Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions - James Randi [78]
The group of scientists at SRI who worked on the tests with Targ and Puthoff objected to their use of the words "totally unambiguous" and "scrupulous" when referring to their experimental procedures. They were anything but that. Targ, told by Leon Otis that his reports were misleading, never responded to the comments. Otis concluded that Targ was willing to present unsubstantiated results to the SRI clients and feared that the scandal resulting from an exposure of such procedures could jeopardize the position of SRI as a research organization. He had underestimated the stubbornness of SRI's administration, which to this day has never publicly admitted Targ and Puthoff's manipulations of fact and of scientific method.
Hundreds of experiments that were done by SRI in testing Price, Geller, and Swann were never reported. Instead, tests with favorable results were selected, in spite of their poor control and heavily biased ambiguity, to be published as genuine scientific results despite strenuous objections from more serious and careful scientists. And it was all given the blessing of the SRI administration. After all, it brought in funding.
In all the real work on Geller at SRI, the only data ever gathered proved that (1) Geller could not perform as claimed, and (2) when they gave him the chance to use trickery, observers were convinced that he did just that, and he was successful. All the other tests lacked proper controls and were useless. When scientists within SRI issued strong statements about this situation and other aspects of experiments done by Targ and Puthoff, the two were quick to cover their tracks with further word games. A statement was issued that included a typical doubletalk term, "non-experiment." This apparently meant an experiment that is not under control but is good enough to report anyway.
Shortly after my book The Magic of Uri Geller appeared and helped to force the retreat of that psychic superstar, Drs. Targ and Puthoff issued a "fact sheet" in rebuttal to twenty-four of the points made in my book. This attempt was a failure, and in response to one claim that the SRI tests were done under tight controls, a scientist who was there declared flatly, "This is b.s. As far as I and my colleagues are concerned, none of the experiments met accepted scientific protocol." I will not burden you with the other twenty-three points; they are as easily demolished.
However, I must disagree with a member of the press, who described Dr. Russell Targ as "not very smart" after seeing the film that both SRI scientists had prepared to prove the wonders of parapsychology. People can change, even parapsychologists. Now Targ lets Puthoff make all the mistakes by allowing him to answer all the questions.
Targ and Puthoff prepared that highly deceptive film for SRI, advertising their efforts. It was criticized by others on the staff, and the two issued a masterpiece of evasion and license in reply. They appended to it—without his knowledge or permission—the name of Zev Pressman, the SRI photographer who had shot the film. Some of the objections that had been raised were based on Pressman's revelations about his involvement in it.
In the film, Geller was shown doing a trick wherein a die was enclosed in a box and shaken about, after which Geller identified the uppermost face on the die eight times in a row. At no time did Geller touch the box, said Targ. Actually, Geller not only shook the box (Targ later reported that he was like a child who liked to rattle things!) but also held it while concentrating and was even reported to have been the one to open it! Pressman, said Targ and Puthoff in their statement, was present during these experiments. Not so, according to Pressman, who said he had been present during a few correct throws made in other experiments, on other days—thus also contradicting Targ and Puthoff's claim that there were no other die