When Paul
McCartney, George Harrison and John Lennon held a séance using an Ouija board
in the early 1960s, they were contacted by the ghost of McCartney's late
mother.
The Beatles Séance
Sir Paul McCartney has recalled how he, Harrison, and
John Lennon held a séance in the early 1960s and admits he was stunned when
they were apparently contacted by the ghost of his late mother.
The trio watched in amazement as an upturned tumbler on
the Ouija board moved beneath their fingertips to spell out a message
congratulating the Fab Four on a recent number one single - but they realized
it was a prank when Harrison burst out laughing.
McCartney tells NME, "We once did a Ouija board
thing when we were kids, it was just me, George... and John, I think... So we
weren't really into all that, but somebody just said, 'Let's do it.'
Says McCartney:
"So we're
touching the glass, you know, saying 'OK, nobody push it, OK?' So then,
suddenly... whoa, it's moving! Now, my mum had died a couple of years before
and it says, 'Congratulations... son...' And we're going, 'NO!'
'Congratulations... son... number one... In NME!' And so we were all, 'Oh, f**k
off! There's no way she would know what NME was'. And there's George, you know
(laughing). He'd been pushing it all the time! Bad boy!"
("NME" is New Musical Express, a UK music
magazine that published a hit singles chart.)
Are Ouija boards
"real" or not?
In February, 1891, the first few advertisements started
appearing in papers: “Ouija, the Wonderful Talking Board,” boomed a Pittsburgh
toy and novelty shop, describing a magical device that answered questions
“about the past, present and future with marvelous accuracy” and promised
“never-failing amusement and recreation for all the classes,” a link “between
the known and unknown, the material and immaterial.” Another advertisement in a
New York newspaper declared it “interesting and mysterious” and testified, “as Proven
at Patent Office before it was allowed. Price, $1.50.”
So many years after the first advertising appeared, and
with the enormous development of the technical progress and education, you may
find a simple explanation that to boards work using the ideomotor effect, where
participants don't realize that they're unconsciously moving the board.
Ouija boards, sometimes referred to as spirit boards,
typically consist of a round board marked with all the letters of the alphabet,
the digits one to nine, and the words “yes” and “no”. Sitters place their
fingers lightly on a specially constructed heart-shaped piece of wood known as
a planchette and proceed to address questions to the spirit world. The
technique also works simply by using letters and numbers written on pieces of
paper and arranged in a circle on a smooth table, along with an upturned wine
glass in place of a planchette.
Amazingly, in response to questions, the planchette (or
wine glass) often appears to move around, pointing to various letters and
numbers to relay the responses back from the spirits. Once again, we are
dealing with an example of the ideomotor effect. Although the illusion that the
pointer is being moved by some outside force is extremely strong, the truth is
that the sitters are actually moving it without realizing it.
So, it is not real? Well, though truth in advertising is
hard to come by, especially in products from the 19th century, the Ouija board
was “interesting and mysterious”; it actually had been “proven” to work at the
Patent Office before its patent was allowed to proceed; and today, there are
still selected psychologists believing that it may offer a link between the
known and the unknown.
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