Paranormal Technology

Welcome to Patented-Gone-Paranormal!! Thomas Edison tried to make a telephone that called the spirit world. One of the pioneers of radio believed he could talk with his dead son through the 'Ether'.

Technology might seem the antithesis of the spirit world. But just at that point in our history when technology began to dominate our way of life, it also sprouted supernatural arms and legs.

Spiritualism emerged in the middle of the nineteenth century. A new form of an old belief that it is possible to communicate with the dead.

And from the beginning it was deeply meshed in the new technologies that were emerging in the Victorian era and changing the way people saw the world.Ghostly photographs, haunted typewriters, spirit voices from the radio, paranormal podcasts even?

My guest today is Efram Sera-Shriar who studies how the occult intersects with science and is the author of a new book Psychic Investigators: Anthropology, Modern Spiritualism, and Credible Witnessing in the Late Victorian Age.

Produced by Freddy Chick. Edited by Aidan Lonergan. Executive Producer: Charlotte Long.

With thanks to Denna Cartamkhoob and Tom Chick

If you'd like to learn even more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts, and audiobooks at History Hit - enter promo code PATENTED for a free trial, plus 50% off your first three months' subscription. To download, go to Android or Apple store.