I used to go to a Spiritualist church that had banned table tipping. They used to have sessions once in a while but the last time before the ban a member of the church brought along a friend from the Caribbean who was into voodoo and during the table tipping session in full light he went into a trance and started giving off ectoplasm which freaked some people out - so they banned table tipping. I wasn't there when it happened but I heard the story from someone who was there and whom I know to be of reliable character.
In the articles thread, K9 posted a 2017 paper by Gimeno & Burgo about a study done at a PK laboratory in Buenos Aires. It lists several videos. This is one of them.
Gimeno's channel where you can find the rest:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiEGlDE...ye-dPlz2Wg
This was an old style meeting as is customary at the New Spiritualists' Society set up to uphold the old values and practices of Spiritualism in this new age. After a service with mental mediumship prayer and a healing session, Rev Cathy Gibb becomes entranced and a table moves in answer to questions.
(2017-08-20, 06:37 PM)Max_B Wrote: [ -> ]I soothed myself somewhat, by accepting that the table was really just a very large Ouija board puck being moved over the floor, rather than over a Ouija board. But still felt a little freaked out, seeing apparently normal adults engaging in this sort of behavior.
As we kids get older and bigger, the ouija board must adjust in size.
(2017-08-20, 03:50 AM)Ninshub Wrote: [ -> ]This was an old style meeting as is customary at the New Spiritualists' Society set up to uphold the old values and practices of Spiritualism in this new age. After a service with mental mediumship prayer and a healing session, Rev Cathy Gibb becomes entranced and a table moves in answer to questions.
"medium Cathy Gibb proves life after death by table turning"
That title has some involuntary Python-esque humor in it....
"philosoper Bill Smith proves free will by dish washing"
But other than that cool video.
I've seen a very similar thing done over here by a rather famous sensitive. He gathered a group of people, they started joking singing creating a very upbeat atomsphere and things (tables, chairs) started moving around.
In that case the claim was PK, rather than spirit intervention. I think it's pretty hard to distinguish among the two.
I'll see if I can find the video(s).
This is pretty old. I think it was the early 70s
The guy is Luciano Muti, pretty well known in Italy for his PK experiments.
This is a rather famous demonstration he's done in public several times, where he fights a group of people keeping the table down while he tries to make it tilt to the opposite side.
Video is pretty old unfortunately.
cheers
This is the same guy in another experiment, similar to the one I was talking about.
There are five sensitives with Muti around the table and two researchers. One is a parapsychologist and the other is a doctor.
During the experiment the latter is measuring Muti's EEG and comments on it later in the video. The whole thing is pretty long and they all speak Italian.
At around 5':00" the parapsychologists comments on the phenomenon. He talks about his inspection of the table, the weigth, the possibility for "normal" explanations of the movement or how it could be faked concluding that the motion of the chair and table seemed anomalous at least in certain points of the experiment.
Then they spend some time talking about how the experiment feels, for the participants. They agree that when all hands are in contact with the table there's a certain amount of palpable "electricity" going through it.
Finally the doctor comments on the EEG saying that there's a sharp difference when Muti is talking and when he's concentrating on the experiment. In the former state the EEG reading looks like expected but during the PK phases there's an off the chart delta state, around 2Hz. Specifically he says that the instrument can measure up to 400 microvolts but the reading is off the scale, this in turn indicates a strong coherence of all neurons.
He also notes that it seems anomalous to see such high delta synchronization while Muti has his eyes open and is either speaking or singing during the experiment.
Finally the doc says that when Muti concentrates on moving the chair, rather than the table, the EEG shows high alpha synchronization. Here Muti comments on the fact that he needs visual contact with the chair to establish "a connection", while for the table he doesn't as he's resting his hands on it.
That's pretty much the gist of the discussion in the video.
cheers
(2017-08-23, 08:55 AM)Max_B Wrote: [ -> ]Do you believe there is some anomalous phenomena going on here?
No idea. The experiment was pretty informal. There may be something interesting going on but I don't have sufficient elements to come to any conclusions. I find the movement of the lady on the chair pretty strange. Her feet don't touch the floor and her posture doesn't suggest any effort in her arms and hands, suggesting she's not pushing or pulling.
There could be fraud going on: the chair might have been modified so that it takes little effort to be pushed around (by reducing its friction somehow). Then again why inviting scientists to check the room, the table, the chair etc...? It would have been spotted immediately.
Right now I am sitting on an office chair with 5 wheels and in front of a table. I can put both hands on the table, rest my feet on the chair's legs and try to push myself back and forth like in the video, but it's not that easy. I have to plant my palms very firmly on the table and I must use the strength in my arms and shoulders to move. Even with a slippery floor the motion is not very smooth and my hands and arms look tense.
I would need a way to reduce the effort by 50% at least to make it less obvious that I am pushing and pulling. Especially the pulling back towards the table is very obvious.
The correlation between anomalous EEG activity and the table/chair movement seems to corroborate the comments of the parapsychologist who admits there might be something anomalous going on.
I've seen the "table fight" experiment done in multiple occasions (see b/w video posted earlier) and it looks even more difficult to fake. I can't exclude fraud there too but on every instance they invited an expert to check the setup and the environment, before proceeding.
Generally speaking Muti has always been very open to all sort of instrumental tests and verifications of his feats. He was actually the one who was pestering physicists, parapsychologists and the like to participate to his demonstrations and find ways to document the reality of the phenomena. As far as I know he's never been caught cheating in those demos.