Charles Tart | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | (1937-04-29)April 29, 1937 |
| Died | March 5, 2025(2025-03-05) (aged 87) |
| Occupations | Psychologist and author |
| Known for | Altered states of consciousness |
Charles T. Tart (April 29, 1937 – March 5, 2025) was an American psychologist andparapsychologist known for his psychological work on the nature of consciousness (particularlyaltered states of consciousness), as one of the founders of the field oftranspersonal psychology, and for his research inparapsychology.[1]
Charles Tart was born on April 29, 1937, inMorrisville, Pennsylvania, and grew up inTrenton, New Jersey. He was active inamateur radio and worked as a radio engineer (with a First Class Radiotelephone License from the Federal Communications Commission) while a teenager. As an undergraduate, Tart first studiedelectrical engineering at theMassachusetts Institute of Technology before transferring toDuke University to study psychology underJ. B. Rhine. He received hisPhD in psychology from theUniversity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1963, and then completedpostdoctoral research inhypnosis underErnest R. Hilgard atStanford University.[1] He was a professor of psychology atUniversity of California, Davis for 28 years.
His first books,Altered States of Consciousness (editor, 1969) andTranspersonal Psychologies (1975), became widely used texts that were instrumental in allowing these areas to become part of modernpsychology.[1] As of 2005, he was a core faculty member at theInstitute of Transpersonal Psychology (Palo Alto, California), a senior research fellow of theInstitute of Noetic Sciences (Sausalito, California), a professor emeritus of psychology at the UC Davis, and emeritus member of theMonroe Institute board of advisors. Tart was the holder of the Bigelow Chair of Consciousness Studies at theUniversity of Nevada in Las Vegas and served as a visiting professor in East-West Psychology at theCalifornia Institute of Integral Studies, as an instructor in psychiatry at the School of Medicine of theUniversity of Virginia, and a consultant on government funded parapsychological research at theStanford Research Institute (now known as SRI International).[1]
Tart was also integral in the theorizing and construction of the automatic ESP testing device called the ESPATESTER machine that was built at theUniversity of Virginia.[2] He supportedJoseph McMoneagle's claim of havingremote viewed into the past, present, and future, and having predicted future events.[3]
As well as a laboratory researcher, Tart was a student of the Japanesemartial art ofAikido (in which he holds a black belt), ofmeditation, ofGeorge Gurdjieff's work, ofBuddhism, and of other psychological and spiritual growth disciplines. Tart believes that the evidence of theparanormal is bringing science and spirit together. His primary goal is to build bridges between thescientific andspiritual communities, and to help bring about a refinement and integration ofWestern andEastern approaches for knowing the world and for personal and social growth.
In his 1986 bookWaking Up, he introduced the phrase "consensus trance" to the lexicon. Tart likened normal wakingconsciousness tohypnotic trance. He discussed how each of us is from birth inducted to the trance of the society around us. Tart noted both similarities and differences between hypnotic trance induction and consensus trance induction. He emphasized the enormous and pervasive power of parents, teachers, religious leaders, political figures, and others to compel induction. Referring to the work of Gurdjieff and others he outlines a path to awakening based upon self-observation.
Tart died at home on March 5, 2025, at the age of 87.[4]
In 1968, Tart conducted anOut-of-body experience (OBE) experiment with a subject known as Miss Z for four nights in his sleep laboratory.[5] Miss Z was attached to anEEG machine and a five-digit code was placed on a shelf above her bed. She did not claim to see the number on the first three nights but on the fourth gave the number correctly.[6][7]
During the experiment Tart monitored the equipment in the next room, behind an observation window, however, he admitted he had occasionally dozed during the night.[8] The psychologistsLeonard Zusne and Warren Jones have written that the possibility of the subject having obtained the number through ordinary sensory means was not ruled out during the experiment. For example, when light fell on the code it was reflected from the surface of a clock located on the wall above the shelf. The subject was not constantly observed and it was also suggested she may have read the number when she was being attached to the EEG machine.[6] According to the magicianMilbourne Christopher: "If she had held a mirror with a handle in her right hand, by tilting the mirror and looking up she could have seen a reflection of the paper on the shelf... The woman had not been searched prior to the experiment, nor had an observer been in the sleep chamber with her — precautions that should have been taken."[8]
The psychologistJames Alcock criticized the experiment for inadequate controls and questioned why the subject was not visually monitored by avideo camera.[9]Martin Gardner has written the experiment was not evidence for an OBE and suggested that whilst Tart was "snoring behind the window, Miss Z simply stood up in bed, without detaching the electrodes, and peeked."[10]Susan Blackmore wrote: "If Miss Z had tried to climb up, the brain-wave record would have showed a pattern of interference. And that was exactly what it did show."[11]
The experiment was not repeated at the laboratory. Tart wrote this was because Miss Z moved from the area where the laboratory was located.[12]
Tart drew criticism from thescientific community for his comments on a failedpsychokinesis (PK) experiment. The targets from the random number generator that were used in the experiment were not random. Tart responded by claiming the nonrandomness was due to a PK effect.Terence Hines has written that a procedural flaw in the experiment itself was used by Tart as evidence forpsi and that this is an example of the use of a nonfalsifiable hypothesis in parapsychology.[13]
In 1980, Tart claimed that a rejudging of the transcripts from one ofRussell Targ andHarold Puthoff’s remote viewing experiments revealed an above-chance result.[14] Targ and Puthoff refused to provide copies of the transcripts and it was not until July 1985 that they were made available for study when it was discovered they still contained sensory cues.[15] The psychologistDavid Marks and Christopher Scott (1986) wrote "considering the importance for the remote viewing hypothesis of adequate cue removal, Tart’s failure to perform this basic task seems beyond comprehension. As previously concluded, remote viewing has not been demonstrated in the experiments conducted by Puthoff and Targ, only the repeated failure of the investigators to remove sensory cues."[16]
Tart has also been criticized by the skepticRobert Todd Carroll for ignoringOccam's razor (advocating the paranormal instead of naturalistic explanations) and for ignoring the known laws of physics.[17]
Tart's book aboutmarijuanaOn Being Stoned has received mixed reviews.[18][19] Harris Chaiklin wrote that the book rejected medical evidence and laboratory experiments in favor for the opinions of marijuana users and probability statistics were inappropriately used.[19] In his bookLearning to Use Extrasensory Perception, Tart endorsed experimental methods fromlearning theory and the results fromcard guessing experiments in support for ESP. Richard Land wrote that Tart's data was unconvincing but concluded "the book will be enjoyed by believers in ESP, and sceptics will regard it as a curiosity".[20]
In 1981, Tart received theJames Randi Educational Foundation MediaPigasus Award "for discovering that the further in the future events are, the more difficult it is to predict them."[21]
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