Would the Kindred Ideas of Relatives Explain?
It makes one feel foolish to add anything more about the curious “thob” to the effect that what is taken for telepathy between husbands and wives is really coincidence brought about by their community of thought and tendency to think about the same things. It should be evident that even if a husband and wife knew only one hundred objects in common, that astonishing fact of limitation would not imply that the lady would be likely to think of a particular one of these, say No. 92, at the particular time that her spouse chose it. For once it may be well to show just how narrow and connubial a range of drawings a husband may submit to his wife. (See Appendix II.)
Would Conscious or Subconscious Fraud on the Part of the Percipient Explain?
We must squarely face every possible theory, and this is one. Mr. Sinclair himself dealt with it. We must do so more thoroughly, in spite of Mrs. Sinclair’s testimony to remarkable telepathic experiences in her earlier years (Mental Radio, p. [16]), in spite of her husband’s testimony about her actually setting down in writing what “Jan” was doing at a distance before she got from him the substantially corresponding facts (pp. [21]–24), and getting in dreams or by “concentration” facts concerning himself at a distance (pp. [31]–33), in spite of Mrs. Sinclair’s reputation for practicality and non-credulity (pp. [17], [139]), honor and conscientiousness (p. [53]), her impressing her husband as being “a fanatic for accuracy” (pp. [138]–139), the grave reasons which caused her to institute these experiments (p. [18]; Appendix I), her intense desire to be sure, and to satisfy every misgiving of her own (pp. [136]–137), her urgency that her husband should watch her work (p. [53]), her variations in the methods of experimentation to see what effect they would have (pp. [80], [136]–137, [144]), her reluctance that her husband should publish his book until still more experiments were had (p. [137]), and the great pains she takes to describe her method of development and “preparation” in order to encourage others to experiment (pp. [116], [128]). All these considerations are cumulatively almost overwhelming, yet we proceed in disregard of them.
But the 7 experiments with “Bob” were at long distance, and the conditions guaranteed by “Bob” and his wife.
The 7 experiments of July 24–29, 1928, were conducted with the agent in one room and the percipient in another, thirty feet away, with a closed door between. That is to say, Mr. Sinclair, in one room, would call out “All right” when ready to draw, his wife, lying in another room, would call “All right” when she had completed her drawing, and then the two drawings were compared. He declares that there was no possible way by which Mrs. Sinclair could have seen his drawing. So that any charge of fraud would have to include him.
The 9 experiments of February 17, 1929, were thus conducted. The original drawings were made by the agent, Mr. Sinclair, while alone in his study, on green paper, enclosed in a sheet of green paper, the whole folded, making four thicknesses absolutely impervious to sight (as established in the office of the B.S.P.R.), put in an envelope, the envelope sealed, and the 9 envelopes put on a table by the percipient’s couch. She took each in turn and placed it over her solar plexus, kept it there until her decision was made, then sat up and made her drawing. All the while her husband sat near, but absolutely speechless until her drawing was done, when the wrappings were taken from the original drawing and it was immediately compared with the reproduction. If the experiments were at night, the reading light immediately over the percipient’s head was extinguished, since she found that somewhat subdued illumination favored passivity, but there remained sufficient light in the room for comparison of the drawings, and every movement of the woman was distinctly visible. If in the daytime, the window shades back of the couch were lowered, but again every object was distinctly visible. Under precisely these conditions, step by step, no professional magician could have obtained knowledge of the original drawing before making his own.[[25]]
As we have seen, 9 of Professor McDougall’s experiments, later than the period of the book and reaching results defying the doctrine of chance, were made with thirty miles between the parties, and 10 of them with the parties at opposite ends of a long room. Five more were done with McDougall at least watching his sealed envelopes. It will probably not be suggested that he was in a conspiracy to deceive the public, but in these cases fraud could hardly have been practiced by the percipient alone.
Already we have 47 experiments, 16 with an intervening distance of above thirty miles, 7 with agent and percipient in different rooms, and 10 with agent and percipient at the two ends of a room; 14 with agent near the percipient but closely watching her and his sealed opaque envelopes.
But since Mr. Sinclair says that “several score drawings” were drawn in his study, sealed in envelopes made impervious to sight, and watched by him as one by one his wife laid them on her body and set down her impressions, the total number of experiments, guarded to this or a greater extent, aside from the later ones by McDougall, could hardly have fallen short of 120.