(1) The Blue Sense: Psychic Detectives and Crime, by Arthur Lyons and Marcello Truzzi, published by the Mysterious Press/Warner Books, New York, (1991).
(2) In Pursuit of Satan: The Police and the Occult, by Robert D. Hicks, published by Prometheus Books, Buffalo, New York, (1991).
(3) Page 179, Lucas found Alexander’s to be “vague self-fulfilling prophecies”.
(4) See Part One.
(5) Mrs Jones has claimed repeatedly that in 1974 she led police to a valuable Vermeer painting which was stolen from Kenwood House, North London. Lyons and Truzzi’s
account of this story appears to be based upon the version which was published in Police Review, by Claire Gilbert. * They say she contacted the police after going
into a trance and seeing the painting. She subsequently led them to a spot behind Kenwood House where the alarm system was buried in the mud, accurately predicted that a ransom note would be delivered with a
piece of the painting, and told the police it had been hidden in a cemetery where it was under surveillance.
“Although Ms. Jones’s ‘visions’ did not lead to the recovery of the painting, Hampstead Police Detective David Morgan credited information provided [sic] by the
psychic as ‘leading the investigation forward.’” (Page 76).
Also on page 76, it is claimed that, “Jones led police to Highgate Cemetery, where they pursued a ‘suspicious man’ who eluded their chase.”
This is at odds with the
facts as reported in the press at the time.
* THE PSYCHIC INVESTIGATOR, by Claire Gilbert, published in Police Review, January 2, 1987, pages 22-3.
(6) The Atlanta child murders is a well-documented series which occurred between July 1979 and May 1981. All the murders were of black children and were committed in predominantly black areas. By May 1981, twenty-six were dead and one missing. A black male,
Wayne B. Williams, was questioned after disposing of something, presumably a body, in the Chattahoochee River. He was placed under heavy surveillance, and two days later the body of Nathaniel Cater was recovered from the river. It was established that Williams had been seen with Cater. He was charged with 2 murders, and convicted in February 1982, primarily on forensic evidence, which linked him to no less than ten victims.
Because of the race angle, there have, not unnaturally been attempts to link the killings to the Ku Klux Klan, and there has been considerable agitation to reopen the case. However, it seems unlikely that anyone else but Williams was involved in this particularly gruesome series of murders. See pages 273-4 of The Encyclopaedia Of Serial Killers, (op cit).
(7) Allison is also supposed to have accurately predicted the date Rob Piest’s body was found floating in the river. (Killer Clown, page 140). This may well be true, but again, how many predictions did she make?
(8) Up until the month of Wayne Williams’ arrest, a total of 2,394 such offers of “help” were received, page 226, (ibid).
(9) This is known as the fallacy of experience: “A resident doctor achieved a high reputation by diagnosing a rare disorder. The diagnosis was first ridiculed by the attending physicians but
confirmed by surgery. The resident was highly praised. Since then he has continued to make the same diagnosis in similar patients, wrong in each case and leading to unnecessary interventions.” *
And, in the case of “psychic detectives” we might add that his (or more often her) reputation is enhanced by every failed prediction, every retrospective prediction, every unsupported assertion, every bare-faced lie...
* Follies And Fallacies In Medicine, by Petr Skrabanek and James McCormick, published by Tarragon Press, Glasgow, (1989), page 57.
(10) Fantasists (and outright liars) “psychic” and non-psychic often claim to have worked for the FBI, the CIA, MI5 etc. Such claims can of course never be substantiated. If the agency ignores them, as is usually the case, this is taken as confirmation. If a denial is issued, this too is taken as proof. “Why else would they deny it?”
(11) There are scientists and scientists though. One such “scientist” is Andrija Puharich, who has investigated Geller, and published an authorised biography of him in 1974. Puharich, a neurologist, is a graduate of Northwestern University. Here are a few samples from his book. *
Chapter One is called “Uri” Means Light. It may, but so does Lucifer!
On page 14, from the introduction, one of Puharich’s other subjects, Dr Vinod speaks thus:
“M calling: We are Nine Principles and Forces, personalities if you will, working in complete mutual implication...Teleology will be understood in terms of a different ontology. To be simple, we accentuate certain directions as will fulfill the destiny of creation.” And so on.
On page 135, Puharich would have the reader believe that Geller teleported a camera case from New York to Israel. On page 141, he would have him believe that a Star of David on a gold chain round his neck became detached from the chain but the link remained intact.
On pages 151-2, as Geller is watching a hawk, he also sees a spacecraft:
“As his eye followed the feather to the sky, he was startled to see a dark spacecraft parked directly over the hotel. We all looked where he pointed, but we did not see what he saw. But I believed that he saw what he said he saw.”
“Scientist” Puharich also wrote Beyond Telepathy. One of the participants in his experiments was Peter Hurkos, whom he endorses.
* URI: THE ORIGINAL AND AUTHORIZED BIOGRAPHY OF URI GELLER THE MAN WHO BAFFLES THE SCIENTISTS, by Andrija Puharich, published by W.H. Allen, London, (1974).
** Beyond Telepathy, published by Pan Books, (1975), first edition published 1962.
(12) The Truth About Uri Geller, by James Randi, published by Prometheus Books, Buffalo, New York, (1982).
(13) Lyons and Truzzi, The Blue Sense, (op cit).
(14) An article on Geller in an issue of the British & Irish Skeptic written by Mike Hutchinson is referred to en passant. Lyons and Truzzi remark in a footnote that his testimony is hardly impartial!
(15) Randi, The Truth About Uri Geller, page 208, (op cit), says that Geller and his followers have claimed that the U.S. Department of Defense has shown an active interest in his powers [sic]. The Department denies this claim. (See also the letter on page 232).
(16) Lyons and Truzzi, The Blue Sense, page 7, (op cit).
(17) OUT THERE: THE Government’s Secret Quest for EXTRATERRESTRIALS, by Howard Blum, published by Simon & Schuster, London, (1990).
(18) There are several versions of this nonsense, which has ensnared many otherwise intelligent, capable people, eg UFO researcher Timothy Good. In some versions it is claimed that the US (or other) government has recovered a crashed saucer, and dead or even live aliens. Just as there are outrageous photographs of flying saucers and even of aliens which have been going the rounds for many years, so too are there many spurious documents in circulation, the most notorious of which are the MJ-12 Saucer Crash Documents, which were faked by two well-known UFOnuts.
(19) Unidentified Flying Hypothesis, by Philip J. Klass; based on photocopy from the Los Angeles Times Book Review, of Sunday, September 2, 1990.
(20) Philip Klass is a technical writer and regular contributor to the American publication Aviation Week & Space Technology; he is also one of the great debunkers of our age. Klass specialises in the UFO myth, and has probably done more than any man past or present to provide rational explanations for irrational stories about little green men. He is the author of, among other books, UFO Abductions: A Dangerous Game, which tears to shreds the nonsense of UFO “abductees”.
(21) It is ironic that even debunkers are frequently accused of being psychics themselves. I have had personal experience of this. When I attended a demonstration at London’s Conway Hall which was hosted by UK Skeptics, several members of the audience refused to believe that the performer’s mind reading act had not been genuine!
(22) One can add to this list almost indefinitely: body language for example. A well-known example is that the pupils of the eyes widen when somebody finds you physically attractive. Then there is odour; animals are said to be able to smell fear, in reality, when people (or animals) are afraid, they sweat, and so on.
It should not be forgotten however that it is possible to misread even very subtle signals, or to be deliberately misled by them. Poker players take note!
(23) Lyons and Truzzi even suggest this themselves, (page 10), ie that a man wearing a long coat on a hot day may trigger off the Blue Sense. But honestly, is there anything “psychic” about this?
(24) Lyons and Truzzi, The Blue Sense, page 109, (ibid).
(25) Lyons and Truzzi, The Blue Sense, page 150, (ibid). The basis of this claim appears to have been that the good doctor had the “profession” clairvoyant stamped in his passport. Of course, in a free country, one can claim to be anything one wants.
(26) Lyons and Truzzi, The Blue Sense, page 75, (ibid).
(27) Hoebens investigated the claims of Peter Hurkos, with the same result.
(28) Lyons and Truzzi, The Blue Sense, page 105, (op cit).
(29) Lyons and Truzzi, The Blue Sense, page 105, (ibid).
(30) The reader is referred to Disinformation, Misinformation and the “Conspiracy” to Kill JFK Exposed, by Armand Moss, published by Archon Books, Hamden, Conn, (1987), an excellent introduction to this much mythologised subject.
Before you read anything else about the alleged conspiracy to kill President Kennedy, read this little known book. It could save you hours or even years of wading through garbage.
(31) Lyons and Truzzi, The Blue Sense, page 243, (op cit).
(32) It is highly unusual but by no means unprecedented for a suspect to be bailed on a murder charge. One case which immediately springs to mind is that of the late Dr Leonard Arthur, a hospital consultant who was charged, initially, with murdering a mongol baby. He was eventually acquitted of any wrongdoing.
(33) Lyons and Truzzi, The Blue Sense, page 9, (op cit).
(34) Lyons and Truzzi, The Blue Sense, page 10, (ibid).
(35) Lyons and Truzzi, The Blue Sense, pages 226-7, (ibid).
(36) Chapter 9, which starts on page 155 and ends on page 188, is called Psychic Success Stories. This is not only an inordinately lengthy chapter, but, from what we have adduced here, a totally unnecessary one.
(37) Killer Clown, page 215, (op cit).
(38) It came as a great surprise to me to learn that Truzzi was a founder member of CSICOP, but to be absolutely fair to both him and Lyons, it is their reasoning in this book rather than their research which is at fault.
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