Chizuko Mifune, Clairvoyant Wonder Woman

The evidence for clairvoyance is overwhelming, and it includes nearly two hundred years of written evidence by distinguished writers including many doctors and professors. Let us look at another of the endless examples of written evidence for clairvoyance: the 1931 book "Clairvoyance & Thoughtography" by Tomokici Fukurai, a Japanese professor and president of the Psychical Institute of Japan, a book that can be read here.  On the first page of the book, Fukurai notes the hostile reception his observation reports received. Despite such hostility, he rightly states at the beginning of the book that clairvoyance is a fact. 

The first chapter deals with stunningly successful clairvoyance experiments Fukurai did with Chizuko Mifune (1886-1911), who Fukurai describes as having an odd, somber personality, and being very much prone to stick to what impressions she got about a person upon first meeting with such a person.  

Chizuko Mifune (1886-1911)

Fukurai suggests on pages 16-17 that Chizuko probably was driven to suicide by skeptics making unfavorable comments about her.  He says, "Judging from these letters, besides agony over her family affairs, the suspicious criticism of scientists on the clairvoyance force, the gradual declining of her psychic force, the appearance of Mrs. Nagao and many other mediums, etc seemed to wound her amour propre and to influence her to commit suicide."

On page 21 Fukurai describes this method of preparing sealed envelopes containing contents to be used for clairvoyance testing, one involving characters blocked by opaque cards on both the front and back, and also blocked by tin foil on the front of the characters, with this arrangement put in opaque sealed envelopes:

The sealed envelopes were sent to Chizuko and returned to Fukurai, and on page 22 Fukurai says he examined the envelopes and found them unopened: "I examined the seams of the envelopes, but there was not the slightest shadow of doubt."

Page 24 gives the answers that Chizuko gave. That page is shown below. References by Chizuko to "dingy paper" apparently refer to the tin foil in the envelopes. Clicking on the image and inspecting it carefully will reveal that the results are almost perfectly accurate, with almost every character correctly identified. Even without being able to read Japanese, an English reader will be able to check the accuracy by simply checking the appearances of the characters of the left column and the corresponding answers in the right column. The only shortfalls are that only the first  six characters in Envelope 10 were read, and that one of the characters in Envelope 6 (the last character in the second row) seems to be wrong. It is inconceivable that anyone could get so many matches by guessing. 

Japanese characters may use any of three different writing systems: Hiragana, Katakana or Kanji.  The main part of the Hiragana alphabet is about 46 characters, and the main part of the Katakana alphabet is also about 46 characters, as we in the charts below. The Kanji alphabet apparently has thousands of different characters. I cannot find any of the more elaborate characters listed above in a listing of either the Hiragana or Katakana characters, like the one we see below. 

We apparently had Kanji characters being included in the guess targets for this test of clairvoyance. When such characters are included as guess targets, along with the two alphabets (Hiragana or Katakana) having a total of about 92 characters, the likelihood of correctly guessing three out of three random characters would seem to be less than about 1 in a million, and the chance of getting any of the more impressive successes shown above (such as 22 out of 23 correct or 16 out of 16 correct) is basically zero, something we would never expect to occur if there were 1,000,000,000,000,000 people spending their whole lives guessing. 

On page 25 Fukurai starts to discuss experiments done by "Dr. Imamuru, Professor at the Kyoto Imperial University." These were face-to-face experiments with Chizuko Mifune in which she was constantly observed. The first test on February 20 made use of twelve objects which were each put in a separate envelope, pasted and sealed. We read on page 26 of this success, in one of the characters was identified:

In the following tests conducted by the professor, Chizuko failed in test 2, but succeeded in tests 3 and 4, test 4 requiring the identification of a character wrapped in tin foil and thick paper. On page 30 we read of tests of Chizuko performed the next day (February 21).  We read of two consecutive successes in tests of clairvoyance:

On the next trial Chizuko was successful on a harder test of clairvoyance. She correctly identified the exact two Japanese characters in a sealed envelope in which the letters were on a scrap of paper covered by two thick sheets of paper. Particularly impressive was the 4th trial reported on pages 33-34. A professor randomly selected one of a thousand business cards, and without reading it, put in an iron pot which was wrapped in paper.  Chizuko successfully identified four characters on the business card. 

On page 36 we begin to read of tests done with Chizuko Mifune on April 10, 1910, in the presence of  Professor Imamuru, Mr. Kiyohara and Fukurai. In the second trial Chizuko was asked to identify characters on a name card put in a china tea pot sealed in paper. She correctly identified all five Japanese characters on the card. A few trials later in the day were unsuccessful. On the next day on the first trial Chizuko was successful, identifying four Japanese characters on a name card covered in two sheets of paper and put in an envelope. On the second trial involving a name card put in a china teapot with a double-lid, sealed in paper, Chizuko got three out of four characters correct.  In the third trial involving a name card in an iron pot sealed by paper, Chizuko named all four characters correctly. In all these tests she was closely observed by multiple witnesses, seeming to prevent any possibility of tampering with the guess targets.  

Another series of trials on April 12, 1910 was conducted in the villa of Mr. Nagasaki, and observed by Professor Imamuru,  Fukurai, and Nagasaki. The successful first test (involving naming all five characters on a name card) is described below:

There was later some trials on April 17, 1910, involving Professor Imamuru,  Fukurai, and a Mr. Kiyohara, at the house of Mr. Kiyohara. In the first trial Fukurai picked randomly from a group of fifty name cards, putting the card in a teapot, which was then put in a wooden box, over which a paper was pasted, with a seal put on the paper. Chizuko named four out of four characters correctly. The second trial involved similar conditions, with Chizuko naming the first three characters correctly, erring on the last one. In the third trial involving similar conditions, all four characters on the name card were named correctly. The fourth trial used similar conditions, with an even greater success:  Chizuko named ten out of ten characters correctly. Figure 16 shown below shows the name cards used in these tests, the one on the bottom right being the card with ten characters.

Later tests were done on April 15, 1910, at Mr. Nagasaki's villa, with the tests witnessed by Iseri, Kiyohari, Professor Imamuru,  and Fukurai, As you can see below, page 45 of the book lists the first three tests as producing perfect results, with 13 out of 13 hidden characters correctly identified:

The fourth trial was very different, involving a test of the ability to identify randomly selected coins, placed by Fukurai in what he calls a purse, and then wrapped in paper. Chizuko perfectly identified a series of coins consisting of "three coins of ten sen, one coin of one sen, and one coin of two sen." The author then describes a mail test involving cards in a wooden box wrapped up in multiple layers that had various types of seals to prevent tampering. Again, Chizuko perfectly identified ten out of ten characters in the heavily sealed box, which was returned with the seals unbroken. 

On page 48 we read of clairvoyance test targets Fukurai had another person prepare, after Fukurai got feedback from other professors. The targets are described below:

On pages 50 to 51 we learn of the results Chizuko achieved on these tests: perfect results, with 11 out of 11 characters correctly identified. Page 52 reports equally perfect results by Chizuko in tests of clairvoyance, involving targets that were mostly letters, but in one case a drawing of a shape looking like a pie with six pieces.  On page 55 we read of rigorous tests of clairvoyance performed on September 2, 1910, with  tests witnessed by Mifune,  Kiyohari, Professor Imamuru,  and Fukurai:

 

After failing on the first trial using such a method (not producing an answer because of some concentration problem), Chizoku succeeded perfectly on the second and third trials, both times naming three out of three characters.  Page 57 describes additional successful trials with Chizoku on another date:

On page 59 we read of a test of Chizuko in which she successfully named all three characters written on a piece of flat pipe that had its two ends sealed by heat-soldering.  The next page reports a similar success on the next trial, with all three letters being successfully read in a lead pipe that was in a pot kept in a wooden case, with additional paper covering and a seal.  On page 63 the author tells of nine tests he did with Chizuko on November 18, 1910, tests in which she was asked to tell the numbers shown on a pair of dice that were put in a black cigarette case, wrapped in paper, with the paper sealed by the author.  In 6 out of 9 trials Chizuko identified the correct number shown on the dice. 

There are 55 numbers that a pair of dice can show, ranging from 11 to 66. Using the binomial probability calculator at the Wolfram Alpha site, I get a probability of such a result as being about 1 in 300,000,000. Such a success seems to be vastly less impressive than the correct guesses of Japanese characters by Chizoku described above. As noted earlier, the simplest Japanese alphabets (Hiragana and Katakana) each consist of 46 characters. But the more complex characters listed above (which I cannot find on lists of Hiragana and Katakana characters) seem to be Kanji characters, and there are thousands of different Kanji characters. 

The author's last page on Chizuku is one with the saddest irony. We read of her success in the most stringent trial, involving reading letters written on a piece of paper inside a flat iron pipe that had both ends soldered tight.  The author tells us that this triumphant test was his last involvement with Chizoku, who soon thereafter committed suicide.  The groundless criticism of her by skeptics may have been a major factor in her suicide. 

No one who has seriously studied the evidence for clairvoyance should be surprised by the reports above. They are simply a replication of what was very abundantly reported in the nineteenth century by a great many reliable witnesses, including professors and many doctors.  As you can read here, the evidence for the clairvoyance of Alexis Didier was every bit as convincing as the evidence for the clairvoyance of  Chizuko Mifune; and Didier repeatedly passed the most stringent tests of his ability to reveal the contents of sealed boxes, and to state detailed corrections descriptions of houses he had never visited.

For example, on pages 508-509 of the  document here, we read that Alexis Didier was able to  describe an object in a thick closed case, an object he had never seen, and also to tell various unusual facts about that object that could not be guessed from its appearance:

"An officer, of long standing in the army, who was severely wounded at Waterloo, and is well known in the highest military circles, was one of the company present. He was an unbeliever, and knew nothing of mesmerism, and had never seen or scarcely heard of Alexis, — but having been accidentally invited to join the party, and been told that the young man had the power of reading through opaque objects, he determined to bring his talent rigidly to the test.
He produced a morocco case, eight inches long, and an inch and a half thick, looking like a surgical instrument case, or a small jewel-case. It was placed in the hands of Alexis, who held it for a short time in silence, and then gradually and slowly gave the following description :

 'The object within the case is a hard substance.'
' It is folded in an envelope.'
' The envelope is whiter than the thing itself.' (The envelope was a piece of silver-paper.)
' It is a kind of ivory.'
'It has a point (pique) at one end' (which is the case).
' It is a bone.'
' Taken from a body'—
' From a human body' —
' From your body.'
' The bone has been separated and cut, so as to leave a flat side.'

This was true : the bone, which was a piece of the colonel's leg, and sawed off after the wound, is flat towards the part that enclosed the marrow.

Here, Alexis removed the piece of bone from the case, and placed his finger on a part, and said, ' The ball struck here.' (True.)

' It was an extraordinary ball, as to its effect.'

'You received three separate injuries at the same moment.' (Which was the case, for the ball broke or burst into three pieces, and injured the colonel in three places in the same leg.)

' You were wounded in the early part of the day, whilst charging the enemy.' (Which was the fact.)"

To read 25 posts telling about how convincing is the evidence for clairvoyance, use the link here, and keep pressing Older Posts at the bottom right. 

Our education system will be operating well when every high school graduate knows some names such as Chizuko Mifune, Alexis Didier, Hubert Pearce, Daniel Dunglas Home, Leonora Piper, Kate Fox and Florence Cook. When 9 out of 10 students graduate high school and 9 out of 10 students graduate college without ever even having heard such names mentioned, as now occurs, it is a sign of how defective our educational systems are.