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| title | chunk | source | category | tags | date_saved | instance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Project Alpha (hoax) | 3/3 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Alpha_(hoax) | reference | science, encyclopedia | 2026-05-05T09:30:56.533475+00:00 | kb-cron |
Phillips decided to release a research brief at a workshop of the Parapsychological Association Convention in August 1981. According to the researchers' official version, in preparation Phillips also wrote to Randi to ask for a tape of fake metal-bending, which was to be shown alongside the recording of Shaw and Edwards. The researchers were looking for critical input from the parapsychology community and afterward released a revised abstract that reflected the received criticism. After the Project Alpha announcements in the press, Randi wrote to the lab again and stated that it was entirely possible the two were magicians using common sleight of hand to fool the researchers. He also started to leak stories that the two were his plants. The story had been widely circulated by the time the meeting was held the next month. Upon returning from the meeting, Phillips immediately changed the test protocols; Shaw and Edwards found that they were no longer able to fool the experimenters so easily, and in most cases, unable to fool them at all. During this time the lab started releasing additional reports that seriously toned down the success rate. In their own words, "We did not conclude that they must be frauds, but only that after extensive testing, they were not behaving nearly as psychically as they had led us to expect." According to Marcello Truzzi, Berthold E. Schwarz was the "chief victim of Project Alpha". Schwarz had written a monograph on Shaw's psychic powers which was withdrawn from publication. Truzzi adds "Dr. Schwarz first became involved with Shaw because Schwarz hoped that Shaw might be able to use PK to help his seriously ill daughter for whom no orthodox medical cure is available." Shaw states that he was unaware of this agenda of Dr. Schwarz.
== Ending == In 1983, Randi decided to end the project and announced the entire affair in a press conference and to Discover magazine. At the press conference, Randi introduced the two subjects as psychics, and asked how they achieved their results to which Michael Edwards replied, "To be quite honest, we cheat." Martin Gardner referred to the hoax as a landmark. To counter accusations of unethical conduct on Randi's part, Gardner cites another similar case, that of the "discovery" of N-rays. Loyd Auerbach, noting the less than forty-eight hour notice given to the laboratory of Randi's press conference and the fact that Phillips was not invited to attend it, questioned whether Randi's motives were those of scientific research or showmanship. An internal memo of the United States Central Intelligence Agency accused Randi of "gross distortions". The memo was written "in anticipation of ... discussions with representatives of Congress" regarding CIA research into paranormal abilities, which was contracted to SRI International, and said "This recent adverse publicity to the field of parapsychology should not have any adverse impact on the GRILL FLAME Project". James S. McDonnell, who had provided the money to open the MacLab in 1979, died in on August 22, 1980. In 1985, with no funding forthcoming, the MacLab closed its doors. Randi viewed Project Alpha as "a great success" that "has resulted in some parapsychologists being more careful about their conclusions".
== Historiography == In a 2023 series of their podcast World's Greatest Con, Brian Brushwood and Justin Robert Young, incorporating their interviews with those involved in Project Alpha including Shaw and Edwards, made a case that Shaw and Edwards were the ones who led the effort and Randi's involvement has been greatly exaggerated in service of a simpler narrative easy for the masses to understand.
== See also == Debunker Extrasensory perception List of scientific skeptics
== References ==
== External links == Project Alpha at Skeptic's Dictionary Project Alpha hoax Archived 2018-08-04 at the Wayback Machine at the website of Banachek. An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds, and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural Project Alpha Introduction Collection of papers at the website of the Australian Institute of Parapsychological Research.'