Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions - James Randi [92]
My personal experience with Thommen a few years later was somewhat less sensational. I had inherited Nebel's interview show when he moved to another station, and Thommen was among my first guests. I took the opportunity ask him for a personal biorhythm chart, and one for my secretary as well. He obliged, and they arrived with our names on the neat covers. Since I'd already investigated this "science" and had read Martin Gardner's discussion of Wilhelm Fliess and his numerology nonsense, I was less interested in how well it worked for me than I was in an experiment I was planning.
Sure enough, several listeners called in asking for information about how to obtain a personal chart. I selected one woman who was willing to cooperate in a test, and who agreed to accept a free chart in return for a report at the end of two months stating how successful the chart seemed to be. She promised to keep a day-by-day diary and to rate the chart for accuracy.
The results were quite interesting. At the end of the two months, she telephoned to tell me that I should take this matter very seriously, since the chart had been "at least ninety percent accurate" in her case. I expressed interest in these results and told her I wanted to check the identification on the folder to be sure that she had received the correct chart. To our "mutual" astonishment, we discovered that she had been sent my chart, not the one intended for her. I blamed the whole thing on my secretary. Actually, I knew very well that she had been given my chart, but I didn't let on, and promised to send her the correct chart to check against her diary. The very next day she called to report that this one was even more accurate, if that was possible! We were thrilled, until we checked further, and I announced that—by mistake, of course—she had received my secretary's chart. There was a short pause, then a snort, and the woman hung up the phone. I could hardly blame her. She had been taken in by after-the-fact rationalization of the data, as have so many thousands who have followed undulating curves and erratic reasoning necessary to make the facts fit this theory. So much for Thommen and his charts.
As for Dr. Wilhelm Fliess and his preoccupation with numbers and cycles, I will leave an analysis of the mathematics of his assertions to mathematicians such as Mr. Gardner. It is interesting that Gittelson fails to mention in his book a curious practice of this nose doctor. Dr. Fliess often administered cocaine, and the marvelous effect it had on his patients made this physician one of the most popular in town. He had discovered that there were "cyclic changes" in the mucous membrane lining the nose, and he related these variations to sexual problems. He also isolated areas inside the nose where he believed "genital cells" abounded, and he stimulated these areas by dabbing cocaine on them. The results were hailed with great enthusiasm by his patients, who returned often for treatment. Fliess prospered. This rather odd medical procedure cannot help but color one's opinion of the worth of the biorhythm theory cofounded by the doctor.
Fortunately, a great deal of careful work has been done recently that provides reliable material upon which to base a decision concerning biorhythm theory. It is buried in scientific periodicals and obscure journals to a large extent, but occasionally it surfaces, as it has several times in The Skeptical Inquirer, the publication of the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal.
Is there any proof that biorhythm actually works? Gittelson, in the "Notes" section of his book, writes, "Biorhythm does not always work, but very few things do." True. The point is, does it work at all, and if so, does it work any better than random charting?
His book provides many answers to this question. Although