[12]. Of course, there would be theoretical possibility that the four persons involved joined in a conspiracy to deceive, and there would be the same theoretical possibility if four psychologists from the sanctum sanctorum of a laboratory announced similar results.
[13]. The cut does not show that the end is open like a pipe, but it is plainly so in the pencil drawing.
[14]. “A Series” since there was another of the same date at a different hour.
[15]. If it be objected that we are not told exactly what the conditions of the series of February 15th were, though assured that all series were carried out with scrupulous honesty, that is true. But it is also true that the results of this series were not better than some where we do know that the conditions were excellent, and that this series contains no successes of such astounding significance as three in the Sinclair-Irwin Group, when many miles separated the experimenters. I would have been quite willing to have employed for the guessing tests the originals in that group, plus those of February 17th, done under excellently satisfactory conditions. (To be sure, the parties were in the same room, but it will be shown later that, even granting all which the egregious “unconscious whispering” theory claims, it could not account for the results actually obtained.) In fact, the Sinclair-Irwin Group was avoided for the test for the very reason that it is an exceptionally good one. That of February 15th was selected because I wanted a series of a considerable number of experiments, an unbroken one produced at one time, and one which exhibited results of a more nearly average character.
[16]. “A series” because there were other experiments at another hour of the same day.
[17]. The general assumption is that Mrs. Sinclair got her successful results by telepathy. But could Mr. Sinclair remember just in what order his drawings came, so to be thinking of each just when his wife was holding that particular one? Unfortunately he did not record whether he laid them down in the order of their production.
We have judged Experiment 1 to be a failure. And yet it is not fanciful to say that if the drawing of the globe is looked at from its left side there is considerable resemblance between the very incorrectly drawn South America and Isthmus of Panama on the one hand, and the “animal’s” head and neck on the other. If clairvoyance were involved, there would be no necessary guarantee that the drawing would be sensed—to a degree—right side up. Nor do we know how the envelope was held.
[18]. Mr. Sinclair says, “Now why should an obelisk go on a jag, and have little circles at its base? The answer appears to be: it inherited the curves from the previous fish-hook, and the little circles from the next drawing.”
It is psychologically likely that a drawing just before made or even looked at sometimes unfortunately influences a succeeding drawing. The most interesting apparent example of this is Figure 8a made just after Mrs. Sinclair had been looking at the several concentric circles of her last reproduction in the Sinclair-Irwin Group. First she got a whirl of circles, then the whirl assumed the shape of a triangle, then came two angles differently characterized, and finally the angles multiplied and constituted a star duplicating the original. And a careful study makes it impossible to doubt that there were anticipations. Some are too striking to be likely as accidents in the same series, and in some cases Mrs. Sinclair announced ahead that such-and-such an object would be found among the originals, and was right. Indeed, in cases where a set of originals was not viewed by the agent one by one, as the tests were proceeding, but were submitted in a heap together, it is a wonder that as a general rule the correspondences were found in due order, and we are hardly able to explain it. I do not, however, count any feature theoretically left over from the previous drawing as evidential, but only as an interesting glimpse into the mental processes. Neither does Mr. Sinclair, as I understand him. Nor do I reckon any “anticipation” as evidential, unless it was announced in advance, and then only in a reduced degree. And Mr. Sinclair’s principles of estimation were nearly the same. For he says (the italics mine):
“Manifestly, if I grant the right to more than one guess, I am increasing the chances of guesswork, and correspondingly reducing the significance of the totals. What I have done is this: where such cases have occurred, I have called them total failures, except in a few cases, where the description was so detailed and exact as to be overwhelming—as in the case of this ‘Happy Hooligan.’ Even so, I have not called it a complete success, only a partial success. In order to be classified as a complete success, my wife’s drawing must have been made for the particular drawing of mine which she had in her hand at that time; and throughout this account, the reader is to understand that every drawing presented was made in connection with the particular drawing printed alongside it—except in cases where I expressly state otherwise.”