While parapsychologists have failed to prove their case, the community of skeptics has provided ample evidence of how supposed supernatural, or psi-phenomena can be explained as the result of sloppy experimental procedures, misinterpretation or ignorance of data and pure trickery.

For example Jame The Amazing Randi, a professional magician whose personal crusade to debunk psychics has included the public unmasking of Uri Geller, recently planted two conjures in the McDonnel Laboratory for Psychical Research at Washington University in St. Louis. Skilled in sleight-of-hand, spoon-bending, mind-reading, and "psychic photography," the two young men gulled the researchers into a euphoria of scientific success, until Randi called a press conference to reveal the two "natural psychics" as nothing more than talented tricksters.

Another debunking was accomplished by retired FBI agent Kennith M. Rommel Jr., who conducted a year-long investigation of the mysterious cattle mutilations that plagued the Rocky Mountain states in the 1970s. Although variously attributed to secret government consiracies or the work of extraterrestrial beings, the removal of cattle toungues, ears, and sexual organs with supposedly surgical precision was found by Rommel to be nothing more than the result of wild scavengers gnawing away at the soft tissues of livestock that had died of natural causes.

And Daryl Bem, a professor of psychology at Cornell who is also an amatuer "psychic entertainer," provides a vivid demonstration of how such performers can convince an audience it is in the presence of a truly powerful force. By successfully "reading minds" and determining the exact contents of a sealed box. Bem-even while disclaiming any psychic powers- shows how people are led to accept such standard tricks as evidence of paranormal power.

One thing that underlies the willingness to believe in ESP, precognition and prophecy, even in the fave of dis-proff, is the human difficulty in sorting out chance events from the multitude of experiences in daily life.