PSYCHO-ENERGETICS

We therefore find it doubly gratifying that his tricks have now been laid bare by a professional conjuror, The Amazing Randi, in a superb little book published in November (The Magic of Uri Geller, Ballantine paperback, $1.75).

"I am a conjuror," writes Randi, "one who gives the impression of performing acts of magic by using deception. And I am proud of my profession. .. In my view, Geller brings disgrace to the craft I practice. Worse than that, he warps the thinking of a young generation of forming minds. And that is unforgivable."

Randi has duplicated every one of Geller's tricks, from bending metal to driving blindfolded in heavy traffic. Except that Randi performs every time; Geller only when the supernatural psychic forces are so disposed (they weren't on the Tonight Show after Randi had told Carson what precautions to take). Randi has also dug up some documents reporting how Geller, years ago, was eyed as a trickster in his country, Israel. Loyal to the ethics of his profession, Randi never reveals how he (Randi) does blindfolded through heavy traffic, but his well documented account leaves no doubt that Geller achieves his effects by chicanery, and poorly executed chicanery at that.

All of which makes highly interesting read, but the book is excellent for other reasons, too. Mr Randi is a very articulate writer with an extraoridinary endowment of common sense, and his book is not only a very effective debunker of Geller's hocus pokus, but of superstition and psychic baloney in general.

And it debunks another myth: that scientists are immune to this type of humbug. The book makes a scientist ashamed of some of his colleagues not only for being taken in by tricks that fool kids at a smalltown fair, but for their despicable snobbery: When Randi offered his services as a consultant in the Geller matter to a scientific journal, he was loftily informed that they did not accept papers from those without academic standing.

Mr Randi has written a highly readable and valuable book. It will be despised by every one "into" the latest Maharaja of Mumbo Jumbo, and we can think of no better compliment.

[Postscript: Science News (12/6/75) has just published a letter by the Physics PhD mentioned in our Sept.74 issue. He retracts his previous testimonial after seeing Randi duplicating every one of the "phenomena" without benefit of psycho-energetics.]