Who has heard of the Harry Houdini Award? What is the prize? What can I get it for? Who has already succeeded? There are many questions. In this article we will try to answer them.
Houdini Award: Skeptics vs. Psychics
Today, it is very common among Russian inhabitants that some supernatural forces can influence a person’s life and that other people have a mysterious gift to come into contact with these forces. Television channels and the Internet now often talk about the miracles of extrasensory perception and various "sensational" discoveries, which official science mainly refers to pseudoscientific knowledge. In the wake of such a fascination with the unknown, not everyone is able to critically evaluate one or another fact.
At first glance, it might seem that this is only a matter of personal conviction, but everything is not so harmless. It is only natural that the situation has been successfully used by numerous scammers posing as hereditary healers and magicians. Although there is no strong evidence that these people have a special gift, many turn to them for help. And, unfortunately, they are often deceived.
In contrast to this trend, the activities of science popularizers are gaining more and more development, which aim to suppress the spread of any kind of hoaxes and show the need for rational thinking and the importance of a scientific approach.
Harry Houdini and the award of his name
The Harry Houdini Prize was founded in Russia in 2015. It was announced: one million rubles will be received by someone who, in a specially organized scientific experiment, will be able to prove that he really has supernatural powers.
The goal of the founders of the award is to draw the attention of the Russian public to the problem of an uncritical attitude to allegations of the existence of superpowers. Testing unusual abilities should be “transparent” and accessible to a Russian-speaking audience. The main slogan of the project was the statement of the American astronomer and popularizer of science Karl Sagan: "Extraordinary statements require extraordinary evidence."
According to Valery Kuvakin, a scientific skeptic and professor at the Faculty of Philosophy of Moscow State University, rational thinking has never been particularly characteristic of Russian people due to some cultural and historical traditions. Kuvakin also emphasizes that although pseudoscience will never disappear completely, being a kind of “shadow” of official science, it is the critical style of thinking that will allow modern Russian society to become highly developed.
When was the Houdini Prize awarded in Russia? This will be discussed further.
Prize Name
The award was named in honor of the world famous American illusionist Harry Houdini. By the beginning of the 20th century, he was at the top of his fame among hoaxers thanks to his legendary liberation tricks, some of which still remain unsolved.
In addition to the art of illusion, Houdini was a professional in terms of revelations: he did not miss the chance to reveal the secrets of his competitors - magicians and magicians. In addition, he openly spoke out against the general craze at the time for spiritualism. Houdini was worried that under the influence of this fashion, many illusionists mask their tricks, passing them off as communicating with otherworldly forces. Incognito attending spiritualistic sessions, he successfully exposed charlatans and was known at one time as a "storm of mediums." This even caused the breakdown of his friendship with Arthur Conan Doyle, who was a staunch supporter of the ideas of spiritualism. Houdini also shortly before his death left his wife a secret code, only with the help of which it was allegedly possible to call the spirit of the great illusionist. So he finally limited his persona from the attacks of the Spirit.
Foreign analogues of the award
The Houdini Award has a counterpart - the James Randy Foundation Award , a well-known scientific skeptic and illusionist from the United States. For many years, Randy has been exposing pseudo-scientific theories and hoaxes related to paranormal phenomena, superpowers, UFOs, etc. The idea of creating the prize arose back in 1964 when Randy promised to personally pay $ 1,000 to the first person who could prove the presence of his superpowers.
Later, the bonus amount increased to 10 thousand dollars, and in 2002 reached a million dollars thanks to a donation. Although the number of participants was large, to date, not a single subject has been able to convincingly prove that he has any phenomenal abilities and receive the Randy Prize.
Similar non-profit projects were launched in other countries, for example, in Australia since 1980 there is an award from the organization Australian Skeptics Inc.
Competition Rules
The Harry Houdini Award is awarded according to certain rules. According to them, the person who managed to demonstrate the declared supernatural abilities, such as clairvoyance, telekinesis, communication with spirits, vision of the aura and others, will receive a monetary reward. That is, any abilities that do not find explanation from the point of view of modern science.
The prize organizing committee recognizes as evidence only the results of its own testing. Other arguments, including letters of recommendation, videos and third-party certificates, are not grounds for paying a premium.
Application for participation
Only a person who has reached the age of majority can apply for participation. In this case, the applicant must clearly describe what paranormal abilities he possesses and how exactly they can be tested. In order for the organizing committee to consider someone’s candidacy, you need to send a video that would demonstrate the stated abilities. If this is not possible (for example, in the case of telepathy), a recommendation by a leader of the academic environment should be attached stating that he personally observed the phenomenon described in the application and cannot give any rational explanations for this. The provision of any evidence is proof of a reasonable and serious approach on the part of the applicant.
The Organizing Committee warns that the application for the award and the information provided by the candidates is not confidential: the applicant’s name, application text, video materials and test results can be published on the Internet.
Limitations
The Houdini Award has some limitations. Only unusual abilities whose reality can be proved experimentally are accepted for consideration. A statement of religious or spiritual abilities will not be accepted for a reason that is simple enough: everything based on faith, personal experience and its interpretations cannot be verified. For example, if someone claims to be able to make a person feel happy through invisible influence, testing will be refused, because in this case it is impossible to talk about an objective result.
The organizing committee may also refuse to conduct an experiment if it is regarded as dangerous to life and health (including mental) of the subject and other participants. Tests in which the applicant promises to risk his life and remain unscathed thanks to his gift will not be conducted from the point of view of safety and common sense.
Testing
Before starting the test, the participant must clearly indicate what abilities he intends to demonstrate. Since all applications are considered individually, for each individual case, special test regulations are drawn up. The applicant can offer his own experimental conditions - the organizing committee can accept or reject them.
Next, the organizing committee and the subject discuss what result of the experiment will be considered positive, which is negative. Difficulties are possible here. If it is not possible to reach an agreement, the application will be rejected. But if both parties are satisfied, then the applicant becomes a candidate for the Houdini Award.
Preliminary testing follows to ensure that the experimental conditions are acceptable. If the result is positive, it is the turn of official testing. According to the rules, it takes place once and only in the place that the organizers choose. The official test should be attended by a representative of the sponsoring company Genotek guaranteeing the issuance of a cash prize. The peculiarity of the final test is that it is unlikely to pass as a result of luck: the participant will need to prove the reproducibility of his ability.
Prize organizers and commission
The main founders of the award are the popular science resource Sci-One and the Genotek Center for Genetics. The council of experts and the composition of the organizing committee includes scientists and experts in the field of biology, medicine, physics, scientific journalists, professional illusionists, skeptics and figures against pseudoscience. Information partners of the project: the Internet publication Gazeta.RU, the portal Antropogenesis.ru, the Internet community Lentach and many others.
The expert composition can change and replenish with new members, experts in the exact and natural sciences.
Prize
Upon successful completion of the final test, the participant will immediately receive a tenth of the prize in cash from the representative of Genotek. The remaining 900 thousand rubles will be transferred to the winner’s bank account in a few days.
An unusual bonus is attached to the prize of one million rubles: at the request of the winner, Genotek is ready to provide him with an exclusive genome decryption service.
Now let's talk about who got the Harry Houdini Award in Russia.
Tests in Moscow
So was someone awarded the Harry Houdini Award? In Moscow on September 26, 2015, the first preliminary tests took place. They aroused great interest of the public and the media. For the right to receive the Houdini Award, demonstrating their unique abilities, two subjects fought. Did they get the Harry Houdini Award? Who got it? We will find out about this now.
The first to try her hand was Bakhyt Zhumatova, a former participant in the acclaimed television project “Battle of Psychics,” who claimed to be able to find hidden money. The proposed experiment was simple and intuitive: in one of 10 identical black boxes a bill of 5 thousand rubles was placed. Thanks to the randomization method, none of the participants and organizers knew where the bill was. The test result was negative - Bakhyt failed to correctly identify the box with the money from two attempts.
The second candidate, Nikolai Zagoruyko, claimed to be able to see metal objects through walls. A test similar to the first was organized for him, but this time aluminum cans were hidden in one of the 10 boxes . The result of the second participant was also negative. Video recordings of these tests are available for viewing.
The following preliminary tests for Houdini Award applicants took place on December 20, 2015. This time, all 3 subjects turned out to be former participants in the Battle of Psychics. They declared the following abilities: telepathy, the ability to communicate with the souls of the dead, the ability to foresee using Tarot cards.
The first test was Iolanta Voronova. The assignment was to identify holders of sealed passports from among 12 male volunteers. The following participants, Tatyana Ikaeva and Zlata Dmitruk, were offered the same test conditions - to determine the cause of death of a person from the photographs. As last time, the test results were negative. All 3 participants failed to give a single correct answer for the permissible number of attempts.
Houdini Award: who got it?
To date, no applicant has yet been awarded the Houdini Prize. Similarly, with the Randy Prize and other similar organizations: although several participants reached the official tests, no one showed a positive result, thereby failing to prove the claimed supernormalities during the scientific experiment.
Further tests
At the moment, the number of published applications is in the hundreds, and the Houdini Award is still waiting for its owner. Summing up and the announcement of the results of the next testing is scheduled for July 2016.