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| In a paper that is truly a classic of nineteenth-century psychical research, Richet (1884) discussed mental suggestion, which he defined as the “influence that an individual’s thought exerts over a specific sense, without an appreciable exterior phenomenon on our senses, over the thought of a nearby individual” (p. 615). The paper is generally remembered for the introduction of statistical analyses of ESP tests, such as those Richet did with card-guessing. The paper, however, presented other interesting aspects such as noticing the sporadic quality of mental suggestion, the use of targets other than playing cards, and the use of motor automatisms to manifest the faculty. Richet also published in the Revue philosophique de la France et de l’étrangere about observations of trance induced at a distance (Richet, 1886, 1888a), and reported on clairvoyance tests in the Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research (Richet, 1888b, 1889). Regarding his 1889 paper of studies with Léonie, who he once caught trying to cheat, Richet concluded: “We have … consequently, to admit the existence of some faculty entirely unknown to us—lucidity or second-sight—whichever name is applied to it—which is to be met with quite exceptionally in certain subjects, and, even with them, quite irregularly and with no possibility hitherto of determining the conditions of its occurrence.” (p. 83) Richet, C. (1884). La suggestion mentale et le calcul des probabilités. Revue philosophique de la France et de l’étrangere, 18, 609–674. Richet, C. (1886). Un fait de somnambulisme a distance. Revue philosophique de la France et de l’étrangere, 21, 199–200. Richet, C. (1888a). Expériences sur le sommeil a distance. Revue philosophique de la France et de l’étrangere, 25, 435–452. Richet, C. (1888b). Relation de diverses expériences sur la transmission mentales, la lucidité, et autres phénomènes non explicables par les données scientifiques actuelles. Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, 5, 18&150;168. Richet, C. (1889). Further experiments in hypnotic lucidity or clairvoyance. Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, 6, 66–83. |
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