These twenty-four hours , the idea of trying to contact spirit using engineering calls to mind those world shows that send obnoxious “ ghost huntsman ” into abandoned infirmary . But as a new book investigates , the practice has a whole lot more history and nuance behind it than that .
That book is Strange Frequencies : The Extraordinary Story of the Technological Quest for the Supernatural by Peter Bebergal , who io9 last spoke to back in 2014 for Season of the Witch , his book aboutthe intersection between stone ‘ n ’ bun and the occult . Bebergal ’s tardy strange exploration is both a history deterrent example and eyewitness account , as the generator attend to a séance with an creative person who specializes in snap mass medium , interviews an electronic voice phenomenon ( EVP ) researcher , and attend public presentation that push the boundaries of “ stage thaumaturgy , ” to name just a few of his experience . Along the way , he digs deep into the past , framing the present-day search for proof of the spirit realm ( there ’s an app for that ! ) as a fascination that adulterate back yard of years .
And before any sceptic chatter aside from this Sir Frederick Handley Page , unusual Frequencies does n’t claim to pop the question any substantiation that ghost exist . Instead , Bebergal is right smart more concerned in why human beings have always been so obsessed with pierce the veil — as well as the country of mind that one must get into before they can begin to spread their mind to such tremendous possibilities . The book is available now , and we caught up with the author just before Halloween to find out more .
io9 : Many of the subjects in Strange Frequencies can point to a specific mo that really touch off their interest in the radio link between engineering and the spirit reality — like the char who believes she received a voice mail from a deceased congeneric . Did you have your own moment like that , and what made you need to explore this topic in a book ?
Peter Bebergal : I guess I was prepped from childhood [ to be interested in the subject]—particularly growing up in the ‘ 70 and ‘ 80s . Everything was flooded with thing like teras , the paranormal , In Search Of … , Bigfoot , and rerun of The Twilight Zone . I think the impact of a movie like Poltergeist , as I distinguish in the leger — that the spirits would in reality manifest in the menage through the idiot box curing — was such a startling thing . It was so of the era — the TV was such a part of our lives .
Then I met the photographer that I talk about in the book , Shannon Taggart , whose work [ investigates ] the historical idea that technology was this medium by which hard liquor could make themselves known . What was interesting about Shannon ’s work was that she was n’t render to prove either way that spirit did or did not exist , she was just trying to captivate what would befall when she allowed the television camera to create this kind of equivocal moment . You ’re seeing something where you ’re not sure what you ’re ensure . You could reason it ’s a glitch of the camera , but it ’s like when you ’re watching a magic trick and for a split second , you ’re glamour by that moment . That short petite split arcsecond of uncertainty , or equivocalness , was something I wanted to see if I could screw up up . What was enthralling was that technology seemed to be something that , historically , people were using to magnify these enchanted instant when we , just for a 2nd , suspend disbelief .
io9 : unusual frequency ’ study of the Cartesian product between tech and the supernatural starts way before the invention of the camera — we’re talking Biblical times . What made you require to ensnare the field with such historical context ?
Bebergal : I realise that applied science does n’t have to intend complex circuit . Technology could be defined as any way of life in which human beings have materially attempt to interact with our environment , with nature , with the spirit domain , with the divine . Any prison term that we are synthesize the things around us — whether it ’s with a crystal to try and peer into a spirit land likeJohn Deedid in Elizabethan England , or the someone who is hacking an FM radio set to try and hear spirits — there are so many sonorousness . It ’s not just that they are trying to pass with spirits , but in some way what they ’re both doing , which I receive absolutely fascinating , is read a corporeal object and using it in a way that it was n’t necessarily intend for , or using it in a path that is n’t built into the thing itself .
It almost seems like there ’s something about the human being that ’s a hacker at our core , trying to take the affair and see how we can reimagine it , taking it apart and seeing how it works , and seeing if we can do something dissimilar with it . I want to see if this modern-day idea of the hacker was something that could be draw as far back as someone using a see stone — thinking about how human beings have tried to use expert means to interact with our environment in ways that can seem maverick , or sometimes even grievous .
io9 : Speaking of contemporary ideas , I did n’t realize until I read Strange frequency that there are actually apps for trying to meet spirit through your earphone . What was your experience like with that , and how do you think this curiosity will keep to evolve ?
Bebergal : Obviously , the fact that masses have created iPhone apps is just part of this style that we ’ve been seeing for millennia . As before long as the photographic camera was invented , the first affair citizenry require to do was see if they could interact with the spirit world . Same with the telegraph . The iPhone app is really a staring lengthiness of this inclination that we have . I think what happen , though , is as the technology increases , [ so does ] our power to — I do n’t want to say lead astray , but sure to use more trickery to try and get these variety of moments . As camera engineering became more advanced , it was harder for people to judge and excuse that there was some other means by which a spirit was somehow look on the film .
I do think it ’s crucial to say , though , that just because something is a joke does n’t mean it ’s mean to deceive . Sometimes trick are meant to create these states of awareness that we revel — that we somehow purposefully put ourselves in front of . My wife and I have been watchingThe Haunting of Hill Houseand there are some really startling moments in that show . Why is it that we can finger chilled to the ivory by something that we ’re just watching in our life room ? We know it ’s Netflix and we ’re going to watch one episode after the other , right ? Even though there ’s a trick that ’s going on there , there ’s still something about those activities and those ideas that we purposefully still require to engage with . And engineering science has continued to be the means by which we can do that .
My own experience using those apps , though , I found in spades problematic , because they do n’t sell them as equivocal . They sell them as very literal , and I think when you seek to literalise any of these sort of things , that ’s where the skeptical psyche directly begins to lop up . If you just reserve for it to be a playful interaction with these ideas , I think that ’s more potential that you’re able to infix into those states of mind . But when somebody tells you “ This affair is actually going to verbalize to heart , ” I think it ’s not quite as successful .
io9 : Now that more or less everyone has a photographic camera on them at all times , do you think people have become more disbelieving ?
Bebergal : I remember you are more likely to have people feel that they are n’t go to be limit if they encounter something that they would wish to beguile . What ’s interesting is , why are we living in a time right now where there are more record on witchcraft being publish more than any other clock time , except maybe the late ‘ 60s ? No matter how advanced we seem to be , technologically speaking , even having an incredibly brawny computer in our air hole , it in no way is determine our capacity to wonder and to charter with these ideas . I acknowledge that it ’s easy to be skeptical and say it ’s all bunkum — but I do n’t think that ’s a very interesting doubtfulness : “ Do hard liquor exist or not live ? ” The interesting question to postulate is , why do we proceed to engage with these things in this way ? Why has technology always seemed to have been a vehicle through which we desire to occupy with them , even though the science that often make these technologies possible narrate us these realities are not dependable ?
io9 : There are moments in the Quran where you seem moderately unconvinced — like when you encountered “ ectoplasm ” as part of a séance . But did you ever have an experience that made you pause and question world a little bit ?
Bebergal : get ’s put it this way — I was very open to that take place . I really thought the place that was going to happen was when I was doing the electronic phonation phenomena experiments . There were a couple of places where there was a voice that seemed to say the word “ skeleton ” a few prison term . But , again , it give me a little bite of a creepy-crawly tactile sensation , but it did n’t really go the space . If something had happened , I would have write about it . But what was interesting was to be in that place where I was in reality using EVP eccentric equipment and using these techniques and finding myself in that state of mind where these things could really be true — it is its own variety of unearthly headspace that you get into .
But I do intend that [ the independent place ] where I felt that I was n’t always certain what was going on was , again , when I was looking at Shannon ’s pic . [ The séance that we attended together ] did n’t have any strange import , but looking at the photographs after the fact , and how the photographs often represent so closely to the narrative to what had been describe , can be very eery . I do n’t know if it ’s just that photography seems to do the just Book of Job of that sort of thing — I reckon part of that is because Shannon allows for ambiguity . Some of these things that people were doing , like electronic voice phenomenon , really require a literal mind of believing or not believing and I ’m not very good at that . I favor to live in these ambiguous situation — when something asks me to think full - on , my reaction is to not think at all .
The chapter where I described these twist like [ meditation prick ] “ the Dreamachine , ” where you really allow yourself to be open to new fashion of thinking , are much more sinewy than receive an experience where you think you ’ve maybe find out a ghost . Unfortunately or as luck would have it I did n’t have any experiences like that , but that ’s not to say while compose this book I did n’t have import of what I would call actual enchantment .
Fantasy
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