ABOUT TELEPATHY

Evening Star, Issue 15075, 6 January 1913, Page 1

ABOUT TELEPATHY

WHAT SIR 0. LODGE SAYS. In tho ‘ Science Quarterly ’ Sir Oliver Lodge says some interesting things about telepathy. He explains “why wo regard telepathy as philosophically important, if real. The fundamental issue is whether consciousness, apart from brains, has any meaning. Brain, nervous system, and muscle, in combination, obviously constitute tho instrument by which mind manifests itself hero and now ; and in the absence of its customary living brain, normal manifestation admittedly ceases. In the absence of all brain and nerve, probably not even super-normal psychic manifestations can occur. But it by no means follows that consciousness and memory coast' to exist. A genuine agnostic should grant the possibility, but should go tm to ask how on earth we are going to establish, their existence, in that case. And we should reply that telepathy appears to he a. non-physical process of communication between minds, not as usual between brains—though we refrain from dogmatising on so difficult and momentous a proposition—and that it tends to suggest a doctrine intolerable to materialistic philosophy. —Unusual Phenomena.—

“ I realise- that physical phenovnon: of an unusual and super-normal kim do occur in the neighborhood of curtail persons, without my being able to osplain how they occur. All that 1 ea; testify to is that somorhing more i involved than is recognised in the pm scut state of orthodox science. J au hound to add, however, that my per. soual view concerning the reality ol sonic abnormal physical phenomena is not shared by many of the leaders in the Society for Psvchical Jlescarch. who still remain sceptical of everything of this kind, though they have boon fomed by long-continued evidence to a belief in the truth of telepathy. Without mentioning the names of the living. I can say that the late Air Podmore. belonged conspicuously to this category. 1 do hold that our records ought to establish n prima facie case for investigation : and J think that by far the greater part of the evidonco which we have actually published—especially the evidence for telepathy—ought to ho received with reasonable respect. I am safe in saying that Professor Sidgwick, proverbially cautious as he was. was certainly convinced of the truth of telepathy—i.e.. of 1!m facts which have necessitated that hypothesis as the minimum which must he granted to explain them.”

—A Scientist's Confession.— Alr .). Arthur Hill, in ‘Bedrock,’ says;—'‘.Modern science is based on observation and experiment. The experts observe, experiment, and infer; tile man in the street rends the experts’ accounts, and believes—if lie does behove—on authority. Most men in the street believe in X-rays; most men in the street disbelieved that the earth revolved round tile sun in tho days of Galileo_ and Copernicus. In each ca-so the opinion of such men is valueless; they ha ve made no first-hand observation or experiment ; they arc not scientific. I am not biased in favor of a future life ’ —more accurately, survival of personality. I do not want any future life. I contemplate with something approaching dread and dismay the possibility that my personality will go on existing and suffering after death, f should greatly prefer extinction ; and it is extinction that I hope, and long for. If I have been driven by sheer force of evidence to believe that personal survival is a fact. I can honestly say that it has been against my will. I had and have a strong ‘ will to disbelieve ’ ; hot facts are facts, and some of the facts of my experience and that of my intimate friends are in my opinion most rationally interpreted by the provisional hypothesis (I will not be driven further, even by facts) of discs mate minds still active and able to communicate. This forced conclusion, tentative though it is. 1 repeat is profoundly distasteful to me.”