During this banner 70th anniversary year I can’t help but look back. The first of a long line of formal conferences and symposia was our 1953 First International Conference of Parapsychological Studies held at the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands. This watershed conference served to convene post world war academics from different countries and disciplines in an effort to reinvigorate and stimulate future research. We with the help of the Het Johan Borgmanfonds Foundation, spear headed by Wim Kramer, were very fortunate to once again return to Utrecht in 2008 within the very same halls as in 1953 to co-sponsor Utrecht II: Charting the Future of Parapsychology. The 2008 conference was styled intentionally as the first in 1953 with an Advisory Committee consisting of Eberhard Bauer, Etzel Cardena, Hans Gerding, the late Gerd Hovelmann and Roger Nelson along with a Conference Bureau staffed by Nancy Zingrone and Carlos Alvarado and Conference Bureau consisting of Wim Kramer and myself. PF’s founders Eileen J. Garrett and the Honorable Frances P. Bolton were in attendance at the first conference as my mother, Eileen Coly and I were lucky to attend the second. I am enormously proud of these conferences and owe gratitude to so many including Chris Roe who so ably served as Moderator and co-editor of the Utrecht II Proceedings which are still available for purchase with a fully searchable cd of presentations and discussion with photographs. Both conferences read as a Who’s Who of the field at their respective times.
Several comments delivered in 1953 and brought back to life in 2008 I believe are well worth repeating for us today as they stand the test of time and are important to continue to consider.
Gardner Murphy in his opening remarks at Utrecht I, “I suggest that the primary reason why parapsychology has failed to receive the intellectual and moral support which its importance requires is timidity, fear of ridicule, or a deeper level, fear of getting out of touch with our neighbors. …Frequently, our data call for boldness, both in announcing facts and especially in setting up hypotheses bold enough to do justice to the extraordinary nature of the facts. …We frequently have need of ‘outrageous hypotheses,’ hypotheses which outrage the common sense of today. ….There is I think a very fundamental difference between a fanciful speculation and an outrageous hypothesis from which new directions in experimental research may take their start.“ Coming off of Dr. Murphy’s statements I invited the participants of Utrecht II to “without further ado to bring on your bold hypotheses to do justice in the extraordinary nature of the facts!” This is fact they all did.
Carlos Alvarado in his paper delivered at Utrecht II, stated “In 1953 the journal Science published a report of an international parapsychology congress …One of the purposes of the meeting was ‘the effort to develop a scientific program to deal with all types of unknown relations between individual and environment, whether at present classifiable or not’…Such an event has been described as a ‘turning point in the history of parapsychology as a science and as one of the most important events of the history of parapsychology’. While parapsychology has a long history of attempts to organize its subject matter through a variety of conferences and meetings there has been little historical work about the topic. Such social events—important to all sciences—serve to transcend local developments and in turn, foster collaborative research. They also help to assess the state of the art and suggest possible future directions.” This is precisely why PF, until lack of finances continued sponsorship of its annual international conferences.
Eileen Garrett, at Utrecht I stated “In thanking you distinguished scholars who have cared enough to join us in Utrecht, each one present, no matter from which branch of science…you have entered the field by way of sacrifice, for I know that this science does not enable young scholars to sustain themselves; each man or woman who makes their life study, namely the exploration of man himself, has done so knowing that they could possibly endanger their material success to keep the vision alive…” Sadly, this somewhat remains the case in 2021.
Eileen Coly in her opening remarks at Utrecht II stated “It has been the continued goal of the PF emanating from the First Utrecht meeting to do all we can to be of assistance in support of your research and we pledge to continue our support in whatever way open to us in recognition of your valuable and courageous effort.” I myself have continued her pledge.
Gardner Murphy in his timeless words from 1953 “We need fuller understanding from the scientific public, fuller support for long and strenuous investigation, a much more effective way of finding the young men and women who will be the parapsychologists of the decades ahead. Personally, I doubt whether parapsychology will bring us this larger understanding of human nature by our own efforts alone. Rather, it seems to me, a scientific spirit working though the mediums of history and the social sciences, through the insights of the physical sciences, biological sciences, medicine, psychiatry, psychology and catching the spirit of the Rembrandts, the Beethovens, the da Vincis, who have described man not in sober prose alone but in color, in tone, and in eternal principles of form can lead us to an integrated conception of the nature of man more satisfying than that which we now possess. But in this integrative effort, of all the modes of understanding man parapsychology will, if our work be well done, play a vital role.”
Frances P. Bolton aptly closed Utrecht I “Man’s knowledge is limited only by his all too great readiness to stay within the boundaries of the proven. Here, men dedicate themselves anew to the task of the search for knowledge, and for truth in the realms beyond those upon which science as such has set its seal of approval.”
The statements that I have chosen to share with you really sum up what we at Parapsychology Foundation over the past 70 years believe. I closed Utrecht II with my heartfelt and yes tearful statement which regretfully remains even more true at present:
Lisette Coly “On behalf of my mother, Eileen Coly, and, I presume, my grandmother, Eileen Garrett—I can say that it has been a privilege through the years, an honor to work with you and see you doing such good work. I just wish that my own organization still had the wherewithal to push you over the top. But we have confidence in your tenacity; you are all too obstinate to give up, and that gives us hope for the future. We have done our best to play a vital role, but it is to future parapsychologists that we will pass Utrecht’s II’s baton.”
Let me just add that should any of you be able to provide or direct funding to PF we would be overjoyed to try and ring the bell once more with a Utrecht III.