the fields), there is little inter- course between the villages except on special occasions. Because they are so close, they are considered twin villages and each is inside the other's boundaries for acceptable exogamy; therefore, there are no marriages between the two villages. At the same time, the villages are far enough apart so that the inhabitants of one do not meet those of the other when they are at work in their fields. One informant of Sharifpura, who lived less than 60 m from Sumitra's house (and was distantly related to her), assured us that it would have been "impossible" for women of Murra to have told or taught Sumitra what she knew about Shiva's family. Again, even supposing that the women of Murra had brought back and somehow conveyed to Sharifpura some news of Shiva's death, such knowledge as they may have had would not have accounted for all of Sumitra's knowledge of Shiva's private life and for her ability to recognize so many persons known to Shiva, but whom Sumitra had never seen before.

Secondary Personality With Paranormal Knowledge

Most secondary personalities do not demonstrate paranormal knowledge;* but a few exceptions have occurred, and the case of Doris Fischer (Prince, 19 15- 19 16, 1926) belongs in this small group. There is no evidence that Sumitra had any powers of extrasensory perception before her apparent death and revival. However, if she somehow acquired such powers she might conceivably have obtained information paranormally about the life and death of Shiva and then developed a secondary personality with that information. The sudden enhancement of Sumitra's ability to read and write makes the case parallel to that of Pearl Curran; she was a person of extremely modest education whose secondary personality, "Patience Worth," wrote a series of remarkable historical novels that seemed far beyond the normal capacities of Mrs. Curran (Litvag, 1972; Prince, 1927). However, "Patience Worth" showed little evidence of telepathy and certainly nothing like what Sumitra demonstrated, if we attribute her knowledge of details of Shiva's life to that process.

Possession

The evidence that Sumitra's case provides of paranormally acquired information invites comparison between it and the cases of Lurancy Vennum (Hodgson, 190 1 ; Stevens, 1 887) and Maria Talarico (Giovetti, 1985; Scam- bio, 1939). However, these were cases in which the change of personality was so marked that the term possession seemed applicable to them. And this is the fourth interpretation we wish considered for the present case.

If the other interpretations we have mentioned should be set aside as inadequately accounting for all the facts of the case, we are led to consider that a drastic change of personality occurred. When personality becomes

1 00 I. Stevenson, S. Pasricha, a n d N. McClean-Rice

altered unrecognizably, taking on the attributes and the knowledge a deceased personality was known to have, it may be best to speak of the change as a type of possession or reincarnation. Although we do not dogmatically assert that this is the correct interpretation of this case, we believe much of the evidence makes it the most plausible one.

I Endnotes I ' Possession states occur in many other countries, one might almost say in all of them.

However, we think it unnecessary to review the unmanageably extensive literature on this subject, all the more so since adequate reviews with further references have been published elsewhere (Bourguignon, 1976: Lewis, 197 1 : Pattison, Kahan, & Hurd, 1986). We should like to record our agreement with Lewis (1 97 I, pp. 29-30), who warned against the futility of trying to find a single interpretation that will fit all cases of ostensible possession. The word possession labels many conditions of various types and different origins and processes.

Although we shall refer to knowledge ostensibly obtained without the known sensory organs asparanormal knowledgc., we do not mean thereby to beg the question of how such knowledge is communicated. However, the important question in any specific case, including the one of this paper, is whether such knowledge has been obtained, not how it was obtained.

The absence of adequate written records in the villages makes some of the dates and ages that we give in this report approximate only. However, we know precisely the dates of Shiva's death and of Sumitra's later apparent death and revival.

Santoshi Ma is a Hindu goddess regarded as the special protector of pious and faithful women. She was little known until this century and is not even mentioned in some standard works of reference for Hinduism, such as Walker (196811983). An immensely successful moving picture film about her in the 1970s both expressed and promoted the cult of Santoshi Ma in regions of northern India. Villagers of Uttar Pradesh would regard apparent communications from Santoshi Ma and seeming possession by her as unusual, but not pathological.

The legal formalities for cremation of a body in a village of India require that five notables of the village sign a document (called a panchnama, which means "five names") authorizing cremation. Although some of the persons forming such committees are honest and incorrupti- ble, many of them, at least in small villages, are likely to be friendly with the family of a deceased person and will do the family's bidding with and without bribery. Not surprisingly, observers give no credence to a panchnama if other evidence points to suspicious circumstances.

However, if a train strikes a living person the head alone may be damaged either by impact with the train itself or if the body is lifted, thrown away from the train, and falls so that the head strikes the ground first. A more suspicious circumstance to us in this case is the location of the dead body within the rails of a single line. We find it difficult to believe that a person intending to commit suicide could have thrown herself so neatly in front of a train as to remain, after the train had passed, within the two rails of a track. We should have expected the train either to have thrown the body away from the line or to have run over it and severed it in two or more parts.


It would be more accurate to say that secondary personalities are not observed or not reported often to demonstrate paranormal knowledge. This may be partly due to the failure of observers to examine open-mindedly the evidence that some cases, such as the present one in our view, provide.

References

Bourguignon, E. (1976). Possession. San Francisco: Chandler and Sharp. Carstairs, M., & Kapur, R. L. (1976). The great universe of Kota: Stress, change and mental

disorder in an Indian village. London: The Hogarth Press. Claus, P. J. (1979). Spirit possession and spirit mediumship from the perspective of Tulu oral

traditions. Culture, Medicine, and Psychiatry, 3, 29-52. Giovetti, P. (1985). Lo storico caso di possessione di Siano (Catanzaro). Luce e Omhra, 85,

55-59. Hodgson, R. (1 90 1). Report of meeting of S.P.R. Journal o f the Society,for Psychical Research,

10, 98- 104. Lewis, I. M. (197 1). Ecstatic religion: An anthropological study of spirit possession and sha-

manism. Harmondsworth, Middlesex: Penguin Books. Litvag, I. (1972). Singer in the shadows: The strange story o f Patience Worth. New York:

Macmillan. Pattison, E. M., Kahan, J., & Hurd, G. S. (1 986). Trance and possession states. In B. B. Wolman

& M. Ullman (Eds.), Handbook ofstates oj'consciousness (pp. 286-3 10). New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold.

Polanyi, M. (1966). The tacit dimension. Garden City, NY: Doubleday. Prince, W. F. ( 19 15- 19 16). The Doris case of multiple personality. Proceedings of the American

Society fur Psychical Research, 9- IO , 1 - 14 19. Prince, W. F. ( 1926). The psychic in the house. Boston: Boston Society for Psychic Research. Prince, W. F. ( 1927). The case of Patience Worth. Boston: Boston Society for Psychic Research. Scambio, G. ( 1939). Strano fenomeno di personalit2 indotta in una giovane di Siano. La ricerca

psichica (Luce e Ombra), 39, 349-362. Stevens, E. W. (1 887). The Watseka wonder: A narrative of startlingphenomena occurring in the

case of Mary Lzirancy Vennum. Chicago: Religio-Philosophical Publishing House. Stevenson, I. (1974a). Twenty cases suggestive of reincarnation (2d rev. ed.). Charlottesville:

University Press of Virginia. (First published in 1966.) Stevenson, 1. (1974b). Xenoglossy: A review and report of a case. Charlottesville: University

Press of Virginia. Stevenson, I. (1975). Cases of the reincarnation type. I. Ten cases in India. Charlottesville:

University Press of Virginia. Stevenson, I. (1983a). Cases ofthe reincarnation type. IV. Twelve cases in Thailand and Burma.

Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia. Stevenson, I. (1983b). Cryptomnesia and parapsychology. Journal of the Society for Psychical

Research, 52, 1-30. Stevenson, I. (1984). Unlearned language: New studies in xenoglossy. Charlottesville: Univer-

sity Press of Virginia. Stevenson, I., & Pasricha, S. (1 979). A case of secondary personality with xenoglossy. American

Journal of Psychiatry, 136, 159 1 - 1592. Teja, J. S., Khanna, B. S., & Subrahmanyam, T. B. (1970). "Possession states" in Indian

patients. Indian Journal of Psychiatry, 12, 7 1-87. Walker, B. (1983). Hindu world: An encyclopedia survey of Hinduism (2 vols.). New Delhi:

Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers. (First published in 1968.)

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ERL 306 P.O. Box 3818 Stanford University University of Virginia Stanford, CA 94305 Charlottesville, VA 22903

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Journal of Scientific Exploration, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 103-1 12, 1989 Pergamon Press plc. Printed in the USA.


INVITED ESSA Y

New Ideas in Science

THOMAS GOLD

Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853

Abstract-The pace of scientific work continues to accelerate, but the question is whether the pace of discovery will continue to accelerate. If we were driving in the wrong direction-in the direction where no new ideas can be accepted-then even if scientific work goes on, the progress would be stifled. This is not to suggest that we are in quite such a disastrous position, but on the other hand, not all is well.

New ideas in science are not always right just because they are new. Nor are the old ideas always wrong just because they are old. A critical attitude is clearly required of every scientist. But what is required is to be equally critical to the old ideas as to the new. Whenever the established ideas are accepted uncritically, but conflicting new evidence is brushed aside and not reported because it does not fit, then that particular science is in deep trouble-and it has happened quite often in the historical past. If we look over the history of science, there are very long periods when the uncritical acceptance of the established ideas was a real hindrance to the pursuit of the new. Our period is not going to be all that different in that respect, I regret to say.

I want to discuss this danger and the various tendencies that seem to me to create it, or augment it. I can draw on personal experiences in my 40 years of work on various branches of science and also on many of the great controversies that have occurred in that same period.

I will start very naively by a definition of what a scientist is. He is a person who will judge a matter purely by its scientific merits. His judgment will be unaffected by the evaluation that he makes of the judgment that others would make. He will be unaffected by the historical evaluation of the subject. His judgment will depend only on the evidence as it stands at the present time. The way in which this came about is irrelevant for the scientific judgment; it is what we now know today that should determine his ~ judgment. His judgment is unaffected by the perception of how it will be received by his peers and unaffected by how it will influence his standing, his financial position, his promotion-any of these personal matters. If the evidence appears to him to allow several different interpretations at that time, he will carry each one of those in his mind, and as new evidence comes along, he will submit each new item of evidence to each of the possible

104 T. Gold

interpretations, until a definitive decision can be made. That is my naive definition of a scientist.

I may have reduced the number of those whom you think of as scientists very considerably by that definition. In fact, I may have reduced it to a null class. But, of course, we have to be realistic and realize that people have certain motivations. The motivation of curiosity is an important one, and I hope it is a very important one in most scientists' minds. But I doubt that there are many scientists to whom the motivation of curiosity about nature would suffice to go through a lifetime of hard struggle to uncover new truths, if they had no other motivation that would drive them along that same path. If there was no question about appealing to one's peers to be acknowledged, to have a reasonably comfortable existence, and so on, if none of this came into the picture, I doubt that many people would choose a life of science.

When the other motivations come into the act, of course the judgment becomes cloudy, becomes different from the ideal one, from the scientific viewpoint, and that is where the main problem lies. What are the motivations? If there are motivations that vary from individual to individual, it would not matter all that much because it would not drive the scientific community as much to some common, and possibly bad, judgment. But if there are motivations that many share, then of course that is another matter; then it may drive the whole scientific community in the field in the wrong direction. So, we must think: What are the communal judgment-clouding motivations? What is the effect of the sociological setting? Is our present-day organization of scientific work favorable or unfavorable in this respect? Are things getting worse, or are they getting better? That is the kind of thing we would like to know.

The pace of scientific work continues to accelerate, but the question is whether the pace of discovery will continue to accelerate. If we were driving in the wrong direction-in the direction where no new ideas can be accepted-then even if scientific work goes on, the progress would be stifled. I am not suggesting that we are in quite such a disastrous position, but on the other hand, I am not going to suggest that all is well.

What are the many factors that many people might share that go against the acceptance of scientifically valid new ideas? One obvious factor that has always been with us is the unwillingness to learn new things. Too many people think that what they learned in college or in the few years thereafter is all that there is to be learned in the subject, and after that they are practitioners not having to learn anymore. Of course especially in a period of fairly rapid evolution that is very much the wrong attitude; but unfortunately it is shared by many.

I can give you there an example from my own experience where, when I was still very green and naive, just after the war, I had worked on the theory of hearing: how the inner ear works. As I had just come from wartime radar, I was full of signal processing methods and sophistication and receiver

New ideas in science 105

of hearing in those terms. I thought it was very appropriate because it is a very fine scientific instrument that we were discussing, the inner ear. But I had to address myself to an audience of otologists-the doctors and the medical people who deal with hearing-the only ones who were doing any kind of research in this field. The mismatch was obvious; it was completely hopeless. There was no common language, and of course the medical profession just would not learn what it would take to understand the subject. On the other hand, they sure made their judgments about the matter, without having any basis at all.

So it just essentially forced me out of the field. The theory of hearing which I proposed then involved an active-not a passive-receiver, one in which positive feedback, not just passive detection is involved. We now have very clear evidence, after these 36 years, that indeed an active receiver is at work, but we still have not got a receptive group of physiologists who deal in this field.' The medical profession still hasn't a clue as to why 15 kilocycles should be coming out of somebody's ears. Thirty-six years is not yet enough to get that learning into the profession.

A motivation which is in a way more serious and more avoidable than the nonlearning one, a motivation that hones out new ideas, is what I brutally call the "herd" instinct. It is an instinct which humans have. It presumably dates back to tribal society. I am sure it has great value in sociological behavior in one way or another, but I think on the whole the "herd instinct" has been a disaster in science. In science what we generally want is diversity -many different avenues need to be pursued. When people pursue the same avenue all together, they tend to shut out other avenues, and they are not always on the right ones.

If a large proportion of the scientific community in one field are guided by the herd instinct, then they cannot adopt another viewpoint since they cannot imagine that the whole herd will swing around at the same time. It is merely the logistics of the situation. Even if everybody were willing to change course, nobody individually will be sure that he will not be outside the herd when he does so. Perhaps if they could do it as neatly as a flock of starlings, they would. So this inertia-producing effect is a very serious one.

It is not just the herd instinct in the individuals that you have to worry about, but you have to worry about how it is augmented by the way in which science is handled. If support from peers, if moral and financial consequences are at stake, then on the whole staying with the herd is the success-

' Since writing this, we do. I recently went to a conference on Mechanics of Hearing; NATO advanced workshop, University of Keele (UK), subject: "The Active Chochlea," July 1988. Also, there are various recent papers on the subject, including one in the Proceedings of the Royal Institution by Dr. David Kemp: "Hearing in Focus." It is now possible to record a clear, high-frequency noise coming out of people's ears, with a sensitive external receiver. The ears make clear, clean-pitched noises. They run into self-oscillation, which is clearly the symptom of an ill-controlled active receiver.

106 T. Gold

ful policy for the individual who is dependent on these, but it is not the successful policy for the pursuit of science.

Staying with the herd to many people also has an advantage that they would not run the risk of exposing their ignorance. If one departs from the herd, then one will be asked, one will be charged to explain why one has departed from the herd. One has to be able to offer the detailed justifica- tions, and one's understanding of the subject will be criticized. If one stays with the herd, then mostly there is no such charge. "Yes, I believe that because doesn 't everybody else believe that?" That is enough justification. It isn't to me, but it is to very many other people. The sheep in the interior of the herd are well protected from the bite in the ankle by the sheep dog.

It is this tendency for herd behavior that is greatly aggravated by the support structure of science in which we believe nowadays. I will read out just one passage here to show that other people than myself have recognized the herd problems: David Michland writes in the Reviews ofAstronomy:

I sometimes wonder if the much encouraged and proclaimed interaction among western astronomers leads to a form of mental herd behavior which, if it does not actually put a clamp upon free thinking, insidiously applies the pressure to follow the fashion. This makes the writings of our Soviet colleagues who have partly developed ideas in comparative isolation all the more valuable.

Yes, I have often wondered whether one should in fact pursue subjects with a big wall between two groups that are working in the same field, so that they absolutely cannot communicate, and see a few years later whether they come even approximately to the same conclusion. It would then give some perspective of how much the herd behavior may have been hurting. But we don't have that. Even with our Soviet colleagues, unfortunately, we have too much contact to have a display of real independence, to see where it would have led.

This question of how the support of science-and I don't mean only the financial support but also the journals, the judgment of referees, the invita- tions to conferences, acknowledgements of every kind-how that interacts with the question of herd behavior, is what I will now discuss.

It is important to recognize how strong this interaction really is. Suppose that you have a subject in which there is no clear-cut decision to be made between a variety of opinions and therefore no clear-cut decision to be made in which direction you should put money or which direction you should favor for publications, and so on. No doubt opinions would need a multidimensional space to be represented, but I will at the moment just represent them in a one-dimensional situation.

Suppose you have some curve between the extreme of this opinion and the extreme of that opinion. You have some indefinite, statistically quite insignificant distribution of opinions. Now in that situation, suppose that the refereeing procedure has to decide where to put money in research,


would say, "We can't really tell, but surely we shouldn't take anybody who is out here. Slightly more people believe in this position than in any other, so we will select our speakers at the next conference from this position on the opinion curve, and we will judge to whom to give research funds," because the referees themselves will of course be included in great numbers in some such curve. "We will select some region there to supply the funds."

And so, a year later what will have happened? You will have combed out some of the people who were out there, and you will have put more people into this region. Each round of decision making has the consequence of essentially taking the initial curve and multiplying it by itself.

Now we understand the mathematical consequence of taking a shallow curve and multiplying it by itself a large number of times. What happens? In the mathematical limit it becomes a delta function at the value of the initial peak. What does that mean? If you go for long enough, you will have created the appearance of unanimity. It will look as if you have solved the problem because all agree, and of course you have got absolutely nothing. If no new fact has come to light and the subject has gone along for long enough-this is what happens. And it does happen! I am presenting it in its clearest form, and it is by no means a joke. If many years go by in a field in which no significant new facts come to light, the field sharpens up the opinions and gives the appearance that the problem is solved.

I know this very well in one field, which is that of petroleum derivation, where the case has been argued since the 1880's. At the present time most people would say the problem is completely solved, though there is absolutely nothing in the factual situation that would indicate a solution. It is also very clear there that the holding-in that has taken place has been an absolute disaster to research. It is now virtually impossible to do any research outside the widely accepted position. If a young man with no scientific standing were to attempt this, however brilliant he might be, he wouldn't have a hope.

I believe that our present way of conducting science is deeply afflicted by this tendency. The peer review system, which we regard as the only fair way we know of to distribute money (I don't think it is, but it is generally thought to be) is an absolute disaster. It is a completely unstable method. It is completely prone to this tendency; there is no getting out of it. The more reviews you require for a proposal-now the NSF requires seven reviewers for a proposal-the more you require, the more certain it is that you will follow the statistical tendency dictated by this principle. If you had noise in the situation, it would be much better. There used to be in the United States many different agencies, and there was perhaps an odd-ball over here who gave out some money for one agency, and a funny fellow over there for another. This was a noisy situation, and it was not driving quite as hard towards unanimity. But now we have it all streamlined and know exactly to whom we have to go for a particular subject and, of course, it is an absolute

108 T. Gold

Why is it thought that the peer review system would work for science? How about trying to make a peer review system work for other forms of endeavor? Suppose we had a national foundation for the arts and every painter had to apply to it to get his canvas and his brushes and his paints. How do you suppose that would work? I can imagine some of the consequences, but better than that, we can look them up in historical examples. If you want to read such, in the book The Experts Speak, you can do that. There is a long list of them that you can read-it makes marvelous reading.

Eduard Manet wrote to his colleague Claude Monet, of Renoir: "He has no talent at all, that boy. Tell him to give up painting."

"Rembrandt was regarded as not comparable with an extraordinarily gifted artist, Mr. Ripingill."

William Blake spoke of Titian and the Venetians as "such idiots are not artists."

"Degas regarded Toulouse-Lautrec as merely a painter of a period of no consequence." One wonders how art would have fared in a peer review system.

Or would it be different in music? We can read what was said of Beetho- ven's compositions by musicians of his time:

"An orgy of vulgar noises" was the verdict of Beethoven's Fifth Sym- phony by Mr. Spore, a German violinist and composer.

On Tchaikovsky's appreciation of Brahms, "I played over the music of that scoundrel Brahms. What a giftless bastard. It annoys me that this jumping, inflated mediocrity is hailed as a genius." But one could go on almost endlessly with such quotations. Music would not have fared any better.

So we see that the herd instinct is a tendency in the human makeup, which is itself a severe handicap for science. Instead of combatting it as best we can, we have arranged a method of nurturing science which actually strengthens it enormously-makes it virtually impossible to depart from the herd and continue to have support, continue to have a chance of publication, continue to have all the advantages that one requires to work in a field.

If in a subject there was initially a diversity of opinions, the review system will assure a very short life for that condition, and soon the field will be closed to all but those who are in the center.

Once a herd is established, by whatever historical evolution this has come about, it obtains such finn control that it is extremely difficult to do anything about it. And even if it were appreciated that that is the situation, one just doesn't know how to interfere. Where then is the right to free speech if every journal has to send each article out to a number of people to review, and the bulk of the people are with the herd? Usually with just one-third of the reviewers very negative the paper does not get published.

So there is no free speech in that sense that you cannot publish diverse viewpoints. There is also no free speech at conferences because the same is true there. Would all those who have a divergent opinion be able to organize


their own conference? Very rarely. We represent perhaps an example here showing that it is possible, but it is pretty rare that one can raise funds to run conferences. Essentially once the herd is established, it will interfere in any one of the activities that one would need to further that science.

Would the Dean in a university be willing to promote somebody to tenure who was outside the pack? He can't, because he has to send out letters to the leading persons in the field-he may inquire from 20 people before he gets permission to appoint somebody to tenure-and how can he get that when the pack is running in another direction than this person? It is absolutely hopeless! So you establish the situation more and more.

Once a herd has been established in a subject, it can only be broken by the most crass confrontation with opposing evidence. There is no gentle way that I have ever seen in the history of science where a herd once established has been broken up.

In many subjects such clear evidence is very hard to come by. In the complex subjects, especially I always think of the earth sciences in this respect, there are always different ways of interpreting any one fact; so many complicated things have taken place that any one fact can have three or four interpretations and the crass confrontation is very rare.

So then when you have a herd, all the money that you spent on it may be wasted, or worse than that, it may actually serve to cement further the bad situation. So it is very likely that money is often spent in science in a way that is absolutely detrimental to that science.

What does the refereeing procedure really look like? How does it really go on? If, for example, an application was made in the early 60's or late 50's suggesting that the person wanted to investigate the possibility that the continents are moving around a little, it would have been ruled out absolutely instantly without questions. That was crack-pot stuff, and long been thought dead. Wegener, of course, was an absolute crack-pot, and everybody knew that and you wouldn't have any chance.

Six years later you could not get a paper published that doubted continen- tal drift. The herd had swung around-but it was still a firm and arro- gant herd.

Shortly after the discovery of pulsars I wished to present an interpretation of what pulsars were, at this first pulsar conference-namely that they were rotating neutron stars. The chief organizer of this conference said to me, "Tommy, if I allow for that crazy an interpretation, there is no limit to what I would have to allow." I was not allowed 5 minutes of floor time, although I in fact spoke from the floor. A few months later, this same organizer started a paper with the sentence, "It is now generally considered that pulsars are rotating neutron stars."

I will tell you about a recent application to the Department of Energy by a colleague of mine and myself for some money to investigate the chemistry of hydrocarbons at high pressures and high temperatures in the conditions in which they might be at some depth in the earth. We had the referee's reports

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because you are allowed to get them, but not signed. We got one voluntarily from one of the referees, so we know who he was. He wrote, "This proposal must be funded. In science every research project is a risk, but here the risk is negligible because even if the hypothesis is not correct, this research proposal will contribute strongly to fundamental science in petroleum engineering, the thermodynamics of fluids, and geochemistry. If the hypothesis is correct, the Department of Energy will have hit the jackpot beyond its wildest imagination." And he continued with the detailed questionnaire with top marks in every part: the competence of the proposer, the institution, the test, the facilities, and all that. He gave it top marks on every point.

There was a second referee who also gave it top marks for all the questions that are posed on the form. But then the last question is: "Should this proposal be funded?" and he wrote, "No." And then there was just a single word after that where it said, "If no, why not?" And he wrote down, "Mis- guided." It was not funded despite the fact that most of the referees in fact gave it very high marks, due to the "misguided," and also similar words were used by two or three other referees. No reason given; just "don't touch it."

It wasn't the only such that I have submitted over the years now, and they have all been turned down both at NSF and DOE. It is absolutely hopeless to get any money in contravention of the opinions that are so firmly established in the petroleum business now.

That brings me to another problem. If in a subject you have a large number of people because it has economic applications, that immediately aggravates the problem. And, of course, in petroleum related matters there are a huge number of people involved at every step. This means firstly that a lot of mediocrity is brought into the field and overpowers the field by sheer numbers; and it also means that much more commitment to a particular viewpoint has been made by many people. Do you suppose that the petroleum geologist who has been advising Exxon to drill for hundreds of millions of dollars for maybe 30 years, will go to his bosses at Exxon and say, "I am sorry, Sir, but I have been wrong all those years. We have been finding the petroleum, but if we had searched for it in another way, we would have found 10 times as much." It is very unlikely that they will do that. In fact, even if his methods and his understanding were completely, clearly wrong -even if you had the crassest confrontation in this case-I don't think that it would be acknowledged. A very small proportion of people would have that stature that they would turn around and say, "All my life I have taught or struggled with these problems on the wrong lines, and now I understand the right thing." So in this case, the herd is so firmly established that one cannot think of converting it. A quotation from Tolstoy comes to mind:

I know that most men, including those at ease with problems of the greatest complexity, can seldom accept even the simplest and most obvious truth, $it be such as would oblige them to admit the falsity of conclusions which they have delighted in explaining to colleagues, which they have proudly taught to others, and which they

New ideas in science 11 1

Another area where it is particularly bad is in the planetary sciences where NASA made great mistakes in the way in which they set up the situation. NASA made the grave mistake not only of working with a peer review system, but one where some of the peers (in fact very influential ones) were the in-house people doing the same line of work. This established a community of planetary scientists now which was completely selected by the leading members of the herd, which was very firmly controlled, and after quite a short time, the slightest departure from the herd was absolutely cut down. Money was not there for anybody who had a slightly diverging viewpoint. The conferences ignored him, and so on. It became completely impossible to do any independent work. For all the money that has been spent, the planetary program will one day be seen to have been extraordinarily poor. The pictures are fine and some of the facts that have been obtained from the planetary exploration with spacecraft-those will stand but not much else.

So yes, it is possible to make what is a bad tendency in humans in the first place (for science at least a bad tendency) that much worse with a lack of understanding of how the inward looking effect can be controlled or at least how it should not be augmented by the method of nurturing of science.

You may think that what I am saying is that the support for science poses this intrinsic problem, and that if you want to be fair you have to go for an unstable system which doesn't work. At first it looks like that. So should you go for something that's fair-makes people reasonably happy-but that doesn't work? Or should you go for something that is not so obviously regarded as fair but does work? It is a difficult decision to make, but you know there is nothing that says that things that are fair must also be the things that work. The world is just not so benign to us. Life is not that easy.

Is there another way of doing it? I suppose that the best that I can think of is roughly on the lines of what my friend, Arthur Katrowitz proposed at least for major decisions: The "science court" idea is the best one. Where a lot is at stake, where a subject has been driven into an alley, one must set up a science court where the different viewpoints would be heard, would be argued by the protagonists of each one, with carefully prepared work. The different viewpoints could be judged, not by others working in that same field, which would merely take you back to the herd, but would be judged by a group of very knowledgeable and very competent scientists distributed over other fields, but with enough general competence to be able to listen and understand the detailed arguments of the field in question. I would be much happier to have subjects surveyed every now and again by a jury of that kind. It has to be a scientific jury because it would have to understand detailed scientific arguments, but they do not have to be-and should not be-from the field in which the decision is to be made.

That is the avenue which I would advise the NSF and such organizations to pick at this time. I would say that in every field they should set up such a science court to hear all the different opinions on a reasonably regular basis.

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is true that you could do it sufficiently often for major decisions to break, or at least spoil somewhat, the herd system. As it is at the moment, the situation seems not to be understood at all. I have discussed the herd problem with many people in the funding agencies, and found no understanding of that problem at all.

I could give you many more examples from my own life of the difficulties of getting subjects funded. At the present time I am struggling with the oil and gas business, and after being turned down very firmly by DOE and NSF, I finally was able to get money from the gas industry itself to do research which is in good progress now. In this area, which is one of the worst because no really significant facts have come to light and everything has been interpreted time and again in the time-honored fashion, and everyone believes they know in detail now how oil and gas come to be where they are. And the fact that we find that oil and gas exist on the other planetary bodies, obviously not due to biology, is completely ignored. They say there was no oil or gas here, and all that happened on the Earth was something that was completely specific to the Earth. Of course, it is a peculiar attitude, but that is the one that is widely accepted.

There is one more point that I should make. When in a subject a general attitude or a viewpoint has become established, then it is very easy to obtain funds to do work in that subject on the basis of what I call "shoehorn science." I think you will understand what I mean by that. If you make your proposal which says: "I will demonstrate how this fact and that fact, that apparently are difficult to see in the accepted framework, can be figured into that framework," they are all delighted to give you money. And by the time that has gone on for a long time, so much work of the shoehorn kind has been diligently done to force the facts into the pattern that is preordained, that it then looks to many people as if it all was firmly established. What happens is that they build a superstructure on what may be no foundation -if I may invent a "Confucius say" sort of proverb, "Never judge strength of foundation from size of building."

In the field of petroleun~ geology that is really what has happened. The moment you dare to look at the foundation, you are a scoundrel. I have made people absolutely wild, shaking their fists at me, when I proposed in my talks that there was some uncertainty about the origin of petroleum. One fellow actually wrote a paper that got published, that there must be life on Jupiter because hydrocarbons have been seen on Jupiter.

That is my sad story. I believe that we could do something about it, that we could propose that this kind of a situation be understood in high quarters-that we could try and have something in the nature of science courts established, or at any rate some review by independent persons and not by the herd; but as it is at the moment, I feel that we are dealing with a large proportion of science funding very firmly in the wrong hands, and much of it is therefore counterproductive.

Journal of Scientific Exploration, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 1 13-1 3 1, 1989 0892-33 10189 $3.00+.00 Pergamon Press plc. Printed in the USA. 0 1989 Society for Scientific Exploration

Photo Analysis of an Aerial Disc Over Costa Rica

RICHARD F. HAINES

325 Langton Avenue, Los Altos, CA 94022

and

JACQUES F. VALLEE

Eurolink Intl., 2882 Sand Hill Road, Menlo Park, CA 94025

Abstract-An unusual image was photographically recorded by an official mapping aircraft of the Costa Rican government at 08:25 am (EDT) on September 4, 197 1 while flying at 10,000 feet altitude over a body of water known as Lago de Cote. None of the flight crew or photographers saw the object. Second generation negative and positive black and white transparencies were obtained and analyzed by the authors. Both transparencies were photographically enlarged and printed on various contrast papers for purposes of making visual inspections and linear measurements. Computer enhancement showed variations in surface brightness. The preceding frame, taken 20 seconds earlier of the same ground region, did not show the disc. The angular position of the sun was determined for the date, time and location of the event and was found to be consistent with cloud shadow positions but not with the dark regions on the disc. A shadow of the disc could not be found. The oval image measured 4.2 mm on the negative and was enlarged to 41 mm (9.76 X magnification). If the disc was located 10,000 feet away from the camera, its maximum dimension would be 2 10 meters (683 feet). The various analyses failed to identify the image. The same body of water was the site of a visual observation of a partially submerged object on October 25, 1986.

Background

On September 4, 197 1 a mapping aircraft of the government of Costa Rica with a crew of four recorded an unusual disc-shaped image as it was flying over the region of Arenal. It took several years for this photograph to find its way into the hands of a Costa Rican investigator, Mr. Ricardo Vilchez who

Editor's Note. Customarily, research articles are either accepted or rejected after review by the editor and two referees. However, one of the motivations for founding SSE was to provide a forum for open and scholarly discussion of anomalies which are sometimes controversial. Therefore, in cases where research methods are sound but disagreement arises regarding interpretation or conclusions, we may publish (after consultation with authors and referees) articles followed by dissenting referees' reviews.

Acknowledgements. The authors wish to thank Joe Kirska for his expert assistance in preparing the positive and negative enlargements and Kenneth Weinstock for assistance in running the computer enhancements.

114 R. F. Haines and J. F. Vallee

(along with his brother Eduardo) runs a civilian research group in San Jose. In 1980 Mr. Vilchez met in person with Sergio L. V., the specialist in aerial photography who was aboard the aircraft that day. They discussed the circumstances surrounding the flight and the photograph without reaching a conclusion regarding the nature of the object. One of the authors saw the photograph while attending a meeting in Costa Rica in 1985, and Mr. Vilchez was kind enough to provide a second-generation negative to be taken back to the United States for analysis. Later we requested and obtained detailed maps of the area in question, as well as copies of the immediately preceding and following frames, respectively numbers 299 and 301. These photographs did not show the disc that was present on frame number 300.

In spite of the lack of a first-generation negative, we felt several unusual factors justified a detailed analysis of this photograph, if only to refine our methodology in dealing with such evidence: (1) it was taken by a high-quality professional camera; (2) the camera was looking down, which implies a maximum distance, hence a maximum size for the object; (3) the disc was seen against a reasonably uniform dark background of a body of water; and (4) the image was large, in focus and provided significant detail.

Geographic Locale

The disc was located about 3 miles North of the town of Arena1 and some 25 miles South of the border with Nicaragua. The precise site was at latitude 10.583 degrees North and longitude 84.916 degrees West in the province of Alajuela above a small lake called "Lago de Cote" measuring approximately 1800 X 1600 meters. Lake level is about 640 m above sea level and the surrounding countryside consists of rolling and sharp hills rising several 100 meters above the valley floors. The region is densely wooded, with some broad grassy patches. A dirt road which is only passable in summer runs along the southern edge of the lake. It connects the small town of Cabanga to the northeast with Aguacate to the southwest. When the photograph is carefully examined, a few houses or other structures can be seen along this road, as well as animals in the fields.

The location of the disc was about 800 meters due North of the boundary between the province of Alajuela and the province of Guanacaste.

Figure 1 is a black-and-white contact positive print of most of the aerial negative.

Figure 2 is a copy of the 1:50,000 chart in the region of Lago de Cote above which the disc was located.

Figure 3 is a copy of a geological chart with an arrow pointing to the Lago de Cote. A heavy long dashed line labelled "Fila Vieja Dormida" is seen passing almost directly through the location where the disc was recorded. This line represents a geological fault. The legend on the chart indicates that

Fig. I . A black-and-white contact positive print of most of the aerial negative.

Fig. 2. Detail from the 1:50,000 chart in the region of Lago de Cote above which the disc was located.

Photo analysis of an aerial disc

I Lago de Cote

Fig. 3. Detail from the geological chart with an arrow pointing to the Lago de Cote.

Parameters of the Photograph

According to Mr. Vilchez the camera used was an R-M-K 15/23. The lens would have featured a fixed focus and a 6-inch focal length. The shutter speed was 11500 second atj5.6. The intervallometer was set at 20 seconds between successive exposures.

The film used was black-and-white emulsion with an ASA speed of 80. This fine grain film produces a high resolution negative given a stable film plane and camera and sufficiently fast shutter speed.

The negative was printed on Kodak Safety aerial film, type 3665. The image measured 23 cm X 23 cm (529 square centimeters) while the film base measured 25.3 cm X 23.8 cm. Comparing the image area with the


reduced scale topographical chart indicated that the negative included a region of the earth measuring approximately 1 1.5 km on a side.

The following information was recorded on one side of the film:

Frame counter: 909 Altimeter: 10,000 feet Bubble level: Approx. level

C = 152.44 Nr 21 186

Clock: 08:25 am local time Notations: ARENAL

10,000 feet 4-9-7 1 (September 4, 197 1 ) R.L.B.

Handwritten between the frame counter and the above information is the notation: 300 L- 1 1 M- 1 3.

On board the aircraft were four men, namely: Sergio L. V., specialist in aerial photography, as well as Omar A. (pilot), Juan B. C., geographer, and Francisco R. R., topographer. No member of the crew observed anything unusual during the flight.

The Disc Image: Analysis Results

Figure 4 is a photographic positive black-and-white enlargement of intermediate contrast of the disc, showing (a) a dark edge across the top and upper-right corner, which is the edge of the frame and fiduciary mark included for measurement purposes, (b) the shoreline, also for measurement purposes, and (c) the ellipsoidal disc. This figure is oriented with the true North facing up.

A number of features are worthy of note on Figure 4. First, the disc image appears to possess lightldark shading that is typical of

a three-dimensional object which is illuminated by sunlight. At this time and location, the sun's azimuth was 85.4 degrees (clockwise from true North) and altitude was 16.7 degrees which explains the lateral displacement of the cloud shadows from the cloud locations.

Second, the generally triangular dark region on the right-hand side of the disc cannot be a solar shadow cast by the (assumed) opaque disc from the right-hand side. If the disc is an opaque, flat conical section of revolution (the dark spot being the tip of the cone) and if the right side is tipped upward, then the entire surface of the disc should be dark. It is more likely that the light and dark regions are surface markings.

Figure 5 shows measured and calculated parameters for this image. The longitudinal axis of the disc was 7 degrees CW from true North. The total included angle of the dark triangular region was about 1 10 degrees arc with the most northerly edge of this shadow 38 degrees from true North. The

Fig 4 A photograghlc positihe black-and-whlte enlargement of ~nterniedlate contrast of the dlsc.


True North

Fig. 5. An illustration of the measured and calculated parameters of the image.

approximate centerline of the triangular shadow region was 93 degrees CW from true North.

Third, the finite thickness of the disc is suggested by the curved thin dark line parallel to the right-hand side of the disc (facing East). Two straight, thin dark lines (a, b) are also visible spanning the top of the disc diagonally and pointed toward the West. Each line is generally parallel with an edge of the triangular darker shadow area.

Fourth, while the right-hand edge of the disc image is in very sharp focus, the left-hand edge is diffuse and appears to be an irregular boundary which

Photo analysis of an aerial disc 121

almost transits the light of the background in a transparent manner. It is of interest to note that the general orientation of this left-hand boundary of the image runs North and South rather than being parallel with the visible longitudinal axis of the disc. This irregular edge is shown more clearly in following computer enhancement photographs.

The top (North facing) edge of the disc is in extremely sharp focus with not even the grain structure of the film being apparent. Whereas the entire top "surface" of the disc shows a mottled graininess which could be repre- sentative of a diffusely reflecting surface.

If the disc image was of a real object travelling at a high rate of speed relative to the film plane, then one would expect a blurred image on both the leading and the trailing edge. This did not occur here.

Fifth, the entire image is in sharp focus suggesting that (a) the shutter speed was fast, (b) the disc was not moving relative to the earth background, or both. It is known that the exposure lasted 11500 second which would "stop" a slowly moving object but not necessarily a fast-moving one.

Of equal interest is the calculated maximum dimension of the disc if it was located at the earth's surface, 10,000 feet away from the camera. The 4.2 mm length of the image is equivalent to an object 210 m in length or 683 feet. The object cannot be farther away than this.

The apparent shadow structure on the disc deserves further comment. Using the location on the ground where defined clouds produce shadows, straight (sun) lines were drawn, all of which should point back toward the sun. Interestingly, these lines are not parallel but converge to a common point near the bottom left corner of the photograph. This suggests that the camera's optical axis was not pointed gravitationally down to the earth but at an oblique angle.

Figure 6 is a photographic enlargement of the negative contrast in which the film's grain structure is apparent. In this regard, there is no distortion of the grain anywhere around the disc's image which suggests that it was not the result of a double exposure. Nor is there any obvious indication of heat-produced atmospheric distortion around the object. There are no visible lines to or from the disc. The magnification is identical to that of Figure 4. It is noted that the finite thickness of the disc is apparent, as is the edge sharpness on its right and diffuseness on the left.

Ground Shadows

All available photographic evidence was studied for the existence of a shadow of the disc. Since the lighting geometry is known, the existence of a shadow would make it possible to calculate the linear size of the disc. The sun-line extending from the disc's location was traced on the negative, positive prints, and digital enhancements and any evidence for an approxi-

Fig. 6. A pho ographrc enlargement of the negat~ve contrast In which the film's grain structure is apparent


may be pointed out that the atmosphere was relatively clear (between the clouds) so that the 32' arc solar collir~~ation angle should produce a shar~ly defined shadow on the ground. O f course, the greater the altitude of the disc above the ground the more diKrse would be the shadow edge due to lighl seatter/difision effects. It should also be emphasized that if the disc was Located at the eaflh9s surface one worxld not expect to find a significant shadow.

Digital Enhancement

This negative was also subjected to digtal enhancement. A regon measuring I3 X 13 mm centered on the disc was digitized using an aperture of approximately I micrometer diameter and 16 bit resolution. A number of color assignments to the density distribution were made to elnpkasize difl ferent katures, Unforlunrztely, the following 4 figures are pr?nted in black and white and do not show all of this rich detail.

Figure 7 is a high rwerse contrast image to illustrate two features. First, the density gradient on the left-hand side of the disc which is not visible on the photographic prints (Figures 4 and 6). The same density was found on the left and rig& sides of the disc. The left side of the disc is not a circular extension of the rest of the disc but is flattened to some unknown extent. Secsnd, the brightness of the lake behind the disc varies regularly fiom the top of the flotograph to the bottom which is consistent with its reflection of collimated sunlight over the range of angles involved.

Fig. 7. A high reverse contrast image ( j - 4, 1 - f t sec.1.

124 R. F. Haincs and J. F. Vallee

Fig. 8. The or~ginal densttles of 100 lo 125 were mapped or expanded to I to 256 level5 of grey ( f = 4, t = A sec.).

In Figure 8 the original densities of 100 to 125 were mapped or expanded to I to 256 levels of grey tc9 demonstrate extremely subtle optical density changes, mainly in the area of the disc's dark regions and edge.

In Figure 9 the original densities of 175 to 200 were mapped to I to 256 levels of grey. The dark and Light regions on top of the clisc become more evident here as does the apparent third dimension of'the object.

In Figure 10 a wider varrety of colors were used to better emphasize the disc9s surface density differences as well as the lake's luminance distribution. Located above the disc is a generally oval shaped region of higher density (darker). However, it cannot be the shadow ofthe disc on the water" surface because it is in the wrong position relative to the sun.

Subsequent Ground Sightings

On October 25, L 986 at about 9:00 am, by clear weather, two men saw an object at the surface of the Lago de Cote. They are Joaquin IJ.A,, 40 years old, a farm manager, and Ronald-Alberto L.A., a 23-year-old farmer, Their sketch of what they saw is presented as Figure I 1 .

Interviewed at the site 2 weeks after the observation by Ricardo and

Photo analysis of an aerial disc

Flg. 9. ?'he or~grnal densities of 175 to 200 were mapped to 1 to 256 levels of grey ( f = 4, t =

sec.).

Carlos Vilchez, they gave a detailed description of the events: First they saw, about 1,800 feet away, a row of thr-ee or four post-like cylinders rising to about 3 feet above the surface of the lake, which was quiet and Rat as a mirror. These cylinders appeared to be attached to a structure that remained suherged, Later they again saw a series of objects sticking out about 3 feel above the water and 3 feet apafi, By then they bad driven their tractor much closer to the lake, and they could clearly observe the cylinders which were of a dark hue, either grey or cofF'ee-colored.

After 5 or 1 v minutes these objeccs ciisappeax cd, the r ;~~~crged pol t tr lr~a

again tilting together as if they were attached to a single submerged structure, and the whole object disappeared back into the lake with significant turmoil and waves.

I t should be nc3ted t t~at such observations of submerged objects, although rare, are not unknown in the UFO literature. For example, on September 27, 1978 at 6:40 pm two Italian fishermen in Falcone (Piombino) saw a luminous, bell-shaped object come out of the sea with a metallic sound and fly to within 150 feet of their location, as reported in the February 1979 edition of lbTclliziarr'o UFO.

Flg. 10. Frnphasls on the citsc's siirface density drlkrences as well as the lake's lum~nance dlsrrrbut~on ( f - 2.8, t - sec ).

Discussion

A number of questions are raised by this analysis. In particular, we have not been able to provide an inteqretation for the fdct that the disc's image has a sharply defined edge on the sun's (right) side and a fuzzy edge on the opposite side, The possible significance of the proximity of a geologic fdult line is unknown. There is no indication that the image is the product of a double exposure or a deliberate fabrication.

Computer enhancemexst (cf. Figures 7 and 10) emphasizes extremely small variations in background brightness. Several Ihon~ontal lines are most likely printlng adihets rather than real, environmental-related effects. An- other feature of interest has to do with the edge of the dark triangular region on the disc's right-hand side. Figures 7 thro~~gh 10 all show that the top edge of this dark region is more convex t t~an is its lower edge, as would be expected if the disc presented a generally conical surface of revolution.

In summary, our analyses have suggested that an unidentified, opaque, aerial object was captured on film at a rnaxlrnurn distance of 10,000 f'eet. There are no visible means of lift or propulsion and no surhee markings


Fig. I I . Sketch by the witnesses.

other than darker regions that appear to be nonrandom. This case must remain "open" until further information becomes available.

Referee's Review of "Photo Analysis of an Aerial Disc Over Costa Rica," by Haines and Vallee, prepared by Marilyn E. Bruner,

Sr. Staff Scientist, Lockheed Palo Alto Research Laboratory

I have examined the photograph exhibited in the paper submitted by Haines and Vallee and read their discussion with considerable interest. While I agree that the image seen in Figure 1 is very suggestive, my impression is that it probably does not represent a physical object. This impression is based primarily on a visual inspection of the negative (Figure 6) under levels of magnification ranging from 3 X to 12 X. The following observations were noted:


The grain patterns in the northern edge of the oval image appear to be of a different character than those in the remaining parts of the field. Grains are smaller and more closely packed. The photographic density is quite high, appearing to be nearly satu- rated at the northern boundary. The northern edge of the image is abnormally sharp; much sharper, for example, than any physical feature on the coastline. There is no evidence of light diffusion or halation that would normally be found adjacent to an image formed by a bright light source. The light areas on the negative (i.e., the "portholes" on the positive image) appear to have the same photographic density as the surrounding water.

The most troubling point is probably the very high density and unusual sharpness of the northern edge of the image. It appears to be a step function. The only other features of comparable sharpness are obvious scratches and other artifacts on the negative. If the high density were due to a bright source, at least some level of flaring, some evidence of lens aberrations, and some diffusion in the emulsion should have been seen. This is certainly the case for the trees, shrubs, and rocks seen along the coastline. I suspect that a quantitative analysis of the image would show that the steepness of the step function exceeds the resolving power of the len's, a point that could easily be tested. The strong variations in sharpness with position around the image boundary are also quite difficult to explain in terms of a photograph of a physical object.

On the basis of these observations and on the authors' discussion of the inconsistent shadow patterns, it is my opinion that the oval image is more likely to be an artifact such as a pressure mark than a photographic image of a physical object. Such a mark could have been caused by a foreign particle trapped between two layers of the film on the supply spool. The gradations in density across the image (the "shadow patterns") could easily be due to thickness variations in the particle; these, of course, would bear no relation to the direction of scene illumination. Thickness variations could also explain the sharpness variations around the perimeter of the image. The dou- bled appearance of the image on the southeast edge could result if the particle shifted and made a second impression while it was being spooled or being transported in the camera. I did a simple experiment with pencil and tracing paper that suggests that the appearance is consistent with rotation of the postulated particle about a point on the northern boundary of the image.

Obviously this part of the discussion is based largely on conjecture, since the original film was not available for inspection. The particle hypothesis could, in principle, be tested by examining the original negative under strong, glancing incidence illumination. If the image is a pressure mark, it may be possible to find marks or scratches on the emulsion or local defor- mations in the film base.


To summarize, there are enough inconsistencies in the appearance of the image to raise doubts that it represents a physical object. The most serious of these is that the image's sharpness appears in places to exceed the resolving power of the lens. This issue can and should be evaluated quantitatively. If the resolving power has, in fact, been exceeded, then the observation must be rejected as representing a photograph of an aerial disc. A hypothesis has been advanced to explain the image as a photographic artifact, proposing a method for its formation and a suggested test of its validity.

Authors' Reply to Referee's Review

We are grateful to Marilyn Bruner for her reading of and technical observations on our paper "Photo Analysis of an Aerial Disk over Costa Rica." She raises several points which deserve further comment. These will be addressed in the same order as in her critique. We sympathize with her difficulty in making judgments about our analysis solely on the basis of a third-generation positive contrast print since its grain pattern might well misrepresent what is found on earlier generation negatives. In her first paragraph she suggested that she had the negative to study which she did not. We only had a second-generation negative to work from. Fortunately, a careful examination of the entire area on this negative under various levels of magnification provides the basis for several clarifications of the points she raises.

Bullet One. We could find no significant change in grain size or spacing anywhere around the outside of this disk on this negative; this is what we said in the original text with regard to Figure 6.

Bullet Two. We agree that photographic density is high along the northerly boundary of the negative suggesting a high level of exposure. Of course this fact, by itself, does not point toward an optical artifact. Based upon optical density measurements alone, the brightest part of the disk is still lower in luminous intensity than sunlit cloud (i.e., < 1 3,500 ft-L).

Bullet Three. Another point she raises is the "abnormally sharp" step function of density on the northern edge of the image which, she states, is "much sharper, for example, than any physical feature on the coastline." This is true. However, careful inspection of the entire negative shows several roofs on houses having significantly sharper edges. This fact indicates clearly that the edge of the disk's image has not exceeded the resolution limit of the lens. It is unfortunate that Dr. Bruner could not have inspected the negative prior to making this observation.

The differential sharpness of the disk's image around its circumference is more difficult to explain, at least in terms of a solid, three-dimensional


that the object is partially submerged so that the water interface produced an irregular boundary.

Bullet Four. Her comment that one would expect more light diffusion or halation around the bright disk than is found here is interesting and raises a number of technical questions that requires far more space than is available to discuss. Suffice it to say that there are several other objects in the field of view that are brighter than the disk which possess extremely sharp edges (viz., roof tops of various buildings). In none of these regions is there significant light spillover from the roof area onto darker, adjacent areas of the film.

The absence of a shadow from the disk remains a puzzle to us. As stated in our article, an obvious explanation is that the object is at the surface of the earth where no shadow would be expected. Another possibility is that the object is opaque, small, and much nearer the airplane so that its shadow's reduced size and darkness would be difficult or impossible to locate on the ground.

Bullet Five. Her reference to light areas on the negative, that is, "the "portholes" on the positive image" is unclear. We did not use the term "porthole" or "portholes" and do not refer to any such areas. Perhaps she is referring to the single circular shaped region at the approximate center of the disk which is a good deal lighter than the average luminance of the disk (on the negative). That particular region is approximately the same density as is the surface of the lake surrounding the disk.

Concerning the Possibility of a Trapped Foreign Particle

We have two major comments concerning this possibility. The first has to do with the kind of an optical image that could be produced purely by a "pressure mark" caused by a "foreign particle trapped between two layers of the film on the supply spool," in the words of Dr. Bruner. If the particle merely produced a dimple in the unexposed film and then came off the film prior to exposure then one would not expect such a highly geometric pattern of light and dark regions produced by the incoming rays from ground-reflected sunlight. It is also unclear how such a film deformation could occur without leaving an oval shaped region of deformation in both the size and spatial distribution of the film grains in that region. A careful examination of the second generation negative shows no such grain deformation. Second, if the particle somehow remained attached to the unexposed film as it rapidly spooled forward within the camera, it would have had to be located on the lens side of the film so its shadow could have differentially exposed the film. Subsequently, as the roll of continuous film spooled on top of itself on the take-up reel, it would have produced another (smaller) dimple there on adjacent film. It is likely that this secondary dimple would have produced a slight physical (and optical?) distortion either on preceding and/or following frames in an equivalent position on the film. The linear distance be-

Photo analysis of an aerial disc 13 1

tween these successive dimples would be approximately the same and a function of the circumference of the film reel at that point. Linear distances between successive dimples would range from 9.42" to 14.1 " corresponding to take-up reels with film having diameters of from 3" to 4.5", respectively. A careful examination of frames 299 and 301 show no areas of distortion at the same distance from the edge of the film and between 9.42" and 14.1" on either side of the disk's image position.

In order for thickness variations of an adhered particle to account for the present disk image detail the particle must remain stuck to the film during its initial exposure and must possess a highly geometric pattern of light transmission. While this is possible, it is considered highly unlikely.

If the particle somehow shifted position it would have to have occurred during the optical exposure period of 1 /500th second. Several issues arise: (a) Why isn't there a set of double edges on the opposite side of the disk as well? (b) Also, the disk's off-optical axis location on the film would have produced a continuous differential density within the two boundaries on the easterly side of the image rather than only a set of two darker lines with lighter region between them. (c) Finally, a differential blur of these two lines should occur at intermediate points around its circumference. There does not appear to be any such blur.

Dr. Bruner's suggestion to examine the original negative using oblique illumination is an excellent one. However, her suggestion that the disk is due to an optical effect produced by an adhered foreign particle is not supported by a careful analysis of the negative that is in our possession. We are continuing to try to obtain the original negative for further study.

Journalof Scientific Exploration, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 133-184, 1989 0892-33 10189 $3.00+.00 Pergamon Press plc. Printed in the USA. 0 1989 Society for Scientific Exploration

A Replication Study: Three Cases of Children in Northern India Who Are Said to Remember a Previous Life

Anthropology Department & Department of Behavioral Medicine & Psychiatry, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22908

Abstract-This replication of Ian Stevenson's studies of spontaneous cases suggestive of reincarnation presents data from 3 of the 10 cases investigated by the author in northern India during 5 weeks in the summers of 1987 and 1988. The purpose of the study was to see if an independent investigator, following Stevenson's methods, would reach conclusions similar to his. Stevenson reports that the numerous cases in which a child speaks and acts from the point of view of a verifiable but deceased person about whom the child could not have normally known are best explained as cases suggestive of reincarnation. With one possible exception the author was satisfied that the cases she studied were not cases of deceit or self-deceit, although she noted that acceptance of the concept of reincarnation played a part in the diagnosis and unfolding of the case. While in some instances the child said no more than could be presumed to be known by the parents, in other cases the child's accurate and intense identification with someone unknown to the parents indicates something paranormal has taken place.

At the invitation of Ian Stevenson, M.D., in August and the first week of September 1987, in July 1988, and for 3 weeks in December 1988-January 1989, I investigated 10 cases of children in northern India who had been reported to spontaneously identify themselves as being someone in fact deceased. The purpose of the study was to ascertain if an independent investigator using methods similar to those developed by Stevenson would reach conclusions comparable to his, that while none of the cases offer irrefutable proof that reincarnation has taken place, they suggest that no normal explanation accounts for the phenomena of children who make accurate statements about and identify themselves with someone about whom they could not have had prior knowledge.

Stevenson has made detailed studies of cases which he calls suggestive of reincarnation in a number of cultures, in most of which the majority of -- ---

Acknowledgements. I would like to thank the Division of Personality Studies of the Depart- ment of Behavioral Medicine and Psychiatry of the University of Virginia for covering the expenses of my research in India, and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada for its award of Postdoctoral Fellowships #456-85- 1804 and #457-86-007 1 , to study belief in and cases suggestive of reincarnation among the Beaver, Gitksan and Wet'suwet'en Indians of British Columbia, Canada.

Requests for reprints should be addressed to Antonia Mills, Ph.D., Box 152, Health Sciences Center, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia 22908.

134 A. Mills

people believe in reincarnation: for example, India (1 974, 1975a); Sri Lanka ( 1977a); Thailand and Burma ( 1983a); Lebanon and Turkey ( 1980); Brazil ( 1974); among the Indians of the Northwest Coast of North America (1966, 1974, 1975b); as well as describing characteristics of cases among the Igbo of Nigeria (1985). However, he has also reported 79 cases among American children (1983b, 1987). He reports that while cases vary from culture to culture they tend to follow a similar pattern: An otherwise normal child on occasion speaks and acts from the point of view of someone else, typically beginning between the age of 2 and 4. Such children usually cease making these statements by the time they are 7 or 8 years old, although behavioral characteristics of the reputed previous personality often persist much longer. Many investigated cases show that there was a verifiable person meeting the child's description. Such a person often died a violent or sudden death, usually less than 2 years before the child's birth (Stevenson, 1986, 1987).

Because the implications of Stevenson's research are far-reaching and controversial (cf. Stevenson, 1977b), he has sought to have his studies repli- cated. In 1979 Pasricha and Stevenson conducted a partly independent replication of cases of the reincarnation type, comparing cases studied by Stevenson with those studied by Pasricha. Later (1987) they conducted a longitudinal survey comparing cases in which the subject was born before 1936 with those in which the subject was born in 1965 or later. Both studies indicated stability in the patterns of the cases. Since Pasricha was trained by Stevenson, she could be expected to make studies of comparable quality to Stevenson's, but her association could have subtly influenced her to expect to find his data confirmed. Pasricha and Barker ( 198 1 ) and Pasricha ( 1983) have demonstrated how different investigators assessing the same case can differ in their interpretations of its authenticity. Stevenson has therefore sought other qualified persons to carry out further replication studies.

I first met Stevenson in 1984 when he inquired at the Anthropology Department of the University of British Columbia if anyone would be interested in pursuing his studies among the Northwest Coast Indians. Through extensive field work with the Beaver Indians, a Northern Athapaskan tribe in northeastern British Columbia, Canada, I had learned that reincarnation played an integral part in their world view (Mills, 1986). In research for.my doctoral dissertation (Mills, 1982) I sought to see how prevalent belief in reincarnation was among a sample of 10 different tribes from 10 different North American culture areas. I found that the information in the literature is quite sporadic and incomplete on the topic of reincarnation. Having met Stevenson and learned of his studies I agreed to make a survey of cases among the Beaver Indians in the following summer, while working on another project, and to ask some outstanding questions from Stevenson's studies among the Gitksan. The month with the Beaver and 5 days with the Gitksan produced much interesting material (Mills, 1988, 1989). I applied

Reincarnation replication 135

suggestive of reincarnation among the Beaver, Wet'suwet'en and Gitksan Indians of British Columbia, Canada.

Among these peoples, children with what are interpreted as past life memories are born to close relatives of the previous personality.' While some of these British Columbia cases present evidence suggestive of the existence of reincarnation, it is often difficult to eliminate the possibility that many of the apparent past life recollections are based on information the child has learned through normal means when the child is close to relatives with intimate knowledge of the alleged previous personality. Information can be internalized, reworked and even improved upon without the source of the information remaining accessible to the individual. Helen Keller offered an example of this kind of source amnesia or cryptomnesia in composing a story for which she was accused of plagiarism (Keller, 1954, pp. 342-362).

India offers a better opportunity to control the variable of contact between the child and people knowledgeable about the previous personality, because in 43% of 183 cases analyzed by Stevenson the subject and the previous personality are from families unknown to each other (1986, p. 2 1 l), sometimes from villages widely separated from each other (Barker & Pasricha, 1979; Stevenson, 1987). Therefore I was interested in accepting Stevenson's offer to investigate cases in India so as to study the phenomena in a culture where more opportunity exists to eliminate the factor of normal means of obtaining knowledge of the previous personality. As of July 1988 I accepted a joint position with the Division of Personality Studies and the Anthropology Department at the University of Virginia, but in order to preserve the independence of my evaluation, Stevenson has not read my notes or any reports I have written.

1 Procedure

Stevenson gave me addresses for 9 cases about which he had learned during his studies or through contacts in India. One of these he and Pasricha had already investigated. The other 8 cases Stevenson has not studied nor does he have any first-hand information about them. Although comparison of 2 independent investigations of the same case might offer the best replication, I found that in the case previously studied by Stevenson and Pasricha the child had been intimidated from revealing his past life memories, and I was therefore not able to complete the study of the case.2 A 10th case which came to our attention was also studied in the summer of 1987.

In the summer of 1988 I reinvestigated 7 of the cases to ask questions I found to be still outstanding and to catch witnesses who had eluded me during the first trip, and I investigated an additional Hindu case and 5 cases in which the subject or the previous personality was Moslem. These half Moslem cases will form a separate report. In December 1988 and January

136 A. Mills

1989 I returned to ask further questions and began investigation of an additional 3 cases. As the information on these latter 3 is still incomplete, I have not included them in the analysis. This paper is based on the original 10 cases studied. All 10 cases were in northern India, 9 in Uttar Pradesh province, and 1 across the border in the province of Rajasthan.

Stevenson has described the methods he has developed to investigate cases of the reincarnation type (Stevenson, 1974, 1975a, 1987). In the summer of 1987 I attempted to follow this procedure as closely and thoroughly as possible. In each case I endeavored to interview the child, its family members and other witnesses to the child's speaking of what was eventually identified as a past life, and subsequently the relatives of the previous personality. The statements of these people were checked for internal consistency and accuracy. Accounts of the child's meeting with the family and friends of the previous personality and the recognitions made were also solicited from the child, his relatives and independently from the witnesses among the previous personality's family. Descriptions of the previous personality's nature and likes and dislikes were obtained.

After the informants had recalled all the details that spontaneously came to their minds, I asked further questions using the "Registration Form for Cases of the Reincarnation Type'' and sometimes the "Computer Code- book for Rebirth Cases" which Stevenson has developed, to ensure that I gathered demographic and other information Stevenson has found useful for analysis. I also took notes of relevant behavior on the part of the child. Written records of births, deaths, postmortems, or journals were sought and copied whenever they existed. In the summer of 1988 I asked additional questions to ascertain more information about the place of the subject in the parent's affections and assess the similarity or difference with Multiple Per- sonality Disorder (cf. Coons, Bowman, & Milstein, 1988).

All 10 cases investigated follow the pattern of "solved" cases in which the child and/or his family had been successful in tracing and meeting the relatives of a deceased person who corresponded to the child's statements. Ideally the investigator should arrive before the case has been solved in order to obtain a record of statements made before contact with the family of the previous personality and to witness the child's first meeting with and apparent recognitions of the relatives of the previous personality (Stevenson & Samararatne, 1988). Unfortunately, it is difficult to find cases at this stage of development. The 2 unsolved cases we came across in the course of our study could not be pursued because there was too little information to trace the previous personality and the parents were reluctant to have the cases studied, for reasons described in the discussion section.

In some cases the child visited the previous personality's family again in our presence, which allowed us to observe the relationship between the child and the various members of the previous personality's family. However, statements made after the initial meeting generally lack the value of statements made before the meeting, as there is inevitably information exchange


between the family of the deceased person and the child and his relatives, information which in some, but not all, cases can account for the further revelations made by the child.

Dr. N. K. Chadha, Lecturer in Psychology at the University of Delhi, was my translator and assistant. Vinod Sahni, a graduate student of Dr. Chadha's at the Department of Psychology, accompanied us on most of the investigations and translated my interviews with women. When Dr. Chadha was translating, Ms. Sahni took notes, making an independent translation of what was said. These notes were compared with those of the author working from the translation of Dr. Chadha. The comparison revealed a high level of consistency between the two independent translations. In January, 1989 Ms. Geetanjali Gulati, a graduate student of Dr. Chadha's, replaced Vi- nod Sahni.

Results

In 5 of the 10, or 50% of the cases, the previous personality was initially unknown to the child and his or her family. In the other 50% of the cases, the child's family had either heard of the existence (or the demise) of the previous personality or was slightly acquainted. In none of the initial 10 cases I studied was the child related to the previous personality.

In 6 of the cases the child was between the age of 4 and 6 years old at the time of the interviews and still speaking from the point of view of being someone else, while in 4 cases the child was between 8 and 16 and recalled only what he or she was said to have said. Six of the subjects were male and 4 female (see Table 4 for a comparison of these features with Steven- son's data).

For the purpose of brevity, only 3 of the 10 cases are presented below in some detail so that the reader can evaluate the evidence these cases present. Data from the other cases are included in the discussion section. I intend to publish similar reports on the other cases.

Case 1: Reena Kulshreshtha of Agra

The informants for this case in Agra were Mr. and Mrs. Kripa Shanker Kulshreshtha, their son Pankaj Kulshreshtha, Kailash Kumari (former neighbor of Shyam Babu Yadev), Shyam Babu Yadev and his second wife Urmila. Phoowati Devi, Shyam Babu's mother, was interviewed in Tilitila.

According to her parents, Reena Kulshreshtha was born on September 13, 1976 at their home in Agra. She is the youngest of six children: she has a sister 20 years her senior, a sister 17 years her senior, a brother about 13 years her senior, a second brother 9 years her senior, and a sister 6 years her senior. Her father began working some years before her birth for the Tele- communications Department. Raised initially in Agra, where her father owns a house, after her father was transferred to the Telecommunications

138 A. Mills

office in Lucknow in 1980, Reena spent part of her time in Lucknow, and part of her time in Agra, as her mother maintained the house in Agra during the time her husband was assigned to Lucknow. In 1988 Mr. Kulshreshtha was reassigned to Agra. The Kulshreshthas are of the Kayastha subcaste of the businessman's caste of the Hindu caste system. The name means "upper most ancestry."

When Reena was approximately 9 months old, Reena said the word "groom," and then got up and lay down on the bed and mimed dying by lying down and stopping breathing (refer to Table 1 for further notes on the chronology and differing estimates of Reena7s age when the various events in the case occurred). For approximately the next 8 months Reena looked through magazines or books every morning for several hours. At first it was not apparent to her parents what she was doing. Eventually she found a picture which resembled her "groom" and was greatly attached to it. She would stare at it for some time every morning.

When Reena was about 10 months old, Reena's mother reported that she said she had died on a day like this (on which a storm was brewing) from an injection that produced blisters all over her body. After hearing a song "Radhay Shyam" on the radio when she was about 12 months old, Reena said her husband was named Shyam. She used to ask her parents to find her husband.

When Reena was about 18 months old, she tried to point out the route to "her" home when she was on the roof of her parents' house, but when brought down from the roof where she could no longer see the turns in the maze of lanes in the neighborhood, she could not direct her parents there.

From earliest childhood Reena identified herself as a married woman and a mother. She insisted on wearing, for months at a time, the necklace that is in India a mark of being a married woman. At the age of 2 and a half Reena said to her mother that she understood why her mother liked to lie down with her father, which her mother interpreted as an indication that Reena had an unusual awareness of sexual relations for a child so young. She was observed carefully covering a doll with a cloth, and when asked by her mother what she was doing, Reena said, "My son is feeling cold. I am keeping him from the cold."

When Reena was less than 3 years old, she described all the steps of her cremation. When she first began speaking about this, her parents could not make out where she said she had been cremated. Reena said that after cremation she was made to lie down for many days in a temple with a mat on the floor; after questioning her, her father concluded that this was a description of her state after death.

When Reena was about 3 years old, Shyam Babu Yadev, a fellow em- ployee of the Telecommunications Department in Agra, of the "backward" of lowest caste, came to her house to drop off some dried tea. Shyam Babu had a side line of selling tea. Reena was happy to see him. After he left, Reena told her mother, "He is my groom. Call him." Her mother did.

In fact, Shyam Babu had met Reena when she was 14 months old. As a


colleague of Reena's father, although of a lower or "backward caste," Shyam Babu had come to the Kulshreshtha home to attend the wedding of Reena's eldest sister. Reena's father remembers Shyam Babu remarking, "Whose influence is upon this child?" because Reena was dark complexioned, unlike her parents (but only somewhat darker than her eldest brother). Because Reena used the word "groom" rather than "husband" to describe the picture, I wondered if Reena had begun the identification of herself as Shyam Babu's wife at the time of her sister's wedding. Both her parents were adamant that she had used this word, indicated how she had died, and sought a likeness of her groom before the sister's wedding. Table 1 shows some of the variation in the age they attributed to Reena when these events began.

Shyam Babu had indeed had a wife, one Gompti Devi (who had the same dark complexion). She had died on February 18, 1975 after about 15 years of marriage to Shyam Babu (19 months before Reena was born). She was approximately 30 years old at the time of her death. According to Shyam Babu, Gompti Devi died when given an injection to which she was allergic which produced blisters on her body. She was cremated that same evening at the white temple near the Taj Mahal. Mr. Kulshreshtha, Reena's father, being a colleague of Shyam Babu Yadev, was asked to attend the funeral but could not go. Gompti Devi was the mother of two daughters and a son. The son was about a year old at the time of her death.

After meeting Shyam Babu when she was about 3 years old, Reena insisted that Shyam Babu was her "husband," and repeatedly asked her parents to "call him" to attend the special events in the family. Hearing from Reena's parents the statements that Reena had made, and seeing that Reena responded to him as her husband, Shyam Babu was convinced that Reena was his wife reborn and came on about 10 such occasions. At these functions Reena would act appropriately for a Hindu wife: She would serve him food and tea and then retire. After he was gone, she would ask her parents to call him again and ask for and give gifts in keeping with a husband-wife relationship. For example, she asked that Shyam Babu give her material to make a long dress. Reena insisted that her parents provide her with a sweater and a baby bonnet for her to give to Shyam Babu.

Shortly after Reena met Shyam Babu when she was about 3 years old, she requested that her mother accompany her to his home. The directions Reena had given her parents to "her" house from the roof of the Kulshreshtha home, prior to her identification of Shyam Babu as her husband, correctly described the way to the house Shyam Babu owned and occupied with Gompti Devi in Agra. The house was about a half kilometer from the Kulshreshthas' home. Reena's parents had been ignorant of the location of his home until Reena asked to go there after she had identified Shyam Babu as her husband. As they approached, Reena led her mother to the correct house.

When Reena arrived at Shyam Babu's house, he was absent but his second wife was present. Reena learned for the first time that Shyam Babu had remarried. Reena did not ask to go back to this house again but frequently

TABLE 1 Summary of statements and recognitions and behavior of Reena Kulshreshtha

Item Informants Verification Comments

1. She had a "groom." Mrs. Kulshreshtha, Reena's mother

2. She mimed her death. Mrs. Kulshreshtha 3. She sought and found Mrs. Kulshreshtha

a likeness of her Mr. Kulshreshtha, husband. Reena's father

4. She said her Mrs. Kulshreshtha husband's name was Shyam.

5. She said she died Mr. Kulshreshtha from an injection and had blisters all over her body.

6. She described the Mr. Kulshreshtha steps from her death to the cremation of her body.

7. She said that after the Mr. Kulshreshtha cremation she was Mrs. Kulshreshtha made to stay in a temple with a mat on the floor for many days.

Shyam Babu Yadev, Reena's father said this occurred when Reena was 6 months old; his wife Gompti Devi's corrected him, saying this was when Reena was 9 months old (07/08/ husband 87). Later (0 1/09/89), her mother said Reena was 1 and a half when

she said this, but thought she was 2 and a half at her sister's wedding when she was in fact 14 months old. Shyam Babu attended this wedding and commented on Reena. However her parents are both sure she said this before the wedding, when she was very little.

Shyam Babu Yadev Reena lay down and held her breath when she was old enough to stand. Mr. Kulshreshtha Reena began her search in magazines and books at 9 months and

continued until she found one that satisfied her. Reena's father noted that the picture she finally selected was not of Shyam Babu Yadev but resembled him. (Note: there is a similarity of face and physical type > between Reena's father and Shyam Babu Yadev.) Reena's parents noted she made her search of her husband in the morning, at 5 or 6 a.m.

Shyam Babu Yadev Reena said this after hearing the radio play the song "Raday Shyam." L V)

Shyam Babu Yadev On 01/09/89 Reena's mother said Reena said this when she was 10 months old. On 07/05/88 Reena's mother said Reena said this when she was 12 months old.

Shyam Babu Yadev At first her parents could not make out the name of the place where she said she was cremated. Reena described the cremation when she was 3 years old, before she met Shyam Babu Yadev.

Her father sought to learn the location of the temple by asking if there were tea shops near the temple. Reena said there was no desire to take tea. Her father interpreted this to refer to an after-death state. He had also interpreted her talk about sparrows to refer to an intervening life, but after learning the interval between Gompti Devi's death and Reena's birth he thought that less likely.

8. She repeatedly said, "Find my husband."

9. She said she was protecting her son from the cold when covering a doll.

10. She insisted on wearing the necklace that is the sign of being a married woman, as well as other jewelry typically worn by married women.

1 1. She pointed out the route to her former house.

12. She told her mother that she understands about sexual activity.

13. She became very upset when taken to the Taj Mahal, near where she said she was cremated.

14. She recognized Shyam Babu Yadev.

15. She predicted her father would be promoted.

Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mr. Kulshreshtha Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mr. Kulshreshtha Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mr. Kulshreshtha

Shyam Babu Yadev Gompti Devi's son was about a year old at her death. She had also raised her half brother after her step-mother's death.

She insisted on wearing such a necklace for months at a time for several years. I did not ask if Gompti Devi wore one. Such a necklace is typically tied by the groom around the bride's neck at the wedding.

Mr. Kulshreshtha F?

Reena pointed out the route from the roof of her house, but could not E' direct her parents when she could not see the maze of lanes when on the street level. After her parents learned Shyam Babu's address they $ saw that her directions were correct (see 2 1 below). P, g

This began at 2 and a half years old. Mrs. Kulshreshtha says she 3 continues to talk without embarrassment about sexual matters. ;it a

0 Shyam Babu Yadev Shyam Babu confirmed that Gompti Devi was cremated in the white temple near the Taj Mahal. While not visible from the Taj Mahal, the cremation ground is adjacent to it. One route to the Taj Mahal goes 3 right past the cremation ground.

Reena's father thought the trip was before she identified Shyam Babu as her husband, but Reena's mother was not sure which came first and thought that perhaps the trip to the Taj Mahal came after the identification. Reena has henceforth refused to go to the Taj Mahal and is upset if she hears it mentioned in songs, or hears the cremation ground referred to.

Shyam Babu Yadev Reena's age at this meeting was given as 2 and a half by her mother and between 3 and 4 by her father.

Mr. Kulshreshtha The exact interval between the prediction (in 1979) and the promotion (in 1980) is unclear. Reena did not predict that the promotion would - entail a move to Lucknow, as it did.

(onrinued) '

TABLE 1 (continued) C

P h)


16. She has a phobia of injections and has not lost this phobia.

17. She asked that Shyam Babu come to her home for special occasions.

18. She acted like a wife in Shyam Babu's presence.

19. She insisted on giving Shyam Babu gifts such as sweaters and a baby bonnet.

20. She asked to be given material for a long dress by Shyam Babu.

2 1. She insists on going to S.B.'s home, and leads the way as they approach.

22. She led her mother to Kailash Kumari and recognized her.

23. She acted as Gompti Devi had in Kailash Kumari's presence.

24. She said there was some trouble in her house.

Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha Mr. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha Shyam Babu Yadev Mr. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha Mr. Kulshreshtha Shyam Babu Yadev Pankaj Kulshreshtha,

Reena's brother Mrs. Kulshreshtha Mr. Kulshreshtha Shyam Babu Yadev Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha Kailash Kumari, Shyam Babu's neighbor

Kailash Kumari Kailash Kumari

Mrs. Kulshreshtha Urmila Yadev, Shyam Babu Yadev's second wife

According to her mother, Reena has not had any injections since her birth and first saw one occur when her mother was ill when Reena was about 4 years old.

Shyam Babu says that he came about 10 times on such occasions.

She was shy, served Shyam Babu tea and food and then retired, correct for a Hindu wife.

The first baby bonnet Reena may have thought was for Gompti Devi's son who was c. 1 year old at her death. See Item 23 for Reena's gift of a baby bonnet to the grandchild of Kailash Kumari. ?

z C.. c.

Young girls typically wear short frocks, while long dresses are worn by G? women.

The house was in the direction Reena had indicated when c. 18 months old.

Kailash Kumari was a surrogate mother-in-law who lived just in front of Gompti Devi whom Gompti Devi visited daily. Reena persistently asked to visit the neighbor of Gompti Devi.

Reena would not eat in the presence of Kailash Kumari. Neither had Gompti Devi, as a sign of respect as for a mother-in-law. Reena asked her parents to give a baby bonnet to Kailash Kumari's new grandchild.

This occurred when Reena was about 3 years old. Urmila confirmed that she had a very difficult delivery as the cord was wrapped around the baby's neck.

25. She announced the birth of a son to Shyam Babu and celebrated the event.

26. She recognizes Phoowati Devi.

27. She does not recognize Gompti Devi's son.

28. She repeatedly asked her father to go and get her four rings and her bangles from her house.

29. She correctly described the colors of Gompti Devi's saris and sweaters.

30. She announced death of Shyam Babu's "elder brother."

3 1. She named the gods represented at the temple at the cremation grounds.

32. She announces that her husband has had an operation.

Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Phoowati Devi, Shyam Babu Yadev's mother

Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Urmila Yadev Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha Kailash Kumari

Mrs. Kulshreshtha Mr. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Urmila Yadev

Urmila Yadev Mrs. Kulshreshtha

Urmila Yadev Shyam Babu Yadev

Shyam Babu Yadev

Not confirmed

Shyam Babu Yadev

The birth occurred at Tilitila, 145 km from Agra. Reena's mother went to Kailash Kumari to ask if this was true. Kailash Kumari asked Shyam Babu who did not know. Sometime later he received a letter announcing the birth of a son on the date noted by Reena. Her parents knew of the pregnancy, however. Reena asked that her mother-in-law send laddu (a kind of sweet) so they could celebrate, and did, taking little for herself.

Phoowati Devi estimated Reena was 3 at this meeting; while Reena's mother said 2 and a half. Phoowati Devi saw Reena weep but she did not observe Reena when she went inside and covered her head, as appropriate for a daughter-in-law, nor did she hear her say, "My bangles are with you [mother-in-law]," and, "I died in her house," as Reena's mother did. Phoowati Devi was brought by Kailash Kumari. Clues to Phoowati Devi's identity may well have been given.

Reena went to S.B.'s house to see Phoowati Devi. She saw Urmila, S.B.'s wife, (for the second time) and saw Gompti Devi's son for the first time but apparently did not recognize him.

Shyam Babu confirmed she had bangles, but couldn't recall the kind. Age at which she asked this was not ascertained.

Three days later Shyam Babu learned his cousin whom he called "elder brother," had died three days before in Tilitila. Reena has never been to Tilitila. Like Item 11 the statement was made while on the roof of her house.

When in Lucknow we have checked some of the temples in the cremation ground, and have not found pictures of the three gods named.

When about 9 years old, Reena asked her mother what an operation was and how one was made unconscious and said her husband had had an operation. The Kulshreshthas did not know at the time (as Shyam + Babu was at Tilitila when he became ill), then learned through the P w office that he had had an operation.

144 A. Mills

asked her mother to accompany her to the home of the lady who lived across the lane from Shyam Babu, one Kailash Kumari Yadev, who had acted as a surrogate mother-in-law to Gompti Devi. At Kailash Kumari's home, Reena would be shy and would not eat the food offered her in Kailash Kumari's presence, just as Gompti Devi had not eaten in her presence, as a sign of respect as for a mother-in-law. When Reena repeatedly asked to visit Kailash Kumari, her mother would oblige her by taking her, but chide her saying, "At home you are always troubling me to bring you here, but when you are here, you are shy."

Reena continued to call Shyam Babu to her house after learning that he had remarried. He did not bring his second wife to Reena's home, "because of how she would feel," but he discussed the situation with his second wife, and they agreed to give Reena material for a long dress as well as bracelets, sweets, toys and some coins.

Gompti Devi had spent a considerable amount of her married life in the home of her mother-in-law in the village of Tilitila, 145 km from Agra. Gompti Devi's children were largely raised by her mother-in-law, Phoowati Devi, after her death. After Reena had declared Shyam Babu was her husband, when Phoowati Devi came to Agra she came in the company of Kailash Kumari to see Reena. To what extent introductions were made that identified Phoowati Devi in Reena's hearing remains unclear. Reena's response to Phoowati Devi was interpreted as a spontaneous recognition of her by Reena's mother: Reena wept upon seeing Phoowati Devi, went inside and covered her head with a cloth, as Gompti Devi and all traditional daughters-in-law do in their mother-in-law's presence. Reena said in her mother's hearing, "I left my bangles in your house. I died in your house." (This phrase is used generally, not just by Reena, to mean "when your daughter-in-law," rather than that the death occurred at her home; Gompti Devi died in the hospital in Agra.) Many other times Reena said she had a particular kind of bangle and four rings, and asked that her father get them for her.

After Phoowati Devi visited her, Reena went to return the visit. This was the second time she went to Shyam Babu's house. When she arrived Gompti Devi's son was there, but Reena did not greet him. Reena's mother felt this was because she was uncomfortable in Urmila's presence. This is the only time Reena has seen any of Gompti Devi's children.

Reena first went with her family to the Taj Mahal when she was about 3 years old. Her father thought this visit was before she had recognized Shyam Babu as her husband, while her mother thought that the trip to the Taj Mahal was perhaps after their meeting. At the Taj Mahal Reena became very upset. She said it was near the place where she had been cremated. Reena had a phobia of the area, and had not been willing to return to the Taj Mahal since. Reena continued to become upset if she heard songs that mention the Taj Mahal, or heard the cremation ground mentioned.


After Reena was in Lucknow when she was about 4 years old she saw a hypodermic needle for the first time when her mother became ill and was given injections. Reena was very alarmed. She continued to have a phobia of injections, and runs away at the mention of a hypodermic needle although she has not had an injection since her birth.

Although Reena did not visit Shyam Babu's house again, she preserved a striking psychic connection with Shyam Babu and his family even when it was in Tilitila. Stevenson (1975a, p. 101) reports that children reputed to have past life memories are sometimes credited in India with extraordinary powers, but he has found no evidence to substantiate this concept. Nonethe- less, on three occasions described below Reena told about events relating to Shyam Babu and his family which she had no apparent means of knowing. Two of these events took place in Tilitila. The only other instance in which Reena exhibited ESP also bore some relation to her contact with Shyam Babu.

When about 4 years old Reena said, "Mother, I don't feel like eating because there is some problem in my house." Later the same day she said, "Shyam Babu has been blessed with a son. Tell my mother-in-law to send laddu [a kind of sweet] to distribute. Let us celebrate and distribute sweets."

Reena's mother went to Kailash Kumari and inquired if it was true that Shyam Babu's wife had had a son. Kailash Kumari did not know, as Shyam Babu's wife was in Tilitila, but asked Shyam Babu when he returned from work. He said that he had not yet heard any news. As Kailash Kumari and Reena's mother knew, his wife was expecting a child but was in Tilitila. Some days later Shyam Babu received a letter announcing the birth of a son on the day on which Reena had announced the birth. Urmila, Shyam Babu's second wife, said that the birth had been very difficult as the cord was wrapped around the baby's neck.

On another occasion Reena said, "My husband's elder brother died." Three days later Shyam Babu learned, according to Reena's parents, that his cousin, whom he called "elder brother," had died in Tilitila on the day Reena made this statement (Shyam Babu had forgotten this incident).

Reena continued to speak from the point of view of Gompti Devi up until she was about 7 years old, even when in Lucknow. When in Lucknow she named three gods whose pictures she said were in the temple where she was cremated. This statement has not been confirmed. When Reena was about 7, Shyam Babu withdrew from the family, feeling that the attachment of a growing girl for a remarried man as her husband was not to be prolonged.

In February 1985, when Reena was 8 and a half years old (and back in Agra), she asked her mother what an operation was and how a person was made unconscious and said, "My husband has had an operation." Reena's family then learned through the office that Shyam Babu had become seriously ill when he was on leave at Tilitila. He had been hospitalized in Etawah and then transferred to Agra where the operation was performed,

146 A. Mills

after which he was unconscious for 2 months. Reena announced that he had had an operation before her father had learned this news. Reena went with her family to visit him in the hospital.

Reena's parents reported that on one occasion she had shown extrasensory perception of an event in her own family: In 1979 she predicted that her father, Mr. Kulshreshtha, would be promoted, as he was in 1980. The promotion affected her relationship to Shyam Babu's family as her father was transferred to Lucknow.

Reena was 1 1 and 12 years old when I investigated and reinvestigated the case and was no longer talking from the point of view of being Shyam Babu's wife. She would not allow me to interview her, although she sometimes answered questions put to her by her parents during the course of our interviews. She continues to show precocity in the housewifely tasks of cooking, selectively shopping for vegetables and other items, sewing and knitting. These skills were markedly developed from the time she was 5. Her mother noted that she could follow directions to knit complicated patterns in sweaters from that age, earlier than her sisters.

Her father remarked that she was never like a child, and she still is more adult than childlike. Her parents report that she is a particularly punctual and methodical person with an excellent memory, who studies before she allows herself to read for pleasure and prefers adult company to that of children. She is well liked at school where she is known as a peacemaker who calms people down when they fight. Reena was then in the sixth grade, in which she was doing well.

Independently we were told by Gompti Devi's husband and mother-in- law that Gompti Devi had these qualities of being a peacemaker, and was very fond of knitting and sewing. Gompti Devi had received an eighth grade education.

When I returned in January 1989, I learned that Reena still related to Shyam Babu as her past-life husband. On December 25th, he was among 400 guests invited to a dinner the Kulshreshthas held in honor of the birth of Mr. Kulshreshtha's first grandson. Reena was eating dinner when Shyam Babu arrived, but on seeing him, she stopped and retired, as a proper Hindu wife should do in her husband's presence.

Evaluation of the Paranormal Features of the Case. Reena made 10 verified statements or acts before meeting Shyam Babu and 15 afterward. Reena correctly recognized three people and two locations related to the previous personality. All of her statements and recognitions were correct, except her statement about the gods at the temple where she was cremated. However, she gave no indication of having recognized Gompti Devi's son. If Reena had been taken to Tilitila during the period when she strongly identified herself as Shyam Babu's wife, her apparent memory of Gompti Devi's life might have received a more thorough check.

This case does not fulfill the criteria of having no contact between the


subject and the previous personality's family. Aside from Reena's apparent foreknowledge of the day and difficulty of the birth of Urmila's son, the death of Shyam Babu's cousin, and Shyam Babu's operation, the inforrna- tion contained in the statements Reena made was either within the scope of her parent's knowledge or potentially so. Reena's father had been told the cause of death of Shyam Babu's wife, although Reena's mother only recalls being told that she had died leaving small children behind, which caused Mrs. Kulshreshtha to feel sorry for Shyam Babu's family.

Mr. Kulshreshtha and Mr. Yadev did not have a great deal of contact as they worked in separate buildings across the road from each other. Neither Mr. nor Mrs. Kulshreshtha had met Shyam Babu's first wife, but other people in the Telecommunications office doubtless had and knew where they lived.

The striking features of the case are Reena's intense identification of herself as a married woman, her description of her death in a previous life, her search for a likeness of her husband at an early age, her phobia of injections and the cremation ground and her apparent foreknowledge of events related to Shyam Babu's family. Their is no apparent motive for her to identify herself as the wife of a lower caste colleague of her father.

1 Case 2: Ashok Kumar Shakya of Ritaur

The informants for this case in Ritaur were Ashok Kumar Shakya, his mother and father Mr. and Mrs. S. B. Shakya, and his brother Awadesh. In Bandha the informants were the late Kishen Behari's eldest son Laxmi Narain Jatev, Kishen Behari's widow Savitri Jatev, Kishen Behari's brother Bhateshwar Dayal Jatev, Kishen Behari's father's younger brother Shyam Lal, the latter's wife Gian Shri, Kishen Behari's mother Teeja Jatev, and the head man of Bandha, Udal Singh.

Ashok Kumar is the third and youngest son of Shyam Babu Shakya and Chandra Wati of the village of Ritaur, District of Etawah, in Uttar Pradesh. Ritaur has a population of approximately 5,000. According to his parents, he was born at home on August 16, 1982. Ashok Kumar's brother Awadesh is 1 1 years his senior and his brother Sarvan is 9 years his senior. They have no sisters. His father, S. B. Shakya, has a high school education and taught school before joining the army. He was unsuccessful in a competition and returned to farm his ancestral land. The Shakyas are of the Kshatriya caste.

At the time of our first investigation he had just turned 5, and then, as at the time of my second investigation, was still talking from the point of view of being a married man and the father of five children. When I visited him in January 1989, his father reported that he was saying less as a result of being teased for being a chamar or untouchable.

When Ashok Kumar was still unable to talk, he would sometimes mime limping. As he grew more verbal, which he did quickly, he once became

148 A. Mills

own house. There I have all my family." When asked the name of his village, at first he answered by trying to walk towards it, limping; then he said "Bandha" and then that he was from the village of Bandha. His mother noted that he spoke very clearly in an adult fashion from an early age, and had only recently, at the age of 5, started speaking falteringly in the language of a child of his age.

Over time, Ashok Kumar said he had a wife and five children and was most concerned about whether they had enough to eat. He continually asked his parents to take him to see them. He would often say of things he saw at his parents' house, "My wife doesn't have this. Go and give it to her." He frequently would ask his mother to put aside her work so they could talk about his family. Table 2 lists Ashok Kumar's statements, recognitions and related behavior.

When the police were mentioned, Ashok Kumar said he was afraid of the police and repeatedly said the chief of police had beaten him with a stick after he had been in a fight near the fields. "If I happen to meet him I can recognize him and will beat him now," Ashok Kumar told his mother. Ashok Kumar told his father, "Let's go to the police station-you, me and Awadesh-and we will beat the policeman who is in charge."

Ashok Kumar continued to mime limping and frequently told his parents, "I came limping, limping to your house." He told us, "When I died, with great difficulty I found the house of my mummy [Chandra Wati] and she has walls of mud like this and I held onto those walls to walk and then only I entered the house of my mummy. . . . I started from there [Bandha, at death] and reached here at birth." In 1988 he added, "I came over here limping, limping. I found one door was closed. I found another door was closed. Then I found this door was open and I entered."

After Ashok Kumar had persisted in asking to go to his family in Bandha, his parents came to conclude that their son was remembering a past life. They thought he was from a good family because he used proper and polite terms of address for relatives, terms not used by his parents. Ashok Kumar's mother was familiar with the phenomenon of children claiming to be someone reborn because a girl, now about 29 years old, had identified herself as the reincarnation of Chandra Wati's sister who had died at the age of 5. However, Ashok Kumar's parents were annoyed at his continued demands to be taken to his family and tried to make him forget by, as his father said, "beating him and scolding him very badly." However, this did not have the desired effect. Ashok Kumar would be annoyed and would not eat for as much as 2 to 3 days.

On January 2, 1987 Ashok Kumar had not eaten for the whole day. When his brother Awadesh returned from school at 4:00 p.m., Ashok Kumar insisted, "I will only eat if you take me to my village. Let's start out from the road. There will be a railroad crossing, then there will be a canal bridge and near that is a small pond. Just near there I have built my own room and my wife is staying there. Take me to my home."


Awadesh and his parents thought Ashok Kumar was referring to a town named Bandha they knew of at some distance from Ritaur. Awadesh and Ashok Kumar set out that day and were joined by two boys, Kuldeep and Bablu. They carried Ashok Kumar on a bicycle but instead of pointing out the road to the town of Bandha, Ashok Kumar pointed out the route he thought they should take across the fields. As they got closer to a village Ashok Kumar got off the bicycle saying, "My village is there," and led the way.

The village of approximately 250 people that Ashok Kumar took them to (indeed called Bandha) is about 4 km from Ritaur this back way across the fields. To get to Bandha by road, one must go from Ritaur to Ekdil, from there to Etawah, and then on the road north which takes one over the railway crossing, and across the canal bridge, as Ashok Kumar had said. The last 2 km to Bandha are impassable except on foot. This road route is a total of 18 km.

No member of Ashok Kumar's family had ever been to this village of Bandha before. Until Ashok Kumar arrived at Bandha, none of the people we interviewed there had heard anything about him. The villagers of Bandha were aware of the larger village of Ritaur, but those we interviewed had no links with it. The closest market center to Bandha is Etawah, whereas the closest market center to Ritaur is Ekdil. Word that Ashok Kumar spoke of a past life had reached Ekdil, where an associate of Stevenson's had noted the case.

Outside the village, Awadesh asked a woman taking goats to the field, "Is there any man who died here? Maybe murdered, maybe hanged by bad people?" The woman said, "No," and they walked on. Ashok Kumar told his brother, "She is my mother." Awadesh scolded him saying, "You should not call everyone your mother." In the village Ashok Kumar went straight to the house of the late Kishen Behari Yadev and said, "This is my house."

A large crowd had gathered, and the village head man, Udal Singh, came up and took charge. Wanting to check the truth of Ashok Kumar's statement, he said to Ashok Kumar, "No, this is not your house," and took him around the village suggesting other houses, some much more substantial, were his. Again Ashok Kumar stopped in front of Kishen Behari's house and said, "This is my house. I constructed this house." Udal Singh called Kishen Behari's widow, Savitri, and said to her, "Come here. Probably your dead child has taken birth."

Ashok Kumar went up to Savitri and laughed, and she took him on her lap. He kept staring at her. She thought he was perhaps one of her two children who had died after her husband, but Awadesh said, "It's not your child. He keeps saying, 'I have five children and a wife,' so maybe your husband has taken birth." Someone in the crowd asked Ashok Kumar, "Who is she?" and he answered, "She is my wife." She then touched his feet and he did not object. This was considered an indication that he saw her as his wife.

TABLE 2 Summary of statements and recognitions and behavior of Ashok Kumar Shakya

- - -- -- --


1. He mimed limping. Shyam Babu Shakya, Gian Sri, Kishen Ashok Kumar's Behari Yadev's father; Chandra father's younger Wati Shakya, brother's wife Ashok Kumar's Not verified by mother Savitri Jadev,

Kishen Behari's widow, and Teeja Jatev, Kishen Behari's

Savitri Jadev

Savitri Jadev

2. He said he had his own Chandra Wati house and family.

3. He said he was from Bandha. Chandra Wati

4. He said he had a wife and Awadesh Shakya, five children. Ashok Kumar's

eldest brother

5. He persistently asked his Chandra Wati parents to give food to his wife as she didn't have enough.

6. He said he was afraid of the Chandra Wati police as the chief of police Shyam Babu Shakya had beaten him after he was Awadesh Shakya in a fight.

Laxmi Narain, Kishen Behari's eldest son

Savitri Jadev

Laxmi Narain, Gian Sri

Ashok Kumar did this when he could first walk, before he could talk.

Gian Sri said Kishen Behari could not stretch his legs in his final illness (081 1 5/87).

Savitri Jadev and Teeja Jadev did not think anything was wrong with Kishen Behari's legs (0 1/08/89).

Ashok Kumar said this when annoyed at his mother, when about 24 years old. ?

When first asked the name of his village, Ashok Kumar tried limping to it; later he said, "Bandha," and then that he was from Bandha. He said he had come ;; limping from Bandha to his mother's house.

Kishen Behari Jadev had five children at the time of his death. Afterwards, the two youngest children died. Ashok Kumar seems to be unaware of these deaths. Ashok Kumar told me he had five sons. This is incorrect. The youngest of Kishen Behari's children was a girl.

Ashok Kumar wanted his father and elder brother to go with him to beat the chief of police whom he said he could recognize.

7. He refused to eat when Chandra Wati scolded for asking to be Shyam Babu Shakya taken to Bandha.

8. He described features on the Awadesh Shakya way to Bandha, such as a railroad crossing.

9. A canal bridge. Awadesh Shakya 10. A small pond. Awadesh Shakya 1 1. He pointed out the way to Awadesh Shakya

Bandha.

12. He recognized the village when it was within sight.

13. He said he had built his own home where his wife lived.

14. He identified Kishen Behari Jadev's mother as his mother.

15. He recognized his house.

16. He recognized Savitri Jadev as his wife.

Observed by author

Observed by author Observed by author Awadesh Shakya

Awadesh Shakya

Awadesh Shakya Savitri Jadev

Awadesh Shakya Teeja Jadev

Awadesh Shakya Udal Singh, head Udal Singh man of Bandha Laxmi Narain Jadev

Savitri Jadev

He would refuse to eat for "two or three days."

This is en route by road.

This is en route by road. This is en route by road. Ashok Kumar's parents thought he was referring to

another Bandha, and did not know of the existence of the other. However, the two village boys, Kuldeep and Bablu, who accompanied Ashok Kumar and his brother, had heard of it (but never been there). r Although Bandha is only 4 km. from Ritaur, it is on a different road system and none of Ashok Kumar's 0

family were aware of its location or had been there $ previously. P, g.

s ;if 2 ga

Ashok Kumar identified a lady Awadesh Shakya spoke to outside the village as his mother. Awadesh later =1 verified that she was the mother of Kishen Behari Jadev.

Udal Singh tried to persuade Ashok Kumar that other houses were his but Ashok Kumar again went to Kishen Behari's house (afler being taken on a tour of the village) and said he had constructed it, which was true.

Udal Singh said Ashok Kumar was her child reborn but Awadesh said he spoke of having a wife and five children. When asked who Savitri was, he said she was his wife.

(continued) ;3, C

TABLE 2 (continued) C

vl N


17. He recognized his eldest son.

18. He called the eldest son "Rakesh."

19. He recognized Bhateshwar Dayal and called him by name.

20. When taken from Bandha, Ashok Kumar resisted.

2 1. He recognized a road he had made.

22. He recognized the place where he had been sick.

23. He used to take baths in the canal with his wife.

24. He expected his wife to treat his mother as a mother-in- law.

25. He recognized his mama (mother's brother).

26. He recognized Mathura Prasad.

Laxmi Narain Jadev

Laxmi Narain Jadev

Awadesh Shakya

Laxmi Narain Jadev

Chandra Wati Shakya

Chandra Wati Shakya

Chandra Wati Shakya

Chandra Wati Shakya

Awadesh Shakya

Bhateshwar Dayal

Laxmi Narain Jadev

Not correct

Bahateshwar Dayal, Kishen Behari's brother

Verified by N. K. Chadha

Verified by N. K. Chadha

Savitri Jadev

Savitri Jadev

Bhateshwar Dayal

When Ashok Kumar asked for his eldest son, anyone coming forward could be construed to be identifying himself as such.

Seven months later Ashok Kumar still gave the incorrect name "Rakesh," for Laxmi Narain. By 0 1/08/89 he was calling him by the correct name.

I failed to ask if Kishen Behari had been sick first by ?

the pond. g. C

Ashok Kumar not only mentioned this to his mother Z as they passed the canal, but invited his wife to go with him.

Ashok Kumar asked Savitri to make food for his mother and brothers, and told his mother to take her back and she will cook for her, forgetting caste differences which mean the Shakyas do not take food from the Jadevs, as untouchables.

Kishen Behari's mama slapped Ashok Kumar's knee in greeting at Bandha. At Ritaur he said that was his mama, and when checked, they found that Kishen Behari was close to this man and called him mama, although he was a village mama (or mother's brother) rather than an actual one.

Ashok Kumar's reported words were that he had seen this man cutting grass on his first trip to Bandha. If Ashok Kumar gave his name, we have not recorded

27. He recognized his brother- in-law.

Shyam Babu Shakya

28. He recognized his sister's husband's brother.

Bhateshwar Dayal

29. Ashok Kumar was distressed that his mother does not give more jaggery to "my brother."

30. He identified area where he was beaten by five people.

3 1. He asked that they bring a dothi [cloth] for his wife, and later says he cannot take her home until they do.

32. He identified spot where he had buried some money.

Chandra Wati Shakya

Ashok Kumar

Ashok Kumar

this. Thus what was assumed to be a recognition could have been merely a correct observation.

When the brother-in-law visited him, Ashok Kumar said he had given his goat back, but did not name the brother-in-law. Kishen Behari had returned the goat lent by his sister and brother-in-law, when he was ill. He then fell ill again and died.

Recognition took place after Ashok Kumar was asked if he remembered returning the goat to his house. Thus mention of something Kishen Behari had done triggered Ashok Kumar's memory, although it is possible that Ashok Kumar learned of the goat

z 5'

incident after going to Bandha. 0

ii P7 g. ec 3

Verified by N. K. As this was said after we left Bandha, it was not verified 'g, Chadha by the people from Bandha. 5'

As Ashok Kumar's father notes, his main attraction in g. for his wife. 0

ec

Shyam Babu Shakya Unverified Ashok Kumar's parents asked that no verification be made as they suspect that in burying the money Kishen Behari had disturbed a discarnate being who is responsible for his death, and they fear it may attack Ashok Kumar as well. By 0 1 /08/89 Kishen Behari's relatives have heard of this statement, but doubt its veracity, saying Kishen Behari had no money to bury.

154 A. Mills

Ashok Kumar called for his eldest son, who came, and was recognized by him, but when asked his name he said, "Rakesh." In fact Kishen Behari's eldest son's name is Laxmi Narain. Ashok Kumar persisted after three subsequent visits in calling him by the wrong name. The name Rakesh has no special significance to Savitri's family.

Kishen Behari's mother heard what was happening and returned from the fields where she had taken the goats; she was the woman that Ashok Kumar had told his brother was his mother as they approached Bandha. Someone asked Ashok Kumar who she was and he said, "My mother," but not in her hearing. She took Ashok Kumar on her lap and asked, "Am I your mother?" He did not say anything, but she said that he answered with his eyes that she was. In fact he had already recognized her.

On this first trip to Bandha Ashok Kumar is said to have recognized Kishen Behari's chacha [father's younger brother] Shyam La1 and Kishen Behari's younger brother Bhateshwar Dayal whom he called by name. When it was time to leave, Ashok Kumar told Awadesh, "You go. I will stay here." When they took him with them, Ashok Kumar cried. The relatives of the late Kishen Behari Jatev (as well as Ashok Kumar's relatives) were convinced that Ashok Kumar Shakya was Kishen Behari Jatev reborn.

Kishen Behari Jatev had in fact died in the month of Phaghan (February 12-March 12) in about 1981 when about 45 years old, we learned from interviewing his brother, wife, son, mother and chachi [father's younger brother's wife]. He had been a laborer without land who had worked for other farmers. He was a member of the lowest or chamar caste formerly considered outside the caste system or "untoucl~able." Once Kishen Behari had become involved in a fight over who owned some land he had been hired to work and was subsequently caught by the chief of police, who beat him.

Kishen Behari was described as a hard-working man who had been quite unhappy being a laborer only able to earn enough money for food for the day. Shortly before he fell ill he had built a small mud house for himself and his wife and five children. He had fallen ill, grew better, then worse and after an illness of 15 days, died with one leg paralyzed from the illness. Three or 4 days after his death, Kishen Behari's brother Bhateshwar Dayal reported that he appeared to him in a dream saying, "Why are you weeping? I have come to you."

On March 26, 1987 Ashok Kumar made a second trip to Bandha, in the company of his mother and two brothers. As they approached the village, Ashok Kumar pointed out where he had been beaten by the police, the road he had worked on, the canal where he and his wife took baths after slipping out of the village, and the pond near which he had fallen ill with vomiting and diarrhea. Once at Savitri's house, Ashok Kumar told her to prepare food for his mother and brothers, and suggested that his mother take his wife home as her daughter-in-law. However, both Savitri and Chandra Wati


know the Shakyas will not eat food cooked at the home of such low-caste people. Ashok Kumar spoke intimately to Savitri as a husband to a wife, saying, "Stop the mother over here and we will go to take a bath in the canal as we went earlier in the night." Savitri responded, "Stop these things. Don't talk like this," but later asked him, "Won't you take me back with you?" to which Ashok Kumar replied, "Not this time. Next time when I bring clothes for you I will take you." As Ashok Kumar left he stopped at Bhateshwar Dayal's house. There a man slapped Ashok Kumar's knee in affection, asking, "Don't you recognize me?" At that time Ashok Kumar did not respond, but when he returned to Ritaur Ashok Kumar said, "He was my mama [mother's brother]." Later when Kishen Behari's brother came to Bandha to visit Ashok Kumar, he confirmed that he and Kishen Behari called this man mama, although he was a classificatory or village mother's brother rather than an actual one. The witnesses felt that Ashok Kumar could not have learned this identity while at Bhateshwar Dayal's, although I would not rule out this possibility. This mama and Kishen Behari had been particularly close.

Between January and mid-August 1987, Bhateshwar Dayal and Laxmi Narain and various other relatives of Kishen Behari visited Ashok Kumar in Ritaur three times. Ashok Kumar said to Mathur Prasad, a friend of Kishen Behari's who came with Bhateshwar Dayal, "When I came to my house the first time you were cutting grass for the cattle." This was indeed true. He did not recognize Kishen Behari's sister's husband's brother until Bhateshwar Dayal prompted him saying, "Do you remember you took a goat to his house?" Ashok Kumar said, "Yes. Now I remember you." Again, one cannot confidently rule out normal means of Ashok Kumar arriving at this information.

On one of these visits, after the Shakyas had given some brown sugar candy to Bhateshwar Dayal, Ashok Kumar came crying to his mother saying, "You have so much jaggery here and you gave so little to my brother."

After going to Bandha, Ashok Kumar once beat his mother to try to get her to give millet to his family. Once when asked to eat Ashok Kumar said to his father, "Give rasaya [a dish made of cane sugar and rice] to my son and then I will eat." They told him they would send rasaya and then he ate. Another time he told his father, "Give bajara [millet] to my son because he is feeling cold." Ashok Kumar's father was struck by this statement because, "A child his age would not know that the composition of bajara is hot."

We took Ashok Kumar and his mother and brother Awadesh to Bandha on August 18, for what was Ashok Kumar's third trip, and observed his familiarity with Savitri and Kishen Behari's relatives. As we walked to the village, Ashok Kumar pointed out where he had worked and where he had been beaten and where he had become ill. As we returned I asked him if that was from the beating. Ashok Kumar said, "I got sick and I vomited and got a fever. I went to the doctor and I used up all my money and I was still sick. I

156 A. Mills

borrowed money and went to the doctor but I got worse and I died. Then I was limping, limping. My knee was broken from the sickness."

Kishen Behari's relatives seemed reluctant to answer my question about whether there was any association between the police beating and his death. However, some were clear that Kishen Behari's knee and leg were not affected by his fatal illness. This description fitted the information we had gathered in Bandha previously, in Ashok Kumar's absence, but by this time Ashok Kumar could well have heard a description of Kishen Behari's death.

On return from his third trip to Bandha, Ashok Kumar told his mother that he had buried some money near the pond at Bandha and he fell ill over there. From this his parents suspected that he had disturbed an evil spirit, by which they meant a discarnate soul who lurks around the pond, and that this had caused Kishen Behari's illness and death. The father asked that no verification be made of the buried money because he is afraid the evil spirit will pounce on Ashok Kumar and "I will lose my child."

When I returned in the summer of 1988, I learned that Ashok Kumar had been invited to the wedding of Kishen Behari's eldest son. He went in the company of Awadesh, and refused to return home, so Awadesh left him in Bandha over night, he and his mother fetching Ashok Kumar back the following day. He has not apparently made any further statements that were identified as being information that Kishen Behari knew and Ashok Kumar could not be expected to, although the conviction of Kishen Behari's relatives that Ashok Kumar is Kishen Behari is by now so complete that they would not necessarily note new revelations made by him.

Evaluation of the Paranormal Features of the Case. Ashok Kumar made 12 verified statements before going to Bandha or en route and 12 after arriving. He recognized eight people and correctly identified four locations. However, he gave the wrong name for Laxmi Narain, and persisted for some time in thinking he was named Rakesh. His statement to me that all his children are sons is also incorrect. In fact the youngest child of Kishen Behari was a girl who died, as did her next elder brother, after Kishen Behari's death. Ashok Kumar is apparently not aware that two of Kishen Behari's children have died.

To Westerners it seems extraordinary that the density of villages in this part of India could mean that people in one village would not know of the existence of another one 4 km away. However, I have found no one who does not concur that this was the case. If true, then Ashok Kumar had no normal means of knowing about a man from Bandha with a wife and five children who had been beaten by the police and died, and no motive for identifying with such a person.

Case 3: Toran Singh, Alias Titu, of the Village Bad

The informants for this case at Bad were Toran Singh, his father Mahavir


Singh (a friend of Suresh Verme). In Agra, the informants were Suresh Verme's wife Uma Verme; his brothers Mahesh Verme, Raja Babu Verme, Rajvir Babu Verme, and Om Kar Singh; his father Chanda Babu Singh Bharity; and his mother Burfi Devi Singh.

Toran Singh, called Titu, is the youngest of the six children of Mahavir Prasad Verme Singh and Shanti Devi of the village of Bad (population about 1,000), which is 13.5 km from Agra. Titu's eldest brother, Ashok Kumar, is about 13 years his elder; next is Titu's other brother, Raj Kumar, about 10 years his senior. Titu's eldest sister, Asha, is about 8 years his senior; the second sister, Kunta, about 6 years his senior, and the third sister, Guloo, was said to be somewhere between 1 to 3 years his senior. There do not appear to be any records of the exact birthdates.

Titu's father and his family are of the Vaishya caste and own considerable agricultural land around Bad which they farm. However, Mahavir Singh goes every school day to Agra where he teaches chemistry in grades 1 1 and 12 in Hubbulal Inter-College. Titu lives with his family in a substantial single story traditional cement house.

Titu's mother was ill the last trimester of her pregnancy with Titu and was admitted to the Military Hospital in Agra about a week before his birth under the name of a friend of the family's who was a member of the military personnel and therefore eligible to use this hospital. The only registration of a birth corresponding to the name of this friend and Titu's mother gives December 11, 1982, as the date of birth. It is possible that Titu's birth was not registered, and/or that the December 1 1, 1982 date corresponds to the birth of the friend's child. Titu's parents thought he was 4 and a half rather than 3 and a half in 1987, although Titu's father gave his birthdate as December 10, 1983, the first time we met before the hospital search.

According to Shanti Devi, Titu began talking when he was a year and a half, earlier than the rest of her children. Shortly thereafter Titu told her, "Tell my grandfather to look after my children and my wife. I am having my meals here and I am worried about them." When his mother asked, "Who are you?" Titu said, "I am from Agra. I don't know how I came here."

At an early age Titu also began saying, "Mummy, please don't go out in these clothes. I feel embarrassed by them. My wife had beautiful saris." Titu made a number of other complaints. He said, "Your house is dirty. I will not stay. My house is very big," and "My sisters-in-law are educated," and "My brothers had beautiful shirts which you have not seen." When he was expected to walk or go on a bus, Titu would say, "I used to go by car. I will not go on foot or in a bus."

When Titu was very young, he went with his family to a wedding in Agra. As they traveled to Agra, Titu said several times, "I have a shop in Sadar Bazaar," although they did not go near this district of Agra. His parents paid no attention to this remark at the time.

As Titu grew older he would cry almost every day, wanting to "go home." He commonly referred, as he continues to do, to his parents as "Guloo's

158 A. Mills

mother and father," rather than calling them his own. He frequently asked to go see, "My brother Raja Babu and my sister Susheela," particularly when scolded. Titu complained to his father, "You go every day to Agra but you don't bring any news of my family."

One day in April, 1987, Titu was crying very bitterly as his father once again left for Agra without him. A friend of Titu's eldest brother took him on his lap, and Titu said, in his brother's hearing, "My father doesn't take me. Can you take me there? I have a shop of transistor radios and I was a big smuggler and goonda [someone who uses force to get his way]. I am the owner of Suresh Radio."

After this, Titu's eldest brother and his friend sought out the Suresh Radio shop, which turned out to be in Sadar Bazaar in Agra. They had never been to the shop before. They told Uma Verme, the widow of the owner, what Titu had been saying. They learned that Suresh Verrne, the owner of Suresh Radio (and a noted smuggler on the black market) had been shot dead August 28, 1983 in his car. He was about 30 years old.

Uma Verrne related this to Suresh's family, and shortly thereafter they set out to visit this child. At first they went to the Bad which is near Mathura. They could not find any child meeting Titu's description, and then learned that there was another village called Bad on the other side of Agra. A party consisting of Uma Verme, Burfi Devi (Suresh's mother), Suresh's father (Chanda Babu Singh Bharity), and three of Suresh's four brothers (Rajvir Babu Verme, Mahesh Verme, and Raja Babu Verme) amved in Bad early one morning in April, 1987.

When Titu saw the party approach, he was very excited. He recognized Uma Verme, Suresh's father and mother and two of the three brothers. He correctly described a trip he had taken to Dolpur with Uma and the children whom he called by their nicknames, Mono and Tono, and the chatt and kulji they had eaten. Titu asked why his children had not been brought. When queried Titu correctly described how he [Suresh Verme] had been killed, saying, "While I was near my house, three people stopped me. One shot me and then they ran off. I did not see their faces." When asked where he was shot, Titu said, "They came from the left side and after shooting ran away." Titu described Suresh's home and some of its unique features, such as its shape, the placement of lamps, and a room "which remains locked."

Titu accompanied the Vermes as they went to the road and noted that they had not brought his car. "This is not my car. My car was white," he said. He played the tape deck in the car, although he had not previously seen one, and insisted on driving the car, which he did with Raja Babu's help, working the brake, gas and clutch pedals. When the party left, Titu wanted to go with them and threw his shoes at his mother Shanti Devi saying, "I am not yours. You are not my mother." In all of this excitement, Titu did not greet Suresh's brother Mahesh Verme, although neither did Titu deliberately slight him. Nonetheless, Mahesh Verme was hurt at not being ac-


Later that day Raja Babu Verme returned with two sisters of the late Suresh Verme. When Titu saw Susheela Devi, he said, "Susheela Gigi, Susheela Gigi." [Gigi means "sister."] Asked which was his elder sister, Titu said neither was. In fact Suresh's eldest sister is Munni Rani, who was not present.

Taken that afternoon to Suresh's brothers' radio and TV shop, Titu insisted it was not his, although Raja Babu tried to mislead him by claiming it was Suresh Radio. He was then taken by car to Suresh Radio, which is about 100 yards away. Titu said, "This is my shop." Inside Titu said, "This showcase was not here; who got it constructed?" Indeed the showcase he was indicating had been built and installed after the death of Suresh.

Titu identified a large, garlanded photo of Suresh on the wall as himself. He also identified the cash drawer (which looks like any of a number of drawers behind the counter in the shop), and recognized the manager of the shop by name.

Titu was then taken to the home of Chanda Babu Singh Bharity, Suresh's father. He said it was not his house [kothi]. This was interpreted by Mahesh to mean Titu did not recognize the house, while other members of Suresh's family interpreted this statement, I think correctly, to mean that it was not Suresh's home. Suresh Verme and Uma Verme had lived in their own modern house [kothi] which was the one Titu had described to Uma Verme earlier in the day and to which he apparently expected to be taken.

At Chanda Singh Bharity's home, Titu told Suresh's mother, "I am just passing through with these people who do not have a T.V., a car, a video. I will run away to you." When Titu's father, Mahavir Singh, tried to take him home to Bad, Titu hugged Suresh's father, and fought Mahavir Singh and tore his shirt. Chanda Singh said, "Son, go. I will come see you."

Suresh's relatives noted that day that Titu has a small round birthmark that looks like a bullet entry wound, at the site on the right temple where Suresh was shot (see Figure 1). They conjectured that several small birthmarks on the back of Titu's skull might be the bullet exit site. Suresh's mother and wife noted that Titu also has another birthmark on the crown of the head that corresponds to one which Suresh Verme had at birth (according to his mother) and at death (according to his wife).

According to Suresh Verme's postmortem report, which we examined at the hospital where he was declared dead, the bullet that took his life entered on the right temple at the site corresponding to Titu's circular birthmark. The postmortem report said that the bullet exited behind Suresh's right ear. After noting this, I returned to Titu and examined behind his right ear and found that Titu's skull is pushed out at the site indicated as the bullet exit site (see Figure 2). Titu's parents had noted this deformity of the skull, but had not associated it with Suresh's death. Titu had not mentioned the mode of death of Suresh until asked by Rajvir Babu Verme at their first meeting. This is noteworthy, as 77% (p < -05) of the subjects in solved cases in India mention the previous personality's mode of death, and 98% (p < .05) when

TABLE 3 Summary of statements and recognitions and behavior of Toran Singh, Alias Titu


1. He said he had a Shanti Devi Singh, Titu's Uma Verme, Suresh wife and children. mother Verme's widow

2. He said he was Shanti Devi Chanda Babu Bharity, from Agra. Suresh Verme's father

3. He said his house Mahavir Singh, Titu's father Observed by author was big. Shanti Devi

4. He is embarrassed Shanti Devi by his mother's clothes.

5. He says his wife Mahavir Singh has beautiful saris.

6. He says his Shanti Devi sisters-in-law are educated.

7. He says his Mahavir Singh brothers have beautiful shirts.

Observed by author

Observed by author

Chanda Babu Singh Bharity

Observed by author

Shanti Devi said Titu was about a year and a half.

He also said, "This house is dirty, I don't know how I came here." Titu's parents' house is not dirty but a large cement village or country style house where cooking is done on a floor hearth. Suresh's parental home has three stories and modem amenities, e.g. TV, and a cooler. Suresh Verme's own home is modem. Note that there is no ? socioeconomic difference between Titu and Suresh's families. Both fathers were lecturers.

5 L

L V1

Suresh's father notes that Titu's family has considerable agricultural land and is related to the royal family.

Shanti Devi was wearing older cotton saris three of the four times I saw her.

The three times I saw Uma Verme she was wearing very nice chiffon style saris appropriate for a wealthy business woman.

Mahesh Verme's wife has two post high school degrees, first class. I did not inquire about the education of the other sisters-in-law.

Raja Babu particularly, but also Mahesh and Rajvir Verme wore stylish synthetic shirts, while Titu's brothers wore plain cotton ones.

8. He said he had a Shanti Devi Chanda Babu Singh Bharity Titu asked to see them often, saying he would tell sister named his sister Susheela or brother Raja Babu, when he Susheela Devi and was scolded. (Titu gave an example of this

behavior when we first visited him, telling the 9. a brother named taxi driver he would tell Raja Babu the driver

Raja Babu. would not let him in the car, saying, "and he will set you straight," but this is after meeting Suresh's family.)

10. He said he would Mahavir Singh Mahesh Verme indirectly said it was like Suresh to not go by bus or refuse to go by foot. I did not specifically ask on foot. whether Suresh had an aversion to going by these

means, but as a prosperous man with a foreign car, that is likely. r

11. He said he had a Mahavir Singh Titu first said this when very small when he was ti' shop in Sadar taken to Agra for a wedding, although they did Bazaar. not pass near the Sadar Bazaar. He repeated this 2

statement several times when very young. Suresh Radio is in Sadar Bazaar. s

12. He cried daily to Shanti Devi He said to his father, "You go daily to Agra but you 3 go to his family. A. K. Singh, Titu's eldest don't bring any news of my family." a =.

brother 0 P,

13. He said, "I have a A. K. Singh g. shop of transistor s radios."

14. He said he was a A. K. Singh While Suresh's family did not mention smuggling, big smuggler and understandably, other residents of Agra a goonda confirmed that Suresh was noted for dealing on (someone who the black market. gets things by force).

15. He said he was A. K. Singh the owner of Suresh Radio.

(continued) - z

Mahesh Verme

Uma Verme

Uma Verme, Suresh Verme's widow

Informants in Agra

Uma Verrne

TABLE 3 (continued) c. b\ N


1 6. He recognized Burfi Devi as his mother.

Burfi Devi, Suresh's mother Chanda Babu Singh Bharity

17. He gave the nicknames of his children.

18. He recognized Chanda Babu Singh Bharity.

19. He recognized Uma, Suresh's wife.

20. He described a trip he had taken to Dolpur with Urna and the children.

2 1. He said they had eaten chatt and kufi on that trip.

22. Titu asked if the children were at home or studying at school.

23. He described his house, giving details of the shape, and the lights.

Mahesh Verme Suresh's Urna Verme third brother.

Rajvir Verme, Suresh's second brother.

Chanda Babu Singh Bharity Chanda Babu Singh Bharity

Uma Verme Uma Verme Mahesh Verme Chanda Babu Singh Bharity Burfi Devi Chanda Babu Singh Bharity Uma Verme

Chanda Babu Singh Bharity Uma Verme

Shanti Devi

Urna Verme Urna Verme

Suresh's parents said Titu hugged her, called her "Mataji [dear Mother]," sat on her lap, and they both cried. Rajvir Verme said his mother wept, but was not sure Titu had. Mahesh Verme, the brother who was not greeted, denied that Titu had "properly" recognized Suresh's mother.

Titu had asked, "Why didn't you bring my children?" Asked if he had any, he said, "Mono and Tono," the nicknames of Suresh's sons, Sachin Singh and Amit Singh.

Shanti Devi recalled that both Titu and Chanda Babu Singh Bharity wept. Titu hugged him and called him "Papaji [dear Father] ."

Titu was asked, "Who is she?' by Suresh's father. .P

i5 C

5;

Rajvir Verme recalled that Titu had said they went to Dolpur because his sister was living there (correct). I have not yet asked if anyone else heard this.

The query contains no new evidence. At the time of Suresh's death they were preschool age.

Urna called this "confidential things." The lights were custom made.

24. He said a room in the house was kept locked.

25. Titu recognized Rajvir Babu.

26. Titu recognized Raja Babu.

27. He said he was shot.

28. He said he was shot from the right.

29. He says they have not brought his car.

30. He said his car was white.

3 1. He insists he can drive.

32. He plays the tape deck in the car.

33. He asks to see his sister in Delhi.

34. He recognizes Suresh's sister Susheela.

Mahesh Verme

Rajvir Singh Verme, Suresh' second brother

Mahesh Verme

Rajvir Babu Verme Uma Verme

Mahesh Verme

Uma Verme

Uma Verme


Mahesh Verme

Rajvir Verme Shanti Devi Chanda Singh Bharity Chanda Babu Singh Bharity

Mahesh Verme

Chanda Singh Bharity Bharity

Raja Babu Verme

Postmortem report

Postmortem report

Uma Verme

Uma Verme

Chanda Babu Singh

Mahavir Singh

Rajvir Verme

One room was kept locked with scrap material inside. He used the word kothi for his house.

Titu called him by the name Suresh used, "Raghubhaya."

Titu had not mentioned the mode of death before he was asked. He then described Suresh murder in detail, some of which has never been verified.

Once Mahesh said left, but he said right two other times. ?J c.

Suresh Verme had a Fiat. They came in a Maruthi.

The Fiat was white. This is the car in which he was murdered. They insist the Maruthi was his, but Titu insists it is not.

Titu insisted on trying, working the gas, clutch, and brake petals and steering, and drove it slightly with Raja Babu's help. Raja Babu noted Titu's and Suresh's common passion for cars.

Titu had never seen a tape-deck or tape recorder before, but worked it on his own.

Titu was then told his sister who lives in Delhi was currently in Agra and he told them to tell her to come see him.

He said, "Susheela Gigi [sister]." His own he does not call by this kin term but by name only.

The informant was not a witness to this, and I failed to check this with the first-hand witnesses of this item.

(continued) - 0\ W

"Guloo's father," and "Guloo's mother."

36. He notes "his" eldest sister is not present.

37. He insisted on "going home."

38. He recognizes Suresh Radio.

39. He identifies a TV.

40. He identifies a showcase made after Suresh's death as not there previously.

4 1. He identifies a photograph of Suresh as himself.

relatives. Titu used the same method to refer to and address his siblings. After meeting Suresh's family, Titu wanted to go home with them. He threw his shoes at his mother, saying, "You are not my mother."

Chanda Babu Singh Bharity Chanda Babu Singh Bharity This occurred later the same day when Suresh's two younger sisters came to visit and Titu's mother asked him which was the eldest. Suresh's father is a second hand witness to this. Confirmation from the primary witnesses has not yet been sought.

Raja Babu Verme 3 There is some confusion over whether Titu meant .

going to Suresh's own home or Suresh's parents' 3 home. w L

V)

Raja Babu Verme Raja Babu took Titu first to his own radio/TV shop and claimed it was Suresh Radio. Titu was adamant it was not. When taken to Suresh Radio he said it was his.

Mahesh Verme Mahesh asked this as a test, confident that Titu would not have seen one. His father confirmed that he had not. Mahesh said Titu had to rack his brain to come up with the name.

Uma Verme Titu asked who had it made.

Raja Babu Verme

Mahavir Singh

Uma Verme

Uma Verme Raja Babu Verme

Uma Verme The prominence of the photograph in Suresh Radio might suggest its identity.

42. He identified the Uma Verme Uma Verme When asked, "What is this?'Titu answered cash drawer. Mr. Raju, manager of correctly. The drawer looks like all the other

Suresh Radio drawers behind the counter. Raja Babu Verme

43. He insisted on Raja Babu Verme His choice of the most expensive was construed as taking a transistor showing his continued knowledge of these radio home. matters. Titu had not seen such an item before,

according to his father. This could have been a chance choice, or based on what was most attractive of the radios to any young child, however.

44. He said Suresh's Chanda Babu Singh Bharity Chanda Babu Singh Bharity Mahesh Verme interpreted this statement to mean parents' home is that Titu did not recognize Suresh's parental not his. home. Suresh's parents interpret it to mean it is ??

not Suresh's own home. Given that Titu had Em 0

described Suresh's home earlier that day, it is likely that he expected to be taken there. Chanda Babu Singh Bharity and Titu recognized the g. parental home. Suresh's mother heard him say he ' had a different home. Suresh was the only son to have a separate house [kothi]. Titu's attachment to Suresh's parents was demonstrated by his na telling Chanda Babu Singh Bharity that he was his only father, and resisting being taken home by ' his own father, whose shirt be tore. Titu told Suresh's mother, "I am just passing through with these people who have no TV, car, video. I will come back to you."

Chanda Babu Singh Bharity Suresh's two children were assembled with a group of other children to see if he would recognize them. This was a month and a half after the first meeting, so it is possible that Titu had seen a picture of them. He said, "You have not said namastay [greeted] me," to the elder son.

(continued) V,

45. He recognized one of Suresh's sons.


TABLE 3 (continued)


46. He said what happened to the money he had with him at the time he was murdered.

47. He said there are twelve Ashok trees at "his" home.

48. He recognized an old friend of Suresh's, Ashok Kumar.

-- -

Chanda Babu Singh Bharity Uma Verme (verification of Titu said a policeman took the 15,000 rupees from money) the trunk of the car. This has not been verified.

Whether Suresh was still conscious when the police arrived is not clear.

Mahavir Singh

Raja Babu Verme

49. He said one of In my presence the bullets hit the steering wheel.

Mahavir Singh

Raja Babu Verme

Not confirmed

Titu demanded that his parents take him there. I accompanied him a second time but failed to ? count the number of Ashok trees. s CL

This friend had been out of town until 1987, when ii

he came to see Titu. Titu asked what happened to the fans he had installed in his car. Raja Babu Verme recalled that Suresh had done so. This occurred when Titu was riding in a taxi with me, of the Ambassador make. Titu apparently thought this was Ashok Kumar's car, which was an Ambassador.

Rajvir Verrne checked the car for bullets after the murder, and said the steering wheel was not hit. Uma heard two shots, however.

50. He said he went In my presence to Mahesh's wedding in Kanpur by car.

5 1. He slapped stool In my presence in Suresh Radio upon entering and leaving.

52. He went swiftly In my presence by himself to the second floor of the shop and commended

Mahesh Verme

Raja Babu Singh

This was in response to Mahesh's questioning in the summer of 1987. Titu could have learned this normally by then.

This "macho" gesture was characteristic of Suresh, according to Raja Babu Singh. F

2. r 0

This was the first time Titu had gone upstairs in Suresh Radio. He did so spontaneously, without $ seeing anyone else do so, as if he knew what he was doing. The existence of a second floor was s not obvious. ;if -

'U workman. 5:

5 3. He said there was In my presence Uma Verme This had held a TV antenna. This was on his 0 w a pole on the roof second trip to Suresh's house. g. of his house. s

54. He said he had In my presence Unverified Uma Verme did not think this likely enough to buried a gold belt check. Titu sized up which tree it would be under the tallest shrewdly. Ashok tree at "his" house.

168 A. Mills

Fig. 1 . Birthmark on the skull of Titu which corresponds to the bullet entry site as described in Suresh Verme's postmortem report.

the mode of death was violent (Cook, Pasricha, Samararatne, U Win Maung, & Stevenson, 1983).

Suresh's family and Titu's family are not related but of the same caste. The name of the father of the accused murderer is the same as Titu's father. Both families are from the same general area and caste. This caused the Verrne family to suspect (illogically) that Titu's family had fabricated the case to save their relative from conviction. Mahesh Verme, the brother to whom Titu did not speak at the initial meeting, was particularly suspicious. To date Titu had passed the tests Mahesh and his family have set up. For example, when Suresh's sons first returned home from the boarding school they attend in Dehra Dun (after the meeting between the Vermes and Titu),


Fig. 2. Birthmark on the skull of Titu which corresponds to the bullet exit site as described in Suresh Verne's postmortem report.

they were placed amidst a group of other children in Chanda Singh Bharity's home, and Titu was brought there. Titu went to Suresh's eldest son and said, "Why did you not say namastay [the polite and correct greeting] to me?" The family felt satisfied that Titu had recognized him.

During the course of our investigation, when we took Titu to Mahesh's shop Titu called him by name, which he could easily have learned to do by normal means. When a pleased and startled Mahesh asked Titu where his (Mahesh's) wedding had been ("Lucknow, Kanpur, Mathura?"), Titu correctly answered, "Kanpur." Asked whether he had gone Titu said he had. Asked how he had gone, Titu said, "By car." However, as with the recognition of Suresh's son, it is impossible to rule out the possibility that Titu could have this information through normal means.

Titu had insisted that his parents take him to Suresh's house (kothi), which Uma Verme is currently renting out. The tenants allowed him to come inside, where Titu described having had a particular cabinet made. He also insisted that he had buried a gold belt under a particular tree, a state-

170 A. Mills

ment which has not been verified (see Table 3). In January 1989, I took Titu to this house in the company of Uma Verme and her sons. Again Titu claimed he had buried a gold belt under a particular tree which he pointed out. He also went on the roof and commented that there used to be a pole there (now absent), which Uma verified. However, the other statements he made incorporated information he has learned through normal means since meeting the Verme family.

The Vermes note the similarity of temperament of Titu and Suresh: both are highly active, intrepid and hot-tempered individuals. I observed these qualities in Titu, who beat a boy as hard as he could with a sugar cane frond because he was annoyed at the crowd that had,gathered when I wanted to photograph him. When we took Titu to Suresh Radio, Titu gave a stool inside the shop a resounding smack as he entered, a very "macho" gesture. Hearing music from upstairs, he went directly to the back of the shop and up the back stairs to a room above the shop where a worker was repairing a tape recorder, and said in the manner of a proprietor, "He is doing good work." Going back downstairs he brushed aside an offer to help him down the steep stairs and as we left, again gave the stool a resounding slap. Querying Su- resh's brothers later, we were told this was a common gesture of Suresh's.

Later that day, Titu grew furious when it was time for him and his father to leave the taxi in which we had brought them to Suresh Radio and resume their travels on Mahavir Singh's motor scooter. Titu threw something at his father and tried to pull away from his grip as hard as he could. Another day at his home, Titu told the bangle seller whom his mother had called to fit bangles on my wrist, "I will shoot you if you charge them. I will kick you out of the courtyard."

Suresh's father said that Suresh was not afraid to fight. In 1975 eight goonda or "hit men" took Suresh and put him in their car. He kicked one and jumped through the window into the river, swam across and came out the other side, thus escaping. Within the year before his murder, Suresh went to recover two cars presumably stolen by the same man who had previously stolen his car (the man later accused of Suresh's murder). Suresh was fired upon but jumped from the car and caught one of the gunmen by the neck.

On my return trips in 1988 and 1989, Titu was still intensely identifying himself as Suresh. For example, two days before I returned to Agra in July 1988, Titu had insisted that his parents take him to the home of Chanda Babu Singh Bharity, Suresh's father. When they arrived Titu discovered that Chanda Babu Singh Bharity was sick, and gave orders for a doctor to be fetched and medicine administered.

When I returned in January 1989, Titu's father expressed concern about possible trouble if Titu persists in thinking he is entitled to Suresh's property as he grows older. I tried to reassure him by pointing out that Stevenson has found that children with apparent past-life memories seem to forget them by the time they are 7 or 8. Titu fairly shouted, " I will not forgetp' Titu was


presumably 6 at the time. Although, as noted above, his statements may now incorporate information he has acquired since the two families have met, Suresh's family continues to be amazed at the knowledge Titu displays of Suresh's affairs.

Evaluation of the Paranormal Features of the Case. Titu made 15 verified statements or acts before meeting the Vermes, and 3 1 since (although some may contain information he has learned normally). One of these 31 statements is apparently incorrect: Titu said a second bullet hit the steering wheel. While Uma Verrne heard two shots, Suresh Verme's eldest brother says he carefully examined the car after his brother's death, searching for the fatal bullet, and did not notice any sign of the steering wheel having been hit. Titu has correctly identified 10 people and four locations. Items 40, 46, 49 and 52 in Table 3 have not been verified.

The most discrepant piece of information in this case is the date of birth of Titu and the date of death of Suresh. If Titu was born December 11, 1982, the date given in the hospital register for the birth of a son of Titu's father's military friend, then he was born 8 months and 17 days before Suresh Verme was murdered. While there are cases on record of Prakash Pravesh, or the entry of the soul of a deceased person into the body of someone just dead (Stevenson, 1974)' and of Prakaya Pravesh, or the entry of a soul into someone still alive (Stevenson & Pasricha, 1979)' the entry of Suresh into Titu when Titu was a small child would not explain the existence of the mark Titu bore from birth which corresponds to the entry and exit of the fatal bullet, unless one posited some sort of complex preknowledge or fore- shadowing of Suresh's murder and Suresh's entry into Titu, or chance coincidence. If Titu was born in December 1983, as his father told me, he was born 4 months after the death of S ~ r e s h . ~ Unaware of the uncertainty about the interval, Titu and Suresh's families and the Indian press have assumed that this is a simple case of reincarnation.

Prior to their meeting in April 1987 the two families had not known each other, as evidenced by the Verme party going initially to the wrong Bad. However, we cannot rule out the possibility of Titu's parents hearing about the murder. Nardev Singh, a man from the village of Bad, was a friend of Suresh's. Titu's mother thought Suresh might have known some advocates who are related to them. While Titu's father did not recall hearing of Sur- esh's murder, he commonly reads the local newspapers. I checked one of the papers he often reads and found it carried stories about Suresh's murder for 3 days running after Suresh's death. However, the papers did not include a list of Suresh's next of kin, and only included the information contained in items 2, 1 1, 13, 15 and 27 of Table 3. It is highly unlikely that the slight acquaintances of Suresh's who lived in his village knew the rest of the information Titu gave. Moreover, cryptomnesia would not explain the specificity of the correspondence of the two birthmarks, noted at Titu's birth, to the entry and exit sites of the bullet that claimed Suresh's life.

172 A. Mills

Discussion

I have presented the data from 3 cases in some detail to assist the reader to make his or her own evaluation of the nature of the evidence. I draw on the experience of studying the additional cases in assessing the evidence for reincarnation or alternate interpretations of cases. Table 4 compares the 10 cases under discussion with the larger body of cases in India studied by Stevenson on a number of different features. The directions in my smaller sample cannot be expected to be as accurate as in a larger sample. Eventu- ally the cases I have studied will be included in the files at the Division of Personality Studies and used for further analysis.

The question is whether the cases represent evidence that something paranormal is taking place or whether the cases are the result of conscious deceit (fraud), or unconscious self-deception and/or cultural construction. Infrequent cases of deception and self-deception have been reported by Stevenson, Pasricha and Samararatne (1988).

The Accuracy of the Information: The Evidence for Conscious Deceit

Before undertaking this investigation in India, I was prepared to find that some, perhaps all, of the cases I would investigate would be hoaxes perpetrated for any number of reasons by the participants, such as a desire of the child and/or its family to identify with a higher caste. This was my first experience in a caste society. The investigations did not substantiate these suppositions.

As Table 4 shows, in 3 of the 10 cases studied the subject was born into humbler circumstances (called Demotion in Table 4) or lower caste than the previous personality. Three of the cases showed no substantial caste or socioeconomic difference (called No Change in Table 4), while in 4 of the cases the child was born in a higher caste than the previous personality (called Promotion in Table 4). In Stevenson's Indian sample for which the relevant analysis has been made, one-third of the cases in which there was promotion or demotion recall worse material conditions, while two-thirds recall better conditions (1987, p. 2 15). Analysis of social status change for the larger body of cases from India will be useful, as well as its relationship to whether the previous personality was known or unknown.

In one of the cases in which the child was from a humbler caste, I enter- tained some question about motive because discrepant accounts of one important event suggested that two informants were misrepresenting the event, or one very elderly informant had incorrectly remembered it. In December 1989 I was able to gather further data on this complex case. I am now confident that this is not a case of conscious deceit, but a case in which there is unconscious construction on a larger scale than in the other cases I have studied. I hope to do justice to the complexity of the case in a separate r e ~ o r t . ~


TABLE 4 Comparisons of features of cases of the reincarnation type in Stevenson's

sample from India and in Mills' replication study

Mills

Stevenson

Mills

Stevenson

Mills

Stevenson

Sex of Subject Percent Solved Cases

60% male N = 10

64% male N = 271'

Related Acquainted Unknown

Social Status Comparison

Promotion Demotion No Change

Violent Mode of Death Recalls Mode of Death Phobia Related (Solved Cases) (Solved Cases) to Death

Mills

Stevenson 53% N = 164'

- -

' (Cook, Pasricha, Samararatne, U Win Maung, & Stevenson, 1983). (Pasricha, 1978).

Consistency and Accuracy of Statements. In the other cases, I noted some minor discrepancies in the different eyewitness accounts of meetings and recognitions depending on what the person had happened to actually hear. I also noted that one informant attributed a statement to a subject which incorporated information learned only after meeting the previous personality's family, and some tendency to accept as evidence statements made after an obvious information flow had occurred. However, I found no indication that the witnesses had fabricated the information itself.

Indeed, like Yuille and Cutshall (1986), I found that cross-referencing numerous independent accounts indicated the testimony was generally consistent and accurate. Like Freeman, Romney and Freeman (1987), I found that informants who had witnessed a single meeting were better able

174 A. Mills

to provide a clear picture of that single event than people who had witnessed numerous meetings, whose reportage tended to blend information about the discrete meetings into a composite description. With the exception noted above, the various accounts were consistent rather than contradictory.

I found that minor inaccuracies sometimes occurred in estimations of the child's age when he or she said particular things, particularly if there had been a considerable lapse of time since the events took place. Table 1 records some of the differences in estimates of the age at which Reena said or did certain things. The inability to pinpoint the correct chronology is particularly significant in the (relatively rare) instances when parents are not sure if an event took place before or after the case was solved, at which time the child and his or her family learned additional information about the previous personality. The implicit assumption that the cases are examples of reincarnation raises the question of unconscious self-deception.

The Evidence for Unconscious Self-Deception

The category of unconscious self-deception, as I see it, includes several alternative explanations: imposition or adoption of an alternate personality in response to serious pathology in the family, analogous to Multiple Per- sonality Disorder; the adoption of an alternate identity without serious pathology; or misdiagnosis of normal fantasy on the part of the child in conformity with the culturally accepted category of reincarnation. When the previous personality was unknown to the child and his or her family before the case was "solved," these latter two explanations rest on the assumption that the discovery of someone that fits the subject's description is a question of coincidence and cultural construction.

Unconscious Construction Hypothesis I: Adoption of an Alternate Personal- ity in Response to Complex Family Dynamics. Krippner (1987) has noted the similarities of some Brazilian subjects in cases said to be of the reincarnation type with North American persons suffering from dissociative tendencies. In Brazil, where the concept of reincarnation has been incorporated into spiritism, intrusive or alternate personalities are diagnosed by some practitioners as past-life personalities which the individual has not accepted or incorporated. (This differs from the cases, also reported in Brazil, in which children appear to remember previous lives without manifesting any pathology.) One may ask if cases reputed to be of reincarnation are, in fact, instances of the adoption of an alternate personality for reasons analogous to the etiology of Multiple Personality Disorder (MPD). Diagnosis of cases of this latter phenomena have been increasing in Western countries over the past half century (cf. Coons, Bowman, & Milstein, 1988; Greaves, 1980). Kenny ( 1986) sees MPD as a metaphor for American culture, analogous to cases diagnosed as spirit possession in other cultures (Kenny, 198 1).

In cases of Multiple Personality Disorder the individual at times manifests one or more separate and quite different personalities, about which the main


or presenting personality has no conscious memory. A precipitating factor in the etiology of Multiple Personality Disorder appears to be a splitting of the personality in response to childhood abuse (DSM-111-R, 1986). In some instances the split in personality begins in childhood, and may be enacted as an imaginary companion who has the ability to deal with distressing situations in a way the primary personality cannot (Congdon, Hain, & Steven- son, 196 1; Hilgard, 1977).

None of the cases of children said to have past-life memories which I investigated appeared to fit within the category of Multiple Personality Disorder. I found no evidence of pathology on the part of the subject or their families. Despite the anomaly of the subject's conviction that he or she was and still is someone else and, in some instances, his or her precocity, all the subjects seemed to be normal, integrated individuals. There was no evidence that they had adopted the conviction that they belonged to another family because they were covertly or overtly rejected by their parents or other family members, or had formed a defensive personality to cope with dis- turbing material or abuse as in Multiple Personality Disorder.

Indeed, one of the most salient features of the cases was the consistency of the apparent past-life and present-life personality. The children did not manifest two separate personalities. Although recollections of apparent past lives sometimes caused some of the children to become pensive, they con- sistently manifested a single personality without amnesia for any segments of that personality. The distinctive features of the personality typically were manifest before the case was solved, and the child and his or her family had an information about the nature of the previous personality. In the 3 cases I have examined in which the subject has grown past the stage of consciously identifying with a particular deceased individual, the child's personality remains consistent with that exhibited earlier.

However, further questioning of the parents indicated that they tended to give preference to their child with past-life memories because of the distress the child experienced in believing that they belonged simultaneously in two different locations and with two different families. This raises the hypothesis that children may construct a previous-life identity in order to gain special attention, in the absence of serious pathology.

Unconscious Construction Hypothesis II: Construction of a Previous Life to Gain Attention. The hypothesis that children unconsciously develop what are interpreted as past-life memories seems to me to be counterindicated by four factors: (1) it presumes that a very young child is aware that indicating a past-life identity would give it positive attention; (2) it presumes that a child gets only positive reinforcement for claiming to remember previous lives; (3) it presumes that the distress the child feels at separation from the apparent past-life family is feigned; and (4) it does not account for the child's apparently accurate knowledge of people and places about which the child

176 A. Mills

the child is not getting adequate attention. I found no indication that the children were motivated by a need for compensatory attention.

I found that there was considerable variation in whether the child's case had received notoriety, and in fact brought the child public attention. Reena's case was never made public or published in any journals. Ashok Kumar has had other enquiries about his case but I am not aware that it has even been described in the Indian Press. Titu's case has been reported in at least three magazines in India, and has entered the public domain in Agra. Uma Verrne reported that an Indian film company is considering making it into a movie. The reader will have to decide for him or herself whether Titu's identification is based on such press coverage.

If a young child thought that claiming to remember a previous life would gain additional solicitude from his or her parents, I doubt that a child would find it worth the trouble to try to maintain an alternate identity on the basis of the parents' response. The parents of the subjects I investigated could not be accused of desiring their child to have past-life memories or encouraging their expression. In all 10 cases, the families found it distressing to have a child claim to belong to another family and cry to be taken to that family. They wanted their child to relate to them as the parents. In addition, some of the parents were upset at finding they had a child who spoke from what was apparently a remembered past life because they thought children with past- life memories have died prematurely of violent causes and returned quickly to finish the unfinished business of the truncated life, after which they will again die.5

In 8 out of the 10 cases, the fear of losing the child to premature death or to the relatives of the past incarnation prompted the parents to take measures to make the child forget and/or cease speaking from the point of view of a past life (Reena and Titu were the exceptions). These measures included scolding, beating or cuffing the child, turning the child counterclockwise on a grinding stone in the hope of making the child forget, and having a pandit or priest recite mantras "to erase the past-life memories from the child's brain." While the parents hoped these measures would be effective and felt some relief in performing them, most parents found them initially ineffec- tual in causing the desired amnesia. In the cases in which the child is now over 9 years old, pare~ts found that the child's memories faded when he or she became about 7 years old (and sometimes attributed this relief to the suppression measures administered much earlier).

Unconscious Construction Hypothesis 111: The Phenomenon of Children Who Appear to Remember Previous Lives as Artifact of Cultural Construc- tion of Natural Childhood Fantasy. If the phenomenon is not, as I conclude, the artifact of the great or minor pathological imposition of another personality, one may ask if it is the result of parents' interpretation of their child's natural fantasies as past-life recollections. Watkins and Watkins (1 986) report that adults under hypnosis can adopt a convincing personality separate


from their usual presenting personality. Stevenson (1987) notes that hypnotically induced "past-life regressions" can often be demonstrated to be the result of fantasy because they do not accord with established historic fact. This indicates that the intensity and conviction with which a child claims to be someone else does not indicate that this is necessarily the case.

This raises the question of whether parents create the phenomenon by labeling the child's statements and behavior as an example of reincarnation. Having provided the child with the mental rubric of past-life recall, does the child elaborate more details, and come, with the parents, to believe implicitly in the fantasy creation, which the parents unconsciuosly bolster by acceptance of it as a valid past-life recollection? Psychologists (Festinger, 1957) and anthropologists (Fiske & Shweder, 1986; Shweder, 1980) have made telling studies of the impact of cultural expectation on the evaluation of ambiguous phenomena. Anthropologists and psychiatrists (cf. Angel & Thoits, 1987; Hughes, 1985; Kleinman, 1980; Obeyesekere, 198 1 ; Torrey, 1986; Waxler, 1979, inter alia) have pointed out that non-Western peoples use different explanatory models which affect diagnosis and prognosis of symptomatology. This raises the question of whether, or to what extent, cases of the reincarnation type are a culture-bound syndrome.

There is no doubt that cultural interpretation played an important part in the development of the various stages of the cases I studied. These stages are the initial diagnosis of the case, the reaction to the case, and the search for and identification of a corresponding previous personality, the "recognitions" of people and places from the previous personality's setting, and the interpretation of further statements by the child.

Diagnosis: Typically, after an initial period when the young child's statements were given little importance, the child's continued revelations were

I interpreted by the parents as relating to a past life. A prior belief in reincarnation certainly facilitated the parents' interpretation of their child's anomalous statements in terms of reincarnation. For example, Reena's mother is unlikely to have interpreted Reena's enunciation of the word "groom" and lying down and holding her breath as an attempt to communicate about a previous life in the absence of believing previous life memories to be possible.

Reaction to the case: Even when the parents were distressed to think that their child was remembering a past life, and tried to stop the child from speaking in these terms, this interpretation provided a framework for interpreting further action and statements. In some cases I investigated (although none of the 3 presented here), the parents did a very careful job of eliciting further information from the child so that they could trace the previous personality, motivated by a desire to satisfy the child with some information that would assuage its crying to go to the former home as well as by curiosity. In these situations the parents often began to assume aspects of the projected previous personality. Even when the parents tried to ignore the

178 A. Mills

talking about a past life manifests in their verbiage. For example, parents made no distinction in pronouns in referring to the child or the presumed previous personality, making statements like, "He remembers his home and brothers."

It is likely that providing the conceptual framework of reincarnation encourages the child to continue to manifest more apparent past-life recollections or identity (and that not providing such a framework inhibits the continuation of this phenomenon in cultures which do not believe in reincarnation).

Solving of the case: In a culture which did not employ the category of past-life recall, little effort would be made to solve such cases. If Reena was a Rachel in Kansas, her mother would have been unlikely to recall the man her 3-year-old said was her husband. If Titu was Tom in Chicago, his brother would be unlikely to seek out the radio shop Tom claimed to own. In North America an Ashok Kumar would be unlikely to get his brother to set off to find the town or village the 5-year-old said he was from.

Recognitions: The interpretation of the "recognitions" is an area where the importance of culturally constituted meanings is most evident. I did not witness any of the initial "recognitions," but it became apparent in hearing them described, that the participants were seldom concerned with, or exact- ing about, standards of evidence for paranormality. It is difficult to rule out the possibility that the child was given subtle (or even not so subtle) hints about who was supposed to be whom. In one instance (see p. 155), Ashok Kumar was explicitly prompted to recognize someone he did not initially. The definition of recognition used may vary. In India, Reena's retiring and covering her head with a cloth upon meeting Gompti Devi's mother-in-law was accepted as clear evidence of recognition. In North America it would not. In other words there are no universal cross-cultural signs of recognition. However, I do not mean to imply that all "recognitions" are worthless as evidence of paranormal phenomena. For example, there do not appear to have been any initial clues provided for Ashok Kumar's initial spontaneous recognition of Kishen Behari's mother.

Interpretation of further statements by the child: Once the case has been solved, information gained through normal means may be interpreted as further validation of paranormal knowledge by the participants. I have included the description Ashok Kumar gave of the cause of death as we left Bandha on his third visit, as an example of such a statement. Ashok Kumar had not described the mode of death before going to Bandha. The information corresponded to what we were told there. While it is possible that being in the place where the events took place stimulated his memory, one cannot rule out the possibility that Ashok Kumar had incorporated information he or his relatives had learned and retold in his hearing. Further, his mother had come to believe that Ashok Kumar's depiction of limping to his new home meant that the previous personality had died with an impaired leg. This presumption was confirmed by one informant but denied by others.


Ashok Kumar's mother gave numerous examples of her acceptance of her son as a reincarnation case, saying to him as we approached Bandha, "Tell your wife to give us water when we arrive," and so on. This does not, of course, detract from the evidence provided by the body of statements that were made before Ashok Kumar went to Bandha.

The strongest evidence for a paranormal process occurs in those cases in which the child and his family had no knowledge of the previous personality before they met. Half of the cases I studied fit into that category. However, it is often difficult to rule out the possibility that the subject or his or her family could have learned something about the previous personality and then forgotten that they knew it. As Table 4 shows, the 10 cases I studied do

I not represent the full variation of contact in Stevenson's larger Indian sample. None of the 10 cases included subjects who were related to the previous personality. The 3 cases described demonstrate a considerable range in the possibility of the child having learned some information through normal means about the previous personality. The case of Reena represents the greatest amount of contact; her parents were acquainted with the husband of the previous personality. I have coded the case of Titu as unknown, although there was contact between an acquaintance of Suresh and Titu's father. In the case of Ashok Kumar there was no prior contacte6

However, even in Reena's case, neither the colleague relationship between Shyam Babu Yadev and Kripa Shanker Kulshreshtha which occasioned the latter's awareness that Shyam Babu's wife had died, nor their living in the same general neighborhood accounts for the child, from the time she was first able to communicate, indicating that she had a husband and had died, or the intensity of her phobia of the cremation ground and of hypodermic needles. Shyam Babu's alacrity in remarrying 3 months after Gompti Devi's death contravenes the usual Hindu 1-year mourning period, and indicates his willingness to forget his past loss. Neither he nor his second wife could legitimately be suspected of willingly transmitting the information to Reena. The Kulshreshtha family had nothing to gain by establishing a link between their daughter and a dark complexioned wife of a backward caste colleague of her father's.

On a continuum from most to least contact, Titu's case falls towards the end of no contact. The two families did not know of each other, although Titu's father may have read of the murder or heard about it from an acquaintance of Suresh's who lives in Titu's village and forgotten it. Nonethe- less it is difficult to explain why Titu would identify as the owner of Suresh Radio on the basis of these possible sources of communication. If a motive could be found, it would not explain the correspondence of Titu's birthmarks to bullet entry and exit site on the Suresh.

It has been suggested that in these instances it is mere coincidence that a person meeting the child's description actually exists. However, it exceeds the bounds of credibility to imagine that it is mere coincidence that there existed a man in a village of Bandha with a wife and five children who had

180 A. Mills

been beaten by the police, as Ashok Kumar had said before going to the village; and that Ashok Kumar would insist on going to that village, be able to lead the way and once there recognize Kishen Behari's house and mother. In this case as in others, the spontaneity and familiarity with which the subject relates to the relatives of the previous personality belies prompting or molding of the child's behavior to fit any preconceived mold.

If some paranormal means of attaining the knowledge seems indicated, one must ask whether extrasensory perception offers a more compelling explanation than the reincarnation hypothesis. Reena's demonstration of extrasensory perception about four events suggests this alternative paranormal hypothesis.

There is evidence that Western children (as well as adults) sometimes seem to know and articulate others' thoughts without having been told them (Rhine, 196 1). Children exhibit this property most often with a parent, that is, someone he or she knows intimately. Spontaneous telepathic impressions in adults are also typically between relatives (Stevenson, 1970). In Reena's case her parents knew something about the existence of a former wife of Shyam Babu Yadev. In Titu's case his father may have read or heard of the murder of Suresh Verme. However, in both these cases the information does not seem important enough or salient enough to the parent to explain the child's attachment to this particular person. It seems unlikely that the child would pick up the information from the unknown deceased individual's relatives. In Ashok Kumar's case the extrasensory perception hypothesis would rest on the presumption that Ashok Kumar was picking up on the thoughts of Kishen Behari's relatives in Bandha, whom he and his parents did not know existed.

Further, if some children can accurately pick up information contained in other's minds it would not account for the child's striking identification with one particular person. The ESP hypothesis would seem more credible if these children could accurately relate facts about a number of individuals unknown to them.7 Three factors counterindicate the extrasensory perception interpretation. First, the specificity of information given by children in cases of the reincarnation type exceeds that in spontaneous childhood ESP. Second, in all the cases the target person with whom the child seems to be in extrasensory contact is a deceased previous personality. Third, extrasensory perception per se does not typically entail strong identification with or as the target person. The phenomena suggest that the consciousness of the deceased person at the time of his or her death has become partially accessible to the child.

Conclusion

My examination of 10 cases of children who identified themselves as a deceased individual in India, 3 of which are described above, indicates that an independent investigator, using Stevenson's methods of investigation, finds comparable results. Some aspects of some of these cases cannot be


explained by normal means. I found no evidence that the cases I studied are the result of fraud or fantasy or could be explained on the basis of projection or assumption of an alternate identity in response to complex family dynamics. While the cultural acceptance of the concept of reincarnation and the category of children remembering a past life influenced the parents' interpretation of the child's behavior, it cannot be credited with causing all aspects of its occurrence, such as the high degree of accuracy of the statements these children make about an actual deceased person when that person is unknown to them and their relatives. The alternate normal explanations rest on the presumption that the existence of a previous personality fitting the child's description is a product of coincidence. The consistency and similarity of the child's personality with the personality reported for the previous personality is also significant. In the cases where there are striking birthmarks on the subject which relate to wounds on the previous personality or phobias related to the mode of death, the possibility of coincidence diminishes even further.

Like Stevenson I conclude that while none of the cases I studied (or the 3 cases cited) offer incontrovertible proof of reincarnation or some related paranormal process, they are part of the growing body of cases for which normal explanations do not seem to do justice to the data. The implications of these cases for understanding human psychology are sufficiently major to warrant further careful studies of such cases. We should be beware of the tendency to discount the evidence these cases present because the concepts of paranormal phenomena in general and reincarnation in particular are not a part of the Western scientific cultural construction. This replication study indicates that there is enough data inexplicable by normal means to warrant further investigation of children who claim to remember previous lives, and to suggest that such cases offer evidence of the survival of some element of the human personality after death.

Further studies of cases in India, should, whenever possible, concentrate on cases which offer the most telling evidence about whether some paranormal feature is involved. These are cases in which the child and his family did not know the previous personality and cases which are as yet unsolved, or in which a written record has been made of the child's statements before verification of the existence of such a person is made.

Further studies are indicated to further refine Stevenson's work on the interaction of specific cultural beliefs and the parameters of cases. I would recommend studying imaginative childhood identities of Western children to assess the similarity of what is considered "natural fantasy" in Western children to the alternate identities of children said to remember past lives in cultures that believe in the concept of reincarnation.

Endnotes

' I am following Stevenson's usage of the term "previous personality" to refer to the deceased person of whom the child speaks.

182 A. Mills

* The subject recalls the murder of the previous personality. The alleged murderer and his family identified me and my assistants as undercover agents seeking information for the murder trial, and they threatened the child, his relatives, and the villagers with dire consequences if they should talk about the case. In addition, we were not able to meet the mother or father of the child, since they were (or were said to be) absent from the village on our repeated visits. For less dramatic reasons we were sometimes unable to find all the witnesses I wanted to interview in other cases as well.

The questions raised by this case show the importance of obtaining records wherever possible of birth and death dates. Unfortunately, births and deaths often go unrecorded in India. The interval between the death of the previous personality and the birth of the subject in most cases studied by Stevenson is greater than 9 months, but there are a number of cases in which the subject was conceived before the previous personality's death (Stevenson, 1986, 1987). Further enquiries regarding the registration of Titu's birthdate have not yet settled the question, but indicate that the person under whose name Shanti Devi was admitted may be fictitious.

In the one case (the one in which I found accounts to be seriously inconsistent), the child's parents were convinced of the validity of the case, whereas the previous personality's father (who had not witnessed any meetings) was not. His reservations were based on hearing that the subject had called both the previous personality's uncle and brothers as uncles, and a sense that the interval between his daughter's death and the birth of the subject (7 years) was too long. Other people attributed his lack of endorsement of the case to be the result of reluctance to believe that his daughter would return in the businessman's class, as he is a Brahmin.

Stevenson ( 1974) reports a similar fear ainong the Tlingit that children who remember past lives will live a short life. I have found that the Beaver, Gitksan and Wet'suwet'en native children of British Columbia, Canada, with such past-life memories are prized and called "special child" and are typically born to close relatives who are solaced by having a deeply mourned relative return. In this context such children seldom bother their parents to take them to an unknown and different home and set of relatives, although all three tribes diagnose the crying or illness of preverbal children as caused by the baby's distress at not having some prized object of the previous personality, or missing some of his or her associates (Mills, 1988).

In the case with the greatest prior contact of the 10 I investigated, the subject became a frequent visitor to the home of the previous personality when about 2 years old, and made statements about the previous personality after contact was established. In the 2 cases with the least amount of contact in my sample, the subject and his relatives were unaware of the existence of the previous personality, who lived in another village, and the subject has not visited the village or home of the previous personality, although the relatives of the previous personality have visited the child at his or her home.

' Stevenson ( 1987) reports that intermediate or additional past lives are recalled by subjects of cases of the reincarnation type infrequently, and are usually unverifiable. One of the subjects in my sample claimed to recall one, unverified intermediate life.

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Mills, A. (1989). A preliminary investigation of reincarnation among the Beaver and Gitksan Indians. Anthropologica, 30, 23-59.

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Journal of Scientific Exploration, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 185-200, 1989 Pergamon Press plc. Printed in the USA.


Searching for "Signatures" in Anomalous Human-Machine Interaction Data: A Neural Network Approach*

DEAN I . RADIN~

Department of Psychology, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08.544

Abstract-An artificial neural network was used to explore whether unique "signatures" could be found in data collected in experiments studying the effect of intention on the statistical behavior of random number generators. Results showed that a network trained with a back-propagation technique was able to learn to associate 32 different individuals with the data they generated, then successfully transfer that knowledge to new data. It is recommended that similar experiments studying anomalous human-machine interactions should attempt to identify person-specific patterns in data in addition to measuring the magnitude of effects; parallel processing analysis techniques are also recommended.

Introduction

One of the most conspicuous and frustrating aspects of the study of human behavior is the fact that people are different. This distinctiveness allows us to identify people based on properties such as fingerprints, handwriting, voice, gait, DNA, personality, and so on (Weisburd, 1988). The importance of individual differences has long been noted in psychological experiments (Barlow & Hersen, 1984), thus it should not be surprising to find that such differences have also been reported in parapsychological experiments (Babu, 1987; Berger, 1988; Jahn & Dunne, 1986, 1987; Jahn, Dunne, & Nelson, 1987; McConnell, 1989). The present study investigated the hypothesis of individual differences, called "signatures," in human-machine interaction data collected by the Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research (PEAR) laboratory (Nelson, Dunne, & Jahn, 1984, 1986).

In the PEAR studies, individuals attempted to influence the output statistics of electronic random number generators (RNG) solely via mental intention. In a typical RNG experiment conducted at PEAR, an RNG is set to produce a series of 200 truly random bits at the press of a button; this is called one trial. A person watches a digital display that shows how many times the random samples matched an alternating "target" bit over the course of 200 generated bits. By chance, one would expect an average of 100

* A version of this paper was presented at the 7th Annual Meeting of the Society for Scientific Exploration, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, June 2-4, 1988.

+ Present address: Intelligent Systems Laboratory, Contel Technology Center, 15000 Confer- ence Center Dr., P.O. Box 108 14, Chantilly, VA 2202 1-3808.

186 D. I. Radin

such matches, and under control conditions the distribution of trial scores closely matches the theoretically expected binomial distribution (Nelson, Dunne, & Jahn, 1986). When an individual is asked to aim for high numbers, he or she mentally tries to cause the RNG to produce trial scores greater than 100. In a low aim condition, trial scores less than 100 are intended; and in a control condition, no mental intention is applied. One run consists of 50 aim high, 50 aim low, and 50 control trials. One series consists of 50 such runs, which takes about five hours of data collection to complete.

Aggregate experimental results to date reveal statistically significant correspondences between the intentional "aim" and the shift of the RNG output statistics (Jahn & Dunne, 1986, 1987; Jahn, Dunne, & Nelson, 1987). Meta-analysis of over 600 similar RNG experiments conducted by some 67 other investigators indicates that the anomalous correlation is not due to methodological shortcomings or undetected artifacts in the PEAR RNG (Radin & Nelson, 1987; Radin & Nelson, in press).

One intriguing observation about this data (beyond the mere existence of an anomalous correlation) is that individuals seem to perform in consis- tently unique patterns. Nelson, Dunne and Jahn (1986) report that data produced in one run often bears resemblance to data produced in other runs, and such similarities appear to be unique to the individuals who produced the data. However, other than providing face validity based upon graphical representation of the data (Jahn & Dunne, 1987), some rudimen- tary statistical analyses (Babu, 1987), and corroborating observations in similar types of experiments (Berger, 1988; McConnell, 1989), a "signature" effect has not been rigorously demonstrated. If such an effect were confirmed, it would suggest that experiments on human consciousness would provide more useful and revealing information with single-subject designs rather than conventional multisubject designs (cf. Barlow & Hersen, 1984).

To explore the idea of person-specific signatures in the PEAR RNG data, I used a powerful computational technique that is proving to be exceptionally adept at discovering weak patterns in noisy data. As described below in more detail, the general term for this approach is neural network analysis, and the specific training procedure used in this study is called back-propagation (Jones & Hoskins, 1987; Rumelhart, Hinton, & Williams, 1986). The study involved training a network to associate given data with given individuals, then observing whether the trained network could successfully identify persons based upon data that the network had not "seen" before.

Neural Net works

New computational techniques and models, variously called neural networks, parallel distributed processing, connectionism, and so on, are at- tracting wide interest within the disciplines of artificial intelligence, the cognitive sciences, and the neurosciences. These models, analogous to biological neural networks, are rapidly advancing the theory and development

Anomalous human-machine interaction data 187

of self-organizing, adaptive machines as well as solving previously intract- able problems in artificial intelligence (Materna, 1987; Shriver, 1988).

Neural networks are a form of parallel processing based upon research about how the brain encodes and processes information. The power of these networks rests upon the finding that when numerous elementary processing units are richly interconnected under the right conditions, they can automatically learn to associate arbitrarily complex inputs with arbitrarily complex outputs. Properly configured, these networks can also implement self- organizing associative memories, automatically derive statistical descriptions of spatial and spatiotemporal data, and autonomously acquire knowledge by observation.

An essential idea underlying neural networks may be illustrated by analogy with a bee hive. A hive is a complex, dynamic community with intelligent organization and structure, created and supported by individually simple creatures. Instead of being controlled by a central, guiding intelligence, a hive seems to be maintained by the hundreds of thousands of interactions among bees. For another analogy, consider the collections of elementary 1 cells that l l ~ o ~ p e r a t ~ " to form complex organic structures called organs.

In engineering terms, a neural network may be described as a "parallel dynamic system with the topology of a directed graph [which] can carry out information processing by means of its state response to continuous or initial input" (Materna, 1987). Information processing involves interactions among large numbers of artificial neurons. These neurons, called nodes or units, have four main components, as illustrated in Figure 1 :

~ input connections, through which the unit receives activation from other units, a summation function that combines various input activations into a single activa-

I tion, an

Output

Fig. 1. Example of a typical node in a simulated neural network. A node may have an arbitrary number of input connections, and any number of output connections (only one output is shown).

188 D. I. Radin

output function that converts summation of input activation into output activation, and

output connections b y which a unit's output activation arrives as input activation at other units in the system (Jones & Hoskins, 1987).

Such networks have been successfully taught to automatically recognize human faces, read text, make medical diagnoses, balance objects, and so on, without conventional algorithmic programming (Materna, 1987; Shriver, 1988; Widrotv & Winter, 1988). Because a more complete description of the techniques and applications of neural networks is beyond the scope of this paper, I will proceed by concentrating on the present implementation.'

Method

The Data

Data used in this study were originally collected at the PEAR laboratory as part of their research on human-machine interactions with truly random event generators2 The dataset consists of 87 series of data ("series" as defined above), produced by 33 different individuals over approximately a nine-year period. The data are in the form of run scores (average scores obtained over 50 successive trials). A typical series is represented in the form of 150 lines of data (one run score per line, and one set of 50 lines for each of the tripolar intentions).

Other types of information were available from computer archive files, including such items as whether the run was in "volitional" or "instructed" mode, whether the RNG was in an "automatic" or "manual" condition, and so on (Nelson, Dunne, & Jahn, 1984), but only run scores, intentional aim direction, and operator identity numbers were used in the present analysis.

Data Preparation

I chose a straightforward method of presenting data to a network, one that required only six numbers to characterize an individual's performance over one series. This had the advantage of simplicity, which was desirable in this exploratory study, but the disadvantage of compressing nearly a million bits of temporally collected data per person into only a few static summary statistics.

Because the main purpose of this study was to see whether a network could learn to identify an operator based solely upon his or her data, I actually needed two datasets associated with each operator-one would be used to train the network and the other would be used to see whether the trained network could transfer its knowledge to new data. Thus, each series


(a total of 50 runs) was split in half, using the first half (25 runs in each of the three aim conditions) as the training set and the second half (25 runs) as the transfer set. This half-split method was used, rather than creating training and transfer sets out of separate series, partially because only 20 individuals had produced two or more series, but more importantly, because I speculated that consistent human performance would be more evident within a given series rather than between different series.3

Individual run scores were transformed into standard normal deviates against chance expectation (i.e., Z scores), then for each series the following six data items were generated to produce the training set: (1) an overall (Stouffer) Z score for the first 25 runs under high aim intention, (2) the average Z2 of those 25 high aim runs,4 (3) a Stouffer Z for the first 25 runs under low aim intention, (4) the average z2 of those 25 runs, (5) the Stouffer Z for the first 25 control intention runs, and (6) the average Z2 of those runs. For the transfer set, the same six data items were determined, except using data for runs 26-50.

This procedure produced 87 items in the training set and 87 items in the transfer set, representing data for 33 operators. To further simplify the interpretation of the training-transfer test, I used only an operator's first series, and only the first 32 operators (for reasons described below). This resulted in two datasets, each consisting of 32 lines of data.

Control Datasets

If the transfer test showed that say, 50% of the operators were correctly identified, the "signatures" results would be self-evident. But, if say, only 2-3% were identified, as expected given the very small magnitude effects reported by the PEAR lab, then a statistical assessment would be necessary. Therefore, two control datasets were generated to compare against the transfer test results. First, a random dataset was generated by simulating the PEAR experimental protocol with a pseudorandom number generator (PRNG). The random dataset was created in five steps: (a) the PRNG was used to generate one trial of 200 random bits, (b) this was repeated 50 times to generate one run, (c) a Z score was determined from this run, (d) this was repeated 25 times to simulate a half-series, and (e) steps a-d were repeated 32 times to simulate the 32 series used from the PEAR dataset.

Then a scrambled dataset was generated by using the original data, but with operator numbers chosen uniformly at random, with replacement, over the range 1-32. Note that I could not create a suitable scrambled dataset by simply shifting operator codes by one, because this would guarantee that at least half of the operators would be identified in that "scrambled" data.5 The UNIX System VTM 48-bit multiplicative congruential PRNG, called drand48, was used to provide pseudorandom numbers in the control study. This generator has passed extensive first-order and higher-order randomness tests (Radin, 1985; Roberts, 1982).

190 D. I. Radin

Description of Net work

The program used to implement the network was originally written in Fortran, later recoded into C, then adapted and revised by the author for the present appli~ation.~ A Silicon Graphics IRIS 4DTM workstation was used to run the program.

The network used for this study was based upon a three-layer model- input, hidden, and output-as illustrated in Figure 2. There were six input nodes, corresponding to the above six values associated with each operator; between 10 and 30 "hidden" nodes (so-called because they are not directly accessible to the outside world), depending on factors such as how fast the network was to learn, how complex the inputs were, and so on; and 5 output nodes, encoding 32 operator identities as binary codes.

For the present study, values applied to the six input nodes consisted of the Stouffer Z scores and average Z 2 associated with each operator's data, as mentioned above. The desired network output was the unique binary code associated with each operator. As is customary in such networks, the inter- connecting links between the input and hidden, and hidden and output nodes were initially set to random values (typically using a uniform random range between f 1.0).

Parallel Processing in the Net work The following events occur in one simulated parallel processing cycle: (a)

The first line of the 32 line training dataset is read by the program, which applies the six data values for the first operator to the input nodes. These

output nodes

input nodes

Fig. 2. Structure of the neural network used in this study. Links from the first input to first hidden node, and first hidden to output node are shown to illustrate the connectivity of the network. The actual network was fully interconnected between input and hidden, and hidden and output layers. Here we see 12 hidden nodes; the networks tested used 10, 16, and 30 nodes.

Anomalous human-machine interaction data 19 1

values cause the input nodes to spread activation out along their links towards the hidden layer in proportion to each link's strength or weight. (b) The hidden nodes sum the activation received from the input nodes, depending on the value of the connecting links, then, in accordance with an activation function they send activation towards the output nodes. (c) The output nodes sum the activation sent from the hidden nodes, ending the "feed-forward" phase of this cycle.

Now a "teacher signal" comes into play: (d) An arbitrary but unique 5-bit code (e.g., "001 1 1" identifies operator number 7) associated with the input data is compared against the actual continuous-valued results residing at the output nodes, generated from step (c). (e) The difference between the observed activation from (c) and the desired "signal" from (d) is now propagated backwards through the network, changing the values of the intercon- necting links so as to minimize that error on the next pass if the same input values were applied (thus the name of the learning rule, back propagation, see the Appendix for the basic equation^).^ This ends one parallel processing cycle.

Now, (f) the same process is applied for the remaining 3 1 operators' data: First a feed-forward phase, followed by back propagation of the error. Ap- plying these 32 lines of input to the network is called one pass. With the present network and form of the data, it typically takes between 1,000 to 3,000 such passes to train the network to perfectly associate the observed data with the desired operator codes. (Some readers may find it surprising that a network can learn to perfectly associate random-looking input data with arbitrary output codes; this is one of the interesting properties of train- able neural networks.)

It is important to note that an untrained network always starts with random interconnection weights between nodes. The hidden nodes act as a kind of mathematical space in which to compute the problem of associating inputs with outputs, thus if we begin with say, 20 hidden nodes, we have a topological flexibility roughly equivalent to a 20-dimensional space. With a space this large, there are a vast number of "solutions" to the problem, and it is likely that a new solution will be found each time the network is trained from scratch. In other words, training the network once will not guarantee the "best" solution, only an acceptable solution (i.e., the network does not know that we want to transfer its knowledge to other data; it just solves the association problem). Because I was interested in exploring the possibility of knowledge transfer, the process described above in steps (a)-(f) was performed repeatedly, forming a distribution of transfer results against which to compare the random and scrambled dataset results.

Transfer Test

The transfer test consisted of 5 steps: (a) The network was trained (from a random starting state) on the 32-line

192 D. I. Radin

per output node at the end of a pass. From experience this was determined to take between 1,000 and 3,000 passes.

(b) The trained network was tested against the transfer dataset by sending each of the 32 items in the transfer dataset through the net in one feed-forward pass, then comparing the values obtained at the output nodes against the desired values. The observed value at an output node was considered to be 0 if the activation was less than 0.5, otherwise it was considered to be a 1 .8

The number of correct bit-matches was then used as a measure of success for the transfer test. For example, if all 5 bits of an operator code number were identified correctly after passing that operator's data through the network, the data-operator relationship learned by the network during the training phase would have transferred perfectly (in informational terms, we could think of the transfer test as having "transmitted" 5 bits of information). If 4 bits were correctly identified, this would constitute an 80% match (transmitted 4 bits of information), and so on.

(c) The same process was conducted for the random dataset and the scrambled dataset, producing for each of the three tests the number of perfectly correct matches (515 bits correct) out of 32 operators, 4 out of 5 correct matches (out of 32 operators), and 3 out of 5 (out of 32 operators). Thus, the score for a perfect transfer test would be 32 (all operators correctly identified with 5 out of 5 bits correct).

(d) Steps a-c were repeated 100 or more times to form a distribution of results for the transfer, random, and scrambled tests.

(e) The means of the distributions obtained in step d were compared with a t-test.9 The null hypothesis is that there are no consistent patterns within the data, so there is nothing that can be transferred, and thus there should be no differences among the transfer, random, and scrambled dataset distribution means. The alternative hypothesis is that there is something consistent in the data that is associated with each operator; that these associations can be learned; and that these can be detected in independent data produced by those same operators. These effects would manifest in the present case by shifting the transfer distribution mean positive with respect to the random and scrambled distribution means, and the random and scrambled means should not differ significantly from one another. Thus, three t-tests were planned in advance: Transfer vs. Random, (TR) Transfer vs. Scrambled (TS), and Random vs. Scrambled (RS).

Results

In considering the results, it is important to note that the values at the output nodes of these networks resemble Bernoulli trials with p = 0.5. For example, we would expect to find approximately one operator correctly identified by chance (say, one "hit") out of 32, or approximately 5 hits out of 32 where 4 out of 5 bits were correctly identified, and so on. Actually, the


chance expected value at the (binary transformed) output nodes also depends on the initial interconnection weights in the network, on the form of the activation and learning rules, and on the input values. With these ca- veats in mind, by rough approximation we would expect to see about one operator completely identified by chance (i-e., all five code bits correct), and one completely missed (i.e., all five bits missed).

Table 1 shows results of tests using three network configurations. Each of the simulations took about 6 hours to complete on a Silicon Graphics IRIS 4-D workstation. l o

Discussion

If the signatures hypothesis is true, it would manifest in this study by making the number of correctly identified operators greater in the transfer condition than in either the random or scrambled conditions. We would expect to find significant differences between the transfer vs. random and transfer vs. scrambled conditions, and a nonsignificant difference for the random vs. scrambled condition. This is what the results show (Table I) . The two histograms in Figure 3 display the distributions for the "415 bits identified" results.

Another way of illustrating transfer in this study is by examining the difference between means of perfectly identified (515 bits) and perfectly unident$ed (015 bits) operators for each of the three conditions. Under the signatures hypothesis, we would expect to find more cases of 515 code bits identified than 015 code bits identified in the transfer condition, but not in the random or scrambled conditions. Because the 515 and 015 means within the three conditions are not fully independent, the statistics shown in Table 2 are based on t-tests for differences between correlated pairs of means. Figure 4 shows the separation between the distributions for the training- transfer test.

Given these results, one may wonder-under the assumption that within-person performance is reasonably consistent-whether repeatedly presenting a network with multiple examples of the same operator's data (i.e., from different experiments) would improve the transfer rate. Table 3 shows test results for correctly identified operators (515 code bits correct) in a 20 hidden node network trained on three independent datasets for each of nine people. (Nine persons in the PEAR database had completed three separate series.)

Comparing results in Table 3 with those in Table 1 suggests that there may be an advantage in presenting networks with repeated, independent views of the same operators' data. More research is needed to determine ways of training networks to recognize this data, as well as to select optimum statistical parameters to use as inputs. In addition, even though the trans-

194 D. I. Radin

TABLE 1 Means, standard deviations, and t-tests for transfer, random, and scrambled tests, using

actual and random training-transfer data; all results are based upon N = 100 training-transfer repetitions

10 Hidden Nodesa

1 2 Bit matches (#/5) Transfer

Mean SD

Random Mean SD

Scrambled Mean SD

16 Hidden Nodesd

1 2 Bit matches (#/5) Transfer

Mean SD

Random Mean SD

Scrambled Mean SD

30 Hidden Nodesd

1 2 Bit matches ( # / 5 ) Transfer

Mean SD

Random Mean SD

Scrambled Mean SD

t-tests 10 Hidden nodes

t (T-R)" t (T-S) t (R-S)

16 Hidden nodes t (T-R) t (T-S) t(R-S)

30 Hidden nodes t (T-R) t (T-S) t (R-S)

" Trained 4,000 passes. The network identified 4 out of 5 operator code bits for an average of 6.02 operators out of

32. ' The network identified all 5 operator code bits for an average of 1.46 operators out of 32.

Trained 2,000 passes. " All t-tests for differences between independent means, 198 degrees of freedom. Significant

results, one-tailed, are highlighted in bold for emphasis.


0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 1 0 1 1 1 2 1 3 1 4 1 5 Number of operators identified out of 32

Fig. 3. Histogram for the number of times that four out of five operator code bits were correctly identified, out of a total of 32 operators, using a 10 hidden node network. T4 refers to the training-transfer test and R4 refers to the training-random test. Thus, in 100 independent repetitions of the training-transfer test, the mean number of operators in which 80% of the operator code was correctly identified was 6.02, whereas the equivalent mean in the random test was 4.9 1. Compare these figures with 5.0, which is the number expected by chance assuming that the output nodes are Bernoulli trials with p(hit) = .5.

solute magnitude was miniscule. Obviously, if the original "signal" (i.e., influence on an RNG output) were more robust, then the neural network would be more likely to recognize a potential signature. Thus, research is also needed on ways of statistically increasing the magnitude of these anomalous influences.

Conclusion

This study suggests that a neural network may learn to associate data produced by a random number generator with the identity of individuals who attempted to "mentally influence" the output statistics of the generator. Results of tests with different network configurations suggest that it may

TABLE 2 Paired t-tests (99 df) for differences between correlated means, for 5 vs. 0 correctly identified operator code bits, in the training-transfer (T), training-random (R), and training-scrambled

(S) conditions; significant results are highlighted in bold

Paired t-tests

Hidden Nodes T5-TO R5-RO S5-SO

196 D. I. Radin

Number of operators i d e n t i f i e d out of 32

Fig. 4. Histogram for five and zero operator code bits correctly identified, out of a possible 32 operators, for the training-transfer (TO & T5) condition, using a 10 hidden node network. In other words, in 100 training-transfer test repetitions, the mean number of times that zero operator code bits were identified was 0.6 1, whereas the mean number of times that all five operator code bits were identified was 1.4. Results shown in Table 2 show that this separation is seen only in the transfer datasets, and not in the random or scrambled datasets.

be possible to develop experimental protocols that are better suited for network analysis than protocols currently used to generate data in typical random event generator experiments.

For example, consider an experiment requiring an operator to attempt to simultaneously influence multiple RNGs. The multiple, parallel outputs of

TABLE 3 Means, standard deviations, and t-tests for transfer, random, and scrambled distributions; N = 50 training-transfer repetitions of a 20 hidden node network, trained for 2,000 passes;

this network was presented with data from three independent series for each of nine operators, for a total of 27 lines of input;" significant tests are emphasized in bold

515 Correct Matches

Transfer Mean SD

Random Mean SD

Scrambled Mean SD

t (T-R) t (T-S) t(R-S)


the RNGs would be fed into a network for analysis. With this form of parallel data, plus additional parameters such as direction of intention (e.g., high aim or low aim), feedback presentation style, age, gender, environmental variables, and so on, a network may be able to learn to associate operator identity with his or her data at a transfer rate approaching practical utility. Trial-by-trial parallel feedback displayed to operators could be more interesting than the typical display of numbers of hits, or linear graphs, and instead provide graphical representations of multidimensional phase relationships among the outputs of the RNGs.

Such displays would have the advantage of conveying more information to operators at a single glance, would allow more interesting forms of feedback (e.g., dynamically shifting coherent vs. chaotic shapes and colors), and would allow experimental protocols in which shift of a theoretical mean of a distribution would be secondary as compared to the relationships of means of independent binomial distributions. It may be that phase relationships are "easier" to influence than mean shifts because changes in phase do not require pushing a device against its normal operating probabilities, that is, different phase relationships among the outputs of independent random generators can be achieved without shifting the individual distribution means beyond chance expectation.

Endnotes

' For an introduction to the capabilities and theories of neural networks, see the special issue of IEEE Computer, 21, 1988.

* I am indebted to Robert Jahn, Roger Nelson, and Brenda Dunne for providing a copy of this dataset, which was retrieved from computer tape archives maintained by the PEAR laboratory.

Note that under the null hypothesis, it should not matter when or by whom the data was collected, so the present method would offer no advantage in identifying "signatures."

In other words, V = (C Z2/N) , where N = 25.

I will allow the interested reader to figure out why this is so, with the hint that successive operator codes in the training set are sequential binary numbers.

The program allows a wide variety of parameters to be set, including variables related to how fast the network learns, how many nodes there are, the range for initial random weights used to interconnect the nodes, and so on. I am indebted to Stephen Hanson and Robert Masterson for their gracious assistance with this software. See the Appendix for the activation and learning rule equations.

' The back-propagation method used here is an extension of the well-known generalized delta rule (Rumelhart, Hinton, & Williams, 1986), allowing the use of non-euclidian error signals. Hanson & Burr (1987) have shown that this method is particularly effective with noisy data.

198 D. I. Radin

In this network, output activation levels were continuous-valued numbers between 0 and 1.

' The variance in the transfer dataset comes from the randomness in the neural network's initial state, whereas the variance in the random and scrambled datasets come from two sources: randomness in the network and randomness in the pseudorandomly generated data. Thus, in statistical terms, the t-test is conditional on the transfer dataset.

'O This computer runs at about 12.5 million instructions per second (MIPS), which suggests why neural network analyses have only recently become practical.

' ' It should be noted that the number of training passes, hidden nodes, training-transfer repetitions, and so on, were chosen by experience with these networks rather than by algorithmic or formal criteria. This is because the state-of-the-art of neural networks remains more of an art than a science.

References

Babu, S. (1987). Analysis of variance of REG data. In D. Weiner & R. D. Nelson (Eds.), Research in parapsychology 1986 (pp. 1-5). Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press.

Barlow, D. H., & Hersen, M. (1 984). Single case experimental designs: Strategies for studying behavior change (2nd ed.). New York: Pergamon Press.

Berger, R. E. (1988). In search of "psychic signatures" in random data. In D. Weiner & R. Morris (Eds.), Research in parapsychology 1987 (pp. 81-85). Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press.

Hanson, S. J., & Burr, D. J. (1 987). Minkowski-R back-propagation: Learning in connectionist models with non-euclidian error signals. To appear in Proceedings ofFirst IEEE Conference on Neural Net works.

Jahn, R. G., & Dunne, B. J. (1986). On the quantum mechanics of consciousness, with application to anomalous phenomena. Foundations of Physics, 16, 72 1-772.

Jahn, R. G., & Dunne, B. J. (1987). Margins of reality. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. Jahn, R. G., Dunne, B. J., & Nelson, R. D. (1987). Engineering anomalies research. Journal of

ScientiJic Exploration, 1, 2 1-50. Jones, W. P., & Hoskins, J. (1987, October). Back-propagation: A generalized delta learning

rule. Byte, pp. 155- 162. Materna, T. (1987, June). Neural networks enter high speed marketplace. Computer Technol-

ogy Review, pp. 1-30. McConnell, R. A. (1989). Psychokinetic data structure. In L. Henckle & R. Berger (Eds.),

Research in parapsychology 1988 (pp. 16- 19). Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press. Nelson, R. D., Dunne, B. J., & Jahn, R. G. (1984). An REG experiment with large data base

capability, III: Operator related anomalies (Technical Note PEAR 84003). Princeton Engi- neering Anomalies Research, Princeton University, School of Engineering/Applied Science.

Nelson, R. D., Dunne, B. J., & Jahn, R. G. (1986). Operator-related anomalies in physical systems and information processes. Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 53, 26 1-286.

Radin, D. I. (1 985). Pseudorandom number generators in psi research. Journal ofParapsycho1- O ~ Y , 49, 303-328.

Radin, D. I., & Nelson, R. D. (1987). Replication in random event generator experiments: A meta-analysis and quality assessment (Technical Report HIP 8700 1). Human Information Processing Group, Department of Psychology, Princeton University.

Radin, D. I., & Nelson, R. D. (in press). Evidence for consciousness-related anomalies in random physical systems. Foundations of Physics.

Roberts, C. S. (1982, January 20). Implementing and testing new versions of a good 48-bit pseudo-random number generator (Bell Laboratories Technical Memorandum, publication no. TM-82-11353-1).

Rumelhart, D. E., Hinton, G. E., & Williams, R. J. (1986). Learning internal representations by error propagation. In D. E. Rumelhart & J. L. McClelland (Eds.), Parallel distributed


processing, Explorations in the m icrostructures of cognition, Volume I : Foundations (pp. 3 18-362). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Shriver, B. D. ( 1988). Artificial neural systems. Computer, 21(3), 8- 10. Weisburd, S. (1988). Fingerprinting DNA from a single hair. Science News, 133, p. 262. Widrow, B., & Winter, R. (1988). Neural nets for adaptive filtering and adaptive pattern

recognition. Computer, 21(3), 25-40.

Appendix

This semilinear function used to calculate activation in the forward pass is from Rumelhart, Hinton and Williams (1986, p. 329):

where

o is the output activation, p is a pointer referring to the hidden or output layer of nodes, w are the interconnection weights from input to hidden, or hidden to output

nodes, i ranges over the number of input or hidden nodes, and j ranges over the number of hidden or output nodes.

For the backwards pass, the back-propagation error (A) is computed for output nodes as:

where

SGN is the sign of (tj - oj), t is the teacher signal (the desired output), o is the observed activation level at the output node, and r is a real number (chosen as r = 3 for all network simulations reported

here).

Now A for hidden nodes is calculated as: Nout

A, = C Ak*wtik)*h,*(l - h,), k= l

where

Nout is the number of output nodes, Ak is the activation on an output node, w is the interconnection weights between hidden and output nodes, and h is the activation on hidden node j.

We then modify the weights in the network according to the rules:

200 D. I. Radin

and

where

a controls the "inertia" of learning in the network, t controls how fast the network learns, t is the time or processing cycle number, and activationi is the amount of activation on node i.

Note that weights are updated after each presentation of an input/output pair, and the amount of change depends on how much the weights were changed on the previous cycle (and the value of a).

Journal of ScientiJic Exploration. Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 20 1-2 12, 1989 Pergamon Press plc. Printed in the USA.


1 A Case of Severe Birth Defects Possibly Due to Cursing

Department of Behavioral Medicine and Psychiatry, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22908

Abstract-For centuries it was widely believed that a strong unpleasant shock to a pregnant woman could cause birth defects in her baby. Medical books and journals published numerous cases of this type up to the early decades of the present century. The idea of "maternal impression" gradually lost ground during the 18th and 19th centuries, mainly because it seemed to conflict with the facts of physiology. In cases of "maternal impression," the pregnant mother was usually reported to have viewed someone with a shocking deformity that her baby was said to reproduce. It has also been thought that cursing, verbally inflicted and without a visual stimulus, could produce birth defects. Three cases of this type, one published by a pediatrician in 1960, are briefly reviewed, and then a new case is reported. In both of the modem cases, the commonly recognized etiological factors in birth defects could not be identified.

Children who claim to remember previous lives are often born with birthmarks and birth defects that correspond to wounds or other marks on a person whose life the child later remembers. In many cases the evidence of such correspondence depends on the memories of informants who saw the deceased person's body; but in some 30 cases, medical documents, usually postmortem reports, have provided the stronger evidence of a contemporaneously written record of the wounds. I have reported a few cases of this type (Stevenson, 196611974) and am preparing to publish reports of a much larger number of cases with fuller documentation, including photographs of the birthmarks and birth defects. The birthmarks and birth defects occurring in these cases are not, for the most part, of the commonly recognized types; and it has been possible to exclude in most cases all the recognized

A report of the case here presented will be included in a work now in progress that will describe a large number of cases suggestive of reincarnation the subjects of which had birthmarks and birth defects possibly deriving from previous lives they remembered. .4 much abbreviated report of the case has been published elsewhere (Stevenson, 1985). I am publishing the present report in the hope of stimulating discussion of this case (and similar other ones) and of their best interpretation.

I wish to thank Godwin Samararatne and Tissa Jayawardene for assistance as interpreters in the study of the case and for conducting some additional interviews. Ms. Emily W. Cook gave helpful suggestions for the improvement of the paper. The comments of four reviewers assisted me in adapting the case report for this journal.

Correspondence and requests for reprints should be addressed to Ian Stevenson, M.D., Box 152, Health Sciences Center, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia 22908.

202 I. Stevenson

physical causes of birthmarks and birth defects, such as genetic factors and illness of the mother during her pregnancy.

In many cases of the type just mentioned the child's mother had seen the dead body of the person her child later claimed to have been. In others she had not seen the body, but had heard descriptions of its wounds. Under these circumstances it could be supposed that images in her mind of the dead person's wounds had somehow affected the body of her child and produced in it birthmarks or birth defects corresponding to the images in the mother's mind and thus also to the dead person's wounds. As I continued my investigations of these cases I learned that the hypothesis of maternal impression-to give the process I have just described its usual name in English-was a serious rival to other interpretations of these cases, including reincarnation.

The principal case reported in this paper illustrates the competition between the hypothesis of maternal impression and that of reincarnation, if we decide from the evidence that some paranormal process seems to have been involved. I hope to facilitate appraisal sf the case report by first giving a brief account of the hypothesis of maternal impression and summaries of 3 published cases in which cursing provided the source of the possibly causative imagery in the mind of a pregnant woman who gave birth to a defec- tive child.

The Concept of Maternal Impression as a Cause of Birth Defects

It was widely believed for centuries-by laypeople and physicians alike- that strong mental impressions in a pregnant woman could cause birth defects (or birthmarks) in the baby born of her pregnancy. Authors of reports of such cases frequently drew attention to close correspondences of site and appearance between some shocking deformity seen by the pregnant woman and the birth defect of her later-born child. For example, if the sight of a man with deformed feet had frightened a pregnant woman, her baby's congenitally deformed feet would be attributed to this fright (Montgomery, 1857, pp. 35-36). The medical literature of the 18th and 19th centuries contained numerous reports of cases of this kind.

Even in the 18th century voices of skepticism, such as that of the famous obstetrician William Hunter,' were heard. These, however, did not stop the publication of reports of such cases in medical journals. In 1890 Dabney reviewed and analyzed 90 cases of maternal impression, reports of which had been published between 1853 and 1886 (Dabney, 1890). Nevertheless, by that time the hypothesis of maternal impression was steadily losing popu- larity, and only sporadic reports of apparently exemplifying cases occurred in the early years of the 20th century. By the middle of this century, authorities on teratology discounted and even derided the concept (Barrow, 197 1 ; Warkany, 1959, 197 1). Warkany (1959, p. 89) pointed out that the hypoth-

Birth defects from cursing? 203

esis of maternal impression lost credibility with advances in anatomy and physiology during the 19th century. "It was known," he wrote, "that the maternal and fetal circulations were separated. How could images be transmitted through the placenta?"

One possible answer to this question is that the influence might be transmitted through some paranormal process as yet not recognized, let alone understood. A careful study of the published reports of cases of maternal impression and the investigation of a few cases that have come under my direct observation have convinced me that the hypothesis of maternal impression deserves renewed attention. I do not expect any reader to agree with my judgment on this matter until he or she has studied the extensive review of reported cases that I have included in my mentioned forthcoming work. This will provide summaries of about 50 cases in which a pregnant woman, after seeing (or occasionally after hearing about) an unusual injury or deformity, gave birth to a baby with birthmarks or birth defects corresponding closely to the apparently stimulating injury or deformity that the woman had seen or learned about.

Cursing as a Generator of Maternal Impressions In the standard case of a birth defect attributed to a maternal impression

(as published in the 19th century and the first decades of this one), the mother had nearly always been directly exposed to the sight of some shock- ingly deformed person. However, a few cases have been reported in which the mother was said to have imagined (and caused) a congenital deformity in her child without any visual experience to guide her. In these cases the mother-to-be would only have heard a description of wounds or defects narrated by someone else who had seen them, such as her husband.

A subgroup of cases without direct visual stimulation of the woman's mental imagery is that occurring with a curse. When one person curses another, the cursing person evokes in the cursed one mental images of some unpleasant and even fatal event that is to happen.

The medical literature on cursing is sparse. There is now widespread skepticism in the West about the efficacy of cursing, and one is surprised to find an occasional educated Western person who believes in its power (Raine, 1977, p. 73). Reports of the effects of cursing, moreover, rarely mention that the curse had specified a particular penalty that the cursed person was to endure; he or she should suffer or die, but was usually not told how (Burrell, 1963; Mathis, 1964). However, I have found 3 published reports of cases in which the cursing person predicted birth defects in a child of the person cursed. I shall summarize them next.

Readers may think that the first 2 of these cases deserve only the status of legends because, although reports of them were published in the 19th century, their origins lay much farther back. This means, however, that the cursing occurred during a period when people believed in the power of

204 I. Stevenson

The birth defect in both these cases was that of hereditary brachydactyly, which, by the time of the proband's life, had already afflicted in one case nine generations of the family (Kellie, 1808), in the other six generations (Mackinder, 1857). These cases occurred in different parts of England (Ux- bridge and Gainsborough), but both were said to have begun, generations earlier, in the cursing of a pregnant woman by her husband and for the same offense. (Perhaps the families were distantly related and the same account became transmitted in two lines of descent.) In each case, the husband of the unfortunate woman had cultivated fruit trees with great solicitude, and, when the time came to pluck the fruit, he had strictly forbidden anyone else in his household to take the first fruit. The fruit nevertheless disappeared. The enraged man then cursed the thief. In the earlier of these two accounts the man "with dreadful rashness wished, that if she [his wife] was guilty, the child which she was then with might be born without fingers" (Kellie, 1808, p. 253). In the second case the angry man was said to have "cursed the thief, and prayed, for so heinous an offence, that the fingers which touched the apple might all be chopped off. His wife, enceinte, feared much . . . , but dared not confess the crime . . . a child was born; but, sad to tell, the fingers which its father had wished to be amputated had strangely forgotten to grow" (Mackinder, 1857, p. 846).2

The next case known to me occurred in Australia and in modern times (Turner, 1960). It is that of an infant with almost complete amelia that followed a cursing of the baby's mother by her mother. The former, a 16-year-old Australian girl, had become illegitimately pregnant in the hope of forcing her parents to allow her to marry a Maltese man of whom they strongly disapproved. The girl's mother, instead of consenting to the marriage, became angry, roundly cursed her daughter, and said that if she continued with the pregnancy the baby would be born "without arms and legs, and blind" (p. 502). (The mother first cursed her daughter during the 5th or 6th week of the pregnancy.) Several persons witnessed the cursing, and the mother repeated it every 2 or 3 weeks in letters to her daughter during the remainder of the pregnancy. The pregnancy ran to term, and the daughter was delivered of a gravely deformed male baby. Both the infant's legs were absent, and of the right arm only the proximal half of the upper part was present. The left arm was normal down to the hand, but it had only two fingers. The infant seemed otherwise normal and was probably not blind. It was cared for in the.hospita1 of its birth for 6 months and then transferred to a babies' home, where it died at the age of 7 months.

Dr. Elizabeth Turner (a pediatrician), who reported this case, found no evidence that any of the commonly recognized etiological factors in birth defects had occurred in it. Since Turner published her report before excessive consumption of alcohol had been clearly identified as a factor in causing birth defects, I corresponded with her about this possibility. She assured me that alcohol could not have been a causative agent in the case. (She mentioned in her letter to me of October 27, 1978 that she had become


aware of the teratogenic effects of alcohol before other pediatricians had published papers bringing this factor in birth defects to widespread attention.) So far as she could tell, the stress of the cursing by the pregnant woman's mother was the only causative factor identified in the case. After briefly reviewing some evidence from pharmacological experiments bearing on the role of stress in causing reduction deformities of limbs, Turner concluded her report by expressing the "hope that it may stimulate others with experience of similar cases to document and record them" (p. 503).

Case Report

A research assistant of mine in Sri Lanka (Tissa Jayawardene) noticed in a newspaper a photograph of a male infant, S.P., who had been born (on August 13, 1980) without arms and with deformed legs. Knowing of my interest in unusual birth defects, he went to the village where the baby lived and photographed the baby himself, afterward sending me a photograph of the baby, who was then 4 months old (see Figure 1). When I was next in Sri Lanka (in October 1982), I went to the village of the baby's family, but learned that he had died (of "some urinary trouble") in April 1982, at the age of about 20 months. He was then just beginning to speak.

The photograph showed almost all that I could learn about the baby's birth defects. There was complete absence of the arms. A finger nubbin was visible at the left shoulder; I do not know whether there was one at the corresponding site of the right shoulder. Both legs were morphologically normal, but both feet were deformed and turned medially; plaster casts (visible in the photograph) had been applied in the hope of correcting the deformities. At the time of his death, the baby could crawl, but could not walk well because of his deformed feet.

I inquired of the child's father whether he knew of anyone in his family or circle of acquaintances who had lost his arms before dying.3 It turned out that he did. The person in question was someone whom the father (with his brother) had murdered in February 1974. The father then narrated the following history, which I corroborated (in its essential features) from the baby's mother, its uncle, and other villagers, particularly members of the murdered man's family.

The murdered man, Y.S., was, at the time of his death, 25 years of age and married. He had been in his village what the Sinhalese call a "chandiya," by which they mean someone who is rough, tough, and given to bullying other people. He had a record of violent behavior, as had other members of his family. His older brother told me, en passant, that he (the informant) had himself killed three men; and their father had died when he had nervously dropped a bomb that he was preparing for use against his enemies in the village. Y.S.'s older brother also told me that Y.S. had been "ruthless," and he compared him to the German soldier Field Marshal Erich Rommel.

206 I. Stevenson

Flg. 1 . S.P. at the age of 4 months. I'here is complete absence of both upper limbs. Both feet have the defect known as tal~pes equlnovanas and plaster casts have been applied with a view to correcting the dekrmities.

A quarrel over Y.S.'s dog, which had entered the house of one of his adversaries and eaten a cooked curry, began with the wornenfolk and spread to the Imnen. The baby"& Fdlher am-rd ern-tclz decrded to 11rrrsh w ~ t h k .9. f hey arranged somehow for him to be made drunk with aIcohol and lured over to their side of the village. They then cut off his arms arid legs with a sword. Other villagers, angry at V.S., came, like the lesser seliators at Caesar's murder, and inflicted additional wounds.

I obtained a copy of the postmodem examination of U.S.'s body. With regard to both legs and the right arm, the report confirmed that the distal portions of these limbs were alrnost fully severed from their proximal parts. It described three deep wounds of the I-ight arm. However, although it mentioned numerous other wounds including one of the left wrist, it did not mention any wound that nearly severed the distal part of the left arm. The


principal murderer and his brother, as well as four members of Y.S.'s family who had seen the body, all agreed that all the limbs had been nearly cut off so that the distal parts remained dangling. Discounting the testimony of the principal murderer and his brother, who were themselves drunk when they killed Y.S., and that of one of Y.S.'s relatives (who may compliantly have agreed with his mother), there remain the concordant statements on this detail of three other members of Y.S.'s family whom I happened to interview independently of each other. It is possible that, when the pathologist described the left arm, he slipped and wrote "right" when he should have written "left." It is also possible that my informants, remembering events of 8 and a half years earlier and aware of S.P.'s birth defects, harmonized their memories to accord with the birth defects.

The principal murderer (S.P.'s father) and his brother (who had helped him) were arrested, tried, and sentenced to 3 years in prison. The prison permitted the murderer to have frequent day-long passes when he would visit his wife, and they were therefore able to continue having children.

Y.S.'s death sorely affected his mother, and she believed that the punishment imposed by the terrestrial court was insufficient retribution for her son's murder. S.P.'s mother told me that Y.S.'s mother several times said to her publicly: "For killing my son, you will have a deformed child." (Even though the murderer's wife had not participated directly in the murder, the wrath of Y.S.'s mother fell on the entire family.) Y.S.'s sister corroborated to me that their mother had had the habit of cursing the murderer's family whenever she went by their house; but she did not recall the specific detail of her wishing the family to have a deformed child. Y.S.'s mother, whom I also interviewed, denied that she had made such a specific curse against the family. She said that she had merely called on the gods-Kataragama and Vishnu-to punish the murderer in some way. (I do not believe she would have admitted to me that she had cursed the mother, and I think that S.P.'s mother was speaking the truth about the nature of the curse.)

Both the murder itself and the subsequent curse troubled the murderer's wife. She recalled mentioning to her husband that Y.S. might be reborn as their son, and when she became pregnant she feared that her baby might be deformed. Then a daughter was born and was normal. The murderer's wife relaxed, thinking that the curse had somehow been neutralized. She and her husband were dismayed, therefore, but not entirely surprised, when her next pregnancy ended in the birth of the badly deformed male infant, S.P.

Excluding Known Causes of Birth Defects

None of the ordinarily recognized causes of birth defects are identified in this case. The parents were not related, at any rate closely; since they came from the same village they might have had some remote common ancestor.

I inquired about other birth defects in the family and was told there were none. (The several members of the family whom I saw-S.P.'s parents,

208 I. Stevenson

paternal uncle, and one sister-had no limb defects.) After my interviews I felt dissatisfied with the completeness of the family history I had obtained, and at my request Tissa Jayawardene returned to the village and inquired about every member of the two families of S.P.'s parents with regard to their having had birth defects. His informants were S.P.'s mother, one of his paternal aunts, and the latter's husband. He drew genealogies to assure completeness of the information. This survey included S.P.'s three siblings, all 20 of his cousins, all eight of his uncles and aunts, and three of his grandparents. Information could not be furnished about one grandparent, presumably because she had died when the informants were quite young. None of these persons suffered from any birth defect known to the informants. The only abnormality they recalled for any of these persons was "mental weakness" in one of S.P.'s cousins.

S.P.'s mother told me that she had enjoyed good health during her pregnancy with S.P., and that she had taken no drugs or alcohol. After my interview with S.P.'s mother, Godwin Samararatne (my senior assistant in Sri Lanka) had a further interview with her concerning the medical care she had received during her pregnancy with S.P. He learned the following details: When her pregnancy was at 5 months, she attended a clinic in a nearby town and was told her pregnancy was normal. She returned to the clinic at 6 months, was examined by the medical officer, and was again told the pregnancy was normal. She was given some tablets, probably vitamins. At the 8th month she again attended the clinic and was told the pregnancy was normal. She was examined this time by the head nurse, but not by the doctor, apparently because the pregnancy was still judged normal. Records of these visits were not obtainable, but we did obtain a copy of the record of S.P.'s delivery at a nearby hospital. The delivery was described as taking place normally at full term. The hospital report noted the absence of the upper limbs of the baby and talipes equinovarus of the feet. The baby was also noted to have a hydrocele.

Discussion

I shall first describe the interpretations of this case favored by the informants and then offer my own opinion.

The idea that some events happen by chance is a Western notion and a relatively recent one (in its widespread acceptance) even in the West. The majority of men and women have believed, and the majority of them still believe, that we can find causes for everything that happens to us, as individuals, if only we seek well enough. Moreover, causes are, ultimately, due to the conduct or misconduct of persons. Accordingly, my informants considered that some personal factor had entered into the causation of the birth defects in S.P.

All the informants were Theravadin Buddhists and believed in reincarna-


permits appeals during life's crises to Hindu gods, such as Vishnu and Kataragama.) S.P.'s parents believed that S.P. was the murdered Y.S. reborn, with congenital deformities corresponding to the wounds on Y.S. On the other hand, Y.S.'s mother ?nd older brother could not accept that Y.S., who had, after all, been the victim in the murder, could be reborn as a deformed child. Why should he suffer, they reasoned, for another's crime? They believed that S.P.'s birth defects were a punishment of his parents for the crime of murdering Y.S.

Although most Sinhalese people believe in maternal impressions, none of my informants mentioned a maternal impression as a possible cause of the birth defects. S.P.'s mother had not viewed Y.S.'s dead body (although she must have heard the descriptions of the wounds); nor was she pregnant at the time of the murder. These features are usually present in "standard" cases of maternal impression, and their absence in this case may have led the informants to set this interpretation aside.

However, the members of Y.S.'s family who believed that S.P.'s birth defects punished his family for the murder must also have believed that the cursing (whatever specific words were used) had been successful. Sorcery is widely practiced in Sri Lanka and its efficacy generally believed in. In sorcery the complainant hires a priest to invoke the supernatural powers of gods in order to punish-with injury, illness, or death-a person who has seriously offended him. The act of sorcery is a kind of vicarious cursing. It appears to be much commoner than face-to-face cursing, because Obeyese- kere (1 975, p. 16) found that only 10% of surveyed clients at three Sri Lanka sorcery shrines had engaged in personal confrontation with their adversaries. Only 4% (included in the mentioned 10%) had engaged in physical or verbal abuse, which might, we could suppose, have included a direct cursing.

In offering my own opinion of the case I must first disclaim any intention to suggest that we can draw a firm conclusion from this single case. My only purpose in presenting it is to bring to readers' attention the possibility that images in a pregnant woman's mind may influence the form of her baby's body.

We now know a great deal more about the causes of birth defects, in medical terms, than was known 100 or even 50 years ago. Genetic factors, excessive alcohol and certain drugs taken by a pregnant woman, and some illnesses, especially rubella (German measles), occurring during pregnancy have all been clearly identified as factors in birth defects. Older maternal age also predisposes to the occurrence of some birth defects, particularly Down syndrome. All these factors should be considered and excluded before we entertain other possibilities. Having done that, however, we are entitled to consider other explanations. All the known causes of birth defects together explain only 30-35% of them (Wilson, 1973). There remain 65-70% in which physicians must acknowledge that they have no explanation. I believe that in Turner's case and in the one reported here we can exclude the known

2 10 I. Stevenson

causes of birth defects. For these cases we can, therefore, consider other possible causative factors.

Although not excluding chance as firmly as my informants did, I believe that there was some causal connection between the wounds on Y.S. (which were highly unusual) and the birth defects of S.P. (which were also unusual4

and corresponded with satisfactory closeness to Y.S.'s wounds). Bodily changes that correspond to mental images may occur through

psychosomatic processes as in cases of stigmatism (Thurston, 1952) and the reproduction of wounds during the revival of memories of traumatic experiences (Moody, 1948). However, the placental connections between mother and embryo include no nervous pathways and permit the passage of few proteins from mother to embryo. It is therefore difficult to understand how the mother's thoughts could influence the embryo through normal processes.

A direct psychokinetic effect of the cursing woman on the embryo is theoretically possible, but lacks the support of a case parallel to the present one in which the mother did not know that her baby had been the object of a cursing. At least I do not know of any such case. Accordingly, in order to account for the correspondence between the curse and S.P.'s birth defects, I favor other paranormal explanations: a maternal impression and reincarnation.

S.P.'s mother was not pregnant at the time of Y.S.'s murder, and although she had probably not entirely forgotten the curse when she became pregnant with S.P., it seems to have sunk into the lower levels of her mind. It certainly did not preoccupy her in the manner usually described by women figuring in cases of maternal impressions. These considerations make me slightly favor the hypothesis that S.P. was Y.S. reborn. I need hardly add that, considered as an instance of reincarnation, the case is much weaker in evidence than the many cases in which the subject, when old enough to speak, made numerous verified statements about the previous life he then claimed to remember. S.P. died before he had begun to speak coherently, and we do not know whether he would have expressed any memories of a previous life if he had lived. I have investigated a few other cases (to be published) in which a birth defect was the only (or almost the only) item of evidence linking a subject with a particular deceased person.

If we seriously consider either maternal impression or reincarnation as an explanatory hypothesis for this case (and similar ones) we are bound to ask how images in the mind of one person (respectively, in this case, the pregnant mother-to-be or the murdered man) can influence the form of an embryo. This question leads to conjectures about an intermediate vehicle that somehow acts as a template for the communication of physical form from one body to another. I intend to discuss this possibility in the larger work from which I have extracted this case report. To do so here would carry me beyond my stated intention in presenting this case and also far beyond the warrant for such conjectures that a single case can provide.

Birth defects from cursing?

Endnotes

' Authors skeptical about maternal impressions sometimes state that William Hunter conducted a prospective study of pregnant women who claimed they had been frightened but who nevertheless gave birth to normal babies. Charles Darwin (1 868) stated that Hunter described this study and its negative results to his father, Dr. Robert Darwin. However, such an investigation was never published and probably was never carried out. Two authorities on William Hunter whom I consulted knew nothing about it. It remains true, however, that Hunter inveighed against the belief in maternal impressions in his lectures (Hall, 1785).

* In this case the husband (and father) did not aim his curse at the unborn baby as did the husband (and father) of the first case. However, one may suppose that both the women cursed had somewhat similar mental images after being cursed.

I asked this question with the hypothesis of reincarnation in mind and from my experience with children having severe birth defects that corresponded to fatal wounds in a person whose life the child later remembered. As mentioned, full details of such cases will be published in a forthcoming book.

Birch-Jensen (1949) stated that the incidence of amelia of the upper arm at birth was I in about 270,000. Frantz and O'Rahilly ( 196 1 ) found that among 13 cases of amelia of the upper arm, 7 (54%) were bilateral. Combining these data we can estimate that the incidence of bilateral amelia of the upper arm is about 1 in 500,000 births. The condition is so unusual that it is not even mentioned in the usual inventories of the incidences of common congenital deformities. (Amelia did occur more commonly during the brief epidemic of thalidomide intoxica- tion, but that drug was not in question in the present case.)

References

Barrow, M. V. (1971). A brief history of teratology to the early 20th century. Teratology, 4, 119-130.

Birch-Jensen, A. (1949). Congenital deformities of the upper extremities. Copenhagen: Andels- bogtrykkeriet i Odense and Det Danske Forlag.

Burrell, R. J. W. (1963). The possible bearing of curse death and other factors in Bantu culture on the etiology of myocardial infarction. In T. N. James & J. W. Keyes (Eds.), The etiology of myocardial infarction (pp. 95-100). Boston: Little, Brown.

Dabney, W. C. (1890). Maternal impressions. In J. M. Keating (Ed.), Cyclopaedia of the diseases of children, Vol. 1 (pp. 19 1-2 16). Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott.

Darwin, C. (1 868). The variation of animals andplants under domestication. 2 vols. New York: Orange Judd.

Frantz, C. H., & O'Rahilly, R. (1961). Congenital skeletal limb deficiencies. Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery, 43-A, 1202- 1224.

Hall, C. (1 785). The medical family instructor: Containing a selection of interesting subjects, calculated for the information and preservation of mankind, together with the management of child-bed women, and children. Shrewsbury: T. Wood.

Kellie, G. (1 808). Case of defect in the fingers. Edinburgh Medical and Surgical Journal, 4, 252-253.

Mackinder, D. ( 1857). Deficiency of fingers transmitted through six generations. British Medi- cal Journal, ii, 845-846.

Mathis, J. L. (1964). A sophisticated version of voodoo death: Report of a case. Psychosomatic Medicine, 26, 104- 107.

Montgomery, W. F. (1857). An exposition of the signs and symptoms of pregnancy. Philadel- phia: Blanchard and Lea.

212 I. Stevenson

Moody, R. L. (1948). Bodily changes during abreaction. The Lancet, ii, 934-935. Obeyesekere, G. (1975). Sorcery, premeditated murder, and the canalization of aggression in Sri

Lanka. Ethnology, 14, 1-23. Raine, K. ( 1977). The lion's mouth. London: Hamish Hamilton. Stevenson, 1. ( 1974). Twenty cases suggestive of reincarnation (2nd ed.). Charlottesville: Univer-

sity Press of Virginia. (First published in 1966.) Stevenson, I. (1985). Birth defects from cursing? A case report. British Medical Journal, 290,

1813. Thurston, H. (1952). The physical phenomena of mysticism. London: Burns Oates. Turner, E. K. (1960). Teratogenic effects on the human foetus through maternal emotional

stress: Report of a case. The Medical Journal ofAustralia, 47(2), 502-503. Warkany, J. ( 1959). Congenital malformations in the past. Journal of Chronic Diseases, IO,

84-96. Warkany, J. (1971). Congenital malformations: Notes and comments. Chicago: Year Book

Medical Publishers. Wilson, J. G. (1973). Environment and birth defects. New York: Academic Press.

Journal oJScientific Exploration, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 2 13-2 16, 1989 Pergamon Press plc. Printed in the USA.


LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Comments on Slanger's "Internal Clock"

The recent paper "Evidence for a short-period internal clock in humans" by Tom Slanger provides an excellent example of a very simple experiment where the experimenter is the operator, and the intriguing result may prove to be a particularly clear example of the "experimenter effect" (White, 1977). Slanger's analytical techniques are robust and the results are certainly persuasive. The possibility of subconscious rejection of data is openly acknowledged, and constitutes one possible explanation. An alternative is that the experimenter replicates a result that they find interesting by a process akin to remote viewing.

It is evident that multicellular organisms could develop extremely precise "internal clocks" which would reset in response to repeated environmental stimuli. The experiments reported by Slanger and his colleagues are most interesting to me both as a student of psi effects and as a naturalist interested in the awareness of time at the cellular level. The following previously unpublished work illustrated how little we understand about temporal effects in biosystems.

Exogenous stimuli such as repeated light-dark cycling trigger a wide variety of robust cyclic behaviors in single-celled motile microalgae which persist as "free running" rhythms long after the stimulus is removed. However, the internal cellular clock appears to be sensitive to a variety of secondary stimuli which combine in such subtle ways that a new culture of a clone of the same species will often behave dramatically differently to its precursor, for no obvious reason. Figure 1 illustrates the ability of the alga Tetraselmis succia to replicate rhythms initially developed by growth in 12-hour dark- 12-hour light cycles after the light cycling was terminated. A 12-hour/ cycle is clearly evident, and it extends through two cell divisions.

The sensitivity of the time-keeping mechanism is illustrated in Figure 2, which shows a velocity and vector set obtained under conditions that were nominally identical. There is no obvious source of a four-hour stimulus in the lab environment, and no evident biological reason why four-hour cycling would be advantageous. It is this that is so interesting to the biologist: The cell seems to have responded to a very subtle change in the local environment by changing its time base. The change is so extreme that at first sight one would appear to be dealing with a different specie.

Any biological explanation of the phenomena which Tom Slanger describes must, as he has pointed out, account for the apparently unnecessary precision. The current evolutionary paradigm suggests that biological sys-

214 Letter to the Editor

1

-0 0000 a400 0400 0000 UOO -00 2000 2400 0400 0000 PO0 -0

Fig. 1. Laser Doppler tracking of Tetraselmis succia. Single axis Doppler shifted He/Ne laser light scattered from the motile cells provides an analog of cell swimming speed (Activity, A) and motion, up or down (B). Data for records A and B are acquired simultaneously and overlaying A and B is appropriate. Although these cultures were initially grown in 12 on: 12 off light dark cycles, illumination throughout this experiment was constant.

tems, especially highly evolved ones, use internal devices whose tolerances contribute to the well-being of the whole. Why therefore should a highly evolved organism like Homo sapiens need to be sensitive to clock time to one part in lo4?

The following suggestion correlates with my personal experience, and the general structure of the literature on the so-called "experimenter effect." (White, 1977). First, think of the act of looking at one's watch as a very simple classical experiment. The objective, apparatus, and method are all quite clear. Assume for the sake of discussion that the experimenter has a preferred form for the outcome; a subconscious preference for an "interesting" result would be quite sufficient. It is instructive to ask the personal question: If I sensed that I was observing an anomaly which was tractable (which could be the subject of repeated experiments by millions of people)

Letter to the Editor 21 5

TlMe ff D A Y

Fig. 2 . Apparatus and method as in Figure 1 . The culture was prepared from the same stock as A and C.

would I have a preference for a specific outcome? Surely everyone who has been drawn into science by the excitement of finding out more about life would have to admit to a preference for a stimulating result. This stimulus, derived from conscious or subconscious preference, may be one of the psychological factors that J. B. Rhine had in mind when he defined an experimenter "not simply, as would commonly be supposed, one who rules out all normal cues to the target and administers a randomized set of targets to the subject, but rather as one who can succeed in liberating the psi function under adequate testing conditions" (Rhine, 196 1).

Needless to say, the suggestion that Slanger's intriguing result may be a direct manifestation of the experimenter effect has no value, in terms of an explanation. It is only a suggestion for a context. However, it is possible that the contextual map on which the phenomenon lies includes other psi phenomena, particularly the class known as remote viewing. Professional sai- lors used to be encouraged to train themselves to wake at precise times without the use of alarm clocks, and I have personally found that this skill is

216 Letter to the Editor

quite readily acquired. Training generally involves visualizing a clock, whose hands have just reached the desired wake-up time, and associating that image with awakening. Many people find that they can do this with amazing consistency and precision, and it may be that the same supra-self functional in remote viewing is at work in the local environment, watching the clock, ready to inform the neurophysiological system when time reaches a point of interest.

C. M. Pleass Senior Research Scientist

University of Delaware College of Marine Studies

Robinson Hall Newark, DE 1971 6

References

Rhine, J. B. ( 196 1). New experimenters in parapsychology. Parapsychology Bulletin, 58, 1-4. White, R. A. (1977). The influence of experimenter motivation, attitudes and methods of

handling subjects on psi results. In B. B. Wolman (Ed.), Handbook of parapsychology (pp. 273-30 1 ). Jefferson, NC: McFarland.

Journal of Scientific Exploration, Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 2 17-2 19, 1989 Pergamon Press plc. Printed in the USA.


BOOK RE VIEW

The Relativity Question, by Ian McCausland. Toronto: published by the author, Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Toronto, 1988, v + 1 1 1 pp. (paper).

In 1972, Herbert Dingle-a philosopher and acknowledged expert in relativity-published Science at the Crossroads (London: Martin Brian & O'Keeffe), a classic in the literature of scientific controversy. The book describes Dingle's attempt to have substantively addressed his claim that the formulation of the special theory of relativity is paradoxical.

According to the special theory, two clocks in uniform motion relative to one another keep (or perceive) time at different rates. But since there exists no preferred frame of reference against which to measure the speeds with which the clocks move, there is also no basis for deciding which of the clocks runs faster and which runs slower. Is that not paradoxical?

One obvious possible answer to Dingle's claim of paradox would be that neither of the two clocks actually runs faster than the other, it is just that each sees the other as running slower (or faster?). Some of the acknowledged experts in fact proffered that answer; but most did not, and some cited experimental evidence to show that the disparity in time-passing is physically real. Others again, despite having taught relativity to students, admitted to Dingle that they had not the insight into the theory to answer the "subtle point" he had raised. Most of those few who accepted Dingle's challenge-and also the editors of Nature-resorted to patent obfuscation: for instance John Ziman, who answered the question as to which clock runs faster thus: "the fastest working clock between any two events is one that travels between them by free fall." Never mind, apparently, that the special theory of relativity deals only with relative uniform motion, whereby gravi- tation and free fall and acceleration cannot be taken into consideration. (Einstein himself had committed this mistake when, in his original paper, he gave as illustration that a clock at the equator would run slower than one at the pole.)

Dingle died in 1978 without having received what seemed to him a satisfactory substantive answer to his question. Now Ian McCausland has taken up the story where Dingle's book left it, by commenting on the reviews that Dingle's book received and by relating his own attempts to have Dingle's Question receive a substantive answer. Both Dingle's book and McCaus- land's afford the opportunity to learn about little-recognized aspects of scientific activity; and the books should be required reading most particularly for those who attempt scientific exploration of anomalous phenomena.

2 18 Book Review

Those who whiff "crank" at the hint of anti-Einstein or anti-relativity should be reassured: this is no attack on the general theory of relativity, in which time-dilation accompanies acceleration; nor is any claim being made as to what actually happens when two clocks are in uniform relative motion (if only because it is not taken for granted that there actually exists no physically preferred frame of reference). The Dingle Question is simply intended to show self-inconsistencies in the formulation of the special theory: the claim is simply that it is paradoxical to assert that two identical clocks, in a situation where there exists no basis for distinguishing the one from the other, can keep time at different rates, that time for those two clocks can actually pass at different rates.

In response, one has to say either, "Dingle is obviously right"; or-and much more commonly-one says, "Relativity is so complicated, recondite, subtle a matter that I can't possibly think about it; if the experts tell me that Dingle is wrong, and if their experiments seem to support them-or at least don't contradict them-then I have to believe them." And so "The Relativ- ity Question" exemplifies the dilemma we all find ourselves in: matters of science and technology, matters indeed of life and death, are decided by the experts in language that seeks to exclude the laity; and we hesitate to push the experts to explain because we doubt our own ability to distinguish sense from nonsense when specialized technicalities are under discussion. Surely, however, one can discern it when a Ziman (see quote above) evades a question? Surely one can draw a conclusion when a President of the Royal Society (cited, with documentation, by Dingle) confesses lack of understanding of a subject that he teaches?

In this reviewer's opinion, this controversy illustrates several points that are germane to students of the anomalous: 1. When something works in science, it is used and thereby implicitly accepted, even if there is no physical basis for the mathematical formulation or if the physical basis ascribed to the mathematics is doubtful or even illogical. And further, the experts will deny that the physical interpretation is illogical or that any problem exists with it (unless and until some alternative view is in the offing).

This state of affairs runs counter, of course, to the popular view of science; but there are many examples of the refusal to see something wrong with an inadequate theory so long as no better alternative has been proposed: apart from the Dingle Question, note the acceptance over decades of the concept of the potential-independent electrochemical transfer-coefficient (Henry H. Bauer, 1968, Journal of Electroanalytical Chemistry, 16, 4 19-432); or, the acceptance by biochemists of the chemically meaningless concept of "energy-rich" bonds (Daniel E. Atkinson, 1988, Science, 242, 946-947); or, the ignoring of statistical fallacies in epidemiologic studies (Alvan R. Feinstein, 1988, Science, 242, 1257- 1263). ( I would be grateful for references to other instances of this, which one might call the ostrich phenomenon.) 2. Mainstream journals cannot cope well with unorthodoxy or controversy.

Book Review 2 19

Even when they wish to be open to minority views-if only so as not to miss out on publishing a breakthrough-ultimately they must bow to the ortho- doxy imposed by the processes of peer review. As a result, one periodically sees unorthodoxy published (though not without a struggle) only to find it quickly abandoned again or even attacked by the very periodical that first published it (whereupon the proponents of the unorthodoxy feel stabbed in the back, though they would also have been furious if they had not achieved publication in the first place). Nature's handling of the Dingle affair, well documented by McCausland and Dingle, is a case in point; earlier there had been erroneous denigration of sonar apparatus used in Loch Ness, and inept handling of remote-viewing studies; recently, the Benveniste affair. (Again, I would be grateful for references to other similar instances.) 3. Perhaps stimulated by frustration over these two types of response, protagonists of unorthodox views easily slip into making excessive claims. Thus Dingle sought to have authoritative bodies take formal part in his quest for an answer-when authority simply can have no proper intellectual role in science; and he sought to buttress that attempt by claiming that society finds itself in some great (albeit undefined) danger because of the acceptance by atomic physicists of the erroneous theory.

Finally, this controversy could help to teach humility by reminding us how very difficult indeed it is to advance intellectually, and that we all are prone to lapses that seem inexplicable to other reasonable people. Thus John Ziman's evasion of the Dingle Question seems incongruous since he has written arguably the best, authentic, accounts of science as an intellectual and social activity, in Public Knowledge, The Force of Knowledge, and Reliable Knowledge (all Cambridge University Press, respectively 1968, 1976 and 1978). If Ziman has such blind spots, then surely I-we all-have some too, and moreover of the very worst sort: ones we are incapable of knowing about.

Henry H. Bauer Virginia Polytechnic Institute

& State University

Society for Scientific Exploration

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