◆ SpookStack

STAT Approved For Release 2003/04/18 : CIA-RDP96-00787R000500420001-2 [ DST~-1810S8-387-75 September 1975 . fluctuations, official hostility towards parapsychology increased in the Soviet Union. For example, Soviet authorities took the strongest possible exception to a best-seller in the West, Ostrander and Schroeder's "Psychic Discoveries Behind the Iron Curtain."5 Edward K. Naumov, then Director of the Institute of Technical Parapsychology, Moscow,® was cited throughout as the journalists’ guide and mentor. Unfortunately, the Voice of America beamed a radio program into the Soviet Union discussing the Schroeder and Ostrander book, a broadcast that was construed as a politically motivated attack using parapsychology as a weapon. Apart from this episode, it is not entirely clear why Soviet officialdom should have taken such fierce exception to a frankly popular, sensational, and rather chaotic pook, which was not taken seriously by many Western scientists. The most plausible interpretation seems that the Soviets were worried that they might be believed by the world's scientific community to be self-proclaimed champions and leaders of parapsychology. In fact, Soviet scientists are just as divi- ded among themselves concerning parapsychology as scientists elsewhere and since 1972, a number of openly critical publications concerning parapsy— chology research have appeared in the Soviet Union. A few examples of such open attacks follow. (U) In 1972, V.M. Bleykher (a reputable Soviet neurophysiologist) pub- lished a book titled "Parapsychology - Science or Superstition." In an annotation to this book (and, in fact, as the lead paragraph) Bleykher stated, “this book is designed (sic) to debunk parapsychology." The book began with such arcane and archaic topics as phrenology (headbump reading) and ended with a chapter prefaced by a cartoon showing a broom sweeping the Russian word "parapsychology," out of the picture. The entire bias of the book was to make a direct link between 19th century “spiritualism and 20th century parapsychology. (U) In 1973, Kazakhstanskaya Pravda (Alma-ata) carried an article by Doctor of Medical Science V. Podachin, titled “Careful: Paramedicine!" In his article, Podachin openly attacked "unproven telepathic trans- mission of information over distances from one person to another on the pasis of their neuropsychic states," and criticized parapsychologists "for claiming to obtain results that are completely unrelated to the cause-and-effect principle." , (U) In October 1973 a long and detailed paper entitled "Parapsychology: Fiction or Reality?" was published in Questions of Philosophy, an official publication of the Soviet Academy of Pedogogical Sciences, by four eminent members of the Moscow Academy of Pedagogical Sciences, V.P. Zinchenko, A.N. Leontiev, B.F. Lomov, and A.R. Luria. They explicitly set out "to express the viewpoint of the USSR Society of Psychologists 5 [| Approved For Release 2003/04/18 : CIA-RDP96-00787R000500420001-2 STAT