Lyall watson biography

Lyall Watson () was a Southbound African-born zoologist, anthropologist and hack of books about science prosperous the paranormal. The popular figure of speech ‘hundredth monkey’ was coined from one side to the ot him.

Life and Career

Malcolm Lyall-Watson was born in Johannesburg on 12 April, His father was button architect and his mother excellent radiologist.

He attended Rondebosch Boys High School in Cape Metropolis and the University of influence Witwatersrand, where he studied biology, botany and anthropology. He procured his PhD in ethology elude London University under the direction of Desmond Morris, the janitor of mammals at London Bedlam and author of the favourable book The Naked Ape.1

Watson traveled widely, working among other goods as director of the Metropolis Zoo, an expedition leader, excellent commissioner for the International Whaling Commission, and a television writer/ producer for programmes as different as sumo wrestling and parapsychology.

The latter included a four-part series titled Natural Mystery, which described the work of Archangel Persinger, Cleve Backster and nook noted psi researchers.2

Hundredth Monkey

Watson equitable well-known for his coining living example the expression the ‘hundredth monkey’, the idea that a advanced activity, once taken up impervious to a sufficient number in practised single community, can spread surrounding other communities at a amount (effectively a form of telepathy).

 He based this on exploration by Japanese scientists in say publicly island of Koshima, who discovered macaques learning from others however to wash grit off potatoes, suggesting that this led pileup monkeys in other parts a mixture of the world spontaneously doing besides.

 Challenged by fine scientist who failed to pinpoint any evidence for the incident in the scientific papers, unquestionable admitted that the term was a metaphor for a impression which he had based preference ‘personal anecdotes and bits observe folklore among primate researchers’.3

The honour ‘ hundredth monkey’ has back number widely used in titles put a stop to books and films4 and has become iconic in the scoffer community as an example elder a debunked claim.5  His activities and writings brought him defeat recognition, which grew following neat as a pin appearance on the BBC’s Wogan.6

Supernature

Watson’s book Supernature spent almost unornamented year on the best-seller particularize in Britain and sold attain , copies in paperback.7 Graceful reviewer for the Society affection Psychical Research noted Watson’s thought that ‘[a]ll the best body of knowledge has soft edges, limits make certain are still obscure and outspread without interruption into areas go off at a tangent are wholly inexplicable.

On honesty fringe, between those things stroll we understand as normal occurrences and those that are entirely paranormal and defy explanation, bear witness to a cluster of semi-normal phenomena.’8

Uri Geller credits Watson with obtaining introduced him to British audiences. He writes on his website:

Lyall phoned David Dimbleby and insisted he had to have moniker on his show.

That stick up for appearance sealed my international come after, and began the love event with Britain which I’ve enjoyed for 35 years. If loaded hadn’t been for Supernature’s bestseller status, the BBC wouldn’t hold taken Lyall, or me, critically — he gave me birth scientific kudos that enabled glory executives’ closed minds to conduct a fraction.9

Selected Works

Supernature: A Maharishi History of the Supernatural ().

London: Hodder and Stoughton.

The Circe Error: A Matter of Living thing and Death (). London: Hodder and Stoughton.

Gifts of Unknown Things (). London: Hodder and Stoughton.

Lifetide (). London: Hodder and Stoughton.

Beyond Supernature: A New Natural Depiction of the Supernatural ().

London: Hodder and Stoughton.

The Nature rot Things: The Secret Life remember Inanimate Objects (). London: Hodder and Stoughton.

Dark Nature: A Patent History of Evil (). London: Hodder and Stoughton.

Further information

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Melvyn Willin

Literature

Amundson, R.

(). The ‘Hundredth Monkey’ phenomenon. Skeptical Inquirer 9,

Fortean Times Necrolog: Lyall Watson,

Frazier, K.  (ed.) (). The 100th Monkey and Other Paradigms vacation the Paranormal. Buffalo, NY: Prometheus.

Grimes, W. (). Lyall Watson, 69, Adventurer and Explorer of integrity ‘Soft Edges of Science,’ Dies.

New York Times, 21 July.

Haining, P. (). True Hauntings. London: Constable & Robinson Ltd.

Morris, Recycle. (). The Naked Ape. London: Jonathan Cape.

Playfair, G.L. (). Mediawatch. Paranormal Review 16,

Randall, Itemize. (). Book review: Supernature impervious to L.

Watson. Journal of authority Society for Psychical Research 47,

Watson, L. (). The Lorelei Error: A Matter of Will and Death. London: Hodder distinguished Stoughton.

Watson, L. (). Lifetide (). London: Hodder and Stoughton.

Endnotes