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'Uri Geller' (, born 'Gellér György'[1] December 20, 1946 in Tel Aviv, Israel) is an Israeli-British performer and celebrity famous for claiming to have psychic powers.
Geller rose to fame after performing a series of televised performances which he said were paranormal demonstrations of psychokinesis, dowsing and telepathy. His performance included bending spoons, describing hidden drawings, and making watches appear to stop or run faster. Geller says he performs these feats through willpower and the strength of his mind. However, critics have demonstrated that his performances can be duplicated using stage magic tricks.
In the 1970s, some scientists were persuaded that Geller's demonstrations were genuine.[2] Since that time various magicians and sceptics, who deny that he has paranormal abilities, have suggested possible ways in which Geller could have tricked the scientists using misdirection techniques.[3][4] These critics, who include Criss Angel, Richard Feynman, James Randi and Martin Gardner, have accused him of using his demonstrations fraudulently outside of the entertainment business.[5][6]
Biography
Born to Jewish parents from Hungary and Austria, Geller was named after a cousin who had been killed in a bus accident. According to Geller, he first became aware of his paranormal abilities when he was four, claiming that after a light from the sky knocked him to the ground, his spoon bent and broke.
Geller is a distant relative of Sigmund Freud on his mother's side.[7]
He served as a paratrooper in the Israeli Army,[8] and was wounded in action during the 1967 Six-Day War.[9] He worked as a photographic model in 1968 and 1969, and in the same year, he began to perform for small audiences as a nightclub entertainer,[10] becoming well-known in Israel.
Geller also became popular in the early 1970s in the United States. He also received attention from the scientific community who were interested in examining his claims of psychic abilities. At the peak of his career in the 1970s he worked full-time, performing for television audiences worldwide.
He claims that he has accumulated wealth in part by performing dowsing services to find commodities such as oil, gold, and minerals, but that the companies he has worked for are reluctant to admit it. In recent years, he has performed demonstrations such as spoon-bending much less frequently in public.
Geller currently lives in Sonning-on-Thames, Berkshire, England. He makes various personal appearances, is involved with art and design projects, and contributes articles to newspapers, magazines, and an Internet web column. He is a vegan and speaks four languages: English, Hebrew, Hungarian and German.
He owns a 1976 Cadillac adorned with thousands of pieces of bent tableware given to him by celebrities or otherwise having historical or other significance. It includes spoons from celebrities such as John Lennon and the Spice Girls, and those with which Winston Churchill and John F. Kennedy ate. Geller designed the logo for popular music group N
★ SYNC [11] and contributed artwork to Michael Jackson's CD, "Invincible."
Jackson was best man when Geller renewed his wedding vows in 2001.[12] He also negotiated the famous TV interview between Jackson with the journalist Martin Bashir: "Living with Michael Jackson".[13] In BBC television interviews, Geller has since admitted that he has not been in contact with Jackson since this time. Geller says that he has split with Jackson because of anti-Semitic statements he had purportedly made.[14]
In an appearance on Esther Rantzen's 1996 television talk show ''Esther'', Geller claimed to have suffered from Anorexia nervosa for several years.
Geller is the president of International Friends of Magen David Adom, a group that lobbied the International Committee of the Red Cross to recognise Magen David Adom ("Red Star of David") as a humanitarian relief organisation. The Red Cross acknowledged the organisation as such in June, 2006.
In 2002, he became honorary co-chairman of the English Nationwide Conference football club Exeter City, who were relegated to the Nationwide Conference in May 2003. He has since severed formal ties with the club. The same year, he appeared as a contestant on the first series of the British reality TV show, I'm a Celebrity, Get Me out of Here!.
In 2007 Geller hosted a reality show in Israel called "The Successor" ("היורש"), where the contestants performed magic tricks and Geller was accused of "trickery".[15]
He has also written sixteen fiction and nonfiction books.
Controversy and criticism
Geller's claims of paranormal powers receive little support within the mainstream scientific community[16] and his critics see him as a very successful con artist.
Parallels to stage magic
Geller admits "Sure, there are magicians who can duplicate it [his performances] through trickery."[17] He claims that even though his demonstrations could have been done using trickery, he happens to use psychic powers to achieve his results.17 Skeptic James Randi, star of ''Secrets of the Psychics'', has stated that if Geller is truly using his mind to perform these feats, "he is doing it the hard way".[18] Stage magicians note several methods of creating the illusion of a spoon spontaneously bending. Most common is the practice of misdirection, an underlying principle of many stage magic tricks.[19]
There are many ways in which a bent spoon can be presented to an audience as to give the appearance it was done with supernatural powers. One way is through one or several brief moments of distraction in which a magician can physically bend a spoon unseen by the audience.[18] Then the bend is gradually revealed creating the illusion that the spoon is bending before the viewers' eyes.[21] Another way, if a performer does not bend the spoon with force during the performance is by pre-bending them and thus reducing the amount of force later needed to be applied.[22]
Geller claims in "telepathic drawing" demonstrations that he is able to read subjects' minds as they draw a picture. Although in these demonstrations he cannot see the picture being drawn, he is sometimes present in the room and on those occasions can see the subjects as they draw. Critics argue this may allow Geller to infer common shapes from pencil movement and sound, with the power of suggestion doing the rest.[19]
Disagreements over measuring success
Critics note Geller's demonstrations are not always successful. For example, he is not always able during his "telepathic" drawing demonstrations to define the shape or image drawn. [1] Geller has also at times canceled performances or failed to produce the expected results, sometimes blaming his apparent lack of psychic power on some interference, exhaustion, or lack of cooperation by the subjects. He was paid to investigate the kidnapping of Hungarian model Helga Farkas, and, although he predicted she would be found alive and in good health, she was murdered by her kidnappers [2]. He was reportedly unable to bend a spoon for Nobel-prize winning physicist Richard Feynman, as mentioned in Feynman's book ''Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!''.
1993 TV show Secrets of the Psychics.
Geller was unable to bend any tableware during a 1973 appearance on ''The Tonight Show'' in which the spoons he was to bend had been preselected by Johnny Carson. Earlier in his career, Carson had been an amateur stage magician, as had James Randi, who advised Carson on how to thwart potential trickery. Randi explained in a 1993 Secrets of the Psychics for the ''NOVA'' television series: "I was asked to prevent any trickery. I told them to provide their own props and not to let Geller or his people anywhere near them."
Geller's critics often disagree with him about the degree of success actually achieved during demonstrations. For instance, his television appearances have frequently involved viewer interaction, and among the viewers there are very often callers who claim to have located bent spoons or restarted clocks after Geller appeared on TV. Skeptics maintain this does not necessarily indicate paranormal success, and speculate that about half of all stopped mechanical clocks can be at least temporarily restarted simply by moving them around.[24]
In his telepathy demonstrations, Geller reveals his answer slowly while asking whether he is on the right track. This approach is consistent with a stage magic technique known as cold reading, in which a magician tricks a subject into revealing information by suggesting that he already knows it. Geller's approach is apparent in an interview on the Gerry Ryan radio show on February 20, 2002:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Testing
Geller's performances of drawing duplication and cutlery bending usually take place under informal conditions such as television interviews. During his early career he did allow some scientists to investigate his claims. A study by Stanford Research Institute researchers Harold E. Puthoff and Russell Targ concluded that he had clearly performed successfully enough to warrant further serious study, and the "Geller-effect", was coined to refer to the particular type of abilities they felt had been demonstrated.[25]
Geller's "watch fixing" abilities do not impress "watch makers" who note "many supposedly broken watches had merely been stopped by gummy oil, and simply holding them in the hand would warm the oil enough to soften it and allow watches to resume ticking."[24]
In ''An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds, and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural'' Randi wrote "Hal Puthoff and Russell Targ, who studied Mr. Geller at the Stanford Research Institute (now known as Stanford Research International) were aware, in one instance at least, that they were being shown a magician's trick by Geller."[27] Moreover, Randi explained, "Their protocols for this 'serious' investigation of the powers claimed by Geller were described by Dr. Ray Hyman, who investigated the project on behalf of a U.S. funding agency, as 'sloppy and inadequate'."[27]
Other critics of this "testing" include Dr David Marks and the late Dr Richard Kammann. They published a description of how Geller cheated in an informal test of his ESP powers in 1977 [29]. Their 1978 article in ''Nature'' and 1980 book, ''The Psychology of the Psychic'' (2nd ed. 2000) described how a perfectly normal explanation was possible for Geller's alleged powers of telepathy. Marks and Kammann found strong evidence that while at SRI Geller was allowed to peek through a hole in the laboratory wall separating Geller from the drawings he was being invited to reproduce. The drawings he was asked to reproduce were placed on a wall opposite the peep hole which the investigators Targ and Puthoff had stuffed with cotton gauze. In addition to this error, the investigators had also allowed Geller access to a two-way intercom enabling Geller to listen to the investigators' conversation during the time when they were choosing and/or displaying the target drawings. These basic errors indicate the high importance of ensuring that psychologists, magicians or other people with an in-depth knowldege of perception, who are trained in methods for blocking sensory cues, be present during the testing of self-proclaimed psychics.
In addition to describing how Uri Geller quite probably fooled the physicists at SRI, among many others, David Marks recorded Uri Geller bending a key on film. This event occurred during Geller's visit to New Zealand in the 1970s. This film actually shows how Geller cleverly misdirected onlookers while gripping the key in both hands and bending it.
Noel Edmonds footage
Noel Edmonds was a television prankster who often used hidden cameras to record celebrities in Candid Camera-like situations for his television programme, ''Noel's House Party''. In 1996, Edmonds planned a stunt in which shelves would fall from the walls of a room while Geller was in it. The cameras recorded footage of Geller from angles he wasn't expecting, and they showed Geller grasping a spoon firmly with both hands as he stood up to display a bend in it.[3] Geller later claimed that he knew that Edmonds' crew had been filming, and that he made the shelves fall off the wall with his psychic powers.
"The Successor" ("היורש") footage
In late 2006 and early 2007 Geller starred in an Israeli television show to find a "successor." During one segment, Geller tried to move a compass with paranormal abilities. However, video cameras caught Geller with magnet-on-thumb (magnets cause compasses to move in the direction of the magnet).[30][15] Geller then forced YouTube to remove the clips that showed the fake thumb.30 In April 2007 the James Randi Educational Foundation made the clip available.[32]
This trick was also done by Geller in 2000 on ABC TV's ''The View'', which was then duplicated by Randi on the same show the following week.[33] On February 9, 2007 Randi posted video of him "outdoing" Geller on the 2000 ''The View'', and posted the "secrets" behind making a compass move.[34]
Litigation
Geller has litigated or threatened legal action against some of his critics with mixed success.[35] These included libel allegations against Randi and illusionist Gérard Majax.
Notably, three lawsuits Geller filed against Prometheus Books, a publisher of sceptical books, which had falsely asserted that Geller had been arrested and convicted in Israel for misrepresenting himself as a psychic, were dismissed in the U.S. as they were filed after the statute of limitations had expired, and Geller was obliged to pay more than $20,000 in costs to the defendant. Uri Geller Libel Suit Dismissed Geller, Uri Upon the final resolution of the Prometheus suit, the chairman of the publishing house, Paul Kurtz, stated, "It seems Mr. Geller's alleged psychic powers weren't working correctly when he decided to file this suit." Kurtz did, however, provide Geller with a written apology and acknowledgment of error on behalf of Prometheus Books after Geller agreed to drop an identical suit filed in London.[35]
In an interview with a Japanese newspaper reporter, James Randi was reported as saying that a scientist who once had believed Geller's claims were paranormal, "shot" himself in the head after seeing magicians reproduce the tricks. Randi claimed this was a metaphor, which was lost in translation. In a Canadian interview, Randi said, "One scientist, a metallurgist, wrote a paper backing Geller's claims that he could bend metal. The scientist shot himself after I showed him how the key bending trick was done."[37] Since the supposed suicide victim died of natural causes, Geller sued both the newspaper and Randi in the Japanese courts. Randi could not participate in the trial due to high expenses of travelling to Japan. The Japanese judge reduced Geller's action from "libel" to "insult", and awarded Geller $2,000. Geller, as part of a later settlement with Randi, agreed not to pursue Randi for collection of the judgment.
In 1998, the Broadcasting Standards Commission in the United Kingdom rejected a complaint made by Geller, saying that it "wasn't unfair to have magicians showing how they duplicate those "psychic feats'" on the ''NOVA'' episode ''Secrets of the Psychics''.[38]
In November of 2000 Geller sued video game company Nintendo over the Pokémon "Yungerer", localized in English as "Kadabra", which he claimed was an unauthorised appropriation of his identity.[39][40] The Pokémon in question has psychic abilities and carries bent spoons. Geller also claimed that the star on Kadabra's forehead, and the lightning patterns on its abdomen, are symbolisms popular with the Waffen SS of Nazi Germany, and was outraged at the connotations that Nintendo had supposedly made.40 Although the symbols are derived from Zener cards, the name is a pun; the katakana ''n'' (ン) resembles the kana ''ri'' (リ) (the transliteration of Mr. Geller's name into Katakana would be ユリゲラー ''Yurigerā''). Geller sued for £60 million, the equivalent of US $100 million, but lost.
He also considered a suit against IKEA over a furniture line featuring bent legs that was called the "Uri" line.[41]
Geller sued the Timex Watch Company for millions, and lost.[4]
Copyright claims
In March 2007, videos showing Geller cheating were removed from YouTube due to copyright claims by Explorologist Limited.[42] Explorologist Limited is operated by Geller who owns 75% of the company and his long time manager/brother in law Shimshon [Shipi] Shtrang who owns 25%.42 James Randi noted Geller does not own the copyright to these clips, which includes Geller's appearance on ''The Tonight Show''.42
On May 8, 2007 the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) sued Geller on behalf of Brian Sapient for making false claims to force YouTube to remove a video.[43] YouTube eventually reversed their decision to remove the video. The EFF posted the documents pertaining to Sapient v. Geller online.[44]
The removals have caused a backlash against Geller.[45]
The Geller Curse
Geller is well-known for his sports predictions. However, Uri Geller skeptic James Randi and British tabloid ''The Sun'' (among others), have demonstrated the teams and players he chooses to win most often lose.[46] John Atkinson explored "predictions" Geller made over thirty years and concluded "Uri more often than not scuppered the chances of sportsmen and teams he was trying to help."46 This was pointed out by one of James Randi's readers, who called it "The Curse of Uri Geller".[47]
Bibliography
Books about Geller
★ Colin, Jim ''The Strange Story of Uri Geller''. Raintree, 1975 ISBN 0817210377 (48 pages)
★ Ebon, Martin ''The Amazing Uri Geller'' Signet 1975. ISBN 0451064755
★ Harris, Ben . ''Gellerism Revealed''. Micky Hades International 1985 ISBN 0-919230-92-X
★ Margolis, Jonathan. ''Uri Geller Magician or Mystic?''. Welcome Rain / Orion ISBN 0752810065
★ Marks, David. ''The Psychology of the Psychic'' (2nd Ed.) New York: Prometheus Books, 2000. ISBN 1573927988
★ Gardner, Martin, ''Confessions of a Psychic''. (under the pseudonym "Uriah Fuller" (an allusion to Geller) that purport to explain "how fake psychics perform seemingly incredible paranormal feats".) Karl Fulves, 1975.
★ Gardner, Martin. ''Further Confessions of a Psychic''. (under the pseudonym "Uriah Fuller") 1980.
★ Gardner, Martin. ''Science: Good, Bad, and Bogus''. Prometheus Books. (March 1990) ISBN 0879755733
★ Panati, Charles, ''The Geller Papers''. Houghton Mifflin
★ Puharich, Andrija, ''Uri: A Journal of the Mystery of Uri Geller''. Anchor Press / Doubleday
★ Randi, James, ''The Magic of Uri Geller''. (Later editions are titled ''The Truth About Uri Geller''). New York: Prometheus Books, Ballintine, 1982. ISBN 0-87975-199-1
★ Taylor, John G.. ''Superminds''. Macmillian/Picador
★ Wilhelm, John. ''In Search of Superman''. Pocket Books, 1976. ISBN 0671805908
★ Wilson, Colin. ''The Geller Phenomenon''. Aldus Books, 1976. ISBN 0717281051
Books By Geller
Non-fiction
★ ''My Story''. Henry Holt & Company, Inc. (April 1975) ISBN 0030301963
★ Uri Geller and Guy Lyon Playfair. ''The Geller Effect''. Grafton, Jonathan Cape, Hunter Publishing, (1988) ISBN 0586074309 ISBN 978-0586074305
★ Uri Geller and Rabbi Shmuley Boteach. ''Confessions of a Psychic and a Rabbi''. (Foreword by Deepak Chopra) Element Books Ltd (March 2000) ISBN 1862047243
★ Uri Geller and Lulu Appleton. ''Mind Medicine''. Element Books Ltd (October 1999) ISBN 1862044775
★ ''Uri Geller's Little Book of Mind Power''. Robson Books (August 1999) ISBN 186105193X
★ ''Uri Geller's Mind Power Kit''. Penguin USA (1996) ISBN 0670871389
★ ''Uri Geller's Fortune Secrets''. (Edited with Simon Turnbull) Psychic Hotline Pty Limited (May 21, 1987) ISBN 0722138121
★ ''Unorthodox Encounters''. Chrysalis Books (2001) ISBN 1861053665
Fiction
★ ''Ella''. Martinez Roca, (March 1999) ISBN 0747259208
★ ''Shawn''. Goodyer Associates Ltd, ISBN 1871406099
★ ''Pampini''. World Authors (1980, ISBN 0899750001
★ ''Dead Cold''. ISBN 0747259216
References
1. "Hot News" Randi, James; www.jref.org; July 27, 2007.
2. Boyce Rensberger, "Magicians Term Israeli 'Psychic' a Fraud," New York Times. Dec. 13, 1975 page 59. Several of the scientists, such as Milbourne Christopher, have publicity criticised Geller as a "fraud" and "charlatan." Other scientists convinced by Geller include Russell Targ and Harold Puthoff at the Stanford Research Institute.
3. The skeptic's Dictionary: Uri Geller
4. Richard Feynman on Uri Geller
5. ''Geller v. Randi'', US Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, 1994.
6. Science: Good, Bad & Bogus, , Martin, Gardner, , 1989, ISBN 0879755733
7. "Something Jewish" interview Caroline Westbrook
8. Nintendo faces £60m writ from Uri Geller
9. For his next trick, illusionist Uri Geller turns into a TV star
10. The Magician And the Think Tank, Time (magazine) Mar. 12, 1973
11.
12. Jackson fans await Geller wedding
13. Jackson interview seen by 14m
14. Geller 'ends Jackson friendship'
15. Uri Geller accused of TV trickery
16. Atheist Foundation of Australia Inc. "As there is no scientific evidence for supernatural phenomena"
17. Uri Geller - A Sceptical Perspective
18. Interview with James Randi in ''NOVA'' episode, "Secrets of the Psychics".
19. Ben Harris,The Second Coming Psychics: All the Bast from Sceptic 1986-1990, page 8
20. Interview with James Randi in ''NOVA'' episode, "Secrets of the Psychics".
21. Interview with James Randi in ''NOVA'' episode, ''Secrets of the Psychics''.
22. Interview with James Randi in ''NOVA'' episode, ''[Secrets of the Psychics''.
23. Ben Harris,The Second Coming Psychics: All the Bast from Sceptic 1986-1990, page 8
24. Boyce Rensberger, "Magicians Term Israeli 'Psychic' a Fraud," New York Times. Dec. 13, 1975 page 59.
25. The Geller Papers
26. Boyce Rensberger, "Magicians Term Israeli 'Psychic' a Fraud," New York Times. Dec. 13, 1975 page 59.
27. An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds, and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural James Randi
28. An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds, and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural James Randi
29. David Marks & Richard Kammann. - "The Non-Psychic Powers of Uri Geller" - Sceptical Inquirer, Summer 1977 - Vol. 1 No. 2 - p. 9-17
30. Geller Redux James Randi
31. Uri Geller accused of TV trickery
32. The Truth about Uri Geller hosted by James Randi Educational Foundation
33. The Moving Compass Trick James Randi
34. http://www.randi.org/jr/2007-02/020209morebrowne.html#i8 James Randi
35. Truzzi, M (1996) from the Parapsychological Association newsletter http://66.221.71.68/psir.htm
36. Truzzi, M (1996) from the Parapsychological Association newsletter http://66.221.71.68/psir.htm
37. Patricia Orwen, James Randi August 23, 1986, ''Toronto Star''.
38. U.K. broadcast commission rejects Geller's 'Secrets of the Psychics' complaint Susan Blackmore
39. {{cite web | url = http://news.zdnet.co.uk/emergingtech/0,1000000183,2076058,00.htm | title = Uri Geller sues Pokemon | accessdate = 2007-05-30
40. {{cite web | url = http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/1003454.stm | title = Geller sues Nintendo over Pokémon | accessdate = 2007-05-30
41. Nintendo faces £60m writ from Uri Geller Jonathan Margolis
42. Geller on the Ropes James Randi
43. Spoon-Bending 'Paranormalist' Illegally Twists Copyright Law
44. Sapient v. Geller Documents
45.
Magician Uri Geller Accused of Bending Copyright Law
46. The Curse of Uri Geller
47. The Curse of Uri Geller
External links
★ Uri Geller official homepage
★ Uri Geller - a bibliography
★ Geller on the Ropes by James Randi
★ Uri Geller listed in The Sceptic's Dictionary
★ Geller, Uri in An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds, and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural
★ Alleged "Psychic" Uri Geller loses libel suit against Prometheus Books from Committee for Skeptical Inquiry
★ Nature - Original Nature 1974 article
★ The Truth about Uri Geller (Video) hosted by James Randi Educational Foundation
★ Uri Geller, Jackson's friend
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