Geller, Uri

Uri Geller demonstrates his ability to bend metal using only his psychic forces. Courtesy Fortean Picture Library.

Geller, Uri (b. 1946)

Uri Geller was born in Tel Aviv on December 20, 1946. He was the son of Hungarian Jewish immigrants. Geller discovered his paranormal powers when still a child. As young as age three, he found that he could bend and even break metal by gently rubbing it and concentrating on it, and he could stop watches by concentrating on them. It wasn’t until he was much older—after serving in the Israeli army in the Six Day War—that he started giving public demonstrations of his skills. He appeared numerous times on television in Europe and the United States, and was subjected to intensive investigations by scientists and psychical researchers. At Stanford Research Institute in California in 1972, Geller demonstrated metal bending and correctly guessed the contents of metal cans and the numbers on dice shaken in enclosed boxes. In the laboratory of Professor John Taylor of London University in 1974, Geller deflected the needle of a Geiger counter and even bent a number of metal rods that were enclosed inside plastic tubes, with metal mesh screens around them so that they could not be physically touched.

Stage magician James Randi tried to reproduce what became known as “the Geller effect” but his simple stage-style sleight of hand was a far cry from the numerous effects produced by Geller under strict scientific conditions. Geller stopped an escalator in a Munich department store simply by concentrating on it. He similarly stopped a cable car. He bent metal that was a distance from him and was not touched by anyone; he caused a piece of metal resting on a scale to bend upward, rather than downward (and with no more than half an ounce of pressure ever measured), and also resulted in the needle of the scale being bent. He told others, including young children, how to concentrate, and they bent metal. He has stopped clocks and caused long-broken clocks to start working again, all with his mind power. He has even involved television viewers in starting and stopping clocks and bending metal. After a visit by Geller to Tokyo, Japan, in 1973, thousands of Japanese children apparently manifested similar powers of mind over matter. The following year eight of these children were singled out for investigation by Dr. Shigemi Sasaki, professor of psychology at the Denki Tsushin University. One twelve-year-old, Jun Sekiguchi, showed an amazing ability to bend spoons and to recharge dead electric batteries by simply holding them. Dr. Joseph Banks Rhine of Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, said, “The tests in Tokyo have shown that PK power exists among many of their children. The research is of great significance.”

During experiments at Birbeck College in England, he caused a Geiger counter to click loudly when he concentrated on it and bent a crystal molybdenum disk without touching it. In another experiment at Kent State University in Ohio, Geller deflected a magnetometer and also scored exceptionally high in experiments involving a die and film cans. In front of television cameras in Toronto, Ontario he was tested by scientist Dr. A. R. G. Owen under conditions Owen said were a rigorous as any in a laboratory. Both Owen and the television audience were totally convinced by the demonstrations.

There have been plenty of detractors for Geller but none have been able to explain all of his effects nor to duplicate them. In the house of American doctor and parapsychologist Andrija Puharich, Geller produced rappings of the type heard in the home of the Fox family in 1848. When visiting the pianist Byron Janis, a death mask of Chopin standing on the piano shed tears.

In the home of Hollywood screen writer Jesse Lasky, he produced apports. Many explanations have been offered—including, of course, outright fraud—but none has explained all of the phenomena produced by Geller.

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