The Emanation of Psychophysical Energy

Original publication

Original title: Die Emanation der psychophysischen Energie. Eine experimentelle Untersuchung über die unmittelbare Gedankenübertragung im Zusammenhang mit der Frage über die Radioaktivität des Gehirns
Author: Dr. Naum Kotik, Moscow
Publication year: 1908
Publisher: J. F. Bergmann, Wiesbaden
Series: Grenzfragen des Nerven- und Seelenlebens, no. 61, edited by Dr. L. Loewenfeld
Original language: German
Source edition: Internet Archive institutional scan · Original PDF
Source file MD5: c0b809a7520e384efaf442c6d73ea114

Translation Note

This translation follows the complete 1908 German edition in source order, including its title leaves, preface, contents, notes, publisher’s catalogue, and series wrapper. Page comments refer to physical PDF pages; page references within the author’s text retain the original printed numbering. Historical claims and terminology are preserved as the author’s statements. Experimental word-stimuli and fragmentary responses retain their source spellings, with the source’s explanatory glosses translated. Later library accession markings are not part of the authorial text.

The Emanation of Psychophysical Energy

An Experimental Investigation of Direct Thought Transference in Connection with the Question of the Radioactivity of the Brain

By Dr. Naum Kotik, Moscow

Wiesbaden: J. F. Bergmann, 1908

Publisher’s Catalogue

J. F. Bergmann, publisher, Wiesbaden.

Borderland Questions of Nervous and Mental Life

Edited by Dr. L. Loewenfeld in Munich, in collaboration with distinguished specialists at home and abroad.

No.	Work	Price in marks
1	Somnambulism and Spiritualism. By Dr. med. Loewenfeld in Munich. Second, enlarged edition.	2.00
2	Functional and Organic Nervous Diseases. By Professor Dr. H. Obersteiner in Vienna.	1.00
3	On Degeneration. By Dr. P. J. Möbius in Leipzig.	1.00
4	The Normal Fluctuations of Mental Activities. By Dr. J. Finzi in Florence; translated by Dr. E. Jentsch in Breslau.	1.00
5	Abnormal Characters. By Dr. J. L. A. Koch in Cannstatt.	1.00
6/7	Delusions in the Life of Nations. By Dr. M. Friedmann in Mannheim.	2.00
8	On Dreams. By Dr. S. Freud in Vienna.	1.00
9	Self-Consciousness, Sensation, and Feeling. By Professor Dr. Th. Lipps in Munich.	1.00
10	Muscular Function and Consciousness. A study of the mechanism of perceptions. By Dr. E. Storch in Breslau.	1.20
11	The Cerebral Cortex as the Organ of the Mind. By Professor Dr. Adamkiewicz in Vienna.	2.00
12	Economy and Fashion. By W. Sombart, Breslau.	0.80
13	The Connection between Body and Mind: The Fundamental Problem of Psychology. By Professor W. Schuppe in Greifswald.	1.60
14	Freedom of the Will from the Standpoint of Psychopathology. By Professor Dr. A. Hoche in Strasbourg.	1.00
15	Mood. A medical-psychological study. By Dr. Ernst Jentsch in Breslau.	1.20
16	Psyche and Life. By Professor Dr. W. von Bechterew in St. Petersburg. Second edition.	5.60
17	On the Pathological in Nietzsche. By Dr. med. P. J. Möbius, Leipzig.	2.80
18	On So-Called Moral Insanity. By Medical Councillor Dr. Naecke in Hubertusburg.	1.60
19	Sadism and Masochism. By Privy Medical Councillor Professor Dr. A. Eulenburg in Berlin.	2.00
20	Sensory Pleasures and the Enjoyment of Art. By Professor Karl Lange in Copenhagen. Published after his death by Dr. Hans Kurella in Ahrweiler.	2.00
21	On Intellectual Activity of Genius, with Particular Reference to Genius in the Visual Arts. By Dr. L. Loewenfeld in Munich.	2.80
22	Psychiatry and Poetry. By Dr. G. Wolff in Basel.	1.00
23	“Consciousness—Feeling.” A psychophysiological investigation. By Professor Dr. Oppenheimer, Heidelberg.	1.80
24	Studies in the Psychology of Pessimism. By Dr. A. Kowalewski in Königsberg, East Prussia.	2.80
25	The Influence of Alcohol on Nervous and Mental Life. By Dr. E. Hirt in Munich.	1.60
26	Choice of Occupation and Nervous Disorders. By Professor Dr. A. Hoffmann in Düsseldorf.	0.80
27	Individual Mental Constitution and Mental Disorder. By Director Dr. Th. Tiling, St. Petersburg.	1.60
28	Hypnosis and Art. By Dr. L. Loewenfeld in Munich.	0.80
29	Music and Nerves. I. Natural History of the Sense of Tone. By Dr. Ernst Jentsch in Breslau.	1.00
30	Practice and Memory. A physiological study. By Dr. Semi Meyer in Danzig.	1.30
31	The Case of Otto Weininger. A psychiatric study. By Dr. Ferd. Probst in Munich.	1.00
32	Woman in the Cultural Movement of the Present Day. By Dr. Gertrud Bäumer, Berlin. With a preface by Dr. Loewenfeld.	1.30

The Emanation of Psychophysical Energy

Printed by C. Ritter, G. m. b. H., Wiesbaden.

The Emanation of Psychophysical Energy

An Experimental Investigation of Direct Thought Transference in Connection with the Question of the Radioactivity of the Brain

By Dr. Naum Kotik, Moscow

Wiesbaden: J. F. Bergmann, 1908

Borderland Questions of Nervous and Mental Life, edited by Dr. L. Loewenfeld in Munich. No. 61.

Reprinting prohibited. The right of translation into all languages reserved.

Preface

In presenting to the German reader this work, which previously appeared in separate parts in Russian, I should like to point out the two principal tasks I have set myself. The first is to shed, as far as I can, a ray of light on the question under investigation and to indicate the path that should probably be followed toward its solution. The second, no less important task is to arouse a widespread and profound scientific interest in the experimental facts I report, and thereby to encourage other authors to undertake control investigations and repeat the experiments. Without these, as I clearly recognize, the solution of the first task cannot at once become a lasting scientific achievement.

As regards the introductory chapter, I consider it necessary to emphasize that it is to be regarded merely as an attempt to illuminate the question philosophically from the standpoint of a particular worldview. In any event, I do not consider an interpretation other than the one I have given to be entirely excluded. As for the general conclusions and my theory as a whole, however, no matter how bold they may appear at first sight, it must be kept firmly in mind that they all rest on indisputable facts established by experiment. Only on the basis of control investigations of its own can serious, thoughtful criticism clarify what has remained obscure in my work and deliver a fair judgment. While awaiting that judgment, I shall in any case feel rewarded for my efforts if my work succeeds, at least in part, in dispelling the prejudice against the question under discussion that is regarded in academic circles as a sign of proper scientific manners.

In closing, it is my pleasant duty to express my warmest thanks to my esteemed colleague Dr. A. Dworetzky for kindly undertaking the linguistic revision of the German edition of my work.

Moscow, March 1908

N. Kotik

Contents

• Preface — V–VI
• I. Introduction — 1–11
• II. Historical Notes on the Question of Thought Transference — 12–23
• III. My Own Experiments: The Transference of Auditory Representations — 24–45
• IV. Double Consciousness: Automatic Writing and Mediumship — 46–57
• V. Further Experiments of My Own: The Transference of Visual Representations and Emotions — 58–79
• VI. Clairvoyance and the Fixation of Thoughts on Paper — 80–101
• VII. The Hypothesis of Psychic Radiations and My Own Experiments — 102–115
• VIII. Psychophysical Energy: Brain Rays and Psychophysical Emanation — 116–128
• Concluding Reflections — 129–130

The task is to bring certain mysterious, elusive phenomena within the sphere of the positive sciences.

Ch. Richet

I. Introduction

What is thought, and what is the nature of its relationship to the brain?

No one who chooses to investigate one or another manifestation of the human psyche can avoid this question, which constitutes one of the cardinal problems of existence. The entire history of scientific and philosophical intellectual work in the past century may be characterized as an assiduous effort to find an explanation for the conspicuous fact that the psychical and the physical, these apparently incommensurable phenomena, are most intimately connected in thought and brain.

If we turn to positive science for an explanation of the question posed above, it leaves us without an answer. All it has been able to say is contained in the proposition that thought is a function of the brain. This proposition merely expresses, in a brief formulation, the universally known fact of the strict dependence of psychical processes on the physiological activity of the brain and the close connection of certain mental functions with particular regions of the brain. But how thought, that is, the psychical, can be a function of the brain, that is, the physical, we do not know. More than that: this connection between the psychical and the physical, revealed so clearly and distinctly in our own brain, remains as incomprehensible to us as ever.

In the sphere of abstract thought, this incomprehensibility led to the creation of a whole series of metaphysical, philosophical, and religious systems; in positive science, on the other hand, it led to the admission of its complete inability to solve the psychophysical problem. This was the admission expressed by Du Bois-Reymond’s famous “Ignorabimus” in his address on the limits of our knowledge of nature.

One may well say that, on the question that concerns us, “Ignorabimus” was the quintessence and the last word of all nineteenth-century positive science and of the dogmatic-materialist worldview on which it rested. This last word, spoken by an outstanding and authoritative representative of nineteenth-century positive knowledge, divided audiences throughout the world into two camps. Some began to cry out about the bankruptcy of science and eagerly to draw seekers after truth into the bosom of religious metaphysics. The others, however, had long been seeking a way out of the situation by analyzing the causes that make the psychophysical problem incomprehensible to us.

And this analysis¹ has already accomplished much. It has shown us that the problem’s incomprehensibility is chiefly conditioned by our customary ideas concerning the different nature and incommensurability of physical and psychical processes. It has led us to reflect seriously on the sources of these ideas and has destroyed our hitherto blind faith in their correctness. Finally, it has strengthened our shaken faith in the power of scientific intellectual work and opened wider horizons to it. Alongside this philosophical analysis, vigorous activity developed in the sphere of positive science. At the beginning of the twentieth century this activity produced extremely important discoveries, which undermined our teachers’ entire worldview and exerted a determining influence on the subsequent direction of twentieth-century scientific and philosophical research.

This direction becomes apparent above all in the transformation of our views on the nature of matter and mind and the connection between them. Matter, the sole reality of the dogmatic materialists, has now lost the reputation for irrefutable “self-evidence” that it enjoyed among representatives of nineteenth-century science. The existence of matter as such has now become highly problematic even for positive science, which, after all, constantly operates with matter alone: at least as problematic as “mind,” the “psychical,” was for the old materialists.

For what is matter now? It might seem that in the world accessible to our knowledge there is nothing whose reality is so self-evident as that of tangible, ponderable matter.

In positive science, as in everyday life, we are so accustomed to dealing continually only with bodies, with matter, that we cannot even imagine the world’s existence apart from it. Despite all the difficulty, indeed the impossibility, of scientifically defining the concept of matter, we have nevertheless always conceived of it as something inert, tangible, and ponderable, in contrast to energy, which we regard as active, intangible, and imponderable.

By a move that was scientifically forced and philosophically bold, we also included “mind” within the concept of energy, insofar as we were inclined to attribute to it a definite influence on one or another process. Yet substance and force, matter and energy, have always been for us concepts as opposite and incommensurable as body and mind. With brilliant rhetoric, Du Bois-Reymond proclaimed the impotence of the human mind ever to build a bridge from the physical to the psychical, or from matter to force.

Is the situation still the same today? May we still cling to these ideas without running the risk of falling into complete contradiction with scientifically established facts? Apparently not. The latest discoveries in physics have brought about so colossal a transformation in the views of physicists themselves, those rigorous representatives of exact knowledge, concerning the nature of matter that the sharp boundary separating matter from energy in our conception has almost disappeared. According to these views, matter is merely a composite system or a complex of forces, in most cases electrical ones. Gustave Le Bon, to whom belongs the honor of having discovered and interpreted the universality of the phenomena of radioactivity, or “the dissociation of matter,” says:

The material atom is an immense reservoir of energy, consisting solely of a system of imponderable elements maintained in a state of equilibrium by the rotations, attractions, and repulsions of the particles composing the system. From this state of equilibrium result the material properties of bodies, such as weight, form, and apparent stability. This way of looking at the matter leads us to conceive of substance as a simple variety of energy. To the already known forms of energy, heat, light, and others, a new one would have to be added, namely substance, or intra-atomic energy. (p. 12)

And further:

There is no difference between matter and energy, because matter is simply a stable form of energy and nothing more. (p. 15)²

“It is possible,” says E. Rutherford, “that matter in general is electrical in origin and arises from the motion of the electrons of which the molecules of matter are composed.”³ The Italian physicist A. Righi says:

Nothing stands in the way of the assumption that the latter [matter], and with it the whole of the known bodies, is built up of aggregates or systems of electrons. A material atom is, on this view, merely a system consisting of a certain number of positive and an equal number of negative electrons, the latter, all or only some of them, revolving like satellites around the remainder of the system.⁴

Thus the material atom, this hypothetical element of materialist theory, represents an entire cosmos in which the individual electrons form a complicated system and move at extraordinary speed. An approximate idea of the forces acting within the atom may be obtained from the following words of the German physicist P. Lenard:

There result … electrical field strengths within the atoms of such extraordinary magnitude as we can never produce by any means known to us, owing to the insufficient resistance of even the best insulators: field strengths compared with which those occurring in the most violent thunderstorms are vanishingly small. The force effects of the radium atom then no longer appear so astonishing. Rather, we must wonder that most of the atoms here around us behave so quietly and reveal something of the reserves of force within them only in the photoelectric effect or on other similar occasions.⁵

Such are the views of outstanding representatives of modern physics on the nature of matter: views that are not bold products of imagination but have developed out of laborious and exact experimental investigations in the field of electricity.

Knowledge of the results of these investigations inevitably presses every thinking person toward the conclusion that inert, ponderable, tangible matter, as this concept has taken shape in our minds, is not a reality but a fiction.⁶

Energy is the sole scientific reality given to us, and the entire multiplicity of phenomena and forms in the knowable world consists only of complexes and combinations of different forms of energy. The principle of energy, taking shape among representatives of exact science under the influence of the latest discoveries, is gradually displacing the principle of matter that prevailed in the nineteenth century and is becoming the guiding star of twentieth-century science.

At present, however, the energetic view of the world built upon this principle cannot be carried through in all its consequences, since unfortunately we do not yet possess a corresponding extent of knowledge. Yet even what we have learned in the comparatively short time since the discovery of radium and the other radioactive substances entitles the energetic hypothesis to claim the most serious attention of thoughtful investigators in every field of science. It must certainly be admitted that the energetic conception of matter presents the greatest difficulties for the worldview that is now disappearing from the scene. But if physicists and chemists, on the basis of exact investigations, arrive from different directions at the electrical theory of matter, then applying the energetic principle to the explanation of all the remaining phenomena of the knowable world no longer presents any particular difficulties.

Indeed, in the light of the new research findings it is possible to foresee a solution even to the psychophysical problem, which, more than any other, has occupied the human mind throughout the history of civilization. It must be admitted, however, that this possibility will arise only when we have finally freed ourselves from the hypnosis of the ideas suggested and imposed upon us concerning the wholly distinctive nature of psychical processes, and have ceased to regard the psychical and the physical as two independent series of causal relations. For this, it is above all urgently necessary to become accustomed to approaching facts without ready-made conclusions.

In this respect, the universally familiar story that Newton discovered the universal law of gravitation by starting from the commonplace phenomenon of an apple falling to earth is very instructive. We may reasonably suppose that when this great scholar, seeing an apple fall from a tree, first expressed the supposition that the observed phenomenon was connected with universal gravitation, the scientific philistines of his day tried to ridicule him. What connection could there possibly be here? Where else was the apple supposed to fall?

Was it perhaps supposed to fly up into the sky? These gentlemen, the philistines, could naturally not understand that the apple’s spontaneous fall to earth is just as wonderful as its flight up into the sky would be. In both cases, one must recognize the action of a force that attracts or repels the apple.

Today we know, or at least believe we know, that the apple falls because the earth attracts it. But since Faraday’s appearance we are no longer satisfied with this knowledge. We ask ourselves: why does the earth attract, and is any action of force at a distance possible without the mediation of intermediate forces? The whole progress of modern physics rests on the discovery and study of these intermediate forces, whose necessity was already recognized by Newton and constitutes a postulate of simple logic, undistorted and unclouded by conventional notions. The foundation of this progress was laid by Faraday’s work. Hertz rightly says of him that he was “a mind of great freshness, which approached phenomena impartially as though anew, starting again from what he saw, not from what he had heard, learned, and read.”⁷

If we were to accustom ourselves to approaching everyday phenomena of a psychophysical kind as impartially as Newton and Faraday did, much that is still obscure would probably soon become clear and simple to us. For this, however, we too must start from what we see and temporarily set aside what we have heard, read, and learned.

Let us take, in fact, the most ordinary phenomenon: voluntary movements. I want to raise my hand, and it rises. What does this mean? For anyone who wishes to see in the phenomenon only what it contains, only one answer is possible: the volitional thought produces mechanical work, the raising of the hand. However one may twist and interpret this fact, its meaning cannot be altered: thought produces mechanical work.

The long domination of the dualistic way of thinking, however, has always induced people to seek other explanations and to distort in every possible way the simple and clear meaning of the example given. We were told, and are still told, that the impetus to the muscular movement is supplied not by thought but by the stimulus, or sensory impression, arriving from the external world and conveyed to the muscles of the hand by means of the neurocerebral apparatus.

Yet for every observer who approaches the facts without ready-made “explanations,” it must be clear that, whatever the origin of the thought may be, without it the hand would not have risen in this instance, and consequently no work would have been performed. However small the contribution of the psychical element may have been in the present case, it is nevertheless beyond all doubt. Even if only in the capacity of an obligatory intermediary between the excitation arriving from outside and the neuromuscular apparatus, the thought still sent the impulse to the muscle and produced its contraction; that is, the thought effected mechanical work.

Against this, adherents of the doctrine of psychophysical parallelism object that it is not thought at all that sends the impulse to the muscle, but the brain, and that thought arises in the brain alongside the impulse going to the muscle. Thought, they say, merely accompanies the physiological process here, without conditioning it. These gentlemen, the parallelists, who not infrequently count themselves among the devotees of positive science, do not wish to see that in this case they are by no means relying on facts, but are passing off their hypotheses, founded on dualistic conceptions, as facts. No one has yet proved that in acts of volition the brain sends the impulse to the muscle independently of thought.

On the contrary, numerous results of experimental psychology compel us to assume that thought, that is, psychical processes, participates in so-called unconscious and even reflex acts. So thorough and cautious a psychologist as W. James even accepts as a fundamental fact of his science the proposition that “not only certain states of mind, such as excitement, but all psychical phenomena as such, even pure processes of thought and feelings, are, in their effects, motor forces.”⁸

We must therefore set all hypotheses aside, take the fact as it directly presents itself to us, and say: if thought effects mechanical work, if thought is a motor force, then it must represent a form of energy fully analogous to the whole series of other forms of universal energy that can likewise effect mechanical work and act as motor forces. In other words, thought is one of the many forms of universal energy.

What are the properties of this form of energy? Apart from the property just identified, that of producing movements, which belongs equally to many other energies, we are for the present accurately acquainted with one other distinguishing characteristic: its capacity to appear to us in the form of representations.

For this reason we call it psychic energy. If we view the nature of thought in this way, we have not the slightest reason to draw a sharp boundary between psychic energy and all the other, purely physical kinds of energy known to us. On the contrary, we must include it in this group of energies and endow it with only one distinguishing characteristic, the psychical. If we do so, the connection of the psychical with the physical, of thought with the brain, appears to us in energetic terms and loses its appearance of incomprehensibility.

Indeed, so long as the old materialists taught that ponderable, tangible matter was the sole reality, and that thought resulted from molecular movements in the brain, Du Bois-Reymond was right to say that “no conceivable arrangement or motion of material particles could build a bridge into the realm of consciousness.” But if, according to the latest findings, the material particles themselves, the molecules and atoms, are nothing other than fields of force and combinations of different forms of energy, and if thought, according to the considerations set out above, represents merely a special form of the single universal energy, then the origin of thoughts in the brain is easily explained by the passage of one form of energy, the purely physical, into another form, the psychic, or, more correctly, the psychophysical, since, as we have seen above, this also possesses the purely physical property of effecting mechanical work.

Following the teaching of the energeticists, we must imagine the formation of psychic energy approximately as follows. All external phenomena are interactions between energies. The organism takes in only those external energies to which it is adapted through its external sense organs. Within it there takes place a transformation, a reworking, of the external, purely physical energy into nervous, or neurophysical, energy. This flows along the nerve pathways to the brain, undergoes a new transformation in the ganglion cells of the central organ, and passes into psychic energy. With the appearance of psychic energy, the process of construction comes to an end, at least so far as we know at present. This energy either acts as such, making itself known to us as consciousness and thoughts,⁹ or is transformed, through the intermediate stage of nervous energy, into the mechanical work of movement.

“At the same time,” Ostwald also says, “we recognize that the energy associated with consciousness is the highest and rarest kind of energy known to us. It arises only in especially developed organs, and even the brains of different people show the greatest differences in the quantity and effectiveness of such energy.”¹⁰

We thus regard psychic energy as the most complex and perfect form of the single universal energy, appearing to us as thoughts and representations and capable of being transformed into other, simpler, purely physical forms. Such a conception of the nature of psychic energy, however, obliges us also to accept the conclusions that follow from it. If psychic, or psychophysical, energy represents merely one of the forms of universal energy, then it too must be subject to the universal law of the conservation of energy. Can psychic energy meet this requirement? The majority of contemporary natural scientists, whose intellectual outlook, incidentally, is rooted in the past century, answer this question in the negative.

And indeed, at first sight certain psychical phenomena seem to contradict the law of the conservation of energy. Let us take, for example, an act of thought that is not manifested externally either in movements or in words. When we think about something silently, we perform a certain amount of mental work. Sometimes a considerable quantity of nervous energy is consumed in this work and transformed into psychic energy. The expenditure of nervous energy manifests itself in an increase, and increased excretion, of the breakdown products of neurocerebral tissue, and makes itself known through the appearance of a general feeling of mental fatigue. Finally, the presence of psychic energy is demonstrated in conscious thought processes. If, however, we wish to follow the subsequent fate or transformation of the psychic energy developed, we are unable to do so. The stream of energy appears to come to a halt here, and the total amount of psychic energy disappears almost without a trace.¹¹ Thought that is not expressed in words or manifested in actions seems entirely to contradict the law of the conservation of energy and serves the dualists as their best argument in favor of the doctrine of the special nature of psychical processes and their incommensurability with physical ones.

Adherents of the energetic worldview assume that the solution of the riddle lies in the fact that, in the case described above, psychic energy probably turns into heat and contributes to warming the body. This, however, is merely a supposition that is almost impossible to prove and therefore cannot serve as a support for the hypothesis of psychic energy.¹² We believe, moreover, that resorting to such a supposition is neither necessary nor fruitful.

The point is that the law of conservation naturally does not require every energy to be preserved in its particular form, but speaks only of the conservation of the total sum of energies. Ostwald is therefore entirely right when he calls the assertion that mental energy must be preserved as such an error. It must nevertheless be admitted that only in such a case would it be possible to prove irrefutably both the existence of psychic energy itself and its subordination to the law of the conservation of energy. For precisely this reason, wherever it is impossible to trace the subsequent fate of psychic energy, as, for example, in silent thinking, room must also be left for the supposition that psychic energy is emitted from the organism as such and dispersed in the surrounding medium.

Is this possible in a technical sense? That is, does the anatomical structure of the nervous system’s central organ, in which all psychical processes take place, present an obstacle? So far as we now know the anatomy and physiology of the brain, we must say that its structure apparently could place no obstacles in the way of the radiation of the energy accumulated within it. We know, after all, that all higher psychical processes take place in the gray matter, which is amassed in enormous quantities in the cerebral cortex. Consequently, almost the entire quantity of psychic energy produced by the individual in question accumulates there. To protect this highest, and therefore most concentrated, form of universal energy from losses through radiation, it would have had to be placed in the innermost depths of the human body and surrounded by well-insulating coverings.

But what do we actually see? The cerebral cortex, as its very name indicates, lies at the outermost surface of the body and entirely lacks specific insulators of the kind represented by the myelin sheaths of the nerve pathways.

As for the pia mater and dura mater, neither their constitution nor their extent, in comparison with the enormous accumulation of gray matter, allows them to be regarded as in any way suitable insulators. And the bony capsule, the skull, is intended chiefly to protect the brain from mechanical injury. Thus both the position and the entire external structure of the organ in which the most intensive psychical processes take place suggest that in this instance nature has taken care to place no obstacles in the way of the radiation of psychic energy into the surrounding space.

If this is so, then to prove that psychic energy is subject to the law of conservation, it remains only to demonstrate its emission into the external world: that is, to demonstrate its presence outside the brain in which it originated. How is this to be done?

The only apparatus known to us in which psychic energy can manifest itself in the form familiar to us, that is, in thoughts, is the human brain; only in this case can we recognize it as psychic. Consequently, we can detect psychic energy outside the brain in which it originated only if, after flowing out of one brain, it enters another and demonstrates its presence there through thoughts and representations like those that would attest its presence in the first brain. In short: the law of the conservation of psychic energy requires the possibility of direct thought transference from one person to another.

This is the result at which anyone must inevitably arrive who wishes to be consistent in applying the energetic view of the world and does not consider it necessary to shrink from conclusions, however impossible they may seem at first sight. Unmediated thought transference is a theoretical postulate of the energetic hypothesis in its application to psychic energy. It remains only to take the final step and demonstrate that this theoretical postulate is actually fulfilled, that is, that thought transference occurs in reality. The present investigation is devoted to this task. In it I shall endeavor to let the facts alone speak for themselves: to employ, that is, the language that is most eloquent in such questions and convincing to everyone.

We begin with the recent history of the question.

II. Historical Notes on the Question of Thought Transference

In 1874 an uneducated American named Brown appeared in New York with mysterious experiments that caused the greatest sensation throughout American society. The subject of these experiments was so-called thought-reading. When he placed the hand of the person whose thoughts were to be guessed, the agent, against his forehead, Brown, blindfolded, carried out everything the agent mentally instructed him to do: he found a hidden object, handed it to the correct person, and so forth. Various hypotheses were advanced to explain this phenomenon, some of which can be traced back to Paracelsus. Some supposed that human thought had an effect at a distance through radiation; others, that one brain exerted a special magnetic influence on another; still others believed that a thought arising in one person’s brain could induce an identical thought in another person’s brain, and so on.

The American neurologist Beard opposed all such attempts at explanation at the time. He sought to demonstrate that thought-reading rested on the percipient’s, or thought-reader’s, perception of the agent’s unconscious muscular movements. When the latter thinks of something and concentrates all his attention on the chosen representations, he makes, according to Beard, involuntary and unconscious muscular movements in which the content of his thought is betrayed. It is precisely these unconscious, barely perceptible muscular movements that the thought-reader perceives, thanks to his heightened cutaneous and muscular sensitivity. Thus, Beard assumed, the whole affair involved not the reading of thoughts at all, but the reading of muscular movements, or “muscle-reading.”

Beard’s theory was not, incidentally, particularly new. As early as 1833 E. Chevreul¹³ performed a series of experiments on the basis of which he concluded that “the thought of a particular movement is capable of setting our muscles in motion without our having to desire the movement or become conscious of it.”

Arago maintained the same position before the Paris Académie des sciences in 1853, as did Faraday before the Royal Society in London. What was new in Beard’s theory was only that he proposed the possibility of one person’s unconsciously perceiving another’s muscular movements and based his explanation of all cases of thought-reading upon it.

Despite the extreme simplicity and, so to speak, scientific plausibility of this explanation of the mysterious phenomenon, the learned assembly of the faculty in New York rejected Beard’s theory by a majority vote. Seven years later, in 1881, a new thought-reader appeared in England: the famous Bishop, who far surpassed Brown in his art. At Carpenter’s suggestion, a commission was appointed to investigate the question, consisting of four professors and the crown prince. The commission arrived at the same conclusion as Beard before it, namely that the reading of thoughts was really nothing other than the reading of muscular movements. The learned world of England also rested content with this explanation.

The interest Bishop’s experiments had aroused in society was so lasting, however, that in 1882 a special society for investigating psychical phenomena was founded in London. Its task was to collect and sift all authenticated facts that supported thought transference. The results of these investigations were published in 1887 by three English authors in a substantial two-volume work entitled Phantasms of the Living.¹⁴ Its authors, Gurney, Myers, and Podmore, first brought into circulation the term “telepathy,” which they divided into experimental and spontaneous forms. By the first they understood what we call thought transference and what Richet termed suggestion mentale. The second form, spontaneous telepathy, includes all those cases in which people see and perceive objects and events that are situated or take place at a great distance from them, and of which they have not even an inkling. The chief aim of these authors was to demonstrate the existence of the second form of telepathy.

Since it is primarily the first form that interests us here, we shall content ourselves with noting that, after taking account of all relevant psychical anomalies, carefully sifting the facts, and calculating the coincidences admissible under the theory of probability, the authors became convinced that thought transference was indeed possible.

When Bishop appeared in Petersburg in November 1884, the entire learned world of Russia, influenced by the explanations of Beard and the London commission, adopted a very reserved attitude toward his performances and confined itself to repeating Beard’s arguments. In a special paper, Professor Ssikorsky¹⁵ set out the psychophysiological findings that clarify the participation of unconscious muscular movements in the mechanism of thought-reading. At the same time, Professor Preyer in Germany also expressed the same views in a work entitled The Explanation of Thought-Reading.

Despite all the authority of science, the public could not be satisfied with its explanations and inclined toward the hypotheses advanced earlier. Professor Tarchanow therefore considered it necessary, in 1886, to give a series of public lectures under the general title “On Deceptions of Consciousness,”¹⁶ in which he sought to demonstrate to his listeners that thought-reading rested on involuntary self-deception. To this end he constructed a whole series of ingenious apparatuses with which he succeeded in recording the agent’s slightest “ideomotor” movement, to use Carpenter’s expression, on a smoked drum. In publicly demonstrating his experiments with these apparatuses, Tarchanow sought to show that when a subject thinks intently of a movement, for example to the right, left, upward, or downward, the apparatus invariably records the subject’s corresponding unconscious ideomotor movements on the drum. “Now imagine,” says Tarchanow, “that in place of this apparatus there is a living person who is exceptionally sensitive to the slightest pressure, push, or pull in the direction in which the object to be guessed lies, and you will immediately understand the significance these unconscious pushes may have for identifying and finding the object to be guessed.”

This theory, which explains the guessing of mentally conceived movements more or less satisfactorily, cannot, however, explain the guessing of mentally conceived words. Tarchanow makes no such claim for it, since he denies altogether the possibility of guessing words. “Not a single abstract thought,” he says, “not even the very simplest, such as that 2 × 2 = 4, or that the sun gives warmth, and the like, can thought-readers ever guess.” Nor can this theory explain the phenomena of extrasensory thought transference at a distance, where cutaneous and muscular sensations can no longer be involved at all. But Tarchanow remains faithful to his doctrine and denies these cases too: “Arrange the thought-transference experiments so that the thought-reader can use neither his sight nor his hearing, and I guarantee that not a single thought-reader will be found anywhere in the world who would venture to guess even the simplest thought.” Since, as the reader will see below, the transference of abstract thoughts by an effect at a distance, under all the conditions Tarchanow requires, is in fact possible, the theory of unconscious muscular movements, as applied to thought-reading, consequently does not withstand criticism. It cannot explain the totality of the phenomena observed and therefore does not meet the fundamental requirement imposed upon every scientific hypothesis.

In mentioning the hypotheses concerning the existence of a radiating energy of the brain, Tarchanow calls them “fantasies that possess no serious scientific foundation.” Nevertheless, these hypotheses found an authoritative advocate in the French neurologist Ch. Richet, whose experiments on thought transference, or, as he calls it, suggestion mentale, conducted with the greatest possible scientific precision, attracted the attention of all educated circles. Richet carried out a large number of experiments and then established by calculation that successful trials occurred far more frequently than would be expected according to the theory of probability, if one were inclined to explain successful answers as chance coincidences.

Conclusions based on calculations using the theory of probability cannot, admittedly, be especially convincing. Nevertheless, they are of considerable interest to us in view of the high scientific authority of the French investigator. “It is very probable,” says Richet, “that thought is projected outside the brain, but the mode of action of this psychic force is entirely unknown to us. …

“To the many kinds of influence that our surroundings exert upon us, we must now add the imperceptible influence of other people’s thoughts on our own. Sometimes this influence is extremely slight; almost always its consequences are scarcely perceptible. Yet it nevertheless exists and modifies the course of our ideas in one direction or another.”¹⁷ Despite these statements, however, Richet does not regard thought transference as a scientifically established fact. Thus, in the preface to Ochorowicz’s well-known work on thought transference,¹⁸ he writes: “I cannot assert that I already regard thought transference as definitively and rigorously proved. Certainly not. … Although Ochorowicz and others before him have brought together an extensive body of evidence, it is nevertheless incapable of convincing the reader fully and decisively, but can only make him waver.”

It would also be appropriate here to mention the experiments performed in 1886–1888, first by Pierre Janet in Le Havre and then by Charles Richet in Paris, on a certain Léonie B., to ascertain whether she could be put to sleep from a considerable distance. Richet undertook 35 experiments, of which 16 succeeded: that is, on 16 occasions Léonie B. fell asleep in obedience to the suggestions of the hypnotist, who was at a distance of ½–1½ kilometers from her. Richet took every possible precaution to avoid deception; even the time of day at which Léonie was to be put to sleep was chosen by lot. Of the 25 similar experiments carried out by P. Janet, 19 were successful.

Individual investigators continued thereafter to attempt to solve the problem of thought transference and put an end to the uncertainty. Thus, in the middle of the 1890s, the Danish scholars Hansen and Lehmann undertook an investigation of telepathy. They started from the consideration that thought transference, if it exists at all, must take place by means of the flowing movement of some extremely subtle substance possessing the capacity to be reflected by metallic surfaces. Accordingly, Hansen and Lehmann proceeded as follows. They set up two spherical concave mirrors some distance apart, with their concave surfaces facing one another, and positioned themselves between them so that their heads lay at the mirrors’ focal points.

In this way they performed about 1,000 experiments, but their results seemed unfavorable to both investigators. Lehmann asserts that he frequently heard the person who was thinking continuously of a word involuntarily whispering it softly. He therefore explains thought transference by involuntary whispering. His principal evidence for the correctness of this view, however, was his analysis of the errors the percipient sometimes made. Most of the errors were of such a kind as to give the impression that the percipient had not heard the agent’s speech distinctly. Lehmann’s observations are entirely correct, but his conclusions are somewhat hasty. For these observations, taken in conjunction with those of other authors and my own, must be interpreted quite differently, as the reader will see below.

Despite all these attempts at a rational understanding, the question of the possibility of thought-reading at a distance remained open and was even ignored by official science as not quite worthy of it. Only in this way can one explain why Dr. N. Krainsky’s report¹⁹ of three cases of thought transference that he observed in 1900 during an epidemic of “possession,” or religious delusion among hysteroepileptics, in the province of Novgorod, remained entirely unnoticed. Yet these cases are extraordinarily interesting and convincing. While observing the “possessed” women, who suffered from fits of screaming, at a time when they were in a somnambulistic state, Krainsky discovered in three of them the ability to read his thoughts. The experiments he carried out in this direction are so convincing that I cannot refrain from describing them here in detail.

The author conducted three series of experiments. In the first series he caused the “possessed” woman, while in the somnambulistic state, to perform a mentally chosen action while he held her hand. In the second series he sought to obtain the same effect from a certain distance, without touching the somnambulist. In the third series, finally, he caused her from a distance to name a hidden object and indicate where it was concealed, without, however, making any movements. Krainsky describes his experiments on the “possessed” Anna G., a married woman aged 25, as follows:

In the first series of experiments I sat opposite Anna, who had sunk into a deep sleep, and suggested to her that despite her closed eyelids she saw the object I was holding in her field of vision and would take hold of it with her hand.

At first I held her hand in mine, as is customary in ordinary thought-reading experiments, strongly concentrated my attention on a clear representation of the movement the somnambulist was to perform, and at the same time repeated the suggestion in the words: “Your hand is moving and taking hold of the object!” After a time Anna’s hand began to move very slowly and gradually in the required direction. It was, as it were, in a state of cataleptic rigidity and advanced in jerks corresponding to the strength of my concentration of thought. From the outset, the direction of the moving hand was correct, as though the somnambulist could see the object sought before her. The hand stopped and remained motionless as soon as my thoughts wandered. The somnambulist then complied with the demand made of her and took hold of the object in question. With each repetition the experiment succeeded more easily and required less effort of attention on my part. Once I had satisfied myself of the success of these experiments, I removed the object from the somnambulist’s field of vision to determine whether this might be a case of extreme hyperesthesia of sight, in which impressions penetrate closed eyelids. With the same experimental arrangement, following the suggestion, the somnambulist extended her hand to the side without error and took the required object from the table. As before, the movement was slow and strained, as though the hand were spring-loaded.

Krainsky then repeated the experiment at a distance, without touching the somnambulist in the slightest. The result was exactly the same: she performed the required actions as promptly as though she knew the object’s location well. Krainsky continues:

In my first experiments I fixed my gaze on the somnambulist’s closed eyes; later, however, I merely followed the movement of her hand. With further repetition the experiments succeeded more easily and quickly, although it became unquestionably clear that the execution of the mentally conceived actions was closely connected with the experimenter’s psychical activity and with the intensity of the representation of movement evoked in his brain. … In the later experiments the somnambulist performed the movements with ever greater ease. … I could sit somewhere to one side and not even look toward her. It was enough simply to concentrate my thoughts and evoke in my mind a visual representation of the person, of the place where the needle was stuck, and of the movement the somnambulist was to perform.

In the next series of experiments, Krainsky’s arrangement was such that he did not cause the sleeping somnambulist to perform movements but asked her where the object in question lay.

Whenever an answer could be obtained from the somnambulist, it was correct. Wherever the object was hidden, even far outside her field of vision, the somnambulist correctly indicated where it was and named the person with whom it was concealed.

In these experiments, as in the preceding ones, it was necessary that I should know about it: that is, that I should form in my mind the representation that was to act upon the somnambulist.

A third series of experiments consisted in my taking a coin in my fist, bringing it close to the somnambulist’s closed eyes, and requiring her to name the coin. These experiments too succeeded well. Without being able to see the coin, she identified it correctly. Yet these experiments were visibly very tiring for the somnambulist; her face took on a more distressed expression, and she frequently awoke. As soon as her sleep became lighter before awakening, the somnambulist began to make mistakes, answered the questions more quickly, and named the coin at random. In all the experiments it was clearly evident that the phenomena of thought-reading disappeared as the sleep grew lighter. The observations were made together with Dr. J. M. Biely.

Krainsky observed the same phenomena in two other “possessed” women, Anna Th. and Helene J.

On the question of how thought transference takes place, Krainsky states that he conceives of the process as an induction of psychical processes, somewhat in the manner in which an electric current flowing through the inner coil induces a current in the outer spiral.

The same conclusion was subsequently reached by Privatdozent J. Shuk, who conducted a whole series of experiments on guessing drawings.²⁰ Shuk performed his experiments as follows. One of the participants took a drawing and studied it attentively. The other had to reproduce the drawing, without having seen it, on a blank sheet of paper lying before him. Of 169 trials, 86, or 51 percent, succeeded: that is, in 86 cases the reproduced drawings corresponded more or less to the originals.

In analyzing these reproduced drawings, which were not always exact, Shuk noticed that the reproductions gave the impression that the person drawing had seen the original fleetingly and indistinctly. Naturally, the experimental arrangement was such that any suspicion that the person drawing could have cast even a fleeting glance at the original held in the other person’s hand was completely excluded. To test his impression and satisfy himself of its correctness, Shuk conducted a series of control experiments. These consisted in showing another person various drawings for only an instant, at a greater or lesser distance, and then asking that person to copy the image perceived. It turned out that the reproductions obtained in this manner bore an extraordinary resemblance to the drawings made by the earlier subjects, who had not seen the originals at all. Thus we encounter here the same phenomenon that Lehmann observed in his experiments on the mental transference of mentally conceived words, with the sole difference that Lehmann’s case involved indistinct auditory impressions of mentally conceived words, whereas Shuk’s involved indistinct visual images of mentally conceived drawings.

Finally, the later experiments of Sidgwick, Lombroso, and von Schrenk-Notzing deserve particular attention. Sidgwick conducted thought-transference experiments with numbers. In the first series, in which agent and percipient were in the same room, there were 131 successes in 644 trials. In the second series, however, in which agent and percipient were in different rooms, only nine successes were recorded in 288 trials.²¹ In his thought-transference experiments with cards or numbers on different people, Lombroso²² obtained up to 44 percent successes, depending on the percipient’s characteristics. The successful mental transference of words is particularly interesting. Among other instances, when Professor Lombroso thought of the word “pitckerel,” the percipient, whose eyes and ears were closed and who was at a distance of ten meters, wrote down the word “pitche …”

Herr von Schrenk-Notzing reports 25 experiments of his own in the transference of drawings, of which 13 produced a favorable result. In two of the successful trials, agent and percipient were in different rooms.

Such are the experiments I have been able to gather from the literature accessible to me. It might seem that these experiments, many of them performed by outstanding investigators, were entirely sufficient to establish the possibility of direct thought transference as a fully proved fact. Yet this is not the case so far. Despite the high scientific authority of individual investigators and despite the comparatively considerable number of different observations, the question of the possibility of thought transference has remained open in science.

Although most scholars who have studied the matter in detail are increasingly inclined to acknowledge this possibility, thought transference still does not count as a scientifically established fact. Thus Forel says:

Doubtful, at least neither sufficiently established scientifically nor explained, are alleged supersensory facts such as so-called clairvoyance or telepathy, so-called direct thought transference, and the like. … Nevertheless, an unprejudiced science requires a careful reexamination of this question, since a number of statements by credible people who are not without judgment affirm it, especially certain cases of premonitions that proved correct.²³

J. Grasset expresses himself somewhat more decisively, though likewise cautiously:

I do not deny thought transference, telepathy, clairvoyance, and the like. I do not declare a priori that these phenomena do not exist and that their existence will never be demonstrated. On the contrary, I use every opportunity that presents itself to seek such proofs. I do maintain, however, that at the present state of our knowledge the existence of these phenomena does not yet count for me as proved. …²⁴

In another work, devoted specifically to the investigation of occult phenomena, Grasset states, after a brief analysis of his factual material:

Scientific proof of mental suggestion and thought transference has not yet been supplied. There are nevertheless experiments, such as those of C. Lombroso and Ch. Richet, which indicate that the question must not be disregarded and that the problem may be solved in the future, if the experiments are approached with zeal and circumspection, if they are performed without the participation of professional thought-readers, and, above all, if the very simplest experiments are undertaken.²⁵

Such, approximately, is the general opinion of serious and cautious representatives of science on the question that interests us here. Such, we add, must also be the opinion of positive science itself. It must indeed be admitted that no fact may be regarded as scientifically established, or at any rate can attain lasting scientific validity, until we have succeeded in bringing it under experimental conditions in such a way that it can be repeated at will any number of times and carefully checked. Only in this case can a provisionally admitted fact, observed here and there, be investigated from every side and acquire the standing of a secure scientific achievement. For precisely this reason, however firm my personal conviction may be that the possibility of direct thought transference has been established in fact, I nevertheless regard carefully arranged and frequently repeated experiments as absolutely necessary and, scientifically, alone decisive.

But I do not agree with Grasset that one must not experiment with professional thought-readers because one might otherwise easily fall victim to their frauds and deceptions. Certainly there are numerous charlatans among professional thought-readers who perform a whole series of conjuring tricks that have not the slightest connection with thought transference. If one does not know these tricks, one can easily be taken in and mistake the skillful communication of agreed signals for the transference of thoughts. All this is perfectly true. But what follows from it? Does it follow that there can be no genuine thought-readers among professionals and that they must be avoided altogether? No. It follows only that one must be very cautious with professional thought-readers, know all their tricks, and, most importantly, arrange the experiments in a scientifically impeccable and unassailable manner. If the professional performer places himself entirely at our disposal, and we make it completely impossible for him to use his sense organs for any conscious or unconscious signals, what further guarantee of his honesty is needed? Everything else already depends on us: that is, on whether we know how to arrange the experiments with such scientific care that they leave no room for the slightest doubt.

I considered it necessary to dwell longer on this question because my first experiments, to whose description I now turn, were carried out on a professional thought-reader. And I declare: we need neither avoid nor fear them.

On the contrary, we must make full use of every case that presents itself to establish and test the facts that interest us. As for the possibility of mystification, a careful scientific experimental arrangement protects us against it. An unscientific arrangement is entirely worthless even when the subjects of our experiments are above all doubt in their moral qualities. A scientific experimental arrangement, on the other hand, excludes every source of error and every deception, even an unconscious one, for this is the conditio sine qua non of anything scientific.

Thus the entire weight, in assessing the results of any psychological experiment whatever, rests not on the subject but on our ability to create the conditions for a scientific experimental arrangement. Only then shall we be able to attain what we seek: a scientific foundation for the facts of direct thought transference.

Whether I have succeeded in this, I leave the reader to judge.

III. My Own Experiments: The Transference of Auditory Representations

The subject is a fourteen-year-old girl, Sophie Starker, who possesses the ability to act as a percipient, but only when her father is the agent. This circumstance alone obliges us to be on our guard and take every precaution to uncover the truth. Before describing the measures adopted, we consider it appropriate to give some particulars from the girl’s case history.²⁶

Sophie Starker, aged fourteen, comes of healthy parents. She has apparently inherited her neuropsychical constitution from the women on her mother’s side. The girl’s maternal grandmother became mentally ill at the age of thirty-three and died soon afterward. This grandmother’s sisters suffered constantly from headaches and died young of incidental illnesses. A maternal uncle of the girl suffered constantly from headaches and died in his fortieth year “of headaches,” as the relatives put it. Another uncle, now thirty-five, is married and has several children. He is a hypochondriac and is continually haunted by the thought that he will go mad. His sister, an aunt of the girl, is healthy. The relatives say that she formerly possessed the ability to read thoughts and appeared in public as a professional diviner, but lost this ability entirely after her marriage. Sophie Starker’s mother is generally healthy, but occasionally suffers from headaches and sometimes also from auditory and visual hallucinations. The father is apparently healthy, showing only a fondness for alcoholic drinks, though he cannot be called an alcoholic. Born in Bessarabia, which is known for its abundance of vines and the cheapness of its wine, he had been accustomed from his youth to drinking a great deal of wine.²⁷

As for the girl herself, Sophie S., she is generally healthy and physically well developed for her fourteen years. Her neuropsychical constitution bears the stamp of great instability, as is indeed the case with almost all anemic individuals showing symptoms of irritable weakness. She is sometimes subject to causeless bouts of gloomy or cheerful mood and unmotivated transitions from crying to laughter or the reverse. In general she is very obedient and almost without a will of her own; occasionally, however, she displays an extreme obstinacy that nothing can break. Among her subjective complaints, headaches deserve mention, especially persistent in the mornings, as do neuralgic pains in various parts of the body. Another important circumstance is that, like her mother, she sometimes suffers from auditory and visual hallucinations. The girl possesses acute hearing and musical ability. Considering the low intellectual level of the surroundings in which Sophie lives, one must describe her as a very intelligent girl.

Turning now to her ability to read thoughts, I can report the following. When Sophie was seven, her father, a professional diviner, began practicing divination with her: that is, he blindfolded her, took her by the hand, and had her search for objects hidden somewhere. During these experiments he soon noticed the following. When he thought of having an object found, the girl named it before she had found it. Repeated experiments convinced him that his daughter possessed the ability to read his own thoughts. At first the girl guessed her father’s thoughts very uncertainly and made mistakes very often. Over time, however, through constant practice she attained great proficiency in this field and was able, according to my observations, to guess almost without error everything her father held in mind, both representations of a motor kind and any abstract word whatever.

Before describing the experiments I carried out in the presence of other physicians, allow me a few words about the difficulties that, in this case, stood in the way of arranging the experiments scientifically, that is, in such a way that their results would be unassailable. The chief unfavorable factor was that the girl read only her father’s thoughts, and mine to an extremely limited extent. This circumstance involuntarily arouses mistrust in the spectator, all the more since he is already very skeptical of the phenomenon in question. This mistrust is further increased by the fact that the father had always practiced divination professionally and the girl’s ability to read thoughts provided the livelihood of the whole family. In view of this, every spectator, even the most unprejudiced, involuntarily suspects that he is dealing with a very skillful trick and that father and daughter are consequently mystifying those present by passing their trick off as thought-reading.

Since I considered such suspicions justified and appropriate in our case, I endeavored to arrange my experiments so that both father and daughter were deprived of every opportunity to communicate or signal to one another in any way. To this end I took the following measures, intended to make it impossible for the subjects to use touch, hearing, or sight. First, I placed the father five to ten paces from the girl. Second, I blindfolded the girl and turned her with her back to her father. Third, I packed her external auditory canals so tightly with cotton wool that she could not hear words spoken in an ordinary voice directly at her ear. These were the precautions I took to make it impossible for the girl to perceive any agreed signs.

To deprive the father, on the other hand, of any possibility of signaling to his daughter, I proceeded as follows. First, a carpet was placed under his feet to deaden any noise. Second, during the experiments he was forbidden to move, speak, blow his nose, or make any sound whatsoever. Finally, one of those present always placed himself between father and daughter to be better able to detect the slightest infringement. If one occurred, the trial was declared invalid. Finally, to divert the skeptics’ suspicions from myself as well, I took no direct part at all in many of the experiments, sitting to one side and leaving the whole matter to the other physicians present.

The further suspicion was expressed that the girl had nothing to do with it at all, and that the father was practicing ventriloquism: he was imitating the girl’s voice by ventriloquism and himself pronouncing the words to be guessed. Quite apart from the fact that such a suspicion must have seemed absurd to everyone who attended my experiments and, standing beside the girl, could see and hear that it was indeed she who spoke, I excluded the possibility of such a suspicion by having the girl write down the guessed word in numerous trials before she pronounced it. The results were, of course, always positive. Finally, the absence of any deception is further shown by the fact that the girl sometimes succeeded in guessing words I held in mind without her father’s participation, though unfortunately by no means so surely and convincingly as when her father was the agent. For this reason my chief interest centered on experiments in thought transference from father to daughter, and I devoted my particular attention to them.

These experiments were always carried out as follows. First I blindfolded the girl, turned her with her back to her father, and handed him a series of objects and a strip of paper on which those present had written several words. The girl then had to identify the individual objects in sequence and name the written words. The experiments fell into two series. In one, while guessing, the girl held her father’s hand a little above the wrist. In the other, the father stood several paces behind the girl, with all the conditions mentioned above observed. I must add that during the experiments, especially in thought transference at a distance, the girl sometimes paused as though unable to decide to utter the words or sounds emerging in her mind. In such cases I or someone present had to encourage her and induce her to speak. Occasionally her father also tried to do so, but to preserve the integrity of the experiments I required him always to maintain absolute silence.

I kept precise records of all my experiments, carefully entering in them all the mistakes the girl made during thought-reading. These errors are especially valuable for understanding the mechanism of thought transference. Below I give the results of experiments I performed in the presence of numerous medical colleagues, some of them very skeptical.

Session I, May 3, 1904

The following physicians are present: A. Knery, N. Kefer, N. Wilensky, J. Raymist, and the medical student Schermann.

(a) The girl, whose eyes are blindfolded, holds her father’s left hand a little above the wrist with her right hand. I hand the father a series of objects given to me by those present.

No.	The father looks at the object and thinks	The girl shortly afterward says aloud
1	Pince-nez	Pince-nez
2	Watch showing 54 minutes toward nine [8:54]28	Watch, made of metal, five minutes toward four [3:05], that is, 54 minutes toward nine [8:54]
3	Pencil	Pencil
4	Silver cigar case with eight cigarettes	Cigar case, made of silver, eight cigarettes
5	Toothbrush	Toothbrush

(b) The father is five paces behind the girl; a carpet has been laid beneath his feet. The girl’s eyes are blindfolded, but her ears are unobstructed. The father maintains the deepest silence. Those present write various words on slips of paper and hand them to the father, each word separately.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers after a short pause
1	Mortira (mortar, a type of artillery)	Modsil … Mojer … Morsir …
2	Block	Blaja … Blom … Block

(c) To the conditions specified under (b), a new one is added: the girl’s ears are tightly plugged with cotton wool, so that she does not react at all to questions addressed to her in an ordinary voice. Those present write individual words on strips of paper and hand them to the father.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Iris	Kirs … Jor … Iris
2	Ssonm (an uncommon word meaning something like a clan)	S … Sso … Ssob … Ssobaka … Sson … Sson … (the girl pauses indecisively, as though she feels that something is still missing)

Note. Asked what “Mortira” and “Ssonm” mean, Sophie declares that she does not know.

(d) Father and daughter are in different rooms, with a tightly closed wooden door between them. The girl’s eyes and ears are unobstructed. Written words are handed to the father. The results are negative.

After these experiments, the colleagues present confirmed to me that, despite the most intense attention, they had been unable to perceive even the slightest indication that the father had communicated any signals to his daughter, whose back was turned toward him throughout.

Session II, May 6, 1904

Present: Privatdozent Dr. A. Janyschewsky, assistant at the neurological clinic; Dr. J. Landesmann; and the medical student Schermann. The father complains of violent headaches and fears that the experiments will fail.

(a) The experimental arrangement is the same as under (a) in the preceding session. Those present write down various words and hand them to the father.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Liman	Liman
2	Tararabumbia	Tararabumbia

(b) The father is five paces from the girl, with a carpet beneath his feet. The girl’s eyes are blindfolded and her ears firmly plugged. Words are handed to the father.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Policinell	Polia … Pol … Policen … Policin … Polucinel …
2	Porträt	Plato … Potsch … Per … Pra … Pero …

Note. On questioning, it emerges that the meaning of “Policinell” is entirely unknown to the girl.

(c) A tightly closed door separates father and daughter, whose eyes are blindfolded. Negative results.

(d) Privatdozent Janyschewsky tries with Sophie himself, without the father’s participation. He has the girl take his hand and thinks of the word “Piroshnoje.” Sophie promptly answers, “Piroshnoje.” It emerges, however, that the father, who was at the other end of the room, also knew the word being thought of. Janyschewsky then thinks of the word “Lampadka,” which is now unknown to the father. The girl did not guess it.

The colleagues present confirm that they were unable to notice even the slightest indication of signaling by the father and that Sophie apparently had no opportunity to use her external sense organs, chiefly hearing and sight.

Session III, May 10, 1904

At the internal-medicine clinic of Odessa University. Present: Professor Lewaschow, Dr. Janyschewsky, L. Usskow, Zawadsky, and others.

(a) Experimental arrangement as under (a) in the preceding experiments.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Carandache (pencil)	Carandache
2	Kliutsch (key)	Kliutsch
3	Resinka (rubber cord)	Resinka
4	Silver ruble from 1901	Silver coin, one ruble, 1901
5	Three-kopeck stamp	Three-kopeck stamp
6	Stethometrie	Sel … Seli … Steni … Steniometr … Stenometrie …
7	Endothelioma	Nendotelicz … Endoten … Endothel …
8	Dobrodietelj (virtue)	Dobrodietelj

(b) Experimental arrangement as under (b) in Session II. Written words are handed to the father.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Carandache	Cran …
2	Bulka (white bread)	Uk … Udk … Dudk … Bub … Bulka
3	Koscheliok (purse)	Kosch … Koscheliok
4	Rieka (river)	Rie … Rie … Rieka
5	Nenawistj (hatred)	No … Noe … Noena … Noen …

Dr. Janyschewsky tries with the girl himself, without her father, but nothing comes of it. Those present again confirm that, despite all their attention, they perceived not the faintest indication of signaling.

Session IV, May 17, 1904

Dr. A. Piewnitzky is present.

(a) Experimental arrangement as under (a) in the earlier sessions.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Platok (handkerchief)	Platok
2	Watch, 38 minutes toward ten [9:38]	Watch, 38 minutes toward ten [9:38]
3	Watch, 35 minutes toward eleven [10:35]	Watch, 35 minutes toward eleven [10:35]
4	Sjurtuk (coat)	Tu … Tru … Ju … Sjurtuk
5	Krassny (red)	Krasse … Krassny
6	Boljno (painful)	Bol … Bolon … Boljno
7	Motor	Motor

(b) Experimental arrangement as under (b) in Session II.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Brander	Odo …
2	Karaul (police guard)	Ka … Kasch … Karaul
3	Lampa (lamp)	Lampa
4	Soldat	A person … Soldat

(c) The father is instructed to suggest to his daughter the performance of an action, but on the condition that she first say what she is to do. Sophie, blindfolded, holds her father’s hand.

The father is instructed to think	The girl answers
Climb onto the chair and from there onto the table.	Onto the chair … climb, then … onto the table.

(d) Dr. Piewnitzky himself tries to suggest a mentally chosen word to the girl without the father’s assistance. Sophie holds his hand. Dr. P. chooses the word “stol” (table); the girl remains obstinately silent. After some time, when it becomes apparent that the girl cannot guess it, I take Dr. P.’s hand, forming a chain of three people: myself, Dr. P., and the girl. I begin to think of the same word, “stol,” and after several minutes Sophie says “stol.”

(e) I form a chain of the father, Dr. P., and Sophie in such a way that Dr. P. is between father and daughter and holds both by the hand. The words thought of are unknown to Dr. P.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Moneta (coin)	Moneta
2	Nagasaki	Na … Naga … Nagasaky

At the close of the experiments, Dr. P. also confirms that he noticed nothing that would have aroused his suspicion of deception.

Session V, May 18, 1904

At the neurological clinic of Odessa University. Present: Drs. Janyschewsky, Usskow, and Silberberg. Father absent.

Sophie, blindfolded, holds my hand. I think of the names of objects handed to me by those present.

No.	I think	The girl answers
1	Spitschka (match)	Spitschka
2	Noshik (pocketknife)	Noshik
3	Nitki (string)	… (remains silent)
4	Pleximeter, in the form of a cylindrical rod	The girl says it is an instrument similar to the one glaziers use to cut glass.
5	Numbered metal token, shaped like a coin	The girl says it is a round object and then tries to guess: button, coin.

This session was intended solely to prove that the girl possesses the ability to perceive my thoughts, albeit to a very limited degree. As a matter of principle, this experiment should suffice entirely to establish the existence of this ability as indisputable.

Session VI, May 31, 1904

Present: Dr. A. Janyschewsky and Dr. A. Piewnitzky.

(a) Sophie’s external auditory canals are tightly plugged with cotton wool. Her eyes are also covered with a layer of cotton wool and then blindfolded. Words are then written on strips of paper and handed to the father, who sits five paces behind the girl and maintains absolute silence throughout.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Policinell	Po … Polko … Poli … Poluczitj … Poloci … Polucinell …
2	Jaszczik (box)	… (did not guess it)
3	Molotok (hammer)	Lo … Mo … Molotok

(b) A chain is formed of the father, Dr. Janyschewsky, and the girl. Dr. J. does not know the word being thought of.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Papyrossa (cigarette)	Papyrossa
2	Akkumulator	Ku … Aku … Aku …

(c) Sophie holds my hand. Objects are placed in my other hand; I think of their names, and the father naturally does not see them.

No.	I think	The girl answers
1	Patrone	Pa … Pa … (she can get no further)
2	Bulawka (pin)	Bulawka
3	Noshnizy (scissors)	Noshik … Noshnizy
4	Resinka (rubber cord)	… (remains silent)
5	Gwosdj (nail)	… (remains silent)
6	Koljzo (ring)	… (remains silent)

In all the preceding experiments, the medical colleagues present stated that they not only perceived no signaling whatsoever but also apparently considered the possibility of such signaling completely excluded by my experimental arrangement.

In the following experiments I set myself the task of determining whether thought could be transferred into another room with the door closed. As the reader will recall, such attempts at transference had previously failed in Sessions I and II. Nevertheless, I did not abandon these experiments. Since, on certain grounds, I had to suppose that thought transference along a wire was possible, I employed a wire for this purpose. I proceeded as follows.

An insulated copper wire one millimeter thick and six meters long was passed through the keyhole of a firmly closed door, and its ends were wound several times around round rods. The father held one end of the wire by firmly grasping the rod and letting the wire wound around it pass between his fingers. Sophie, on the other side of the tightly closed door, held the other end of the wire in her hand in the same way. Altogether, apart from the door, father and daughter were separated by a distance of five to six meters. To exclude the possibility of transmitting any signals by pulling on the wire, it was fixed immovably by winding it around the door handles on both sides of the door. I then satisfied myself by pulling that neither wire nor door yielded. In every case but one, the door was a single-leaf door and could be closed very firmly, which is not always the case with double doors, which tend to move slightly even when closed. In several cases the wire was also wound firmly around a chair placed in the middle of the room, on which one of those present sat as a check.

During the experiment itself a witness remained beside the father, handed him the word to be thought of, and watched to ensure that he did not make a single sound. Other witnesses remained beside Sophie. The results of these experiments were, as I expected, very satisfactory.

Session VII, May 5, 1904

My first experiments with the wire, without witnesses. All the precautions described above have been taken. The father and I are in one room, Sophie on the other side of the door in another room, from which she calls out her answers to us.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Jamamoto	Jam … to … Jamto …
2	Tokio	To … Toj … Tojak … Top … Topkiya
3	Ökonomie	Okno … Kn … Knut … Öka …
4	Korsina (basket)	K … Kor … Korset
5	Papyrossa (cigarette)	P … Pa … Papyrossa
6	Koscheliok (purse)	K … Koscheliok

In the following experiments I used an uninsulated wire three millimeters thick.

Session VIII, May 15, 1904

Present: Dr. Usskow and Dr. Silberberg. Experimental arrangement as above.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Mjasso (meat)	Ja … Jam … Amo … Amos …
2	Derewo (tree)	E … E … Re … Resinka
3	Nebo (sky)	N … Nib … Nibo … Nebo

Supplement to Session V of May 18, 1904. Experimental arrangement as above.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Kostj (bone)	K … Ko … Kostj
2	Molnia (lightning)	Mo … Mol … Molo … Moni … Monol … Molin … Molnia

The experiments reported above on thought transference by means of a copper wire, both insulated and uninsulated, are convincing in the highest degree and may serve as further proof to skeptics that we are not dealing here with deliberate deception. First, under the experimental arrangement described above, the possibility of any signaling between the subjects was entirely excluded. Second, the use of a wire in the experiments was so unexpected and so new to the subjects that they had no time to agree on methods of signaling, even if signaling were to be assumed.

After obtaining positive results with the wire, I returned once more to the attempt to ascertain the possibility of thought transference through a firmly closed door without any contact whatever. These experiments of mine were finally crowned with success.

Session IX, May 30, 1904

The father and I are in one room; the girl is in the adjoining room. The wooden door between us is firmly closed. Apart from the door, the subjects are separated by a distance of three meters. I hand the father words written on slips of paper and instruct Sophie to answer loudly from the other room.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Noshik (pocketknife)	Noshik
2	Krowatj (bed)	Krowatj
3	Athanasius	A … Athanasius
4	Chemulpo	Chem … Chemulpo
5	Faraday	Fra … Frad … Frad … Frede …

Having obtained such favorable results in thought transference through a firmly closed door, I decided to repeat these experiments in the presence of one of my colleagues, to forestall the objection that in performing them alone I had been unable to supervise father and daughter simultaneously and that the experiments therefore could not be regarded as beyond all doubt.

Session X, June 15, 1904

Dr. A. Piewnitzky is present.

(a) Sophie is with me in one room, the father with Dr. P. in the other. The door between us is tightly closed. Dr. P. hands the father words written on slips of paper.

No.	The father thinks	The girl answers
1	Kartoczka (picture)	Kr … Kra … Kraska … Kra … Kra …
2	Pugowitza (button)	Pu … Puk … Puko …
3	Breloque	… (not guessed)

(b) Sophie is in the same room, a few paces from her father. The father mentally sings musical themes that I indicate to him. After a short pause, Sophie begins to sing the same themes aloud.

Such are the results of the experiments I performed in 1904 in the presence of medical witnesses, most of whom were very skeptical about the possibility of thought transference. During the three months in which I had the opportunity to observe my case, I carried out a large number of similar experiments, but have confined my description to those undertaken in the presence of other physicians. In any event, the results of all my experiments were always the same and differed in no respect from those reported above.

These results may be summarized in the following conclusions.

1. If Sophie touches her father’s hand, she names mentally conceived objects and words very rapidly, sometimes after only a second, while blindfolded. If the word is unknown to her, a foreign word or a scientific term, she pronounces it slowly, spelling it out, frequently makes mistakes, and corrects them herself.
2. If Sophie is placed some distance from her father, with all the precautions mentioned above observed, she is likewise able to read her father’s thoughts. In this case, however, the reading process takes much longer; mistakes, and even complete failures, occur more frequently. Here again it can be established that Sophie guesses everyday objects and familiar words far more quickly than abstract and difficult words.
3. Mentally conceived words are also transferred when Sophie and her father are in different rooms. But the process then takes still longer than usual, and failure of the experiment is more frequent.
4. If, in the latter case, contact is established between father and Sophie by means of a copper wire, thought transference from the former to the latter is considerably accelerated and improved.

5. Sophie can also guess thoughts with me, without any participation by her father, but only under the following condition: she must hold my hand, while I must think only of the names of objects and look at them at the same time. When these conditions are observed, Sophie often guesses very accurately, but guessing takes much longer than with her father.
6. With other people Sophie guesses only if a chain is formed in which her father participates.

We now turn to solving the question of how the phenomena described above are to be explained. Three possibilities present themselves. First, it may be a skillful trick, that is, simply deliberate deception by the subjects. Second, it may be involuntary self-deception, as in Beard’s theory. Third and finally, it may be genuine thought-reading. It must be admitted that the most important and at the same time most difficult task in our case consists in the need to demonstrate the untenability of the first interpretation, or, more correctly, the groundlessness of this suspicion. This is important because we are dealing here with a professional performer, toward whom every suspicion is appropriate. These grounds for suspicion led us to take every precaution to prevent the subjects from employing tricks. For precisely this reason I directed my attention chiefly to thought-transference experiments at a distance, observing all the necessary precautions. Experiments in thought transference with direct contact, where it is impossible to prevent signaling between the subjects, I demonstrated merely to prove that contact accelerates direct thought transference.

Although I admit that every suspicion is appropriate in this instance, one must not go so far in this direction as to remain suspicious even when there are absolutely no grounds for suspicion beyond the fact that the subject is a professional performer. Yet just such mistrust was expressed by several medical colleagues, who asserted that there must be deception somewhere. They asserted this, first, because they had a professional performer before them and, second, because thought transference seemed improbable and incomprehensible to them. But if something seems improbable to us, this cannot serve as proof that it is impossible. Charles Richet said this long ago on the same occasion. As for the subjects’ professional activity, it is within our power to arrange the experiments in such a way that every possibility of deception is excluded.

It might be objected that in my experiments the possibility of deception was not entirely excluded and that those present could not form a firm conviction that no fraud was taking place. To this I have the following reply. Since everyone who attended my experiments was very skeptical, they always supervised the subjects extremely carefully and frequently placed themselves between the two for this purpose. Yet no one could ever show me that he had noticed even the slightest indication of signaling by the father. Let us nevertheless concede for a moment that the latter managed to transmit signals despite this. In such a case we must assume that the subjects had a separate sign for every letter of the alphabet, since Sophie often guessed words unknown to her, such as “Policinell” and “Mortira,” spelling them out, as it were. If that were so, the father would have had to transmit not one signal but an entire series, corresponding to the number of letters in the word held in mind, in order to signal an unfamiliar word. It is utterly improbable that spectators watching the whole process so closely would not have caught a single sign.

Finally, let us concede even the impossible: that the father, although remaining completely motionless and silent, nevertheless managed to transmit a whole series of signals to his daughter, sitting ten paces away, without being detected by those present. But how could the girl perceive these signals? Sight and touch must unconditionally be excluded, since Sophie was several paces from her father, turned her back toward him, and had a firm blindfold over her eyes. Only hearing remains, and this is somewhat difficult to exclude completely, since we cannot be entirely certain that the girl really does not hear. Nevertheless, it is within our power to reduce her hearing considerably, by plugging the external auditory canals with a thick layer of cotton wool. Certain signs allowed one to conclude that under these circumstances Sophie really did not perceive ordinary sounds. These signs are as follows. When, standing behind the girl whose ears were firmly plugged, I addressed her in a whisper or an ordinary voice, she remained motionless and gave the impression of being deaf. But when, gradually raising my voice, I reached a fairly high note, the girl made a violent movement with her whole body on the chair and turned toward me with the question, “What?” The very fact that Sophie turned her head sharply and suddenly toward me only when I raised my voice very much speaks strongly in favor of the genuineness of her deafness to ordinary sounds. It is difficult to suppose that the girl feigned deafness so skillfully, when I introduced the plugging of the ears with cotton wool into the experimental arrangement entirely unexpectedly and to the subjects’ complete surprise. This is quite apart from the fact that Sophie’s whole character, which I had the opportunity to observe daily for three months, could by no means have suggested that she was capable of deceiving and making fools of others.

Can it be supposed, then, that the girl, with her ears plugged in this way, perceived a whole series of acoustic signals while the physicians sitting between her and her father, with their ears open and their attention strained to the utmost, were unable to perceive the slightest indication of them? To assume this would be to defy common sense and refuse to see facts that strike us as so incomprehensible and improbable. It should incidentally be noted that plugging the ears with cotton wool must have affected the experimental results very unfavorably. The procedure was unpleasant for a girl already so nervous. The unfamiliar sensation of cotton wool in her ears irritated her and undoubtedly affected her mental equilibrium. This circumstance could not fail to react upon the success of the experiments, for which complete mental calm is necessary. Yet despite these unfavorable factors, the results of my experiments were favorable.

Finally, the experiments in thought transference into another room, both directly and by means of a wire, completely remove the basis for any doubt about the genuineness of the phenomena observed.

Among other objections, the following was also raised. If Sophie really possesses the ability to read thoughts, why is she unable to read the thoughts of anyone other than her father? To this I would reply as follows. When we are dealing with a phenomenon that is wholly unknown and incomprehensible to us, we have no right to demand that it occur under these conditions rather than those. Still less have we the right to deny the phenomenon merely because it does not occur when we wish it to. I shall confine myself to pointing out that in Dr. Krainsky’s cases too, discussed above, the experiments in thought transference with the “possessed” succeeded only for Krainsky himself and no one else. Only a hypothetical answer is possible to the question of why this is so. But this circumstance, I repeat, cannot be regarded as an objection to the fact itself, all the less since I too, as the experiments reported above show, succeeded in transferring my thoughts to Sophie, albeit with contact. I attached no particular importance to my own experiments with Sophie, since they could not provide me with such rich material for conclusions as those of her father with her. The experiments conducted with me had significance only in principle, in the sense that they were intended to establish the genuineness of the phenomenon itself.

Unfortunately, the following idea also occurred to me very late. Starting from the consideration that the girl apparently perceives auditory excitations arising in her father’s brain (see below), I concluded that Sophie should be able to guess a melody her father sang mentally to himself. Even if, contrary to common sense, one assumes that in all the preceding experiments the father had “telephoned” the mentally chosen word to the girl by means of special signals, it could not be supposed that they had any agreed signs for signaling musical themes in experiments on their transference introduced entirely unexpectedly for the subjects. Naturally, I chose themes that had no words, such as popular waltzes, marches, elegies, and the like. The results of these experiments were, as was to be expected, wholly favorable. Sophie, some distance from her father, began to sing what I had instructed him to sing mentally to himself. I indicated the theme to the father by first sending the girl to a distant room, closing all the doors firmly, and then singing my chosen theme into his ear almost inaudibly (compare Session X). I can only regret that the idea of testing the genuineness of the phenomenon in question by suggesting musical themes occurred to me much too late, so that I was unable to demonstrate it to the skeptical colleagues. It seems to me, however, that even such a test would not have shaken the skepticism of those who did not wish to believe.

The possibility of deliberate deception is thus decisively excluded by the experimental arrangement I employed. In order to explain the phenomena observed, we must therefore turn to another interpretation, namely the theory of involuntary self-deception, according to which it is not thoughts but the agent’s unconscious muscular movements that are “read.” I need not dwell long on this theory, for even if it barely manages to explain cases in which mentally conceived actions are performed, and even these only with contact, it is absolutely incapable of explaining the guessing of mentally conceived words at a distance.

As for the hypothesis of conscious or involuntary whispering, its application to our case, under the experimental arrangement we employed, is positively absurd. To suppose that the girl, with her ears plugged and her father absolutely silent, had been able to perceive certain sounds that none of those present could hear even with the most strenuous attention would be to accept hypotheses more hazardous than the facts and their boldest interpretation permit.

We thus have no alternative but to conclude that in the observations I have reported, a real transference of thoughts as such took place. This conclusion follows necessarily from the totality of the reported observations, and we have no right to deny it merely because it seems improbable to us and is not yet amenable to an explanation in terms of natural science. Such an explanation will present itself in due course as a natural consequence of a more precise knowledge and analysis of the facts. Exact science, however, is above all obliged to establish the facts themselves as they present themselves to us, without seeking to foist upon them explanations far less well founded than the facts themselves. Let us therefore bow before the facts and proceed to analyze them.

It should first be noted that, in the process of thought transference in our case, excitation of the auditory regions of the subjects’ speech center apparently plays the chief role. We have seen that the mistakes and errors were phonetic in character: that is, they give the impression that the girl hears poorly the word her father holds in mind. This was the circumstance that gave particular occasion for suspicion among those present. I merely recall, however, that we encounter the same kinds of errors in Lombroso’s experiments, and that in Shuk’s experiments in guessing mentally conceived drawings, where whispering could consequently no longer be involved, the reproduced drawings gave the impression that the percipient had had an opportunity to cast a fleeting glance at the originals. In other words, in my experiments and Lombroso’s there resulted indistinct auditory images of mentally conceived words, while in Shuk’s there were indistinct visual images of mentally conceived drawings. This circumstance compels us to assume that we are faced with a law-governed phenomenon, by virtue of which either the visual or the auditory centers are excited in the percipient in each given case, but to a weaker degree than in the agent. Since excitation of the centers in the percipient apparently stands in connection with their excitation in the agent at the moment of thought, it is worth recalling, on this occasion, certain facts concerning the nature of our thinking.

When we think, says Professor J. Déjérine, we can do so in two ways. Either we think in images of objects or in images of words. In the latter case we converse with ourselves: that is, we think with the aid of our inner speech (langage intérieur). All three speech centers, the auditory, motor, and visual, play a part in the functioning of our inner speech, but in different degrees. Auditory representations emerge first: we think by means of auditory images, and at the moment when we hear the word, the representation of the movements required to pronounce it emerges in us. This means that the auditory representation has evoked a corresponding motor representation. In other words, our inner speech proceeds with the aid of auditory and motor representations. As for visual images, they play only a subordinate part in the mechanism of inner speech.²⁹

Consequently, at the moment when the agent thinks of the chosen word, that is, repeats it to himself, it is chiefly his auditory speech center that is excited. But if he holds the name of an object in mind, then his visual speech center probably becomes excited as well as the auditory one.

Let us compare our observations with this. The girl herself explains that when guessing a word she is unable to decide definitely whether she hears it or not. “For some reason,” she says, “just such a word or syllable suddenly comes into my mind.” If, on the other hand, an object is thought of, a whole series of objects presses itself upon her imagination, and she instinctively feels the need to name one of them, as she herself states. There is reason to suppose, however, that even when objects are guessed, it is predominantly Sophie’s auditory center that becomes excited. Thus, when the word “Porträt” was transferred, she began to stammer, “per … pra … pero …”; to “Bulka” she answers, “uk … udk … bu … bulka”; to “Sjurtuk,” the answer is “tu … tru … ju … sjurtuk” (see Sessions II, III, and IV), and so forth. In view of this circumstance we can assert that at the moment of guessing, auditory images of the words her father holds in mind emerge in Sophie first and foremost: that is, her auditory speech center is primarily and chiefly excited. There is therefore apparently complete harmony between these two processes, the father’s thinking and the girl’s guessing, in the sense that in both cases the auditory speech centers become excited, while the representations emerging in the father’s head are somehow perceived by Sophie.

On the basis of these considerations we may conclude with considerable probability that the character of the errors in thought transference, whether visual or auditory, is conditioned by the type of thought process in the agent and the special receptivity of one or another center in the percipient. I therefore also believe that in my own case the visual type of thought process predominates (see point 5 of the concluding propositions on page 37). If we analyze the process of thought transference further, we can also discern that the guessing apparently takes place unconsciously. Richet already observed this in his experiments, and all later investigators confirmed it. Lack of consciousness serves better here than the strongest desire to guess. Partial unconsciousness, Richet’s inconscience partielle, evidently plays an enormous role in successful thought-reading. The famous Bishop declared that during guessing he sank into a certain half-delirious state, which he attempted to describe more precisely with the term rêverie. In Krainsky’s case, a deep somnambulistic state in the “possessed” was even necessary for the experiments to succeed. As for my own case, the subject did not need to be in any special state for the experiments to succeed. Sophie was always able to guess under all circumstances, and while guessing she was often even mischievous and joked about. I forbade her to do this only in the experiments described above, where caution was required to exclude deception. For the experiments to succeed better, however, it was always necessary to remove any external impressions that might distract Sophie, so that she often herself asked to be blindfolded during the session. Furthermore, in every case where she tried to work out by guessing which word had been chosen, she was constantly mistaken. Finally, another circumstance supports the view that the process takes place unconsciously: Sophie often could not recall at all the words she had guessed a minute earlier. From this we may conclude with sufficient probability that if thought-reading is to succeed, the higher centers of the percipient’s psychical activity must be in as complete a state of rest as possible.

Passing now from establishing the facts of direct thought transference to the question of the manner in which it takes place, we may for the present make the following observations. The modern scientific worldview rests on two fundamental laws: (1) no effect without a cause, and (2) no action at a distance without intermediate forces. These two principles have always served as a reliable guiding star in scientific research and have repeatedly rendered enormous services to science in important discoveries. Taking these two principles as our starting point on the one hand, and considering the scientific achievements of modern times in physics on the other, we must express the following considerations concerning the manner of thought transference.

If thought arising in one person’s brain can be transferred to another person without the mediation of the external sense organs, then this transference must take place by means of a radiating energy that probably develops in the thinking subject’s brain, spreads from there in every direction, and evokes various representations in another person’s brain. What this energy is, we do not yet know. But on the basis of the capacity we attribute to it to cause the appearance of various representations in the human brain, we can call it psychic energy. Furthermore, on the basis of the conclusions from the observations reported above (see page 36), we can more closely define certain properties of this presumed radiating psychic energy.

Since thought transference takes place comparatively rapidly and perfectly with direct contact, we may suppose that the human body, or certain of its elements, serves as a good conductor for this presumed energy, along which it propagates with greater ease and speed. Since, however, thought is also transferred at a distance without contact, the assumption is justified that this radiating energy also propagates through the air. But from the fact that thought-reading at a distance proceeds much more slowly and imperfectly, it follows that air is a poorer conductor of this unknown radiant energy, so that it is considerably weakened and loses strength in passing through the air. Further, thought transference through a door indicates that psychic energy can penetrate opaque partitions, while the improvement and acceleration of transference by means of a copper wire indicate that the latter is a good conductor of psychic energy. Finally, the better and easier transference of the names of everyday objects and familiar words apparently indicates that the radiation of psychic energy reaches a higher tension when thinking of these objects and words than with abstract and incomprehensible terms. The totality of our observations and the theoretical conclusions based upon them thus leads us, independently of the views developed in the introduction, to formulate the following hypothesis.

There exists a radiating psychic energy that arises in a person’s brain during thought, passes into the brains of other people, evokes auditory and visual images there, and possesses the following physical properties:

1. It propagates easily in the human body from the brain to the periphery and vice versa.
2. It penetrates air and opaque partitions, but is partially absorbed by them.
3. It is well conducted by a copper wire.
4. Its tension varies.

These are the inevitable conclusions from the observations I have reported, provided that the latter are recognized as properly conducted and the possibility of every deception, conscious as well as unconscious, as entirely excluded. I believe there is no reason to withhold this recognition from my experiments. Whatever the reader may think, however, I ask only that he keep firmly in mind that the apparent improbability of any occurrence can never serve as proof of its impossibility.

IV. Double Consciousness, Automatic Writing, and Mediumship

However detailed and convincing all the experiments reported above may be, it must nevertheless be admitted that they alone do not suffice to establish scientifically a fact whose possibility is still disputed by numerous representatives of science, both in principle and in actuality.

Certainly no phenomenon becomes less real because most scholars have not yet acknowledged it. In positive science, however, it is rightly a rule, one that protects us from hasty and frequently erroneous conclusions, to regard as a securely established scientific result only a phenomenon that any investigator can test experimentally and repeat at will any number of times.³⁰

In the preceding experiments, it is true, I succeeded to a considerable extent in fulfilling these conditions and obtaining material of considerable scientific value. Nevertheless, the significance of this material is diminished, first, because the subject of my experiments was a rare specimen who cannot often be available to every other investigator; and, second, because my experiments were more in the nature of experimental observations than pure experiments, in which I should have played not only the part of an observer but also that of an agent. Experimental observations alone certainly possess enormous scientific value, both in general and in the present case. But let us once and for all adopt the standpoint that the existence and radiation of psychic energy is a postulate of the energetic theory of thought. The possibility of thought transference must then be regarded as the rule, rather than as an exceptional phenomenon. In other words, from the energetic standpoint every human being is already an agent by the mere fact of possessing a brain, and must consequently possess the ability to transfer his thoughts to another person.

The energetic theory does not, however, settle the question of whether every subject can be a percipient: that is, whether he can take in the psychic energy of any agent whatever. If we set about solving this question on the basis of the comparative rarity of cases in which thought transference is directly observed, we would be entitled to assume that, in order to perceive another’s thoughts, the percipient must possess certain special qualities that apparently are not frequently encountered.

If we succeeded in determining these qualities and the sure signs by which their presence could be recognized in one subject or another, it would no longer be difficult to develop reliable methods for conducting thought-transference experiments. A scientific means of proving the fact in question, accessible to everyone, would thus be opened up.

Let us now try to find in the preceding experiments indications of the circumstances that may contribute to solving the task we have set ourselves.

We saw above that one of the conditions favoring the process of thought perception is the percipient’s unconscious or half-conscious state, and that the process of perception in any case takes place unconsciously. To derive the greatest possible benefit from this observation for our purpose, we must depart somewhat from the immediate subject of the present work and consider what unconscious psychical activity actually is and how the relation between conscious and unconscious processes is constituted.

The fact is that a whole series of phenomena from the fields of normal and pathological psychology, as well as the results of comparative psychology, inevitably presses every thorough thinker toward the conclusion that there are no “unconscious” psychical phenomena. Everything hitherto customarily described as unconscious cerebral activity actually possesses all the characteristic features of the ordinary consciousness familiar to us.

The existence of ordinary consciousness is conditioned by the intensity of the thought processes taking place in the brain and by attention being fixed upon them. Consciousness is merely the result of a synthesis of certain psychical processes; so-called lack of consciousness indicates only the absence of synthesis. The phenomena of hypnotic suggestion demonstrate that anything “conscious” can be transformed at any moment into something “unconscious,” and conversely, everything that has ever taken place in our brain without the participation of so-called “consciousness” can be recalled into it. Consequently, psychology now speaks increasingly often of two forms of consciousness: the conscious mind, or “upper consciousness,” and the subconscious mind, or “lower consciousness.”

A. Binet, referring to the well-known case of complete division of personality in Dr. Azam’s patient, says:

The human being is no longer a simple unity. For if he were, it would be incomprehensible how, under certain conditions, some patients … can exhibit several different personalities. What can be divided must consist of several parts. If a personality can double and triple itself, this proves that it represents a complex, a union, the resultant of several elements.³¹

In view of these considerations and a whole series of other circumstances to be discussed below, the German psychologist Max Dessoir proposed dividing our total consciousness into two halves: the conscious and the subconscious mind. In his interesting work on the double ego, this author analyzes certain “unconscious” manifestations of the human psyche and connects them with the activity of the subconscious mind.

It seems necessary, he says, to distinguish between that part of consciousness which is presented to the individual’s awareness and that which is withdrawn from it under normal conditions. We carry within us, as it were, a hidden sphere of consciousness which, endowed with intellect, sensation, and will, is capable of determining a series of actions.³²

Dessoir proposes calling this hidden sphere the subconscious mind, in contrast to the part of consciousness whose activity always comes to our awareness, which he calls the conscious mind.

Admittedly, this division of our total consciousness into two spheres, an upper and a lower, is not especially fortunate, since it in a sense subordinates the latter to the former and thus anticipates the solution to a question that can be correctly settled only after the most careful comparative study of all the vital manifestations of each part of consciousness separately. Dessoir himself also emphasizes that he by no means wishes to prejudge the question through this division, but has chosen the designation merely as an easily understood image, which he is quite willing to abandon in favor of a more appropriate one.

It must not be overlooked, however, that more appropriate terms can be found only when we have thoroughly investigated the two spheres of consciousness we seek to define more closely. Until then, we may adopt Dessoir’s division, which is in any case greatly preferable to the customary division of our psyche into a “conscious” and an “unconscious” sphere. The latter division creates a deep gulf between forms of manifestation of our psyche that are essentially of the same kind, and places insuperable difficulties in the way of solving the question of the relationship of unconscious processes to conscious ones and the possibility of the former passing into the latter.

This artificially created difficulty is removed by Dessoir’s division, which emphasizes the complete identity of the processes occurring in our brain, whether above or below the level of our awareness. For this very reason the division was received sympathetically by a number of other authors, who in their turn developed and supplemented the German psychologist’s arguments.

The experience of self-observation alone, says Forel, enables us to recognize experimentally that many things which seem unconscious to us are or were nevertheless conscious. Indeed, certain sensory impressions remain unconscious to our ordinary or upper consciousness at the moment they occur, yet can subsequently be recalled into it. Entire chains of cerebral activities, dreams, somnambulism, or second consciousness, ordinarily seem excluded from the conscious mind, but can subsequently be associated with its remembered contents by suggestion or otherwise. In all these cases, therefore, the apparently unconscious proves nevertheless to be conscious.

In view of these considerations, Forel, in agreement with Max Dessoir, proposes calling our ordinary consciousness the conscious mind, and all the other consciousnesses, partly forgotten and partly only loosely or indirectly connected with the contents of the conscious mind, that is, everything hitherto understood as “the unconscious,” the subconscious mind. “Consciousness,” he continues, “does not exist at all in and of itself, but only through cerebral activity, of which it is the inner reflection. … Our conscious mind signifies only a summary, synthetic, incomplete, subjective illumination of the stronger portion of our cerebral activity.”³³

Only recently, J. Grasset³⁴ devoted a special work to the same question. He likewise divides our psyche into two spheres of almost equal significance. He adheres, however, to the view that the hidden half of the human psyche lacks the element of consciousness. For this very reason, unlike Forel, he speaks not of two “consciousnesses” but of two “psyches,” an upper and a lower. “Psychical processes,” he says, “fall into two groups: (1) psychical processes of a higher order, conscious, voluntary, and free; (2) psychical processes of a lower order, unconscious, automatic, and involuntary.” The former belong to the upper psyche, the latter to the lower.

Numerous weighty objections were raised by Pierre Janet, Binet, Gondard, and others against Grasset’s view that the lower or inferior psyche lacks the element of consciousness. We shall not discuss them further here, since the dispute turns not on the substance of the matter but merely on words. It is enough to point out that Grasset endows the lower psyche with all the attributes we have hitherto been accustomed to ascribe to consciousness: memory, imagination, association of ideas, creative imagination, logic, and so forth. “The lower psyche,” he says, “possesses as great or even greater significance than the higher. All psychical functions also take place in the lower psyche, and in many cases the latter’s role is dominant.”³⁵

From these words it is easy to see that, in denying the element of consciousness to the lower psyche, Grasset assigns a particular content to the latter concept, an interpretation that is naturally binding on no one. For us it is important only to establish that this author’s work fully confirms a fact whose recognition is now beginning to become common knowledge and which is of the greatest far-reaching significance for the further development of psychology: namely, that the human personality is composed of at least two spheres, two parts of consciousness or two psyches, each possessing all the properties characteristic of our ordinary consciousness.

Both parts of consciousness, the conscious and the subconscious mind, exist side by side in the same brain and can carry on their activity simultaneously or alternately. While the functioning of our ordinary consciousness, the conscious mind, comes fully to our awareness, we do not even suspect that at the same time our subconscious mind is also active, judging, evaluating impressions arriving from the external world, and drawing conclusions on their basis.

Under the ordinary conditions of our cerebral activity, the subconscious mind makes itself known through almost nothing, and we therefore have no inkling of it. In certain states of our psyche, however, such as somnambulism, the subconscious mind comes to the foreground, begins to dominate the scene exclusively, and pushes the conscious mind back to the position it itself occupied in the waking state.

There are cases, however, in which the conscious and subconscious mind are active simultaneously and independently, manifest themselves in different actions, and know not the slightest thing about one another.

The actions through which the subconscious mind demonstrates itself independently of the conscious mind are ordinarily called automatic, and the capacity for such actions is called psychical automatism. In other words, the latter term denotes the capacity for actions that bear every mark of psychical determination, being rational and considered, but that are nevertheless not “known” at all to the person performing them at the moment of performance.

A classic work in the investigation of the various manifestations of mental automatism, one that served as the starting point for analogous investigations by a whole series of other authors, Dessoir among them, is Pierre Janet’s book on psychological automatism³⁶ in hysterical and hypnotized persons.

Of all the kinds of psychical automatism, the one that chiefly interests us here is graphic automatism, that is, automatic writing, which provides rich material for highly instructive conclusions. Automatic writing consists in the ability of some people, under certain conditions, for example while engaged in conversation with another person, simultaneously to write down individual words, sentences, and entire connected passages by means of a pencil placed in their hand, automatically: that is, without in the least willing it or noticing it.

In this way they can sometimes divulge their most hidden secrets or relate what was suggested to them at some time under hypnosis, of which their conscious mind has not the slightest conception.

Cases of this kind of graphic automatism have been described by various authors whose names guarantee the credibility of the facts they report, such as Pierre Janet, Binet, Féré, Dessoir, and others. These authors made their observations chiefly on hysterical persons and on people who had been subjected to posthypnotic suggestions. In the former, graphic automatism usually manifested itself in the anesthetic hand; in the latter, anesthesia was not required. A hysterical person whose attention is distracted by something can, without noticing it, write down perfectly reasonable answers to questions softly put by a third person whose presence she does not even suspect. A person subjected to a posthypnotic suggestion can in the same way communicate everything that was once suggested to him.

Graphic automatism is, among other things, one of the principal peculiarities of spiritualist mediums, that is, those people with whose help all spiritualist “miracles” are performed. Since in what follows I shall have to discuss certain manifestations of graphic automatism in mediums, I consider it appropriate to define at once my position on the question of the nature of mediumship.

Every branch of knowledge has in its time passed through a stage in which facts inaccessible to explanation led, on the one hand, to their denial, and on the other to superstition and the construction of all kinds of fantastic theories. The question of mediumistic phenomena is at present precisely in such a stage.

As for the mental state called mediumship, its nature has now been clarified to a high degree through the investigations of outstanding psychologists and neurologists. Most of the phenomena observed in mediumship, however, still await scientific investigation and explanation. Only such an explanation can put an end to the origin and spread of spiritualist superstition and fantastic imaginings, which owe their existence to the human mind’s ineradicable need for an explanation of the phenomena it observes.

“It is truly no wonder,” Dessoir rightly remarks,

that spiritualism … spreads ever further, since the most qualified representatives of science disdain to this very day to investigate the facts underlying the mystical-religious theories and to remove them from the spell of superstition. … Nothing is more unjustified, nothing more unscientific, than the fearful avoidance of this field, especially in our day, when the same tactic toward hypnotism has fortunately been abandoned.³⁷

The task of positive science now consists in clearing a path toward the discovery of truth between two equally unscientific extremes: the denial of the facts and their fantastic interpretation.

What, then, is mediumship as a psychical state? Most authors who have investigated this question agree that mediumship represents a mental state that arises as soon as the subconscious mind detaches itself from its connection with the conscious mind and becomes active independently of it, although alongside it. The fact is that in so-called “normal” people the activity of the two spheres of consciousness is so intimately connected, so firmly associated, that independent work by either is impossible. The psychical activity manifested by a normal person is merely the result of the coordinated work of the conscious and subconscious mind, although the manifestations of this activity are determined by the conscious mind alone. What characterizes the normal personality is precisely the firm association of all the elements and complexes of total consciousness.

In certain states of our total consciousness, however, brought about by causes still unknown, an insufficient or weak association develops, resulting in a partial dissociation of the elements of consciousness. This dissociation can attain different degrees in its duration and in the extent of the regions of consciousness affected. When the entire complex of consciousness is dissociated or insufficiently firmly associated, its individual elements are capable of carrying on their activity independently, almost without any connection with the remainder of consciousness. From this results the picture of the various “hysterical” states, from graphic automatism to clearly pronounced hysteria.

In calling graphic automatism a “hysterical” phenomenon, we are nevertheless far from identifying mediumship with hysteria, as so many are inclined to do. These two states have only this in common: in both there is a dissociation or insufficient association of the elements of total consciousness. But the difference between them is considerable.

In hysteria, dissociation forms only one of the symptoms. What must be regarded as characteristic of hysteria is the ready mobility of the elements of consciousness, by virtue of which the dissociation of some elements can disappear as rapidly as an abnormal association of other elements can arise. In hysteria we are equally concerned with disturbances of normal associations and with the appearance of unusual and abnormal ones. The characteristic property of this mental state, however, consists in the instability of the elements of consciousness. And it is precisely because of this fundamental property of hysteria that those affected by it are such responsive subjects for hypnotic suggestion. Suggestion always operates with individual elements or complexes of consciousness, separating or combining them at will. Naturally, this is most easily accomplished in people whose elements of consciousness are loosely connected and readily mobile.

The situation is quite different in mediumistic persons. What characterizes them is not the ready mobility of the elements of consciousness, which can naturally also occur in them, but rather dissociation itself, distinguished by great persistence. This dissociation always concerns two spheres of consciousness of almost equal significance, each representing a very extensive complex and capable of functioning as an entire consciousness with all its attributes. One we called the conscious mind, the other the subconscious mind. The dissociation of these two spheres makes possible a greater or lesser independence of each, which manifests itself, among other things, in the automatic writing of mediums. In addition to the difference between mediumship and hysteria just given, there is another, to be discussed below.

According to P. Janet, mediums, when they are good, “represent the type of an almost complete division of personality, in which the two personalities do not know one another at all and enter into action independently of one another.”³⁸

According to J. Grasset, mediums are people “whose lower psyche is very active, separates very easily from the higher, and very rapidly translates its mental activity into actions,” or, expressed otherwise, “a medium is a person endowed with a lively imagination in the lower psyche and, at the same time, with a high degree of capacity for dissociation of the two psyches.”³⁹

Although the dissociation of the two spheres of consciousness in mediums is marked by comparative persistence, it is nevertheless inconstant. From time to time, under the influence of causes not yet elucidated, the dissociation disappears. With it disappears the condition for the independent activity of the subconscious mind, and the capacity for graphic automatism is lost. After a time, several days or even weeks, the dissociation reappears and the vanished activity returns.

I considered it necessary to dwell somewhat longer on the similarities and differences between hysteria and mediumship because most authors are inclined to regard mediumship as one of the manifestations of hysteria and to build their explanation of mediumistic phenomena themselves upon this. The explanation amounts to saying that all mediums are victims of hysterical self-deception or autosuggestion. This conclusion undoubtedly rests on very hasty generalizations made with an extremely superficial knowledge of the relevant facts. I can only urge everyone with a lively interest in science to undertake the most serious investigation of all the phenomena of mediumship, since such study promises a rich yield for science, as will already become evident from my further discussion.

Having illuminated the nature of mediumship as a mental state, and now turning to its manifestations, I intend here to deal only with graphic automatism, which offers us sufficient material for very important conclusions. W. James says:

Mediumship is an extremely complicated phenomenon and has only recently become the object of rigorously scientific investigation. The weakest degree of the mediumistic state is represented by automatic writing. The weakest manifestation of the latter is found in cases where the subject becomes conscious of the words he writes, but feels a certain external impulse compelling him to write. Next comes unconscious writing, which is performed even while reading or conversing.⁴⁰

As for the intellectual content of mediums’ automatic writing, most authors, Dessoir, Janet, Flournoy, Grasset, and others, regard it as a reproduction of the ideas contained in the medium’s subconscious mind. In automatic writing, the subconscious mind is said to exercise its rational activity, apparently using the organs of our body as skillfully as our ordinary conscious mind does. The spiritualists’ belief in the beyond rests in part on this circumstance, among others. Not knowing where the perfectly reasonable answers given by “psychographic” mediums come from, the spiritualists ascribe them to their spirits. The latter are supposed to choose mediums as instruments for communicating with living people. In other words, spiritualists ascribe the activity of the medium’s subconscious mind to their spirits.

Such an explanation of the contents of automatic writing undoubtedly corresponds to reality in many cases, but it cannot encompass all cases of graphic automatism in mediums. The fact is that during a séance a medium sometimes makes known in writing circumstances of which his subconscious mind could in no way have known. For example, mediums communicate details from the lives of participants whom they are seeing for the very first time. In confirmation of this fact I appeal to James, whom surely no one would venture to suspect of mystification or of a lack of critical judgment.

James expresses himself on this subject as follows:

The only strange circumstance is that people unfamiliar with spiritualist traditions speak in the name of the dead while in the state of mediumistic trance, in several cases live through the illusions of their death agonies, communicate news of their life in the land of eternal summer, and reveal the faults and errors of people taking part in the séance. I have no theory to explain the numerous facts I have seen with my own eyes. Nevertheless, on the basis of a whole series of observations of a medium in a trance, I am convinced that the spirit need not bear the slightest resemblance to the subject’s normal personality. I can point to a case in which the “spirit” was a French doctor who, as I was able to ascertain, knew all manner of circumstances from the lives of the very numerous participants in the séance, as well as of their living and deceased relatives and acquaintances, whom the female medium had never previously met and whom she did not even know by name. … I hope that this personal declaration of mine may induce two or three of my readers to undertake the investigation of this field, which the so-called “priests of science” usually consider unworthy of attention.⁴¹

Thus the medium’s subconscious mind, the spiritualists’ “spirit,” is able, by means of the automatically writing hand, to communicate facts that the medium could not possibly have known. How, then, does the subconscious mind come to possess this knowledge? How does knowledge of what it has never itself seen or heard enter the medium’s subconscious mind?

If we take into account that the medium always reports facts from the lives of those attending the séance, or in general facts known to someone present, only one answer to the question is possible. Evidently the knowledge of the facts passes from the consciousness of those present into the medium’s subconscious mind without the mediation of the external sense organs. In other words, I explain all those incomprehensible cases in which mediums at spiritualist séances communicate the most secret thoughts or the most intimate events in the lives of those present by an involuntary transference to the medium, at a distance, of the thoughts stirring in the brains of those present, in their conscious or subconscious minds.⁴²

If this were so, mediums would provide precisely the people who, as I explained at the beginning of this chapter, could serve as percipients in thought-transference experiments. In view of the present widespread prevalence of spiritualism, which always works with mediums, one would suppose that their number was not small, especially that of writing mediums, who according to James represent the weakest degree of the mediumistic state. Consequently, any investigator interested in the question under discussion should be able without difficulty to find in his place of residence the percipient required for his experiments.

The reader naturally understands that to clarify the present question it was necessary to conduct a series of experiments on some medium. I therefore resolved to do so.

V. Further Experiments of My Own: The Transference of Visual Representations and Emotions

At the beginning of the preceding chapter I started from the fact that thoughts are perceived unconsciously. After examining the nature of the so-called unconscious processes, I then reached the conclusion that mediums might prove suitable percipients for experiments in thought transference. They represent a type of person in whom the subconscious mind (the unconscious sphere) makes its store of ideas known through automatic writing, independently of the conscious mind and without its knowledge.

Having reached this conviction, I resolved to conduct a series of experiments to test the correctness of my conclusions and, at the same time, of the facts themselves that had led me to them. I therefore needed to find a medium willing to place herself entirely at my disposal for the purposes of my investigations. Chance, that good genius of every investigator, came to my aid. I learned that a young woman of my acquaintance, Miss Lydia W., possessed the faculty of graphic automatism. She had discovered it when, in jest, it once occurred to her to hold a spiritualist séance with her sisters. They arranged their séance according to the usual spiritualist pattern, about which I think it appropriate to say a few words here.

The fact is that, at spiritualist sittings, the traditional “saucer” most often takes the place of a pencil in the medium’s hands; she finds it much easier to operate than a pencil. The sitting is usually arranged as follows. A sheet of paper is laid on the table, with the letters of the alphabet written on it in any order. An ordinary saucer is placed upside down on the sheet, and an arrow pointing from the center toward the rim is drawn in ink at some point on its edge.

The medium sits down at the table and places her hand on the saucer, which soon begins to move. Another person sits nearby, follows its movements, and writes down the letters indicated in succession by the arrow drawn on its rim.

The séance begins when someone present asks the “spirit” a question about something. After a while the hand and saucer begin to move slowly, the arrow pointing to one letter after another; as a rule, the saucer pauses momentarily at each. These letters, most carefully recorded by the other person, form words, whole sentences, and lengthy discussions, which are regarded as the answer to the question put to the “spirit.” During the sitting the medium can converse, occupy herself with all sorts of things, and often even refrain from looking at the sheet bearing the alphabet. Nevertheless, her hand moves toward particular letters and thus gives a coherent, sensible answer to the question asked.

In these experiments, then, a saucer with an arrow and a ready-made alphabet take the place of the pencil. This arrangement has many advantages over the pencil. In writing with a pencil, the medium has to perform a series of very complicated coordinated movements, which also require considerable effort because of the friction between the paper and the pencil point. Under these circumstances the medium may involuntarily notice what she is writing; wholly unconscious writing could therefore be obtained only in a trance, a state in which the medium does not always find herself.

Once a saucer and a ready-made alphabet are used, however, the matter becomes considerably simpler. First, the hand need perform only the simplest movements, backward and forward. Second, it has a support on the smooth-rimmed saucer and therefore glides over the paper very easily. Add to this that the medium often need not look at the alphabet at all, and it is clear that under such conditions she can very easily write down answers automatically, without the slightest knowledge of their contents and without being in anything remotely like a trance.

For these reasons I, too, thought it appropriate to adopt the spiritualist pattern in the experiments to be described below, merely replacing the traditional saucer with a triangle cut from ordinary cardboard and mounted on three bone cuff links.

A cardboard triangle of this kind, or planchette, glides very easily and noiselessly over the paper and points to the letters with one of its corners or with a paper arrow attached to it.

Before describing my experiments with Miss Lydia W., which were carried out in the first half of 1907, it is appropriate to say something about Lydia herself. She is eighteen years old, has finished girls’ school, and is now attending the women’s higher courses in Moscow. On objective examination Lydia presents no abnormalities: sensation is normal everywhere, there are no areas of anesthesia, and the reflexes are slightly heightened. In character she is quiet, reserved, somewhat phlegmatic and introspective; within her family she exercises a certain influence over the others. Although she generally displays considerable independence, she often shows a lack of willpower where a quick decision must be made and carried out. One fact in her history deserves particular mention. When she was eight or nine years old, she suffered for a considerable time from visual hallucinations, on the basis of which she occasionally spun a web of entertaining tall tales. Only after these phenomena had disappeared did her relatives understand that something abnormal had been taking place. Lydia herself, however, remembers nothing of that period of her life and cannot recall what she saw. It is not without interest that one of her sisters suffers from unmistakably hysterical attacks, though of a mild kind. Otherwise there is nothing noteworthy about either Lydia W. or her close relatives.

I thus had a suitable psychological subject at my disposal and proceeded to investigate the mediumistic phenomena that interested me and to test my conclusions, which were, so to speak, a priori. Besides Lydia and myself, her sister sometimes took part in my experiments whenever I needed a third person’s assistance. On these occasions her conscientiousness and patience made her quite indispensable to me as a helper and assistant.

The experimental arrangement was the same as that used by the spiritualists. Lydia sat at the table with her hand resting on the cardboard triangle; her sister followed the movements of the hand and wrote down the letters; I asked the questions. My experiments differed from spiritualist séances, however, in one small detail that was highly important for my purposes. In spiritualist circles the questions are generally spoken aloud by someone present, whereas, in view of the problem to be solved, I decided to ask my questions in thought rather than aloud.

Indeed, if my supposition was correct that mediumistic phenomena involved the direct transference of thoughts from those present to the medium, then I ought to receive a correct answer even if I did not utter my question at all. Such an arrangement makes the experiment unambiguous and highly convincing. Since neither Lydia nor her sister knows what I have in mind, a correct answer allows no explanation except the one clear and simple explanation: the thought is transferred directly.

The following were my first experiments:

Question: How does one get rid of a bad habit?

Answer: I would say, more self-discipline.

Question: How should one struggle against misfortune in life?

Answer: Energy and good cheer mean almost everything in life; if only misfortune does not rob us of our courage, then all is well.

Question: How is this phenomenon to be explained?

Answer: One must probably believe in the power of the supernatural, but also try to approach it critically.

I emphasize once again that I asked my questions in thought, so that neither Lydia nor her sister could know them. Nevertheless, as can be seen, the answers were not accidental but responded directly to my questions. The possibility of deception on Lydia’s part, assuming her capable of it, did not arise at all. Not only did she not know what I had in mind; she also did not know what she had written down. Everything happened entirely automatically. We talked, laughed, and joked about the spirits, while at the same time Lydia’s hand moved slowly toward particular letters and my assistant wrote them down.

Attention should also be drawn to the following detail. The alphabet had been jotted down in pencil on an ordinary sheet of newspaper, and the letters were so faint that Lydia’s sister and I had to bend right down to the table to distinguish them. Lydia, however, not only did not bend over the sheet but often did not look at it at all. At first this circumstance puzzled me: how could Lydia’s hand move toward particular letters if she was not looking at them? The explanation of this mysterious phenomenon was soon found, however. After modifying the experimental arrangement slightly, I was able to establish that, although Lydia was not looking at the letters, she nevertheless saw them unconsciously: that is, with her subconscious rather than her conscious mind. Indeed, I had only to blindfold Lydia or ask her to close her eyes, and her hand stopped moving or wandered aimlessly in various directions. It was therefore clear that in my experiments Lydia required the assistance of sight, but perceived the letters through peripheral rather than direct vision. As is well known, in the former case one can see many things without becoming conscious of them. In other words, during the experiments Lydia’s subconscious mind sees the letters of the alphabet with the periphery of the eye.

The experiments cited thus proved to me that my hypothesis concerning the nature of mediumistic “revelations” was well founded. Wishing to test it in every possible way, however, I went further. If my explanation was correct, if suggestion mentale really was taking place here, then any word I chose to think of could be expected to be transferred and written down in the same way. Experiments undertaken in this direction fully confirmed my expectations and at the same time revealed a number of interesting “errors.”

Here are several such experiments:

Thought of	Written down
Swieeza (candle)	Swieezka (little candle)
Poduschka (cushion)	K … . . Sch … . . Poduschka
Snieg (snow)	Signal
Krowatj (bed)	Revolver
Krowatj	Priwolje (open view)
Bumaga (paper)	Bumaga
Loschadj (horse)	Loschadj
Gaseta (newspaper)	Journal
Ikona (icon)	Rosha (grimace)
Stakan (glass)	Samowar (tea-making apparatus)
Pole (field, meadow)	Trawa (grass)
Lob (forehead)	Slowo (word)
Senega	En … . . Nech … . .
Alexius	Alexandra
Nikolaus	Nikolaus
Swonok (bell)	Swonok
Rieka (river)	Lodka (boat)

Despite the numerous “errors” in the answers written down, these experiments must nevertheless be regarded as highly convincing evidence for thought transference in mediums’ automatic writing. They show that the medium actually perceives thoughts arising in another person and writes them down automatically.

As for the “errors,” their nature can generally be traced to some association: either by affinity or contrast, or by similarity of sound or appearance. As already noted above, this origin of the errors is of great interest to us, since it gives us an important means of elucidating the actual process of thought transference. Indeed, if, instead of the word I have in mind, another word is transferred without my willing it or knowing it, as a result of association by similarity of sound (Snieg–Signal; Lob–Slowo; Krowatj–Priwolje) or by affinity (Gaseta [newspaper]–Journal; Stakan [tea glass]–Samowar [tea-making apparatus]), then these associated ideas have evidently arisen in my subconscious mind in connection with the words thought of by my conscious mind. If so, it is not only the automatic writing that is brought about by the subconscious mind, as I explained above: both the arising of the ideas in the agent and their perception by the medium also take place in the subconscious minds of the two. Otherwise the possibility of such surprising “errors” through association cannot be explained.

The whole process thus takes place chiefly within the subconscious minds of the agent and the medium. The image arising in the agent’s conscious mind is communicated to his subconscious mind, or evokes some associated idea there. The image that has arisen in this way in the agent’s subconscious mind is accompanied by a release of psychic energy, which flows out of the agent’s brain and reaches the medium’s brain by one route or another. Here it evokes a corresponding idea in the medium’s subconscious mind, and this is written down automatically. In the present case the medium’s automatic writing must therefore be regarded as the subconscious mind’s reaction to a stimulus coming from outside in the form of another person’s psychic energy. The medium’s automatic writing is a psychic reflex set off in the subconscious mind.

If the nature of mediumistic ability is considered from this standpoint, much of what occurs at spiritualist séances becomes understandable. In connection with a particular question put to the “spirit,” a whole series of associated ideas may arise in the subconscious minds of those attending the sitting, ideas of which their conscious minds have no inkling at that moment. These associated ideas, which may contain much of interest, are communicated to the medium’s subconscious mind and automatically committed to paper. It is no wonder that automatic records produced in this way sometimes reveal such intimate details or deepest secrets of the participants that they involuntarily acquire an awe bordering on terror and readily believe in the supernatural intervention of omniscient “spirits.”

But as soon as the idea of “spirits” gains numerous adherents and belief in spirits becomes firmly established in the spiritualists’ minds, a vicious circle results from which the spiritualists can no longer find a way out by their own efforts. The spiritualists have populated the whole visible world with their spirits. Their entire consciousness, both conscious and subconscious, is thoroughly infected with belief in spirits. The spirits have taken possession of their consciousness and driven sound, critical common sense out of it. Consequently, when spiritualists put a question to the “spirit,” their subconscious minds expect an answer only from a spirit, and indeed from a quite particular spirit, the so-called guardian spirit of the circle in question. The images and ideas that arise on this occasion are communicated to the medium’s subconscious mind, which makes automatic records. Naturally these records then concern the spirits that haunt the spiritualists’ minds incessantly, and even speak in the “spirits’” names. Even if the medium is entirely free of spiritualist fantasies, she still automatically writes down all these fantasies. In a word, the character and content of the answers given by the medium depend on what the participants in the séance think and feel.

In this connection the statement of Professor Lapponi, a convinced spiritualist, is very interesting. “The ease,” he says, “with which the spirits know how to adapt their behavior to the inclinations of their worshippers is admirable… . The spirits share the convictions held by the participants in the séance: they are pious with believers, tender and sentimental with lovers, rational with intellectual people, sober and practical with businessmen; they display knowledge before those devoted to science; they are merry with men of pleasure, simple and uncouth with ordinary folk.”⁴³

This circumstance seems so strange to the spiritualist Lapponi that, spiritualist though he is, he is even inclined to assume deception by the mediums in such cases. From our standpoint such an assumption is, of course, quite unnecessary; and even from the spiritualists’ standpoint an attempt at explanation of this kind ought to be unacceptable, if only because the circumstance emphasized by Lapponi is the rule at spiritualist séances, not the exception. As I indicated above, the explanation is much simpler: at the sittings, mediums are essentially nothing other than the mental or psychic echo of those beside them.

It must be stressed, however, that this is not always the case: mediums are not always merely an echo. The fact is that the medium’s subconscious mind is not a blank sheet of paper but sometimes has content of its own. Accordingly, records of the most varied and surprising kinds may sometimes be observed. If the medium’s subconscious mind is entirely or almost entirely devoid of content of its own, it records every psychic “telegram” it receives accurately. If, however, it is occupied by something, the answer written down to a question may sometimes be such nonsense as to leave one utterly astonished. For example, at the very beginning of my experiments with Lydia W., when her imagination had evidently not yet entirely freed itself from the “spirits,” I mentally addressed the “spirit” with the question “Who are you?” and received the following answer: “I am the sorrowful demon, the fallen angel, the spirit of evil who sows doubt and vice.” Yet scarcely had I explained sound views on the nature of automatic writing to the young woman when such answers ceased altogether, never to return.

From time to time, however, “improvisations” of some other kind still made their appearance, and one must always be prepared for them to avoid being disconcerted. Once, for example, in response to the word “Polotenze” (towel), which I had in mind, I received the following answer: “Everyone is unhappy, but in the depths of the heart each thinks ill of the other.” Improvisations appeared in Lydia’s answers most frequently when some unpleasantness had occurred in her life. In such cases the experiments had to be suspended for a few days until Lydia’s subconscious mind had regained its equilibrium.

Above we saw how a brief analysis of the errors in Lydia’s answers enabled us to elucidate part of the process of thought transference itself. As we now turn to discovering the conditions that favor this process, we can likewise find valuable indications in the analysis just mentioned.

The reader will recall that, on the basis of my experiments with Sophie Starker, I had concluded that the nature of errors in thought transference, whether visual or auditory, was most probably determined by the agent’s type of thinking. For this very reason I concluded at the time that the visual type of thought predominates in me personally. When I now analyzed Lydia’s answers to the words I had in mind, I likewise noticed that the names of objects before my mind’s eye or my actual eyes were transferred best: that is, objects at which I was looking directly or which I was picturing to myself. If errors occurred, they were based on associations chiefly of a visual nature. In view of this I came to the conclusion that I think mainly in visual images, and that the psychic energy arising in my brain attains a much greater tension with visual impressions than with auditory ones. The degree of tension of psychic energy must, then, depend entirely on the strength of the visual impressions: the more vivid and varied the impressions, the greater the tension of the psychic energy arising, and consequently the more favorable the experimental results in mental suggestion.

To test these conclusions I conducted a series of new experiments using the illustrated postcards now so much in fashion. These offer an enormous choice of all kinds of views, which undoubtedly make a strong impression on our eyes through their wealth of color and variety of subject matter, an incomparably stronger impression, in any case, than ordinary objects do. The arrangement of these experiments was as follows. As always, Lydia sat at the table with her hand resting on the cardboard planchette. Her sister sat opposite her and recorded the letters on a piece of paper in such a way that Lydia could not see which letters were being written. I sat down near Lydia, sometimes behind her, took from my breast pocket a postcard I had brought with me, which therefore could be known neither to Lydia nor to her sister, held it before me in such a way that nobody else could see it, and began looking at it. After a time, sometimes five to ten minutes, sometimes half an hour or more, Lydia’s hand began to move slowly over the sheet of paper, the point of the cardboard triangle indicating particular letters, which the assistant, Lydia’s sister, faithfully wrote down. As soon as the assistant informed me that an entire picture had been recorded, I ended the experiment. While the writing was taking place, we by no means maintained a reverential silence. On the contrary, we talked about a wide variety of subjects, joked, and laughed; in a word, we carried on an easy conversation. Even so, I did not lose sight of my task for a single second and held the postcard throughout so that nobody could see it.

It now turned out that under these experimental conditions Lydia automatically described the contents of the postcards I held in my hands. The descriptions, or answers, often contained references to such characteristic details of the views shown on the postcards that their reproduction could in no way be explained by accidental coincidence. The postcard experiments definitively settled the question of the nature of mediumistic statements and at the same time furnished convincing, striking proof of the possibility of mentally suggesting not only individual words but also entire pictures.

I do not intend to quote all my postcard experiments here. These experiments are convincing not through their number but, so to speak, through the individuality of each postcard, the task, and the characteristic details of its description, the answer. In experiments of this kind one positive result is more valuable and convincing than ten negative ones. In my case, however, there was one negative for every ten positive results, which is of course still more convincing. A few experiments follow by way of illustration.

Experiment I

Before me is the following postcard: a sea with a gently rippled surface; far away on the horizon, a line of mountains; in the right foreground, a fishing boat rocks beside the stony shore; on the bank above the boat, a young woman in a bonnet stands leaning on a wooden railing and looking out to sea.

The accurately recorded answer reads: “Bluish distance … . there the sky merges with the blue sea … . boundless space all around … . the sea as in a fairy tale … . calm … . blue, beautiful … . what thoughts may arise amid this expanse … . how freely everyone breathes here … . there, with arms resting on a post, a figure seems to be visible … . how much longing in that pose … . longing for the expanse and for the beauty that she sees only here … . surrounded by nature too vast to take in … .”⁴⁴

Experiment II

The postcard shows a green field; in the right foreground, yellow ears of grain and colorful wildflowers; in the distance, a group of cottages surrounded by trees. The background is formed by the blue sky, with milky-white clouds and birds appearing as dots.

Answer: “Blue sky … . colorful flowers … . barely visible buildings on the horizon … . shaded by trees … . something like dots can be seen in the distance … . probably something alive … . farther on, a narrow strip of something bright … . perhaps these are clouds drifting past in loose masses… .”

Experiment III

The postcard: a small stretch of sea is visible on the left; the whole card, however, is occupied by a high, rocky shore, covered with bushes in places. A tall white rock, probably a chalk cliff, rises on the shore, with a small cottage at its foot.

Answer: “White mountains … . gleaming ones … . below, at their foot, a little house nestles … . greenery also to be seen … .”

Experiment IV

The postcard: a lake with a smooth surface; in the distance, a straight line of mountains. At the foot of the mountains, houses are visible in two places on the lakeshore. In the foreground a woman stands in a boat, propelling it by pushing a pole against the bottom of the lake.

Answer: “Water … . a feeling of freshness … . soft lapping of water … . is the sky with its blue reflected in the water like that … . or is the sea simply sapphire-colored … . something is rocking gently there … . on the waves … . probably a boat … . something black rises in it … . that is a person … . a woman … .”

These examples will suffice for the moment. I do not wish to dwell on them, since these experiments are too convincing to require many more words. No words can be so eloquent and forceful as the facts themselves. Let all those who hold the interests and progress of science dear convince themselves, through control experiments with a suitable medium, that the facts I have cited correspond to reality. Indifference on the part of serious psychologists, however, would be a great sin against science.

Apart from the fact itself that complex visual impressions are mentally suggested, the most interesting feature of these experiments is the character of the descriptions received in answer. First, they give the impression that the medium herself is amid the natural surroundings she describes on the basis of the thought-telegrams received. Second, the description of the pictures is sometimes accompanied by a series of emotions evoked by them.

As regards the first circumstance, it apparently makes no difference to the medium’s subconscious mind where the impressions come from: from the real external world or from a copy of it in a picture; through the medium’s own conscious mind or through the agent’s conscious mind, followed by their mental transference to the medium. The subconscious mind does not judge, and probably cannot judge, the manner in which impressions from the external world reach it. It assesses only the impressions themselves and tries to form an idea of the external world on their basis.

As regards the second circumstance, the indication of emotions in the descriptions received in answer from the medium, it would be interesting to determine where these emotions arise: in me as I look at the postcard, or in the medium’s subconscious mind as it assesses the impressions received. In other words, do I transmit, along with the visual images, the emotions they evoke, or do these arise only in the medium’s subconscious mind? A whole series of facts, which will be discussed below, proves that both occur. In any case there is no doubt that the corresponding emotions can be transferred together with the visual impressions; sometimes emotions alone are transferred almost exclusively.

In general, the medium’s subconscious mind is, in a sense, the echo of the impressions that enter or arise in another person’s consciousness. Better expressed, the subconscious mind represents, so to speak, a “speaking” light-sensitive plate in a camera. Whatever impressions enter it, it automatically and faithfully tells us about them through the appropriate expressions of living speech.

The medium’s subconscious mind is a living recording apparatus for receiving another person’s ideas.

These are the conclusions that can be drawn from the experiments cited above. I think it necessary to explain here at once that I consider it superfluous to dwell at length, on each occasion, on proving the correctness of my conclusions. The further experiments will themselves show how right I was. The facts, I repeat, are more convincing than any words, and I vouch for the authenticity of the facts I report.

A whole series of experiments like those cited above also showed that the illustrated postcards reproduced best were those depicting views with sufficiently broad perspectives: that is, scenes of nature with an open horizon and numerous characteristic details clearly perceptible amid the natural surroundings. Pictures of a narrow street or a scene in a room were poorly transferred; pictures of individual objects or animals were transferred only with great difficulty or not at all. The broader the horizon in the picture, the more room for the eye, the more faithful and better the reproduction. The description of the picture generally begins with its overall outlines, its perspective, and its horizon; only then do the details follow. These are sometimes mentioned only in passing or not at all, even when the particular detail takes up a large part of the postcard. This can already be seen from the experiments cited, but I will give one further example that is interesting in this respect.

Experiment V

The postcard shows a yellow field; far away on the horizon, dark patches of trees and something like a building; in the foreground, tall green grass, and on the left a group of trees. In front of these, in the extreme foreground and taking up almost the whole width of the postcard, is a large white dog holding a hare in its teeth and at the same time stalking some game that is fluttering about in the grass there.

Answer: “Blue horizon … . light green … . beside it runs a strip of dark green … . nothing else to be seen … . something is coming into view … . even something alive … . some animal … . probably several … . I cannot make them out … . a cow perhaps … . I do not know … .”

The dog, then, which takes up the whole width of the postcard, appears to Lydia’s subconscious mind as something barely perceptible, something difficult to distinguish. The subconscious mind is, in a sense, amid the natural surroundings it describes. Indeed, if we imagine the observer somewhere in this field, it is quite possible that a large dog in the tall grass would be barely visible from a distance and difficult to distinguish from a cow or another animal.

How to explain the fact that pictures without broad perspectives, and individual details in other pictures, even conspicuous ones, are often reproduced very poorly or not at all will be discussed later. For the moment I will merely observe that this by no means permits the conclusion that pictures with broad perspectives generally resemble one another so closely that the medium’s successful answers can be explained by accidental coincidence. Let the gentlemen skeptics say what they will. I, however, maintain that answers containing, besides a description of the general tone, such characteristic details as the woman leaning on the railing, the black figure in the boat, the white rock with the cottage at its foot, and so on, can never, ever be explained by accidental coincidence. This is too obvious and convincing for many more words to be wasted on proving it.

Finally, my experiments also revealed the following. For a picture to be transferred, it is not at all necessary to look at it throughout the time Lydia is writing. It is enough to look at the postcard for just a minute and then conceal it; it will nevertheless be reproduced. Moreover, an effort of will, that is, the conscious mind, plays not the slightest part in conveying particular details. I can look as long and as intently as I please at some detail in the picture, even a very important one, with the wish to convey it to Lydia, and absolutely nothing may come of it. Only what appeals more to my subconscious mind than to my conscious mind is transferred. With the last postcard, for example, I very much wanted to convey the dog with the hare in its teeth and therefore looked at it very intently; nevertheless, it is barely suggested in Lydia’s answer. On the other hand, details are often reproduced to which I had paid no attention whatever during the experiment and of which I learned only on reading the answer. In view of this I consider myself justified in concluding that visual impressions are transferred from my subconscious mind to Lydia’s almost without any participation by our conscious minds.

To test the correctness of this conclusion I conducted the following experiments.

From a packet of postcards kept in my pocket, the selection of which I constantly renewed, I took whichever came first and, without examining it, that is, without fixing my gaze on it, brought it for two or three seconds near my eyes, which were directed sideways, and immediately put it back into my pocket. Under these circumstances I had not the slightest knowledge of the contents of the postcard that had appeared before my eyes. Nevertheless, Lydia’s automatic answer described the picture correctly. Here, then, the postcard was seen by my subconscious mind, which conveyed it to Lydia’s subconscious mind without the participation of my conscious mind.

Soon, however, I noticed that with this experimental arrangement entirely wrong answers occurred comparatively often, something that rarely happened when the conscious mind participated, that is, when I fixed my gaze on the postcards. This shows that the conscious mind nevertheless takes some part in the transference of the pictures. Perhaps this participation consists in checking the correctness of the impressions received through the subconscious mind, with the conscious mind playing something like the role of an electric push button. By pressing this button we dispatch the psychic charge in a particular direction, whereas the manner and strength of its action, that is, the effect of the discharge, depend entirely on the content of the subconscious mind situated in that direction.

These, in general outline, are the results of my experiments on the mental suggestion of direct visual impressions from pictures on postcards. I then proceeded to carry out another series of experiments, intended to show whether and how visual memory-images, that is, reproduced representations, are transferred. For this purpose, instead of looking at a postcard, I tried to picture actual scenes in nature that I had once seen, or, more generally, anything I had seen that had left a trace in my memory. Here are a few experiments of this kind.

Experiment VI

I picture the Zeiss Glacier in the Caucasus, which I climbed two years ago. Everything is flooded with sunlight. I think chiefly of myself, of the guide who led me by the hand over the smooth ice, and of how at one point I nearly fell into a crevasse. I scarcely think at all of the overall view of the glacier, at least not consciously.

Answer: “Something inexplicably brilliant … . sparkles, burns … . like a sea of stones of different colors … . illuminated by bright sunshine … . something white in the distance … . like milky clouds … . and below, something green … . how beautiful the green wall against the snowy background … . and there something blue … . like snowy peaks veiled in mist … . something gleaming there … . something black upon it … . little patches … . what is that … . a shimmering, sublime picture … . black dots are moving … . evidently something alive … . damn it, how good it is … . far removed from the whole world … . here, by contrast, nature alone … . wild, magnificent nature … .”

Need I say that this description contains a surprisingly faithful and poetic portrayal of the overall scene I saw at the time, and ends with exactly the same words that escaped me when I first reached the summit and the magnificent sight of the glacier, flooded with sunshine and framed by the green mountain slopes, opened before me? The “black, moving dots” were tourists who had set out an hour before me and whom I could make out in the distance on the glacier precisely as mere black dots. I recalled all this only after reading the answer; during the experiment I had not even thought of it.

Experiment VII

Task: I recall the summer retreat where I spent the previous summer. Children are playing ball on the lawn in front of the villa. I am particularly taken with a little girl in a white dress, with a rubber ball larger than her head. Several adults are there as well.

Answer: “Something small, merry … . floats along … . something bright … . silvery laughter … . ah, that is a child’s figure … . she raises her thin little arms … . she tosses something into the air … . how charmingly she bends down … . what sort of game is that … . there is the bright laughter again … . a round object flies along … . delicate, dear creatures … . how freely they romp about here … . on the green carpet … . how the sun plays on that translucent figure … .”

I believe these two experiments suffice to clarify the fact and character of the transference of reproduced representations.

First of all, it is clear that these are transferred just as well as, if not better than, direct visual impressions from picture postcards. Next, it is striking that the memory-images arise in my subconscious mind independently of my will, that is, of my conscious mind, and are transferred in the same sequence in which I experienced them in reality. Thus, when I thought of the glacier, I chiefly pictured my dangerous journey across the ice amid chasms and crevasses, and wanted to transfer precisely this image. My subconscious mind, however, transferred the overall view of the glacier, which had evidently made a deep impression on me at the time and left the chronologically first trace in my memory. The remaining experiences on the glacier merely formed details against the general background of this picture and were hardly transferred at all. Thus we have further confirmation of the fact that our conscious mind takes almost no part in the transference of visual impressions to the medium’s subconscious mind.

The experiments cited also show that the representations reproduced by the conscious and subconscious minds do not coincide. Whereas the conscious mind chiefly recalls details that have probably left a stronger impression on it, the subconscious mind reproduces the overall background of what was experienced, which it evidently grasps better. In any case, it is still impossible to lay down general rules, since, as Experiment VII shows, details too can be transferred by the subconscious mind with astonishing fidelity, like individual scenes or even poses captured by a camera. Everything apparently depends on the strength of the impression a particular detail makes on us.

Finally, experiments in transferring reproduced visual representations show that these appear strongly colored by emotion when reproduced, and that the source of this coloring lies in me rather than in the medium. It follows that the reproduction and transference of visual images are accompanied by the reproduction and transference of the corresponding emotions. Incidentally, this fact definitively settles in the affirmative the question of whether there is a memory for affects. Two or three experiments like those cited settle this question much more quickly and conclusively than all the intricate calculations and indirect proofs to which we have hitherto been compelled to resort. Our emotions can undoubtedly be reproduced, and the subconscious mind apparently serves as the repository for emotions once experienced.

Thus, whereas in the experiments with Sophie Starker we were chiefly dealing with the transference of auditory representations, in the experiments with Lydia W. we observe almost exclusively a transference of visual representations and emotions. And since, on the one hand, my personal participation in the experiments as agent removes every suspicion of deception, while, on the other, the fact that complex visual representations are transferred rules out all such interpretations as muscle-reading, involuntary whispering, and the like, the experiments cited, taken together, furnish striking and convincing proof that thoughts can be transferred directly from one person to another. If this is so, only one hypothesis remains for a scientific explanation of the phenomenon in question: precisely the one I set out on theoretical grounds in the introductory chapter and developed further, on the basis of experimental results, at the end of the third chapter.

I have in mind the hypothesis of psychic energy. This hypothesis is in complete accord with the results of experiment and with modern theoretical views on the nature of all processes. At the present state of our knowledge, only through it is a fully scientific explanation of thought transference possible. Let us now continue our investigations with the support of this hypothesis and of the conclusions drawn from the experiments with Sophie.

First of all, certain observations made with Sophie need to be tested: namely, that a metallic conductor and direct contact facilitate the transference of thoughts from the agent to the percipient or, in other words, that metal and the human body conduct psychic energy well. For this purpose I carried out a series of experiments in which a round copper rod, 25 cm long and 5 mm thick, served as the conductor. Holding one end of the rod in my hand and instructing Lydia to hold the other, I proceeded with the experiment, which was arranged in the same way as the preceding ones. Naturally, I looked at the postcard in such a way that nobody else could see it.

The speed and accuracy with which the picture was transferred under these circumstances were simply astonishing. Previously automatic writing had generally begun ten to fifteen minutes after the start of the experiment, and reproduction of the whole picture had sometimes taken one to one and a half hours. Now writing began after two or three minutes, and the whole picture had already been reproduced in five to ten minutes. The description was so accurate and exact that it was obvious Lydia’s subconscious mind could now analyze the impressions received much more easily. To illustrate what I have said, I give two experiments here.

Experiment VIII

Postcard: a pond in the foreground; bathing huts visible in the distance; behind the huts, the green shore with a grove; in the left foreground, a tall rock with trees growing along its edge. Blue sky with clouds.

Answer: “Water … . . trees on the shore in the distance … . . something like a slope on one side … . . there in the distance, scattered buildings are visible on the water … . . blue sky with light clouds … . .”

Experiment IX

Postcard: winter; bare trees on the left; buildings in the distance; a frozen brook.

Answer: “Winter … . . gray tones … . . bare trees … . . buildings on the horizon … . .”

The transference of each of these postcards took, I repeat, only five to ten minutes. The concise wording and exactness of the answers are plain to see; even the details are reproduced. After carrying out a considerable number of further experiments arranged in this way, I concluded that a copper rod really does accelerate and improve thought transference from me to Lydia.

I then modified my experiments by establishing contact between Lydia and myself without a rod, simply by holding her hand in mine. I was able to establish that, under these conditions too, transference of the picture proceeded far better than without any contact. Nevertheless, it was noticeable that the description took much longer and was no longer as faithful as when a copper rod was used. From this circumstance we may surely conclude that a metallic conductor in some way favors the rapid transference of psychic energy from one person to another.

Possibly chemical processes and the thermoelectricity developed when the hand is brought into contact with the metal play a certain part here. In any case this question requires closer investigation, but the fact itself admits of no doubt: the copper conductor considerably improves the transference of psychic energy.

The experiments with a metallic conductor revealed a further circumstance of the greatest interest and instructiveness, all the more valuable because I had not foreseen it in the slightest. It was as follows. Before beginning an experiment I would usually spend some time choosing the most interesting postcard from my stock, or reviewing impressions I had experienced in my memory until I settled on one of them. Once I had made my choice, I proceeded to the experiment. In the experiments with the copper rod it now sometimes happened that, instead of the picture I had chosen, that is, the one I was looking at or reproducing in memory, an entirely different picture was transferred: precisely one of those I had just seen on the postcards or, if the object of the experiment was reproduced representations, reviewed in memory.

This was quite extraordinary. For a long time I could not explain the phenomenon, until I inclined toward a supposition that was fully confirmed in subsequent experiments and is as follows. When I look at the pictures on the postcards or relive in imagination scenes I have seen in reality, one of them, for some reason, makes a special impression on my subconscious mind. The psychic energy that arises on this occasion has not had time to leave my body by the moment I begin the experiment. As soon as I immediately take hold of the rod, therefore, the energy flows across to Lydia and evokes the corresponding visual images, which are duly described. The picture that I consciously chose and wanted to transfer, however, enters Lydia’s subconscious mind only when it is already responding reflexively to the first stimulus. Consequently the second picture produces no effect and probably does not even cause a psychic discharge.

In this case, then, I conceive of psychic energy as being able to accumulate on the surface of the human body, just as electricity accumulates on capacitors and flows along conductors. If this explanation is correct, then, to prevent surprises, before each experiment one must conduct the accidentally accumulated psychic energy into the earth by touching metallic conductors in the room, such as heating or water pipes. In fact, from the time I began adopting this measure, I never again experienced a surprise of the kind described above, whereas previously they had occurred several times. This circumstance must be regarded as the best proof of the correctness of the explanation itself.

If, with reference to the hypothesis of psychic energy that I developed earlier, I now sum up the results of all the experiments I have so far carried out with Lydia, I can say the following:

1. Direct visual impressions and reproduced representations, as well as emotions, can be transferred from one person to another without the mediation of the external sense organs.

2. This transference apparently takes place through a psychic energy that arises in the agent’s brain during thought, can spread from there in all directions, and, on reaching the percipient’s brain, cause corresponding representations to arise in the latter.

3. The entire process of transferring and perceiving thoughts evidently takes place in the subconscious minds of both persons, though with some participation by the agent’s conscious mind.

As regards the properties of psychic energy, on the basis of the experiments cited the following purely physical properties may be attributed to it:

a) Psychic energy penetrates air, though it is partly absorbed by it.

b) It is conducted well by the human body and still better by a copper wire.

c) It can accumulate on the surface or at the extremities of the human body, leaving it rather slowly.

d) If our body is connected to a metallic conductor, psychic energy flows rapidly along it and can thus pass to another person or into the earth.

These are the conclusions from the experiments I have reported thus far. One further conclusion should be added: since the energy we have considered possesses both psychic and physical properties, it would be more correct to call it psychophysical rather than psychic energy.

I turn to the further investigation of this energy in the next chapter. For the moment I will merely observe that, however bold and even impossible my conclusions may appear at first sight, the reader must not forget that they all rest on unshakable facts. The inexorable logic of these facts must lead every conscientious scientific investigator to analogous conclusions. Love of truth must overcome every fear of the strangeness and apparent improbability of conclusions that follow with logical necessity from properly observed facts.

What is not a marvel when it first comes to our knowledge? How many things are judged impossible before they have been done?

Pliny.

VI. Clairvoyance and the Fixation of Thoughts on Paper

The preceding investigation has proved to us the existence of a psychophysical energy and clarified some of its properties. In pursuing these investigations further, I came to undertake new experiments that shed a bright light on the nature of the psychophysical energy in question and revealed new properties in it. I shall now describe these experiments, but first I consider it necessary to make a few observations of a historical character, so to speak.

While I was still conducting my experiments with Sophie Starker, I found myself driven to suppose that telepathy was very closely related to clairvoyance or, more precisely, that the ability to read thoughts had much in common with the ability to read letters in sealed envelopes. In both cases, I thought, one and the same energy must play a part. As regards the ability to read letters in sealed envelopes, cases have already been described in the scientific literature whose credibility can admit of no doubt. Such cases were discussed in the London Society for Psychical Research. Then, in Paris, Janet and Richet undertook a series of experiments that proved the existence of clairvoyance in a young woman and were reported to the Paris Society for Physiological Psychology in 1886–1888. The Russian scientific literature contains an exceptionally convincing and valuable case, excellently described by Dr. A. Chowrin, chief physician of the asylum in Tambov.⁴⁵

I shall discuss Chowrin’s work in somewhat greater detail, since this will make my task easier in the explanations that follow. Chowrin made his observations on the thirty-two-year-old Miss M., who suffered from grande hystérie and, among other things, possessed the ability to read letters in sealed envelopes. This fact was attested by a whole series of physicians who attended Chowrin’s experiments and by two reports printed in the Russian journal Beiträge zur Philosophie, among the proceedings of the St. Petersburg Society for Experimental Psychology for 1892 and 1893. On the occasion of the solution of a task it had sent, this society, meeting in full session, reached the conclusion “that the fact of clairvoyance in this case was indisputable.”

Miss M. manifested her ability both in the somnambulistic and in the waking state. She reported aloud to Dr. Chowrin the contents of the letter, which was handed to her only for the duration of the sitting and in the physician’s presence; he recorded all her answers accurately. Reading each letter sometimes required ten to fifteen sittings, each lasting one or two hours. Altogether, as much as an entire month sometimes had to be spent reading a letter. Reading proceeded much faster when Miss M. was in a trance; then a single sitting sometimes sufficed.

The most interesting and puzzling feature of Chowrin’s observations was the manner in which the contents of the letters were reproduced. As a rule Miss M. did not reproduce the original wording of the letter, but spoke about the scenes described in it, speaking as though she were seeing the scene herself. If M. was in a trance, however, she really did see the scenes described in the letter.⁴⁶ The author explains this by supposing that the unconsciously perceived text of the letter subsequently evoked corresponding visual hallucinations in M.

As for the ability to perceive the text of a sealed letter itself, Chowrin seeks to explain this partly by seeing and partly by feeling the written letters through the paper. In his opinion M.’s ability is entirely attributable to a refinement of the discriminative capacity of her higher senses, chiefly sight and touch.

Professor Anfimow, who quite unjustifiably doubts both the fact of clairvoyance in M. and the very possibility of clairvoyance, at the same time subjects Chowrin’s attempted explanation to a detailed critique. “Hyperesthesia of sight alone,” Anfimow says, “that is, an extension of the eye’s optical capacity, is far from sufficient to bring about clairvoyance. Clairvoyance requires not merely an extension of the optical horizon but a change in the nature of visual sensations, since opaque objects and media must thereby be made transparent. Accordingly, the eye must be adapted to vibrations that differ entirely in form and speed from those we perceive as light. Biologically, the occurrence of such a state in our unaided eye can scarcely be assumed… . Thus, for clairvoyance … new external conditions must be created under which many vibrations not now perceptible to our eye could become perceptible rays. This would therefore be the very path taken by Herz and Röntgen in their magnificent discoveries.”⁴⁷

If Professor Anfimow considers clairvoyance impossible at present, he is merely bowing to deeply rooted scientific prejudices from whose power he is unable to free himself. Nevertheless, almost instinctively he reaches the entirely correct conclusion that clairvoyance can rest only on the perception of rays capable of penetrating opaque objects and media. Anfimow simply failed to consider that this radiant energy need not be perceived by the eye alone, which is specially adapted for light rays.

In view of these considerations I became convinced that clairvoyance must have much in common with direct thought transference: common in the sense that in both cases the principal role is probably played by one and the same energy, possessing the property of penetrating opaque media and evoking a series of representations in our brain. If this is so, persons who possess the ability to “read” the thoughts of others must also be capable of reading letters in sealed envelopes. To establish this for myself, while I was still investigating Sophie Starker I carried out a series of experiments with her to determine whether or not she possessed the ability to read letters in sealed envelopes. Some of those experiments succeeded and others did not. On the whole, I gained the impression at the time that Sophie probably possessed the ability in question.

The most interesting circumstance was that in the successful experiments, the reading of sealed letters had the same character as in Chowrin’s observations. Instead of the original text, Sophie conveyed to me the content of the scenes described in the letter: in other words, what Sophie reproduced had the character of visual hallucinations.⁴⁸ At the time, however, external circumstances prevented me from taking all the precautions needed to make my experiments in this area scientifically unimpeachable. I therefore did not consider it appropriate to publish them, and decided to wait until a sufficient amount of scientifically unimpeachable material had accumulated.

When I now began investigating Lydia W., I resolved to test my supposition concerning the close relationship between the phenomena of clairvoyance and those of thought transference, and the identity of the energy playing the principal role in these phenomena. First of all I had to decide whether, with the experimental arrangement described, Lydia W. could communicate the contents of sealed letters that I had received from persons entirely unknown to her. To exclude the possibility of mental suggestion completely, I obtained the letters from people wholly unknown to Lydia; naturally, I too did not know their contents. I merely asked the people from whom I obtained the letters containing the tasks to describe direct or reproduced visual representations.

The process of automatic answering proceeded as follows. First Lydia took the sealed letter I had brought in both hands and held it for one or two minutes. She then placed her right hand on the cardboard planchette with which she indicated the letters, while continuing to hold the letter in her left. Five to ten minutes after the start of the experiment, her hand began to move slowly and indicate the letters. I sat opposite Lydia and noted down the letters; I no longer needed an assistant. During the writing itself we behaved, as usual, entirely naturally: we chatted, joked, and laughed. In short, our conscious minds displayed their own manifestations of life.

I ended the experiment as soon as some scene had been written down or Lydia’s hand stopped for a considerable time. After the experiment I opened the envelope, which was as a rule securely sealed and opaque, and read the letter’s contents aloud. In this way I sought to keep Lydia herself interested in the experiments; otherwise the painfully long periods spent sitting at the table over the alphabet would have been an unbearable torment for her. I must add that I obtained the letters from various people, whom I asked to keep them brief, consisting of one or two sentences, so as not to complicate the experiments for the moment. The results of the first experiments follow.

Experiment X

The letter: “The sun shines brightly over the meadow.”

Answer: “Sun … . birds … . greenery … . what delight … . songs there perhaps … . what a sound … . difficult to distinguish … .”

Experiment XI

The letter: “Before sunrise in the grove. Everything is covered with dew. The birds awaken and chirp.”

Answer: “Something black … . large, dark outlines … . a gentle wind … . the trees whisper something to one another … . what can that strange light be … . a rosy glow … . the treetops have turned rose-colored … . as though in the light of dawn … . it is so fresh … . so lively … . silvery dew … . a large red ball is visible … .”

Experiment XII

The letter: “A crowd of people moves along the street with red flags.”

Answer: “A dull sound … . the crowd’s murmuring perhaps … . something immense rolls toward us … . an unfamiliar scene … . there is something calm and solemn in this procession of people … .”

Experiment XIII

The letter: “In the mountains of the Caucasus. Lush vegetation on the mountain slopes. Streams and waterfalls everywhere.”

Answer: “Freedom all around … . nature alone … . not disfigured by man … . sun … . blue sky … . greenery all around … . young, slender trees … . rise up … . something murmurs softly … . like a silver ribbon it winds through the greenery … . a woodland stream gleams there, or a narrow strip of snow … . no … . it rushes along like a spring flood … . and there a ravine … .”

We shall confine ourselves to these letters for the moment.

Writing each answer took from twenty or thirty minutes to an hour or more. Usually the hand pauses for one or two minutes after three or four words have been written; sometimes the pause can last as long as ten minutes. All four of the answers cited were written down in the course of a single sitting, which, with interruptions, lasted four or five hours.

Before analyzing the answers obtained, I must emphasize that there must not be even a moment’s suspicion that Lydia could have read the letter’s contents by holding it against the light. I watched for this most carefully, quite apart from the fact that such a supposition concerning the modest, truth-loving Lydia would be positively absurd. I repeat once more that the contents of the letters were entirely unknown to me until the conclusion of the experiment, when I opened the letter.

Let us now proceed to analyze the answers.

First of all, there can be no doubt that the answers correspond perfectly to the contents of the letters. Consequently, Lydia does indeed possess the ability to “read” sealed letters automatically, just as I had expected.

But the following peculiarities are striking in Lydia’s descriptive answers: first, the disproportion between the fairly short letters and the long answers; second, the description in the answers of details not mentioned at all in the letters, which is certainly very surprising; finally, third, the strong influence on all the descriptions of emotions that are likewise not mentioned in the letters. All this gives the impression that Lydia is directly seeing the corresponding scene, taking pleasure in it, assessing and combining its individual impressions. In a word, the same thing happens here that we have already observed in the direct transference of visual representations: in both cases the character of the reproduction is the same.

Moreover, when the following day I showed the answers to the people from whom I had obtained the letters, they were speechless with astonishment. It turned out that Lydia’s descriptive answers communicated details that had indeed occurred in reality but had not been mentioned in the letters. The chronological sequence in the changing impressions during the experience was also astonishingly accurate, and the emotions experienced, likewise unmentioned in the letters, were reproduced very faithfully.

What does this really mean? How is it to be explained?

Once we accustom ourselves not to shut our eyes to facts, once we become consistent in our reasoning and shrink from no conclusions, however improbable and bold they may seem, science will gain much, above all in the pace of its development.

What conclusion must we draw from the facts reported? Only one conclusion is possible: evidently thought is fixed directly on paper, that is, even without verbal signs. Evidently the psychic energy that in the preceding experiments passed from me to Lydia through the air or along a metallic conductor can also pass onto paper, remain there, be carried with it to another place, and then pass to another person and evoke particular representations in that person. However rash and improbable this may seem at first sight, we must nevertheless not draw back from this conclusion, but must endeavor to test it.

Apart from the character of the answers, other facts also led me to the hypothesis just indicated. I have cited only four experiments, but I conducted many more, all with the same result. These other facts were the cases in which the answers did not correspond in the slightest to the contents of the letters: that is, cases in which the answers ought to have proved to me that they were purely accidental, had I been as hasty in drawing conclusions as prejudiced skeptics tend to be. Here, for example, are two letters I obtained from my brother, who is wholly unknown to Lydia. He is a businessman, and his head is always full of business matters. When I asked him in his office to write two short letters of two or three sentences, seal them in envelopes, and hand them to me, he looked at me in extreme astonishment: this was beyond his comprehension. Finding it useless to initiate him into the nature of my experiments, I asked him not to delay me with questions but to comply with my request. He then wrote the two letters and handed them to me already sealed.

The results were as follows. I add that Lydia did not know who had written these letters.

Experiment XIV

The letter read: “I am impatiently awaiting the settlement, as money is needed.”

Answer: “A strange request … .”

Experiment XV

The letter: “I feel pleased that the principal manufacturer’s arrival is expected.”

Answer: “Interest must be paid tomorrow … .”

After such answers, one might ask, can there still be any question of the possibility of reading sealed letters? Well, reading in the sense in which that word is ordinarily used, of course not. But in the cases last cited Lydia did not read what had been written down at all. She read what had imprinted itself on the paper alongside the written words: Lydia read the thoughts fixed on the paper. My questioning of my brother on the following day convinced me that this was precisely what had happened. It emerged that, when he wrote the first letter, his astonishment at the strange request I had made was still lingering in him. When he wrote the second letter, however, putting down the first thing that came into his head, his mind was already occupied again with current business matters, including the thought that interest really had to be paid to a firm. Thus, what occupied him most intently at the moment of writing was what chiefly imprinted itself on the paper. The sentences he wrote, by contrast, had evidently appeared in his conscious mind for only a moment, without leaving a trace.

I said above that we must not shrink fearfully from conclusions but must endeavor to test them. This is what I did in the present case, proceeding from the following considerations. If my supposition is correct that thought is fixed directly on paper, that is, without the aid of verbal signs, then a correct answer to the task set can also be expected if, instead of a letter, that is, a sheet of paper containing text, I bring Lydia a blank sheet of writing paper over which a third person has thought about some scene. According to my supposition, that person’s thought must then have been fixed upon it.

I did indeed carry out such experiments. For them I obtained several tasks from different people, each task consisting of the following. Alone in another room, the person concerned was to think of a picture, either reproduced or directly seen, for two or three minutes over a sheet of writing paper, then seal this “thought-upon” sheet in an envelope and hand it to me, while retaining another sheet on which the contents of the imagined picture had been described. This second sheet was subsequently to serve as a check on the answer obtained.

I obtained several such tasks from different people and took them, these blank sheets, to Lydia W., to carry out my decisive experiments with her. I freely confess that, fully aware of the crucial importance of these particular experiments, I approached them with fear and trembling and was prepared to retract my conclusions if they failed. But logic did not deceive me. It did not lead me into a blind alley, but raised me to a height from which the broadest horizons and the most promising prospects for the further development of scientific investigation suddenly opened before me.

The arrangement of these last experiments was the same as in the letter experiments already described, with the sole difference that I instructed Lydia to open the envelope and take the blank sheet of writing paper in her hands, to facilitate the presumed passage of psychic energy from the sheet into Lydia’s hand. She did not always open the envelope, however; the first experiments were carried out with sealed envelopes.

I report the results below.

Experiment XVI

Answer to the first blank sheet of writing paper: “Something spreads out … . something large, green … . it seems to me this is a sea of green plants and flowers … . or perhaps a deep, still lake with its aquatic plants … . or pale lilies … . a scent … . that is the freshness of the sea … . perhaps it is not the sea but a dream-image … . behind it, though, a dim expanse … . something is crawling about … . it glitters all around … . so wonderfully beautiful and soothing … .”

When the next day I showed this answer to the young woman from whom I had obtained the sheet containing the task, it turned out that her control sheet described the following picture, which she had once seen and subsequently copied onto canvas herself: “Seabed; a rock covered with shells; aquatic plants with yellow flowers; a large crab on the seabed.”

For the moment I shall leave all commentary aside and merely observe that the young woman was surprised by how faithfully the picture’s general background and the feelings it evoked in her had been reproduced. The smaller details, as in the preceding experiments, had appeared only in part.

Experiment XVII

Answer to a blank sheet of writing paper from another person: “Dark … . suddenly a gleam … . something strange, enchanting … . a multitude of shades of color … . something bright … . shining … . does the sun shine like that in the waves of the sea … . or is it the milky-white light of the pale moon … . all this is so indistinct and unclear … .”

Corresponding to this sheet was the description of the following scene: “Recently, as I crossed a bridge in the evening, I saw freshly cut blocks of ice beneath it. The light of an electric arc lamp fell on them from above. I stopped and spent some time enjoying the play of colored light in the blocks of ice.”

Experiment XVIII

Answer to a blank sheet from a third person: “Immeasurable expanse … . something smooth spreads out … . like a blue mirror … . as though the whole vault of heaven were reflected in it … .”

The description of the scene read: “In summer on the shore of Lake Geneva.”

Experiment XIX

Answer to a blank sheet: “It was on a wonderful day … . something caressing … . lay in all of nature … . something uplifting … . that indistinct rustling … . which speaks of life … . of spring … . of love … . is that the swallows chirping … . or is it the never-ending sound of every atom of nature … . why have the trees turned so red … . what a bright, joyous scene this is … .”

Corresponding to this answer was the following description: “On entering the forest I was surprised by the sight of the setting sun, which had colored the treetops rosy.”

I believe the experiments cited are so characteristic that there can be no question of an accidental correspondence between the answers and the tasks. Together with those described above, these experiments must therefore be regarded as entirely sufficient to decide, in the affirmative, the question of extraordinary importance and decisive significance that forces itself upon us: whether thought can indeed be fixed directly on paper.

What is striking in these experiments, however, is the abundant reproduction of emotions, which almost entirely obscure the whole visual image and push it into the background of the description. This is explained by the fact that the tasks concerned reproduced representations, which, as we saw earlier, tend to be strongly intermingled with emotions previously experienced. These emotions are now reproduced very faithfully and sometimes cast the actual visual image deeply into shadow. Therefore, to eliminate as far as possible the accompanying transference of emotions and thus make the reproduction of the visual representations themselves purer and more convincing, I decided to use picture postcards once again.

I instructed the people from whom I now obtained the tasks to proceed as follows. First they were to choose a picture postcard, then take a small sheet of clean paper and, holding both the sheet and the postcard before them, look at the latter for a little while, two or three minutes. They were then to seal the sheet in a clean envelope prepared beforehand and send it to me, retaining the postcard to check the answer given. With tasks of this kind, blank sheets of “thought-upon” paper, I went once more to Lydia W. to continue my experiments.

The results were as follows.

Experiment XX

Answer to the first blank sheet of writing paper: “Light-green fields … . there in the distance a forest seems to be green … . numerous buildings amid the trees … . domes can be seen … . farther on, a smooth surface of water … . apparently the sea … .”

The corresponding picture postcard depicted a broad seashore; the sea stretching into the distance; green fields and groves, and amid them a monastery with numerous domes.

Experiment XXI

Answer to the second blank sheet of writing paper: “Clear, pure light … . wonderfully blue sky … . magnificent nature … . there in the distance a mirror-smooth surface of water seems to shine like silver … . the green trees bend toward the emerald-green lake … . houses stand among the trees … .”

The postcard depicted a little river or a pond; on both sides, green banks with blossoming trees reflected in the smooth water; houses in two places; in the distance, a footbridge with a person on it.

Experiment XXII

Answer to the third blank sheet of writing paper: “Light-green field … . something golden spreads over the ground … . shimmers in the sun … . ah, that is the yellow of the field … . and there something dark … . probably a little wood … . some building in the distance … . a very simple structure … . figures in fairly colorful dress can be seen nearby … .”

The postcard showed a green field with a great many golden-yellow flowers; on the left, the enclosure of a village church and part of the church itself, without its dome; on the right and farther back, the view is obscured by dark, wooded hills, between which a little house can be seen. In the foreground several male and female figures in festive village dress were making their way to church.

Experiment XXIII

Answer to the fourth blank sheet of writing paper: “Green field with colorful flowers … . a strip of dark green runs through it … . cloudy sky … . a cottage on the horizon … . with wings … . probably a mill … .”

The picture postcard showed what was described in the answer, but in addition cows were grazing in the field and there was a little house beside the windmill.

It seems to me that these last experiments require no commentary. Their entire arrangement is so convincing, and their meaning so clear, that every unprejudiced, truth-loving investigator can and must acknowledge openly and courageously that thought is fixed directly on paper and can be perceived from it by another suitable person. However fabulous, absurd, improbable, impossible, and so forth this may seem at first sight, one must not forget that this conclusion is categorically demanded by the incontrovertible facts, and that rejecting it would mean denying the facts themselves.

Having reached the conclusion that thought is fixed directly on paper, however, I still had another question to decide: how it is fixed. Does thought leave some trace on the paper, as sound does on a gramophone record, or does it pass onto the paper as such, in the form of psychic energy? I inclined toward the second supposition, which is most closely connected with my conception of the nature of psychic energy. I supposed that the psychic energy emitted from one person’s brain at the moment of thinking could pass onto paper, remain on it, be carried with it to another place, and, when another person’s hand touched the paper, flow into that person and evoke particular representations in that person’s brain. In other words, I added one new property to those of psychic energy already known to us: the ability to pass onto paper and remain on it. But this still had to be proved: it had to be proved that psychic energy as such was really present on the “thought-upon” paper.

This was not difficult to do. Since psychic energy possesses the property of flowing easily along a metallic conductor, I ought also to obtain correct answers to the tasks if, instead of putting the sheet in Lydia’s hand, I applied it to the end of a wire she was holding. The psychic energy would then have to pass from the “thought-upon” paper into the wire, flow along it to Lydia, and set off the psychic reaction already familiar to us. I did indeed conduct such experiments, arranging them as follows.

Lydia sat in one room with her right hand resting, as usual, on the planchette, while her left grasped the end of an ordinary insulated wire, stripped of its insulation and wound around a pencil. The wire passed through the keyhole of the closed door into the other room. There I applied a blank “thought-upon” sheet, either in its envelope or without one, to the other end of the wire, likewise stripped of its insulation and wound around a pencil. I had obtained the sheet from third parties, and it had been prepared in the manner already familiar to us. Lydia’s sister, my tireless assistant, now again followed the hand’s movements and recorded the letters.

The results of several experiments follow.

Experiment XXIV

Answer to the first blank sheet of writing paper, through a wire: “Water … . trees on the shore … . numerous houses in the distance … . probably reflected in the water … . a boat can be seen … . blue mountains … .”

The picture postcard corresponded exactly to this description.

Experiment XXV

Answer to the second blank sheet of writing paper, through the wire: “Light-green field … . there in the distance a dark forest seems to be green … . some Gothic building … . mountains … . clouds … .”

The corresponding postcard showed a green field with colorful wildflowers; yellow strips of ripe grain, with a man and a woman mowing beside them; in the background, numerous dark deciduous trees, and amid them two or three houses and a Protestant church with a pointed Gothic tower; farther still, bluish mountains and a cloudy sky.

Experiment XXVI

Answer to the third blank sheet of writing paper, through the wire: “Darkness … . water … . large buildings … . little flames … . probably a boat … . dark coloring … .”

The postcard corresponded perfectly to the description.

Experiment XXVII

Answer to the fourth blank sheet of writing paper, through the wire: “Night … . large blocks of stone … . probably ruins … . red light … . like a tongue of flame … . people all around … . the red light plays on their faces … . they are sitting … .”

The picture postcard shows a desert in Egypt; the half-ruined walls of ancient buildings; numerous blocks of stone; night, a starry sky; a caravan camped around a fire, Arabs with their camels.

If anyone could still harbor any doubt about the genuineness of the phenomena I observed, the experiments just cited must completely remove the last remnants of such doubt. If Lydia can answer the tasks correctly without even seeing the blank sheet itself, merely by touching the end of a wire to which the paper is applied in another room, no other interpretation is possible but this one: the psychic energy released from one person’s brain at the moment of thinking can pass onto paper, remain there, be carried on it to another place, pass in turn to another person, and evoke corresponding representations in that person’s brain. I now consider this proposition proved.

In this connection it is interesting to note that the occultists maintain the existence in some mediums of a special faculty called psychometry. According to the occultists, this consists in the ability of certain mediums, on touching an object previously held by another person, to communicate a great many accurate details concerning that person’s past life and character. “The occultists maintain,” says Maurecy, “that impressions and images can be registered on objects that were present at the time, so that, for example, with the aid of some trinket the sensitive, or medium, can reveal events in which the trinket’s owner played a certain part.”⁴⁹ In recent times reports of successful “psychometric” revelations have appeared particularly frequently in the French and American press. Professor Grasset, who cites several such cases and treats them with extreme skepticism, apparently believes that the hypothesis of accidental coincidence is entirely sufficient to explain the successful “revelations.”

Grasset’s skepticism is, of course, very much in place, since almost all the reported cases of psychometric revelations have the character of isolated, chance observations lacking precision, having been made without any precautions to exclude fraud and error. As regards the hypothesis of accidental coincidence in cases where the precision of the observation has been established and all deception excluded, however, it can scarcely be seriously entertained. It is simply impossible to explain by coincidence alone cases in which the “psychometer” takes a scrap of paper in hand and describes such characteristic details as could have been known to nobody except the owner of that scrap. I believe that, after the purely experimental observations I have cited, which I came to undertake wholly independently of the occultists and without even suspecting that “psychometry” existed among them, all skepticism must disappear, insofar as it does not, of course, arise from distrust of the author himself. Every reader capable of reflection must fearlessly acknowledge what follows logically from the facts: namely, that thought can be fixed directly on paper.

Apart from all the experiments reported so far, I have carried out numerous similar ones, but I consider it entirely superfluous to include them in this work. For the moment I have set myself the task of establishing general propositions without entering into a detailed psychological analysis. For establishing general conclusions, however, the experiments cited are entirely sufficient. They must convince through the individuality of each picture serving as a task and the characteristic peculiarities of the descriptive answers, rather than through their number. No statistics, however overwhelming, will help anyone whom the experiments cited have not convinced. One cannot force into people’s heads what their brains are incapable of grasping.

Yet although I have so far cited only successful experiments, I cannot and must not remain silent about my failures. These are also extremely valuable to the investigator, since they make it possible to resolve many secondary questions and clarify the conditions that favor or impede the experiments. By failed experiments I mean those in which either nothing was written, that is, the hand did not begin to move at all; or a picture was described that did not correspond to the task in the slightest, or was mixed, containing elements of the task alongside extraneous elements; or, finally, some “improvisation” was written down. I have already spoken above of several cases of this kind. In general, an analysis of all my failed experiments has led me to the following conclusions, from which rules for ensuring the experiments’ success can be derived.

First, the medium’s mood and general condition play an enormous part. If she is in a depressed mood, that is, if her subconscious mind is occupied by something, it is better not to attempt the experiments. Either nothing will be written, or there will be some outpouring on the subject of what is troubling her.

Second, the person setting the task, that is, imprinting a picture on a sheet of paper by looking at it, whom we shall call the “viewer,” must always take a clean sheet that has not yet been in anyone’s hands, preferably from the middle of a packet of writing paper. Otherwise the sheet may contain psychic energy involuntarily fixed there by someone, which will evoke entirely different representations from those intended.

Third, the viewer must choose a picture in good time and, while looking at it, must no longer think of any other. He must bear firmly in mind that even a fleeting thought of another picture may sometimes imprint itself on the paper more strongly than the thought of the picture being viewed, and may subsequently be written down. It is therefore better not to look at the picture for long, one minute being sufficient, and to do so in a room where no other pictures are before one’s eyes. Immediately after viewing, the sheet must be sealed in a psychically clean envelope prepared beforehand.

Fourth, the sheet intended for the experiment should be taken from the packet only at the moment when viewing begins, and should be held in the hand before oneself while looking at the picture. As it has turned out, psychic energy passes onto the paper most easily in this case. It can, however, also reach the paper through the air, but much more slowly and less effectively.

Finally, fifth, before each viewing begins, the accidentally accumulated psychic energy must always be conducted into the earth by touching a metallic conductor for this purpose.

Once I had clarified all these conditions and began taking the corresponding precautions, unexpected incidents almost entirely disappeared from my experiments. Either nothing was written or a correct answer to the task was given. Surprises occurred only when I enlisted a new person as “viewer,” someone who did not immediately know how to take sufficient account of all the precautions and made mistakes that he subsequently admitted himself.

For example, on two occasions I obtained tasks, blank sheets of paper, from Privatdozent Dr. A. Bernstein, director of the psychological laboratory at the psychiatric clinic of Moscow University. On the first occasion the answers to three tasks were unsatisfactory: they contained extraneous elements alongside elements of the tasks. When I communicated these answers to Dr. Bernstein, he admitted that while viewing the pictures he had been unable to concentrate on them, and that unrelated representations had intruded throughout. He himself had therefore feared that the experiments would not succeed. And so it proved: the answers were as mixed as his representations during the viewing. Subsequently Dr. B. sent me three further tasks, blank sheets of writing paper, now prepared with all the precautions I had laid down. The results were as follows.

Experiment XXVIII

Answer to the first blank sheet of writing paper from Dr. Bernstein: “There seems to be a field there … . a road winds through it … . several trees stand there … . bluish distance … . there in the greenery there is probably something alive … . and there … . a forest seems to be green in the distance … .”

The corresponding picture showed a field, haystacks, and a wagon; in the foreground, three women; on the right, farther back, houses, with a dark forest behind them.

Experiment XXIX

Answer to the second blank sheet of writing paper from Dr. Bernstein: “A smooth mirror of water … . houses seem to be scattered along the shore … . surrounded here and there by trees … . a boat appears to be rocking on the water … .”

The corresponding picture showed a seashore; a boat in the distance; people standing in the water; farther along the shore, a building surrounded by sparse greenery.

Finally, the experiment with Dr. Bernstein’s third sheet of paper, the most interesting of all.

Experiment XXX

Answer to the third blank sheet of paper from Dr. Bernstein: “Probably a great deal of water … . perhaps an entire sea … . a great gray mountain range stretches along … . a light sail in the distance … . and here a whole town … . at the foot of the mountains, dark greenery rising upward … .”

The task was a reproduced representation of a winter landscape. In other words, the description did not correspond to the task in the slightest.

Since I already knew from experience what could cause a discrepancy of this kind, I told Dr. B. emphatically that, while he was “imprinting” his image of the winter landscape on the paper, either a picture like the one described in the answer had happened to be before his eyes in the room, or he had happened to think of such a picture. I could not, however, admit the possibility of an “improvisation” in this case: first, because the answer given was rounded, coherent, and entirely definite; and second, because Lydia W. was in a condition favorable to the experiments while solving this task. To me it was clear that the cause of such an answer lay not in her but in the experimental subject, that is, in Dr. B.

What emerged? As Dr. B. told me, he had in fact initially wanted to imprint a different picture, namely the Sparrow Hills near Moscow, seen from the Moskva River. In doing so he had spent quite a long time considering from which side it would be best to picture the scene: whether the view from the hills toward the riverbank or from the riverbank toward the hills was preferable. Since he found it difficult to choose a suitable viewpoint, Dr. B. abandoned this task altogether and decided to imprint the image of a winter landscape he had recently seen. Having made this decision, he left the hall where he had been thinking about the subject, went into the study, took a clean sheet of writing paper that had been prepared earlier, and pictured the winter landscape for two or three minutes. Despite this, the view of the Sparrow Hills was reproduced, the view with which his thoughts had been intently occupied shortly before. Anyone who has visited the Sparrow Hills near Moscow must admit that the description cited above, Lydia’s answer, portrays quite accurately the view of the Sparrow Hills from the opposite bank of the Moskva River.⁵⁰

How did this happen? From my standpoint it is very simple. When Dr. B. thought about the view of the Sparrow Hills, psychophysical energy developed in his brain, gradually left it, and accumulated on the surface of his body, on his hands. Scarcely had he then taken the sheet in his hands when the energy passed onto the paper and remained there. The picture he thought of immediately after the first had, for some reason, excited his subconscious mind only weakly. Consequently the energy produced could not attain sufficient tension to leave the brain and pass onto the paper before the experiment had ended.⁵¹ The result was that the first picture was transferred, while the second was not. It should be noted here that at that time I did not yet employ the practice of conducting the energy into the earth before the experiment, and therefore had not drawn Dr. B.’s attention to it.

If we now examine the answers to the first two sheets more closely, we see that, as in my other experiments, they chiefly contain a general description of the picture serving as the task, while the details are not fully reproduced or are only faintly indicated. In any case, however, it is clear at first sight that there is a great general resemblance between the description and the picture. As for the last experiment, it is so characteristic and demonstrative that a more convincing proof of the correctness of my entire theory and the conclusions following from it could scarcely have been produced.

Before summing up my experiments, I should like to answer a question that has probably occurred to the reader several times already: why, in the mental transference of visual representations, are chiefly the general outlines of the picture reproduced, while details that sometimes occupy the entire foreground are transferred only poorly or not at all? How is this phenomenon to be explained? At the present state of our knowledge it is, of course, impossible to give a fully correct and scientifically grounded answer to this question. Nevertheless, I consider it necessary to offer a few hypothetical considerations.

When we look at a picture, it is above all those details that are most conspicuous and have entirely definite outlines that involuntarily attract our attention. To apprehend these details clearly and accurately, our eyes must accommodate well: in other words, considerable work by the internal eye muscles is required. The more clearly and definitely an object is depicted, the more work it demands from those muscles. The energy developed at the first impression of the object is used almost entirely for the contraction of the muscles doing the work in that particular case, and is therefore not emitted at all. Consequently those elements of the picture that require a special effort of accommodation by the eyes are transferred either not at all or only poorly.

Conversely, from this standpoint those elements of the picture that do not possess sharply drawn outlines and produce only a diffuse impression, such as sky, water, clouds, field, forest, greenery, and so on, must be transferred. Looking at the sky, water, clouds, greenery, and the like requires almost no fine adjustment of the eyes. The energy developed while viewing such elements of the picture is scarcely consumed at all, is freely emitted, and evokes the corresponding images in the other person’s brain.

Thus, in my view, the character of the transference of visual representations is determined by the operation of the law of conservation of energy, thereby once again confirming its validity for phenomena of a psychic order as well.

In conclusion I consider it necessary to report the results of experiments I also conducted with two other young women endowed with the faculty of graphic automatism. In one case the young woman was keenly interested in spiritualism and herself served as a medium at spiritualist séances. The experiments I carried out with her yielded entirely favorable results, confirming all the principles established on the basis of the experiments with Lydia. The experiments with another young woman produced precisely the opposite results. Although she too possessed a distinctly pronounced faculty of automatic writing, its contents for the most part had not the slightest connection with my thoughts. In her automatic records the young woman set down only what was, or could have been, in her own subconscious mind. In other words, this young woman was incapable of serving as a percipient, and her faculty of graphic automatism represented merely a hysterical symptom in the sense of a partial dissociation of the elements of consciousness.

On this occasion I think it appropriate to emphasize once again the distinction between mediumship and hysteria in general, and between the contents of automatic records in the two states in particular. As I emphasized in Chapter IV, graphic automatism in hysteria represents the expression of a partial dissociation of particular complexes of consciousness. As a result, one or another complex can outwardly disclose its contents independently of the whole remainder of consciousness. But these contents bear no direct relation to the contents of another person’s consciousness. They consist solely of impressions acquired now or previously from the external world through the person’s own external sense organs. In other words, the presence of graphic automatism in hysterical individuals by no means implies that the person concerned can function as a medium in my sense, that is, as a percipient.

To be suited for this, one must evidently possess other peculiarities as well, by virtue of which the skin or other bodily elements of the person concerned become permeable to another person’s psychic energy. The former’s consciousness is thus subject to the direct influence of the latter’s consciousness and sometimes even becomes its echo. At present we do not know the nature of these peculiarities, but this knowledge can and must be gained through diligent and conscientious study of all manifestations of mediumship.

Summing up all my experiments, I can now formulate my conclusions in the following propositions:

1. Thinking is accompanied by the emission of a special radiant energy.

2. This radiant energy possesses psychic and physical properties and must therefore be termed psychophysical energy.

3. The psychic properties of this energy consist in its causing, on entering another person’s brain, precisely the same representations to arise there as accompanied its production in the first person’s brain.

4. The physical properties of psychophysical energy consist in its ability to:

   a) flow freely within the human body from the brain to the extremities and vice versa;

   b) accumulate on the surface of the body or at its extremities;

   c) penetrate air only with difficulty;

   d) penetrate an opaque partition, a door, with still greater difficulty;

   e) flow easily along a copper wire;

   f) pass onto paper, remain there, and in this way be carried to any desired place.

   Note. It is at present impossible to give a definite indication of how long psychophysical energy can remain on paper. Certain circumstances, however, correctly answered tasks that had lain unused for several weeks, indicate that under favorable conditions psychophysical energy can remain on paper for quite a long time.

   g) When a body charged with psychophysical energy, whether a living organism, “thought-upon” paper, or a metallic conductor, touches one that is weakly charged or not “charged” at all, the psychophysical energy flows from the former into the latter.

5. The place of origin and reception of psychophysical energy is apparently the subconscious mind, in which the psychic reaction also takes place that manifests itself outwardly in automatic writing.

6. For psychophysical energy to enter another person’s brain, that person must possess certain special properties by virtue of which the body becomes permeable to this energy.

VII. The Hypothesis of Psychic Radiations and My Own Experiments

Having in the foregoing traced all the phenomena of thought transference and clairvoyance to the action of a psychophysical energy and established many of its properties, I shall now attempt to clarify the nature of this energy: that is, to define it physically and ascertain its analogue in the physical world. First, however, I consider it necessary to touch in somewhat greater detail on the history of the question of radiant energy in the living organism generally and the brain in particular.

The idea that the human body in general, and the nervous system in particular, emits certain specific rays that act on other persons is very old. It probably dates from the time when cases of involuntary thought transference first began to be observed and the human mind began seeking a natural explanation of the phenomenon. As an attempt at a natural explanation of all kinds of occult phenomena, the hypothesis of a specific radiation from the human organism is so simple, and presses itself so persistently on anyone seeking such an explanation, that despite the solemn auto-da-fés to which learned commissions in various countries have repeatedly consigned it, it has always reappeared after a short time.

It must be admitted, however, that victory over this hypothesis came rather easily to its opponents. The hypothesis always rested on the uncertain ground of chance observations by isolated individuals, while its theoretical justification amounted to the claim that certain particularly sensitive persons, the so-called sensitives, had reportedly succeeded in perceiving in the dark the radiation of the human body, which consequently appeared luminous to them.

As regards the nature and properties of the organism’s hypothetical radiant energy, the views of different authors diverge. The famous Mesmer, the father of hypnotism, maintained that a peculiar fluid flowed from the human organism, possessing magnetic properties and therefore called by him “animal magnetism.” In Mesmer’s view, the hands and eyes of certain persons could exert a physical influence on others by means of the fluid energy of animal magnetism. The sensation caused in society by Mesmer’s teaching and cures from 1779 onward was so great that in 1784 the Paris Academy of Sciences considered it necessary to appoint a special commission to investigate the question. Its verdict, however, was extremely unfavorable to Mesmer’s doctrine. Owing to the high authority of this commission, whose members included Franklin and Lavoisier, its verdict made such a strong impression on French society that the magnetic fluid was thereafter placed in the same category as the philosopher’s stone.

Nevertheless, even after Mesmer, the question of radiations from the human body repeatedly arose in scientific circles and attracted the attention of individual investigators. The best known among them is the learned chemist Baron von Reichenbach, whose works attracted general attention and enjoyed great success in their day, around the middle of the nineteenth century. This author called the energy that, according to him, radiated from the human body and could be seen in the dark by his “sensitives” “Od.” He maintained that the human body is bipolar: that is, energy of opposite signs flows from the right and left halves of the body. As to the nature of odic energy, von Reichenbach stated that it occupied an intermediate position between magnetism, electricity, and heat, but could not be identified with any of these forces.

Baron von Reichenbach’s tireless advocacy of his ideas in a whole series of writings had no effect, however, beyond earning him the reputation of an incorrigible eccentric, despite his considerable scientific achievements in chemistry. We do not venture to decide how far this reputation was justified. We shall merely observe that a quarter-century later, when everyone was taking the liveliest interest in spiritualism, the French physician A. Chevillard published a work in which he attempted to explain the nature of spiritualist phenomena on the basis of the hypothesis of an animal fluid.⁵² In this author’s view, the entire surface of the human body is in a certain state of tension and, like electrified bodies, radiates some imponderable matter that he calls nervous fluid. It is also interesting that Professor Mendelejeff, that relentless opponent of spiritualism who devoted much effort and energy to combating spiritualist superstition, passes the following judgment on Chevillard’s hypothesis: “This hypothesis,” he says, “in my opinion contains nothing impossible, and if the experiments intended to substantiate it were free of doubt, every natural scientist would accept it.”⁵³

In this connection let us also recall that the famous English physicist William Crookes, who thirty years ago sought to demonstrate the existence, then improbable but now generally accepted, of a fourth, “radiant state of matter,” also admitted the existence of a special “psychic force” on the basis of his own observations of spiritualist phenomena. Finally, it remains to mention that in recent times, half a century after von Reichenbach, his ideas have come to life again and found enthusiastic adherents in two French authors, de Rochas and Luys. They made a series of corresponding observations and arrived at almost the same conclusions as von Reichenbach. Yet in our time these authors too meet the fate of their German predecessor: official science pays them no attention, and the philistines ridicule them. This is inevitable. Philistines of every kind and rank will always ridicule anything that lacks the stamp of official approval, while science can never, and must never, acknowledge what cannot be proved by the objective method or by rendering objective the results obtained through the subjective method.⁵⁴

Bearing this in mind, several authors attempted to construct apparatuses that would make it possible to establish objectively the specific radiations of the animal body, especially psychic radiations. The result of these attempts was the invention of a whole series of so-called biometers, such as those of Lucas, Fortin, Baraduc, and others. The principle of all these biometers is that a freely movable needle is suspended inside a glass bell and is attracted or repelled when a finger is brought near it. The authors mentioned and their followers now supposed that such experiments with biometers proved the existence of specific emanations from the body, and even of psychic rays. But this conclusion was not entirely justified. The fact is that in their biometer experiments the authors were unable to exclude the effect on the apparatus of the heat and electricity of their own organisms. As criticism demonstrated, the electrical and thermal phenomena associated with the physicochemical processes of life, and even atmospheric influences, could act on the biometer needle. Under these circumstances the movements of the needle cannot, of course, be used to substantiate the hypothesis of specific radiations from our body.

In 1904 Paul Joire reported to the Paris “Society for Hypnology and Psychology” the results of his experiments with a new biometer he had constructed himself and called the sthenometer.⁵⁵ It consists essentially of a thin pointer made of straw or aluminum, suspended from a very fine silk thread or resting on a glass knife-edge like the beam of a balance. With the help of this apparatus, Joire believes he has demonstrated the existence of a special force “that flows from the living organism, arises chiefly under the influence of the nervous system, and can be transmitted to a distance.” The action of this force at a distance manifested itself in the sthenometer needle’s always turning toward the experimenter’s hand, though in rare cases it turned away from it. In arranging the experiments he took care to exclude the possible action of every other force: heat, light, electricity, and sound (vibration of the air). Since, with all these forces excluded, the sthenometer needle still turned one end toward the experimenter’s outstretched hand, Joire concluded that the force acting in this case represented the specific energy of the living organism, originating in the nervous system.

Moreover, this author also established the following: “If someone places himself before this apparatus, approximately 60 cm from the glass bell, and, without extending his hand, fixes his gaze on a little tuft of cotton wool attached to the needle’s tip, one can observe that, whatever its original position, the needle turns and sets itself perpendicular to the observer, as though the tuft of cotton wool were being attracted by him.”

The reader will naturally see that, if such experiments proved accurate, they would indeed, as Joire maintains, demonstrate the existence of a special energy of the living organism that arises in the nervous system or brain, flows out of the body, and exerts an action at a distance. To establish this for myself I considered it necessary to carry out a series of control experiments with the sthenometer.⁵⁶ Unfortunately, however, the results were unfavorable. According to my observations, made in 1905 in the psychological laboratory at the psychiatric clinic of Moscow University, the slightest thermal influences could turn the needle, so that I was quite unable to exclude the effect of my own body heat on its movements. The following makes this readily clear.

Joire maintains that by wrapping his sthenometer in a thick layer of cotton wool he succeeded in protecting it from external heat so well that bringing a piece of red-hot iron near it had not the slightest effect on the needle, whereas bringing the hand near it under the same circumstances set it in motion. I carried out the same experiments, but instead of red-hot iron I brought a vessel of warm water near the sthenometer, which was wrapped in a thick layer of cotton wool. It now emerged that, despite this very thick layer, the sthenometer needle invariably turned toward the vessel of warm water. Even a double or triple layer of cotton wool was still unable to protect the sthenometer from the effect of the warm water. It seems to me that under such circumstances it is very difficult to exclude the influence of the experimenter’s body heat on the needle, and in that case this method, too, cannot prove the existence of a special radiant “energy of the living body originating in the nervous system.” In any event, I do not wish to pronounce a final judgment, but merely to report my impressions.

As for the contradiction between Joire’s observations on the effect of heat on the sthenometer needle and my own, its cause may lie in the fact that I experimented with moist heat, water, whereas Joire used dry heat, red-hot iron. At any rate, the Frenchman Jounet, who made the same observations as I did in 1905, expresses precisely this supposition concerning the results of his own experiments. “If a candle,” he says, “is placed before the sthenometer needle, it does indeed exert a scarcely perceptible influence, whereas the hand turned the needle 20° toward itself. But a piece of iron or the flame of a candle is dry heat. I now asked myself whether moist heat, which corresponds more closely to the heat of the living body, might not exert a stronger effect on the apparatus. Experiment confirmed this idea: when a vessel of warm water was brought near the sthenometer, the needle deflected by 20°.”⁵⁷

Joire’s experiments, then, have not so far yielded results that leave no room for doubt about the existence of a special nervous energy proceeding from the living organism and acting at a distance. After these experiments, just as before, we still face the task of finding a method for objectively demonstrating the presumed radiations of the human body. In searching for such a method, thought turns involuntarily toward that field on which the attention of the entire scientific world is now concentrated and where entirely new horizons have opened to the human mind: I mean the investigations of radioactivity.

As is well known, the recent discovery of radium and a whole series of other radioactive substances has brought about an immense transformation in our conceptions of matter and opened a fatal breach in the old view of the world. Through this breach ideas that until recently seemed absurd have entered in a swift, fresh stream. In connection with this, the question of a special radiant energy of the human organism has arisen anew and now seeks to establish a firm footing on a scientific basis. But this time the method of establishing the presumed radiations is borrowed from the branch of physics concerned with the latest investigations into radiant energy.

I have in mind the investigations of the French physicist R. Blondlot. While observing the rays emitted by a Crookes tube, he noticed that some of them, unlike X-rays, possessed the property of being reflected and refracted. On closer examination of this group of rays, the scientist discovered a whole series of further properties distinguishing them from X-rays. Blondlot called these new rays N-rays. Although themselves invisible, N-rays possess the ability to intensify weak light. For example, a screen coated with a thin layer of faintly phosphorescent calcium sulfide is made to phosphoresce more strongly under the influence of Blondlot’s rays. Thanks to this circumstance, such a screen can serve to detect N-rays, and Blondlot used it in his investigations.

The fate of this discovery, however, was rather sad. While a whole series of French authors carried out control experiments and confirmed and supplemented Blondlot’s observations, German and English investigators obtained negative results. The English physicist Wood made the greatest effort to refute the doctrine of the new rays. He visited Blondlot’s laboratory and maintains that he did not see at all the phenomena on the screen that his French colleague wished to demonstrate.

It cannot be denied that Blondlot’s method is indeed highly subjective. To perceive, on a faintly phosphorescent screen, the slight changes in the intensity of its glow produced by N-rays requires a very fine sense of sight. It is therefore no wonder that persons lacking this faculty fail to apprehend changes on the screen that are perfectly clear to others. Thus, although the method of observation must be acknowledged as subjective, this by no means constitutes sufficient grounds for passing a categorically negative judgment on the rays in question. For this very reason the German and English investigators’ denial of the existence of rays discovered by Blondlot and demonstrated by a whole series of French authors seems to me highly hazardous. It remains only to regret equally both that it has not yet proved possible to demonstrate the newly discovered rays by a more objective method, and that reputable investigators should pronounce such dismissive judgments without sufficient grounds. Science must be equally cautious in its affirmations and its denials.

Be that as it may, investigations of invisible rays by means of the phosphorescent screen led the French physiologist Auguste Charpentier to discover that the animal body, chiefly its nerve and muscle tissue, also emits invisible rays that produce a luminous effect on a faintly glowing screen. In view of this last property, their effect on the screen, Charpentier classified the rays he discovered as N-rays. This was somewhat premature, however. The fact is that Charpentier’s rays differ in many respects from Blondlot’s. The latter, for example, are absorbed by water and tin, whereas the former pass through these substances easily but are stopped by an aluminum plate 0.5 mm thick. It must therefore be assumed that the nature of the two kinds of rays differs somewhat, and that they cannot be identified on the basis of just one property, their effect on the screen. The same property belongs to a whole series of different invisible rays, such as heat rays, infrared rays, the rays of radium, and those of all radioactive substances generally. In view of these considerations I prefer to speak of Charpentier’s rays, regarding them as a distinct group and leaving aside the question of their physical nature and their relation to Blondlot’s disputed rays.

In observing the rays of the animal body, Charpentier established that nervous tissue is distinguished by particularly energetic radiation, with the central organ, the brain, proving to be the strongest source of these rays. Further observations by this investigator and by other authors, André Broca, Zimmern, Jean Becquerel, and others, showed that excitation of the nerve centers increases their emission of rays,⁵⁸ and that the rays proceeding from the nerve centers tend to spread chiefly along the spinal cord and nerves, both centrifugally and centripetally.⁵⁹

Most valuable to us are Charpentier’s observations on the effect of mental work, or thinking, on the phosphorescent screen. To make these observations he placed the screen in front of the subject’s forehead, slightly to the left. “This person,” says Professor Bordier, describing Charpentier’s observations, “passes successively into two different mental states. In one state the person endeavors to relax attention as much as possible and think of nothing; in the other, the person performs some mental activity: calculates, reflects, develops in thought a series of unfamiliar ideas. It can now be clearly observed that in the first case the screen’s glow diminishes, while in the second it intensifies. The difference, though slight, is evident, and is the more clearly marked the better the person concerned can fulfill these conditions of mental rest and mental activity… . These phenomena can be observed by the thinking person himself, who is thus able to follow his thought process on the screen.”⁶⁰

Charpentier’s observations have thus revealed the existence of certain invisible rays that flow from the brain at the moment of thinking and produce a luminous effect on the screen. As regards the nature of these rays, it is interesting that, according to their discoverer’s observations, they differ from the rays of muscle tissue. The latter readily penetrate even a thick aluminum plate, whereas the former cannot pass through one only 0.5 mm thick. In general, the rays of neurocerebral origin differ in their physical properties from those described by Blondlot more than do any of Charpentier’s other physiological rays. For this reason I consider it quite wrong to identify them, as Charpentier has done, on the basis of a single, by no means characteristic feature, their effect on the phosphorescent screen. On the contrary, so long as the nature of rays of cerebral origin remains unknown to us, and so long as certain special physical properties distinguish them from other rays, we must separate them into a group of their own and give them a definite name. If we call them brain rays, we thereby give them an entirely appropriate name that indicates only the origin of these rays without deciding the question of their nature. We shall now concern ourselves with these brain rays.

As early as 1904, while I was carrying out my experiments with Sophie Starker, Charpentier’s observations aroused my interest. I hoped to find in them a scientific basis for the theory of psychic radiations and an explanation of thought transference. At that time I was still entirely unaware of this author’s observations on the effect of thinking on the screen, and I then made a series of analogous observations independently of the French scientist.⁶¹

Since these are of great importance for resolving the question that is the subject of the present investigation, I consider it necessary to give them here. This is all the more so because my observations invalidate the objections that can be raised against Charpentier’s experiments: namely, that the luminous phenomena on the screen are the result of the observer’s autosuggestion and therefore cannot be adduced as conclusive proof of the existence of brain rays. In my experiments, as the reader will see, the possibility of autosuggestion is entirely excluded by control observations, which render objective the results obtained by the subjective method and thereby invalidate the objection just mentioned.

For my investigations in this direction I made a circular screen of cardboard, 12 cm in diameter. The calcium sulfide was first mixed in equal parts with dammar varnish and then applied to the screen in a thin layer, ½ mm thick. On drying, the varnish fixes the calcium sulfide firmly to the screen. If a screen prepared in this way is exposed to diffuse sunlight for only one second, it can subsequently glow in the dark for eight to ten minutes. Naturally I carried out the investigations in a dark room.

Holding the screen in my hand with the phosphorescent side facing me, I took up a position in front of the subject’s head. While instructing the subject to think of some word, that is, to repeat it mentally, I watched closely for the changes occurring on the screen at that moment. These investigations revealed the following.

Initially the screen appears as an evenly glowing disc. As soon as the subject, at a signal I give, begins to think of a word or calculate mentally, the following can be observed on the screen. Its edges become brighter, while the central part remains as faintly illuminated as before and, by contrast with the brightened edges, appears like a dark patch against a bright background. As soon as the subject stops thinking at a given signal, the edges of the screen darken again and the entire screen immediately assumes an even brightness. The width of the luminous margin varies, but the central part of the screen always retains the same faint glow and, during thinking, appears as a billowing dark cloud against a brightened background.

At first I could not explain why the central part of the screen did not brighten, but the phenomenon soon became clear to me. The fact is that only the periphery of our retina possesses the ability to perceive weak light and slight fluctuations in light, whereas the central part of the retina does not perceive slight fluctuations in weak light. Consequently the slight brightening of the screen is sensed only at the periphery of the retina and projected by us onto the edges of the screen. Its central part, corresponding to the area of central vision that does not sense small fluctuations in light, retains the same faint glow and thus appears, in a sense, as a dark cloud against a bright background.

Since our eyeball, and with it the retina, oscillates slightly throughout the period of observation, the central patch consequently moves to and fro on the screen the whole time, now approaching the edge, now receding from it. For this very reason, when one observes the screen at the moment of thinking, what first strikes the eye is the appearance of a mobile, billowing dark cloud against a bright background. The whole appearance gives the impression that the central part of the screen darkens at the moment of thinking; in reality, however, it is caused by the periphery becoming brighter.

Numerous observations on different persons consistently yielded one and the same result: the screen brightened during thinking and darkened after the act of thought ended. Fearing, however, that I might be the victim of involuntary autosuggestion, I conducted a series of control observations consisting of the following. The subject was to choose independently when to think and when not to think. I, meanwhile, watched the screen and had to determine whether the subject was thinking at that time, indicating precisely when the thinking began and ended. The results convinced me that no autosuggestion was taking place here. In all the control experiments, on the basis of the phenomena observed on the screen, I was always able to determine accurately when the subject began and stopped thinking at will. I generally indicated the beginning one or two seconds late, but the end almost instantaneously. Reversing the experimental arrangement had thus given me a means of constantly checking myself, and I used this means in all subsequent observations to avoid false conclusions.

Having thus established the fact of increased radiation from the brain during thinking, I proceeded to investigate the manner in which the rays emitted by the brain, the brain rays, spread. These investigations revealed the following.

If I placed the screen on the subject’s hand or foot, it likewise began to glow more strongly at the moment the subject began to think. In this case the brightening was much more pronounced than when the screen was in front of the subject’s head. Evidently, in the former case the brain rays retain more energy and act more intensely than in the latter.

I was also able to establish the following. Whatever my distance from the subject within the same room, and whatever position the subject adopted, standing, sitting, or lying down, the screen always brightened as soon as the person began to think. It was noticeable, however, that the farther I was from the subject, the weaker the effect on the screen. If the subject was in a different room from me and the door between us was tightly closed, the screen could likewise be observed to brighten at the moment the subject began thinking in the other room. Again, the greater the distance between the subject and myself, the weaker the effect. Here too, control experiments convinced me that my observations were by no means based on autosuggestion.

Finally, if the subject was in a third room away from me, with both doors between us tightly closed, the person’s thinking produced no effect at all on the screen. If, however, I passed a copper wire through the keyholes of both doors, and the subject held one end in the hands while I brought the screen up to the other, the usual effect appeared on it while the subject was thinking. By means of the control experiments described above I could establish here too that no autosuggestion was involved. I always succeeded, using an agreed signal, in determining precisely the moments when the subject in the third room began and stopped thinking.

It is interesting that in all the cases cited above, speaking, that is, thought expressed aloud, produced no effect on the screen: in other words, it was not accompanied by the emission of brain rays. If I had the subject alternate between thinking a word and pronouncing it aloud, the screen brightened in the first case but not in the second. From my standpoint this phenomenon finds an entirely satisfactory explanation in the operation of the law of conservation of energy. When we pronounce a word aloud, the energy developed in our speech centers is consumed in exciting contractions of the muscles of the tongue and mouth. If, however, we merely think the words, the energy developed remains free and flows out in increased measure in the form of brain rays. Here, therefore, we observe the validity of the law of conservation of energy for the brain rays we are investigating, just as above we saw, in the effect of this universal law on psychophysical energy, the cause of the peculiar character of the transference of visual representations, the recession of the details into the background.

If we now sum up all the observations I made by means of the screen and take Charpentier’s analogous experiments into account, we are justified in asserting that thinking is indeed accompanied by the emission of brain rays, and that these possess the following properties:

a) Within the human body they flow easily from the brain to the extremities and vice versa.

b) They penetrate air fairly easily.

c) They flow easily along a metallic conductor.

d) They penetrate an opaque medium, a door, while being partly absorbed.

In conclusion I venture to offer a few practical hints to those wishing to test my observations.

1. The calcium sulfide must glow with a violet light in the dark.

2. Before beginning the investigation with the screen, the observer must spend some time in the dark so that the eye can rest and acquire the ability to perceive slight fluctuations in light. During the investigation too, the eyes should be allowed to rest in the dark from time to time. Otherwise such a flickering begins before them that it becomes difficult to perceive the changes taking place on the screen.

3. Observation of the effect produced on the screen by the act of thought is favored by a certain optimum degree of glow, probably determined by the nature of our eye. If the screen glows either too strongly or too weakly, our eye cannot perceive the fluctuations in light associated with the process of thinking. According to my observations, this optimum occurs when the initially bright screen becomes covered by a slight cloud or mist. The phenomena appear most clearly on a screen clouded lightly in this way. Such a screen can be used for eight to ten minutes, but it then becomes so dark that nothing more can be observed on it. After this, the screen must be charged anew with sunlight, for which purpose it is exposed to diffuse daylight for one second.

4. During the investigation the observer must think of nothing, for his own thought can likewise produce the effect on the screen described above, disturbing the regular alternation, and consequently the observation, of the phenomena caused by the subject’s thinking. At the beginning of the investigation the observer generally waits for the moment when the screen shows a uniform intensity of light. It often happens, however, that the screen refuses to reach a luminous equilibrium and a billowing central patch stubbornly persists. In my experience this is explained by either the observer or the subject involuntarily thinking of something. In such cases one must suppress every thought in oneself and instruct the subject too to think of nothing, preferably to doze. Scarcely is this condition fulfilled when the central patch immediately disappears and the screen attains luminous equilibrium.

5. The subject must become accustomed to beginning and stopping thought abruptly, either spontaneously or at the observer’s signal. This is most easily achieved when the subject thinks of a single word or calculates.

VIII. Psychophysical Energy: Brain Rays and Psychophysical Emanation

Although obtained by the subjective method, the results set down in the preceding chapter, in view of the control observations, leave no doubt that thinking is accompanied by the emission of brain rays that intensify the glow of the phosphorescent screen and possess definite physical properties.

If we now compare these properties of brain rays with the physical properties of psychophysical energy as we established them on the basis of the phenomena of thought transference (see p. 100), a multitude of common features immediately strikes us. More precisely, we notice that all the properties of brain rays form part of the physical properties of psychophysical energy. In view of such a correspondence, the supposition involuntarily presents itself that brain rays are identical with psychophysical energy: that is, that they also possess psychic properties, and that it is precisely they that transfer thoughts by causing corresponding images to arise in the percipient’s brain. Certain considerations, however, do not permit us to draw such a conclusion.

The fact is that, as we have seen, brain rays quickly and easily produce a luminous effect on the screen, even when the observer is in a different room from the subject with the door closed. Consequently, brain rays suffer no loss of power over a relatively considerable distance through the air. Thought transference at a distance, even the shortest distance, meanwhile proceeds very slowly and extremely imperfectly, and in any case much worse than with direct or indirect contact, as the experiments with Sophie Starker and Lydia W. show. If brain rays, which produce their effect on the screen, possessed psychic properties in the sense indicated above, thought transference at a distance would have to take place as easily and reliably as the production of the luminous effect on the screen.

It is evident, then, that brain rays possess no psychic properties, or at least possess them to a much smaller degree than the psychophysical energy that arises in the brain at the moment of thinking, whose properties we established earlier through an analysis of the conditions prevailing in thought transference. In other words, brain rays are apparently not entirely identical with psychophysical energy. But what is their relation to one another?

If we consider that the physical properties of psychophysical energy include all the properties of brain rays, we are justified in supposing that the latter form a component of the former. In other words, psychophysical energy is composite in nature, and brain rays represent one of its constituents. If we also consider that brain rays pass comparatively easily through the air and even through a door at a considerable distance, we are justified in saying that these rays apparently possess great penetrating power. Conversely, the slow and imperfect transference of thoughts at a distance justifies us in supposing that, in passing through the air, psychophysical energy loses a certain component to which psychic properties chiefly belong. This psychically active portion, which we shall call the psychic element, evidently possesses very little penetrating power and is consequently held back in the air.

We thus arrive at the conception that the psychophysical energy developed in the brain at the moment of thinking consists of two parts: 1) brain rays, possessing great penetrating power and detectable by means of the phosphorescent screen; and 2) the psychic element, possessing very little penetrating power and detectable and investigable with the aid of a medium, or percipient. The phosphorescent screen is, in a sense, the physical reagent for detecting brain rays; the mediumistic person is the psychic reagent for detecting the psychic element.

Turning now to the latter, we must further establish that, insofar as it manifests itself in thought transference, the psychic portion of psychophysical energy displays a whole series of physical properties besides low penetrating power. It accumulates on the surface and at the extremities of the body; flows along a wire; can pass onto paper and remain there for quite a long time; and, finally, can pass from a body charged with it to an uncharged one. Taken together, all these properties indicate that the psychic element of psychophysical energy is to a high degree material or, if the expression may be permitted, physical. It is therefore more correct to call it the psychophysical rather than the psychic element. From our standpoint it is, so to speak, the physical substrate of thought, its carrier and its exciter.

The composite psychophysical energy that appears in the brain at the moment of thinking therefore consists of brain rays, detectable by means of a “physical reagent,” the phosphorescent screen, and of the psychophysical element, the physical substrate of thought, which can be investigated with the aid of a “psychic reagent,” the mediumistic person.

But what is this “psychophysical element,” this physical substrate of thought? What is it in its physical nature? Does it possess an analogue in the purely physical world? Have our conclusions perhaps left the ground of scientific reality altogether? To decide these questions we turn to physics, and chiefly to the branch that must particularly interest us here: the branch dealing with radiant energy and with substances that independently emit invisible rays, that is, radioactive substances. The work of the well-known physicist A. Righi, Die moderne Theorie der physikalischen Erscheinungen, is devoted to presenting and generalizing the fundamental facts established by science in this field. Using this book as a guide, I shall cite the findings that interest us, keeping as closely as possible to the author’s own account.

Investigations of radium and other radioactive substances, that is, substances that independently emit invisible rays, have shown that these rays consist of three groups: α-, β-, and γ-rays. These three groups differ from one another in their refrangibility, penetrating power, and deflection in the electromagnetic field. “When various substances,” says Professor Righi, “are struck or penetrated by the three kinds of rays, different effects arise according to the nature of those substances, effects that are particularly evident when a radium salt is used… . It is not possible to separate rays of one kind completely from the others and study the phenomena they produce in isolation. But by means of absorbing plates it is possible to hold back the less penetrating rays, for example the α-rays, or these together with a portion of the β-rays, or even to allow only the γ-rays to pass… . The effects produced by radioactive substances, and especially by radium, can be classified as luminous, chemical, electrical, mechanical, thermal, and physiological effects… . Phosphorescence and fluorescence seem chiefly to be effects of the α- and β-rays; some substances are excited to a more vivid glow by α-rays, others by β-rays.”⁶²

Moreover, a whole series of facts indicates that α- and β-rays differ considerably in nature from γ-rays. Whereas the latter appear in every respect to be a kind of electromagnetic wave, exhibit corresponding properties, and rightly deserve the name “rays,” the same cannot be said of the former. α- and β-rays can be called rays only in a figurative sense, since in reality they consist of minute particles, the so-called electrons, ejected from the radioactive substance in enormous quantities and at incredible speed. α- and β-rays are not really rays but, so to speak, streams of electrons endowed with enormous velocity, those minute units of which, according to the present conception, all material atoms are composed.

Apart from α-, β-, and γ-rays, radioactive substances constantly give off part of their substance in another form: the radioactive emanation discovered by Rutherford. This investigator showed that thorium constantly emits slowly spreading particles whose action is added to that of the α-, β-, and γ-rays and approximates that of the first two kinds of rays.

This is precisely the radioactive emanation, which possesses all the properties of the radioactive substance and itself in turn emits new masses of electrons, likewise in the form of α- and β-rays.

To all appearances the emanation consists of the same particles, electrons, of which α- and β-rays are composed. But “the particles forming this emanation differ from those of which α- and β-rays consist in that the former diffuse slowly through space like the molecules of a gas, whereas the others are ejected at enormous speed. In fact, the emanation mixes with the surrounding gas and can be carried with it from one point in space to another.”

“The emanation passes readily even through very small openings and narrow cracks, which permit an ordinary gas to pass only exceedingly slowly. It is radioactive only temporarily: that is, its radioactivity constantly diminishes… . The emanation possesses the property of making the bodies with which it comes into contact temporarily active. This appearance of radioactivity in bodies that do not possess it in themselves was … called induced radioactivity. According to Rutherford, it comes about because the emanation deposits imperceptible quantities of an invisible substance on the bodies concerned… . Moreover, the emanation as such seems to adhere to the bodies it makes active and, in a sense, to permeate them, for these bodies themselves become sources of emanation… . Radioactivity is probably a property present in varying degrees in all bodies.”⁶³

“The observations reported here,” says Righi, “taken together form a weighty body of facts, many of which have been established with absolute certainty… . It is indeed beyond doubt that a radioactive body constantly gives off portions of the matter of which it consists… .”

Such are the latest facts from the field of physics that I considered it necessary to place before the reader in order to put my final conclusions in their proper light. Let us now proceed to examine them.

We saw that the brain emits a radiant psychophysical energy: that is, it belongs among the radioactive substances. On the basis of an analysis of psychological and psychophysical experiments we reached the conclusion that psychophysical energy consists of brain rays possessing great penetrating power and a “psychophysical element” with very little penetrating power. We now learn from physics that all radioactive substances generally emit an energy likewise consisting of two parts: rays with great penetrating power and an emanation with very little. Let us leave aside the question of the nature of brain rays, which apparently have much in common with the α- and β-rays of any radioactive substance, such as great penetrating power and the excitation of phosphorescence, and turn to the other component, the “psychophysical element,” which chiefly interests us.

If we compare it with physical emanation, we find a multitude of features common to both. Both possess very little penetrating power, diffuse slowly through the air, adhere to bodies, as the psychic element adheres to the paper in our experiments, and permeate them, so to speak. They make them active, as the paper becomes psychically active in our experiments, and finally make other bodies sources of energy: that is, they pass from a “charged” body into an “uncharged” one.

In view of these shared properties, embracing almost all the characteristics of physical emanation, I believe I draw an entirely logical conclusion in saying that the “psychophysical element” I have discovered and examined more closely above is nothing other than the emanation of psychophysical energy. The correspondence between the physical properties of the “psychophysical element” and those of the emanation of any radioactive substance is so complete that this conclusion presents itself inevitably. This agreement is all the more convincing because I reached these results from quite a different starting point and by quite different routes from the physicists.

A number of objections may be expected from the latter, however, and I should like to answer them here at once. The fact is that by “radioactivity” physicists ordinarily mean the ability of certain substances, such as uranium, thorium, radium, and others, independently to emit a special kind of rays capable of: a) producing phosphorescence in certain crystalline substances; b) affecting the photographic plate; and c) discharging electrified bodies by ionizing gases. On the basis of these chief properties of the rays emitted by radioactive substances, three methods have also been specified for detecting and measuring every kind of radioactivity: the phosphorescence, photographic, and electrical methods. Consequently, to prove the radioactivity of the brain and of psychophysical emanation by strictly physical means, one would have to demonstrate the effect of both by means of these three procedures.

As regards the first method, phosphorescence, we have already employed it above, and it was precisely this method that led us to the discovery of brain rays. Admittedly, strictly speaking, these rays do not produce phosphorescence but merely intensify phosphorescence already present. This circumstance, however, does not detract from the significance of the phenomenon, except insofar as it indicates the relatively weak physical activity of the rays in question. Perhaps this weak physical activity of brain rays also explains why it has not proved possible to demonstrate them by the photographic method. As is well known, Blondlot’s and Charpentier’s rays likewise have no effect on the photographic plate. In any event, both these procedures, the photographic method and that of phosphorescence, are not generally regarded in physics as particularly reliable, and are used to investigate only substances possessing very intense radioactivity, since their application to weakly active substances often yields a negative result.

For investigating these latter substances, and indeed any radioactivity, the most reliable, sensitive, and exact method is the electrical one: electroscopic measurement of the decrease in the electric charge of an electrified body under the ionizing influence of the radioactive substance. Consequently, to demonstrate by strictly physical means the radioactive nature of the brain and the existence of the radioactive emanation of psychophysical energy, I would have had to employ the electrical method for both.

As regards the brain, scarcely anything could have been demonstrated in this way concerning the brain of a living person, in whose examination it is quite impossible to exclude the ionizing influence of all the other factors associated with the physicochemical processes of life. The electroscopic method, however, could be admirably applied to determine the radioactive nature of psychophysical emanation. Since, according to our findings, this can remain on paper, electroscopic examination of such “charged” paper could demonstrate and prove, by purely physical means, the presence of radioactive emanation on the paper concerned. Unfortunately, until now external circumstances have prevented me from carrying this out, and I am therefore not yet in a position to supply physicists with the evidence they are entitled to demand of me.

But if physicists, taking a purely physical standpoint and insisting on the precision of purely physical terms, are entitled to demand from me evidence obtained by purely physical methods when I use those terms, the same does not apply to an equal degree to psychologists and to all those who understand that the importance of the discovery of psychophysical emanation lies chiefly in the recognition of its psychic properties. What matters, or matters most, is not that emanation emitted from the organism is present on paper at all, but that this emanation is psychophysical: that it possesses psychic properties. And this circumstance is and can be proved only by psychological and psychophysical experiments, by no means by purely physical ones.

Indeed, even if by the most exact physical procedure we demonstrate that radioactive emanation is contained in paper over which I have thought about something, and that beforehand no emanation of any kind was present in the paper, are we then entitled to conclude that this emanation was emitted from the brain and is psychophysical emanation? Of course not. To identify the emanation established by physical methods as psychophysical, we must prove that it possesses psychic properties. We must, therefore, necessarily perform the psychological experiments on which the present investigation is based. In other words, demonstrating and studying psychophysical emanation absolutely requires a psychic reagent, and only a living person capable of perceiving the emanation we are investigating can serve as such a reagent (see p. 11).

Thus, in the question of the existence of an emanation of psychophysical energy, psychological or psychophysical experiments, rather than physical ones, must be regarded as alone convincing and uniquely decisive. For this very reason I consider it wrong or inconsistent to call the propositions concerning psychophysical emanation that I have established on the basis of exact experimental observations a hypothesis. No: this is not a hypothesis but a fact that I have discovered and explained, just as the existence of radioactive substances and radioactive emanation is likewise a fact, not a hypothesis. The difference consists only in the method of investigating them. But I repeat: for the discovery and investigation of psychophysical emanation, only psychophysical methods are conceivable.

Those who insist on the precision of physical terminology could ask me, however: by what right do I continually speak of an emanation when I myself admit that I have not yet applied the requisite physical methods? Is this not, in that case, idle fantasizing on physical subjects?

To this I would reply as follows. There are iron laws of human logic, binding on everyone, that, given the existence of certain facts, make the conclusions following from them compulsory. Throughout the entire history of science’s development, these iron laws of logic have served as a sure guiding star in the search for truth. They have repeatedly led to the greatest discoveries. They helped Newton discover universal gravitation; clothed in mathematical formulas, they helped astronomers discover new luminaries in the heavens, inaccessible to the mightiest telescopes; and thirty years ago they led Crookes to the discovery of the fourth, “radiant state of matter,” a discovery met with universal skepticism at the time but now, in a somewhat modified form, a generally acknowledged fact. It is on these iron laws of logic that I base my conclusions, and to them that I appeal in the last instance.

I reason as follows. A precise analysis of experimental observations of a psychological order, carefully carried out by me, leads me logically to demonstrate a hidden operative principle in the form of psychophysical energy, possessing definite psychic and physical properties. Further analysis of likewise carefully conducted experimental observations of a psychophysical character, those with the screen, leads me, together with the preceding results, to discover the composite nature of this energy and to differentiate it into brain rays and a psychophysical element. Finally, setting the results obtained in this way alongside the latest findings of physics reveals a truly astonishing correspondence between the properties of the psychophysical element and those of radioactive emanation. After all this, it seems to me that anyone who fails to draw the only conclusion possible at the present state of our knowledge falls into an insoluble contradiction with logic: namely, that the psychic element is nothing other than psychophysical emanation. This conclusion is logically compelling, and only those who disregard either logic or the facts can refuse to accept it.

By this I by no means intend to say, however, that the question has reached its final stage, or that we have no need at all of a purely physical demonstration of the emanation in the present case. On the contrary, I am deeply convinced that physical investigations in this field, alongside psychological ones, are precisely what can advance the matter considerably. But I maintain that, in view of everything set forth above, the fact of the existence of the psychophysical emanation I have described cannot be subject to the slightest doubt. Supported by the experimental results, this fact stands so firmly that even if electroscopic examination revealed no trace of radioactive emanation on the “thought-upon” paper, this would testify only to the inadequate sensitivity of modern electrometers to the exceptionally subtle psychophysical emanation. It could in no way shake the fact of the existence of that emanation itself.⁶⁴

This is also so for the following reason. Let us even set aside all analysis, disregard every theoretical consideration, and take the fundamental fact in itself: the blank “thought-upon” paper transfers a whole series of representations, even through a wire, and consequently contains some energy. What sort of energy can this be? Of all the forms of energy known to us, there is only one capable of passing onto other objects, remaining on them, being carried with them to another place, and retaining its activity in the process: radioactive emanation. All other kinds of energy known to us, heat, magnetism, electricity, and so on, do not possess such inert physical properties. It is clear that the energy to be investigated can only be emanation and nothing else. This conclusion is as clear and unavoidable as the schoolroom syllogism: all men are mortal; I am a man; therefore I am mortal. I ask the reader’s pardon for these general discussions, which I considered indispensable in view of the objections mentioned.

The emanation of psychophysical energy, then, is that mysterious agency whose intervention produces a whole series of inexplicable psychic phenomena, astonishing and bewildering some people and filling others with reverential dread. Here we have the mysterious agency that has engendered a vast amount of superstition, from the medieval belief in witches to modern spiritualism with its belief in “spirits,” communication with the beyond, and other nonsense. Here we have the mysterious agency that until now had escaped the investigator’s searching gaze and for that very reason caused such confusion in the observation of psychological phenomena that their scientific treatment was extraordinarily hampered. After all, as James aptly remarks, modern psychology cannot even be considered a science!

The discovery of psychophysical emanation makes it possible to explain a whole series of hitherto inexplicable, so-called occult phenomena, while at the same time raising a series of new questions whose solution must form the immediate task of further investigations.

Among the questions now on the agenda is, for example, that of the composition of psychophysical emanation. As we saw above, physicists regard emanation as consisting of minute particles that diffuse slowly into the surrounding space. But it is already clear to us that the particles of psychophysical emanation must be composite in nature, or that this emanation itself must consist of a complex combination of minute particles. Otherwise we could not explain how this psychophysical emanation, deposited on the paper and permeating it, evokes a whole series of the most complex images and representations in another person’s brain when it passes into that person. We must therefore admit that the particles of psychophysical emanation consist of a complex combination of elementary psychophysical elements, which we could call psychophysical atoms or, in accordance with the latest views, psychophysical electrons.

Proceeding further along this path, we are entitled, on the basis of the knowledge we borrow from physicists concerning the nature of α- and β-rays and their relations to radioactive emanation, to put forward certain suppositions about the psychic properties of brain rays. Above we left the question of brain rays open and merely indicated the possibility that they might be identical with the α- and β-rays of any radioactive substance. We are now entitled to go further and say that, if this identity could be proved by one means or another, the question of the psychic properties of brain rays would have to be decided in the affirmative, on the basis of the following considerations.

Physical investigations of radioactivity have demonstrated that α- and β-rays consist of the same electron particles as the emanation, or particles of the same kind, with the sole difference that the electron streams in the rays possess an enormous velocity approaching that of light, about 300,000 km per second, whereas the electrons of the emanation are distinguished by considerable inertia and diffuse slowly through the air. If this is so, brain rays too must be composed of the same psychophysical electrons that form psychophysical emanation. In that case brain rays must possess the same psychic properties as this emanation: that is, cause particular representations to arise in our brain and accordingly transfer thoughts.

The experimental observations, however, contradict this. We have seen that thoughts are transferred through the air comparatively slowly and only over short distances. Two conclusions are possible. Either brain rays are not identical with α- and β-rays and therefore do not consist of psychophysical electrons; or they are indeed identical, but for some reason the psychophysical electrons of brain rays possess little activity in a psychic respect, and thought transference over great distances therefore occurs much too rarely to be demonstrated experimentally. Personally I incline toward the latter supposition, for the following reason. For any representation, even the very simplest, to be transferred, a definite combination of a whole series of electrons is required. These must leave the agent’s brain in this combined state, firmly linked together, and enter, in the same form, the brain of the percipient. In other words, a certain stability is required of the combination or structure of electrons serving as the carrier of particular representations. It is immediately apparent that this stability belongs in greater measure to the slowly diffusing electron emanation than to electron streams ejected at the speed of light. It is quite possible that in the rushing whirl of electrons with which we are dealing in brain rays, the linkages and structures of electrons that carry particular representations are destroyed or disintegrate. Hence psychophysical emanation can be distinguished by readily demonstrable psychic properties, while brain rays cannot manifest these properties.

Apart from the theoretical considerations just set forth, there are also several factual indications that likewise do not permit us to deny psychic properties to brain rays altogether. The fact is that, although it has not yet proved possible to make experimental observations of thought transference over great distances, we cannot entirely ignore the numerous reports, often from wholly credible persons, of cases of involuntary telepathy, sometimes manifested over colossal distances. Perhaps in these cases we are dealing with the rare occurrence that brain rays, despite their enormous velocity, have preserved in a stable state the combinations and linkages of electrons formed in the brain emitting them.

Naturally, only carefully arranged experiments can properly resolve this question, whose practical and theoretical importance is obvious to everyone. To attempt already to resolve this and other analogous questions through theoretical discussion would be to enter the realm of pure fantasy, from which I have always striven to keep my distance. I therefore prefer to stop here for the time being.

Concluding Reflections

In bringing my work to a close, I venture to point out the general consequences following from the fact of the existence and from the properties of psychophysical emanation.

First of all, the fact that in my experiments paper “thought upon” by persons of different sexes and ages promptly conveyed the intended representations to the percipient, that is, contained psychophysical emanation, indicates that every person’s thinking is invariably accompanied by the emission of this emanation. Consequently we must suppose that in densely populated places, in great centers of civilization, and wherever large numbers of people gather, psychophysical emanation is emitted in such enormous quantities that it probably permeates every object and saturates all the air.

The question of whether this emanation continually enters our brain and influences the changing contents of our thoughts, however, admits of different answers. The reader will recall that a series of experiments I conducted with a young woman whose graphic automatism was hysterical in nature suggested the conclusion that, to be receptive to psychophysical energy, the person concerned must possess certain properties by virtue of which the body becomes permeable to that energy. What these properties are, and whether their nature is anatomical or psychophysiological, remains unknown to us for the present. Consequently we are not in a position to decide definitively here and now how, and to what degree, the psychophysical emanation saturating the air everywhere influences the contents of our consciousness.

Yet while there is no doubt that certain individuals, the so-called mediums or percipients, undergo a constant, direct, though sometimes imperceptible influence from the psyche of those around them, are, so to speak, continually made uniform by it, and may thereby lose their individuality, we believe that the experiments mentioned above in any case justify us in supposing that “normal people” are protected by their innate properties or special psychophysiological mechanisms from the direct influence of another person’s psyche. Consequently, under ordinary circumstances they are, in a sense, surrounded by a covering impermeable to the psychophysical emanation of others, enabling them to preserve their psychic individuality.

Numerous facts indicate, however, that psychophysical emanation, which according to the considerations just set forth plays a subordinate role in ordinary life, gains quite extraordinary significance and influence in all mass movements. At such times the psychophysiological mechanisms mentioned above probably become inadequate and lose their protective power. The body becomes permeable to psychophysical emanation, emitted in immense quantities and filling the air to saturation; it enters everyone’s consciousness without resistance and becomes a genuine psychic infection in the true sense of the word.

If we also bear in mind, on the one hand, the easy and accurate reproduction of all kinds of emotions in our experiments and, on the other, the rapidity with which various emotional affects take possession of a mass of people and their immense power over a crowd, we must conclude that the psychology of the masses, the laws of imitation, and indeed all the mysterious phenomena of the collective psyche, as well as those of individual suggestion, can be properly illuminated and interpreted only from the standpoint of a direct influence exerted by the emanation of psychophysical energy.

From the same standpoint the figurative and apt expression that “the ideas of the age are in the air” acquires a profound and fitting meaning. Yes, we must now say, ideas are in the air in the literal sense of the word, and their carriers are the particles of the emanation of psychophysical energy!

Publisher’s Catalogue Continued

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Borderland Questions of Nervous and Mental Life

Edited by Dr. L. Loewenfeld in Munich, in collaboration with distinguished specialists at home and abroad.

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33	Psychiatry and Education. By Dr. Georg Wanke in Friedrichroda.	0.80
34	Drunkenness and Temperance in the United States. Studies and impressions by Dr. B. Laquer in Wiesbaden.	1.50
35	On Consciousness, Its Anomalies, and Their Forensic Significance. By Dr. med. L. M. Kötscher in Hubertusburg.	2.40
36	Brain and Language. By Lecturer Dr. Heinr. Sachs in Breslau.	3.00
37	On the Comparative Psychology of the Different Sensory Qualities. By Professor H. Obersteiner in Vienna.	1.60
38	On Mental Working Capacity and Its Hygiene. By Dr. L. Loewenfeld in Munich.	1.40
39	The Significance of Suggestion in Social Life. By Professor Dr. W. von Bechterew in St. Petersburg.	3.00
40	The Temperaments: Their Nature, Their Significance for Mental Experience, and Their Particular Forms. By Dr. E. Hirt in Munich.	1.30
41	Nervous Life and Worldview: Their Interrelations in German Life Today. By Dr. Willy Hellpach in Karlsruhe.	2.00
42	Alcohol and Crime in All Their Relationships. By Dr. Hugo Hoppe in Königsberg.	4.00
43	The Individual and Social Sides of Mental Life. By Dr. Chr. D. Pflaum in Rome.	1.60
44	Brain and Culture. By Dr. Georg Buschan.	1.60
45	Personality and the Conditions of Its Development and Health. By Dr. W. von Bechterew, Professor in St. Petersburg.	1.00
46	Legal Protection and the Treatment of Criminals. Medical and scientific perspectives on future criminal policy. By Dr. Emil Lobedank, staff physician in Hann. Münden.	2.40
47	Pain. An investigation of the psychological and physiological conditions of the process of pain. By Dr. Semi Meyer in Danzig.	2.00
48	Imagination as a Cause of Illness. By Professor Dr. Dubois in Bern.	1.00
49	Love and Psychosis. By Dr. Georg Lomer in Nieder-Schönhausen near Berlin.	1.60
50	The Abnormal Characters in Ibsen. By Professor Dr. G. Weygandt in Würzburg.	0.80
51	Mental Illness and Crime. By Medical Councillor Dr. H. Kreuser, Director of the Royal Asylum at Winnenthal.	1.80
52	The Awakening of Sexual Consciousness and Its Anomalies. By Dr. L. M. Kötscher in Hubertusburg.	2.00
53	The Gothenburg System and Alcoholism. By Dr. B. Laquer in Wiesbaden.	2.40
54	Noise. A polemic against the noises of our life. By Theodor Lessing.	2.40
55	Fundamental Concepts of Ethics. By Professor Dr. Christian von Ehrenfels in Prague.	0.80
56	Sexual Ethics. By Professor Dr. Christian von Ehrenfels in Prague.	2.80
57	Homosexuality and Criminal Law. By Dr. L. Loewenfeld in Munich.	1.00
58	Common Errors in Judging the Mentally Ill. By Dr. med. Oswald Bumke in Freiburg im Breisgau.	2.00
59	Konrad Ferdinand Meyer: A Pathographic-Psychological Study. By Dr. Sadger.	1.40
60	Maupassant’s Illness. By Dr. G. Vorberg in Hanover.	0.80
61	The Emanation of Psychophysical Energy. By Dr. Naum Kotik in Moscow.
62	The Unconscious Ego. By Dr. Werraguth in Zurich.

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LXI

The Emanation of Psychophysical Energy

An experimental investigation of direct thought transference in connection with the question of the radioactivity of the brain.

By Dr. Naum Kotik, Moscow.

Wiesbaden: J. F. Bergmann, 1908.

Footnotes

1. I have in mind here the school of Mach, Avenarius, and others. ↩

2. Gustave Le Bon, L’évolution de la matière. Paris, 1908. ↩

3. E. Rutherford, Radioaktive Umwandlungen, 1907, p. 11. ↩

4. Augusto Righi, Die moderne Theorie der physikalischen Erscheinungen, 1905, p. 137. ↩

5. P. Lenard, Über Kathodenstrahlen, 1906, p. 33. ↩

6. To forestall objections, I consider it necessary to emphasize that I have in mind the positive-scientific, physical proof of the fictitious character of matter, in contrast to the philosophical proof that originated with the sensualists and Kant. ↩

7. Heinrich Hertz, Gesammelte Werke, vol. I, p. 342. ↩

8. William James, Psychologie, Russian translation, 1905, p. 4. ↩

9. Why psychic energy makes itself known to us in the form of thoughts we do not know, any more than we know why, for example, the energy of electromagnetic waves appears to us as light. These are questions of epistemology, which we leave aside in our experimental work. ↩

10. W. Ostwald, Vorlesungen über Naturphilosophie, 1902, p. 396. ↩

11. A certain portion is probably stored in the ganglion cells as potential energy. ↩

12. Since, in an experiment on a human being, we cannot eliminate the other internal sources of heat, we shall never be in a position to establish with certainty whether the rise in body temperature is caused by the transformation of psychic energy or of some other energy. ↩

13. E. Chevreul, “Lettre à M. Ampère sur une certaine classe de mouvements musculaires,” Revue des deux Mondes, May 1, 1833. Cited after Grasset, L’Occultisme. ↩

14. Gurney, Myers, and Podmore, Phantasms of the Living. London, 1887. ↩

15. Ssikorsky, “On Thought-Reading,” Wratsch, 1884, nos. 51 and 52. ↩

16. Tarchanow, Hypnotism and Thought-Reading. In Russian. Petersburg, 1886. ↩

17. Ch. Richet, “La Suggestion mentale et le calcul des probabilités,” Revue philosophique, 1884, no. 12. ↩

18. Ochorowicz, De la Suggestion mentale, 1887. ↩

19. N. Krainsky, Bewitchment, Epidemics of Screaming, and Possession. Novgorod, 1900. ↩

20. J. Shuk, “The Interrelations between Organisms.” In Russian. Mir Boshij, 1902, no. VI. ↩

21. Cited after L. Loewenfeld, Somnambulismus und Spiritismus, 2nd ed. Wiesbaden, 1907, p. 42. ↩

22. C. Lombroso, “Mon enquête sur la transmission de la pensée,” Annales des sciences psychiques, 1904. ↩

23. A. Forel, Der Hypnotismus, 1902, p. 33. ↩

24. J. Grasset, Le psychisme inférieur. Paris, 1906, p. 94. ↩

25. J. Grasset, L’Occultisme. Montpellier, 1907, p. 369. ↩

26. All the following experiments with Sophie Starker were carried out by me in Odessa in 1904. Their description also dates from that time and was published in the Russian journal Obosrenije Psychiatrii, 1904, nos. 8 and 9. ↩

27. The subsequent fate of this man, who played the role of agent in all the experiments with Sophie reported below, is not without interest. A year after we became acquainted, that is, in 1905, he became mentally ill and was confined for some time in the Odessa asylum. Unfortunately, I have been unable to obtain information from that institution about the form of his illness. Apparently discharged too early, he took his own life that same day. ↩

28. Translator’s note: The source gives times by counting minutes into the hour named next. Thus “54 Min. auf 9” means 8:54; “5 Min. auf 4,” 3:05; “38 Minuten auf 10,” 9:38; and “35 Minuten auf 11,” 10:35. Clock equivalents have been added in brackets while retaining the source’s verbal forms and the girl’s correction. Compare E. Mitt and E. Jaanvärk, Deutsches Lehr- und Lesebuch (Tartu, 1930), p.78, which explicitly equates 9:10 with “zehn Minuten auf zehn” and “zehn Minuten nach neun” (digitized edition). ↩

29. Traité de Pathologie générale, by Ch. Bouchard, 1904, p. 425. ↩

30. Naturally, I am speaking only of those branches of positive science in which experiment is possible at all. With regard to phenomena of cosmic origin, for example, science must confine itself to observations alone, whose results, however, are no less exact. ↩

31. A. Binet, Les altérations de la personnalité, 1892, p. 316. ↩

32. Max Dessoir, Das Doppel-Ich, 2nd ed., 1896, p. 11. ↩

33. A. Forel, Der Hypnotismus, 4th ed., 1902, pp. 2, 4, and 12. ↩

34. J. Grasset, Le psychisme inférieur, 1906. ↩

35. J. Grasset, work cited, p. 355. ↩

36. Pierre Janet, L’automatisme psychologique. Paris, 1889. ↩

37. M. Dessoir, work cited, pp. 60 and 82. ↩

38. J. Grasset, Le psychisme inférieur, 1906, p. 98. ↩

39. J. Grasset, L’Occultisme, 1907, p. 163. ↩

40. W. James, Psychologie, Russian translation, 1905, p. 177. ↩

41. W. James, work cited, p. 179. ↩

42. This theory does not, incidentally, appear to be entirely new, since it has previously been employed on several occasions by critics and opponents of spiritualism, for example the philosopher E. von Hartmann, as a hypothetical explanation of mediumistic phenomena. ↩

43. Lapponi, Hypnotismus und Spiritismus (Russian translation, 1907), p. 136. ↩

44. Dots are placed wherever Lydia paused during the writing. ↩

45. A. N. Chowrin, “Eine seltene Form von Hyperästhesie der höheren Sinnesorgane,” Beiträge zur neuro-psychischen Medizin (in Russian), 1898. ↩

46. Chowrin always used letters containing descriptions of visual representations, since he had noticed that these were “read” best. ↩

47. J. Anfimow, “Über übersinnliche Erscheinungen bei Hysterischen,” Wratschebnaja Gaseta (in Russian), 1902, no. 22. Emphasis mine. ↩

48. I obtained the letters from third parties and did not know their contents, but, following Chowrin’s example, I asked for letters describing visual representations. ↩

49. Louis Maurecy, “Expériences de psychométrie.” Quoted from Grasset, L’occultisme, 1907, p. 305. ↩

50. I consider it necessary to mention that before publication I read the foregoing description of the experiments with Dr. Bernstein’s tasks aloud to him, and he confirmed that it corresponded perfectly to the facts. ↩

51. Another supposition is possible: after the energy from the first picture had passed onto the paper, the paper reached its saturation point, and consequently the new energy could no longer pass onto it. ↩

52. A. Chevillard, Études expérimentales sur certains phénomènes nerveux et solution rationelle du problème spirite, 2nd edition, 1875. ↩

53. D. Mendelejeff, Materialien zur Beurteilung des Spiritismus [in Russian], 1876, p. 324. ↩

54. By rendering objective I mean the endeavor to lend the results of subjective observations the greatest possible scientific exactness by means of large series of numbers or parallel control observations. ↩

55. Paul Joire, “Étude de la force nerveuse extériorisée et enregistrée par le stenomètre,” Revue de l’Hypnotisme, February 1905. ↩

56. To my regret, I did not have a sthenometer from the factory specified by Joire and was therefore obliged to confine myself to experiments with one I had constructed myself according to the author’s descriptions. ↩

57. Albert Jounet, “Expériences à reprendre et à vérifier.” Quoted from Professor Grasset, L’Occultisme, p. 267. ↩

58. André Broca, Comptes rendus de l’Académie des Sciences, 1904, no. 20. ↩

59. Aug. Charpentier, Comptes rendus, 1904, nos. 12 and 19. ↩

60. Professor H. Bordier, Les rayons N, 1905, p. 76. Unfortunately, Charpentier’s corresponding paper was inaccessible to me here, so that I am obliged to content myself with referring to Bordier. ↩

61. Obosrenije Psychiatrii (in Russian), 1904, nos. 8 and 9. ↩

62. Professor Augusto Righi, Die moderne Theorie der physikalischen Erscheinungen, Leipzig, 1905, pp. 73 ff. ↩

63. A. Righi, work cited, pp. 85 ff. ↩

64. In support of these considerations it is appropriate to cite the following observation by Rutherford (Radioaktive Umwandlungen, p. 275): “The experimental observation that the α-particle loses its effect on the photographic plate and ceases to ionize a gas when its velocity has fallen to approximately 8 × 10⁸ cm per second is of great importance in this connection. Undoubtedly α-particles emitted from matter at less than this velocity would produce a very small electrical effect, if any. It is therefore by no means improbable that the so-called radioactive substances differ essentially from ordinary matter only in their ability to emit α-particles at a velocity greater than the critical velocity. Ordinary matter, which produces extraordinarily weak ionizing effects, might emit α-particles to the same extent as uranium, and yet it would be difficult to detect the presence of these α-particles if their initial velocity lay below the critical value.” ↩