I discovered late last night while searching through Amazon that I am mentioned in Martin Gardner’s Did Adam and Eve Have Navels? I appear on page 219 in a selectively edited role concerning Thomas Edison’s self-professed joke (see the New York Times for Oct. 15, 1926) about constructing a machine to contact the dead. Gardner, who has made a career out of pointing out the irrational beliefs of others, seems determined to hold on to his, because there is absolutely no evidence besides several mutually conflicting statements made by Edison himself, that such a machine was ever considered by the inventor. And we know, through our experience with our beloved George W. Bush, that mutually conflicting statements from a primary source rarely constitutes positive evidence of anything other than the dubious nature of the respondent and/or of the subject spoken of by the respondent.

Moreover, the cataloguers and workers at the Edison Papers Project–which contains virtually every scrap of paper Edison laid a writing implement to, as Edison appeared to have been incapable of throwing anything of that sort away–have found nothing. No plans, no parts lists, nothing. Given the fact that Edison was not shy about promoting and documenting any of his ideas, this is pretty powerful evidence that the machine was nothing more than what Edison said it was–a joke.

I’m pleased to be included in Mr. Gardner’s book. He is indeed one of my long-time favorite authors. We’ll keep you updated on the subject.