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Gary E. Schwartz is an American psychologist, author, parapsychologist[1][2] and professor at the University of Arizona and the director of its Laboratory for Advances in Consciousness and Health.[3] Schwartz researches the veracity of mediums and energy healing.[4][5]
Schwartz received his PhD from Harvard University and was a professor of psychiatry and psychology at Yale University as well as Director of the Yale Psychophysiology Center and co-director of the Yale Behavioral Medicine Clinic from 1976 to 1988. Currently, he is Professor of Psychology, Medicine, Neurology, Psychiatry, and Surgery and the Director of the Laboratory for Advances in Consciousness and Health in the Department of Psychology at the University of Arizona.[6][7]
Schwartz says that his initial interest in psychic ability stemmed from a car accident he had with his then wife while driving on the FDR highway in Manhattan. The car was reportedly stopped on the roadway when he "heard a voice" tell him to "put his seat belt on." He told his wife to do so, and moments later, said they were rear ended by a car going 50 MPH. He claims that having his life saved by a mysterious voice prompted him to begin his research into where that voice might have come from.[8]
In his early career, Schwartz wrote on biofeedback research and health psychology. Schwartz's more recent research has been in parapsychology and consciousness-based healthcare. His VERITAS research project, which concluded in 2008, was created primarily to test the hypothesis that the consciousness (or identity) of a person survives physical death.[non-primary source needed][9] Schwartz performed experiments at the University of Arizona testing mediums such as John Edward, of the TV show Crossing Over, and Allison DuBois, who inspired the TV series Medium. Schwartz believes that DuBois could contact dead people. Schwartz says his experiments with DuBois included a reading for proponent of alternative medicine Deepak Chopra following the death of his father that Chopra characterized as 77% accurate.[10]
Gary Schwartz is viewed as a leader of counter-Establishment using his academic career to enable “the happy fantasies of pseudoscience and the paranormal.”[6]: 309-310 Among his hundreds of academic papers is a 3-part series entitled “God, Synchronicity, and Postmaterialist Psychology”[11][12][13] published in the journal Spirituality in Clinical Practice by the American Psychological Association, where Schwartz describes eleven coincidences that he found so “increasingly improbable,” he figured God must have been signaling him that souls of dead people collaborate with the divine to orchestrate personally meaningful synchronicities.[6]: 310
On Fox News on the Geraldo at Large show, October 6, 2007, Geraldo Rivera alleged Schwartz had overstepped his position as a university researcher by requesting money from a bereaved father to fund research into mediumship.[14]
Schwartz's methods have prompted criticism from skeptics such as University of Oregon professor Ray Hyman, who says Professor Schwartz's research deviates from the accepted norms of scientific methodology, and criticizes Schwartz for research errors such as inappropriate statistical tests and using subjects predisposed to believe in psychic abilities.[1] Skeptic Robert Todd Carroll maintains that Schwartz's evaluation of mediums is subjective and a product of "wishful thinking."[10][2] When retired stage magician and skeptic James Randi asked the University of Arizona to submit Schwartz's research data to an independent panel for evaluation, Schwartz declined because he thought that the panel, which he believed would be picked by Randi, would be biased.[non-primary source needed][15]
