12 - Esp In The Space Age

Space age travel has put several thorny problems to the men who dream of traveling to the stars. It is unfortunate, but true, that conveying information energy by means of electromagnetic waves is a time-consuming process. A message sent by conventional radio from the sun takes over eight minutes before it arrives at the earth. A future explorer at the fringes of the solar system, sending a message from the frozen crust of Pluto, for example, will have to wait at least eight hours for a reply by conventional means. Once man gets out of the solar system and to the nearest stars the time lag will be measured not in minutes or hours, but in years.

Some scientists hope that "psi" research may come up with the answer that will eliminate the time lag problem in space age communication. A team of scientists from the Westinghouse Electric Corporation began the study of ESP as a possible vehicle of communication as part of the company's astronautics institute. Soviet Russia has been trying to probe the nature of telepathy since the second decade of this century.

There are many examples of long-range telepathic communication. In 1937 a Russian flyer, Sigismund Levanev-sky, set out on what was then a daring flight over the polar regions of the earth. The flyer and Ms five crew members vanished without so much as a whimper of their shortwave, and the Soviet government prevailed upon a well-known British Arctic explorer, Sir Hubert Wilkens, to conduct a search for the missing airmen.

Just before the explorer was to leave on his search, October 15, 1937, he had lunch with Harold Sherman, a psychical researcher and author, and the two men agreed to attempt to remain in contact with each other by telepathy during the days of the search. They agreed to a time when they both would concentrate on telepathic rapport—11:30 to midnight on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday evenings—and also on the type of information which they would try to convey. Sir Hubert would try to "transmit" specific information concerning the position and progress of the expedition.

On the first, and all succeeding sessions, Sherman retired to his study and darkened all the lights before sitting in his chair facing a blank wall. He kept a pad and pencil at his side and a flashlight, but that was all. As he began concentrating, he almost immediately began receiving a series of vivid yet very confused images of what appeared to be the Arctic. He described them as "a maze of kaleidoscope scenes." Not quite sure what to make of the images, Sherman realized that such transmission, if indeed it were transmission, was of no use since no intelligible information was transmitted. His desire was to get a clear picture of what the explorer was in the process of doing. He let this idea flow through the conscious portion of his mind, and by the force of his will, the maze of images congealed into one. At that time, Wilkens was over a thousand miles away, but the images were very vivid. Sherman was disappointed, however, when a few days later he received a letter from Sir Hubert stating that the man had found it impossible to spend the time allotted for the attempt at telepathic communication. The demands of his search mission took up every waking moment of his time.

Nonetheless, Sherman wrote the impressions that he thought he had received from the explorer in a letter and sent them to one of his bases in the Arctic. Both men were surprised to find that the images which Sherman received had indeed been of things that Wilkens had observed. The transmission had occurred even without

any conscious effort on Wilkens' part. The men continued to work in the same fashion: Sherman collecting images and then transmitting them by mail to the Arctic bases, Wilkens mailing Sherman the corroborating accounts.

The information was never as precise as a formal report would have been, but it was surprisingly accurate. Sherman was able to determine the location of the expedition, the events which the explorer observed, and the mechanical difficulties Sir Hubert was having with the plane that he flew.

Reginald Iversen, who had been hired by the New York Times to keep in radio contact with the search expedition, found that the sunspot and magnetic conditions made regular communication impossible, and he was able to get through to the search party on only a relatively few occasions. In an affidavit, which the radioman signed after the unsuccessful search for the Russian flyers had been completed, Iversen testified that Sherman had received more accurate knowledge via telepathy than he had been able to gain from his sporadic radio contact with Wilkens.

Thus there is reason to expect that information can be transferred with the use of telepathy. But even if such transmission can be established, there are still many questions which must be answered before its value for interstellar communications can be determined. For example, the exact nature of the energy involved is yet to be identified. If telepathy is electromagnetic in character, then it would be impossible for it to travel faster than the speed of light, and it would not be of any advantage over conventional communication. If it is not, its speed will have to be determined. It is possible that facts uncovered in research on telepathy will require an entirely new concept of tune.

Although telepathy is one of the most promising branches of "psi" research with "scientific potential," it is not by any means the only area which may have space age applications. The advantages of being able to control clairvoyant powers have already been made obvious to police departments all over the world. There are many famous cases where a clairvoyant has been able to locate a missing body or identify a criminal without being near the scene of the crime, or even the city where it was committed. In some cases, mechanical difficulties within machines have been located by bringing a clairvoyant's attention to the case, as in the case of Croiset and Captain Jansen's ship engine.

In less spectacular fields, where man is trying to divine reasons for human behavior, "psi" research may perfect useful new tools for exploring the human psyche. Very little is known about the thought process itself, but if a psychiatrist were able to mentally probe his patient's mind, he might be in a much better position to treat him. Although such speculation is interesting, researchers have had several disappointments in trying to determine the nature of schizophrenia with the use of Psychedelics.

It was assumed that the experiences of people under the influence of a drug called mescaline were similar to the experiences of schizophrenics. It was then hypothesized that a normal person experiencing the effects of the drug could then report to psychologists the nature of his experience, giving them a new insight into the mental disease. Superficially, these two kinds of experience seemed to be alike, but the actual insight gained by the researchers was of no particular value to the psychological study of schizophrenia. The thought process is more complicated than it appears on the surface.

In the borderline between psychology and parapsychology is the use of trance states for investigation of both normal and paranormal phenomena. Hypnotic and drug-induced trance states seem to be easy avenues of entry into the inner recesses of man's mind. Hypnosis has been a psychiatric tool for many years, even though its use has gone in and out of vogue several times. "Psi" research with hypnosis and Psychedelics may unlock secrets of the trance states, which will allow man to understand himself more thoroughly in the world of the future.

As with any other natural ability the application of psychic powers is at the discretion of man. During the Korean war, the public became acquainted with the term "brain-washing." This domination of men's minds has become one of the most useful weapons in the propagandists' arsenal. With the use of what most experts term a kind of post-hypnotic suggestion, propagandists have been able to extract confessions of crimes never committed, to reverse lifelong loyalties, and to blur any conventional notion of the difference between truth and falsehood.

In a famous case, Dr. John D. Hayes, a Presbyterian minister and teacher, who had lived in China his entire life, was accused, along with a fellow missionary, of being an American spy. A grueling trial, which was held at Kweiyang, lasted for seventy-five days. During this time, Dr. Hayes was kept on what later looked like a rigorously planned program to keep him in a kind of mental never-never land. This state was projected by the use of two pivots—a constant barrage of accusations during the day, and the evocation of nostalgic dreams of home during the night. At the end of this psychological program, Dr. Hayes awoke one morning to find two memory-patterns in his mind.

These memories, if true, showed clearly that the two missionaries had conspired against the People's Republic of China. In one, Dr. Hayes' friend asked if he should get rid of "the radio," and in the other, this same friend told Dr. Hayes that he had got rid of "the radio." Although the Chinese were successful in planting these "memories" in Dr. Hayes, they were not successful with his friend. When Dr. Hayes confessed, his friend denied that he had any knowledge of such a conspiracy. The trial ended with both of the men being deported because of the uncorroborating testimony.

One phase of Soviet experiments with telepathy has Pill centered around the induction of hypnosis at long range. Some of these experiments have been successful at distances of over a thousand miles!

It is well known that certain drugs induce states of mind that make individuals more susceptible to advertising. Research with Psychedelics show that certain areas of the brain, including centers of pleasure and depression, can be chemically stimulated. Other sections of the brain can be stimulated electronically. If some combination of psychedelic stimulus and a "psi" phenomenon such as telepathically induced hypnosis could be welded together, a psychic weapon of terrifying significance would emerge.

Although such research is in infant stages, many sources all over the world indicate that the terrifying possibilities do exist. The application of "psi" research is in the hands of man. It may allow him instantaneous communication across the reaches of space, or it might allow a few fiendish minds to psychologically dominate the world.