SIXTH SENSE

by Larry Kettelkamp ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 9, 1970

Essentially serious, sound, unsensational, but unsettling, this stop-short explication of Psi or psychic experiences. It includes the manifold manifestations of ESP, precognition, and retrocognition--defining each and following up with case histories; but it ignores what is crucial, a critical perspective, criteria by which to judge the genuine and discard the possibility of coincidence. Whereas the skeptic as well as the casual student will surely suspend disbelief temporarily, faith-at-face-value is a permanent demand here, the evidence purely phenomenological: mind-over-matter 'proved' by the success of a minister's prayer-plant experiment; prophesies by Jeane Dixon or the late Edgar Cayce borne out; the author's own ingratiatingly shared premonitions realized. Documentation notwithstanding, these instances of sixth-sense operation only arouse yet a seventh irrational feeling, of creepiness, in their elusiveness; it is regrettable therefore that the treatment given popular magic in the section on fraud was not extended to cover telepathy, psychokinesis, etc. The hints at the end for heightening personal perceptions or at least for determining susceptibility (record dreams, act on hunches), again lack a framework of grounds for comparison, again foster uncomfortable limbo. For all its singularity among juveniles this young-looking parascience survey does half the job: it hypnotizes with 'would-you-believe-it' but offers no intellectual bases for 'or-not.'

Pub Date: Sept. 9, 1970

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Morrow

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1970

Categories: NONFICTION