October 2013 – Unbelievable

Nov. 16th: An Evening of Possibilities, Interactive Demonstrations, and a Fundraising Auction at the Rhine Research Center

October 31, 20130

On Saturday, November 16th, 2013, the Board of Directors of the Rhine Research Center will provide a night of fun, information, interactive experiments, and a fundraising auction to support the cutting-edge research being done by the Rhine in the field of parapsychology and consciousness studies. The evening’s events will include:

– Wine, food, and refreshments.
– An opportunity to be part of ESP testing and other interactive activities.
– A live auction of spectacular services, unique experiences, and one of a kind opportunities.
– The BIG FINISH: A spoon bending party (spoons provided).

Among the auction items are a private phone reading with Allison Dubois (the tv show Medium was based on her life) a remote viewing session with Joe McMoneagle (Project Stargate’s remote viewer #1) and a full-course online program with instructor Loyd Auerbach (parapsychologist) including Ghost Hunting: How to Investigate the Paranormal. There are many, many other great items to bid on and not all are parapsychology related, like an overnight stay for two at the Washington Duke Inn (a beautiful place, I’d go for that one if I was in the area).

Don’t miss this, it’s going to be a great party!!

For more information and to register, click here.

A PK party. That’s Sally Rhine Feather at the lower right, and the late Dr. Elizabeth McMahan (aka BettyMac) on the left.

Helmut Schmidt, Rest in Peace.

October 9, 2013October 9, 20132

I only just learned that Helmut Schmidt, a German parapsychologist I’d researched, died on August 18, 2011. How sad that I heard about this two years after the fact. From my book:

Many years later [I was writing about the 1940’s] Helmut Schmidt, a German physicist who worked at Boeing’s research laboratory, and later for Rhine, would develop a PK experiment involving a device called a random number generator. Using the process of radioactive decay to randomly illuminate a circle of lights, subjects were asked to influence which direction the lights lit. The results were so impressive that when referring to later versions of this test, scientist and skeptic Carl Sagan would grudgingly concede that “by thought alone humans can (barely) affect random number generators in computers,” unable to resist pointing out that modern PK tests, like the telepathy tests, indicated a weak effect, as if weak effects are trivial or unimportant. The effect of aspirin in reducing hearts attacks is even weaker, but nonetheless life-saving. The fact that the effect of PK is weak does not in itself diminish its significance.

Schmidt’s time working for J. B. Rhine was not a happy one alas, and when I tried to talk to him about it he told me he found the memories so hurtful he didn’t want to discuss it. I do know that he later reconnected with one of Rhine’s daughters. I believe through her the wounds were healed.

That is Helmut Schmidt in the photograph below. From the caption that came with the photograph:

A recent development in the testing of precognition is the electronic machine shown. It emphasizes elements of fun and challenge to prevent build-up of emotional blocking mechanisms in the subject. The four lamps of different colors light up in different sequence: The subjects task is to predict which one will light next and push the corresponding button. The machine uses single quantum processes which may form nature’s most elementary source of randomness. And electronic counter that counts (at a rate of 10 to the 6th power per second) in the sequence 1,2,3,4 1…is stopped at the random time when an electron emitted by a radioactive source (strontium 90).

This machine and others is on display at the Museum at the Rhine Research Center.