From: wjames@cse.ucsc.edu (John Amenta)
Newsgroups: alt.paranormal
Subject: Response to Robert McGrath
Date: 12 Dec 1992 20:54:26 GMT
Organization: University of California, Santa Cruz (CE/CIS Boards)
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: pal.ucsc.edu



I have just caught up with the many articles which have been
generated in this newsgroup circling about Robert McGrath and
his very strong and well voiced skepticisms of psychic phenomena.
I am very glad to see the discussions have been maintained at
a very mature and open level, and hope they will continue to
be so.  I have enjoyed many of Mr. McGrath's arguments, and in fact
agree with some of them whole heartedly.  For example, Mr.
McGrath states:
  
>> A very convenient rhetorical defence, but not really relevant.  
>> Theoretical computer science is the source of claims that the 
>> human brain is, in principle, equivalent to a TM.  If this is NOT 
>> true, it is a very important finding for both psychology and S, 
>> because we have to deal with two apparently similar systems with 
>> radically different capabilities.

I most certainly agree.  IF you approach AI from the perspective that
the human brain is nothing more than a very complex computer, following
all the mechanical laws a computer must follow, then if this were
found not to be true, as I also agree with McGrath - veridical psychical 
phenomena would prove it to be untrue, then indeed many AI 
theoreticians will have to start burning stacks of well written papers
while hopefully, nobody is looking.  

However, I also hope Mr. McGrath is willing to see that this particular
view of the human mind, has been a hotly debated topic for a number
of centuries now - by some of the greatest minds the human race has
yet known:  Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Kant, Emerson, Jung, Einstein, 
etc.  Many AI researchers approach the computer from a very 
different perspective: believing the computer will be able to simulate a 
very large amount of what a human brain is capable of, but will never be 
able to simulate the human soul (or consciousness as you will).  My 
own disagreement with McGrath's original statements was that Mr.
Mcgrath made it sound as if all of AI research would crumble before the 
onslaught of veridical psychical phenomena, because it would disprove
the theory of "human mind = computer."  I will agree with him that
it will have a strong effect for many in the field, but it will hardly end
the endless approaches to Artificial Intelligence that do exist.

Mr. McGrath also writes:

>> Which, of course, is no coincidence--most belief in ESP is a form
>> of secular religion, with "scientific" trappings used to help shore
>> up age-old mystic concepts.

I also whole heartedly agree with him here.  Most of the religions that
humankind has known have been permeated with paranormal phenomena.
In fact, I would say, "scientific" trappings is a very kind statement 
on RM's account:  much of the paranormal belief in Christianity for 
example, had no scientific basis at all, but was simple taken
on blind faith.  I strongly disagree with any such approach,
and feel any claimed psychical event should be exposed to the strongest
of possible scientific light.  However, I also hope McGrath allows such
research to occur in the name of science .. for those who want to do
so, and believe me, there have been many, among which some of the
highest of scientific caliber.  

And I know now exactly what will be Mr. McGrath's response to that last 
statement, name these gentleman.  In fact, McGrath states in an earlier 
post directed to myself:

> As far as I am aware, there is not one shred of evidence that 
> telepathy exists, plenty of evidence that it doesn't exist, and grave 
> theoretical problems in trying to establish how it might exist.  
> Perhaps you are referring to some facts I am unaware of?

Very well, Mr. McGrath, I accept your challenge.  I just hope it will
not fall on deaf and unscientific ears.  

Let us then begin with the S.P.R. (Society for Psychical Research) that
was founded in 1882 by a group of scholars at Cambridge University at
England.  Of this group, was included Professor (later Sir) William
Barrett, F.R.S., a physicist of impeccable scientific reputation from the
Royal College of Science in Dublin, Frederick W.H. Myers, an eminent
classicist at Cambridge, philosopher Henry Sidgwick, and Dr. Edmund
Gurney, a young classical scholar who also had a degree in medicine.
+This original core group came together to form the SPR, whose purpose
was to study all forms of psychical phenomena by adhering to the most 
strict of scientific methods.  This Society soon brought in other capable
and very much scientifically distinguished individuals such as John
Strutt (later Lord Rayleigh) and J.J. Thomson, both eminent physicists;
Bateson, the biologist who was then reviving interest in the theories of 
Mendel; Sir William Crookes, inventor of the Crookes tube; Russel 
Wallace, who shares with Charles Darwin the credit for discovering the 
principle of natural selection; and many others.  Then of course,
another scholar whose scientific credentials are absolutely incontrovertible,
an American giant:  Professor William James in the United States, was
affiliated with the SPR, and other well known international figures
which found themselves part of this scholarly Society: Cesare Lombroso in 
Italy, Camille Flammarion in France, Albert Freiherr von Schrenck-Notzing 
in Germany, to name just a few.  

I submit to you Mr. Mcgrath, that you will be hard put to find names of
higher profession reputation than those names I have listed above, and
who took upon themselves seriously the study of psychical phenomena of
which there is nothing remotely "fakey" about them.  They were all
highly respected men in science and philosophy, whose goal was to get
at the truth of psychical phenomena wherever it may lay.

Now to the evidence, which is voluminous.  There are three great works
which I will cite first, which even today stand as classics of the literature
in psychical research.  They are "Phantasms of the Living", published in
1886, "The Census of Hallucinations", published in 1894, and Frederic
W.H. Myers' "Human Personality and Its Survival of Bodily Death",
published in 1903.  "Phantasms and Human Personality"  contain scores
of rigorously documented case histories of veridical psychical phenomenon,
and the "Census" was an analysis of some seven thousand replies which
had been received to a questionnaire which the Society had sent out.

In 1908 G.N.M. Tyrell joined the S.P.R., he was a "hard-headed" scientist,
taking a degree in physics and mathematics at London University.  He was
an expert in the field of wireless telegraphy, and studied under Marconi.  
Tyrell was a first-class experimentalist, and emphasized the "quantitive"
aspects of psychical research and published a comprehensive survey of
paranormal evidence in his book "Science and Psychical Phenomena", and
probably another classic in the field of Psychical Research is Tyrell's
other book "Apparitions" which contains numerous well documented cases
related to apparitions and telepathy.  

There is the extensive study of the trance mediumship of Mrs.
Leonore Piper, of Boston, Mass.  She was discovered by Prof.  William
James in 1885, and was studied intensively by American and British
psychical researchers, among them Dr. James Hyslop, Dr. Richard Hodgson,
Sir Oliver Lodge and F.W.H. Myers.  No imputation of fraud was ever
brought against her - and for William James, she revealed incontrovertible
evidence of telepathy.  An excellent source book for this research is:
"William James on Psychical Research", compiled and edited by Gardner 
Murphy Ph.D and Robert O. Ballou.  

Of more recent evidence which is been brought forth by the SPR, has
been the life work of Ian Stevenson who has collected thousands of cases
around the world of children who claim to have remember previous lives,
and has published many of these cases in several volumes each titled
"Cases of the Reincarnational Type" I, II, III etc.  Also, his book 
"Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation" is also an excellently well
documented source of at least telepathy (note he does not claim to have
discovered reincarnation).

Above all, you will find thousands of cases documented in the
"Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research" which to this day
is still published.

Well, Mr. McGrath, I have not even exhausted by a long shot, all of the 
evidence which has been brought forth by the S.P.R. in regards to psychical 
phenomena, but at least I have given you some references to the evidence.  
I myself feel, the S.P.R. is the leading source of known facts about 
paranormal phenomena.  However, there have of course been a large amount 
of other sources too - the work of Carl Jung for example, some paranormal 
phenomena he cites in his semi-autobiographical book "Memory, Dreams 
and Reflections".  The famous Rhine experiments.  J.W. Dunne's
publications of "An Experiment With Time", "The Serial Universe", and
"The New Immortality".    William McDougall's work with Trance
Personalities especially the case of Helene Smith.  And of course, the
testimony of millions of common every day people, who are also convinced
of the validity of their own person paranormal experiences, regardless of
what skeptics, like yourself, tell them otherwise.

Join me Luke, it is your Destiny.  The Emperor has forseen it.

John Amenta
wjames@cse.ucsc.edu




















 








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