The Problems of Psychical Research Part 13

After some wholesome criticisms devoted to the "recognition" of materialized forms, and the very true statement (p. 509) that "a very small error in perception may sometimes lead to a very large error of inference," Miss Johnson ends her remarkably interesting paper with two ill.u.s.trations--one a hallucination (?)[31] induced by false a.s.sociation of ideas; the other an incident in her own experience, occurring at a seance with Eusapia Palladino. Both of these are of importance, and should be studied carefully.

Count Solovovo on the contrary considers it somewhat in favour of the hallucination theory that hands were found to melt in the sitters'

grasp, when they were forcibly retained (p. 441). I cannot agree with this. It is a different thing to say that hallucination might account for the facts, and saying that the facts tell in favour of hallucination. Chance might account for an experimental apparition, but the fact that the apparition occurred does not prove it to be chance.

One must be careful to distinguish facts and inferences, in a case of this character. Whether or not the hands were hallucinatory will depend, not upon _a priori_ probability, or the fact they were visible to some, invisible to others, (for all this might just as well be accounted for on the opposing theory), but upon the fact that, so far as we know, there is no a.n.a.logy whatever between this oft-recorded event and any of the phenomena of suggestion known to us. If we offer a theory to explain certain facts, it must not only explain them in a rational manner, but must dovetail into what we know--into _the known_. That is the whole method of science. If, therefore, a man advances "hallucination" as an explanation of such facts as those under discussion, he must show how it is that hallucination might be supposed to work: he must bring forward some a.n.a.logies and examples of somewhat similar instances in order to have a case at all. In science, we cannot speculate _in vacuo_, but must connect with what is already known, if we wish to be scientific at all.

What a.n.a.logies, then, have we that spirit-hands, similar to those described, can be created by suggestion; and that suggestion can cause a number of investigators, at various times, in various places, to believe that these hands melted in theirs while they were trying to retain them?

I venture to think we have no a.n.a.logies whatever. It is quite possible that a subject in a hypnotic trance might be induced to believe that he was holding a hand while in fact no hand was there, and, further, that this hand melted away in his grasp while he was holding fast on to it.

But I can see practically no resemblance whatever between the two cases.

For, in the case we have supposed (i) the hand did not move any material object; (ii) no one but the hypnotized subject saw the hand; and (iii) the illusion was only induced by repeated verbal suggestion to a subject already hypnotized. Where is the a.n.a.logy in the two cases? Home's hands moved objects; they were seen by several people at once; and, so far as the records prove anything, they prove that constant verbal suggestions of the sort necessary were certainly _not_ given, while there is no evidence whatever that the subjects were hypnotized! On this very subject, speaking of Home's seances, Sir William Crookes has said:

"General conversation was going on all the time, and on many occasions something on the table had moved some time before Home was aware of it. We had to draw his attention to such things far oftener than he drew our attention to them. Indeed, he sometimes used to annoy me by his indifference to what was going on...."[32]

Does this look like suggestion? Is there any similarity between the two cases? Their differences are too obvious to dwell upon. And, apart from the performances of the Hindu fakirs (which I have discussed elsewhere,[33] and which Count Solovovo himself thinks too few and too weak evidentially to require serious consideration), there is no similarity between an hallucination induced in a hypnotized subject by constant verbal suggestion, and one supposedly induced instantaneously in a large number of persons, not hypnotized, without any suggestion.

The cases cannot be considered similar, or even as resembling one another in the slightest degree; while the improbability is heightened a thousandfold by the fact that these hands apparently performed physical actions and moved physical objects at the same time. The coincidence would have to be explained as well as the hallucination, in that case.

Both Count Solovovo and Miss Johnson lay particular stress upon the fact that the Master of Lindsay seems to have been extremely suggestible.

a.s.suredly, that is an important point in so far as his own experiences are concerned, but the fact in nowise affects the experiences of _others_. In order to prove that suggestibility played an important part in the phenomena, it would be necessary to show that _all_ witnesses of the phenomena were suggestible--for the phenomena were seen by all in a slightly varying degree. Yet there is no evidence that many of the witnesses were suggestible at all: they did not see things Home suggested they should see, while, on the other hand, they saw things quite on their own account, when Home was busily engaged in conversation with some one else. The whole case must be made to hang together, and if "suggestion" be the key to the puzzle, it certainly fits the lock remarkably ill.[34]

In summing-up his paper and the evidence contained therein, Count Solovovo concludes:

"For my own part I lay it down as a general proposition ... that the testimony of several sane, honest and intelligent eye-witnesses is, broadly speaking, proof of the objectivity of any phenomenon.

If there are people who maintain an opposite view, let them make experiments themselves" (p. 477).

That is precisely the position I should a.s.sume: I do not believe that collective hallucinations of the kind supposed exist at spiritistic seances, except perhaps very rarely, and to special gatherings of individuals. Let me now adduce the evidence in favour of my position, and the reasons for my taking this stand so strongly.

First, then, let us distinguish between _illusions_ and _hallucinations_, as this is of the very greatest importance in a discussion such as this. An illusion is a false sensory perception, the basis of which is, nevertheless, real. Thus, if an old coat in a corner of the room be mistaken for a dog, that would be an illusion. A _point de repere_ is there--a peg, upon which the mind hangs its false inferences or perceptions. An hallucination, on the other hand, is entirely a creation of the mind, and there is, in this case, no _point de repere_, which exists externally, and serves as the basis of the hallucination. Roughly speaking, this may be said to be the difference between the two. Now, let us apply this to Home's seances, and to spiritistic seances in general.

During the course of my twenty years' constant investigation, I have had many score seances with various mediums--slate-writing mediums, materializing mediums, physical mediums, clairvoyant mediums, _et hoc genus omne_. Speaking now of materialization seances only--of which I have seen many--I may say that in all my investigations _I have never seen one single instance of suggested or spontaneous hallucination_.

Plenty of _illusions_ were observed, but never the trace of a full-blown hallucination.[35] And I venture to think that, if we examine the evidence in the case of D. D. Home, we find very few cases which could have been illusions--the vast majority of them seem to have been "pure hallucinations"--if they were psychological processes (as opposed to physical) at all. So that we should have to suppose that we find in these seances--not mere illusions, commonly seen at spiritualistic seances, but full-blown hallucinations of a type rarely or never seen elsewhere. In other words, these seances present evidences of psychological processes for which we can find no a.n.a.logy in any other series of seances, or in hypnotic or any other phenomena with which we are familiar. I venture to think that this entirely _new_ order of things cannot be accepted upon such evidence: that the hypothesis of hallucination cannot be said to explain anything whatever, inasmuch as it is entirely unsupported by facts, and finds no a.n.a.logies whatever in any other psychological processes known to us.

At the very conclusion of his paper, Count Solovovo places his finger upon the vulnerable spot: he there points out the only way to solve the difficulty. It is by the acc.u.mulation and study of _new facts_.

Discussions as to the historical phenomena might go on for ever and the question still remain unsolved. The only way out of the difficulty is to establish, if possible, the objective or the hallucinatory character of these newer phenomena--if such are obtained--and from them draw conclusions concerning the older manifestations. If these newer phenomena turn out to be hallucinatory--in spite of all the testimony in favour of their being objective--then it is highly probable that many of the older phenomena were hallucinatory also. If, on the other hand, the newer phenomena turn out to be physical and objective, then the improbability of the older manifestations having been hallucinatory is proportionately increased--until it becomes almost a certainty that they were not so. For, if physical phenomena of a genuine character ever do occur, the _a priori_ improbability is at once removed, and thenceforward there is but little ground for objecting to the phenomena in Home's case; and not only those, but the phenomena in the case of Stainton Moses, and scores of others less well attested. The props would have been knocked from beneath all logical scepticism of the historical phenomena, once newer manifestations of the same type be proved true.

The whole case hinges upon the fact of whether or not such new facts as may be forthcoming tend to prove either the one theory or the other.

Let us therefore turn to this newer evidence, and see which alternative is rendered more probable by the phenomena in question.

This newer evidence is, of course, supplied by the case of Eusapia Palladino. Here we find phenomena of a physical character recorded by many men and women--including numerous eminent scientists--not one of whom tolerates for a moment the idea that these phenomena are hallucinatory. Indeed, the photographs of table levitations, of hands and heads,[36] of instruments flying through the air,[37] and the impressions left in cakes of plaster,[38] leave no doubt whatever that, in this case, the phenomena--no matter how produced--are objective. This conclusion is further supported by the fact that registering apparatus has been employed, and has successfully recorded the results of physical movements. From this, it is certain that real, objective facts have been observed.[39] Whether the phenomena were due to fraud or were the results of the operation of some supernormal force, or whatever their explanation, they were certainly not due to hallucination.

Our own sittings, it seems to me, abundantly confirm this conclusion.

During the greater part of the time, when phenomena were in progress, Eusapia was pa.s.sive and silent: when she did speak, she did not suggest anything to us directly, and even if she had done so, it would have been in Italian--a language I do not understand. And yet I saw the phenomena--the movements of objects, the hands and the heads, and felt the touches--just as the others did: in fact, I think I may say _more_ frequently than either of my colleagues did. How was this? Eusapia only "suggested" anything to us on three occasions, and on two of these we failed to perceive what she wished us to see! On the other hand, we frequently perceived what she did not "suggest" to us, and which came as a complete surprise to us all. The expression "Oh!" occurring, as it does, at several places in the notes, shows how unexpected the manifestation was. When one's hair is suddenly and forcibly pulled by living fingers, and when one is banged over the head by a closed fist, and when one is grasped by a hand and pulled so forcibly as to almost upset one into the cabinet--it requires a strong imagination to believe that this is nothing but hallucination. Then, too, we all saw the phenomenon at the same instant, invariably; and if one of us failed to do so, it was always because there was a physical cause for it: the curtain intervened, or something of a similar nature occurred. I need hardly point out that this, in itself--looked at from one point of view--is exceedingly strong evidence that the manifestation was not hallucinatory, but objective. The unexpected nature of the majority of the phenomena--when Eusapia was in deep trance, and we were doing all the talking--renders the hypothesis of hallucination quite untenable, it seems to me; at least, if any one chooses to defend it, he must give some a.n.a.logies and somewhat similar instances of the power of suggestion--a task that will never be satisfactorily undertaken; of that I am sure.

No; whatever be the interpretation of these phenomena, they are certainly not hallucinatory. And if they were objective, it is almost certain that the Home phenomena were objective also--since the parallel between the two cases is often extremely close.

And this, it appears to me, is the only way of approaching this problem that is liable to prove conclusive or trustworthy. Discussions of historical phenomena will never settle anything one way or the other: nothing is _proved_ thereby, one way or the other. The only conclusive method, as Count Solovovo pointed out--and I heartily agree with him--is the acc.u.mulation of _new facts_; and these new facts, when obtained, have, it appears to me (and to my colleagues also), proved beyond all question that the phenomena were genuine in at least some instances; and, that once admitted, the _a priori_ doubts are removed, and the historic phenomena raised to a standard of probability which amounts to cert.i.tude. Some of the physical phenomena of spiritualism are objective--real, external facts; and I am a.s.sured that they are not due to fraud or trickery. Whatever their ultimate explanation, however, they can no longer be said to be due to any form of hallucination in the sitters.

FOOTNOTES:

[25] The chapter which follows originally appeared in the _Journal_ of the American S.P.R. (December 1909), and was critical of the articles of Miss Alice Johnson and Count Solovovo, which had previously appeared in the English _Proceedings_. While the chapter is self-explanatory, it may be well to say that Count Solovovo, in his original paper, considered the "hallucination theory" as a possible explanation of certain physical phenomena--such as those of D. D. Home--and, after a lengthy discussion, came to the conclusion that it would be extremely difficult to believe that hallucination could account for all the observed facts. Miss Johnson, in her reply, inclined rather more to the hallucination theory--at least in some cases--and endeavoured to show how it might have occurred on several occasions. My paper is critical of these articles--chiefly Miss Johnson's; and I have here endeavoured to combat the hallucination theory,--which I do not believe to have nearly so wide a range as Miss Johnson supposes. The interested reader is referred to the original papers, as well as to the discussion which follows; after which he may decide for himself which seems to him the more rational explanation of the facts.

[26] _Proceedings, S.P.R._, vol. xxi. pp. 436-515.

[27] _Researches in the Phenomena of Spiritualism_, p. 92.

[28] _Proceedings, S.P.R._, vol. xxi. p. 488.

[29] _Proceedings, S.P.R._, vol. xxi. p. 487.

[30] Critics are apt to compare psychic phenomena to the links of a chain--each phenomenon being a separate link. As the chain is only as strong as its separate links, it has been pointed out, and as each case, taken by itself, can be shown to be inconclusive, it is obvious that the whole of psychic research comes to naught. This objection is met, it seems to me, by the following consideration. Each separate case represents, not the link of a chain, but the thread of a woven rope, which, taken by itself, is extremely weak, but which, when placed beside hundreds of others, becomes so strong as to be practically unbreakable.

[31] This appears to me to be rather an illusion than a pure hallucination. Miss Johnson's own case appears to me to be an illusion also. See the discussion of this point later on, however.

[32] _Journal_, vol. vi. p. 343.

[33] See _The Physical Phenomena of Spiritualism_, pp. 386-93, and my pamphlet _Hindu Magic_, for a discussion of these performances, and of the theory of hallucination in connection therewith.

[34] See, e.g., Count Solovovo's position which he was driven to accept--that the chair-threading witnessed by him was due to unconscious telepathic suggestion! (p. 469). The position appears to me to be absolutely untenable, in face of the evidence he himself adduces.

[35] An excellent example of an illusion generated by the conditions of a spiritualistic seance is the following, which occurred to myself at Lily Dale, N. Y., during my investigations there in the summer of 1907, and which I reported in the _Proceedings of the American S.P.R._, as follows:--

"My sister 'Eva' materialized for me. I suggested 'Eva' and she 'came.'

I never had a sister Eva, so she was a little out of place. However, she 'came' as a little girl about ten years old, with a hooked nose, bright black eyes, and a fringe of false hair over her forehead. Her doll-like appearance was very manifest. After she de-materialized, I was on the point of walking back to my chair, but was told to wait. I returned to the curtains of the cabinet, and my mother announced herself present, 'who had died from consumption.' The curtains were pulled aside, and I put my face close to the opening, since it was so dark I could see nothing. And there, in the dim twilight of that seance room, I beheld one of the most ghastly, most truly terrifying faces I have ever seen.

It was white and drawn, and almost shiny in its glossy, ashen hue. The eyes were wide open and staring--fixed. The head and face were encircled in white; and altogether the face was one of the most appalling I have ever beheld, and it would have required a great deal of fort.i.tude, for the moment, to look steadfastly at that terrifying face--in that quiet, still room, in response to the spirit's demand: 'Look at me!' The distance between our faces was not more than six inches; and after the first shock, I regarded the face intently. I was spurred by curiosity and excitement, and prompted yet further by the spirit form, who grasped my wrist, through the curtain, and drew me yet closer--until I was nearly in the cabinet itself. I remembered that my mother had not died from consumption, and that the present face in nowise resembled hers, and my feeling of terror lasted but an instant; but it was there at the time, I confess. I regarded the face intently, and it was gradually withdrawn into the shadow of the cabinet, and the curtains pulled over it. _I am certain that, had I been in an excited and unbalanced frame of mind at that instant, I should have sworn that the face melted away as I looked at it._ But my mental balance was by that time regained, and I could a.n.a.lyse what was before me. I can quite easily see how it is that persons can swear to the melting away of a face before their eyes, after my own experience. The appearances clearly indicated that, and it was only my alertness to the possibility of deception in this direction, which prevented my testifying to the same effect." (See my _Personal Experiences in Spiritualism_, pp. 31-32.)

[36] _Annals of Psychical Science_, April 1908, pp. 181-91.

[37] _Ibid._, April-June 1909, pp. 285-305.

[38] Flammarion: _Mysterious Psychic Forces_; Morselli: _Psicologia e Spiritismo_; De Fontenay: _A Propos d'Eusapia Paladino_; De Rochas: _L'Exteriorization de la Motricite_, etc.

[39] Why were Sir William Crookes' experiments with the spring balance not discussed, by the way, in this connection? Here we have indubitable proof of the objectivity of the phenomena; even Mr. Podmore being driven to grant this, and suppose that the manifestations were the result of some trick.--_Modern Spiritualism_, vol. ii. p. 242.

CHAPTER VIII

THE PROBLEMS OF TELEPATHY

"I suppose everybody would say it would be an extraordinary circ.u.mstance," said the Right Hon. A. J. Balfour, M.P., F.R.S., in his Presidential Address before the Society for Psychical Research, some years ago, "if at no distant date this earth on which we dwell were to come into collision with some unknown body travelling through s.p.a.ce, and, as the result of that collision, be resolved into the original gases of which it is composed.... This is a specimen of a dramatically extraordinary event. Now I will give you a case of what I mean by a scientifically extraordinary event--which you will at once perceive may be one which, at first sight and to many observers, may appear almost commonplace and familiar. I have constantly met people who will tell you, with no apparent consciousness that they are saying anything more out of the way than an observation about the weather, that by the exercise of their will they can make anybody at a little distance turn round and look at them. Now such a fact (if fact it be) is far more scientifically extraordinary than would be the destruction of this globe by some such celestial catastrophe as I have imagined. How profoundly mistaken, then, are they who think that this exercise of 'will power,' as they call it, is the most natural and the most normal thing in the world, something which everybody should have expected, something which hardly deserves scientific notice or requires scientific explanation. In reality it is a profound mystery, if it is true, or if anything like it be true; and no event, however startling, which easily finds its appropriate niche in the structure of the physical sciences ought to exercise so much intellectual curiosity as this dull and at first sight commonplace phenomenon." (_Proceedings, S.P.R._, vol. x. pp. 9-10.)

These were the words, not only of the Premier of England, but of an exceptionally well-balanced and learned man of science, from which it will be seen how extraordinary a thing this "thought-transference" or "telepathy" is to the scientific world; and how hard it is for the _savant_ to accept it! Yet, as Mr. Balfour says, nearly every one at the present time believes in telepathy, and accepts it as the only explanation for certain facts, and as a more or less commonplace event.

Why, then, is there so much mystery about it; _why_ is it so extraordinary?

The reason for this lies in the fact that psychologists hold a certain view of the nature of the mind which is not shared or understood by the majority of persons. They believe that the mind, or consciousness, is bound up with the functionings of the brain; and that it is inseparable from them. Just as digestion is a function of the whole digestive apparatus, circulation of the circulatory apparatus, and respiration of the respiratory apparatus; just so, it is believed, is thinking a function of the thinking apparatus--the brain and nervous system. And one is no more detachable than the other; and one is no more "immortal"

after the death of the body than the other. All these functions fall away and perish at once, at the moment of death. This is the position of positive, materialistic psychology--which is the psychology taught in our schools and colleges at the present day. Naturally, our professors do not believe in telepathy; were this theory true, it would be "impossible," just as impossible as it is for a solid object to be in two places at the same time. Consciousness cannot be both inside the brain and out of it; and as it is believed to reside inside, it cannot be outside! As it is a function of nervous tissue, how can it make itself manifest at a distance of 2000 miles--at the moment, too, when it is being annihilated. Obviously the thing is impossible!

But, alas for science (or rather for the dogmatic scientist), the experience of the past tells us that many things deemed impossible are nevertheless facts. Though they are jeered at when they are first brought to the attention of the scientific world, subsequent investigation has only served to confirm them.... It is on record that no physician over forty years of age at the time of his great discovery ever accepted Harvey's proof of the circulation of the blood--so great was the force of tradition and orthodoxy.... And today the facts of "psychical research" are laughed at, and its investigators held up to ridicule, because of this same spirit of prejudice and intolerance, and the desire to mock at what we do not understand. "But," as Professor James so well remarked _a propos_ of this subject, "whenever a debate between the mystics and the scientists has been once for all decided, it is the mystics who have usually proved to be right about the _facts_, while the scientists had the better of it in respect to _theories_." But inasmuch as only the "facts" are now in dispute, and no one cares as yet what theory shall be adopted in order to explain them, is it not time at least to investigate them, and to see whether or not such facts exist--quite irrespective of whether they are explainable, when found?