The Great Witch-Goddess and Pseudo-Science

[DANDOM%UMASS.BITNET@wiscvm.wisc.edu (Dan Parmenter at Hampshire College)]

>From: Mark Katsouros <KATSOURO@UMDD>

>> From: IED0DXM%UCLAMVS.BITNET@wiscvm.wisc.edu

>> Was Houdini's name really Kate? Amazing.

> uh, no andy, i have no idea What houdIni's "real" name was.  (i
> would cerTainly wager tHat it wAsn't "Kate" though.)  dId my
> incredibly poor engliSh imply Such a thIng?  anyway, the source of
> my text is a Direct transcendental link between kate and myself,
> which only occurs when i PlAy "houdini" backwardS at 78 Speed, and
> sTare at tHE ivy on the dreaming's bacK covEr.  (i have a similar
> sort of link with garcia and the boYs, but that's another story.)
> but seriously, it was just something i sort of made up on the fly.

    For the record, Houdini's name was actually Erich Weiss, as
I recall from the biography I read.  Kate's song about him makes
reference to the widely publicized incident where his wife, seeking
messages from beyond from him received the infamous 'Rosabel
Believe' from a celebrated medium.  These words of course were part
of the mind reading act that Houdini's wife acted as assistant for.
The basis upon which psychic's have proclaimed this as iron-clad
proof of the validity of communication with the dead is in that no
one but Houdini and his wife knew the code words; however, it later
turned out that plenty of the stagehands knew all or many of the
words, and in fact a seasoned observer could have easily deciphered
the messages.
    
    This debunking of the Houdini legend is courtesy of "The New
Apocrypha" by John Sladek, a marvelous book on the topic of
Pseudo-science,and an invaluable source for poking fun at some of
Kate's seemingly esoteric beliefs.  For example, the book also goes
on at length about Wilhelm Reich and his 'Cloudbuster' experiments.
The Cloudbuster equipment really was a bunch of tubes attached to a
revolving platform, as depicted in the "Cloudbusting" video.  The
tubes supposedly drew negative orgones from the clouds into the
machine, and from the machine into a nearby stream.  I am *not*
making this up.  Kate herself seems to believe this madman, as she
alludes to the veracity of his claims when questioned on the topic
on the picture-disc interview.  Orgones, for the unaware, are a
type of energy produced during orgasm, spake Reich.  Blue in color,
their presence makes the sky blue.

    Willhelm Reich is generally believed to be a deranged
psychotic who although he made significant contributions to
Freudian theory, spent his latter days believing that Airplanes
were being sent over his house to watch him.

    This isn't to cast any aspersions on Kate of course, it's a
wonderful song, with a delightful video about a character who might
be Reich -- as he should have been.

Dan Parmenter