Paranormality: Why we see what isn't there (22 page)

The Machine in the Ghost

Spend any time looking at websites about ghost-hunting or reading books about hauntings and you will soon come across the ‘Stone Tape Theory’. According to its proponents, ghosts are the result of buildings recording and then replaying past events. To put it another way, ghosts don’t just walk through walls but are actually part of them. The idea has emotional appeal but, from a scientific perspective, suffers from three significant problems. First, the idea is quite literally a work of fiction. In December 1972 the BBC broadcast a Christmas ghost story entitled
The Stone Tape
. Written by Nigel Kneale (who also penned the fabulous
Quatermass
) the play centres on a group of scientists investigating an old haunted house. The researchers discover that the stone in one of the rooms is capable of recording past events, and that the alleged ghosts are actually these recordings being replayed. Curious to discover more, the team carry out various experiments and (as is often the way when fictional scientists meddle with the unknown) unwittingly release a malevolent force into the world. The second problem with the theory is that it is completely implausible – as far as we know, there is no way that information about events can be stored in the fabric of a building. And the third and final problem – and from a scientific perspective this is perhaps the biggest stumbling block – is that there is not a shred of evidence to suggest that it is true.
 

Thankfully, other scientists have come up with more plausible ways of explaining things that go bump in the night. In the 1950s Mr G.W. Lambert, the president of the Society for Psychical Research, suggested that the answer lay not in the walls of haunted buildings but rather deep beneath their foundations
⁸⁴
.
 
Lambert speculated that the rise in underground streams following heavy rainfall could induce structural movement in a house that could, in turn, cause doors to creak and objects to move around. Eager to test Lambert’s theory, Cambridge researchers Tony Cornell and Alan Gauld carried out one of the most bizarre, and often overlooked, studies in the history of ghost-hunting
⁸⁵
.
 

BOX

BOO!

Psychical researcher Tony Cornell carried out a great deal of fascinating work into the unknown, but perhaps his strangest series of studies aimed to assess the reliability of eyewitness testimony for ghosts
⁸⁶
.
 
The idea was simple. First, Cornell and his colleagues would dress up as apparitions, stand in various public spaces at night, and attract the attention of passers-by. Next, other members of the research team would interview these eyewitnesses and assess the accuracy of their testimony. However, as is often the case with supernatural science, the studies proved surprisingly difficult to conduct.

In their initial experiment Cornell wrapped himself up in a white sheet and spent several nights walking around a dark park in the centre of Cambridge. Although 80 people were in a position to see the fake spirit, none of them appeared to notice the strange goings-on. Wondering if the disappointing results were due to poor illumination Cornell put the sheet on again and spent several nights walking around a well-lit Cambridge graveyard. 90 cars, 40 cyclists and 12 pedestrians passed by, but only four people appeared to notice the apparition. Of these, two were interviewed, with one saying that he had assumed that the ‘ghost’ was part of an art project and the other remarking that the person under the sheet ‘surely must be mad’. In a final attempt to be spotted, Cornell contacted a local cinema and arranged to re-stage his ghost walk in front of the screen just prior to the showing of an X-rated film (chosen ‘to safeguard against children being present’). The audience were then asked to raise their hands if they had seen something unusual, revealing that a third of the audience had failed to notice the fake spirit. The testimony from those who did spot the figure was often far from accurate, and included a description of a young girl dressed in a summer frock, a woman dressed in a heavy coat, and a polar bear ambling across the screen.
 

Cornell’s findings suggest that if the dead do indeed walk among us they might benefit from wearing a high-visibility vest.

END BOX

Gauld and Cornell found a house that was scheduled for demolition and persuaded the local council to give it to them for the purpose of serious scientific research. The duo started off by cementing a powerful vibrating machine to the wall of the house. Next they slung a long rope around the chimney and attached a heavy weight to the end of the rope. They then ventured inside the house and carefully positioned 13 ‘test’ objects in different rooms, for example, placing a marble on the floor in one room and a teacup and saucer on a shelf in another. Preparations complete, they moved onto the second stage of the experiment.

Gauld positioned himself inside the house and Cornell switched on the giant vibrator. The entire house shook but none of the test objects moved an inch. Cornell then arranged for the heavy weight on the end of the rope to be lifted and slammed into the side of the building. All the test objects remained unmoved by the experience. The following day Gauld and Cornell returned to the house, turned the vibrator up to 11, and finally managed to get the teacup to rotate in the saucer. The dynamic duo then repositioned the vibrator for even greater effect and took up positions in the house for one final test. As a colleague turned the vibrator’s dial to maximum Gauld and Cornell felt the entire house shake. Dirt came crashing down the chimney, slabs of plaster fell from the ceiling, and a large crack emerged in one of the bedroom walls. Subsequently describing their time there as ‘quite our most terrifying experience in pursuit of a poltergeist’, they stood their ground and observed that even under these extreme conditions only a few of the test objects moved (a plastic beaker fell over, the cup and saucer fell off the shelf and a plaster of Paris donkey moved a fraction of an inch away from the wall). After putting their lives on the line in the pursuit of scientific knowledge, Gauld and Cornell concluded that Lambert’s theory simply didn’t hold water.

Lambert is not the only one to suggest that hauntings might be the result of bad vibrations. In my previous book,
Quirkology
, I described another idea put forward by electrical engineer Vic Tandy
⁸⁷
.
 
In 1998, Tandy was working in a laboratory that had a reputation for being haunted. Working alone in the lab late one August night, he started to feel increasingly uncomfortable and had the distinct impression of being watched. As he slowly turned around he saw an indistinct grey figure slowly emerge from the left side of his peripheral vision. With the hair on the back of his neck standing to attention, Tandy eventually built up the courage to look directly at the figure. As he did, it faded away and disappeared.
 

Tandy was a keen fencer and the following day brought his foil into the laboratory for repairs. As he clamped the foil into a vice, it started to vibrate frantically. Although initially baffled, he eventually figured out that the air conditioning unit in the room was producing a low frequency sound wave that fell well below the human hearing threshold. These waves, referred to as ‘infrasound’, vibrate at a frequency of around 17Hz, and are capable of producing weird effects. Tandy speculated that in some allegedly haunted buildings certain naturally occurring phenomena, such as strong winds blowing across an open window or the rumble of nearby traffic, could be creating infrasound and giving people strange experiences that they incorrectly attribute to the presence of spirits.
 

There is some evidence to support Tandy’s idea. For example, in 2000 he reported investigating a fourteenth-century cellar in Coventry that had a reputation for being haunted, and found infrasound in the part of the cellar where many people had reported seeing apparitions
⁸⁸
.
 
As I also noted in
Quirkology
, some additional research has suggested that people do have strange experiences when exposed to low frequency sounds. However, although the theory might explain some alleged ghostly activity, the required combination of strong winds, specifically shaped windows and nearby traffic mean that it is unlikely to account for a large number of hauntings.

Of course, as a scientific explanations for spirits, infrasound is not the only show in town.
 

Waiting for God

Neuropsychologist Michael Persinger, from Laurentian University in Canada, believes that ghostly experiences are caused by the brain malfunctioning and, more controversially, that these sensations can be easily elicited by applying very weak magnetic fields to the outside of the skull
⁸⁹
.
 

In a typical Persinger study participants are led into a laboratory and asked to sit in a comfortable chair. They then have a
helmet
placed on their heads, are blindfolded, and are asked to relax for about 40 minutes. During this time several solenoids hidden in the helmet generate extremely weak magnetic fields around the participant. Sometimes these fields are focused over the right side of the head, at other times they switch to the left and once in a while they circle around the skull. Finally the helmet and blindfold are removed and the participant is asked to complete a questionnaire indicating if they experienced any
strange sensations, such as the sense of a presence, vivid images, odd smells, being sexually aroused or coming face to face with God.
 

After years of experimentation,
Persinger claims that around 80 per cent of participants tick the ‘yes’ box to at least one of these experiences, with some even going for the ‘all of the above’ option.
The study has featured in lots of science documentaries, resulting in several presenters and journalists putting Persinger’s magic helmet on their heads in the hope of meeting their maker. For the most part, they have not been disappointed. Parapsychologist Sue Blackmore felt as if something had got
hold of her leg and
dragged it up the wall, followed by a sudden sense of intense anger (which is exactly how I would feel if someone took my leg and dragged it up a wall).
Scientific American
columnist and sceptic of the paranormal Michael Shermer had an equally strange time under the influence of the helmet, feeling a strange presence rush past him, followed by a sense that he was drifting out of his body. Persinger does not, however, have a 100 per cent track record, with evolutionary biologist and well-known atheist Richard Dawkins feeling very little, followed by a strong sense of disappointment.

Despite the occasional unresponsive atheist, all was going well with Persinger’s theory until a team of Swedish psychologists, lead by Pehr Granqvist from Uppsala University, decided to carry out the same type of experiments
⁹⁰
.
 
It all started well, with some of the Swedes visiting Persinger’s laboratory and even borrowing a portable version of one of his helmets for their own study. However, Granqvist became worried that some of Persinger’s participants may have known what was expected of them and their experiences could therefore have been due to suggestion rather than the subtle magnetic fields. To rule out this possibility in his own work, Granqvist had all of his participants wear Persinger’s borrowed helmet, but ensured that the coils were only turned on for half of the participants. Neither the participants nor the experimenters knew when the magnetic fields were on and when they were off.

The results were remarkable. Granqvist discovered that the magnetic fields had absolutely no effect. Three of his participants reported intense spiritual experiences, but two of these were not being exposed to the magnetic fields at the time. Likewise, 22 people reported more subtle experiences, but 11 of them were in the ‘coils off’ condition. When Granqvist’s work was published in 2004, Persinger argued that the poor showing may have been due, in part, to the participants in the ‘coils on’ condition only being exposed to the magnetic fields for fifteen minutes, or Granqvist running the DOS-based software controlling the coils in Windows and thus possibly altering the nature of the magnetic fields. The Swedish team defended their work and stood by their findings.
 

Worse was to come for Persinger. In 2009, psychologist Chris French and his colleagues from Goldsmiths College in London, and his colleagues, carried out their own investigation into Persinger’s ideas by hiding coils behind the walls of a featureless white room, and then asking people to wander around the room and report any strange sensations
⁹¹
.
 
79 people visited this most scientific of haunted houses for about 50 minutes each. Following in the footsteps of Granqvist, French and his team ensured that the coils were only switched on for half of the visits, and that neither the participants nor experimenters knew whether the coils were on or off. The magnetic fields had absolutely no effect on whether or not people reported a strange experience.
 

Some commentators have noted that we are all subjected to far greater magnetic fields whenever we use a hairdryer or turn on a television set, and so, if the theory worked, we would experience ghosts far more frequently.

The idea of infrasonic ghosts and electromagnetic spirits has caught the imagination of the media and public alike. However, the scientific jury is unconvinced.
 

So has anyone solved the mystery of hauntings? Before we delve deeper, it is time to discover more about the spectre of a rather strange clerical ghost.

The Power of Raman Spectroscopy

A few years ago I conducted an unusual experiment as part of a television series on human behaviour. We assembled 20 unsuspecting volunteers in a room, had them sit in four rows of chairs and explained that we were about to test their sense of smell. They were shown a small perfume bottle containing bright green liquid and we explained that once the lid of the bottle was unscrewed a strong peppermint smell would permeate throughout the room. We then carefully removed the lid and asked people to raise their hands once they could smell the peppermint. Within moments a few people in the front row raised their hands. Seconds later those in the second row followed suit. Before long about half of the group had their hands in the air. When we asked people to describe the smell they said that it was fresh, pleasant and stimulating. There was just one small problem. As you might have guessed by now, the bottle actually contained a mixture of water and odourless dye. The peppermint smell existed solely in the minds of the participants and was designed to demonstrate the power of suggestion.