Let us now inspect a complete and long series of February 15, 1929. It
contains no such brilliant success as in Experiment 4 of February 20,
but out of 13 experiments there is but one absolute failure, the first.
In this the agent drew a rat, the percipient two crossed objects like
keys.
2. In Figure 147, the agent’s drawing represents a door with lattice on
the upper half; it is made up of perpendicular and horizontal lines
only. The percipient’s drawing (Fig. 147a) consists of four
perpendicular lines finishing at the top in curves like fish-hooks, and
these lines are crossed by three horizontal lines. There is in the
crossed lines a suggestion of the agent’s drawing, a resemblance greater
than to any other of the thirteen.
[Illustration: Fig. 147]
[Illustration: Fig. 147a]
3. The agent’s next drawing (Fig. 93) represents a sun over hills. Mrs.
Sinclair first seems to have got the notion of a sun, which was right
(Fig. 93a). Then she made another circle and put features in it, as will
be seen suggested in the agent’s drawing (actually, in the original
drawing, the features are plainly to be seen). Then she got the idea of
something stretching out below it with curving lines, interpreted it to
be a body, so probably, from mere inference, clapped her sun with
features on to it.
4. Agent’s Figure 97 is a butterfly but the percipient did not get the
idea of a butterfly (Fig. 97a). However, the divergent lines and the
spots, five instead of four, and similarly placed, do seem to bear a
relation to it.
5. In Figure 96a, Mrs. Sinclair’s drawing resembles a part of her
husband’s (Fig. 96), although she misinterpreted her mental picture.
What she thought to be the leg of an animal, and which she drew twice,
was judged by the way it bends to be a front one, but the knee of the
leg roughly corresponds with the elbow of the pipe. Note that she seems
to have got the bulge at the end of the pipe, translating it into a
“foot,” naturally at the end of the leg.
6. In Figures 98 and 98a, compare the three “sparks” with the three
crosses on the box.
7. The shape of Figure 94a is like that of Figure 94 reversed, and there
is a suggestion of the strings, while the feet represent the pedals of
the harp.
8. The percipient in the case of Figure 95a did not get the picture of
the whole balloon bag of the agent (Fig. 95), but she did of half of it,
with a strong suggestion of the cords.
[Illustration: Fig. 148]
[Illustration: Fig. 148a]
9. In Figure 148a, bad as the percipient’s drawings are, regarded as
reproductions of Figure 148, yet they do contain suggestions of it. In
her left upper drawing we may suppose that an impression of the
leaf-stem (but badly twisted) was expressed with a leaf-lobe directly
below the stem, together with an idea of the veining, that in the right
upper one the stem is corrected, and that in the lower drawing a notion
of the veining alone is conveyed. Exactly so would the attention of the
agent, when drawing the leaf or afterward looking at or thinking of it,
pass from and to, or at least stress, one part of the leaf after
another.
10. The agent drew a necktie (Fig. 90). The percipient first drew what
much resembled the necktie, even to the shaded knot (not given here),
and almost exactly like Figure 90a aside from the “smoke.” Next she
wrote “Then it began to smoke,” and drew as in Figure 90a. One would
suppose that the knobby extremity and the diverging lines suggested a
burning match.
11. But no, the alteration appears to have been an anticipation of the
agent’s next drawing, already prepared (Fig. 91)! In this case Mrs.
Sinclair achieved a complete success (Fig. 91a), though she distrusted
it, writing beside the drawing, “Must be memory of the last one.”
12. In Figure 92a the percipient got the first two links of the agent’s
chain (Fig. 92) fairly well. The succeeding ones are suggested by a
series of partially superposed ovals, owing to misinterpretation of her
impressions. She wrote: “An egg-shaped thing smoking? Anyway, curls of
something coming out of end of egg.” Note that her combined “egg” and
“curls” describe a curve similar to that of the chain, and one not far
from the same length.
13. The last experiment of this date resulted in two percipient drawings
(Fig. 149a), similar but with differences as noted below. Presumably the
“arm” of the upper drawing is a reflection of the neck of the violin
(Fig. 149), the “hand” of its bridge, the “strings” of the violin
strings, while the “something” very imperfectly stands for the body of
the instrument. The bracelet (?) on the arm may result from an obscure
impression of _something_ curving in that region, really the volute
termination above the keys. The lower drawing stops with the strings,
but makes them more nearly parallel, like those of the violin.
[Illustration: Fig. 149]
[Illustration: Fig. 149a]
No exact mathematics can be applied to such experiments as these. But,
considering the multitude of objects and shapes which must have been
familiar to both experimenters, do you believe that there was 1 chance
in 16 of the successes in Experiments 10, 11 and 12? Or more than 1
chance in 4 for Experiments 5, 6 and 7? Or more than an average of 1 in
2 for such small degree of success as is discoverable in the rest,
excluding the failure of the first? Multiply accordingly, and divide the
product, let us say, by 2 for this failure. The result, on what I think
a moderate basis, is 1 chance in 16,777,216. Figure any other way you
like, but be reasonable.
Or substitute the first above percipient drawing for that in any and
every one of the above 12 pairs. Then take the next drawing and match it
with the other originals. And thus with the others, if your patience
holds out to the end of 132 exchanges. Have you found a single one which
will suit as well as in its actual position?
COUNTER-TESTS WHICH PROVE THE VAST DISPARITY BETWEEN THE RESULTS
OBTAINED IN THE SERIES OF FEBRUARY 15TH AND THOSE OBTAINED BY GUESSING
It is proposed at this point to interrupt the review of Mr. Sinclair’s
report of his experiments for telepathy by a test applied to the series
which has just been exhibited. In the light of the test, as it proves,
the evidential weight of both the earlier series and those which will
come later ought to be better appreciated. The only way to explain (?)
such results is to hazard the conjecture that they were due to the
possibilities of chance guessing. Well then, let us have a lot of
guessing done on the basis of the same originals and see what we get and
how it compares.[15]
It seems almost incredible that any intelligent person would hold, or
suggest it possible, that the several degrees of resemblance between 12
of the 13 originals in this series and the reproductions could have come
about by chance guessing. Surely, no one possessing an average quality
of logical and mathematical faculty, if he takes time to consider, will
be guilty of so monstrous a _faux pas_ of the intellect. But experience
teaches that some, even of excellent academic or professional standing,
to whom the notion of the possibility of telepathy has long been
obnoxious, are indeed capable of dismissing an exhibit such as this
after a passing glance, with the exclamation, “Merely chance
coincidence.” It is well, then, to make a large number of experiments in
order to test the chances of chance-coincidence to produce such a
result. Perhaps, after that is done, even those most convinced that
chance cannot account for such correspondences as we have seen will be
astonished to find the extent to which results where telepathy has
played a part and results of mere guessing differ.
Ten ladies offered themselves for experimentation. Of course the
likelihood was very small that any one of them would show a trace of
telepathic faculty. As it proved, there developed no reason to suspect
its possession by a single one of them. And it is certain that no one
who disbelieves that _any one_ gets impressions by telepathy will
complain of our conclusion that the ten ladies did nothing more than
guess.
If they did nothing more than to guess, it made no difference what
method we employed, so long as the ladies were given no inkling of the
original drawings. Nevertheless, the exact replicas of Mr. Sinclair’s 13
drawings of February 15th were separately sealed in numbered envelopes,
and the lady was asked to hold the envelopes, one by one, in her hand,
and to draw what came into her mind visually or by concept, choosing
from such impressions according to vividness, recurrence or by whatever
criterion seemed to her most congenial. She was told to take all the
time she wished and was then left alone. Thus the conditions of the
Sinclair experiments were imitated as closely as possible. The time
occupied by the ladies for the series varied from half an hour to nearly
an hour and a half. Every woman would have been pleased, naturally, if
her results had been such as to give grounds for suspecting telepathy,
but the results of the ladies differed in quality only by narrow
degrees, and, as said, there was not the slightest reason to suppose
that with any of them there was anything but chance in play.
It is, of course, not practicable to reproduce their 130 drawings in
this Bulletin. But they are to be mounted, the ten for each original
drawing on a separate sheet together with a copy of the Sinclair
original and reproduction, and the 13 sheets will be preserved by the
Boston Society for Psychic Research as a permanent exhibit which any
visitor may inspect and judge for himself.
As has been seen, we classified the Sinclair reproductions of this
series as Successes, Partial Successes, Suggestive and Failures. This is
a rough method, and others might increase or decrease the number
assigned to any of these classes, except the last. There can be no
question that there is but one entire failure. But however faulty our
standard of rating, it is the same standard which is applied to the
drawings of the ten ladies.
Not only did I use the utmost care in rating the drawings of the ten
ladies, but I asked my secretary, Miss Hoffmann, a lady of education and
keen intelligence, to do the same. Her rating of the guessing sets was
as absolutely independent of mine as mine was independent of hers.
Our mutually independent estimates were surprisingly alike. According to
both, there were among the 130 trials (by 10 women) not a single
Success, only 1 (Miss H) or 2 (W. F. P.) deserving to be entitled to
Partial Success, 7 Suggestive, 5 Slightly Suggestive and 116 (W. F. P.)
or 117 (Miss H) Failure. Compare with the Sinclair set, 3 Success, 5
Partial Success, 4 Suggestive, 1 Failure, out of a total of but 13.
Before the foregoing judging was done, I had Miss Hoffman guess the
whole set, twice a day, until another 10 sets were produced, based upon
the same Sinclair series. Our wholly independent estimates of the total
results of these additional 130 experiments in guessing proved again to
be surprisingly alike. Neither found a single Success, 1 (W. F. P.) or
no (Miss H) reproduction deserved to be called a Partial Success, 5 (W.
F. P.) or 7 (Miss H) were rated Suggestive, 8 (W. F. P.) or 7 (Miss H)
as Slightly Suggestive and 116 as Failures.
We will now tabulate the two groups (the sets of the 10 ladies and Miss
H’s 10 sets), taken together (260 experiments in guessing).
_W. F. P.’s Estimate_ _Miss H’s Estimate_
─────────────────────────────────────────────────
S. 0 S. 0
P. S. 3 P. S. 1
Sug. 12 Sug. 14
S. Sug. 13 S. Sug. 12
F. 232 F. 233
If we calculate the averages for the 20 sets of experiments, we can more
directly compare with the Sinclair results.
_Sinclair Set_ _Average of the 20 Guessing Sets_
──────────────────────────────────────────────────
_W. F. P.’s _Miss H’s
Estimate_ Estimate_
──────────────────────────────────────────────────
S. 3 S. 0 S. 0
P. S. 5 P. S. 3⁄20 P. S. 1⁄20
Sug. 4 Sug. 3⁄5 Sug. 7⁄10
S. Sug. 0 S. Sug. 13⁄20 S. Sug. 3⁄5
F. 1 F. 11 3⁄5 F. 11 13⁄20
But there is perhaps a surer way of making comparisons. It is sometimes
difficult to draw the line between a Success and a Partial Success, a
Partial Success and a Suggestive, a Suggestive and a Slightly
Suggestive. But when the drawings represent not simple diagrams, but
objects animate and inanimate, and a reproduction by Mrs. Sinclair is
placed beside a like-numbered one in any of the 20 guessing sets, it is
very seldom that one cannot be certain whether one is better as compared
with the common original, and within fair limits how much better. And
the proof of this statement is found in the fact that when two persons
passed upon the 20 sets of guessing reproductions, comparing them with
the 1 set of Sinclair reproductions, to determine, case for case, in
260, which were more nearly like the originals, and to what degree,
their rating was almost identical, although they worked in entire and
absolute mutual independence of each other.
In the following table, Si. = Sinclair drawing, G. = a Guessing drawing,
v.m.b. = very much better, m.b. = much better, b. = better.
W. F. P. found the guessing reproduction of experiment 1 to be bad to a
degree equal with the Mrs. Sinclair failure, in 16 instances. Miss
Hoffmann found it equally bad also in 16 instances, and deemed another
reproduction equally to possess some tiniest resemblance to the original
in 1 instance. Aside from these we have