Houdini & Doyle
THE SKEPTIC AND THE BELIEVER
Conan Doyle was faced, with his friend
Houdini, with a conjurer who could duplicate the psychic feats of mediums.
His response was not to disbelieve in the mediums, but to attribute
supernatural powers to the conjurer. "My dear chap," Doyle wrote,
"why go round the world seeking a demonstration of the occult
(Houdini visited all the famous mediums when he toured Europe)
when you are giving one all the time? Mrs. Guppy (a well-known
and hugely fat medium who was reported to have traveled by
telekinesis from Highbury to Bloomsbury) could dematerialize,
and so could many folk in Holy Writ, and I do honestly believe
that you can also."
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