CIA-RDP79-00999A000200010084-3

Declassified and Approved For Release 2014/01/09 : CIA-RDP79-00999A000200010084-3
THE TIMES TUESDAY JULY 2 1974
Moscow academics prepare for what looks like an official monopoly of rescarch
Is Russia adopting a party line on parapsychology?
It will come'ns a surprise to
many that there has been wide-
spread interest in the pheno-
niena of psychical research in
Russia, not only in the popular
press but at the highest aca-
demic levels.
In October 1973 there ap-
peared in Questions of Philo-
sophy, an official publication of
the Soviet Academy of Sciences
a iong, careful and very inter-
enting paper by four of Russia's
must . eminent psychologists.
members of the Academy of
Pedagogical Sciences, V. P.
Zinchenko, A. N. Lcontiev, E. F.
Lomov and A. R. Luria called
Parepsychology: Fiction or
Reality, in which the authors
commit themselves to the state-
ment,
" Obviously, some
50-
called paraps; chelogical pheno-
mena do happen ".
Yet when, on March 26, 1974,
the Moscow parapsychologist,
Eduard Naumov, was sentenced .
to two years in a labour camp
because he was alleged to have
misappropriated funds of a club
where he had been lecturing
on parapsychology Dr Andrej
Snezhnevsky. a psychiatrist, was
I called as an expert withers who
testified that parapsychology is
2 pseudo-science based on mys-
ticism and idealism. It is,
of course, difficult to find out
exactly what happened : accord.
ing to friends of Naumov's, the
club's director allowed him to
take some entrance fees for
showing a film on the so-called
Philippine spirit healer, Tony.
Appena, however, the director
was not permitted to speak on
Naumov's behalf in court, hav.
ing; been declared psychologic-
ally unfit to testify by the
authorities.
There has been activity in
the parapsychological field in
the Soviet Union since the carly
1920;, when Academician V. M.
Bethterev toal: an interest in
the subject. Indecd, in 1924,
Ar A. V. Lunakharsky, Commiis-
sar for Education, took the
initiative in farming a Soviet
Committee for Psychical Re-
search, to the International
Committee
for .
Psychical
Research.
la 1022 Dekluerev founded'a
special commission for the
study of mental suggestion
attached to the Institute for
Brain Research at the Univer.
sity of Leningrad. The activities
of the commission included 1
collection
of
spontaneous
phenomena, case historics of
people reporting, for example,
alleged telepathic experiences ;
the psychological and physio-
Jogical" effects of magnetic
fields ; and the effects of dis-
tant or mental suggestion on
subjects under hypnosis.
The scientist in charge of the
hypnotic programme was a
former student of Bekhierev's,
I .. L. Vasiliev, subsequcutly
Professor of Physiology at the
University of Leningrad, who
throughout the 1920s and '50s
conducted a systematic research
project on distant influencing.
Vasiliev had originally wit.
nessed an experimental demon-
stration of apparent telepathic
hypnosis by K. I. Platonov, an
ciniacet Soviet psychiatrist ..
Professor at the University of
Kharkov, later author of an
important work on medical
hypnotherapy, The word as a
physiological and therapeutic
factor.
Vasiliev and his team of
engineers,
doctors, hypnotists
and physiologists set out to test
the theory put forward by Cazza-
maili that telepathic influencing
wis mediated by radio-type.
waves. When the experimenters
found that screening by means.
ofa Faraday cage failed to.
inhibit the telepathetic rapport'
and that consequently, so far,
no channel for the ostensible
non-sensory
communication
could be detected, thic research
ceased. . It is not entirely cicer
just why the research was dis-
continued in the mid-thirties.
Certainly, as Vasiliev wrote,
when he was eventually able to.
publish some of his results in
the carly 1960s, the war inter.
vened (one of his most promis-
ing research students, V. S. - for Brain Research at the Uni-
Stebiin-Kaminsky was killed
during the siege of Leningrad).
On the other hand, there is also
reason to believe that it was
precisely his failure to prove the
existence of a physical channel
that led to the abandonment of
the research.
In
1939
sonie
articles
appeared in the French popular
press alleging that successful
telepathy experiments had been
carried out between the Ameri-
can. atomic submarine and the
shore. thus proving that sercen.
ing which entirely cut out radio
waves did not inhibit telepathy.
It is to be welcomed that Soviet
scientists should wish.
to bring some scientific and
theoretical order and
restraint into the field of
psychical research.
Nor are they the only ones who
deplore a state of
affairs where people with
ostensible paranormal
gifts are publicized before
investigation and publication
in the technical literature
national activity. For example, made a special point of disso.
Dr Stanley Krippner of the!' ciating
Maimonides Dream Laboratory
in Brooklyn delivered'a lecture
on parapsychology at the Iesti-
tute of Psychology, a section of
the Soviet Academy of Pedago-
Fical Sciences in 1971. Krippner
arranged, jointly with Naumov,
to organize an "International
Meeting on the Problem of Bio.
Energy and Related Arcas" in
Moscow, which took place in
July 1972. The conference, as
Krippner wrote, "was
not
' oficialy' sponsored by the
Sovict government, being re.
garded rather as a function of
Naumov's Institute for Tech.
· nical Parapsycholony ".
In the Soviet Union interest
is apt to be focused on possible .
biological and physical part-
meters of so-called paranormal
phenomena. Zinchenko et al
write. for example, thet " the
search for the measurement of
electromagnetic fields
con-
whereas
Zinchenko
et
describe es " in principle sin :..
plistic and incorrect "
the
search for a single basic force
or principle to account for the
phenomena.
tinues. These fields are called
hy
different name: (' bio-
plasma ', 'electregram', 'bin-
potential') . . . fine propress
has been made with instruments
. . . to appraise the functional
state of individuals. For in-
stance, the 'Kirlian effect'
posed in high frequency cur.
rent) was used by parapsychoin-
Fists before it was used by
physiologists
and
pisos": again: "In 1967 an
psycholo.
All-Uman section for Techrical
Parapsychology and Weintra-
scopy was organized within the
.Central Administration of the
Scientific-Technica! Society of
the Instrument Building Tadius.
try. In 1968 and 1971 two'scicu-
' bio-physical effect'. (cf. dow ..
sing) were held under .its
auspices."
Now. it
would
scom that
Schroeder
and
Ostrander's
book gave extreme offence in
Schroeder and Ostrander re-
turned in the United States and
wrote . an international best.
seller. Psychic Discoveries he-
Find the Iron Curtain which, if
not distinguished by accuracy
or restraint, nevertheless fore ..
ibly drew the attention of
Western researchers to a pas-
sionate, if not always critical,
Russia. Zinchenko et al single
it out for disapproval, partly
because of what they feel to be
'ils overtly anti-Soviet attitude,
partly because of its inaccuracy,
partly because of its seasation
alism. At the International Con-
gress of Psychotronics (another
Eastern word for psychical re.
search) in Prague in Jure 1973.
organized by Dr Z. Rejdsk
interest in psychic matters in, under the auspices of the Czech
countries of the Eastern block., Scientific
and
Technical
speakers
themselves
from
Schroeder
.and
Ostrander.
Neither Naumov nor any of his
co-workers, such as Barbara ..
Ivanova or Larissa Vilenskog&
attended.
Russian workers tend to stress
that the main obstacle to prs-
gress in parapsychojegy is the
lack of a suitable physical basis
to explain the phenomena and
to concentrate on the search for
such explanations, whereas i
the Weat the emphasis has on
.the whole been an endeavour to
theis
demonstrate
very
existence, leaviez theoretical co.
planations to tike care of themt.
selves in the !ature. It may
well be that at the presrt
juncture the Russian cinphasi :
is very much perder. 'Krippuer
states that Soviet researchers
are chonly concerned with the
formulating of a unified theory
to deserile the basic eperey
transformations
involvea.
That Soviet scientists should
wish in bring some scientific
restraint imto the field of
psychical research is, of course.
10
he welcomed. Not are
Russian scientists the only one:
who deplore a state of affairs
where people with ostensible
paranormal Affis are promoted
and publicized prior to proper
systematic investigation, and
publication in the technical. .
literature.
The take-over of any field of
amateurs always raises difficult
and painful problems. It would
be trapic if what sinnunts te ast
official pronouncement by the. .
Soviet Academy of Pedagonice!
Sciences, to the effet that the
investigation of psychical phe-
:
nomena is a subject fit for acad.
cmic and scientific : tudy, were
15 herald wholesale legal perse-
-..
cation of all private enthusiasts
and amateurs in Russia. Iadesi
such a move might well be scif.
defeating ; who. in such a poh-
tical climate, is likely to own
up. of draw auction to, so-
called psychic experiences in.
be studied by the official
cxperis ?
Anita Gregory
:
Declassified and Approved For Release 2014/01/09 : CIA-RDP79-00999A000200010084-3
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tific-technical seminars on the study by professionals from
(photography of live risque ex. and theoretical order and
pointed out' to his authorities ' West. It was not, however, until
that be 'and' thus his country 1970 that the full impact of
certainly had priority of dis- Russian parapsychological ac.
covery in this respect, and he tivity came home to the West.
was allowed to publish some of
In 19G8 two young American
journalists. Lynn Schroeder and
Sheila Osterander, visited the
Soviet Union. Their guide and
mentor was Eduard Naumov
who was manifestly helpful and
informative, and assisted them
in contacting a great many
people who might be of assisi-
ance to the two. journalists.
his work. He was also, in 1960,
allowed to set up a research
unit attached to the Institute
versity of Leningrad, and letters
poured in from all parts of
Russia, giving examples of what
Vasiliev's . correspondents be-
Jieved to be psychic experiences.
To the best of my knowledge
Vasiliev published three works ;
a long essay Mysterious Pheno.
mena of the Human Psyche, a
popular bock which has been
translated into French under
the title La suggestion a dis-
tonce and a . scientific mono-
graph translated into English in
1963 - under the title Experi-
ments 'in Mental Suggestion. .
This latter_book was widely