Is it true to say that psychics always under-perform once under laboratory conditions?
"It's true to say that there always have been and always will be phonies and charlatans claiming psychic powers either for profit or for notoriety.
But it's wrong to say that every psychic has been exposed as fraudulent. Quite apart from famous names like Uri Geller, there are dozens of individuals all over the world who have repeatedly performed paranormal feats in controlled conditions.
In England there are Nicholas Williams, Stephen North, Julie Knowles and a number of juveniles who remain anonymous such as Andrew G. In France there is Jean-Pierre Girard. In Japan there is Masuaki Kiyota and in Russia there are numerous individuals, the best known of which is Nina Kulagina.
Working with English metal benders, John Hasted, professor of experimental physics at Birkbeck College, University of London, has devised extensive methods of guarding against conscious or unconscious fraud. He has for example implanted microscopic strain gauges in metal specimens linked electrically to a chart recorder to provide a record of the forces imposed on the specimen. He has recorded many instances of stresses being registered simultaneously from three or more gauges, and extensive deformation of the specimen, under circumstances that rule out fraud. In one famous case, a large piece of aluminium was twisted out of shape by Andrew G., a 12-year old boy, from a distance of 30 feet.
Doctors Charles Crussard and Jean Bouvaist in France have recorded metal bending by Jean-Pierre Girard in glass tubes that have been completely sealed under conditions that have been examined by Hasted and others. Working under the auspices of a French commercial metals company, the investigators have gone to enormous lengths to ensure the effects they are examining were produced paranormally and not by normal methods.
For example each metal sample was hallmarked so it could not be substituted, and all its dimensions measured accurately before and after bending. The hardness of the metal was tested before and after and the crystalline structure of the metal examined by taking 'residual strain profiles'. The structure was also examined under the electron microscope and micro photographs taken. In addition the chemical composition of the metal was examined before and after.
These observations revealed a number of structural anomalies such as a local hardening of the kind produced by compression forces of many tons, but apparently originating internally.
Hasted has adopted similar rigorous precautions to rule out fraud. For example he and the French researchers have been able to get subjects to bend metal rods that it is beyond the strength of any normal person to bend. Crussard has videotaped Jean-Pierre Girard bending a metal rod by gently stroking it, yet producing a bend that requires some three times the strength of a normal person.
Hasted has also reported the phenomenon of a metal-bender turning part of a spoon 'as soft as chewing gum' merely by stroking but under closely controlled conditions that enabled the plastic deformation to be verified by Hasted himself and where the chemical composition and weight of the spoon was examined before and after. It is possible to soften a metal spoon chemically but only by causing a corrosion that would leave a number of alteration such as weight loss, and no such changes were detected.
The usual response to such experiments is "How come scientists have discounted them? They must have been frauds musn't they?"
What has tended to happen in the past two decades, especially since CSICOP has been on the case, is that if anyone claiming psychic powers shows any signs of gaining scientific credibility, then a concerted attempt is made to ridicule and publicly debunk that person, showing how he or she "could have" faked their results. These "explanations" are usually preposterously contorted exercises but as long as the mud sticks they serve their purpose. Thereafter the "skeptics" can always claim "so and so was caught cheating and exposed long ago".
No-one ever bothers to check the real facts and most people dimly recall the public notoriety that the "skeptics" achieved simply by making accusations of fraud. "
http://www.alternativescience.com/paranormal-phonies.htm