Tribute to David Fontana

David Fontana was one of three Professors invited to address the NAS Seminar in 1997 held at a hotel in Cardiff.

The following extract is from a lengthy report on the weekend seminar prepared by Lew Sutton and published over two issues of our Newsletter.

"The weekend beginning 12th September 1997 saw another Noah’s Ark Seminar with three of the lectures given by respected professors.

"Professors Arthur Ellison and David Fontana are both members of the SPR (Society for Psychical Research) and also members of the SMN (Scientific & Medical Network).

"Arthur is Vice President of the SMN, and David, President of the SPR. Professor Kiyohiro Miura from Japan is a director of the Japan Psychic Science Association and is Professor of English at Meiji University. Professor Miura is also a member of the SPR.

"'In Defence of Physical Mediumship' formed the title for Professor David Fontana. A brave title for a leading academic who may risk scorn from colleagues!

"In fact he started by saying this is an age when the sceptic speaks very publicly. A time when the scientific evidence for the paranormal is slowly building up so much so that it will finally make the sceptics stance untenable.

"One of the interesting facts that came out of various scientific laboratory experiments that David covered in his talk was the results of the American Governments 20 million pounds worth of investigations. Information on their experiments has only been recently released.

"Apparently if the results of the 26,000 trials are added together, the chances of the positive results being due to pure chance are a billion billion to one against. That sounds pretty conclusive to me.

"Another interesting fact that came out is that paranormal experiments work better at certain predictable times by a considerable amount. The best results occurred at about 1300hrs sidereal time.

"As a sidereal day is 23hrs 57min 4sec long it means that each day by our own local time the peak effect is at a different time each day. What this means is that the effects are best when our planet faces in a certain direction with respect to the rest of the universe.

"Now does that have astrological implications I wonder? Is this why mediumship works better some days than others? As regards understanding the sidereal day, at midday sidereal time we are always pointing in a certain direction with respect to the distant stars (Aries constellation) whereas midday local time we are always pointing towards our own star, the sun (A simple computer program can calculate sidereal time with respect to local time).

"In spite of watertight experiments, the sceptics still claim that there must be flaws in the experiments. David claimed that this "can't happen" attitude is now inhibiting science.

"Sceptics cannot accept that the world is a very mysterious place."

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Following the seminar David wrote to me as follows:

“It was a most enjoyable weekend, and I much appreciated your arranging for me to attend both the [physical mediumship] sittings.

"I have to say also George that your conference organisation is one of the very best I have experienced.

"I attend academic conferences all over the place, and rarely do I come across such excellent timekeeping, information dissemination and general support both for speakers and participants. Many congratulations.

"In addition, your talk and your chairmanship provided some of the outstanding highlights of the weekend, so you can see why I enjoyed things so much.

"...... Have you thought of changing the title of the Newsletter? Its quality is way beyond that of a humble newsletter these days. It could be called ‘The Ark’ or ‘The Ark Review’.......

"Still on the subject of the Newsletter, I would like to do interviews with Tom Harrison and with Stuart Adamson if you agree. Tom likes the idea (I haven’t asked Stuart yet).

"I think readers would be interested, and obviously Tom and Stuart have such rich experiences to call upon (as you do yourself)."

Sincerely yours

David

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I wish him well in his new environment.

Ave atque vale, David.