26/07/2023
Whats your view
“How are people still falling for this?”
You’d expect reasonable adults to move past their beliefs in ridiculous things like bigfoot, flat Earth, and the AMPTP negotiating in good faith. But the easiest person to fool is yourself, and plenty of us have been taken in by our own ever so slightly twitchy muscles.
Today’s Moment of Science… Ouija Boards & The Ideomotor Effect
Centuries before Hasbro marketed it as a toy, spirit boards of all sorts were used to commune with the dead. The versions most of us have seen this century typically have all the letters of the Latin alphabet and the numbers 0-9 along with the words ‘yes,’ ‘no,’ and an irreverent little ‘goodbye’ to let you know the afterlife is fed up with your s**t. The spirit-board-pointer-thingy is called a planchette, French for ‘little plank.’
There are a few rumors about how it came by the modern name ‘Ouija.’ It seems the most likely story is that the group looking to patent and sell the toy in the late 1800s decided to ask the board to breathe life into its name. With hands upon the planchette, it spelled out, “ouija.” Well they just had to know what that meant. Cheeky board that it was, Ouija answered “good luck.”
It was marketed as an Egyptian spirit board with a name meaning ‘good luck.’ Eventually, that story changed to it being a combination of the French and German words for “yes.”
The cool thing about asking a Ouija board which boy in school likes you? Those tricksy spirits from the next realm are gonna tell you it’s the boy you’re thinking of. Which might be the scientific explanation for how this mundane board at the center of so many junior high sleepovers got its name.
So the legend goes, the person who suggested compelling the board to talk was wearing a locket with a picture of someone named ‘Ouida’ in it. Accounts vary on if the name was written in the locket as Ouida, Ouija, or even written at all. But it calls into question the idea that the name was perfectly random when it was already on the mind and, curiously, the fingertips.
(Allegedly or whatever, because everyone’s got a story to sell and maybe it was the French and German thing).
So, the ideomotor effect.
Humans are giant f**k-up machines and even when we’re not scheming up some s**t on purpose, our minds and bodies are getting into shenanigans without us. Somewhat literally meaning a motion from an idea, we make these minuscule movements unconsciously. Even if it’s not on purpose, this kind of motion can be motivated by our thoughts, for better or worse. Tell yourself not to move all you want, but put that ‘little plank’ underneath your hands? The back of your mind may have secrets to spill.
Everyone at the table thinks they’re definitely the only one not moving it, and everyone is almost certainly moving it. Scientists and modern skeptics alike have gone to great lengths to show that this isn’t the work of ghosts or humans who play coy with their handiwork when the board comes to life; it’s just our minds doing the talking- er, spelling for us.
This effect on a Ouija board if someone is taking the results for what they are– a reflection of their own desires– is perfectly harmless entertainment. But if you have a tendency to get spooked into believing in these things and subsequently paying money to a psychic based on some bulls**t a planchette spelled out on a toy made by the same company that produces Lite Brite, Jenga, and My Little fu***ng Pony? Maybe board game based communication attempts with dearly departed Uncle Greg isn’t for you.
That said, there are other fields in which the ideomotor effect is employed that harm practically everyone involved. But we’ll talk about facilitated communication another day.
This has been your Moment of Science, just saying… I didn’t move it. No, I didn’t. I seriously didn’t you guys.
