Jolyon Jenkins reports on the world of electronic voice phenomena
(EVP) - the community of people who believe that the dead can speak to
us through radio transmissions and white noise. The technique was
introduced to the English speaking world by a mysterious Latvian, Dr
Konstantin Raudive, who travelled to Britain in 1969 with recordings of
Hitler, Churchill and Stalin speaking from beyond the grave. The method
is now a mainstay of paranormal investigators. Jolyon unearths tapes
from 40 years ago made at a key séance held by Dr Raudive in Gerrards
Cross. Raudive eventually came to believe that a budgerigar called Putzi
was passing on messages from a dead 14 year old girl. Jolyon speaks to
EVP current practitioners, and to a man who believes that his recordings
of animal noises also contain messages.
The claims are
improbable, but they tell us interesting things about human perception:
about our ability to construct meaning from meaningless sound, and about
how our brains naturally fill in the gaps where information is
incomplete. Optical illusions are well known, but we are equally prone
to being fooled by audio illusions. Sound artist Joe Banks suggests
that, while EVP researchers may be carrying out parapsychology
experiments, they are unwittingly doing conventional psychology
experiments.
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