SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN FRONTIERS: BEYOND SCIENCE? (TV)
Summary
One in this series of science documentaries hosted by Alan Alda. This episode focuses on debunking dowsing, therapeutic healing, and other disciplines in what Alda calls "the realm of pseudo science." At the beginning of the program, Alda looks at people's willingness to believe in the supernatural by asking Dianna Paz to have her palm read. She is amazed at how accurate the reading is, and her faith never budges -- even when she learns that her reader is a fake. Nobel-Prize-winning physicist Steven Weinberg offers his opinion that people believe in mysticism because they want to be special. In the first segment, "Water, Water Everywhere," Alda looks into dowsing, the finding of water and other objects with divining rods. As he follows the story of Paul Sevigny, a dowser who is attempting to locate a good spot for a new well in the Vermont mountains, he puts another dowser, Jay Todd of Eugene, Oregon, to the test. Todd is given a series of trials to find a hidden object in one of ten buckets. He fails four times.
In the next segment, "Aliens Have Landed," Alda looks into the alleged saucer crash in Roswell, New Mexico, in the 1940s. He speaks with special-effects expert Steve Johnson about the famed "alien autopsy" film that circulated well after the supposed crash and offers an alternate explanation of the crash, backed up by retired meteorology professor Charlie Moore. In segment three, "New Energy Age," Alda visits Scott Little and Hal Puthoff at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Austin, Texas, as they attempt to harness "zero-point energy," which would offer the world limitless free energy. Steven Weinberg says that he believes that zero-point energy exists but doubts whether its potential output is worth the effort. Next, in "Paper Personality," Alda looks at the accuracy of handwriting analysis. He and graphology expert Barry Beyerstein have their handwriting analyzed by Datagraph, one of the larger graphology companies, and Alda is skeptical of the results. And in the final segment, "Healing Touch," Alda meets Ellen McMahon, a nurse who specializes in therapeutic touch -- the art of sensing and manipulating human-energy patterns. McMahon's ability is put to the test when young Emily Rosa conducts an experiment to see whether practitioners of therapeutic touch can sense her hand without seeing it. They fail fifty-nine percent of the time.
Cataloging of this program was made possible by Alan Alda.
Details
- NETWORK: PBS
- DATE: 1997
- RUNNING TIME: 0:56:46
- COLOR/B&W: Color
- CATALOG ID: T:62049
- GENRE: Public affairs/Documentaries; Science/Nature
- SUBJECT HEADING: Dowsers; Graphology; Healing; Palmistry; Unidentified flying objects - Sightings and encounters
- SERIES RUN: PBS - TV series, 1990-
- COMMERCIALS: N/A
CREDITS
- Graham Chedd … Executive Producer
- John Angier … Executive Producer, Director, Writer
- David Huntley … Producer, Director, Writer
- Sara Finkelstein … Associate Producer
- Laura DeBonis … Associate Producer
- Karen Hoving Mainville … Associate Producer
- Marika Hoving … Associate Producer
- Randy Roos … Music by
- Alan Alda … Host
- Barry Beyerstein
- Steve Johnson
- Scott Little
- Ellen McMahon
- Charlie Moore
- Dianna Paz
- Hal Puthoff
- Emily Rosa
- Paul Sevigny
- Jay Todd
- Steven Weinberg