The Experimental Basis: Thought-Transference. Part 12

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This section is from the book "Phantasms Of The Living", by Edmund Gurney, Frederic W. H. Myers, Frank Podmore. Also available from Amazon: Phantasms of the Living.

The Experimental Basis: Thought-Transference. Part 12

"It is difficult to classify them. A great number of them are decided successes; another large number give part of the drawing; others exhibit the general idea, and others again manifest a kind of composition of form. Others, such as the drawings of flowers, have been described and named, but have been too difficult to draw. A good many are perfect failures. The drawings generally run in lots. A number of successful copies will be produced very quickly, and again a number of failures -indicating, I think, faultiness on the part of the agent, or growing fatigue on the part of the 'subject.' Every experiment, whether successful or a failure, is given in the order of trial, with the conditions, name of 'subject' and agent, and any remarks made by the 'subject ' specified at the bottom. Some of the reproductions exhibit the curious phenomenon of inversion. These drawings must speak for themselves. The principal facts to be borne in mind regarding them are that they have been executed through the instrumentality, as agents, of persons of unquestioned probity, and that the responsibility for them is spread over a considerable group of such persons; while the conditions to be observed were so simple - for they amounted really to nothing more than taking " care that the original should not be seen by the ' subject' - that it is extremely difficult to suppose them to have been eluded".

1 The full record of the experiments will be found in the Proceedings of the S.P.R., vol. i., p. 264, etc, and vol. ii., p. 24, etc. There is one point of novelty which is thus described by Mr. Guthrie: "We tried also the perception of motion, and found that the movements of objects exhibited could be discerned. The idea was suggested by an experiment tried with a card, which in order that all present should see, I moved about, and was informed by the percipient that it was a card, but she could not tell which one because it seemed to be moving about. On a subsequent occasion, in order to test this perception of motion, I bought a toy monkey, which worked up and down on a stick by means of a string drawing the arms and legs together. The answer was: 'I see red and yellow, and it is darker at one end than the other. It is like a flag moving about - it is moving. . . . Now it is opening and shutting like a pair of scissors'.

I give a few specimens - not unduly favourable ones, but illustrating the "spreading of responsibility" to which Mr. Guthrie refers. The agents concerned were Mr. Guthrie; Mr. Steel, the President of the Liverpool Literary and Philosophical Society; Mr. Birchall, mentioned above; Mr. Hughes, B.A., of St. John's College, Cambridge; and myself. The names of the percipients were Miss Relph and Miss Edwards. The conditions which I shall describe were those of the experiments in which I myself took part; and I have Mr. Guthrie's authority for stating that they were uniformly observed in the other cases. The originals were for the most part drawn in another room from that in which the percipient was placed. The few executed in the same room were drawn while the percipient was blindfolded, at a distance from her, and in such a way that the process would have been wholly invisible to her or anyone else, even had an attempt been made to observe it. During the process of transference, the agent looked steadily and in perfect silence at the original drawing, which was placed upon an intervening wooden stand; the percipient sitting opposite to him, and behind the stand, blindfolded and quite still.

The agent ceased looking at the drawing, and the blindfolding was removed, only when the percipient professed herself ready to make the reproduction, which happened usually in times varying from half-a-minute to two or three minutes. Her position rendered it absolutely impossible that she should obtain a glimpse of the original. Apart from the blindfolding, she could not have done so without rising from her seat and advancing her head several feet; and as she was very nearly in the same line of sight as the drawing, and so very nearly in the centre of the agent's field of vision, the slightest approach to such a movement must have been instantly detected. The reproductions were made in perfect silence, the agent forbearing to follow the actual process of the drawing with his eyes, though he was, of course, able to keep the percipient under the closest observation.

In the case of all the diagrams, except those numbered 7 and 8, the agent and the percipient were the only two persons in the room during the experiment. In the case of numbers 7 and 8, the agent and Miss Relph were sitting quite apart in a corner of the room, while Mr. Guthrie and Miss Edwards were talking in another part of it. Numbers 1-6 are specially interesting as being the complete and consecutive series of a single sitting.

No. 1. Original Drawing.

No. 1. Reproduction.

Mr. Guthrie and Miss Edwards No contact.

No. 2. Original Drawing.

Mr. Guthrie and Miss Edwards. No contact.

No. 2. Reproduction.

No. 3. Original Drawing.

Mr. Guthrie and Miss Edwards No contact.

No. 3. Reproduction.

No. 4. Original Drawing.

Mr. Guthie and Kiss Edwards. No contact.

No. 4. Reproduction.

No. 5. Orginal Drawing.

Mr. Guthrie and Miss Edwards. No contact.

No. 5. Reproduction.

No. 6. Original Drawing.

Mr Guthrie and Miss Edwards. No contact.

No. 6 Reproduction.

Miss Edwards almost directly said, "Are you thinking of the bottom of the sea, with shells and fishes?" and then, "Is it a snail or a fish?" - then drew as above.