Telepathy

==Case studies==
[[File:Gilbert Murray.jpg|thumb|[[Gilbert Murray]] conducted early telepathy experiments.]]

In the late 19th century the Creery Sisters (Mary, Alice, Maud, Kathleen, and Emily) were tested by the [[Society for Psychical Research]] and believed to have genuine psychic ability. However, during a later experiment they were caught utilizing signal codes and they confessed to [[fraud]].<ref>[[Ray Hyman]]. (1989). ''The Elusive Quarry: A Scientific Appraisal of Psychical Research''. Prometheus Books. pp. 99–106</ref><ref>[[Gordon Stein]]. (1996). ''The Encyclopedia of the Paranormal''. Prometheus Books. p. 688</ref> [[George Albert Smith (film pioneer)|George Albert Smith]] and [[Douglas Blackburn]] were claimed to be genuine psychics by the Society for Psychical Research but Blackburn confessed to fraud:

<blockquote>For nearly thirty years the telepathic experiments conducted by Mr. G. A. Smith and myself have been accepted and cited as the basic evidence of the truth of thought transference...

...the whole of those alleged experiments were bogus, and originated in the honest desire of two youths to show how easily men of scientific mind and training could be deceived when seeking for evidence in support of a theory they were wishful to establish.<ref>Neher, Andrew. (2011). ''Paranormal and Transcendental Experience: A Psychological Examination''. Dover Publications. p. 220. {{ISBN|0486261670}}</ref></blockquote>

Between 1916 and 1924, [[Gilbert Murray]] conducted 236 experiments into telepathy and reported 36% as successful. However, it was suggested that the results could be explained by [[hyperaesthesia]] as he could hear what was being said by the sender.<ref>Payne, Kenneth Wilcox. (1928). ''Is Telepathy all Bunk?'' ''[[Popular Science Monthly]]''. p. 119</ref><ref>Couttie, Bob. (1988). ''Forbidden Knowledge: The Paranormal Paradox''. Lutterworth Press. p. 129. {{ISBN|978-0718826864}} "In the early 1900s Gilbert Murray, who died in 1957, carried out some experiments in ESP in which he was in one room and the sender in a hallway, often with an open door between them. These experiments were successful. Most of the time the target was spoken aloud. When it was not, there were negative results. This is suggestive of a hyperacuity of hearing, especially since on at least one occasion Murray complained about noise coming from a milk-cart in the street next to the one in which the experiments were being carried out."</ref><ref>Mauskopf, Seymour H; McVaugh, Michael Rogers. (1980). ''The Elusive Science: Origins of Experimental Psychical Research''. Johns Hopkins University Press. p. 331. {{ISBN|978-0801823312}}</ref><ref>[[Leonard Zusne|Zusne, Leonard]]; Jones, Warren H. (1989). ''Anomalistic Psychology: A Study of Magical Thinking''. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. p. 155. {{ISBN|978-0805805079}}</ref><ref>Anderson, Rodger. (2006). ''Psychics, Sensitives and Somnambules: A Biographical Dictionary with Bibliographies''. McFarland. p. 126. {{ISBN|0786427701}}</ref> Psychologist [[Leonard T. Troland]] had carried out experiments in telepathy at [[Harvard University]] which were reported in 1917.<ref>[[Milbourne Christopher|Christopher, Milbourne]]. (1971). ''ESP, Seers & Psychics''. Crowell. p. 19. {{ISBN|978-0690268157}}</ref><ref>Berger, Arthur S. (1988). ''Lives and Letters in American Parapsychology: A Biographical History, 1850–1897''. McFarland. p. 66. {{ISBN|0899503454}}</ref><ref>[[Roger Luckhurst|Luckhurst, Roger]]. (2002). ''The Invention of Telepathy: 1870–1901''. Oxford University Press. p. 269. {{ISBN|978-0199249626}}</ref><ref>Hannan, Caryn. (2008 edition). ''Connecticut Biographical Dictionary''. State History Publications. p. 526. {{ISBN|1878592726}} "On his return to Harvard in 1916, one of his first enterprises was an investigation of telepathy in the psychology laboratory, which gave negative results."</ref> The subjects produced below chance expectations.<ref>Asprem, Egil. (2014). ''The Problem of Disenchantment: Scientific Naturalism and Esoteric Discourse, 1900–1939''. Brill Academic Publishers. pp. 362–364. {{ISBN|978-9004251922}}</ref>

[[Arthur Conan Doyle]] and [[William Thomas Stead|W. T. Stead]] were duped into believing [[Julius and Agnes Zancig]] had genuine psychic powers. Both Doyle and Stead wrote that Zancigs performed telepathy. In 1924, Julius and Agnes Zancig confessed that their [[Mentalism|mind reading]] act was a trick and published the secret code and all the details of the trick method they had used under the title of ''Our Secrets!!'' in a London newspaper.<ref>[[John Booth (magician)|John Booth]]. (1986). ''Psychic Paradoxes''. Prometheus Books. p. 8</ref>

In 1924, Robert H. Gault of [[Northwestern University]] with [[Gardner Murphy]] conducted the first American radio test for telepathy. The results were entirely negative. One of their experiments involved the attempted thought transmission of a chosen number between one and one-thousand. Out of 2,010 replies, none was correct. This is below the [[Probability|theoretical chance figure]] of two correct replies in such a situation.<ref>Gault, Robert H. (August, 1924). ''Telepathy Put to the Test''. ''[[Popular Science]]''. pp. 114–115</ref>

In February 1927, with the co-operation of the [[British Broadcasting Corporation]] (BBC), V. J. Woolley who was at the time the Research Officer for the SPR, arranged a telepathy experiment in which radio listeners were asked to take part. The experiment involved 'agents' thinking about five selected objects in an office at [[Tavistock Square]], whilst listeners on the radio were asked to identify the objects from the BBC studio at [[Savoy Hill]]. 24,659 answers were received. The results revealed no evidence of telepathy.<ref>Mauskopf, Seymour H; McVaugh, Michael Rogers. (1980). ''The Elusive Science: Origins of Experimental Psychical Research''. Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 36–38. {{ISBN|978-0801823312}}</ref><ref>Edmunds, Simeon. (1965). ''Miracles of the Mind: An Introduction to Parapsychology''. C. C. Thomas. pp. 26–28</ref>

A famous experiment in telepathy was recorded by the American author [[Upton Sinclair]] in his book ''[[Mental Radio]]'' which documents Sinclair's test of psychic abilities of [[Mary Craig Sinclair]], his second wife. She attempted to duplicate 290 pictures which were drawn by her husband. Sinclair claimed Mary successfully duplicated 65 of them, with 155 "partial successes" and 70 failures. However, these experiments were not conducted in a controlled scientific laboratory environment.<ref name="Gardner1957">[[Martin Gardner]], ''[[Fads & Fallacies in the Name of Science]]'' (Courier Dover Publications, 1957) Chapter 25: ''ESP and PK'', [https://books.google.com/books?id=TwP3SGAUsnkC available online]; accessed July 25, 2010.</ref> Science writer [[Martin Gardner]] suggested that the possibility of [[sensory leakage]] during the experiment had not been ruled out:

{{blockquote|In the first place, an intuitive wife, who knows her husband intimately, may be able to guess with a fair degree of accuracy what he is likely to draw—particularly if the picture is related to some freshly recalled event the two experienced in common. At first, simple pictures like chairs and tables would likely predominate, but as these are exhausted, the field of choice narrows and pictures are more likely to be suggested by recent experiences. It is also possible that Sinclair may have given conversational hints during some of the tests—hints which in his strong will to believe, he would promptly forget about. Also, one must not rule out the possibility that in many tests, made across the width of a room, Mrs. Sinclair may have seen the wiggling of the top of a pencil, or arm movements, which would convey to her unconscious a rough notion of the drawing.<ref name="Gardner1957"/>}}
[[File:Frederick_Marion_mentalist.png|thumb|[[Frederick Marion]] who was investigated by the [[Society for Psychical Research]] in the late 1930–1940s.]]
The Turner-Ownbey long distance telepathy experiment was discovered to contain flaws. May Frances Turner positioned herself in the Duke Parapsychology Laboratory whilst Sara Ownbey claimed to receive transmissions 250 miles away. For the experiment Turner would think of a symbol and write it down whilst Ownbey would write her guesses.<ref name="Sladek 1974">[[John Sladek]]. (1974). The New Apocrypha: A Guide to Strange Sciences and Occult Beliefs. Panther. pp. 172–174</ref> The scores were highly successful and both records were supposed to be sent to [[J. B. Rhine]]; however, Ownbey sent them to Turner. Critics pointed out this invalidated the results as she could have simply written her own record to agree with the other. When the experiment was repeated and the records were sent to Rhine the scores dropped to average.<ref name="Sladek 1974"/><ref>[[Bergen Evans]]. (1954). ''The Spoor of Spooks: And Other Nonsense''. Knopf. p. 24</ref><ref>[[C. E. M. Hansel]]. (1989). ''The Search for Psychic Power: ESP and Parapsychology Revisited''. Prometheus Books. pp. 56–58. {{ISBN|0879755164}}</ref>

Another example is the experiment carried out by the author [[Harold Sherman]] with the explorer [[Hubert Wilkins]] who carried out their own experiment in telepathy for five and a half months starting in October 1937. This took place when Sherman was in [[New York (state)|New York]] and Wilkins was in the [[Arctic]]. The experiment consisted of Sherman and Wilkins at the end of each day to relax and visualise a mental image or "thought impression" of the events or thoughts they had experienced in the day and then to record those images and thoughts on paper in a diary. The results at the end when comparing Sherman's and Wilkins' diaries were claimed to be more than 60 percent.<ref>Simon Nasht. (2006). ''The Last Explorer: Hubert Wilkins, Hero of the Great Age of Polar Exploration''. Arcade Publishing. pp. 267–268</ref>

The full results of the experiments were published in 1942 in a book by Sherman and Wilkins titled ''Thoughts Through Space''. In the book, both Sherman and Wilkins had written they believed they had demonstrated that it was possible to send and receive thought impressions from the mind of one person to another.<ref>[[Hubert Wilkins]], [[Harold Sherman]]. (2004). ''Thoughts through Space: A Remarkable Adventure in the Realm of Mind''. Hampton Roads Publishing. {{ISBN|1571743146}}</ref> The magician [[John Booth (magician)|John Booth]] wrote that the experiment was not an example of telepathy as a high percentage of misses had occurred. Booth wrote it was more likely that the "hits" were the result of "coincidence, law of averages, subconscious expectancy, logical inference or a plain lucky guess".<ref>[[John Booth (magician)|John Booth]]. (1986). ''Psychic Paradoxes''. Prometheus Books. p. 69</ref> A review of their book in the ''[[American Journal of Orthopsychiatry]]'' cast doubt on their experiment, noting "the study was published five years after it was conducted, arouses suspicion on the validity of the conclusions.<ref>Steiner, Lee R. (1942). ''Review of Thoughts Through Space''. ''[[American Journal of Orthopsychiatry]]'' 12 (4): 745.</ref>

In 1948, on the BBC radio [[Maurice Fogel]] made the claim that he could demonstrate telepathy. This intrigued the journalist Arthur Helliwell who wanted to discover his methods. He found that Fogel's mind reading acts were all based on trickery as he relied on information about members of his audience before the show started. Helliwell exposed Fogel's methods in a newspaper article. Although Fogel managed to fool some people into believing he could perform genuine telepathy, the majority of his audience knew he was a showman.<ref name="Lamont 2013">[[Peter Lamont (historian)|Lamont, Peter]]. (2013). ''Extraordinary Beliefs: A Historical Approach to a Psychological Problem''. Cambridge University Press. p. 220. {{ISBN|978-1107019331}}</ref>

In a series of experiments [[Samuel Soal]] and his assistant [[K. M. Goldney]] examined 160 subjects over 128,000 trials and obtained no evidence for the existence of telepathy.<ref name="Reznek 2010">Lawrie Reznek. (2010). ''Delusions and the Madness of the Masses''. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers . pp. 54–55</ref> Soal tested Basil Shackleton and Gloria Stewart between 1941 and 1943 in over five hundred sittings and over twenty thousand guesses. Shackleton scored 2890 compared with a chance expectation of 2308 and Gloria scored 9410 compared with a chance level of 7420. It was later discovered the results had been tampered with. Gretl Albert who was present during many of the experiments said she had witnessed Soal altering the records during the sessions.<ref name="Reznek 2010"/> Betty Marwick discovered Soal had not used the method of random selection of numbers as he had claimed. Marwick showed that there had been manipulation of the score sheets and all experiments reported by Soal had thereby become discredited.<ref>[[C. E. M. Hansel]]. (1980). ''ESP and Parapsychology: A Critical Reevaluation''. Prometheus Books. p. 165</ref><ref>Betty Markwick. (1985). ''The establishment of data manipulation in the Soal-Shackleton experiments''. In [[Paul Kurtz]]. ''A Skeptic's Handbook of Parapsychology''. Prometheus Books. pp. 287–312</ref>

In 1979 the physicists [[John G. Taylor]] and Eduardo Balanovski wrote the only scientifically feasible explanation for telepathy could be electromagnetism (EM) involving [[Electromagnetic field|EM fields]]. In a series of experiments the EM levels were many orders of magnitude lower than calculated and no paranormal effects were observed. Both Taylor and Balanovski wrote their results were a strong argument against the validity of telepathy.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Taylor | first1 = J. G | last2 = Balanovski | first2 = E. | year = 1979 | title = Is There Any Scientific Explanation of the Paranormal? | journal = Nature | volume = 279 | issue = 5714| pages = 631–633 | doi=10.1038/279631a0| pmid = 450111 | bibcode = 1979Natur.279..631T | s2cid = 2885230 }}</ref>

Research in [[anomalistic psychology]] has discovered that in some cases telepathy can be explained by a [[Covariance|covariation bias]]. In an experiment (Schienle ''et al''. 1996) 22 believers and 20 skeptics were asked to judge the covariation between transmitted symbols and the corresponding feedback given by a receiver. According to the results the believers overestimated the number of successful transmissions whilst the skeptics made accurate hit judgments.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Schienle | first1 = A. | last2 = Vaitl | first2 = D. | last3 = Stark | first3 = R. | year = 1996 | title = Covariation bias and paranormal belief | journal = Psychological Reports | volume = 78 | issue = 1| pages = 291–305 | doi=10.2466/pr0.1996.78.1.291| pmid = 8839320 | s2cid = 34062201 }}</ref> The results from another telepathy experiment involving 48 undergraduate college students (Rudski, 2002) were explained by [[Hindsight bias|hindsight]] and [[Confirmation bias|confirmation]] biases.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Rudski | first1 = J. M. | year = 2002 | title = Hindsight and confirmation biases in an exercise in telepathy | journal = Psychological Reports | volume = 91 | issue = 3| pages = 899–906 | doi=10.2466/pr0.2002.91.3.899| pmid = 12530740 | s2cid = 24242574 }}</ref>