Later Experiments by Professor William McDougall
In the main, this review has dealt only with the period covered by Mental Radio, although it has exhibited some experiments not illustrated or even mentioned therein. A few of the special tabulations have also included a part or all of the later tests made by Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair, to the number of more than a hundred, the materials of which are in my hands. When the tabulations have reached so far, the fact has been stated.
But it may be well to say something about tests made by Professor William McDougall during a sojourn in California, July-August, 1930. He examined the proofs of previous work and consented to write an introduction to Mental Radio, saying: “A refusal would imply on my part a lack either of courage or of due sense of scientific responsibility. * * * It is the duty of men of science to give whatever encouragement and sympathetic support may be possible to all amateurs who find themselves in a position to observe and carefully and honestly to study such phenomena. Mrs. Sinclair would seem to be one of the rare persons who have telepathic power in a marked degree and perhaps other supernormal powers. The experiments in telepathy, as reported in the pages of this book, were so remarkably successful as to rank among the very best hitherto reported. The degree of success and the conditions of experiment were such that we can reject them as conclusive evidence of some mode of communication not at present explicable in accepted scientific terms only by assuming that Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair either are grossly stupid, incompetent and careless persons, or have deliberately entered upon a conspiracy to deceive the public in a most heartless and reprehensible fashion.” As we have seen, the circle of conspirators would have to be enlarged to admit Mr. and Mrs. Irwin, for they vouched for an extraordinarily successful series of experiments at long distance. And it would have to be enlarged to include Professor McDougall himself, since he sent me the materials of his experiments, whose results, though inferior to many of the series of 1928 and 1929, yet show a ratio and quality of correspondence vastly beyond chance expectation. Remember that the 260 Guessing tests resulted in not one drawing which, being compared with the original, could possibly be regarded as a Success, and this by the independent verdicts of two judges. Of course, this does not mean that another set of 260 guesses would not show one Success or more than one, but it does show the great improbability that a particular drawing made by guess will correspond with the particular original enough so that it is possible to call it a Success. The 260 guess-drawings, according to one of the judges, showed 3 Partial Successes, 1 according to the other. Then say there was no Success and but 3 Partial Successes, and it is still unlikely that a particular drawing made in any short guess series will correspond with the particular original to the extent of being worthy of the title Success or Partial Success. On the basis of those 260 guesses we would be warranted in assuming that there would be about one-third of a likelihood of getting either a Success or a Partial Success in a series of 25. But another series of 260 guesses might be more fortunate, so call it an expectation of getting one. Professor McDougall had 25 experiments with Mrs. Sinclair.
On July 19th, “five cards drawn or chosen and sealed in envelope and thick paper at Santa Monica and presented in turn sealed to Mrs. S. at Long Beach.” Reproductions 1, 3 and 4 were failures. But agent’s No. 2 was a “prairie schooner” showing two wheels with spokes and a long black line crossing the wheels at their hubs and standing for both the bottom of the vehicle-body and the shafts in front, while the percipient drew (1) a wheel with spokes and a long black line running from the hub, and (2) a wheel-like shape without spokes, but the line extending far in one direction and passing through the hub and beyond the wheel a short way in the other direction, as in the original. Here we have a distinct Partial Success. Agent’s No. 5 was a postal-card picture of a part of Oxford, the most conspicuous feature in which is the tower of Magdalen College with pinnacles and high, narrow windows. The percipient made a drawing which anyone would recognize as a tower, with bristling short lines projecting upward from the top suggesting pinnacles, and high, narrow windows. The proportions of height and width are approximately correct. Below the lower window level are two parallel horizontal lines, which call attention to such lines in the original. This was drawn, however, while the percipient was holding agent’s No. 4, his No. 5, the tower, still being in his pocket. It looks like an anticipation. But when she arrived at No. 5 she wrote “Turret of a castle and trees,” and now she is right for the very original in hand, which does display, besides a river, a bridge and buildings, the conspicuous tower, and trees prominent in the picture. She added “Sword,” “Scissors,” and “Key,” which may possibly be erroneous impressions from the pinnacles. So we have here a striking result, worthy to be called a Success. I have again taken pains to go through all the originals and all the reproductions, 413 of each, and find that but once besides did an original represent a tower. It was the Eiffel Tower, and all will remember its tall, slender and tapering shape. The percipient’s drawing represented a long, slender and tapering cone—a Partial Success. And but once besides, among all 413 drawings, did the percipient present a tower. This was on the following August 16th, when, apparently as an experiment, the drawings were “done in a hurry” and no record made of the order. If compared with a particular one of the originals, the “tower top” is a Partial Success, but it probably was a Failure. So here we have the factors: out of 418 agent drawings two represent towers, and one results in a percipient Success, the other in a Partial Success; out of 418 percipient drawings two represent towers, and one is a Success, the other a Failure.
On July 20th Professor McDougall made 5 drawings “at one end of a long room, while Mrs. Sinclair tried to reproduce them at the other end.” The agent made what is supposed to be a stork, each foot furnished with three toes. The percipient made two long legs with three-toed feet, the legs extending from a curved line like the under side of a bird. Above and isolated is what looks like a crest, which the stork does not have. Partial Success. The 4th agent drawing is of a ringed target and a feathered arrow sticking in it, the barb not visible. The percipient drawing is practically the feathered part of the shaft. Partial Success. The 5th agent drawing shows a drum-like object with elliptical top, from the center of which a tube or spout projects vertically, with water rising from the spout, parting and falling to right and to left so that it looks something like a tree. The percipient drew (1) an ellipse, (2) an ellipse, (3) something like a very round teapot, with elliptic top and spout at an angle of 45 degrees, (4) something like the vertical trunk of a tree surmounted by a ball of foliage. Success; there are too many suggestive partial parallels to allow this to be doubted.
July 26th there were 5 experiments, all drawn by Professor McDougall except one, that being a postal-card picture of trees, bushes and the yucca in bloom. Agent’s No. 2 was a wheel with spokes and tire nicely drawn. Percipient made three circles in a row with something like the connecting rod of a locomotive across them. This is at least Suggestive. Directly before the yucca picture, the percipient described plants with flowers, but the description did not fit the original next to come, nor did the impression of flowers persist when the yucca was at hand, so I do not allow this to count at all. There were no other successes in any degree.
Then followed experiments, one a day, with Professor McDougall drawing at Santa Monica, Mrs. Sinclair drawing at the same time at Pasadena, thirty miles distant.
July 30th. A failure.
August 2nd. Original drawing: a coffee-pot, its spout at the right of peculiar shape, somewhat like the profile of a boat’s stern. The percipient’s drawing was principally made up of a vertical line like the edge of the coffee-pot, and turned to the right from its upper extremity a projection curiously like the coffee-pot’s spout. To the left of the vertical line seven dots. It may be a mere coincidence that in the original there are several, but not seven, dark spots in the drawing, placed relatively about as far from the right edge of the coffee-pot as the dots are from the vertical line in the percipient drawing. The drawing is Suggestive, at least.
August 10th. Original drawing a teapot, and percipient’s drawing, a palm frond, was relatively to it, a failure.