MASS TELEPATHY TEST.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XLVIII, Issue 86, 13 April 1927, Page 1 (Supplement)

MASS TELEPATHY TEST.

LODGE’S EXPERIMENT

AN ABfflY OF LISTENERS-IN. Most wireless listeners —at least those who sit up later than 11 o’clock —took part in the experiment in mass telepathy a few nights ago. Locked in a room in Tavistock Square, London, were Dr. Y. J. Woolley, secretary of the Psychical Research Society, and five other men and Women whose names wore not divulged. The telephone in the room had been disconnected; the window’ fixed so that it could not be opened. They had no means of communication with the outside world.

In deep armchairs round a large writing table the six people concentrated their eyes and minds on five objects produced separately by Dr. Woolley at five-minute intervals. In the meantime Sir Oliver Lodge, at the head office of the British Broadcasting Compan)*, spoke to the world at large, explained the experiment, and announced the exact time Dr. Woolley and his colleagues concentrated on the various objects. One of the listeners-in, after relating what took place, says: —“We posted our answers early next morning, and all through the night the six members of the Psychical Research Society kept their lonely vigil. They were locked up somewhere in Bloomsbury until o’clock next morning, so that answers could be posted before there was any possibility of any of them repealing the secrets. The most vivid impression left on the mind after this mass experiment was of the heavily-weighted postman and the sacks of letters which would find their way to those Tavistock rooms before 48 hours had gone by.”

Ten thousand letters reached the society by noon on the day after the experiment. Half an hour later four postmen appeared on the scene with sacks crammed with more letters, and hardly had these been deposited in the hall when the General Post Office rang to ask what should be done with the thousands of additional letters that were hourly pouring in from town and country. , .

The objects selected for the experiment were revealed in the newspapers later. The first object was a playing card—the two of clubs in green on a black background. The second was a Japanese print, depicting a skull and two birds with some green grass id the foreground. The third was three sprays of lilac held out in a hand. The fourth was another playing card—the nine of hearts in Ted on a black background. The last was an effort to produce an impression of Ihe comical. Dr. Woolley wore a grotesque mask with a bowler bat on his h-ead!

The last effort, which surely would have presented the most difficult ask for thought-readers, appears to have had more success. Dr. Woolley said: “A number of members of the society have been trying to sort out the letters throughout the day. I have been able only to throw a cursory glance over these letters, but I arti told that at least one person gave a full description of me wearing my mask and my bowler hat!”