Psychokinesis is a pheneomenon that every
paranormal investigator should be aquainted
with since it is usually associated with
poletgeist activity. This feature will go
over some of the evidence supporting PK, and
its connections with poltergeists.
Psychokinesis, or PK, is the ability of the mind to affect matter. It has been proven to exist through many parapsychological tests, such as the dice tests. Some people show signs of great psychokinetic powers, such as the man known as Uri Geller. Uri Geller is a man, who in his younger years was reportedly able to bend metal with his mind. While he was not always able to do this on command, there were many laboratory tests, which had results showing his powers could not be faked. One such experiment had metal coils which were attached to a machine that would register any bending while the test was being conducted. In this particular test, Uri was not actively touching the metal. When Uri began to concentrate upon the metal, the machine registered that it began to bend in the center of the coil before it showed any bending on the surface. While some people (especially magicians and slight of hand artists) accuse Uri Geller of bending spoons with slight of hand tricks instead of his mind, the lab tests speak for themselves.
PK is the modern explanation of many hauntings. Poltergeist activity does not seem to be the actions of a real spirit, but the unconscious work of a human agent through PK. The typical agent of poltergeist activity is an adolescent girl, usually at the beginning of her menstrual cycle, with pre-existing psychological problems, or a great amount of stress; sometimes from apparent sexual repression. This theory is backed up from studies in which the poltergeist activity seems to follow a certain person (the agent) instead of a location as it would in a regular haunting. The activity also seems to cease after a few years. In this time the agent has either matured independently, received professional counseling, or may have relieved the sexual repression that cause the subconscious PK.
One very interesting exhibition of PK that supports the poltergeist theory was the Philip experiment. The “Philip” experiment was an attempt to create an artificial poltergeist through psychokinesis. The experiment began in 1972, and was conducted by the Toronto Society for Psychical Research. None of the group exhibited any sort of psychic ability prior to the experiment. The main goal was to create a collective thoughtform by intense concentration. The success of this experiment would prove that the human mind is capable of creating ghostlike effects, and therefore would validate the theory of poltergeists being nothing more than unconscious psychokinetic forces.
Before the real experiment was to begin, the group created a profile of their artificial ghost. They gave him a fictitious name and history. Philip Aylesford was born in 1624. He joined the military at age 15 and was knighted at age 16. He was a friend of Prince Charles I and fought for the crown in the English Civil War. He was a secret agent for Charles II. His wife uncovered an affair that Philip was having with a gypsy, and had the gypsy burned for witchcraft. Philip committed suicide when he was 30 in 1654.
When the life story of Philip was complete, the group began to have sessions in which they meditated and discussed his life. They visualized him, and attempted to establish some sort of communication with him. These tactics were generally unsuccessful. The most activity that these methods could bring about were a feeling of a presence in the room or an especially vivid mental image of Philip.
After months with little success, the group turned to a new way of establishing communication. They began to conduct their experiment more like a séance than they had been. After a few sessions, this proved to be successful. The group began to ask questions and get a series of knocks for answers. The spirit claimed to be Philip. It could give information about the time period he supposedly lived in, but could only give the information about himself that had been created by the group, and no more. On many occasions, the spirit moved the table around, once even trapping some members in the corner of the room. It would move the table towards latecomers to the group. Philip could even play certain tunes with his series of knocks. The group even tried EVP with Philip, which had mixed results although some questions were answered.
While these phenomenon were relatively easy to bring about, according to the group, their main goal seemed just always out of reach. They could never bring about a full materialization of Philip. Eventually interest in the group waned and it broke up around 1977. The Philip experiment did spawn some other groups which were even more successful in creating thoughtforms, but were still unable to create a materialized apparition.
The results of the Philip experiment are parallel with most poltergeist hauntings, which have various phenomenon, but will only progress to a full materialization after much emotion and fear are caused by the lower level phenomenon. So it seems that concentration is enough to create a low level thoughtform, and when this thoughform begins to cause emotional distress, the stress increases the PK that was used to create the thoughtform in the first place. This could case such an escalation that would explain all the phenomenon in a poltergeist haunting.
