Extracts from "The World's Greatest Mysteries"
ISBN 1 85152 482 7
Mind Over Matter
BENDING METAL OBJECTS
On 23 November 1973, Uri Geller appeared for the first time on British
television. He held a fork to his hand, stroking it gently until it bent
and then broke. He rubbed his fingers across the glass of broken watches
and they began ticking. After the broadcast the BBC switchboard was jammed
with calls reporting bent cutlery or restarted watches and clocks from all over the
country.
A Sunday newspaper followed this up by announcing a set time when Geller
would be concentrating his powers and asked readers to report anything that
happened. They recorded 300 bent spoons and forks, 1,000 broken clocks and
watches starting up again.
Opinion regarding the phenomena was sharply divided: Was Geller a conjurer
or a genuine psychic? Was his performance just a trick played on a gullible
public or a genuine demonstration of psychokinesis, moving objects by the
power of mind? Some sceptics dismissed the whole thing as mass hallucination,
though that made it hard to explain away the permanent bends in metal
implements.
Tests for Uri Geller
Geller had already undergone tests at Stanford Research Institute in
California, supervised by two physicists. They had made a filmed record of
Geller's effect on a Bell gaussmeter, an instrument measuring magnetic fields.
By passing his hands near the gaussmeter he was able to achieve a full scale
deflection of the instrument several times, indicating that his magnetic
field was at least half as strong as that of the earth.
In the next few years he underwent tests at 17 different laboratories. Some
of the most thorough testing was carried out in Britain by two academics
from London University, Professor John Taylor of King's College and Professor
John Hasted of Birkbeck College.
British Tests
Geller was often accused of bending metal by sheer pressure, so he was asked
to bend a brass strip attached to a letter balance which would register the
exact amount of pressure he exerted. As he stroked the strip the scale read
only 15 grams (1/2 oz), but the strip bent upwards, against the pressure of
his fingers.
Another experiment involved influencing a Geiger counter. When the instrument
was held near him, the count was zero. When Geller held it in his hands and
concentrated hard, the needle deflected to 50 counts per second and its
gentle bleeping sound rose to a wail, which would normally indicate
dangerously radioactive material. When he stopped concentrating, the wailing
stopped. After several attempts, Geller was able to deflect the needle to
1,000 counts per second, with the machine screaming.
Scientific Testing
Two researchers from the University of Bath, Dr Brian Pamplin and Dr Harry
Collins, tested a group of children who had bent metal at home, following
Geller's broadcast. The children were in a room with an observer, who was
told to glance away at certain times, while scientists watched with keen
attention through one way mirrors. Once the children thought no one was
looking, they cheated: one put a rod under his foot, others used two hands
and as much strength as they could muster. Afterwards the researchers stated:
'We can assert that in no case did we observe a rod or spoon bent other than
by palpably normal means.'
These exposures undermined confidence in scientific testing. However, among
the rash of twisted forks and headless spoons appearing when Geller fever was
at its height, there were some feats that seemed inexplicable. For instance,
a 12-year-old girl managed to bend a metal towel rail 5-mm (1/4 inch) in
diameter at an angle of 40 degrees as her parents watched. The rail was made
of mild steel with a chromium plate finish and later tests showed that
bending it would have taken the force of at least a quarter of a ton.
Serious attempts at investigating the field of psychokinesis began in the
1930s when Joseph Banks Rhine set up the world's first laboratory for the
study of parapsychology in North Carolina. He attempted to investigate claims
from a professional gambler that it was possible to influence the fall of
dice by willpower but, though the results attracted a lot of attention, he
was criticized for his lack of scientific safeguards.
In a long running American project, the Society for Research into Rapport
and Telekinesis devised a system of minilabs. At first, these consisted of
wooden boxes with glass lids. Various objects would be placed inside the
box, and a layer of coffee grounds spread across the floor before it was
locked and sealed in the presence of witnesses. Members of the group would
then concentrate on the objects, trying to move one across the floor of the
box. The coffee grounds made sure that no one could shake or tilt it; after
a successful experiment there would be a single trail across the box to mark
the path of the chosen object.
Later a perspex minilab was developed, so that what happened inside could be
recorded by cine camera. However, the resulting film of levitating pens and
objects moving across the floor of the box have been disputed by psychic
researchers who have produced films of their own to show how the evidence
could have been faked.
Solid proof is hard to find but many sincere researchers are convinced that
the power of mind over matter does exist, perhaps as a result of tapping a
reservoir of energy that is all around us.
A spoon bent by Uri Geller. The energy required to produce such an
unnatural bend must have been considerable.
A Kirlian photograph of Uri Geller's index finger during a burst of
energy which shows the considerable force generated.
Above: Uri Geller is seen (left) with Jimmy Young inspecting the Automobile
Association's telephone box key which bent during Geller's appearance on
Young's BBC Radio 2 programme in October 1974.
A Kirlian photograph,
showing Uri Geller's ability to bend keys with psychic energy.
Additional information
One of the Children in the above (Julie Knowles) did not cheat. Another of the
other children bent an object outside in the lounge infront of several witnesses
while waiting to enter the observation room.
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