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JOURNAL OF SCIENTIFIC EXPLORATION A Publication of the Society for Scientifi c Exploration (ISSN 0892-3310) Editorial Offi ce: Journal of Scientifi c Exploration, Society for Scientifi c Exploration, Kathleen E. Erickson, JSE Managing Editor, 151 Petaluma Blvd. So., #301, Petaluma, CA 94952 USA [email protected], 1-415-435-1604, (fax 1-707-559-5030) Manuscript Submission: Submit manuscripts online at http://journalofscientifi cexploration.org/ index.php/jse/login Editor-in-Chief: Stephen E. Braude, University of Maryland Baltimore County Book Review Editor: P. D. Moncrief ([email protected]) Managing Editor: Kathleen E. Erickson, Petaluma, CA Assistant Managing Editor and Copyeditor: Eve E. Blasband, Larkspur, CA Assistant Managing Editor and Proofreader: Elissa Hoeger, Princeton, NJ Associate Editors Carlos S. Alvarado, Th e Rhine Research Center, Chapel Hill, NC Daryl Bem, Ph.D., Cornell University, Ithaca, NY Robert Bobrow, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY Courtney Brown, Emory University, Alanta, GA Etzel Cardeña, Lund University, Sweden Jeremy Drake, Harvard–Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, MA Bernard Haisch, Digital Universe Foundation, USA Michael Ibison, Institute for Advanced Studies, Austin, TX Roger D. Nelson, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ Mark Rodeghier, Center for UFO Studies, Chicago, IL S. James P. Spottiswoode, Los Angeles, CA Michael Sudduth, San Francisco State University, CA Society for Scientifi c Exploration Website — http://www.scientifi cexploration.org Chair, Publications Committee: Robert G. Jahn, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ Editorial Board Chair, Prof. Richard C. Henry, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD Dr. Mikel Aickin, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ Dr. Steven J. 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JOURNAL OF SCIENTIFIC EXPLORATION A Publication of the Society for Scientifi c Exploration AIMS AND SCOPE: Th e Journal of Scientifi c Exploration publishes material consistent with the Society’s mission: to provide a professional forum for critical discussion of topics that are for various reasons ignored or studied inadequately within mainstream science, and to promote improved understanding of social and intellectual factors that limit the scope of scientifi c inquiry. Topics of interest cover a wide spectrum, ranging from apparent anomalies in well-established disciplines to paradoxical phenomena that seem to belong to no established discipline, as well as philosophical issues about the connections among disciplines. Th e Journal publishes research articles, review articles, essays, commentaries, guest editorials, historical perspectives, obituaries, book reviews, and letters or commentaries pertaining to previously published material. JOURNAL OF SCIENTIFIC EXPLORATION A Publication of the Society for Scientifi c Exploration Volume 27, Number 4 2013 Editorial 597 Editorial STEPHEN E. BRAUDE Research Articles 603 Hum and Otoacoustic Emissions May Arise Out of the Same Mechanisms FRANZ G. FROSCH 625 A Case of a Japanese Child with Past-Life Memories OHKADO MASAYUKI 637 Unidentifi ed Aerial Phenomena: The VASP- 169 Flight Brazilian Episode Revisited LUIZ AUGUSTO DA SILVA Historical Perspective 655 Nineteenth Century Psychical Research in Mainstream Journals: The Revue CARLOS S. ALVARADO Philosophique de la France et de l’Étranger RENAUD EVRARD Essay Review 690 Cryptozoology and the Troubles with “Skeptics” and Mainstream Pundits Abominable Science by Daniel Loxton and Donald R. Prothero HENRY H. BAUER Book Reviews 705 AKA Shakespeare: A Scientifi c Approach to the Authorship Question by Peter Sturrock BRUCE SPITTLE 711 The Twilight of the Scientifi c Age by Martín López Corredoira HENRY H. BAUER 714 Okkulte Aesthetik [Occult Aesthetics] by Timon L. Kuff; Thomas Mann’s Geisterebaron by Manfred Dierks ANDREAS SOMMER 726 Communication with the Spirit World of God: Its Laws and Purpose. Extraordinary Experiences of a Catholic Priest by Johannes Greber MICHAEL TYMN 735 Zones of Strangeness: An Examination of Para- normal and UFO Hot Spots by Peter A. McCue JEROME CLARK 738 Men and Women of Parapsychology, Personal Reflections, Esprit Volume 2 edited by Rosemarie Pilkington MICHAEL POTTS 744 Things You Can Do When You Are Dead: True Accounts of After Death Communication by Tricia J. Robertson JESÚS SOTO-ESPINOSA Further Books of Note 746 Brilliant Blunders: From Darwin to Einstein— Colossal Mistakes by Great Scientists That Changed Our Understanding of Life and the Universe by Mario Livio HENRY H. BAUER 747 Alien Mysteries, Conspiracies, and Cover-Ups by Kevin D. Randle THOMAS E. BULLARD Article of Interest 748 Insolation-driven 100,000-year glacial cycles and hysteresis of ice-sheet volume by Ayako Abe-Ouchi, Fuyuki Saito, Kenji Kawamura, Maureen E. Raymo, Jun’icho Okuno, Kunio Takahashi, and Heinz Blatter. Nature, 500 CONSTANTIN CRANGANU SSE News 750 SSE Masthead 751 Index of Previous Articles in JSE 767 Order forms for JSE Issues, JSE Subscriptions, and Society Membership 770 SSE 32nd Annual Conference Announcement 772 Instructions for JSE Authors Journal of Scientifi c Exploration, Vol. 27, No. 4, pp. 597–602, 2013 0892-3310/13 EDITORIAL n a few previous occasions I’ve documented my misgivings over Ocertain terminological fads or conventions in parapsychology. In fact, I’ve done so in this Journal (Braude 1998). I’m now writing an entry on macro-PK for a promising new handbook of parapsychology (a long- overdue update to Wolman 1977), and this exercise has reminded me about a concern I expressed many years ago (in Braude 1997), and which I hope is worth mentioning again. One of the most widespread views within parapsychology is that there is a viable distinction between micro and macro forms of psychokinesis. The general (and rough) idea is that there’s a difference worth making between (on the one hand) apparent PK on the kinds of systems used in most laboratory PK experiments (i.e. random event generators of one kind or another), and (on the other hand) PK of the sort reported from mediumistic séances and poltergeist cases (e.g., object levitations, apports, and materializations).1 However, there are reasons for thinking that the distinction between micro-PK and macro-PK might not be worth making— or at the very least that it’s in critical need of clarification. So let’s look at it more closely. Note, first of all, that that it’s unclear how “psychokinesis” should be defined, even provisionally (see Braude 2002). Nevertheless, the following would be a reasonable and relatively undogmatic beginning. Let’s define “PK” as “the causal influence of an organism’s mental state on a region r of the physical world, without any currently scientifically recognized physical interaction between the organism’s body and r.” This definition obviously leaves certain questions open. For example, because it doesn’t specify that region r is extra-somatic, it leaves open the possibility that PK might operate on the organism’s own body. Given our present (and still considerable) state of parapsychological ignorance, this feature of the definition would seem to be a virtue. Some have suggested that ordinary volition might be a form of PK in which an intention directly produces a bodily change. Similarly, psychosomatic ailments and self- healing through hypnosis might be classed as types of PK. For now, it would be hasty to rule out these possibilities by definition. I realize many recoil at what they usually—and disparagingly—label negative definitions, that is definitions framed in terms of our ignorance, or in terms of what the thing defined is not. In fact, some would argue that when we say that a puzzling phenomenon is due to PK (or, similarly, 597 598 Editorial telepathy or clairvoyance) we’re actually saying