August 11th. Agent drew a faucet. Percipient wrote “Teapot,” which is a failure. But agent had drawn a teapot the previous day—did percipient get a deferred telepathic impression?
August 13th. Agent drew a palm tree and percipient’s result was a failure. But, records agent, “Had it in mind to draw the palm in patio several days before. Mrs. S. seemed to get it August 10th.” No agent should have in mind to draw one thing when he actually draws another. If the result is from telepathy, not clairvoyance, a percipient is at least as likely to get that on which the agent’s mind has dwelt. On the whole it would perhaps be fair to count this as a Success.
August 16th. Agent drew a flower-pot and in it a plant with sword-shaped leaves, somewhat like a century plant. Percipient first drew what one might take to be a stalk with five straight, short leafless branches, but with the script “Velvet bow with band.” She added, “Then saw” and drew a plant—no pot—with leaves exactly of the form of the leaves in the original, and added, “I have too many leaves in the above.” Right: she had 11 leaves, the original had 7. This certainly is at least a Partial Success.
August 17th, August 18th and August 19th each yielded a Failure.
Now let us take account of stock. On the basis of our 260 experiments in guessing we would have about one-third of an expectation of finding in the McDougall experiments one Partial Success, but as another series of 260 guesses might be more fortunate we proposed to reckon a full likelihood of getting one Success or Partial Success, on the theory that Mrs. Sinclair was guessing also. But we have found 3 Successes and 4 Partial Successes (not counting a possible “anticipation,” and 2 instances of Suggestive). It is not mathematics, it is not logic, it is not common-sense to conclude that we have not, even in this series of Professor McDougall, although it does not equal some which have been exhibited, something for which chance is wholly unable to account.
It is not at all difficult to account for the fact that Professor McDougall’s results were not quite up to the average of Mrs. Sinclair’s work during the period covered by Mental Radio, both quantity and quality taken into consideration. In the first place, it has for many years been evident that something depends upon the degree of rapport between agent and percipient; in other words, that some persons are better suited than others to act as agents in relation to a particular percipient. Thus, we are told in the book (pages [33]–34) that among the friends of Mrs. Sinclair there was one peculiarly adapted in this respect—Mrs. Kate Crane-Gartz. I venture to relate my own very limited experience, as fact, not scientifically guaranteed. I have had reason to suppose that I was getting telepathic messages only with two persons. One was with my wife the first time I ever experimented with her, and then I got most of the objects she was thinking of, more or less satisfactorily, in about eight trials. But I never again had any measurable success with her, though I tried repeatedly. The other person I was for a time in sympathetic relations with, and there occurred a number of incidents which convinced me that I was acting as a spontaneous percipient. The most striking category of these is the same which Mr. Sinclair describes when he says: “My wife will say to me, ‘Mrs. Gartz is going to phone,’ and in a minute or two the phone will ring.” Repeatedly, when I had no particular reason to think that the lady to whom I refer would ‘phone me, and when I was occupied with work, I would suddenly, as by a jerk, look at the ‘phone, expecting it to ring, and in a few moments it would do so. I have even gone to the ‘phone, almost without thinking, and stood there for half a minute or so before it did so. This period lasted for perhaps three or four months only, then faded out. Never at any other time, nor with any other person, not even with my daughter between whom and me there is the most cordial sympathy, has there been evidence of this kind sufficiently striking and repetitious to arrest serious attention. So it may well be that Professor McDougall, however amiable and fairminded he is, not having been long known to the percipient and being invested with the awe of a psychologist of extended reputation, was not so well adapted to be an agent in relation to her as her husband or her brother-in-law.
But again, while at times Mrs. Sinclair to the last of her experimentation analyzed by me got excellent results, I find that, whether because she was wearied, or too much occupied by other things, or more anxious and less spontaneous, or for whatever reason, did not in the later months do so well on the average as during the earlier months. The poorest stretch of the period after the material covered by the book was that from August 1 to August 28, 1929, inclusive. There were 27 experiments, of which, according to my reckoning, 2 were Successes, 1 a Partial Success, 3 Suggestive, 2 Slightly Suggestive and 19 Failures in a series of 27 experiments. The poorest stretch of experiments during the book period was that ending with the series of February 17, 1929, nevertheless shown on account of its significance. Here there were 4 Successes, 8 Partial Successes, 4 Suggestive, 1 Slightly Suggestive and 10 Failures out of the same total number of 27. So, after all, while the McDougall results did not reach the highest level of the later period, they did not by any means mark the lowest level. They greatly transcend the expectation of chance, and, with the exception of five experiments only, were achieved when agent and percipient were either thirty miles apart or at the two ends of a long room.
Attempts to Explain Otherwise Than by Telepathy
Would Chance Coincidence Explain?
It has already been proved by experiments in guessing that even the comparatively poor Dessoir results were far beyond the reach of chance. And it has been shown by experiments in guessing that the Sinclair results were much farther beyond the reach of chance. Such counter-tests may be repeated by any reader ad libitum.