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By Gary P. Posner, M.D.
Fountain's February 13, 1995, show was definitely one of the downers. According to her introductory
remarks, "There are two world-renowned experts in the very controversial field of therapy
If Dr. John Mack, Pulitzer Prize-winning Harvard psychiatrist and "UFO abduction guru," derisively
dubbed "The Man From Outer Space" last April 25 by Time magazine (and currently in
hot water at Harvard -- see item later in article) has a psychiatrist of his own, perhaps it is
Dr. Brian Weiss, author of Many Lives, Many Masters and Through Time Into
Healing. If Weiss has his way, soon the numbers of "UFO abductees" (only in the low
millions per Mack) will be eclipsed by those claiming to have been reincarnated since, Weiss
claims, everyone has lived before, and will again.
I can't help but harbor a few questions after dissecting the above recital. Since Weiss now
routinely regresses his patients to past lives (and can do so in minutes for any sufficiently
suggestible attendees of his advertised $200-a-head Sunday reincarnation "workshops," such as the
one on March 5 at the Tampa Sheraton Grand), why did it take so many years to stumble upon his
first case? If the spirits of his father and son were present in the "middle ages," why were they
not also present "four thousand years ago" or at his patient's other deaths? Why did his infant
son's eternal spirit appear as that of a "tiny" infant back in the "middle ages" (that brief
lifetime wasn't lived until the 20th century)? Why do the references to his father and son sound
suspiciously like "psychic readings" rather than like excited hellos from long-lost loved ones with
hundreds or thousands of years of wisdom and gossip to impart? And, given the unreliability of
hypnosis in determining truth from fantasy (a dilemma well known to psychiatrists), how can Dr.
Weiss (and, for that matter, Dr. Mack) really believe what he claims to believe?
Speaking of "psychic readings," the other "world-renowned expert" on the panel was Ted Andrews,
billed as a "super psychic" and "author of more than 15 metaphysical books." As Weiss, sporting
the same smile that he exhibits while discussing "past lives," looked on, Andrews proceeded to
perform typical "psychometry" readings on several objects handed to him by Fountain.
Before the show, three audience members had volunteered to be regressed to a past life by Andrews.
This group session was taped, and a portion of the hypnotic induction was shown. It was easy to
see why a suggestible volunteer/patient, wishing to be a "good" hypnotic subject, might confabulate
an appropriate story on command, given Andrews' step-by-step instructions:
Weiss clone practicing in Tampa
Tampa psychiatrist Edward Klein, "who has worked extensively with [Dr. Brian Weiss]," was profiled
in the March 2 St. Petersburg Times (Tampa edition). Subtitled, "Past life regression therapy has
become [his] specialty," the article by Jennifer Rose Marino described Klein's first encounter, ten
years ago, with reincarnation:
In the year 4 A.D., the invention of a calendar referring to the year "4" or "IV" was still about
1,000 years away. Dr. Robert O'Hara, professor of linguistics at the University of South Florida, Tampa, informs me that only
about 2-3% of the population would have been capable of writing anything (even a simple number),
and stated with "100 percent confidence" that Dr. Klein's interpretation of this event is "utter
and complete nonsense." But no matter. Klein has written a book, Soul Search: The Healing
Possibilities of Past Lives, scheduled for publication in September. Klein is said to
have performed "hundreds of past life regressions with patients who come from all over the world to
his office.
In Susan H. Thompson's March 2 Tampa Tribune article about Dr. Weiss, he says that following his
discovery, "I didn't write the [first] book for about four years. I was afraid for my reputation,
my career
Big Mack attack at Harvard
Weiss may indeed have reasons for concern about his medical career if the following action sets a
trend. The March 1995 issue of Philip J. Klass' Skeptics UFO
Newsletter reports that Dr. John Mack's attorney, Daniel P. Sheehan of Los Angeles,
has written a letter, dated Feb. 9, to consultants with the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON), advising
them of the following situation. Klass, who secured a copy from a source, quotes from the letter:
Sheehan's letter further warns that unless the Draft Report is changed before being formalized, it
might later be submitted to the State Board of Medical Examiners as a formal complaint of
malpractice against Dr. Mack.
This article appeared in the Spring 1995 Tampa Bay Skeptics Report.
More on "Past Life Regression" from The Skeptic's Dictionary
Return to Tampa Bay Skeptics Home Page
Return to TBS Report Online
The upside of the Kathy Fountain Show's new hour-long format (weekdays at 10 a.m.
on WTVT-TV 13) is that if and when the Tampa Bay Skeptics are again the featured guests (as we
have twice been), we will have additional time to get our desperately needed message across to
the vast viewing audience. The downside is that in the meantime, dozens of advocates of the
paranormal will have even greater opportunities to present to the public their own brands of
pseudoscience.
Weiss (see right image, with Oprah), who says he began "entirely skeptical," told the story of the main character in his first
book, a young woman ridden with phobias. Like thousands of other psychiatrists, Weiss had employed
hypnosis "for years" to regress patients back to childhood in order to find the origins of their
incapacitating fears. But for some reason, this one patient unexpectedly
flipped back spontaneously, it appeared to me, about four thousand years. She was in a different
body, face, hair
. . . every muscle and fiber, as the tension leaves and the arms relax. The sound of my voice will
relax you more peacefully, and you will continue to hear it. And you notice this [unintelligible]
house
The psychiatrist sat in his chair.
Harvard University has secretly convened a "Special Faculty Committee" to investigate Dr. Mack's
work [in the UFO abduction field]
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