Telekinesis

“ Failures are sure to come when the psychic is honest. Only the juggler can produce the same effects. A medium is not a Leyden-jar nor an Edison battery; materialization is not precisely a vaudeville 'stunt.'"
"I don't call the last sitting a failure," said Fowler. "The conditions were strictly test conditions, and yet matter was moved without contact. Of course, the mere movement of a table, or even of the trumpet, seems rather tame, as compared with the doings of 'Katie King'; but, after all, a single [Pg 129] genuine case of telekinesis should be of the greatest value to the physicist ”

“ To begin with, there is no sense-organ for our presumed new mode of sensation; nor at the present stage of physiological knowledge is there likelihood that we can annex any as yet unappropriated organ to register telepathic stimuli, as the semicircular canals are supposed to register the movements of the body in space. In lacking an elaborate machinery specially adapted for receiving its messages and concentrating them on the peripheral end of the nerves, telepathy would thus seem to be on a par with radiant energy affecting the general surface of the body. ”

“ While there is no distinction of space in true telepathy, still in experiments such as I shall now describe, the physical nearness of the projector enables him to concentrate more forcibly, and also gives confidence to the new beginner in receiving mind-currents. The benefit is solely that of the psychological effect upon the minds of the two persons, and has nothing to do with the actual power of the telepathic waves. It is much easier for a person to concentrate his thought and will upon a person in actual physical sight before him, than upon one out of sight. ”

“ The ether-waves employed in wireless telegraphy are physical pulses which obey the law of inverse squares; telepathy shows no conformity with that law, and has not been shown to be an affair of physical waves at all. I believe that it is not a physical process; that it occurs in the spiritual world, between mind and mind, not primarily between brain and brain. And, if so—if mind can communicate with mind independently of brain—the theory of materialism at least is exploded. If mind can act independently of brain, mind may go on existing after brain dies. ”

“ More than this, he says: “It is beyond doubt that at the moment of death a subtle shock, unknown in its nature, at times affects those at a distance who are connected with the dying person in some way. This connexion is not always that of sympathy.” The method in which telepathy acts is explained by the author in the following words: “It is admitted that a kind of radiation emanates from the dying person’s brain, from his spirit, still in his body, and is dispersed into space in ether waves—successive, spherical waves, like those of sound in the atmosphere. ”

“ Podmore advances the following theory in explanation of the phenomena of telepathy:
“If we leave fluids and radiant nerve-energy on one side, we find practically only one mode suggested for the telepathic transference—viz., that the physical changes which are the accompaniments of thought or sensation in the agent are transmitted from the brain as [Pg 26] undulations in the intervening medium, and thus excite corresponding changes in some other brain, without any other portion of the organism being necessarily implicated in the transmission. ”

“ Now this does not happen; if the fact exists [Pg 157] only in the consciousness of a person who is at the time at the far ends of the earth, it makes no difference in the precision of the details. If an analogy should be made between telepathy—as we must conceive it, to explain the phenomena—and wireless telegraphy, Mrs Piper entranced must be regarded as a mere coherer of the telepathic waves. But this analogy is non-existent; wireless telegraphy is far from being unaffected by distance, and besides, when the coherer functions, it is because another instrument is emitting particular waves. ”

“ Such being the case, and telepathy being proved, as many eminent men of science today believe, the question of its theoretical explanation becomes most important.
Now the first analogy which strikes one in the consideration of this question is that of wireless telegraphy—the subtle electric vibrations which journey to and fro with incredible swiftness through the universal ether. In short, telepathy is thought by many to be simply a species of physical vibration, proceeding from brain to brain, just as electric waves pass from the transmitter to the receiver in wireless telegraphy. ”

“ I refer to the suggestion that telepathy is propagated by "brain-waves"; or, as Sir W. Crookes has more exactly expressed it, by ether-waves of even smaller amplitude and greater frequency than those which carry the X rays. These waves are conceived as passing from one brain to another, and arousing in the second brain an excitation or image similar to the excitation or image from which they start in the first. The hypothesis is an attractive one; because it fits an agency which certainly exists, but whose effect is unknown, to an effect which certainly exists, but whose agency is unknown. ”

“ This undoubtedly is the explanation that most strongly commends itself to those scientists who courageously acknowledge their belief in telepathy. Nor do they see any objection to it in the fact that people apparently are affected by the telepathic impulse only at certain times. For the [99] brain of both sender and receiver may conceivably, on the analogy of wireless telegraphy, be set to transmit and receive telepathic communications only when attuned to vibrations of a certain amplitude. ”

“ Jaeger admitted.
"It does, doesn't it?" Kweiros nodded. "And there's a further extrapolation. Some of the members or the elder races have speculated on a sort of second-order telepathy, undetectable to the normal telepath, but capable of noting normal radiation. And some of the speculations seem to make sense—though they're a little confusing. If you don't have a specific sense, it's difficult to visualize it, or even to speculate on its presence." He drew a deep breath.
"That leads us into a real problem. Our people roamed around this planet for several cycles this time. ”

“ Under this general head he considers Animal Magnetism, what is known generally as mesmerism, the power, that is, to create hypnotic states in others; the phenomena of Telepathy "comprising numerous varieties, such as the transmission or penetration of thought, the exteriorization of the sensitiveness, psychometry, telepathy, clairvoyance or lucidity, etc.," and finally states "where physical matter appears to exert over animate beings, especially human beings, an action that does not seem to be explicable by any physical or chemical properties already known." ”

“ Sir William Crookes, for example, calling attention to the marvelous but undisputed facts of ethereal vibration as evidenced by the phenomena of wireless telegraphy and the Röntgen rays, urges that here we have quite possibly an adequate explanation of the mystery of telepathy on a wholly naturalistic basis—that is to say, a basis which enables us to accept telepathy without dislocating our entire conception of the physical universe. ”

“ At the most it has been demonstrated that telepathy, a kind of wireless telegraphy between brain and brain, may occur under favourable but rare conditions. Whenever trickery was excluded the pretended mediums were invariably unsuccessful. ”

“ Here, in language that admits of no misinterpretation, we see stated the doctrine of telepathy, which is only now beginning to find acceptance among scientific men, but which, as I view it, has been amply demonstrated by the experiments of recent years and by the thousands of cases of spontaneous occurrence recorded in such publications as the "Proceedings of the Society for Psychical [Pg 78] Research." And if these experiments and spontaneous instances prove anything, they prove that telepathy is distinctively a faculty of the subliminal self ”

“ An hour later they were back on deck. Black looked worried.
“Listen, Gresham,” he said earnestly. “I don’t know what’s happened to you. I admit that. The encephalogram was—puzzling. Your brain emits radiations that don’t check with anything we’ve seen before. Some peculiar things are possible, theoretically. For instance, a radio isn’t really likely to pick up transmitted waves, but it does. And telepathy’s theoretically possible. Suppose your brain has been altered a little by your exposure to the atomic blast. There are powers latent in the human mind, new senses that we know little about.” ”

“ In the cases so far described, where success has been attained, the agent and percipient, if not actually in the same room, have been separated by a distance not exceeding at the most 25 or 30 feet. The analogy of the physical forces would, of course, have prepared us to find that the effect of telepathy diminishes in proportion to the distance through which it has to act. And in fact we have but few records of successful experiments at a distance. ”

“ Consideration more or less adequate has now been given to the various phenomena in which there is proof apparent of the action of telepathy. The experimental evidence has shown that a simple sensation or idea may be transferred from one mind to another, and that this transference may take place alike in the normal state and in the hypnotic trance. It has been shown also that the transferred idea may be reproduced in the percipient's organism under various disguises; at one time, for instance, it may cause vague distress or terror, or a blind impulse to action ”

“ On the other hand, a curious phenomenon has been noted in experiments; if the percipient gaze at an arrow with its head turned to the right, there is a tendency, disproportionately strong if we suppose that chance alone operates, for the arrow to be seen reversed. This fact is, however, more important in all probability for the light which it throws on the mechanism of hallucinations (q.v.) than on that of transmission. Telepathy is often invoked as an explanation of the facts of mediumship (see Medium, and Possession) ”

“ Janet, Prof. Richet, Dr. Gibert, and Dr. Héricourt, in France under the observation of Mr. Myers and other members of the Society for Psychical Research, and hundreds of other cases of hypnotizing at a distance, or silently influencing the subject without hypnotization, the matter then challenges attention and belief;—and it is from abundant observation of such cases, from the simplest examples of thought-transference to the most wonderful exhibition of perceptive power at great distances, that the doctrine of Telepathy is founded. ”

“ If you were a Frenchman you would be hearing this in French; or, if you were a Manarkan and couldn't talk at all, you would be getting it as regular Manarkan telepathy."
"Oh—I see—I think," the astounded Dutchman gulped. "Then why couldn't you talk back to them through their phones?"
"Because the Lens, although a mighty fine and versatile thing, is not omnipotent," Kinnison replied, dryly. "It sends out only thought; and thought waves, lying below the level of the ether, cannot affect a microphone. The microphone, not being itself intelligent, cannot receive thought. ”

“ We have no proof that it killed the one found slain in Greenwich Village."
"I'm satisfied to assume that. But I'm wondering just what contact those 'people,' as you call them, had with their androids. Could a part of the brain have been a sending and receiving device?"
"It would be difficult to tell. I delved in far enough to find a mechanical device, if there had been one. It did not exist in those I dissected. There is another possibility though, except that we often make the mistake of assuming that what we humans on earth can't do, can't be done. Consider telepathy. ”

“ Telepathy, as it is clumsily called, which is nothing more than this direct communication of mind, is a thing which has been demonstrated in a way which no reasonable person can reject. We may call it abnormal if we like, and it is true that we do not as yet know under what conditions it exists; but it is as much there as electrical communication, and just as the electrician does not create the viewless ripples which his delicate instruments can catch and record, but merely makes it a matter of mechanics to detect them, so the ripple of human intercommunication is undoubtedly there ”

“ For the telepathic impact, we may fairly conjecture, may often be a stimulus so gentle as to need some concentration or exaltation in the percipient’s mind, or at least some inhibition of competing stimuli, in order to enable him to realize it in consciousness at all. And in fact (as we have shown or are prepared to show) , almost every abnormal mental condition (consistent with sanity) as yet investigated yields some indication of telepathic action.
Telepathy, I venture to maintain, is an occasional phenomenon in somnambulism and in the hypnotic state ”

“ But when we leave these experiments in the transfer of the less specialised forms of sensation we find that but few observers have paid attention to the phenomena of telepathy in the hypnotic state. Probably this is in some measure due to one or two initial difficulties in conducting experiments on such subjects. Opening the eyes to permit the subject to reproduce a diagram will in many cases have the effect of wakening him. ”

“ Such incidents, with those cited in connection with the experiments of Professor Hyslop and the Misses Miles and Ramsden, in my opinion [84] go to show exactly why it is that one cannot hope to obtain unfailing control over the process of telepathy. For they indicate that at bottom genuine thought transference depends not so much on conscious willing as on subconscious feeling. It is not necessarily the things about which one thinks most strongly, but rather things which are tinged with some emotional coloring, that are most likely to become subjects of telepathic communication. ”