Spoon bending party

[[File:Spoonbend.jpg|right|thumb|165px|The power of your 
mind
 muscles. Extraordinary, innit?]]{{psychic}}
{{cquote|You're releasing something more powerful than atomic weapons|||Atomic weapons and a party; what could possibly go wrong?<ref>Jack Houck in ''[[Penn & Teller: Bullshit!]]'', episode 1.10, ''ESP''</ref>}}
So here you are on a Friday evening with nothing to do. No work; no date; nothing on TV. So why not lighten up the evening and go to a '''Spoon bending party'''<ref>Not to be confused with a party where everyone [[Sex|spoons]] (which can also be great fun).</ref> where you, yes, '''YOU''' can learn to bend cutlery with the power of your mind!

They're also called '''PK Parties''', short for [[psychokinesis]], and these hardcore raves were first thrown by '''Jack Houck''' (1939-2013) in 1981
after hearing about the exploits of [[Project Stargate]] (the same people that [[Uri Geller]] fooled in the 1970s) and became convinced that [[remote viewing]] is a real phenomenon.<ref name="pk">http://www.jackhouck.com/pk.shtml</ref> After this the [[crank magnetism]] kicked in and Houck also started believing in [[psychokinesis]], [[dowsing]], [[psychic healing]], and [[brainwave woo]], writing several papers on these subjects.

==Party pooper==
Anyone can throw a spoon bending party; Houck helpfully wrote a "how-to guide" and published it on his website<ref>He may be a [[crank]], but he's not a profit-hound, unlike some [[Uri Geller|others]].</ref> which is successful for "over 85 percent" of the party goers (emphases added):

{{aquote|
(1) Hold the piece of silverware between the thumb and forefinger and rub gently.

(2) Project a point of concentration in your head, almost to the point of pain.

(3) Then move this point of concentration down through your neck, shoulder, arm, hand, fingers, and project it into the silverware. In effect, this process allows the mind to achieve a link from the brain to some point within the silverware.

(4) Next, verbally command the silverware to bend. In recent parties, I have been having everyone '''shout as loud as they can: "BEND, BEND, BEND!!!"''' The people are asked not to just shout for the sake of shouting but to concentrate and intently command the silverware to bend.

(5) Then release that thought, sit back, relax, and use the body sensors (e.g., fingers or a feeling) to find the small time window when the silverware is ready to bend. '''Occasionally, push on the object with the other hand to see if the object gives'''. Most people have a hard time releasing the thought, and think that they have to continue to concentrate on the bending objective. I move around and try to break everyone's concentration. Sometimes I hold a person's silverware as if to test how he/she is doing, and then make-up something as to how well he/she is doing or what he/she should try. Usually, a person is able to bend the object shortly thereafter.
|||<ref>http://www.jackhouck.com/pkmf.shtml</ref>}}

Based on this, we can see several much more likely reasons for the silverware to bend:

* Due to the exhilarating group effect and shouting, people are likely to underestimate how much strength exactly they exert on the spoon, and bend it with their muscles when "testing" to "see if the object gives". In fact, in most PK parties the "testing" is done ''during'' the shouting, not ''after'' the shouting. Houck said that an "atmosphere of excitement and emotional arousal" was required and "encouraged people to be noisy and excited".<ref name="crichton">[https://web.archive.org/web/20021229174521/http://www.uri-geller.com/mct27.htm Michael Crichton's account of a PK party]</ref>
* Most people attending these parties ''want'' to bend a spoon with their mind and already believe such a thing is possible, which will [[confirmation bias|influence their judgement]] when judging whether it was mostly their mind or mostly their muscles doing the work.
* People don't want to disappoint the party host, be "that guy" who ''wasn't'' able to bend a spoon, or be a boring [[Skeptic|party pooper]]. Maureen Caudill for example claims that spoon bending is significantly easier to achieve when performed in groups rather than alone.<ref>Caudill, Maureen. (2006). ''Suddenly Psychic: A Skeptic's Journey''. Chapter 7. ISBN 978-1-57174-501-9</ref>

Unfortunately, many of the videos on PK parties are of poor quality and don't focus on a single person more than a few seconds, but [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNxo9NPEUyI here's an example of the sort of "amazing" bending] that you can see if you pay close attention. Look at the woman in the sunglasses, and how much force she is exerting on the fork. Does this ''really'' look supernatural?

Houck replies to this sort of argument with:
{{aquote|Sometimes […] you find that there is some guy looking over your shoulder saying, "AH, you are just bending it physically." That really doesn't help you at all. So I suggest using a little technique that I developed to shut down the interference from the skeptics. You simply get a big smile on your face, look at the skeptic, and shout "SHUT UP!" I really don't want the skeptics to get in the way.|||<ref name="pk"/>}}
Lalalalalalalalaala! I can't hear you!

==Other party animals==
When just psychokinesis isn't enough for you, you can go [[quantum woo|'''QUANTUM''']] for extra power! In—where else—[[Sedona]], you can learn to bend spoons using [[time travel]]. Yes, really (emphasis and colour in original):

{{aquote|[T]echniques based on quantum mechanics and the unified field. The specific technique used for the fork above was called time travel in which I took the fork and sent it back in time to a condition where it would most easily bend in the above conformation. Voila. {{blue|'''How cool is that!'''}}|||Oh wow man!<ref>https://web.archive.org/web/20190822234601/https://sedonacreativelife.com/pre1674.html</ref>}}

[[Michael Crichton]] describes attending a PK party in his 1988 book {{wpl|Travels (book)|''Travels''}} and apparently really believed he bent the spoon with his mind.<ref name="crichton"/>

==External parties==
* [http://www.jackhouck.com/pk.shtml Jack Houck's full account of how PK parties came to be]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20021229174521/http://www.uri-geller.com/mct27.htm Michael Crichton's account] (hosted on Uri Geller's website)

==Partynotes==
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