In 1979, the McDonnell Laboratory for Psychical Research began a series of experiments on psychic and paranormal abilities. 

The parapsychology lab was funded by a $500,000 grant from Washington University, and under the direction of Peter Phillips, a physicist with degrees from both Cambridge and Stanford.

His goal? To understand spoon bending and similar unexplainable abilities.

The McDonnell lab had two promising young test subjects, Steve Shaw and Mike Edwards.

Shaw and Edwards repeatedly fooled the researchers. The pair bent spoons in full view of cameras recording their every move. They blew fuses with their minds. They identified pictures inside sealed envelopes. They made objects move inside a sealed globe. 

And if that all sounds like a terrific magic show…

It was.

Steve Shaw and Mike Edwards were magicians.

The Con

Photo by Maria Rantanen

Upon learning about the McDonnell Lab’s new venture, magician and skeptic James Randi (The Amazing Randi) wrote to the lab.

He had spent years watching and discussing Uri Gellar, a magician who claimed true psychic powers and captivated the world with his talk show demonstrations.

Gellar, when confronted with test conditions he couldn’t overcome, would simply change the rules or do something else. He used sleight-of-hand and misdirection like any magician, and repeatedly fooled the scientists at the Stanford Research Institute.

Randi was tired of watching con men fool the world’s best and brightest using nothing more than simple parlor tricks. So he offered the McDonnell lab list of 11 scams to watch out for during their experiments, and how to avoid them. 

Peter Phillips refused to take Randi’s suggestions or accept his offer to watch the experiments alongside the researchers. According to Phillips, he dismissed Randi because of his reputation as a showman who lacked academic integrity.

So when Steve Shaw and Mike Edwards contacted Randi, the game was afoot. The three devised a plan to have Shaw and Edwards enter the experiments as test subjects on Randi’s behalf, to undermine the test. 

Contrary to Phillips’ belief, Randi was a man of integrity, he instructed Shaw and Edwards to tell the truth if they were ever asked whether they were faking the results. 

Their plan was codenamed Project Alpha, and for 120 hours of observed experimentation over four years they proved that the lab should have taken Randi’s advice.

They fooled the researchers so badly the initial findings were even published, which in some cases had to be retracted later.

Not once in four years were the pair directly asked if they were faking the results.

How to fool the best and brightest

The researchers at McDonnell Lab were not idiots. They were highly trained, brilliant scientists who had legitimate interests in the paranormal and followed their curiosity.

But they didn’t know what they were looking for.

When I’m invited by scientific institutions or prestigious universities to perform my magic show, my friends will sometimes say, “Boy, that’s gonna be a tough crowd.” And it’s always the opposite. The smartest people are the easiest to fool. Because the more you know, the more I have to use against you.

If you don’t know the secret of how a magician bends a spoon, it’s very difficult to design an experiment with test conditions that rule out the standard sleight-of-hand procedures. 

Any magician, even an amateur conjuror, would pick apart a fake psychic demonstration in seconds. 

We speak the language of misdirection, of manipulating angles, sightlines, and attention. 

We have learned hundreds if not thousands of ways to make something look impossible until intense scrutiny.

But you don’t know what you don’t know.

How to find your passion

What do magicians, parascientific researchers, and a now defunct lab have to do with finding your passion?

I’ll say it again:

You don’t know what you don’t know.

One of the most common questions I get from college freshmen after I speak at their orientation is, “How do I find my passion?”

My answer is always the same: If you haven’t found it, then it’s probably something you don’t even know exists…

Yet.

The only way to discover your passion is to try new things. Meet new people. Ask interesting questions. 

Join that club you’re not sure you’ll like. Learn a new hobby you think you’ll be bad at. Go to a social gathering where you don’t know anyone and introduce yourself. Ask those people questions about their lives. Get curious.

There are so many things to experience in this world and you’ve encountered almost none of them. Statistically, you’ve done 0% of all possible activities.

Your passion isn’t going to find you. No matter how many inspirational quotes you read on Instagram, that’s just not how the world works.

It’s yours to find.

So be active.

Be open.

Be curious.

Connect.

Engage.

And never believe someone who tells you they can bend a spoon with their mind. But do enjoy the show.