Mysterious Universe - 36.07 - MU Podcast - Strange Powers of the Mind

Episode Date: August 21, 2026

Welcome to Mysterious Universe Season 36, episode 07! Today we dust off a 1968 banger written by Warren Smith to investigate some strange cases of some strange powers of the mind. From unheeded premonitions that should have been heeded, to a Yogi burying himself in the outfield of a baseball game that is played in full, only to be dug up at the end of the game, just a little parched. Including, but certainly not limited to, a remarkably perceptive mentalist detective who solves an impossible quadruple murder case in Canada. For our Plus+ extension, we conclude the amazing journey through Spontaneous Human Combustion by Jenny Randles & Peter Hough. We take a look at more electrical possibilities including atmospheric effects, individual biology/chemistry, and some final thoughts on what this odd phenomenon could possibly be.  Strange Powers of the Mind by Warren Smith  Count Ostoja Rises from his Grave Spontaneous Human Combustion LinksPlus+ ExtensionThe extension of the show is EXCLUSIVE to Plus+ Members. To join. click HERE.Links Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ready to take your investing knowledge to pro-level. This is Fidelity Connects, your daily edge in the markets. Get deep insights on real-time market topics that may impact your investment portfolio. Listen to Fidelity Connects on Spotify today and power your next move tomorrow. Mysterious Universe, this is season 36 episode number seven. Today we're going to investigate some strange cases of some strange powers of the mind. I'm your mentally sound host, Brandon Thomas, and with me as always, is the original mental ninja

Joe Son, Hodgden. How are you, fella? Mentally sound, are you sure about that? Are you talking about me mentally sound? Well, from my perspective, I'm mentally sound. If we're going off of my metric, yeah, buddy, we are as sound as she comes. Yeah, so taking kind of a hard left, huh, from the last six, you know, the series you were doing on visitors from within. And I did want to mention, too, since this is a free show and people on YouTube and everything,

if you're missing a couple parts of what we do, it's because it's on plus. I just want to put that out there. So it's not that it's missing from YouTube or the free feed. It's in the subscriber feed. So if you want to catch those episodes, that's where you would find them. And you obviously go to the links in the show notes to find them. And I'm not sure. Do you know, but how far back does the free feed archive even go?

because that is one of the perks of, especially if you sign up to MU Max, you get the entire back catalog. All have been in Aaron's 20 years worth of shows. Yeah. And so if you're not getting the plus shows and the extensions, you're missing probably over half the context of what we're going after here. So just putting that out there. Yeah, it's two thirds. Yeah, because we do the Friday free bit. If this is what you guys are experiencing, it's one third of the content that we put out.

Definitely get on board with plus and absolutely get the back catalog because it's going to fill you in on all the stuff, the legendary. So yes, this is a higher bitrate feed. You guys get a completely separate concurrently running season on Tuesday. So you get a Tuesday, this, and then we add a completely another show on what you're listening right now. Definitely sign up in the links below, guys. This is the way to go because we're doing it all as one continuous threat. So there's not necessarily going to be a, oh, we'll make sure that the free listeners are caught up. No.

This is a package deal for the Plus members, free listeners. You guys get to catch it a little bit at a time here on Friday, and we appreciate you joining us. but stop missing out on this stuff, man. Guys, come join us in Plus. It's the way to go. Yeah, the free show and the YouTube version is pretty much a trailer for what we do. Yeah. Yeah, it's literally a third.

Literally a third. So if you guys are like, man, there's more here. You're correct. Follow that intuition into the links below and check it out. Speaking of that, speaking of plus. Segway. Talking about following on from threads. So I think it was the last free show.

I did, I think, is when I started this spontaneous human combustion book, and it ended up being a lot more in there than I could fit into one show or even two. So the conclusion to that is going to be coming up in plus, and it's going to be finally going to be getting into some more electrical phenomenon with spontaneous human combustion and the ball lightning aspect. And then they kind of tie it in with, okay, some of this UFOs or some kind of ET thing that's going on here. And the whole thing weaves together pretty nicely. So if you're on, on, on, Plus, stay tuned for that. If you're not, go sign up. Yes, and thank you guys, the Plus members, for joining us on those deep dive.

Getting great feedback. Got a sweet message from Bailey the day the other day, the other day talking about how when we were comparing us as the heart cells and the entities as the brain cells, that's pulled on a cool string for her. And she's just great. So yeah, you guys, join us on Plus, and we again, appreciate you, plus members. You guys are incredible. Thank you, all. Well, brother, this is a beautiful little book that I found in the stack that came from Australia here. It doesn't look like it was broken into at all. So the boy sent me a freshie here that has just, it was printed back in 1968, and it's just been sitting there. This is beautiful forward by Brad Steiger.

And this thing is called Strange Powers of the Mind. And this is by Warren Smith. Now, Warren Smith, first of all, have you ever heard of Warren Smith? No. I had neither. And I love this. I love walking over to the library and seeing a few that I know and a few that I don't, and grabbing that one.

So his biography, just under the name Warren. Smith, which is very important. He wrote 25 books. Okay. Now, he then went under a pseudonym of Eric Norman. So keep a look out in your library for that. And he wrote 11 books. Then he and Brad Steiger with Eugene Olson wrote five books together. Then you have Warren co-authored with Gabriel Green. One book. You've got written under the pseudonym Paul Warren. So this is titled The Sensual Male Pinnacle in 1971. You have another pseudonym. Are you keeping track because I didn't?

Robert E. Smith wrote another three books. Then you've got a pseudonym Barbara O'Brien, which I know I've seen one of those in my library. Then you've got another pseudonym Barbara Brooks. Then you have Johnny Sear. Then you have Joanne Warren. These are novels. And then also David Norman for six novels as well.

And then Norma Warren. for another novel and then Jake Logan for two and then Warren Smith and Harry Plethrum wrote a book together in 83. So he's just trying out different names, seeing which one stick? Seeing what sticks. I thought Warren Smith was fine and he had 25 books that says same thing. But then I guess if an author does want to kind of go off and write novels or something like this and it's like if, you know, I mean, David Hatcher Childress wanted to write like a series

about dragons, like a fictional series, he'd probably need to do it under a different name. Well, from what I've noticed, I don't know what the cause or the meaning of this is, but especially fiction writers love to just use two letters and then a last name. What is that? That actually, that actually is important for women. Did you know this? I know this actually. So women used to use two initials in the last name because they were getting swept away because their name was Catherine or some shit. So if you use two initials and then a last name, people don't. J.K. Rowling. Yeah. Right. So that's one of the examples of that would be a female authors do this. But J-R-R-R-R, no, yeah, the guy that did Game of Thrones was another two letters in the last name. Anyway, it's just something I noticed. I'm like, is that just a thing writers do just because other writers do it or what? And then you had R.L. Stein. I mean, same thing. C.S. Lewis.

C.S. Louis, sure. I agree with you, but I knew that women used to do it so that they weren't swept away because there were women. So that people would read their words and listen to what they had to say. That makes sense. Yeah, it does. If I was a woman, I'd probably do that. Okay, buddy, are you ready? Because these stories are just nuts. I just pulled quite a few here.

I've got them grouped into two different categories here. One is just going to be premonitions and bizarre shit. All right, just weird, weird premonitions, weird bizarre shit. Then we have another one that we're going to get into the next time that we get together on dreams, specifically dreams. One of them is fucking nuts. I told Mary about it. She was like, that's one of the craziest stories. It's one of the craziest stories I've ever heard.

We are going to sandbag that for the next time that we get together. So, Tuesday, come back for the. dreams version of this. We save the best for that. So you plus members enjoy it and there's plenty of time to sign up to come enjoy that. Well, that's going to be right up my alley. Not so much yours, but you can imagine at least, right? I will be baffled by it. It was funny too because Mary said that the other night I was saying something or doing something in my sleep if I was dreaming, but I have no fucking recollection of any of it. So I probably do, I just have no clue. It's zap from my mind. Brandon's sleeping going, yeah. It was. It was something like that because it wasn't intelligible,

not that any much of what I say is but it was and she said and it kept getting more like I was trying to spit out maybe that was my tone right I'm playing my frequency that we talked about on the visitors from within the series

sounded like some sleep paralysis or something something like that man yeah no clue I get great sleep I just turn off turn back on but we are going to talk about the weird strange powers of the mind dreams edition on Tuesday so you guys sign up in the links below

and join us for that but Warren and Smith has some crazy stuff for us so let's check it out So this is titled The Teenagers Premonition. Now, he writes that in Judah, Wisconsin, it's located just south of the state capital of Madison, which sits quietly in the county of Hamlet, and it's then 400 residents. We're just living life, dude. It was a glorious time to be alive out there.

In that Wisconsin town there, Judah stood a single school building that accommodated the elementary school and high school grades. So all the grades went to one school, that classic single school house. type thing. It's been a tradition in this town that among the high school students, they would raise funds for this senior spring trip by like holding cake sales and ice cream socials and chilly suppers and Sadie Hawkins dances and weekend car washes and shit. Do you, I know you don't know what that is. Do you feel like you missed out on any of that kind of shit, like the bake sales and Sadie Hawkins and such? No, I mean, we had bake sales through the church and the church school and stuff like that. So I didn't ever like them or the, yeah, the pie.

and ice cream socials. I never liked going to that shit anyway. A bunch of just crabby old people. What about a dance? Did you guys do dances? No. And I don't feel like I missed on that either. I'm far too white for that. I missed on that social weirdness. Do you know what Sadie Hawkins dances? No. Okay. Sadie Hawkins is when the girls ask the boys. So it's this reverse patriarchy, feminist empowered type of a thing.

Oh, smash it. Yeah. In March of 1967, a young Judah high school senior had a frightening premonition concerning her forthcoming trip to New Orleans. Her name was Doreen William. She was 17 years old, and she told her minister that she did not want to go on this trip. She felt that something seriously bad would occur. She just had this weird feeling. However, the young girl discounted her own premonition so that she could hang out with her classmates.

And on March 30th in 1967, 32 Judah seniors had shopped and visited the tourist shrines and hung out in New Orleans, and shortly after midnight, as the group prepared to retire, any guests, this show? They all died. I don't know. This sounds like final destination. Yeah, that's kind of what it reminded me,

of a DC-8 jetliner glided towards a landing strip at a nearby airport. Five pilots were undergoing practice training, and God saw an opportunity to take them all out at once. The plane banged for the landing, and the giant airliner's white wings scraped against the house. The enormous craft cartwheeled, and it slammed into a motel. This wouldn't have happened if Denzel would have been there, is all I'm saying.

Exploding debris and high-octane jet fuel splattered over the wing of the motel, where several Judah senior girls were housed. I thought this was kind of wicked. You're being killed by a wing in a wing? After eating wings for dinner? The wing of the hotel flared into a fiery Holocaust, and nine of the students were consumed by the ugly flames. And among the victims was Doreen Williams, the young girl who failed to heed the warning of her own ominous premonition.

That really is final destination. Yeah. Yes. He'd them premonitions, kids. Well, she would have just been outrunning it for the next seven movies anyway. So get it over quick. Yeah, good call. Doreen just like, I'm just going to skip that right now.

Okay, well, here's one where the premonition was heated. So let's check this out. This is titled His Premonition Trapped a Thief. Heating an intuitive warning of some incomprehensible danger caused Harold Pelvin, who was 48 years old at the time, to leave his president's desk at the Pelvin Petroleum Company in Chicago and returned to his 15-room home one early afternoon in 1966. And we arrived at midday, Pelvin found that his 67-year-old mother, who also lived in the house, she was doing. doing well, hanging out. Nothing seemed to miss. So Homeboy retired to the screened in porch to relax. His brief rest was interrupted by his mother's scream for help, though. And Ms. Pelvin informed police investigators that a man had knocked on the door. He said, I'm with the heat and company,

and I did some work on your furnace, mentioning the firm by name. So he knew the company that was already there. He said he felt silly and he left some tools there and he just needed to go in and grab him. Now, the story sounded completely plausible. Ms. Plevin, of course, allowed the man to enter the house, and immediately the intruder flashed a gun and threatened Ms. Plevin and demanded money and jewels. Now, when Harold the son dashed to his mother's aide, the excited robber jammed the barrel of the revolver into his stomach,

the well-built six-footer with instinctive actions and cat-like reflexes, he knocked the weapon aside and twisted the hoodlum's arm around until the pistol dropped on the floor. Both men scrambled for the fallen revolver. Puevlin, the son here, the guy who had the premonition, he snatched it up. And during the continued struggle, he shot the intruder to death. And police identified the dead robber as ex-convict Robert Dunlop, and he was 32 years old. So he had a premonition to go home, goes home, boom, saves his mother's life.

It's pretty wild. What do you think about that? Have you ever had a feeling like that where something just made you go, I've got to go check this out. and then it ended up being something you were really glad that you listened to? Not to that extreme. I have had weird things, though, where I was somehow late leaving for work, and then that five minutes I would have been involved in like a five-car pile-up.

Yes. I've had weird stuff like that happened, but it wasn't something I premonitioned. It was whatever you want to call that, luck or fate or destiny or whatever, but I just, I mean, I probably would have been smashed between like six other cars. So I was like, well, I'm glad I'm late to work today because. That would have sucked worse. I always think this. If there's something that I'm like, oh, damn, I forgot this.

It's never like, ugh, and I have to run back in the house. Even if I need to come back a mile or two to the house to get it, it's never a pain in the ass because I know it happened for a reason. Like you and I always say that. I'm always like, maybe I'm missed a wreck by five minutes or something. Yeah, or your kid forget something or your wife needs to go back to it or whatever it is. Right. It's like, well, we're out 10 minutes now, so maybe that's good somehow.

Yeah, you trust that shit. This is where divine timing comes in. You know, this is why you don't rush. shit is because everything happens exactly on time. And if you're hurried or you should go, oh, well, it's not a big deal. And don't heed these kind of things. Maybe die in New Orleans in a fiery crash. Yeah.

On a plane you weren't even in. You were just sleeping peacefully and then just boom, now you're on fire. That sucks. Okay, check this out. I thought this was so crazy. So this is titled Miracle Mind of the White Yoga. A determined line of spectators had formed early outside the ticket window leading to Citronella field in Inglewood, California on July 25, 1932.

So we're at a baseball game in 1932 in July, great summer. Few in the group, though, were interested in the baseball game. Everybody was attracted by a feat to be performed by Count Roman Ostuha, a Polish nobleman known as the white yogi. This little kid asked, are they really going to bury him alive, Pa? The youngster looked up at his father, wide-eyed, and the father said, That's what they claim. I don't know how this guy can survive.

So Count Astoha planned to go into a trance, be buried alive in a freshly dug grave in the center of the baseball diamond, and then be disinterned at the climax of the baseball game. Okay? So you're on board with what's happening here? So through all nine innings, apparently? Yes. Hmm. Well, 1932.

It sounds like some Houdini shit. He's got a straw or something he's breathing through, right? The David Blaine of his day, man, for sure. And I've got an article linked on this guy. Actually, he did a ton of shit. So, spoiler, Larry, he doesn't die, but check this out. He went on to do all kinds of stuff, and it's linked. So the count plan to go into a trance,

be buried alive in a freshly dug grave in the center of the baseball diamond, right? Then at the climax of the game, he is to be dug up and revealed. It was just the type of show, though, to make this depression haunted Californians like shake a few pennies out at their sugar jars for admission to the ballpark. They were trying to get people out, so any spectacle would work to stimulate the economy here. The gravesite had been selected by a delegation headed by the town mayor, and the local grave diggers had checked carefully to be certain that there was no method in which air could enter the grave. A pine board box had been hastily pounded together by a local carpenter.

One of the bystanders was like, we'd better get the count to sign paperwork to show that we're not responsible if he gets hurt down there. And that's a fair thing to do. You know, you've got to get this guy to sign something. So the count obliged. Release of liability. Yeah. Absolutely.

The count obliged. And he said that when the stance had filled with spectators, the count turned. He raised his arms into a T position and prepared himself for entry into a state called some mutty. There's a doctor there. And it said, he says that his tongue turns backwards and swallows air so that nothing can get into his lungs. This is what the doctor said, how he does this. So he swallows his tongue. No air can get in or out. The physician there stepped forward and examined the stiffened body of the white yoga as he's doing this practice here. The physician and his colleagues carefully checked the count. Somebody reported

that there was no pulse and that they couldn't find a heartbeat. Somebody else suggested that you put a mirror up to his lips and nose, you know, to see if he's breathing. Somebody else said there's no sign of breath and he said, my God, he's getting cold and stiff. He's dead. were heard from the crowd here. Now, the Count's skin had turned at the color of chalk. His rigid body was placed in the pine coffin. The carpenters hammered on the top, and the gravediggers lowered the coffin into the grave.

One gravedigger was quoted saying, I don't like it, but I guess we've got to cover him up. And so they're shoveling fresh dirt onto this guy. Even the grave diggers weren't cool with it. The crowd stared in gruesome fascination as a last shovel of earth was packed onto the grave, he writes. and then play ball and umpire yells because they've got this baseball game to do right

so they're just stomping all over and through the whole game yes the two ball the two baseball teams then ran onto the field and started warm up the spectator asked the examining physicians like how's he do this and the doctor said it has something to do with astral projection of his body during the burial said the skeptic physician he says he said that it's possible to project himself right up here into the stands and watch the game. That would have been cool. I was going to say, yeah, he wanted a free ticket to the game. He's going to astrally watch it. Why not? Better AC, and it's in July, too, so I bet the

conditions are a little bit cooler, and he gets buried underground. It's nice and temper under there. Nice and temperate. So the count said that he studied yoga, the psychic phenomena and philosophy under a man he called the Master of the East. And on numerous occasions, the count had performed the burial to prove the ability of man to survive in a state of suspended animation with no food, no water, and no air. Even the most ardent baseball buff was bored with the game played that afternoon. Spectators' eyes clung to the fresh amount of dirt on the ball field. I don't know how you could think of anything else.

There's a dude buried under there. How could you play? I don't know how the players could. I know. That's what I'm saying. So many thought about the dark blackness of a premature grave and the type of man that would subject himself to such an experiment. Because you've got to think there's kids that don't get what's going on there.

just like seeing this man get buried in the middle of the field and then now we're playing ball on it. They're like, is a guy still in there? Is he okay? What do we do? Did we see a dead guy? And what does he get out of it? Because it may be just notoriety and that's kind of viral marketing of the time, you know? He's like, I got to get more eyes on me. So I'm going to do this crazy stunt at a baseball game. And it worked out for the ballpark too because they sold more tickets. Nailed it. You got post-depression time going on here in 1932. They're just trying to get folks out and spending money. And here we go. Now is the sun reddened in the evening sky? The grave diggers dug up the pine coffin.

And the crowd tensed and pressed forward as the coffin was raided to the surface. A carpenter slammed a nail puller into the nail on top. A raising sound grated through the ballpark as a reluctant nail gave way. He writes. I love that. Like that right, you know, as you're pulling off that huge box. Again and again, long nails were pulled from splintering boards. And the count lay quiet in the box when it was opened,

tensed to a cold, cold stiffness, or perhaps even actual death. The doctors again examined his body and their tests revealed no signs of life whatsoever. He's dead for certain, a city official said. However, following the nobleman's instructions, the officials waited several minutes before they did anything. So he told them before, like, look, I'm going to look pretty damn dead when you open this thing, okay? But just give me a few minutes and see what happens. So they obliged this and said, okay. I was going to say, if he never came to, they already dug a fresh grave.

Just keep him there. And wouldn't that be great if I was like, and he was actually dead, they actually just decided to put the lid back on, chuck him in the ball field, and that's there. There's a marker there in the middle of the field and you can go play. To this day. It's not what happened, though. So the clock moved very slowly, though, in those few minutes while everybody's looking

at this guy going like, what are we looking at here, you know? A prominent citizen talked quietly about the risk to the community and allowing such a stunt to be performed in the entire time. town's reputation would be blemished if they killed this guy. I said, what will people say when they hear that everyone in town paid to see us bury a man alive? I can't disagree with that, because it's kind of weird. You got to talk like him back then, though. He's good, see?

So a doctor then said, look, his eyelid blinked. His body is trembling. He's coming around. And a warm glow began to color. This creepy pale, once-dead white count's face. awaiting officials pressed glass after glass into the pine box, and the miraculous yoga eagerly drank them and asked for more, and he explained that the liquid regenerated his body.

So astral travels like a diuretic, I guess, takes it out of you. So he didn't just go and wake up? They just started dumping water on him? Yeah, he started breathing, and so they started, yeah, handing him water, and he starts drinking it, like sipping on it, and then just more and more, and so they just kept handing him water, and he kept getting stronger and stronger. It's like waking up a vampire.

It is. I wonder if there's a way you can just like dehydrate yourself. And then know that if they open the box, air will kind of get those processes started. Once you get enough to where you can drink, they start handing you water and then you're out of it. Maybe that's the process. It reminds me of that story from several years ago now,

but it was some kind of yogi or Indian guy or something that had apparently died, but the locals were like, no, he's actually just in this like Samadhi. state. Like he's he's in deep meditation. Yeah. But they kept him in this place for like a long time and they finally just maybe he is dead. Shit.

Like he was going rigor mortis like starting to look like a dead body and they're like maybe he's not doing that. Maybe he actually just died. Should he fool everybody? And he's like roast everybody's like this is going to be the best prank ever. He goes going to have to take care of my body. They're going to look after it and keep bugs off of it and shit. All he did was die. It's like this is great.

You just hover it over your body. Laugh and your ass off. It's awesome. Yes. So a few minutes later, the count stepped from the coffin and walked around the baseball diamond. The applause from the crowd was insane. It's just this thundering roar as they see this dude step out of a box. They watch get buried nine innings ago. Real Canadian Superstore has everything you need this back-to-school season. Save on lunchbox savers like Ziggy's sliced deli-meat products for always $3.75. And get life brand pure Vita shampoo or conditioner for $8 each. At Real Canadian Superstore, when you're ready, we're ready. With a whole world in

Ready to take your investing knowledge to pro-level, this is Fidelity Connects, your daily edge in the markets. Get deep insights on real-time market topics that may impact your investment portfolio. Listen to Fidelity Connects on Spotify today and power your next move tomorrow. The unexplained powers of this count had baffled once again. It puzzled and astonished those who were attending the Grizzly demonstration. And those who had supervised the demonstration swore that there was no evidence of a single-tread of trickery. He did this legit. The count was dressed in pajamas when his body was placed in the coffin and there was nothing in the pine box. Perhaps another example here of the mastery of the mind.

You can hear folks doing this, man, these weird ability to take their body into these incredible states that we think shouldn't happen, but they just know that they're possible. Yeah, I wouldn't, like anything else, I wouldn't put off the table. It's just a lot of, especially the David Blaine types now, you know this just an illusionist. I mean, he's not, he's not having any mind power in my opinion. But it would be funny if this dude passes out flyers on the way out of the ball stadium. My tour dates for the next month. Here you go.

Come see me. Pretty much. So I did link this. Count Osorja rises from his grave and it's actually got heaps of accounts of this dude. It's a picture of him pulling something through his tongue. In black and white, of course. He's just real flim-flam type of dude. It's very over the top. So I linked an article along with it, guys. So you can

check out more about this guy. He apparently did this all over the place. Pretty cool. See him at the sphere in Las Vegas on October 7th. Seen this weekend at the laugh spot. Yes. See me get buried. It's just weird shit like that. I kind of miss those days.

And I think if you do have true magic, now would be the time to come out. Because like you said, oh, David Blaine's just an illusionist. That could be a damn demon running around here, man. And he just plays like he's an illusionist, but we expect flimflan magic and none of it to be real. So therefore, they could display proper magic and we'd write it off. We'd go, oh, fucking AI or whatever, you know. Yeah, now. But that's the thing,

those are a lot of the people that say they have these, are they call them cities, these, you know, especially in the east, these, it's like gifts of the spirit type of idea where they can do these things. It seems like they can,

once they start doing it for notoriety or money, it seems to fail. Or at least it doesn't work as well. It's like it's sequestered to the people who need it. So go back to your village and if you have these healing abilities, use it and it's free. because it's something, you know, that you don't charge for, that kind of idea. It's very interesting.

And I wonder if that's a psychological deal. Like if this guy, for instance, he's like, man, I've been doing this forever. Like, nobody cares. I do it for me and everything's good. And I don't know. I wonder if it's a psychological thing. But I have heard that as well that folks feel that whenever they start doing something for money, artists, musicians, things like this have a tough time transitioning to receiving value for something,

even though they know because putting value on something is very tricky. So, yeah. But there's a spiritual component to that with that. But it seems that rather again, they cock block themselves in some way, but it's kind of alters whenever you do start receiving funds from it. And I think it's mental. I think it's their ability to receive. If you want to talk about Hollywood and the music industry, that's different thing entirely. Yes.

The money does pour in, at least for a time. A lot of these people seem to have some kind of weird, you know, proverbial deal with the devil. And a lot of them actually come out and say that. And it's like a ha, ha, ha. But then they end up, you know, having some kind of mental break or go. going to rehab and die weird coming out a different person yes yeah they go out to rehab and then now their tattoos missing that they had forever they have a new one or something like that yeah usually come out with their head shaved and uh a lot a lot of times blonde in some cases but oh

weird yeah this place is weird we should get yeah we should get into clones sometimes so uh for sure though all right let's talk about the madman of matoon i actually pulled this one just for you buddy Oh, thanks. Warren writes in here that it was a frightening experience for Miss Alice Pagan of Matoon, Illinois. At a few minutes after midnight on September 2nd, this is in 1944, Mrs. Pagan hastily dialed the Matun police station and screamed, Help me, I've been guest. Hmm, what?

A policeman stated. Send a policeman right away, said Miss Pagan. An intruder has tried to murder me with poison gas. Although Ms. Pagan was trembling with fright when the police arrived, the police who rushed her home obtained the information that she was alone that night for her husband worked at a Matun factory. Ms. Pagan said about an hour after she went to bed, something woke her up about half an hour into her sleep.

She said that she felt like she was being suffocated. She tried to get out of bed, but she couldn't move. She said that her legs and arms seemed paralyzed. She said that there was a sickish, sweet odor in the room. But then she finally managed to get up and call the police. An inspection of the house, though, in the yard revealed that everything, of course, was in order. Shining a powerful flashlight in the bedroom window, police did notice, though, the screen

was intact to the window. Nobody knows signs of force entry at all. The cop said, ah, perhaps you were dreaming there, as he mansplained to her. And she said absolutely not. She said she smelled the gas. She felt sick to her stomach. and she was dying on that hill that something was going on.

Now we hear this though also that there's this sulfuric sweet smell sometimes in some of these interesting woo cases of entities, a variety of types are associated with UFO phenomena, demons, what people call demons, even these shadowy type entities or whatever.

Some say it's, you know, I mean there's, and then that splinters into a whole show's worth of what's that from. Is it a portal? Is it how they manifest? Is it what they really smell like? Is that what their dimension smell?

like they pull a little air in from where they come from, that they rip ass, and that's how they time travel or portal across. You don't know. But that night, though, two more reports of Phantom Gassers were received at the police headquarters. You had Miss Sarah, Miss George, and Miss Celeste Orlando had each awakened to the smell of a sickening, sweet odor in their bedrooms, and they felt nearly paralyzed. Their reports were almost identical to the one furnished by Miss Paget. And at that time, during World War II,

Matun was this county of like 18,000 residents and very few law enforcement problems. So nothing like this really happened. Nevertheless, the residents were absolutely shocked by the news of the macabre attacks. There's this businessman who suggested that perhaps is a Japanese secret weapon. Because, I mean, that's a thing, right? Oh, they were worried about that back then. I'd be more thinking along the lines that it was early CIA experiments, but that's just me. That's what I thought of it too, because they were testing on their own people around this time.

Because that's what the Nuremberg trial said, right, that you can't do chemical weapons testing on people from other countries. But didn't say shit about doing it on the people in your own country. Yeah, well, they're going to do it anyway if they want to. Fair enough. Which is about the time that the weather modification stuff started happening as well. Pretty interesting patents for making it rain and whatnot starts coming up. And they did heaps of tests on people that they've admitted, putting these fogger machines. on rooftops and

Operation C spray or C foam or something like that. There's the subways in New York they gassed on purpose just to see what would happen. Yeah. Not to mention things like Tuskegee, but yeah. I'm thinking this is kind of one of those is in 44. And you'll find

a pattern through this as well. So another businessman suggested that if the Japs had a secret gas, they wouldn't use it in Matun. He said there's certainly no threat to anybody. And so it was a silly thing for anyone to think that Matun would ever get in much action like that. But that's how you do it, right? You hit like a super small town.

That's the psychological op. You just hit one, one or two, that nobody's ever heard of put them on the map. That's the thing is that that would be an ideal place to do it because it's such a small town. It's not going to get much press. Same idea as Camelio, you know, why would they chase around a druggie? Because it's the perfect target. Exactly. No one's going to believe him.

It's perfect. On the night, following the first three attacks, it appeared as if the magic, Phantom was intent on gassing every woman in town because that's the threat is it's all chicks. It's all women, yeah. Yes. Did they say that they had hysteria or the vapors or something like that? See, and I don't know because that's the thing that they all go to the same like potluck and eat the same thing and then all just have really bad farts or something or get a bad reaction from it. You can't roll this kind of thing out.

Right, and they can't admit to it, not in 1944. God, no. No, it wasn't to me, dear God. The switchboard at the Matoon police station was flooded with Frantic Hall. for help. This guy named Barry Rothman's police chief and his department answered calls throughout the night from various sections of the city. So it wasn't in one specific area.

It was all over. Terrified women claimed that gas had poured into their bedroom windows and each suffered from shock and nausea. And on the third night of the phantom's wave of terror, one woman told police that she'd been awakened by a noise at her bedroom window. A woman said that the madman was pumping gas into the bedroom window. She said that she caught a look at him as he ran away and he was tall and slender, and it was a dude. There was a policeman that asked how he was dressed.

She said, quote, his clothes were black and he was wearing a black skull cap that read, My other hat is your mom. Police Chief Rothman placed his men on 24-hour emergency duty. That's also what it's called when he ate a king-sized bag of raisinets intended for a six-hour-long road trip and they get stuck in traffic 20 minutes outside of your intended toilet. All night duty. Ooh, emergency duty. So squad cars patrol the residential areas during the night,

and air raid wardens and volunteer vigilantes marched through the quiet neighborhood searching for someone suspicious. This town just went nuts. Remember that Twilight Zone? What was it called? The Monsters? And the humans ended up being the monsters? Anyway, this reminded me of that, too,

because you could gas a town and then see how not only the women, because, again, it habits to women, now your protector mode kicks in and you're like, what's happening to these women? They're not admitting to farts. It's got to be something else. So you should go patrol the area with your buddies and your neighbors with shotguns at night. Just looking for anybody suspicious.

So the nighttime terror continued and the Phantom Gasser was reported in 13 spots during a single night. Holy shit, he got around. I know. Homeowners patrolled their neighborhoods armed with shotguns and pistols. A commissioner said, quote, I would not want to walk through someone's backyard for 50,000. dollars right now which is i don't know 1944 money but that was probably quite a bit because people in matune are losing control and somebody could be killed and he added that the victim would probably

most likely be an innocent bystander rather than the phantom gasser yeah well if the whole town knew it was going on you'd think they'd be able to i don't know do some early meth about it and stay up and just watch their window and catch a glimpse of this guy yeah yeah just hey pull an all-nighter They said after a few nights of gas attacks, Chief Rotham said that the strange gas could be fumes escaping from this Atlantis Imperial diesel engine plant that was right there. And this plant manager was like, fuck that.

There's no damn way. We've been running this thing for four years and nobody's complaint, he snapped. He said, if the fumes were escaping from the plant, we didn't notice by now. We'd be the first to notice and we didn't notice by now. So they ruled that out. A crack team of investigators, though,

from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, no less. hoared into the town. And they check for the possibility of a secret chemical being used by the madman of a matoon as the press tagged this mysterious phantom. So they're investigating themselves at this point? Correct. That's what I'm hearing.

I'm like, oh, well, we've got to go check this out as they're scooting the canisters of whatever this is off to the side. Overnight, the peace-loving community had been transformed to a panic-stricken town and the Illinois State Police stepped into the investigation under the command of Captain Charles Perry. Now, Captain Perry moved eight squad cars into the community equipped with mobile radio facilities,

and they were manned by handpicked teams of state patrolmen. The captain said, clear all the calls about the gassing's through our mobile unit. So all the things were redirected. They had this huge squad team on this phantom gasser here. He said, we'll be able to arrive on the scene quickly. So nobody's died yet, though, huh? There's a lot of reports, and they all say it's sickeningly sweet, and I feel nauseous, and whatever, but nobody's died, but the FBI moves in on it.

It's, yes, yes. As we look at something like this, from the perspective of 68, he's saying strange powers of the mind. You know, and again, we also can't rule out that some weapon was being used to make people think that they smelt gas. Yeah. Do you know what I mean? And so, again, this could be that as well, that early, I guess, sort of attempt at the sky to skull technology, but with an intuition perhaps, like, because allegedly they have technology that they can incentivize people in the sky to school technology, but they can incentivize people in the early, they can. their own minds to want to commit suicide or something like this. And if you do that, you'd probably start it with some weird things, like an olfactory sense, especially smell, man, because that one's

really deep and it bypasses the other senses in your brain. It's got its own track. And it's just a fascinating sense to fuck with if that's what's a car. There's early research on the brown note. Yeah. And it worked way too well. And these ladies could not admit that they shit themselves. This I like, that's probably my favorite theory so far. Yeah. Yeah. They're like, oh, it's just a ghost that came in. They all get together at the bridge the next Monday and go, oh, it's the gas, right? Yes. No one shit themselves, no.

They're all sowing themselves new pants at that book club meaning. State patrol cars were spotted in various sections of the community. And wherever the phantom gas were struck, a patrol car would be only moments away. So they were there. They were ready. This is a legit thing. The attack started at 10 o'clock. Gassed women called in.

That madman has gassed me! A screaming housewife yelled over the phone at this cop. Help me send the police! Sirens screaming to Illinois State policemen rush off to this home. Unexpectedly, the officers sped the victim to Memorial Methodist Hospital. So they take this gassed woman in and she said, I was in bed with my daughter mentioned smelling something, the woman explained. So just the daughter mentioned it.

Then she smelled gas and realized that the madman had been there. She said that her throat was dry, her mouth was burning. and she felt nauseous. The victim was examined at the hospital by Dr. Raymond Ortiz, and after an exhaustive examination, the doctor announced that there's a normal pulse beat, there's an absence of temperature, and no mouth burns. There's nothing wrong with this woman. Did they check her drawers with her skid marks?

I don't think they did. They were looking at the wrong place. The surprised woman shook her head. But I was guessed. She said feebly. As the patrolman returned the woman to her home, a young lady in the Matun in the Matun theater suddenly rose from the crowd

audience and screamed. The startled audience milled around in panic. So again, it's starting these panics around. Just because this chick stood up, anyone could be the Phantom Gasser. The young woman fainted and she was rushed to the hospital. Dr. Ortiz examined her as well.

And he said that she's suffering from an attack of hysteria. Ah, there it is. Maybe this is how the new Beatles mania would work. So the telephone calls ended abruptly at 2 a.m. from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. After the news spread through the community, the victims of the gassing

were being examined at the hospital. So Captain Perry announced that the case was closed. The Madman of Matun never struck again. The Phantom Madman existed in only the imaginations of the so-called victims. Psychiaturists call these strange cases

mental epidemics, usually rare in America. I don't know about that. Maybe back then. There's only been one similar case in the past 70 years when this was written in 68. And that occurred when a group of Louisiana high school girls were seized by an epidemic of twitching. As strange as the story of the Madman of Matun is, it's an incredible situation going on here

where all of these people can think the same thing. Mass hysteria, man. This power of suggestion or placebo nocebo again. Yes. It's definitely not the only case of that. I remember hearing a lot, especially from about that time period. There seemed to be what, at least what they called back then was mass hysteria or whatever, but it could, yeah, maybe it was, I mean, if you want to go the crazy route, maybe it was like early social engineering or something to see how far they could take this one power of suggestion from the first lady I'm saying was a plant. She works with the FBI.

She calls in, makes a big deal about this. And then every other lady in town is like, oh, me too. And then they all start the early Me Too movement, you know? Yeah, she's like a trendsetter. She's the David Bowie of gas attacks. That's amazing. That's a good, I didn't think to plant the plant, but good call, Joe. You diabolical, son of a bitch.

I love it. Hey, I've learned from watching decades' worth of fucked up experiments on populations. We have been trained well, eh? All right, this one is very interesting here. This one's called the Psychic Detective. And again, guys, this is from Strange Powers of the Mind by Warren Smith, one of his pseudonyms. One of the 25 books he wrote under that. pseudonym. This one cited again

the psychic detective. So there's this Manville Alberta, Canada. They were shocked to hear the news of these four senseless murders that fan through the countryside. So the case started at 9 p.m. on the quiet evening of July 9th of 1928.

So we're talking way back. Constable Bill Meredith to the role Canadian-mounted police was in his office scribbling a report when the telephone wreck. The Mounties. The Moonties, I tell you, So the telephone rang, and it was Dr. Peter Singh, and he was a Manville physician. He said, Tim, out at the F.J. Johnson Farm, you better get out here right away.

He said, well, calm down, Doc. What's the trouble? Doc said, there have been four people murdered out here. Constrable Meredith then stiffened with shock and disbelief. Four people murdered? Well, I'll be right out. So he mounted up his moose, right? And rode out. This F.J. Johnson, though, is a prosperous farmer who lives five miles from town, and Constable Meredith found it hard to believe that something had happened to the family. The policeman drove hurriedly over the graveled road, and he turned into the farm driveway,

and he walked into one of Canada's most baffling murder mysteries. Now, Dr. Singh met Meredith at the doorway to the farmhouse, and he said that the murders happened sometime after supper. He said that the Johnsons are patients of his and that their son James called him, when he found the bodies. Meredith said, all right, well, let's see him. So Miss Johnson, the mom, was shot in the back of the head and lay sprawled over the dining room table. Fred Johnson, one of the family's two adult sons had been shot several times in the face.

Two hired hands were dead in the barn. Their faces had been mutilated by gunshot. Damn. Constable Meredith said he was horrified by the carnage. He said, well, how about the rest? F.J. and his son James were working in the fields after dinner, explained the doctor. They're inside now in a bad state of shock. The two teenage daughters had went to town to a baseball game, so they missed being there.

So they missed out on it all together. Doctor said James and his dad were working in separate fields, and James came home about 8.30 p.m. and found the bodies, and then he called the doctor, okay? He said, right after he came out, the doctor then called the cops. Constable Meredith then watched the grieving father and 21-year-old James as he inspected the home. the victims had been shot point-blank range by a rifle or a pistol and the murder weapon was gone robbery seemed an unlikely motive because the bodies were not disturbed or anything nothing in the house had been touched and the policeman even noticed a small sum of money

that was laying on this kitchen ledge and a robber probably would have grabbed that right so he waited for other officers to arrive and constable meredith mentally reconstructed the murders Do you know what happened here? Because I thought this was really interesting. So just by telling that the mom was shot in the back of the head and everyone else was shot in the face, can you conclude anything with that? I mean, if we're going nuts and bolts,

but this is powers of the mind. Go nuts and bolt. This isn't the powers of the mind story. This is an actual murder. The powers of the mind come in and how they solved it. Oh. So, but from that, how could you, what would you conclude?

Mom shot in the back of the head, everyone else shot in the face. I guess I would think that the mom would be shot first sneaking up on her or something and then other people came out and they shot them right in the face. Okay. Constable Meredith concluded that Ms. Johnson had been the first

to die as she had been shot in the back of the head and was probably the intended victim. Very good. He said the others that might have been wantingly killed because they recognized the murderer. They saw it go down, right? Meredith said that it had to have been a revenge motive. Although the killer had carefully

picked up his fired cartridges, Constable Meredith did discover a 303 rifle shell in the pan of the cold dishwater. He's shooting him in the face with a rifle. That is cold. Yes, yes. Oh, God, yeah. Yeah.

Yes, and we'll find out even more so here in a minute. It was a slim clue, but it was the only evidence he had to lead him to the killer. Local police records revealed a neighboring farmer who had lived only a short distance from the Johnsons had reported the theft of a 303 rifle. The farmer willingly provided a couple of fired cartridges from his weapon and a microscopic examination by the crime lab revealed that the shells were identical. The missing rifle was the murder weapon. Now, during the days it followed, Constable Meredith repeatedly questioned the Johnson family about possible enemies. Whenever Meredith appeared on the farm, he felt a strange surge of intense hatred from James Johnson,

the son who had discovered the body as a 21-year-old. So Meredith asked him, during an interrogation, he was like, do you have a girlfriend? And James was like, girls aren't any good. And he was like, why don't you like them? And James said that they treat a person like dirt. The constable then said, well, I heard talking Manville there that a girl you dated up until six months ago was great and that the affair broke up because your mom said some nasty

things about the girl. James said, that girl wasn't any good. So you were just writing it off, right? Unemotional. Meredith tried a bluff, though. He said, James, you hated your mother, and you killed her. He said, you murdered the others when they saw you. The youth smirked.

He said, you ain't got nothing on me. You ain't found no rifle. That's an odd thing to say. It is an odd thing to say, isn't it? Specific. Yes, Meredith said, well, we'll find it, and I'm charging you with murder right now. Come along. So, the son of the slain woman was arrested and transferred to the provincial police

headquarters at Edmonton, Alberta. The officer said, you could save everybody a lot of trouble if you just confess, James. Just go ahead and let everybody know. We know that you did it. And James insisted that he didn't kill anybody. After several days of questioning the Sullen Farm Youth, Inspector Jordan read about a mentalist who claimed that they could read the minds of criminals. So he dispatched a telegram to the man because it was 1928. His name was Hans Lay, and he asked for aid in bringing down James Johnson's Iron Will.

Now, when Inspector Jordan met the train, he was greeted by a short, suave, 35-year-old man who carried a walking stick and dressed impeccably. Ah, the police inspector announced, you must be the mentalist grasping Jordan's hand. I am proud to help in my humble little way, he said. How do you work? The inspector asked. Lay said that he sits down in front of the prisoner's cell, and he guides his mind into the thought patterns of the prisoner. He said that he believed that the human mind under intense pressure transmitted signals, which could be intercepted by a trained receptive mentalist.

The inspector wondered if he just brought a crackpot into the case or if this is going to work at all. I guess he's not far off if you're thinking like Rupert Sheldrake morphic fields. You know, the fields put off by your brain and your body really in general, which is not crazy woo. That actually happens. And this actually made me think of you singing jingle bells in your your head that we'd went over on the visitors thing as we go through you'll see him okay so the inspector said have you actually tried this system and found it to work lay said there was a jewelry robber in

berlin a few years ago and they captured the culprit but we were unable to look at the jewels he said he intercepted the suspect's thoughts and discovered exactly where they were hidden so the inspector asked could you read a murderer's thoughts and find out where he'd hidden a rifle lay just says yeah of course He said the rifle is undoubtedly an important piece of evidence in the case, and he'll be thinking about it. He'll tune into it with his mind. The inspector said, I don't believe it, but as long as we're here, we might as well try it. He said, I've tried for several days to break him, but he's a tough kid. Now, shortly after arriving at the police station, Lay just placed a chair in front of James Johnson's cell, leaned back and stared directly at him.

James, of course, was a smart ass, and he was like, oh, do you like what you see? and Lay just remained absolutely silent and continued to stare. You went from around here, is you, by the way? Yeah, yeah. And you could tell, the cane, you know? So he said, though, that he remained completely silent and continued to stare at him. Now, two hours later, an angry James Johnson was screaming curses at the silent staring mentalist. So he's just sitting there staring at him.

Two hours in, he's like, fuck you, you, fucking guy. He's just sitting there going, fucking, fucking, fuck you. Yes, yeah. Now, during the third hour, the prisoner was perspiring heavily as he lay and shivered on the hard jail caught. And within four and one half hours, Joe, after he entered the jailhouse, Hans Lay returned to the Inspector Jordan's office with a drawing of the Johnson's farmstead. And he said, this is the edge of the house. He said precisely, over here in the clump of bushes, you'll find the rifle hidden there. they didn't think to look around the house

it's in a clump of bushes really I'm telling you this is you didn't need a mentalist for that a flashlight honestly when we got to this part I thought it was cool

but like you I'm like what a shit search job at the place so of course Inspector Jordan goes well let's go find out if you're right police inspector

follow the mentalist drawings because he had to draw you couldn't say that that corner so he had a drawing he found a British made 303 caliber rifle in the bushes on the Johnson farm.

Returning to Edmonton, the inspector confronted James Johnson with the evidence. James Zinn said, of course, how did you find it? He thought it was such a good hiding job. And honestly, it was. For Canadian police, I guess they just don't think to check the bushes, dude. I guess.

You got a full of mentalist. He's like, no, they're not going to check the bushes. Why would they look there? Why would they look in a perfectly reasonable place to hide a gun, dummies? He was so good, but not only was he shocked that they found it, but he was confident that they wouldn't look there. And they didn't. They had to call in a mentalist for some common sense on the topic.

I thought it was so good. He said, okay. So the police inspector said, you were worried about the rifle, and Mr. Lay read your thoughts. Or came to very obvious conclusions. He was sitting there going, I wonder if these fucking Mounties even checked the bushes. James Johnson confessed to the killing of his mother and three other victims. as Constable Meredith had concluded the young farm youth had been driven

to extreme hatred of his mother because she had interfered with his romance with a girl in Manville, moms, stay out of it. Don't get involved. You're going to get shot in the back of the head and then whoever else's own dies to. Fred Johnson and the hired men were murdered because they could identify the murderer.

James Johnson was eventually hung for his crimes. Hansley left Edmonton for further challenging. And shortly before World War II broke out, he was reported traveling through the Middle East being awesome. Well, you got to give it to the Canadians. They know how to save taxpayer dollars, at least back then. Like, no, he's not going to rot in a cell for the rest of his life. One $5 piece of rope.

We'll take care of this for you. I have a rope here, eh? I can show you what this is all about to hang it from a tree. Oh, that wouldn't be very nice wooded it. I'm sorry. We'll see if we can make your neck snap so you don't have to suffocate there, eh? All right. Let's do one more here.

So this one I just found bizarre here. Definitely getting in the head of your opponent is what I will say on this. And this is titled, A New Outlet for Occult Powers. So he sets the scene here by saying that the witch doctor came raging out of his hut and advances across the field, waving his juju sticks and pointing the thigh bone of an ox at his enemies. Terrifying. What would you think we're starting up here? A curse? Is this black magic an indebted?

jungle or some kind of voodoo in a valley of the dead? No, actually, it's nothing more than sorcery at a Nairobi-Kenya soccer game. Wow. It said clad in the shorts and shirts of their respective soccer teams, the witch doctors race up and down the sidelines in their feathered headdresses like a maniacal linesman. Many of the Kenya soccer teams retain supposedly powerful witch doctors to curse the opposing team with incantations and spells.

And if a team is being slaughtered on the scoreboard, the players have a stock answer for their harassed coach. Man, their witch doctor, he has a spell on the ball, the player state. Excusing their poor performance. It's not me. It's the witch doctor. He's bewitched it. That's why I suck today.

So they just have a scapegoat for their shitty playing. This is what it sounds like, but it's a full league of them. Because everybody's got a witch doctor. They all shake bones at each other, and they all blame each other. Anti-hero cheerleaders or something. Yes, pretty much. Yeah, they're a shitty cheerleaders with no tits. Change that ball as a frequent lament of a coach to a referee

because we're not playing with a bewitched ball is what they're saying. It's not much different than in football or any other sport where they examine the balls and they're like, oh, this has a niche on it or it's overpressure or something like that. Yeah. Oh, wow. So is this just a thing they do? or like it's just normal. So are they really believing it or buying into it?

Or is it just kind of like a thing? Yes. So referees complain that sorcery and witchcraft make it extremely difficult to handle the game because this isn't in the rule books. You're not supposed to have to deal with deities and swapping balls out for B. I've refereed and lined when I was a kid. That's pretty cool. They have a god that interferes in sports games.

Which one is that? He said that some players really believe in witchcraft. so they're honestly sincere when they complain that the juju boys on the sidelines are casting spells and sapping their playing ability. One of these referees is quoted in saying, something will have to be done eventually to curb these excesses. And he said this in a Nairobi Sunday Nation. He was quoted in a paper by saying, like, we can't place a penalty on a team simply because their player swears that he's bewitched.

That's the thing, is it's really screwing with the game. Warren writes that the strange powers of the mind are such that many native players believe in the witch doctor's power to influence the game. When a free kick was won near their opponent's goal, he said that the old witch doctor would come running along and pointing his thigh bone at the ball. The kicker seemed to swell with confidence and kick the ball with such force

that deflated in the goalie's hands. Isn't that great? So your witch doctor runs out before you take the kick, shakes the bone at it, and then boom, your superpower. He's probably shooting a blow dart at it. To deflate it. Yeah, he runs up. Now, kick now, kick now.

So when their teams fall behind a game, Kenya fans just chant with a ferocious incantation and say, do, do, do, do, do, we want the do-do. And on the signal, the feathered witch doctor roars out of his little sideline hut there and shakes his magical thighbone at the opposition. Yeah, it's like a fun little mascot. Yeah, I was going to say it's a cross between

cheerleaders and a mascot just with magic. Yes, but power of the mind on this. And this cannot be understated at all. the idea that putting something in your opponent's head will screw with their performance. Absolutely, dude. And that's why everybody's got to have one because it's so effective. They're like, oh, yeah, well, you have a juju guy. I got a juju guy.

And then there's that competition element of it. They do heaps of studies on the mentality of sports players, visualization techniques, all of those kind of things. There's a story in here about a hypnotized golfer. Do you want to wrap it with that one? Let's do it. It's a short one. So that is a thing, though, with the, especially the, the voodoo and, you know, witch doctors, shamans like that.

I remember hearing years ago, like the witch doctor from another tribe would put a curse on somebody. Yeah. And a couple days later, they would die. And it was kind of this placebo effect because they believed that he actually did. And so they end up dying of a heart attack or, you know, whatever. Some kind of, it looks like natural causes, but they think it's because the witch doctor put a hex on him. So is it this placebo nocebo thing or is his magic rube? really that strong. I'm going with the former, but yeah. I think it's, but I think it's yes

and I agree with all of it because I think you are that strong and being influenced in that way will make you exceptionally powerful. I mean, you know this. You got a good woman behind you, man. It makes you unstoppable. It's incredible. And especially these athletic types are very superstitious, right? Remember Ace Ventura when he's like, I got a linebacker that hadn't watched his jockstrap in a week because he believes flies are lucky, you know, things like that. Like, they do these interesting superstitions and to take it to this level to where it's married in with the culture's superstitious faith at a level.

I mean, you know, like the players who do stuff for Jesus and they go pray and things like that and they think Jesus, like Super Jesus helped him out score the touchdown or whatever. It's just interesting, the psychology behind this stuff. There's also something in Kung Fu where you can, there are energy fields that run through the body. So allegedly

it runs out of your head and forward and down and then the opposite direction, So if you're looking at your opponent, what you're supposed to do is run up and wave your hands at them. And whenever you see Kung Fu people doing that, what they're doing is they're lowering the energy of the other opponent. And it's actually effective. It works. Like NLP, you know that if you say something true, you won't be able to move your arm. If you lie, you will.

Those muscle test type things. Yeah, it's very interesting. This is how they can tell if you're being honest or not. So you can do this in Kung Fu with energies. And so you build your energy up by SWE. weeping your hands up. And so you'll see Bruce Lee doing all those arm movements. He's charging his chi up.

And if you see him walk up to an opponent and wave them down, he's lowering his opponent's defenses. So you can technically, I mean, there is science to this. It's fascinating. Crazy. I know. So let's do this last one, guys. And then we're going to hear about what's going on in the extension.

Then we're going to cap this off and get to that extension because I'm excited about it. Okay, so this one is a hole in one for the hypnotized golfer. This is fascinating, too, thinking of hypnotizing athletes. Warren writes that the talents of athletes can be unleashed through the utilization of the limitless powers of the mind. Can hypnosis create sports players who will perform more efficiently and with less stress in a trance state?

I would think so. Shave that edge off? I would think so. Answers to these and other intriguing questions may possibly be found in the experiments launched by psychologists and parapsychologists in several countries. Folks have been looking into this, and I don't see why you wouldn't.

So, for example, here, there's this well-known psychologist who hypnotized 32 golfers at this Huddle Park golf course in Johannesburg, South Africa. This was in 1966. The experiment was to determine rather putting skills

could be improved under hypnosis. This is what every golfer wants to improve, right? Their short game? Oh, yeah. I don't play golf. Do you play golf? No. Like a can, and I'm capable.

I just like the carts. I've done it. Right. Yeah. He writes that each person in the experiment played a regulation game in his normal state, and the scores were marked as his conscious average. So they get your baseline here.

So then they completed rounds of the same greens again, but on the last round, they were under hypnosis. Now, one of the golfers acquired 24 putts for nine holes during his normal state. So it took him 24 putts and nine holes to get this done. Under hypnosis, it went from 24 to 17. Hmm, not negligible. No.

So the psychologist who conducted the experiment, believes that if hypnosis could possibly improve golfing and other sports, and it could also be applied to limitless vocational activities. You do this to anything. Drivers, I would think high-speed like Formula F-1 drivers and stuff like this would be good for. It's like putting in an instant flow state where they're just zeroed in on the task at hand instead of the monkey brain chattering at you the whole time. Instead of anything else, which is exactly what you want, right?

A Southern California psychologist has conducted private experiments, and hypnosis for several years and on one occasion, an amateur golfer of a mediocre ability was hypnotized. The psychologist explained he stepped up, he teed off, and he got a hole in one.

He said then his performance maintained that standard throughout the game. So he hit holes in one the entire time after being hypnotized. That is insane. Played 18, shot 18, made 18, yeah. In a light hypnotic state,

a woman bowler increased her average by 22 pins maintain the increase for three successive nights. So she kept going and getting better and better after being hypnotized. So at what year did they ban doing this? Yeah, no shit, right? I know.

And we've got a quote here from one actually in a minute. There's another one here. A sluggish hitter on the Pacific Coast on a Pacific Coast League baseball team improved his batting performance during several games under a mild hypnotic trance. Remember that baseball player who played under acid and he threw the no-hitter. Yeah.

That's awesome. Famous. Kind of the same thing. Just this is not that. He directed his acid trip towards pitching instead. Yes. He just honed it all in. Yeah.

He said, all right. So one of the psychologists admitted that it's much too early to formulate any definite conclusions about the possibility of hypnotizing athletes for greater performance. He said perhaps the extra attention shown to these experimental subjects, it's transmitted into an improved playing pattern. So like you said, it just takes away all the noise and focuses it on this one activity. The psychologist requested anonymity because, quote,

there might be repercussions from ruling commissions in the various sports that they knew some players were using experimental hypnosis. So, yeah, he's like, they were juicing the brain. That's it. That's exactly what this is. It's a performance enhancing skill, for sure. some experimenters believe that the mind contains the necessary skills to perform much better than actual scores might indicate. However, the conscious mind frequently is unable to handle the necessary coordination of all muscles. There's an element of positive thinking, but he said that we're frequently bested with vague self-doubts and a surprising lack of confidence. A hypnotic state can eliminate these doubts and allow the mind and body to function with less friction.

The doctor cited as an example The myth of the four-minute mile. Remember that? Roger Bannister. He said it was generally considered to be unobtainable by even the best track coaches. Once the mark was made, other runners knew it could be done

and now it's not an uncommon occurrence these days. And now they've done three-minute miles, right? I think. I don't know. I mean, what was that one dude? Usain Bolt? I don't know of what his mile is. He was a sprinter, right?

He's a short distance. Yeah, I think so. But he did. bolt. I wonder if they could actually prove that you use this performance enhancing hypnosis, though. Like, it doesn't show up in a piss test. I doubt it. So, yeah. Do it anyway, I guess. Okay. It reads here that the three-minute miles currently impossible for human runners. The world record for men's, I know. The world record for men's three mile is three minutes and 42.66 seconds set by a British runner, Josh Kerr in London on July 18th of 2026, very recently.

So running a mile in three minutes requires maintaining an average speed of 20 miles an hour. Damn. Or a 45 second pace lap, which exceeds human physiological limits. A really insanely tall guy that has a longer leap, you know, because then he's got an advantage, right? Yeah, I would think so, yeah. If you just move that quick or a little guy that moves really fast. You're going to maintain 20 miles an hour the whole time. No problem.

It'll be done. Because they're talking shit about it now. they did Mr. Bannister back in the name. I say it's going to be done and then they're going to find out later that he was on cocaine or something. Yeah, yeah, some massive performance. He still did it. So what? He's got a chip in his head that enhances everything.

All the, yeah, it ends up being all the bionic legs. The glyphosate from the shot. They just teamed together and made him stronger. But Warren writes that in the realm in the realm of mind experiments, we may someday see the coaches be replaced by psychiatrist and trained hypnotists. That's an interesting thought. So they're running plays. They're getting into the heads of their players.

I wonder what a team coached by somebody like that would look like. Probably be a lot chiller. Yeah. They'd at least be relaxed. Have Manchering candidates running around all over the place? Anyway, so that's it. That's pretty much what I wanted to say about this one. Next time we're going to get into dreams on this

because there's this insane dream that this woman has. It's one of the craziest stories I've ever heard in my life. It bothered me, honestly. This one bothered me because I don't dream. So if something like this happened, y'all just be fucked. That's it. But anyway, so that was it, guys. It's going to be linked down below.

It's a book from 1968 by Warren Smith, one of his aliases here. Strange Powers of the Mind. Very, very cool. It's just got heaps of stories. I only pulled a few out of here, but it's just one of those just one after another after another. Some short, some long. It's just, it's cool. I can't wait for the dream episode.

We haven't really done a whole lot on dreams themselves. So, yeah, I can't wait to hear about that. But yeah, if you're on Plus, stick around after the break. We're going to be doing the finale of the. spontaneous human combustion and what their final, you know, thoughts on it might be along with the ball lightning effect, which is apparently a real thing. I've never seen one, but I've seen supposed videos of it, but, I mean, we have AI now, so who knows? But it is apparently a real thing, though. It might be damn entities that they're kind of brushing out of the rug with something

that can be like some type of, it sounds like just another swamp gas kind of a thing. It's like a throwaway, oh, natural phenomena, a ball lightning. But maybe it's an entity. Maybe it's an intelligence. And maybe you were marked for death by that thing. Maybe these glowing orbs people have been seeing forever or what they're calling ball lightning. Who knows? Right. That's what I'm saying.

It's like an intelligence. But they're like, oh, it's a natural. But it's random. Maybe. We just don't know how it works. But we know it's natural. Right. Yeah, we don't know how it works, but we're certain it's nothing to fear.

Yeah. Well, incredible. Well, you guys sign up in the links below. Get these massive series that we're running so you can get all of the episodes that we're doing here and get off of this one third of the content vibe that you got going here, if that's what you're doing. And Plus members, thank you guys so much again for connecting, reaching out. You all are awesome.

We love hearing from you. You suggest the coolest things. And again, thank you. And Sam, thank you for your email. I saw it. I'm looking into it. I appreciate you, buddy. Very cool.

All right, well, let's get to this extension. For all you free listeners, we'll see you down there in the link getting signed up for Plus. And all you Plus members, let's get to this extension. Everybody else. We'll see you next week. Your Plus extension for this episode. Thanks for being on Plus. Thanks for joining us.