第一章

Part I

第一部分

RUSSIA

俄罗斯

CHAPTER ONE

第一章

“A RIDDLE WRAPPED IN AN ENIGMA”

“谜团包裹在谜团中”

It was a brilliant, cloudless June day as we stood near the rapidly revolving door of our Moscow hotel waiting to finally meet our first Communist psychic researcher. Muscovites, we noticed, walked like New Yorkers, fast, even in the heat as they jostled along Gorky Street and past the new Minsk Hotel, six scorching blocks from the Kremlin. Around us in the lobby, languages fizzed like bubbles in soda. Tourists knotted together; Russians stepped patiently around them. Middle-echelon Soviet bureaucrats on business trips were off to afternoon appointments in their standard summer wear: sandals, slacks, and nylon sport shirts. A tall, lean Russian cut through this crowd, straight towards us. Minutely pressed dark suit, French cuffs, he conjured wrinkle-free memories of air conditioning.

那是一个晴朗无云的六月日子，我们站在莫斯科酒店快速旋转的门附近，等待着终于见到我们第一位共产党心灵研究员。我们注意到莫斯科人走路的姿态和纽约人很像，即使在炎热的天气里，他们也快速地在高尔基大街上挤来挤去，经过克里姆林宫六个火辣辣的街区外的新明斯克酒店。在大厅里，各种语言像苏打水中的气泡般爆发。游客们聚集在一起，俄罗斯人耐心地绕过他们。中层苏联官僚们在公务旅行中穿着标准的夏季装：凉鞋，裤子和尼龙运动衫。一位高大瘦削的俄罗斯人穿过人群，径直走向我们。他的衣服整整齐齐，深色西装，法式袖口，让人联想到没有皱纹的空调记忆。

“I’m so glad you’re here. I’m so very glad”, Edward Naumov repeated warmly as he shook various Western hands with both of his. Biologist Edward Naumov is one of the guiding energies of Soviet parapsychology—the study of the supernormal. He has traveled throughout the U.S.S.R giving over 460 lectures on ESP and showing scientific ESP films at scores of institutes. Yet just a decade ago Naumov’s profession, parapsychologist, didn’t exist in the Soviet Union. Then in the early sixties, the Stalinist taboo against all things psychic vanished with a bang.

“你们来了，我真是太高兴了。真的太高兴了。”爱德华·瑙莫夫热情地重复着，一边用双手和西方的各种手握手。生物学家爱德华·瑙莫夫是苏联超心理学——超常现象研究——的一位重要人物。他在全苏联各地演讲过460多场关于超感知和展示科学超感知电影的讲座。然而，就在十年前，瑙莫夫的职业——超心理学家，在苏联根本不存在。直到六十年代初，斯大林时期对所有心灵超自然事物的禁忌才突然消失得无影无踪。

Top-level physiologists, geologists, engineers, physicists, and biologists abruptly plunged into work on ESP. A free-wheeling, little-known psychic renaissance hit Russia. Bank-rolled by their governments, not just Russians, but Bulgarians, Czechs, and Poles are pursuing clues to telepathy, prophecy, and PK—psychokinesis, the ability to move matter with mind alone. These thriving Communist groups hope to prove that supernormal happenings spring from laws of mind. They hope to prove we can harness and use psychic abilities right now.

高级生物学家、地质学家、工程师、物理学家和生物学家突然开始研究超感知。一个自由奔放、鲜为人知的心灵复兴在俄罗斯兴起。得到政府资助的不仅仅是俄罗斯人，还有保加利亚人、捷克人和波兰人，他们追寻有关心灵感应、预言和PK——心灵动力学，用心灵单独移动物质的能力的线索。这些繁荣的共产主义团体希望证明超常现象源于心灵的法则。他们希望证明我们现在就可以驾驭和利用心灵能力。

When we first landed in Moscow in the summer of 1968, we began to wonder if we might have to summon up something like psychic abilities to contact some of these Communist scientists. It wasn’t that they’d never heard of us. When we learned of ESP’s sudden appearance in Russia, we’d written, without great expectations, to some of the scientists supposedly involved. Many of them surprised us with registered letters and cables telling of their work. And the letters kept coming. From Kiev, Leningrad, Moscow, Novosibirsk, for three years, every few months an envelope plastered with Soviet stamps would appear filled with clippings about ESP tests, about controversy and grandiose plans for psychic investigations. Finally Edward Naumov wrote, “Why not come and see for yourselves what we’re doing?” He invited us to an international conference on ESP in Moscow.

当我们在1968年夏天首次抵达莫斯科时，我们开始思考是否需要发挥类似超感知的能力来联系一些共产主义科学家。并不是说他们从未听说过我们。当我们得知超感知突然在俄罗斯出现时，我们写信给一些据说参与其中的科学家，虽然并没有抱太大期望。然而，许多人都以挂号信和电报的形式回复我们，告诉我们他们的工作情况。信件还在不断涌来。从基辅、列宁格勒、莫斯科、新西伯利亚，三年来，每隔几个月，带着苏联邮票的信封就会出现，里面装满了有关超感知测试、争议和大胆的心灵调查计划的剪报。最后，爱德华·瑙莫夫写信邀请我们：“为什么不亲自来看看我们在做什么呢？”他邀请我们参加莫斯科举行的超感知国际会议。

Why not? Why not see if we could separate the rhetoric from the results, enthusiasm from facts. We had suitcases packed with questions. Yet when we finally made it to Moscow across five thousand miles of space and, it seemed, about as much red tape, all we really wanted to get over as an opener was, “Here we are”. But this was Moscow, a city of phones, but no phonebooks, of streets lined with official institutes, but no detailed street maps. It didn’t seem sensible to assume our hosts would know where we were, because no one is told what hotel you’ll be staying at until you arrive, body and baggage on the spot.

为什么不呢？为什么不看看我们能不能把言辞和事实区分开，把热情和事实区分开呢？我们的行李箱里装满了问题。然而，当我们终于跨越了五千英里的空间，并似乎度过了相当多的麻烦，我们真正想要完成的第一件事就是“我们来了”。但这是莫斯科，这是一个有电话但没有电话簿的城市，有官方研究院排列的街道，却没有详细的街道地图。认为我们的东道主会知道我们在哪里，似乎并不明智，因为直到你亲自抵达时，没有人会告诉你你将住在哪家酒店。

We shouldn’t have worried. We were still thinking in Western terms of reasonable ways of getting in touch with people. Instead, two Americans we’d met in Leningrad bumped into us again in our Moscow hotel. Then they boarded a bus and happened to sit near a beauty queen, Miss Lebanon. Miss Lebanon struck up a conversation with two Englishmen who were in Moscow—for an ESP conference. The sharp-eared Americans soon got us all together. We discovered the intrepid British had already found their man, Naumov, and we were connected.

然而我们无需担心。我们还在用西方的理智方式考虑如何与人们取得联系。然而，在列宁格勒我们遇到的两个美国人又在莫斯科的酒店里再次碰到了我们。然后他们搭乘一辆公共汽车，偶然与一位美丽的黎巴嫩小姐坐在一起。黎巴嫩小姐与两名在莫斯科参加超感知会议的英国人开始交谈。敏锐的美国人很快把我们几个人聚在了一起。于是我们找到了英勇的英国人已经找到了他们的人，瑙莫夫，于是我们也联系上了。

The intense, thirty-six-year-old Naumov plunged right in. “Look, this will give you some idea of what you’re going to be hearing about, some idea of our approach”. He dug into his voluminous satchel. “Here’s the program for the conference”. He held out copies for us and two British delegates, John Cutten and R. George Medhurst (from the Society for Psychical Research in London, the oldest such group in the world).

这位身材高大、年仅三十六岁的瑙莫夫迅速投入到话题中。“看，这会让你们对你们将要听到的，对我们的研究方法有一些了解。”他掏出了自己的厚厚的公文包。“这是会议的议程。”他给我们和两名英国代表约翰·卡顿和乔治·梅德赫斯特（来自伦敦心灵研究协会，是世界上最古老的类似组织）递了一份拷贝。

A program may not sound like much, but this one made us forget about the heat. It was a cornucopia of psychic delights—psychic and scientific, the combination we’d come to Russia to find out about. At the conference we’d hear about dowsing, fingertip vision, PK. We’d learn about photographing the human aura and machines that register telepathy. We’d be hearing about these and an afternoon of other subjects from physicists and biophysicists, chemists, and mathematicians.

一个议程也许听起来不像什么，但这份议程让我们忘记了炎热的天气。这是一个心灵和科学结合的丰盛盛宴——超感知和科学的结合，我们来俄罗斯就是为了了解这个。在会议上，我们将听到关于寻水、指尖视觉、PK（心灵动力学）的报告。我们将了解关于摄影人类气场和注册心灵感应的机器的方法。从物理学家、生物物理学家、化学家到数学家，我们将听到这些和其他主题的下午报告。

Apart from the top brass roster of scientists, we noticed that Karl Nikolaiev was also scheduled to talk. In 1966 Nikolaiev, the Soviet Union’s first “tested” telepathist, had starred in a famous telepathy experiment from Moscow to Siberia. After this success, the Russian people began to hear about “Psi”. “Psi”—the twenty-third letter of the Greek alphabet Ψ (pronounced si), is a general term for the whole field of the paranormal.

除了一系列高层科学家的名单，我们注意到还有卡尔·尼古拉耶夫的演讲计划。1966年，尼古拉耶夫是苏联第一位“经过测试”的感应者，他在莫斯科到西伯利亚的一次著名的心灵感应实验中表现出色。在此之后，俄罗斯人开始听说“Ψ”。“Ψ”—希腊字母Ψ（发音为si）的第23个字母，是心灵超自然领域的通用术语。

Within a year, psychic Nikolaiev took part in some very strange-sounding, super modern telepathy tests. At Leningrad University he sat in the wiry clutches of a roomful of machinery that registered his bodily reactions as Moscow scientists attempted to send him Morse code messages via telepathy. They claim they succeeded. They claim that with nothing but mind power from Moscow, they influenced Nikolaiev’s brainwaves in Leningrad. These shifts in brainwaves could eventually be decoded, they said, into a word. A psychic SOS system was in the making.

一年之内，超感知者尼古拉耶夫参与了一些听起来非常奇怪、超现代的心灵感应测试。在列宁格勒大学，他坐在一屋子装满仪器的房间里，莫斯科科学家试图通过心灵感应向他传递莫尔斯密码信号。他们声称他们成功了。他们声称仅凭莫斯科的心灵力量，他们就影响了列宁格勒的尼古拉耶夫的脑电波。他们说，这些脑电波的变化最终可以解码成一个单词。一个心灵SOS系统正在形成之中。

As the translator coalesced the pages of the program into instant English, Naumov seemed to vibrate with words to come, like a radio paused for a station break. “Of course we want to get together specialists working in ESP in our country. That’s one reason for the conference. But there’s another reason. We’d like more contacts with foreigners. After all, parapsychology is an international question. And I believe it’s more than just a question of an exchange of research. Parapsychology must develop in the name of good. It must”, he repeated.

随着翻译把议程的页面翻译成英语，瑙莫夫似乎已经准备好了一大堆话，就像一台暂停的电台。“当然，我们希望邀请到在我们国家从事超感知研究的专家。这是举办会议的一个原因。但还有另一个原因。我们希望与外国人有更多的接触。毕竟，心灵超自然现象是一个国际性的问题。我相信这不仅仅是一个研究交流的问题。心灵超自然现象必须在善的名义下发展。必须如此。”他重复道。

We thought of the words the famous Russian poet Evgeny Evtushenko wrote to the American writer, Olga Carlisle. “I think there are only two nationalities—good people and bad people. . . . You are Americans. We are Russians. But good Americans will always be closer to me than bad Russians, and to you, I am sure, good Russians are preferable to bad Americans”. Evtushenko and Naumov are of the same generation.

我们想起著名的俄罗斯诗人叶甫根尼·耶夫图申科写给美国作家奥尔加·卡莱尔的话：“我认为只有两个民族——好人和坏人……你们是美国人。我们是俄罗斯人。但好的美国人对我来说永远比坏的俄罗斯人更亲近，而对你们来说，我相信好的俄罗斯人也比坏的美国人更可取。”耶夫图申科和瑙莫夫是同一代人。

“I’m so very, very glad you’ve come”, Naumov said once more, and he seemed to mean it right down to his bones. “Particularly from England and America. This meeting will be so helpful. You’ll be able to talk to scientists from all over our country at the conference on Monday”, he added, shepherding the four of us into the Minsk dining room with its long, white tables. Russians traditionally offer the newly arrived guest bread and salt as symbols of hospitality. The ongoing symbols of hospitality among psychic circles turned out to be more inviting: champagne and ice cream.

“我真的，真的很高兴你们来了。”瑙莫夫再次说道，他似乎是真心实意地这么说。“特别是来自英国和美国。这次会议将会非常有帮助。你们可以在星期一的会议上和我们国家各地的科学家们交谈。”他带着我们四个人走进明斯克餐厅，里面有长长的白色桌子。俄罗斯人传统上会以面包和盐来表示热情款待。而在超心理学领域，用来表示热情款待的标志更加诱人：香槟和冰淇淋。

Someone at the table brought up the subject of submarines. Submarines have played a big part in the Russian psychic renaissance. Soviet parapsychology actually surfaced atop the U.S. atomic sub Nautilus. In 1959 French journalists splashed the now rather infamous Nautilus story in headlines. “U.S. Navy Uses ESP on Atomic Sub!” Ship-to-shore telepathy, according to the French, blipped along nicely even when the Nautilus was far underwater. “Is telepathy a new secret weapon? Will ESP be a deciding factor in future warfare?” The speculating French sensationalized “Has the American military learned the secret of mind power?”

桌子上有人提起了潜艇的话题。潜艇在俄罗斯心灵复兴中发挥了重要作用。苏联超心理学实际上是在美国“核子潜艇”纳努特光芒四射的表面上出现的。1959年，法国记者用如今相当臭名昭著的“纳努特”故事在头条报道了它。“美国海军在核潜艇上使用超感应！”根据法国人的说法，无论纳努特潜艇深潜多深，心灵感应传播都很顺利。“心灵感应是一种新的秘密武器吗？心灵感应是否将成为未来战争的决定性因素？”法国人猜测“美国军方是否已经掌握了心灵力量的秘密？”

In Leningrad, the Nautilus reports went off like a depth charge in the mind of sixty-eight-year-old Dr. Leonid L. Vasiliev, an internationally recognized physiologist. In April 1960 Vasiliev rose to speak to a gathering of top Soviet scientists. They’d met to commemorate the discovery of radio. No one expected to hear revelations about that bourgeois fiction “mental radio”.

在列宁格勒，纳努特的故事在1968年春季像深水炸弹一样在68岁的列宁格勒大学生理学博士列昂尼德·瓦西列维的头脑中爆发。1960年4月，瓦西列维站起来对一群顶尖的苏联科学家发表演讲，他们聚集在一起庆祝无线电的发现。没人预料到他会谈论那个资产阶级虚构的“心灵无线电”。

“We carried out extensive and, until now, completely unreported investigations on ESP under the Stalin regime!” Vasiliev told his startled colleagues. “Today the American Navy is testing telepathy on their atomic submarines. Soviet science conducted a great many successful telepathy tests over a quarter of a century ago! It’s urgent that we throw off our prejudices. We must again plunge into the exploration of this vital field”.

“在斯大林时期，我们进行了广泛的，直到现在完全没有报道的心灵感应研究！”瓦西列维告诉他震惊的同事们。“今天，美国海军正在核潜艇上测试心灵感应。苏联科学在四分之一个世纪前进行了许多成功的心灵感应测试！我们必须迅速消除我们的偏见。我们必须重新投入到这个重要领域的探索中。”

Dr. Vasiliev, a corresponding member of the Soviet Academy of Medicine, Chairman of Physiology at the University of Leningrad, holder of the Lenin Prize, was highly respected in the Soviet Union. The Soviet hierarchy apparently bought Vasiliev’s advice—perhaps because he stated uncompromisingly, “The discovery of the energy underlying ESP will be equivalent to the discovery of atomic energy”.

瓦西列维是苏联医学科学院的通讯院士，是列宁格勒大学的生理学主任，是莫斯科工程学院的教授，也是列宁奖的获得者，在苏联备受尊敬。苏联政府显然采纳了瓦西列维的建议——也许是因为他毫不妥协地表示：“发现心灵感应的基础能量将等同于核能的发现”。

Within the year Vasiliev headed a special laboratory for parapsychology at the University of Leningrad. (Westerners often call this the world’s first government-backed ESP lab; actually, Holland has boasted a government-funded psi institute for years.) However, the Parapsychology Laboratory at the prestigious University of Leningrad was a first, vibrating with implications for the Soviet Union.

一年之内，瓦西列维成为了列宁格勒大学超心理学专门实验室的负责人。（西方人通常称这是世界上第一个政府支持的超感知实验室；实际上，荷兰多年来就拥有一家政府资助的超感知研究所。）然而，著名的列宁格勒大学超感知实验室，对于苏联却意义重大。

A 1963 Kremlin edict gave top priority to the biological sciences, which in the U.S.S.R. include parapsychology. Major impetus behind the Soviet drive to harness ESP was said to come from the Soviet Military and the Soviet Secret Police. Today the Soviet Union has some twenty or more centers for the study of the paranormal with an annual budget estimated in 1967 at 12 to 20 million rubles ($13 million to $21 million).

1963年的克里姆林宫法令将生物科学，包括超感知学，列为首要发展领域。苏联推动利用超感知的主要动力据说来自苏联军队和苏联秘密警察。如今，苏联拥有大约20个或更多的超心理学研究中心，据1967年估计，每年的预算为1200万至2000万卢布（1300万至2100万美元）。

As Russia reversed gears and began speeding in pursuit of the supernormal, the United States Navy denied the Nautilus story in tones of demi-horror. No one in the Navy has anything to do with telepathy, they said, and have kept saying since 1959.

随着俄罗斯逆向而动，开始追求超自然，美国海军以半恐慌的语气否认了纳努特的故事。自从1959年以来，海军从未与心灵感应有过任何关联。

“Is the Nautilus story really untrue?” Naumov asked us.

“纳努特的故事真的是不真实的吗？”瑙莫夫问我们。

“Who knows?” was our best answer.

“谁知道呢？”这是我们最好的回答。

Whether the American Nautilus tests happened or not, the reports of them were enough to set the Soviets going on some ESP tests with their own submarines. The Soviet tests (see chapter 3) are much more unusual than the supposed Nautilus ones.

无论美国的纳努特测试是否发生过，但是这些报道足以激发苏联进行自己的潜艇上的超感知测试。与所谓的纳努特测试相比，苏联的测试（请参阅第三章）更加不同寻常。

The conversation shifted away from submarines as a young physicist, a friend of Naumov’s, joined us at our table in the Minsk dining room. More cherry ice cream, black coffee, and good, cold Russian champagne appeared. The talk shot from subject to subject. It seemed there was a great deal to tell us.

谈话从潜艇转移开来，因为一位年轻的物理学家，是Naumov的朋友，加入了我们在明斯克餐厅的桌子旁。新的樱桃冰淇淋、黑咖啡和美味的冰冷俄罗斯香槟出现了。谈话话题跳来跳去，似乎有很多事情要告诉我们。

For the past ten months, biologist Naumov had been Chief of Technical Parapsychology at a special laboratory affiliated with the Department of Physics of the State Instrumental Engineering College of Moscow. The creation of this laboratory was presided over by many eminent scientists: Dr. Ya. Terletsky, a physics chairman at Moscow University; Dr. E. Sitkovsky of the Academy of Social Sciences; Dr. Pavel Oshchepkov, founder of radar in the U.S.S.R. and President of the Engineering Institute.

过去的十个月里，生物学家Naumov一直担任莫斯科国家仪器工程学院物理系附属特殊实验室的技术超心理学主任。这个实验室的创建由许多杰出的科学家主持，其中包括莫斯科大学物理系主任Dr. Ya. Terletsky、社会科学院的Dr. E. Sitkovsky、苏联雷达创始人、工程学院院长Dr. Pavel Oshchepkov。

As one might guess from the title of the laboratory, a major thrust of Soviet ESP work is to develop machines capable of monitoring, testing, and studying ESP. But the Soviets are also eager to study the human, people-to-people aspects of ESP. “We believe ESP is enmeshed with all of everyday life”, they told us. “We believe ESP affects any group situation”. And perhaps with people as warm-hearted and volatile as the Slavs, ESP does flow more easily.

从实验室的名称可以猜到，苏联超心理学工作的一个主要方向是开发能够监测、测试和研究超感知能力的机器。但苏联也渴望研究超感知能力在人与人之间的方面。“我们认为超感知与日常生活中的所有事物都紧密相连”，他们告诉我们。“我们相信超感知影响着任何群体情况”。也许对于像斯拉夫人那样热情而多变的人们来说，超感知更容易流动。

Many Westerners seem to have the idea Soviet citizens are robot-like people, gray automatons in a well-run machine shop. An American student we met in Leningrad confessed, “I thought the sun never shone in Russia and the people never smiled—boy was I wrong!” We found the characteristic Russian warmth and generosity a constant of everyday life. Casual Soviet acquaintances presented us with huge, rambling bouquets of flowers and books of poetry from their own libraries. Whenever we snapped a Polaroid picture, enthusiastic passers-by crowded in to argue the merits of the shot and exclaim over the wonders of American science. Grandmotherly elevator operators kept us suspended between floors while they hugged us roundly and blessed our ancestors because we’d given them a small gift.

许多西方人似乎认为苏联公民就像机器人一样，是在一个良好运转的机器店里的灰色自动机器。我们在列宁格勒遇到的一位美国学生坦白说：“我以为俄罗斯从来不见阳光，人们从来不笑——我错了！”我们发现典型的俄罗斯热情和慷慨是日常生活的常态。随意的苏联熟人会送给我们庞大而花哨的花束和他们自己图书馆里的诗集。每当我们拍下一张宝丽来照片，热情的路人们都会围拢起来讨论这张照片的优点，并对美国科学的奇迹感叹不已。亲切的电梯操作员会把我们悬停在楼层之间，同时热情地拥抱我们，为我们的祖先祈福，因为我们给了她们小小的礼物。

“Telepathy is probably always flowing among people”, Naumov said. “We may always be telepathically aware of subtle thoughts and feelings of others in a group. It helps explain why some people get along well and others instantly dislike one another. Our scientists are trying to study and measure ESP objectively among groups of people”.

“或许心灵感应在人与人之间一直在发生”，Naumov说。“在一个群体中，我们可能总是能够心灵感应地感知到其他人微妙的思想和感情。这有助于解释为什么有些人相处得很好，而有些人则立刻互相讨厌。我们的科学家正在试图客观地研究和测量群体之间的超感知能力”。

Shortly before his death, Bishop James Pike wrote in Psychic, “This whole psi field has opened up a much bigger view of human potential for me. The potential of interrelationship, the sensitivity of the mystery of all that goes on between persons beyond just their words, or their actions or touches. There are things like AM and FM and everything else going on and we’re just beginning to discover some of this. There are more lines of connection in this universe than I ever realized”. Soviet dialectical materialists like Edward Naumov and his scientist friends were talking about the same thing as Pike.

詹姆斯·派克主教在《心灵》一书中在去世前不久写道：“这整个超心理学领域为我打开了一个更大的人类潜能视野。人与人之间的相互关系潜能，所有超越言语、行动或触摸的神秘敏感。就像AM和FM以及其他一切事物一样，我们才刚刚开始发现其中的一些。这个宇宙中有更多的联系线，比我意识到的还要多。”苏联的辩证唯物主义者，像Edward Naumov和他的科学家朋友，也在谈论同样的事情。

“We believe man has vast hidden potential”, Naumov said, and you couldn’t help feeling his intense sincerity. “It is vital, we must investigate these untapped resources of human beings in every possible way”. He seemed to belong to that Russian school of passionate intellectuals who too often skip meals, sleep, and from their point of view, other such diversions.

“我们相信人类拥有巨大的潜在能力”，Naumov说，你不能不感受到他的强烈诚意。“这是至关重要的，我们必须以各种可能的方式来研究这些未开发的人类资源”。他似乎属于那些热情洋溢的俄罗斯知识分子学派，他们往往会跳过吃饭、睡觉，以及从他们的角度来看的其他娱乐。

The conversation turned to the West. We found the Soviets knew a lot about ESP outside their country. They knew all about Edgar Cayce, the “sleeping prophet”, and had even had a lecture on him in Moscow. They knew about Jeane Dixon, the Washington seeress, and about Gerard Croiset, the Dutch psychic famous for helping the police solve crimes. More surprising to us, the Soviets asked repeatedly about the American Ted Serios, who is supposedly able to make a photograph of a distant building appear on a film by staring at a camera. The Russians, we heard, were also researching this “psychic photography” and wanted all the information they could dig up on Serios.

谈话转向了西方。我们发现苏联对他们国外的超感知能力了解很多。他们了解埃德加·凯西，那位“睡着的预言家”，甚至在莫斯科还有他的讲座。他们知道琴·狄克森，华盛顿的预言家，以及荷兰的杰拉德·克罗塞特，因帮助警方破案而出名的心灵感应者。更让我们惊讶的是，苏联反复询问美国的泰德·塞里奥斯，据说他能够通过凝视相机，使遥远建筑物的照片出现在胶片上。我们听说，俄罗斯人也在研究这种“心灵摄影”，并想尽可能地获取关于塞里奥斯的所有信息。

Soviets knew about American parapsychologists, too. They were certainly familiar with the lifetime of research that Dr. J. B. Rhine has dedicated to the field. Dr. Rhine, formerly of Duke University, now with the Foundation for Research on the Nature of Man, is the most eminent American parapsychologist. “Of course”, Naumov went on, “we have more than our share of skeptics here. But thanks in part to Dr. Rhine’s proof of ESP, researchers here aren’t trying to prove again that ESP exists! We are trying to find out how and why psi works”.

苏联也了解美国的超心理学家。他们对J·B·莱恩博士多年来在该领域所做的研究非常熟悉。莱恩博士曾在杜克大学任教，现在是“人类本性研究基金会”的顶尖美国超心理学家。“当然”，Naumov继续说，“我们这里也有不少怀疑论者。但部分要感谢莱恩博士证明了超感知的存在，我们这里的研究者不再试图证明超感知是否存在！我们现在是在试图找出超感知是如何以及为什么起作用的”。

While the Russians knew much about ESP in the West, Westerners were only getting the tiniest snatches of information about the world of Communist ESP. One of the strangest and most bizarre stories to reach the West via the international wire services in the spring of 1968 told of Nelya Mikhailova. This plump Leningrad housewife was apparently a PK medium. She supposedly had the power to move matter with the mind alone. “When Nelya Mikhailova wants something, she just stares at it and the object begins to creep toward her”.

尽管苏联对西方的超感知能力了解很多，但西方人对共产主义国家超感知领域的信息只是一些零星的片段。1968年春天，通过国际电讯社传到西方的一个最奇怪、最离奇的消息是关于Nelya Mikhailova的。这位丰满的列宁格勒家庭主妇显然是一位PK媒介者。她据说有用思想移动物体的能力。“当Nelya Mikhailova想要某样东西时，她只需要盯着它，物体就开始朝她移动”。

An Associated Press release from Moscow went further. “Nelya has astounded Soviet scientists with her ability to move such things as match sticks or wine glasses without touching them”. Nelya Mikhailova and her supposed mind-over-matter power to move anything from aluminum tubes to apples and water pitchers were question mark number one when we landed in Russia.

莫斯科的一篇美联社通讯进一步报道说：“Nelya以她的能力让苏联科学家大吃一惊，她可以在不触摸的情况下移动火柴棍或酒杯。” Nelya Mikhailova以及她所谓的心灵控制物质的能力，包括移动铝管、苹果和水壶等，成为我们在抵达俄罗斯时面临的第一个谜题。

“Over forty top scientists, including two Nobel prize winners, have tested Nelya Mikhailova”, our Soviet hosts told us. “Dr. Vasiliev did research with her right up to his death in 1966”.

“超过40名顶尖科学家，包括两位诺贝尔奖得主，已经对Nelya Mikhailova进行了测试”，我们的苏联东道主告诉我们。“Vasiliev博士一直在1966年去世之前与她一起进行研究。”

We’d heard there were movies of the remarkable Nelya in action.

我们听说了关于这位出色的Nelya的行动的电影。

“I produced a film on Mikhailova myself”, Naumov said, “but I don’t think I should tell you about it”. He paused. “Because you’re going to see the film on Monday!” Obviously, the Nelya film was to be the caviar of the conference. “And it’s possible you’ll meet Mrs. Mikhailova too”, he said with a broad smile.

“我亲自制作了一部关于Mikhailova的电影”，Naumov说，“但我想我不应该告诉你们这些。”他停了下来。“因为你们将在星期一看到这部电影！”显然，Nelya的电影将成为会议上的一大亮点。“而且你们可能也会见到Mikhailova夫人”，他笑得很灿烂。

Naumov had one last surprise for us. We were all invited to give speeches at the conference. He not only invited, he insisted. With that, Naumov and his friends left to welcome other Western delegates.

Naumov还给我们带来了最后一个惊喜。我们都被邀请在会议上发表演讲。他不仅邀请了我们，而且坚持邀请。说完这些，Naumov和他的朋友们离开去欢迎其他西方代表。

We’d met our first Communist parapsychologist. He’d come on strong and talked for three hours straight. The biggest impression he left us was of his kinetic curiosity, his kinetic enthusiasm. If nothing else, it looked as if our two weeks in Moscow weren’t going to be dull.

我们见到了我们的第一个共产主义超心理学家。他表现得很强势，一口气讲了三个小时。他给我们留下最深刻的印象是他那种充满好奇心和热情的样子。至少，我们在莫斯科的两个星期看起来不会无聊。

Attempting to order supper through the glass-clinking, foot-stamping roar of a Russian wedding party, we talked with our English friends about the First Moscow International Conference on Parapsychology. The original invitation set the conference in December 1967. Then a letter arrived explaining that some four hundred scientific papers had been submitted, “too many to edit in time”, and an expanded conference would be held in May 1968. Soon a note came saying because of “difficulties” the conference would be sometime in June. The bulletin advising when in June flashed out long after we’d sailed from Montreal for Leningrad on the M.S. Pushkin. Meanwhile, we spent two news-free weeks on the Soviet liner enjoying Russian lessons, Ukrainian movies, and a sporting group of Soviet diplomats who donned tutus and ballet shoes to gallumph through Swan Lake on amateur night. After a week of Leningrad’s famous White Nights, when it’s pearly light even at one a.m., we boarded the Red Arrow Express for Moscow, miraculously arriving just in time for the conference.

在俄罗斯一个婚礼晚宴的欢声笑语和杯盘狼藉的背景下，我们与我们的英国朋友讨论着第一届莫斯科国际超心理学会议。最初的邀请将会议定于1967年12月。然后收到一封信解释说提交了大约四百份科学论文，“编辑的时间太紧”，于是会议推迟到1968年5月举行。不久之后又来了一张纸条，说因为“困难”，会议将在六月某个时候举行。但是，我们从蒙特利尔乘坐的M.S.普希金号轮船前往列宁格勒时，关于六月份具体何时举行会议的通知已经迟迟未到。与此同时，我们在苏联的轮船上度过了两个没有新闻的星期，学习俄语，观看乌克兰电影，欣赏一群苏联外交官在业余夜晚穿着芭蕾舞裙和芭蕾舞鞋跳《天鹅湖》的精彩表演。在列宁格勒名扬四海的白夜过后，当它在凌晨一点钟仍然拥有珍珠般的光辉时，我们乘坐“红箭号”快车前往莫斯科，准时赶到了会议现场。

“Unfortunately”, George Medhurst told us, “John and I are going to miss the second day of the conference. Our visas run out. Intourist says there’s nothing we can do about it”. There wasn’t. You have to tell Intourist, the Soviet agency that oversees foreign visitors, exactly how long you’re going to be at each place you stop in Russia—and you have to pay in full well before you’re allowed into the country.

“不幸的是”，乔治·梅德赫斯特告诉我们，“约翰和我将错过会议的第二天。我们的签证到期了。旅游机构说我们无能为力。”的确如此。你必须准确告诉苏联外国游客管理机构Intourist，你在俄罗斯每个停留地点计划停留多长时间，并且在获得进入该国许可之前，必须提前全额支付费用。

As we strolled along Moscow’s Gorky Street late that evening we speculated on this new Soviet push into research on the paranormal. When we first decided to do this book, we went to Durham, North Carolina, to consult Dr. J. B. Rhine, the dean of American parapsychologists. “The inspiration of the Communist movement centered on a new understanding of the nature of man, but it only got through to a certain level”, he told us. “Now the Russians may be ready for a larger science, a new and more spiritual understanding of man. This new Soviet work in parapsychology at a high scientific level could be very hopeful”.

当晚晚些时候，我们漫步在莫斯科的高尔基大街上，对苏联对超自然领域的新推动进行推测。当我们决定写这本书时，我们去了北卡罗来纳州的杜兰市咨询美国超心理学泰斗J·B·莱恩博士。“共产主义运动的灵感集中在对人性本质的新理解，但它只到达了一定层次”，他告诉我们。“现在，苏联可能已经准备好进入一个更大的科学领域，对人性进行新的、更加精神的理解。这种在高科学水平上进行的新的苏联超心理学研究可能是非常有希望的”。

On our way back to New York from Durham, we stopped at the Edgar Cayce Foundation in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Among the volumes of predictions made by the American psychic, we discovered that over forty years ago Cayce had prophesied that one day out of Russia would come a great spiritual development. Was this what the unexpected psychic renaissance pointed toward?

回到纽约途中，我们在弗吉尼亚州比吉海滩的埃德加·凯西基金会停留。在美国超感应者所作的预测中，我们发现在四十多年前，凯西曾预言说，有一天，俄罗斯将会出现一个伟大的精神发展。这是否是这场意想不到的心灵复兴所指向的方向？

Or did the Russians, as some observers believed, have more devious reasons for exploring ESP and ways to control the mind?

或者，正如一些观察者所认为的那样，俄罗斯对探索超感知和控制心灵有更多的不可告人的原因？

For all her famous “mystic soul”, her fabulously peopled occult history, Russia since the Communist revolution had been inordinately leery of anything that could not be immediately seen in the clear, material light of day. Why the sudden shift? What were the Soviets up to?

尽管有着著名的“神秘灵魂”和丰富的神秘历史，自共产主义革命以来，俄罗斯对任何在明朗的物质光芒中看不见的事物都持非常谨慎的态度。为什么会突然转变？苏联人在做什么？

In New York, a famous psychic told us in the spring of 1968, “I see dark clouds hanging over Russia. Very dark indeed”, she added grimly.

在1968年春季，纽约一位著名的超感应者告诉我们：“我看到黑云笼罩在俄罗斯上空。非常黑暗”，她严肃地补充道。

Had we known then what we now know about the currents pressing toward the surface in the Soviet Union, we would have been a lot more nervous about suddenly being plunged into an area of serious political controversy—ESP.

如果那时我们已经知道现在我们了解的有关苏联内部思潮的一切，我们会对突然陷入严重政治争议——超感应领域——的地区感到更加紧张。

The Czech invasion was just weeks away. Only days after we arrived in Moscow, a manifesto by Dr. Andrei Sakharov, father of the Soviet H bomb, reached the West. This “Report Against the System”, reflecting the liberal ideas of the Soviet scientific elite, shocked Soviet officials. There were also open demonstrations by Soviet citizens against policies of the regime—something previously unheard of in Russia. At the same time, backlash Neo-Stalinists were rapidly consolidating control. Soon hundreds of scientists would be fired for political reasons. Soon all of the scientists in the country would be required to undergo political examinations. We had arrived in the Communist world while it was halfway between renaissance and inquisition.

捷克斯洛伐克入侵只有几周之遥。我们到达莫斯科后仅几天，苏联H弹之父安德烈·萨哈罗夫博士的宣言传到西方。这份“反体制报告”反映了苏联科学精英的自由主义思想，震惊了苏联官员。苏联市民还进行了对抗政权政策的公开示威——在俄罗斯以前从未听说过这种情况。同时，反弹的新斯大林主义者正在迅速巩固控制权。很快，数百名科学家将因政治原因被解雇。不久之后，全国的科学家都将被要求接受政治审查。我们来到共产主义世界时，正好处于文艺复兴和审判之间。

Fortunately for our peace of mind that first evening in Moscow, we weren’t yet fully aware of all that was rumbling behind the scenes. As we walked along Gorky Street, we half-heartedly made the usual jokes about microphones in the lamp and wondered about the odd circumstances surrounding the conference. The lime trees sent big puffs of fuzz into the warm air. They floated like a surreal snowstorm over the heads of the crowds sauntering now at midnight. Since Sheila’s 1961 trip to Russia, New York-style steel and glass buildings had sprung up to reflect the ancient, Asian domes of Moscow. There were new consumer goods, new stores, more cars, better-dressed people. As we walked toward the Kremlin and past the old Metropol Hotel, once the Moscow headquarters of Rasputin, the mystic monk who’d held the Tsar and all Russia in his sway, we wondered if we’d find out anything solid about the space-age telepathy of Karl Nikolaiev and about the ways or wiles of Nelya Mikhailova.

幸运的是，对于我们第一个晚上在莫斯科，我们并不完全意识到幕后正在发生的一切。我们在高尔基大街上散步时，虽然有些调侃，玩笑着说台灯里有窃听器，但对于会议周围的奇怪情况还心存疑惑。在温暖的空气中，椴树发出大团大团的绒毛，像超现实主义的风雪在午夜时分在漫步的人群头顶飘舞。自从希拉在1961年前往俄罗斯以来，类似纽约风格的钢铁玻璃建筑冒起，反射着莫斯科的古老亚洲穹顶。有了新的消费品、新的商店、更多的汽车和穿着更好的人们。当我们朝着克里姆林宫走去，路过古老的梅特罗波尔酒店，曾经是俄罗斯沙皇和全国的据点的拉斯普京的莫斯科总部，我们不知道我们是否能够真正了解到卡尔·尼古拉耶夫的太空时代的心灵感应，以及涅利娅·米哈伊洛娃的手段或诡计。

The Soviets seemed to be plunging into the psychic realm from perspectives very different from those of the West. Were they slowly making clear a new understanding of what a human being is? Had the Soviets found proof that we all possess supernormal powers?

苏联似乎从与西方截然不同的角度深入探索心灵领域。他们是否慢慢地明确了对人类的新理解？苏联是否找到了我们所有人都拥有超常能力的证据？