By the 1920s, people interested in the world’s great mysteries and psychic sciences were creating machines and gadgets to try and understand psychic energies, ghosts, and other phenomena. Here is a rather long article that was published about the tools they used and their desire to understand what is on the other side.
New York’s Laboratory Of The Mysterious
By Dr. Hereward Carrington, Research Officer
The American Psychical Institute Takes as Its Fascinating Field for Experiment the No Man’s Land Between Spirit and Matter
THERE has recently been founded in New York a laboratory for the exclusive study of the unknown powers of mind and body, all sorts of psychical and odd physical phenomena. This is the first institute of its kind in this country — in fact, in the world. Here will be undertaken researches into the vast unknown, into the vast unknown, into the borderland of spirit and matter, into that mysterious beyond which so fascinates us all. But these researches will be conducted by means of delicate electrical and physical instruments and in the strictest scientific manner.
A few isolated investigators have in the past made researches in this line, but no organized and systematic attempt has ever been made. Men have speculated for thousands of years to solve the great problem of the soul, but now science is taking up the question.
What Happens to Bodily Energy After Death?
Associated with the research officer are William Russell, high frequency and electrical engineer, who is the technical expert, and a number of able physicians, psychologists and general scientists, who are to act in the capacity of “consulting specialists” and are to have charge of the therapeutic work.
Is the life of the body an energy? If so something must happen to it at the moment of death, for it is inconceivable that it could be altogether annihilated. Where does it go? Is it not possible that some sort of instrument might be devised capable of “catching” this energy and obtaining its definite registration? And if this energy continues to persist might it not be capable of continually affecting such an instrument? These questions are perfectly legitimate and lend themselves to scientific treatment. This is one of the questions which the psychic laboratory is about to set itself to solve.
Then again there is a certain amount of evidence that the human will can exert a definite physical pressure. We have an instrument which is capable of registering this and a number of experiments are now being conducted in order to prove it. Dr. Charles Russ, of England, has lately asserted that the human eye radiates a certain energy which will affect his special instrument. A number of experiments will be conducted in this direction also.
Dr. Kilner, of St. Thomas’s Hospital, London, has conducted researches upon the so-called human “aura” — an atmosphere which surrounds the body — and has devised glass slides, or screens, filled with a chemical called “dicyanin,” a coal tar dye, be means of which the aura can be rendered visible. Extensive experiments upon the aura must be undertaken, with a view to photographing it and also to study the effect upon the aura of other physical forces such as electricity, magnetism, the action of certain chemicals, etc.
French investigators, again, have devised a number of instruments whereby the vital radiations, issuing from the human body, can be detected and registered. “Mediums,” and other unusual individuals, seem to radiate an energy from their fingertips and this energy should be definitely measures and the nature of the radiation discovered. Preliminary tests in this direction, indeed, forced Dr. Imoda to declare that “the radiations of radium, the cathode radiations of the Crookes tube, and mediumistic are fundamentally the same.” He based this conclusion upon a number of experiments in which an electroscope had been discharged without contact — merely by holding the fingers above it.
What Used To Be Fanciful Is Now A Reality
These examples will be sufficient to illustrate the kind of phenomena which may profitably be investigates in a laboratory such as this. There need be nothing unscientific about such an effort. Science does not consist in a body of facts — as many believe — but in a method. One can be absolutely scientific as to the investigation of a “haunted house” and absolutely unscientific in a problem in physics. The facts of science are constantly changing, the method never! And the fanciful and “impossible” of yesterday have become the reality of today. In view of these undoubted facts let us keep an open mind and endeavor to investigate any odd and bizarre facts which may present themselves — seeing to it that we always employ the methods of science.
Many other striking and unusual phenomena could be studied in this manner. Movements of objects without contact, the direct photography of thought, instrumental tests of mediums during trance, hypnosis, sleep under an anesthetic, etc., photographing and weighing the should at the moment of death, the effect of light, color, music, etc., upon normal and abnormal individuals, psychotherapy and psychoanalysis, instrumental tests of phenomena said to be produced by certain “physical” mediums, etc. — all these would form the basis of study in this laboratory.
Let me give an outline of a few of the instruments which we have so far devised and have in operation in the psychical laboratory. I must select a few only, because space prohibits any extensive treatment of this side of the question. Some of them are new, especially devised for the purpose; others are well known instruments, which have been employed in novel ways.
In the latter class I would place a galvanometer, which have employed in a new way to test the reality of the so called “spirit control,” speaking through a medium when in trance. We employ a mirror galvanometer for this purpose, connected with a Wheatstone bridge and connected to the medium by two electrodes, covered with sponges which have been moistened with salt water.
A galvanometer is an instrument which registers slight changes in electric currents. If any emotion is aroused in the subject this will cause the resistance offered by the body to the electric current to vary, and more current will pass through the subject’s body as the emotion is aroused. This variation of current is shown in the galvanometer. A small mirror swings to the right or left as the current varies, and this can be observed through a slit, through which the observer looks, or it can be caused to reflect a beam of light on the opposite wall, which will travel over a scale drawn upon the wall, so that a very slight movement of the mirror will cause a large variation on the scale at a distance.
This has been employed in the past to test emotions, and has been applied in criminal investigations to test the emotional reactions of the subject when asked certain questions in court.
It can be applied in psychic investigation in this way. A list of words is read to the medium when in a normal state. Emotional reactions will be noted to certain words, which are reported.
Now, when the medium goes into a trance and a “spirit” claims to be talking through her, the question is: Is this a real “spirit” or only a part of the subconscious mind of the medium? Hitherto it has been impossible to prove this by any objective test.
The instrument, however, shows it in the following manner:
If the trance personality, claiming to be a “spirit,” reacts emotionally to the same words as those which the medium reacted, we have proof that we are dealing with the same mind — that is, the medium. If, on the contrary, we obtain emotional reactions to different words, we have proof that we are dealing with a different mind — either a “spirit” (as the intelligence claims to be) or an absolutely watertight compartment in the medium’s subconscious mind, which reacts to different words than the medium’s normal mind. Hitherto investigations have failed to show the existence of any such water tight compartment, in cases of hypnotism, multiple personality, etc., which show emotional reactions of a totally different kind from this exhibited from the normal personality of the medium. Experiments in this direction are not being undertaken, and it seems fairly clear that, if successful, they would prove the reality of some alien mind different from that of the medium herself.
A special instrument which has been devised by Dr. Paul Joire, and known as a “sthenometer” has been employed to detect vital radiations issuing from the fingertips. A straw is nicely balanced on a needle point, the power end of which is imbedded in cork. The straw revolves over a graduated disc, showing the number of degrees which the straw moves in either direction. A bell shaped glass completely covers the straw, thus shutting off air currents and normal causes which would affect the movement of the straw.
The subject is requested to place one or both hands near the ends of the straw, on the outside of the glass and, in a certain percentage of cases, definite movements of the straw can be detected, ranging from over a certain number of degrees, right or left. In psychic subjects this is very marked. Dr. Schofield, of London, uses this machine regularly in his medical practice and states that in hysterical and neurasthenic patients definite movements can always be obtained.
The movement of the straw is due, apparently, to a “vital energy” which issues from the finger tips. It is not heat, since a hot iron will not cause the straw to move; and, further, the hands, even when cold, will cause movements. It is not electricity, for the glass could act as an insulator. Normal causes thus seem to be eliminated, and the movement of the straw is left to be accounted for by other forces yet unknown. It sometimes swings in one direction and sometimes in another, sometimes backward and forward, and sometimes steadily in one direction. One observer has reported that neurasthenic subjects caused the straw to move to the right and hysterical subjects to the left.
Another special device which is being tested in the laboratory is the so called “volometer,” or “will beard,” which was devised by Dr. Sydney Alrutz, of Upsala University, Sweden. By means of this instrument it is apparently possible to register the pressure exercised by the human will, showing it to be a definite physical energy or force, and not merely a “choice,” as modern psychology teaches.
A beard approximately eighteen inches in length by ten inches in width is supported on two knife edges, about one third up the board from the end nearest the subject testing it. The further or long end of the board is suspended by means of a thread to a delicate balance, which registers the weight of the board as it rests in its normal position.
The subject is requested to place her hands on the near end of the board. It will be seen that any pressure on this tends to depress the near end of the board and raise the far end, thereby causing it to weigh less. In only two possible ways can the far end of the board be made to weigh more. First, by pulling upward on the near end of the board (which is impossible, since the subject’s hands rest lightly upon the surface); second, by pressure exerted on the further end. The subject is requested to look intently at the further end of the board and “will” that it shall be depressed. In a certain number of subjects (perhaps 2 per cent) a definite downward pressure will be recorded, which is registered on the scale.
Another piece of apparatus employed in the psychic laboratory might be called the “ululometer” or “psychic howler.’ Its object is to reveal the presence of any energy or body, visible or invisible, within its field, by a loud noise, which sometimes becomes a howl. The electric energy passing through the amplifying machine and the large coil are affected and variations are produced in the amount of current by any other energy or body approaching it. It is delicately adjusted, and the resulting electric changes in the instrument are converted into audible sounds in the telephone receivers placed over the observer’s ears.
If a human body, which is a source of electric energy, approaches the coil, it will affect the electric energy passing through it and, thus modifying it, will cause sounds in the telephone receivers, which are plainly audible. The electric energy radiated by the heart when beating, by breathing, etc., is thus recorded when the subject is near the machine. As the whole body approaches it will “howl” with a very loud, high note, which increases in pitch as the body approaches nearer and nearer the coil. If any form of energy, such as that possessed by a “spirit” or an “astral body,” therefore, were in the vicinity and approached this machine, the latter would at once give evidence of its proximity by variations in the electric current, which would at once be heard by the observer at the telephones. That is to say, if no visible body be near the coil and sounds are nevertheless heard, there must be some invisible body, or some mode of energy, in the immediate environment of the coil which the latter thus records. It can thus be seen that this coil would be the means of detecting the presence of unknown forces or entities within its immediate radius.
These are some of the instruments which are employed in the American Psychical Laboratory for the purpose of testing the unknown powers of mind and body which we undoubtedly possess and the nature of certain psychic phenomena, of course which readily lend themselves to an investigation of this character, among which I may mention thought photography, “dowsing” or water finding, radiations said to be emitted by magnets, crystals and other bodies, experiments in weighing and photographing the soul at the moment of death, experimentally induced dreams, the polarity of the human body and the nature of the electrical and other energies within it, experiments upon the human aura, experiments in the projection of the astral body, etc. A great deal of work has been done in France, England, Germany, Poland, Japan, and elsewhere in these directions, but no organized attempt has been made as yet to study them by suitable laboratory methods.
We are also attempting to duplicate or reproduce in our laboratory purely by physical and electrical means certain psychic phenomena to discover, if possible, the analogies and connections which may exist between the one and the other. It is my belief that much may be gained in this field by attempts to duplicate by artificial means certain spiritualistic and psychical phenomena, and in this manner to ascertain the possible relations or connections between these manifestations and other physical or electrical phenomena better known. All advance in science is made by dovetailing the unknown into the known and showing their possible connections. It is the same here. In attempting to duplicate certain psychic phenomena we may at least discover some useful analogies which may guide our thought in further investigation.
Continually Seeking a Door To The Spirit World
Could we but find in this laboratory an energy common to the two worlds — the spiritual world and the material world — we should have here a means of direct communication, possibly by instrumental means. Delicate physical and electrical apparatus might be the means after all by which such communication will ultimately be established. At all events, when subtle causes and forces are in operation, as they certainly are at such times, it is only natural to suppose that instruments far more delicate than our sense would be the logical method of detecting them.
This is the object of the American Psychical Institute — to conduct experiments which will serve to throw light upon the hidden powers of our being, upon that vast borderland which lies between spirit and matter.
Source: New York Tribune. Newspaper. April 09, 1992.
