The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1921-01-14
Psychical Force Given Off by Mediums to Be Measured and Dark Seances Photo graphed by Ultra Violet Ray
By HERBERT ASBURY.

possessed the greatest single intellect
 that the world has known: yet almost any high school boy of to-day knows more of the structure of our universe than did Aristotle and has a more comprehensive 1oea or the energ1zing forces of nature than had the great Greek philosopher. The reason Tor this Is not, of course, that the modern school boy is an intellectual giant; it is solely because science has more fully pene- trated the secrets of nature, and mankind now knows approximately the constitution of matter and great deal concerning life and mind.
 Pages of natures great book that were closed to Aristotle now wide open to be read and this progress has been possible through the improvement of the mechanical means by which nature is studied. Man would never have arrived at his present posi- tive knowledge had it not been for the deli cate and sensitive instruments which are to- day employed by the chemist and the physi- cist in his laboratory.
 Dr. Hereward Darlington of 504 West I11th street, one of the foremost psychical investigators of the United States believes that much of the same law will be found to apply in the realm of what is commonly called psychics. He believes that until defi- mite laboratory methods can be applied and psychica1 phenomena studied by means of physical instruments far more delicate than the human senses the present state of things "a state in which the world is divided into opposing factions of belief and disbelief in the possibility of life after death and munication with the spirit world-will tinue to exist. But he believes that were laboratory fitted up with suitable physical and electrical apparatus for the study of promising cases of psychic or mediumistic phenomena scientists would be able to rive at some definite conclusions within ten years.
 This does not mean that Dr. Darlington believes absolute and unquestioned commu- nication with the dead could be esta blisbed within that time; it means that in his opinion-the opinion of a man who has spent twenty years in psychical research work and who has written more than twenty au thoritative books the subject-the world would be able to have some definite inforna- ton as to whether there is such a thing a spiritual world.
 Special Instruments Must Be
 Invented to Weigh Psychic Phenomena "We should then" says Dr. Darlington, "know something about the laws and the conditions under which telepathy, clairvoy- ance telekinesis (the movement of objects without contact), &c., operate, and not until we do know something about these laws and conditions, I believe, will such positive con- clusions be reached. As far back as 1894 Sir Oliver Lodge, in paper on Some Ap- pliances Needed for Psychical Laboratory, said: If the investigations are to go on easily and we'll special appliances must be contrived and arranged conveniently for use precisely is done in any properly fitted laboratory. It has already been doubtless realized that one of the needs of the future is psychical laboratory especially adapted for all kinds of experimental psychology and psycho- physics.'' D
 In view of the progress that has been made in psychicai research within recent years there be little doubt that con- tinuation of the experiments under proper surroundings and with suitable instruments would result in the question being definitely settled one way or another. Scientists should be able at least to determine whether the imDe1 mediums and that induce psychical phenomena of all sorts are merely forces of nature at present unknown or whether they really forces exerted by the spirits of the dead from an unknown world The possibilities of such investiga- tions are practically boundless, and it is pre- cisely for these reasons that Dr. Darlington and other scientists who have devoted their lives, with scarcely any monetary reward to solving the problem, urging that the United States have properly fitted psychi- cal laboratory for the study of psychical anc occult phenomena.
 Tn this particular the United States 1ags behind other countries. France, England Germany and Japan have well organized and endowed societies for psychica1 investlga- tions which are establishing laboratories and their scientists are devising instruments tc test the forces employed by mediums ano to investigate phenomena of every sort ComparativeIy few instruments of this sort have been devised, but among those in use are several which have already brought eS- cellent results. One of the most 1mportan results obtained that achieved by Dr Inoda assistant to the scientist Prof Mosso who conducted a number Of exper1 rnents in the discharge of an electroscope bv means of rays emanating from the bod, of a medium. Dr. Imoda concluded. as re suJt of these experiments, that ''the rad1a lions of radium the cathode radiat1ons O inc Crookes tube and the medium1stic radta +;ons are fundamentally the same." Possi bilities of tremendous import are laid barr by a continuation of experiments based ol these conclusions.
 Mediums Should Be Studied:
 Nervous Reactions Catalogue
 Dr. Darlington estimates that S5000 woul establish psychical laboratory for tn United States and equip it with the mos necessary of the instruments that hav been devised for testing mediums and in vestigating phenomena. The uplleep c the laboratory would cost somewhere be tween $20,000 and $30,000 year, dependin upon the number of investigations of phe romena made, but this sum would defray tn expenses of equipment and the hire of a investigator an electrician and a neurolc gist who would be employed to stud mediums from medical standpoint, prir cipally to determine and analyze nervous an muscular reactions.
 The equipment of such a laboratory woul include machine suggested some years az by Sir Oliver Lodge-a delicate registerin balance adjusted that it would recor