I've said a lot about the evidence for the Enfield levitations in other posts. For an overview, see here. And here's a lengthy discussion of the evidence for the famous December 15, 1977 levitations. Janet Hodgson produced some paranormal results in a scientific experiment conducted in 1982 that was related to levitation. Here's a discussion of that experiment, and here's a lengthy discussion I had with David Robertson (one of the researchers involved) about the experiment and other scientific testing that was done on Janet. You can watch Maurice Grosse discussing the experiment I'm focused on in a 1998 television program here. And there's some photographic evidence for some of the levitations. The post linked above that provides an overview of the levitation issue discusses some of the photographic evidence. Below is a photographic sequence that wasn't mentioned in that post, one that I got from Apple TV's Enfield documentary that came out last year. As Graham Morris explains starting a little after the 30:12 mark in the second part of the documentary, there was one-sixth of a second between the two photos in this sequence:
That's not as good as video evidence, but it's close. (For a discussion of the segment of the documentary featuring Morris' comments, go here and do a Ctrl F search for "30:12". For a discussion of the video evidence for some other Enfield phenomena, see this post. Regarding the common skeptical objection that there isn't more video evidence, start listening here in a 1978 documentary on the Enfield case. The relevant segment is less than three minutes long. You'll hear two professional camera operators, Ron Denney of Pye Business Communications and Graham Morris of the Daily Mirror, commenting on how their camera equipment malfunctioned in extremely unusual ways while they were in the Hodgsons' house and attempting to film the poltergeist's activities. They use the phrases "impossible", "absolutely impossible", and "one chance in a million" to describe the likelihood that these malfunctions would occur by normal means. Their testimony is important for multiple reasons. They're professionals whose jobs involved working with that camera equipment. So, that addresses their competence to assess what's involved and skeptical claims about a need to have professional analysis of such events. Furthermore, the events in question not only provide evidence that something paranormal was going on, but also provide evidence that the entity involved sometimes didn't want to be filmed. The researchers did attempt to film it, though, and were occasionally successful.) For a discussion of the evidential value of some of Morris' other levitation photos, see my overview post mentioned above.
The post here discusses some other levitations. Do a Ctrl F search for "One doctor's" to read about a levitation that occurred while Janet was incapacitated with Valium and, therefore, not in a condition to fake the event. During the course of the Enfield case, a double-digit number of witnesses reported seeing one or more levitations. Do a Ctrl F search for "Edwards" in the post just linked. Read on for a while, and you'll get to a transcript of a discussion between Maurice Grosse and another individual who witnessed some paranormal events, including some levitations. Another subject that comes up in that post and others is audio evidence for these levitations (how tapes of the events corroborate the testimony of the witnesses, a lack of creaking noises from beds and floorboards in circumstances in which those sounds are relevant to fraud, throwing incidents that involved landing with a louder noise than jumping produces, etc.).
I'm just giving several examples here. There's a lot more in the posts linked above and elsewhere. Keep these things in mind when you see skeptics making their typical claims about Enfield and the levitation photos.
To consider the significance of a photo sequence like the one I posted above, let's think of some problems with a potential argument that the second photo isn't depicting a levitation. Let's say somebody brought up the possibility that the camera malfunctioned. So, there was more than the usual one-sixth of a second between the two photos:
ReplyDelete- Cameras usually don't malfunction. You'd have to take the odds against such a malfunction into account.
- The camera would have to not only malfunction, but also malfunction in a particular way that would accommodate faking a levitation (e.g., enough time between each photo to allow Janet to do what was needed for the faking).
- Graham Morris would have to have not noticed the malfunctioning or been dishonest about it. That carries with it all of the problems with whichever of those scenarios the skeptic chooses (Morris' professional experience using such cameras, the evidence for his general trustworthiness, his willingness to express doubt about other Enfield phenomena, etc.).
- The undisturbed condition of most of the bed covers. Under normal circumstances, getting up in a bed you're lying in doesn't just disturb the covers in the area next to the pillow. The covers would be disturbed further down as well. If the critic is going to propose that Janet pulled her legs up toward the pillow before getting up, so as to make it look like she'd been pulled out of the bed near the pillow, that raises the question of why she'd do so. I don't recall ever coming across anything in coverage of paranormal issues (books, articles, etc.) suggesting that it's typical for a poltergeist or any other paranormal source to throw people from beds from the area of the pillow. In fact, I don't recall ever coming across that detail in any other paranormal case. Maybe there are some instances out there, but they're probably highly unusual, if they exist at all. It would be really dubious to suggest that Janet had been studying the paranormal literature (or whatever other source) and noticed that poltergeist throwing incidents should involve exiting the bed near the pillow. And Janet's leaving the bed in the area of the pillow isn't discussed much on the tapes. It doesn't seem that Janet would have thought there was any need to move herself to the area of the pillow before jumping, if she was faking the incidents by jumping. An argument that she was imitating what had happened during an earlier throwing incident would just push the question back a step. Why did that earlier incident involve leaving the bed near the pillow? As I've documented elsewhere, the beds and floorboards in the house creaked a lot, and multiple visitors to the house (including Morris) commented on how you could tell that there was movement upstairs that way. Remember, the camera was remote-controlled, and it could be set off by the person with the remote at any moment. Why would Janet take the time and effort to move her body to the top of the bed before jumping, with all of the noise or potential noise and other risks of getting caught, when leaving the bed from the top rather than further down was so unnecessary?
- Since there are so many photos to explain, not just the two in the sequence posted above, we should consider the cumulative effect involved. This point I'm making involves more than the two photos in the sequence posted above, but those two photos are part of the cumulative sum. Why didn't Janet (or Margaret, etc.) ever get filmed in the process of faking one of these incidents? Given how long it would take to move your legs to the top of the bed before getting up or walk to the top of the bed after getting up further down, get up from the lying position, and do all of the crouching and other motions involved in jumping, why would the photos never show any of that? Under the critic's scenario, there was a lot of movement on the bed, a creaky bed, before the jump, so there would have been a substantial amount of noise before the jump and during it at least a large percentage of the time, if not every time. You could propose that Morris did get some photos of one or more of the children faking things like that, but lied about it. That would have the problems mentioned above regarding his credibility. And he wasn't the only one who filmed these throwing incidents. Maurice Grosse took some levitation photos as well. Was he also lying? You'd also have to dismiss people who witnessed a levitation, not just people who took photos. See the photo at the top of the Psi Encyclopedia article here, for example. It shows Peggy Hodgson looking directly at Janet as she's in the air during one of these episodes, with her bed covers once again being disturbed near the pillow, but not further down. Are we supposed to think Peggy didn't notice Janet jumping from the bed right in front of her or saw Janet jump from the bed, but lied about it or didn't mention it later in any relevant context? Skeptics of anything can always resort to dismissing the relevant witnesses as liars, but that approach costs something. It's not free. You have to address the evidence for the credibility of the witnesses in question and the plausibility of dishonesty under the circumstances in question. And the more witnesses you dismiss as dishonest without significant evidence to that effect, the weaker your view is. These throwing incidents are just a small percentage of all that needs explained in the Enfield case. If there's a large cumulative list of people you have to dismiss as liars after you've gone through all of the relevant events, that's a big problem for your hypothesis.
ReplyDeleteMy points above are in response to the idea that Morris' camera malfunctioned. Not every response to that hypothesis is applicable to every other hypothesis. But some of my points have a wider application. The typical skeptical approach of just saying that Janet jumped from her bed, and leaving it at that, is highly inadequate.
Although the 'Hauntings' programme didn't add a great deal to existing knowledge on Enfield, Jason, it did have some points of interest. Graham Morris speaks of "voice coaches", but my understanding is that there was only one who ever examined Janet - Daphne Pearce. Surprisingly, Melvyn Willin said that he's "not happy with the voice at all", implying that the swearing was indicative of Janet using the voice as a pretext to engage in behaviour she otherwise couldn't have got away with. But Pearce, an expert, declared the voice to be a mystery, so it's interesting why Willin is going against the opinion of an expert. As I think I mentioned previously, it's a shame Pearce can't be approached for a retrospective view. As with Carolyn Heeps, whenever Enfield is revisited in some programme or book, we're left with the assumption that these participants might have been approached, but we just can't be sure. I suppose it's a reasonable assumption though that because they haven't come forward of their own volition, they don't want to become embroiled in the case again.
ReplyDeleteRichard Grosse is always interesting, but I'd dissent from his apparent stance that the discarnate entity of Bill Wilkins was behind the phenomena. As you know, the entity bandied many names about, and Grosse must be aware of this. It was interesting to see Grosse visit the grave of Wilkins but, because the cemetery is in such close proximity to the house and the fact that Wilkins once resided there, skeptics will no doubt continue to seize on those facts as evidence that is why Janet alighted on the name. You have of course discussed these shortcomings at length, such as the fact that the voice often expressed a romantic interest in men.
I do wish these programmes focused on some of the more extraordinary and unexpected aspects of the case though - such as the extraordinary incidents involving Maurice Grosse's doppelganger and John Burcombe's solo visit to the house one night.
Thanks for the information, Anthony. I haven't seen the "Hauntings" program. Every time I've tried to view it, my access has been blocked, because I'm in the United States.
DeleteRegarding the voice's swearing, we need to consider the issue within the framework of the fact that Janet's mental state was tested and found to be within the normal range by multiple professionals on multiple occasions (and not just at the Maudsley Hospital), followed by her going on to live a relatively normal life, as far as we can tell, for a few more decades since then. So, any hypothesis we offer for something like her potential reasons for producing the poltergeist voice in one way or another should take those factors into account.
She (and Margaret) swore sometimes on the tapes, though not often. They were criticized for it on occasion (by their mother, Maurice Grosse, or whoever else), but they don't seem to have gotten any kind of noteworthy punishment for doing it. If Janet had a desire to swear more, she surely could easily have done so in other contexts, when adults or others who would disapprove weren't around, such as with her classmates, friends, or relatives. She wouldn't have to go to all of the trouble involved in faking the poltergeist voice to find an outlet for a desire to swear. There are plenty of adolescents and others who find outlets for swearing without resorting to something like a poltergeist voice.
And the voice swore in other contexts. I've written before about the occasion when it manifested through Peggy Hodgson when she encountered John Burcombe in a store. None of the children were present on that occasion. And the voice swore when manifesting through the other Hodgson children, not just Janet. Did they all have some kind of strong desire to swear more and were using the voice as an opportunity to do it? It seems unlikely that even one of them would have resorted to that. The idea that everybody involved did so is even more unlikely.
The swearing is consistent with what the poltergeist did in other contexts. The writing episodes included swearing. Some of the poltergeist's other non-voice activities were also of a vulgar nature, such as the frequent production of excrement and urine (discussed in the last section of the post here). It was also vulgar in other contexts. The voice's swearing fits well with the character of the poltergeist across a large number and variety of contexts.
One of the issues involved is the persistence of the voice's characteristics. When Ed Warren recorded his Enfield tapes in August of 1979, a few months short of two years after the embodied voice originated, it was still acting as it had before. Given Janet's age at the time, I'd expect her to have matured significantly over those nearly two years of her life. Those years typically involve a significant amount of maturing. If Janet was using the voice to express things, such as swearing, that she wasn't willing to express in other contexts, it would be surprising if that was still going on as late as August of 1979. You'd think she would have moved on by then. As I've said before, I think the poltergeist's persistence over time in such contexts makes more sense if it's an entity independent of Janet (and the other living humans involved).
Even if Janet and/or others were using the voice to swear, that's a distinct issue from whether the voice was paranormal. The poltergeist could be a paranormal manifestation of Janet's mind, consciously or subconsciously, or something produced by another entity making use of her mind in some way. Or it could be some sort of hybrid involving multiple sources. So, saying that she was using the voice to swear doesn't resolve the question of whether the voice was paranormal.
DeleteConcerning Morris' comment about voice coaches, he may have some significant information from one or more of his Daily Mirror colleagues. Several people on the Daily Mirror team covered the Enfield case or were associated with it in some other way. At the March 29, 1978 SPR symposium where Grosse and Playfair gave a presentation on the Enfield case, Grosse used the plural to refer to relevant professionals who were consulted:
"I am getting a little tired now of people saying to me that 'this is happening' and 'that's happening', the girls are doing it [producing the voice by a normal means]. I have continually challenged everybody to tell me how this girl does it if she does do it deliberately. And nobody - nobody - has been able to come up with an answer: speech therapists, phonetic experts, and doctors, psychiatrists, and psychologists. You name them, I've asked them." (tape 38B in Playfair's collection, 53:10)
Playfair adds that a science editor of the Daily Mirror wasn't able to explain the voice either (53:35). So, it's plausible that one or more individuals in Morris' circles at the Daily Mirror passed on some relevant information to him. Or he may have gotten it from Grosse or Playfair. Even if Pearce was the only professional with relevant credentials who examined the voice firsthand, Morris may have had some broader category in mind, not just the sort of firsthand work done by a professional that we have with Pearce. Or maybe Morris was misinformed, misremembered, or misspoke.
Concerning Heeps, Playfair refers to her as if she's still active as a police officer in a 2011 interview, something he probably wouldn't have said if he hadn't recently heard from her or had some other relevant evidence of her career status. So, he may have had contact information for her. But Melvyn said, in his Enfield book, that he couldn't find current contact information for Heeps. If Playfair had contact information for her, Melvyn apparently didn't get it or found it to be out of date. Elsewhere in the 2011 interview, Playfair refers to how much opposition Heeps got from her colleagues because of what she said about what she'd witnessed. That could be a factor in her lack of participation in documentaries and such in recent years.
A good point about the profanity, Jason. The girls didn't need to fake a poltergeist in order to swear, contrary to Chris French's belief. And incidents like the one where Peggy swore at John Burcome barely get any attention at all. I can’t recall once reading about that incident in any of the Enfield literature.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your comments too about Janet. Any typical teenager, who was indeed faking paranormal phenomena, would likely soon grow tired of the charade. Yet the voice was still expressing itself a whole two years after making its first appearance. Do we have a rough idea of its final communication?
The poltergeist's persistence itself is baffling, particularly the notion that it was still to some extent active right up until Peggy's death some 20 years ago. If it was - or is - even semi-sentient, it raises the question of why a deceased person or even non-human intelligence would wish to occupy such a place and situation for so long. I would also venture that if it really was causing footsteps to be heard and doors to be closed, that it was not likely to be a manifestation of Janet's mind, since presumably it would have needed Janet to be present in order to do these things. Then again, the incident involving loud banging late at night which disturbed the Nottinghams shows that it didn't need any family member to be present, even at the height of the phenomena. To confuse matters, though, the entity clearly did have some specially close connection to Janet.
As for the nature and qualities of the voice, I've never quite understood why some people dismissed it outright. I can understand why people like Morris occasionally found it unconvincing or outlandish, but the way that the voice speaks at length while it allegedly recounts the death of Bill Wilkins is very strange indeed and very uncharacteristic of a young girl to say the least.
There are other interesting aspects to the voice which you may have alluded to previously. Re-reading Colin Wilson's book on the poltergeist phenomenon, I see that he notes: "The voice had an odd quality, as if electronically produced. (I have one of Playfair’s tape recordings of the voice, and it reminds me strongly of a record I have of an electronic brain singing a song)”.
When Wilson says that the voice had an odd quality, as if electronically produced, I was immediately put in mind of the segment on the tape in which the voice eventually musters the ability to enunciate Maurice Grosse’s forename. I have wondered to what extent the tape recorder might have affected that sound quality or if it would have sounded equally robotic and electronic in real-time to Maurice Grosse.
I’m not entirely sure what Wilson means by an “electronic brain”, however. He could be referring to early computers or devices that produce sounds or synthetic speech. But in the Enfield context, it could perhaps lend support to my own view of the phenomenon as a non-human entity, attempting to mimic human speech and control Janet’s vocal apparatus. Or was the entity manipulating electromagnetic energy to generate sound? There are also its first faltering, rudimentary sounds, such as the barks and whistles, suggesting a phenomenon that was gradually building up to being able to enunciate speech. Do we know how long it took the voice to graduate from the rudimentary sounds to being able to articulate full sentences? It could be that this non-human entity was learning to control energy more precisely – initially creating crude sound bursts and then fine-tuning this energy to simulate human phonetics.
As far as I know, Ed Warren's tapes from his August 1979 visit to the Hodgsons' house is the last context in which the voice was taped. It's been years since I listened to Warren's tapes, but I don't recall any significant difference between the nature of the voice on his tapes and the nature of it earlier. I think the next record we have of the voice, without any recordings, is from the 2000s. Margaret Hodgson reported that she and Janet heard the voice when they went to the house after their mother's death, presumably in 2003. For more about that, see here. When the Bennetts moved into the house shortly after that, one of the phenomena they reported was hearing indistinct voices in a different part of the house than where they were at the time. Peggy Hodgson had reported the same kind of experience.
DeleteThe voice varied a lot, much more than sources like Playfair's book and documentaries suggest. It sometimes manifested as a female, sounded like Maurice Grosse, etc. Colin Wilson is right that it sometimes had an electronic quality to it, but only sometimes. There were occasions when it would sound weak, would break up or temporarily become high-pitched, etc. Whatever the source behind the poltergeist, human bodies were often being used to manifest the voice, so we should expect bodily limitations, weaknesses, and such to affect it to some extent.
The incident you referred to when the voice was asked to enunciate Grosse's name happened on December 10, 1977, the night when the embodied voice originated. It had an unusual quality that night, different than what followed. I have a section on that subject in my article on the voice, the section titled "The Initial Characteristics Of The Embodied Voice". The voice that night comes across as something you wouldn't be able to fake without practicing it a lot, but the witnesses involved agree that the voice wasn't requested until that night. It's unlikely that Janet would have been practicing faking something nobody had been asking for, that Grosse then asked for it, and that she either came up with the idea of making the voice sound like it was improving over time or the timing of Grosse's request for the voice just happened to line up with the natural course of Janet becoming better at faking it. The manner in which the embodied voice originated makes a lot more sense if it was paranormal than if it wasn't.
Concerning how the voice developed over time, keep in mind that there was a disembodied voice from early on in the case. The reason Janet and Johnny were in the same bedroom at the start of the case, instead of the two girls and the two boys being together, was because Billy was frightened by hearing his name being called, which Peggy assumed Johnny was doing. That's why she started putting them in separate bedrooms. But I doubt that Billy would have been so frightened by his brother calling his name, and multiple people later reported hearing the poltergeist calling Billy's name on at least a few occasions, so I suspect those incidents in August of 1977 came from the poltergeist. In that sense, the voice was there from the start. My impression is that it could communicate clearly in a disembodied manner as far back as we have evidence for a disembodied voice, whereas the embodied manifestation was something the poltergeist initially had more difficulty doing.
Here's Maurice Grosse, commenting on the levitation photos in a 1996 television program, saying that Janet is shown "going from horizontal to vertical in a sixth of a second".
ReplyDelete