Uri Geller - What do you think?

[Laird]

I'm really tired of the claim - counter-claim in this thread. I think it comes down to this: Puthoff and Targ and their team were serious, qualified researchers - quite obviously they would have been very aware of the possibility of sensory leakage and taken every necessary step to prevent it.

Only "skeptics" would believe this team could have made fundamental errors like allowing Uri to peer through holes.

I'll quote from the Scott Rogo chapter excerpt that Chris shared earlier (emphasis mine):

Randi opts for the fraud theory, and he even thinks he knows how Geller carried out the shenanigans. He offers his readers a diagram of the booth and adjoining room where the tests were held. This diagram shows that a four-and-a-half inch hole (used to extend cables in and out of the booth) is situated in the booth three feet above the floor. Randi claims that Geller merely peeked through this hole for at least two of the drawing tests, and either saw the targets or was signalled by a confederate located in the adjoining room. While the magician points out that the hole is usually kept stuffed with gauze, he believes that Geller simply withdrew the material while carrying out his secret observations.

This all sounds reasonable enough until you check out the booth, which I was able to do when I visited SRI on 12 June 1981. I found, first, that the hole is not four-and-a-half inches wide at all. It is three and-a-quarter inches and extends through a twelve-and-a-half inch wall. This scopes your vision and severely limits what you can see through it. The hole is not left open either, since it is covered by a plate through which cables are routinely run. Dr Puthoff and his colleague were however, concerned that their subject might be ingenious enough to insert an optical probe through this hole so they monitored the opening throughout their telepathy experiments. But the most embarrassing error Randi makes concerns the position of the hole. It isn’t three feet above the floor but is located only a little above floor level. The only thing you can see through it – even under optimal conditions – is a small bit of exterior floor and opposing wall. (The viewing radius is only about 20°, and the targets for the Geller experiments were hung on a different wall completely.) I also discovered during my trip to SRI that an equipment rack was situated in front of the hole throughout the Geller work, which obstructed any view through it even further. I ended my little investigation by talking with two people who were present during these critical experiments. They both agreed that wires were running through the hole – therefore totally blocking it – during the time of the Geller experiments.

I have no doubt that the claims which Linda references are at the same level of fantasy.

Unless something very compelling comes up, I'm probably done debating in this thread.