URI GELLER AND SCIENCE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: STARGATE
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79-00999A000200010087-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: November 4, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 9, 2014
• Sequence Number: 87
• Publication Date: November 29, 1973
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2014/01/09: CIA-RDP79-00999A000200010087-0 3
Comment
Uri Geller and science
Millions, of viewers across Britain watching the
"Dimbleby Talk-In" on BBC television last Friday
evening were treated to a fascinating demonstration
of what was alleged to be telepathy and psychokinesis
?supposed paranormal faculties of the human mind
which have excited the imagination of scientists and
yet resisted experimental verification despite almost
a century of laboratory studies. The young Man
demonstrating the phenomena, Mr Uri Geller, success-
fully reproduced a drawing which a production assis-
tant had sketched and placed in a sealed envelope,
made kitchen forks bend and break, and persuaded
dud watches to start ticking simply by touching them.
This was all done to the satisfaction of David
Dimbleby, the studio audience, a two-man scientist
panel and, no doubt, the vast majority of the viewing
audience at home?large numbers of whom
apparently later rang the BBC to say that forks had
bent mysteriously nn their kitchen tables.
"Uri gets Britain in a twist" was one newspaper
headline the next day, commenting presumably on
the nationwide fork bending. And if the Sunday
papers are to be judged, Mr Geller was equally suc-
cessful at a special press conference on Saturday.
The science correspondent of one highly respectable
newspaper reported that Geller had apparently bent
one of his keys, without even touching it, and that his
own scepticism about such matters had taken a nasty
tumble. All this, of course, made fabulous TV material
and newspaper copy, and served to launch Uri Geller
into the British national consciousness in the same
way that similar exposure in the United States and in
his native Israel has previously achieved.
There is, however, clearly something more than a
good story for journalists at issue here. If Mr Geller
had appeared on the programme as a professional
magician, it would have been surprising if there had
been a hundredth of the fuss. Demonstrations of the
kind given by Mr Geller are a feature of the repertoire
of many good professional magicians. But Geller does
not claim to be a magician. He states specifically that
he achieves his effects by special paranormal powers.
Furthermore he has convinced a number of scientists,
most notably at the highly respected Stanford Re-
search Institute, that his phenomena are more rele-
vant to the world of parapsychology than to that of
the Magic Circle (see New Scientist, vol 59, p 95). If
this is indeed so, and Mr Geller really does bend metal
with his mind, mend broken watches without tinkering
with them, and do telepathy, then he must be one of
the most brilliant exponents of psychic phenomena
that the world has ever seen. His powers (or more
precisely his ability to demonstrate them) would be
of tremendous significance for the future of scientific
theory and practice. On the other hand, if the
phenomena demonstrated to millions of people over
television were achieved by the subtle touch of the
.professional magician, then it is equally important
that this is made clear.
New Scientist believes that last Friday's demonstra-
tion, while fascinating, can hardly be counted as a
controlled investigation. Mr Geller himself expressed
awareness of this and declared that he was willing to
demonstrate his powers to interested scientists. For
this reason we have invited Mr Geller to demonstrate
his ability to a small research committee, the composi-
tion of which will reflect the multidisciplinary
approach needed in investigating phenomena outside
the mainstream of orthodox science. The committee
will consist of a ,member of the Society for Psychical
Research, a research psychologist, the editor of New
Scientist (a biologist) and one other member of the
editorial staff a (physicist), a professional magician of
international standing, and a journalist from an inde-
pendent national newspaper. The committee has been
chosen from people varying in their attitudes to extra-
sensory phenomena, but none of them believes that
such phenomena should be discounted. It is proposed
to make audio and video tape recordings of the entire
proceedings and to publish a full report of the ;re-
search session or sessions in New Scientist. Every
effort will be made to ensure that arrangements for
the session(s) are agreeable to Mr Geller?who has,
of course, never claimed to be able to perform "to
order".
It might be argued that further investigations of
Geller's phenomena are superfluous, because he has
already demonstrated them satisfactorily to the Stan-
ford team, or possibly that it would 'be unreasonable
to expect him to demonstrate them at will. Neither
argument has much substance, as a satisfactory
demonstration to an independent, critical group in
Britain could only serve to accelerate parapsychologi-
cal research by confirming Stanford's controversial
findings. On the second point, Mr Geller has re-
peatedly been able to generate the phenomena on
numerous television shows in various parts of the
world, admittedly under poorly controlled conditions
but under the glare of TV lights and in the tense and
oppressive atmosphere of a TV studio. The vast wave
of publicity which has followed his latest appearance
will, of course, give a great boost to public interest in
alleged paranormal powers of the mind.
However, scientific research and parapsychology,
which has made at best painful progress in the last
50 years, will not be advanced one jot by demonstra-
tions in which it is not 100 per cent certain what is
being demonstrated. For this reason New Scientist has
taken the unusual step of instigating this direct re-
search proposal. We believe that the majority of our
readers would wish us to take this step.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2014/01/09: CIA-RDP79-00999A000200010087-0