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You know, I've been around for a while.

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Might some interesting people.

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Done some crazy things.

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See, you just might think that there's not much

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that can take me by surprise.

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You'd be wrong.

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A world is full of stories,

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science, and things that amaze and confound

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the world.

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Every single day, incredible mystery is that

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keep me awake at night, some I can answer.

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Oh, there's just...

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defy logic.

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Does the human mind possess powers

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beyond our comprehension?

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A housewife's psychic vision helps crack

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a major murder case.

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I never wanted to be so well in the light.

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Can crimes be solved with psychic power?

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A Californian man remembers every moment

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from every day of his life.

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I can remember something so clearly

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and then I go, wow, that was 41 years ago.

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Is total recall possible?

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And a faith healer cures terminal disease

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with prayer.

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Is it a miracle or an amazing display

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of mind over matter?

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If this was just possible,

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you would find a handful of stories.

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You don't, you have thousands.

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Yeah.

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It's a weird world.

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And I love it.

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The human brain.

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It's the most complex advance,

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and many would say, beautiful thing in nature.

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But how much do we know about it?

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Well, here are some facts for you.

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Did you know that it can process

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over 70,000 thoughts a day?

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This is actually a cow brain,

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so it's more like seven thoughts.

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Or that it has over 10,000 miles of blood vessels?

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Could you put it back, please?

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I need that.

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Or that it doesn't feel pain.

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Ouch, that hurts.

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But these amazing abilities are really only the tip of the iceberg.

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The big question is, what don't we know about this incredible stuff?

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What else can it do?

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This is so great.

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Your brain generates between 10 and 23 watts of power,

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enough energy to power a light bulb.

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Impressive, huh?

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This is pathetic.

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Weird or what?

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1980, Los Angeles, California.

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A massive police search grips the small, suburban community

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of local housewife, Ed Smith.

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I think we were a little edgy because having things like that happen

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wasn't the everyday practice.

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A hospital nurse is missing and feared dead.

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Astoundingly, Ed was about to find herself at the center of the investigation

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in the most bizarre way.

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I made it a point to listen to the news during the day

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about this nurse missing.

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And the news said they were making a house-to-house search.

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At the moment that they said house-to-house search,

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everything went haywire.

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It was like I was seeing a movie.

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I began to see this area.

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I saw a trail, I saw a dirt path.

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I saw something white through the bushes,

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and I knew where it was.

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For the first time in her life, Ed has had a psychic vision.

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She's convinced she knows where the nurse is.

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She's terrified and confused.

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I didn't know what to think of it.

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There's some things that you just can't explain away.

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I'm arguing with myself.

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Should I go tell the police?

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They're gonna think I'm crazy.

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What if she's there?

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And she needs help.

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Ed decides to drive to where she believes the nurse to be

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a nearby canyon.

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Just being there seems to increase her newfound psychic abilities.

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I see a big spray of dirt and tire marks.

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And I laid my hands into the tire prints.

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And as soon as I did, I could feel trauma.

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I mean bad.

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By then, my heart is just fluttering.

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And I'm thinking, all I want to do is get out of here.

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Fighting or fear, Edda follows her instinct.

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Down the embankment, out the dirt path,

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I see something.

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There was white nurse's shoes.

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And I said, oh my God, it's her.

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I never wanted to be so wrong in my life.

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All I could think of is run, get out of here, get to the police.

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When the police arrive, Edda's in for a huge shock.

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Instead of thanking her, they're convinced

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she must have had something to do with the murder.

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To her horror, she's arrested.

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It was shocking.

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I tried to open the cry anymore.

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Strip searched me, put me in a cell by myself.

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It was a nightmare.

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After four days behind bars, Edda is finally released.

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Soon after, the killers through local men

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are arrested and convicted of rape and murder.

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Edda sues the police for false arrest

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and after six years of legal battles, she wins.

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But even now, Edda struggles to make sense of the whole thing.

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What did Edda Smith experience that day?

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Did she have a genuine psychic vision?

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Remarkably, many psychic detectives claim to solve crimes

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by means of mysterious insights.

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Is this possible?

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Joe Nicol researches paranormal claims.

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He believes there's no such thing as psychic vision

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or extrasensory perception.

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The history of ESP has been a history of self-deception,

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deception, wishful thinking, playing games with statistics,

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and not one person has been able to do anything meaningful.

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But if psychic ability doesn't exist,

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how do psychic detectives achieve such amazing results?

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The typical psychic engages in something we call retrofitting

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or after-the-fact matching.

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You throw out some so-called clues.

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I'm getting water. I see a tall structure.

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And then the next thing you know, search party found the remains,

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and in comes the psychic saying, you know, I mentioned water

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and that body was found near a creek or a pond or a riverside drive

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or a water tower.

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Remember the tall structure I mentioned?

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I didn't get by with this.

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Did Eddysmith just make a lucky guess?

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The average psychic detective is no use to police.

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In my opinion, they provide no real evidence.

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They create false hope.

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And they have done it at the expense of promoting ignorance

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and superstition in our society

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and driven unsuspecting people into the clutches of fortune tellers

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and other people who are engaging in magical thinking

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rather than rational thinking.

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I see a long life full of riches

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and a man named Stephen. Does that ring a bell?

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You know, many of us have been to palm readers, fortune tellers,

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people who claim to have amazing psychic abilities

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who are really nothing but fakes.

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Eddysmith wasn't someone performing cheap tricks.

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She saw something in her mind

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even the police couldn't understand.

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Would she do it just for fame and fortune?

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Or is she truly psychic?

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And no Stephen, what about Harry?

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A Los Angeles woman has a strange and sudden visit

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which helps police solve a murder.

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Was it a genuine psychic phenomenon?

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Popular psychic, Tana Hoy, thinks so.

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When I first read out a story,

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my reaction that I had was,

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wow, this woman had a spontaneous psychic memory.

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I believe that the spirit was drawing her,

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pulling her to go and find her body.

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If anyone can testify to how important psychic visions

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can be to the police at Hoy,

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he's helped investigators solve a double homicide

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and while on live radio, predicted a terrorist attack

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90 minutes before the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995.

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A person can hear a word, a phrase,

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and it will awaken a psychic memory

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or a psychic vision within that person.

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She's awakened this vision

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and she saw the canyon where the body was.

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That's an example of clairvoyant experience, clear scene.

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And when she placed her hand in the tire tracks,

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she was making a direct connection

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with the energy imprint of the vehicle.

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But if Edda's vision was for real,

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why didn't the police believe her?

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We're going back to 1980.

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So back then we didn't have the awareness of psychics

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that we have today.

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We see TV shows and we see psychics on talk shows.

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I don't feel that she would have been arrested today.

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So given their remarkable successes,

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should detectives add psychics to the force?

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A lot of psychics, when they work with police departments,

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they don't do it for publicity.

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They do it to help and give back.

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So it happens a lot more than we ever hear about.

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But did Edda Smith really see something with her mind?

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Psychology professor Tim Moore thinks not.

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I think Edda may have overheard information in the community

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without fully processing it at the time that she acquired it,

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but later on it registered and prompted her to go to the police.

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Moore believed something in Edda's unconscious memory

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triggered what she thought was a psychic vision.

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Psychologists call it source misattribution.

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Source misattribution, you have information

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to which you falsely attribute having acquired

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as a result of experience when in fact it's been suggested to you

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or provided to you by someone else.

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Edda Smith wasn't the killer,

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so how could she have any idea where the body was?

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My understanding is that the actual culprits were blabbermouths

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and they talked about what they had done in their neighborhood,

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which was her neighborhood.

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Could Edda's psychic vision be mistaken for random information

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she had nothing to do with?

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If Edda is not concentrating on the information at the time

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that she's hearing it, because it's not the focus of her attention,

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the information nevertheless gets in,

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but she doesn't remember the source.

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At some later date she hears information on the news

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that the police are looking for a missing body.

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She recollects somewhat hazyly

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or without appreciating how she came by that information.

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But how could Edda have known the exact location of the body,

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the precise road in the right canyon?

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I believe she's familiar with the area,

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so the original information could easily have triggered a cognitive map.

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The canyon roads there, for example, are pretty distinctive.

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She may have intuited just on the basis of what she overheard

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where the body probably was.

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I mean, that's not a stretch.

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Did the unexpected recall of a hidden memory lead Edda to the body?

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Or did she experience a genuine psychic event

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which helped solve a case the police could not?

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Whatever the truth, the story is most definitely weird.

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Or what?

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You know, the human brain has been evolving for...

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Hold it. How long has it been evolving?

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2.5 million years.

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903B, take 2, marker.

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Action.

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You know, the human brain has been evolving for 2.5 million years,

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but perhaps one of the greatest things that sets us apart from any other creature

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is the power...

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Oh, damn.

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903B, take 3, marker.

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And action.

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You know, the human brain has been evolving for 2.5 million years,

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but perhaps one of the greatest things that sets us apart from any other creature

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is the power of our memory.

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Yay!

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Oh, come on.

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Bring my keys.

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Damn.

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Oh, wow.

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They say that everyone has a special talent.

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And in Bob Petrell's case, that's certainly true.

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But he possesses something so special,

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it sets him apart from the rest of humankind.

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The reaction kind of varies.

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A lot of people are amazed.

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A lot of people call him a phenomenon of strange and unusual.

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Even old friends are still shocked when they see Bob's power on display.

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Oh, very good. Very good.

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May 18th, 1980.

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Oh, that's the Smiles St. Helens.

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Nerve gas attack in Tokyo subway.

266
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March 20th, 1995.

267
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It's a Diana's wedding.

268
00:15:12,000 --> 00:15:14,000
July 29th, you want this on Wednesday.

269
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It may seem that Bob just has a gift for a member in trivia,

270
00:15:18,000 --> 00:15:21,000
but there's much more to his incredible talent.

271
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He can remember nearly every single moment

272
00:15:24,000 --> 00:15:27,000
from every single day of his life.

273
00:15:27,000 --> 00:15:31,000
I threw a bowl of soup on the ceiling on March 13th, 1975.

274
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Sometimes they think you're lying, they think you're making it up.

275
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But every fact Bob pulls from his mind is correct.

276
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His memory is somehow perfect.

277
00:15:43,000 --> 00:15:45,000
When's my birthday?

278
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November 8th.

279
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What's the year?

280
00:15:47,000 --> 00:15:48,000
68.

281
00:15:48,000 --> 00:15:49,000
What day of the week was it?

282
00:15:49,000 --> 00:15:50,000
Friday.

283
00:15:50,000 --> 00:15:51,000
What were you doing that day?

284
00:15:51,000 --> 00:15:53,000
I was at a football game watching Beaver Falls play Hope Well.

285
00:15:53,000 --> 00:15:56,000
Beaver Falls gonna beat, I think 28 to 7.

286
00:15:56,000 --> 00:15:59,000
We all know our memory is far from complete.

287
00:15:59,000 --> 00:16:02,000
Words, names, stick on the tips of our tongues

288
00:16:02,000 --> 00:16:05,000
to say nothing of the inconsequential details of daily life.

289
00:16:05,000 --> 00:16:08,000
May 1st, let's go back May 1st, 10 years.

290
00:16:08,000 --> 00:16:11,000
Well, May 1st, 91, I was wrapping up a job

291
00:16:11,000 --> 00:16:13,000
at Pacific State University.

292
00:16:13,000 --> 00:16:14,000
That was a Tuesday.

293
00:16:14,000 --> 00:16:16,000
And that was the NFL draft.

294
00:16:16,000 --> 00:16:18,000
Yeah, that's usually gonna be around the end of the day.

295
00:16:18,000 --> 00:16:19,000
Yeah, yeah.

296
00:16:19,000 --> 00:16:24,000
And then May 1st, 81, I was house-sitting in Laurel Canyon

297
00:16:24,000 --> 00:16:26,000
for this woman named Autumn Barm.

298
00:16:26,000 --> 00:16:27,000
May 1st, 71, was a Saturday.

299
00:16:27,000 --> 00:16:29,000
Oh, and I was back east visiting.

300
00:16:29,000 --> 00:16:32,000
I went out drinking for the first time as a 21-year-old

301
00:16:32,000 --> 00:16:33,000
in a bar.

302
00:16:33,000 --> 00:16:34,000
It was a Saturday.

303
00:16:34,000 --> 00:16:36,000
You know, and I was, let's see your idea.

304
00:16:36,000 --> 00:16:38,000
Yeah, here it is, pal. I'm 21, you know.

305
00:16:38,000 --> 00:16:41,000
So it was like only three days after my 21st birthday.

306
00:16:41,000 --> 00:16:44,000
Incredibly, Bob is not the only person with a perfect memory.

307
00:16:44,000 --> 00:16:46,000
He is part of an exclusive club.

308
00:16:46,000 --> 00:16:51,000
Around 20 people worldwide have what scientists now call

309
00:16:51,000 --> 00:16:53,000
super autobiographical memory,

310
00:16:53,000 --> 00:16:58,000
the ability to remember every single day of their lives.

311
00:16:58,000 --> 00:17:01,000
Yeah, the amazing part to me sometimes is I can remember

312
00:17:01,000 --> 00:17:04,000
something so clearly, and then I go, wow,

313
00:17:04,000 --> 00:17:06,000
that was 41 years ago.

314
00:17:06,000 --> 00:17:08,000
I'm not sure how it works.

315
00:17:08,000 --> 00:17:10,000
It came natural to me.

316
00:17:12,000 --> 00:17:16,000
Man with a super memory, they can remember the tiniest detail

317
00:17:16,000 --> 00:17:17,000
from every part of his life.

318
00:17:17,000 --> 00:17:18,000
Now, that's impressive.

319
00:17:18,000 --> 00:17:19,000
But he's not the only one.

320
00:17:19,000 --> 00:17:21,000
You see, I've got some tricks of the trade myself.

321
00:17:21,000 --> 00:17:24,000
For instance, I forgot and I put my phone and

322
00:17:24,000 --> 00:17:29,000
to stimulate my memory, I use another phone to call it.

323
00:17:30,000 --> 00:17:37,000
And then I listen, and then I simply head towards

324
00:17:37,000 --> 00:17:40,000
the source of the sound, and I should find it in the last place

325
00:17:40,000 --> 00:17:42,000
I was doing something important.

326
00:17:42,000 --> 00:17:47,000
Okay, I know it's in here now.

327
00:17:47,000 --> 00:17:50,000
Come on, yeah, no.

328
00:17:50,000 --> 00:17:58,000
Ah, you see, it works every time.

329
00:17:59,000 --> 00:18:01,000
Hello?

330
00:18:01,000 --> 00:18:04,000
The ice cream is in the refrigerator.

331
00:18:04,000 --> 00:18:08,000
So what explains Bob Petrellas' incredible gift?

332
00:18:08,000 --> 00:18:11,000
Do the rest of us have this superpower?

333
00:18:11,000 --> 00:18:14,000
We all have this capacity.

334
00:18:14,000 --> 00:18:17,000
California man has an incredible gift.

335
00:18:17,000 --> 00:18:21,000
He is able to remember every detail of every day of his life.

336
00:18:21,000 --> 00:18:24,000
Does he possess a kind of superpower?

337
00:18:24,000 --> 00:18:27,000
When I first heard about this idea,

338
00:18:27,000 --> 00:18:29,000
I thought it did smell right to me.

339
00:18:29,000 --> 00:18:32,000
Gary Marcus is a cognitive scientist.

340
00:18:32,000 --> 00:18:37,000
He believes people with super memory might not be so super after all.

341
00:18:37,000 --> 00:18:40,000
I think what's really happening in this syndrome

342
00:18:40,000 --> 00:18:44,000
is that people are really spending a lot of time studying their own lives.

343
00:18:44,000 --> 00:18:48,000
People might try to remember the past because they want to hold on to it.

344
00:18:48,000 --> 00:18:50,000
It's not necessarily voluntary.

345
00:18:50,000 --> 00:18:53,000
Most of us, if we're interested in something, don't obsess over it.

346
00:18:53,000 --> 00:18:55,000
I think one thing that often happens in this syndrome

347
00:18:55,000 --> 00:18:58,000
is that people are particularly interested in the details of their own lives.

348
00:18:58,000 --> 00:19:01,000
Not everybody is, so I think my life is interesting,

349
00:19:01,000 --> 00:19:04,000
but not so interesting that I spend a lot of time thinking about what happened to me in the past.

350
00:19:04,000 --> 00:19:07,000
So a super memory just a form of obsession?

351
00:19:07,000 --> 00:19:12,000
To find out, Marcus spent time with other people who also claim they haven't.

352
00:19:12,000 --> 00:19:15,000
I think that people who have studied this phenomena

353
00:19:15,000 --> 00:19:19,000
have focused on what the people who have the phenomena are good at,

354
00:19:19,000 --> 00:19:23,000
but with the person that I tested that had this kind of syndrome.

355
00:19:23,000 --> 00:19:27,000
I think I focused on some things that I thought they might be bad at and indeed were.

356
00:19:27,000 --> 00:19:31,000
When given standard memory test life recalling lists of words,

357
00:19:31,000 --> 00:19:36,000
Marcus found people with so-called super memory did no better than anyone else.

358
00:19:36,000 --> 00:19:42,000
So has Bob simply chosen to obsessively memorize his entire life?

359
00:19:42,000 --> 00:19:46,000
Not everyone is convinced.

360
00:19:46,000 --> 00:19:52,000
Dr. James McGaw was the first psychologist to study super memory.

361
00:19:52,000 --> 00:19:57,000
The most surprising thing about this ability to me is what it surprises everybody.

362
00:19:57,000 --> 00:19:59,000
The fact that it can be done at all.

363
00:19:59,000 --> 00:20:02,000
After interviewing more than a dozen people with super memory,

364
00:20:02,000 --> 00:20:06,000
he's convinced they're not merely obsessive.

365
00:20:06,000 --> 00:20:09,000
One of our subjects made this very clear.

366
00:20:09,000 --> 00:20:13,000
When somebody suggested all that she does is sit around and re-rehears all of her information.

367
00:20:13,000 --> 00:20:15,000
And she said, let me get this straight.

368
00:20:15,000 --> 00:20:18,000
I have a full-time job and I have a life,

369
00:20:18,000 --> 00:20:22,000
and I'll just be sitting around re-rehearsing all of those experiences.

370
00:20:22,000 --> 00:20:24,000
Highly unlikely.

371
00:20:24,000 --> 00:20:33,000
McGaw feels that people like Bob are a real phenomenon with memories way, way beyond that of even the best minds.

372
00:20:33,000 --> 00:20:39,000
But if it's not an obsession, how else would they remember their lives in such detail?

373
00:20:39,000 --> 00:20:43,000
McGaw is working on an incredible theory.

374
00:20:43,000 --> 00:20:50,000
The ability is that we all store all this information about all of our experiences in our brain someplace.

375
00:20:50,000 --> 00:20:57,000
We all have this capacity, and they are able to tap this capacity in ways that we can't.

376
00:20:57,000 --> 00:21:07,000
It's believed part of the brain called the cardiac nuclei is seven times larger in people with super memory.

377
00:21:07,000 --> 00:21:11,000
Could this somehow explain Bob's gift?

378
00:21:11,000 --> 00:21:14,000
The human brain is capable of doing that.

379
00:21:14,000 --> 00:21:18,000
That tells us that the human brain has this amazing capacity.

380
00:21:18,000 --> 00:21:22,000
There's something really important here, something unique and something important.

381
00:21:22,000 --> 00:21:30,000
Do super memorizers have turbocharged brains, or is there another answer to this mystery of the mind?

382
00:21:30,000 --> 00:21:36,000
I see the year and I see the month and then I'm accusing it.

383
00:21:36,000 --> 00:21:45,000
A man has an amazing ability. He can remember all of us in every moment from every day of his life. But how?

384
00:21:45,000 --> 00:21:50,000
Dr. Mary Spiller is a psychologist at the University of East London.

385
00:21:50,000 --> 00:21:56,000
She believes super memory could be explained by a medical condition called synesthesia.

386
00:21:56,000 --> 00:22:01,000
Synesthesia is probably best thought of as a crossing of the senses.

387
00:22:01,000 --> 00:22:08,000
So someone with synesthesia, when they hear music, they may see colours, or when they hear words, they might have tastes.

388
00:22:08,000 --> 00:22:14,000
So for example, the word tomorrow might taste like bacon, the word computer might taste like ice cream.

389
00:22:14,000 --> 00:22:20,000
The letter F might be a bright pink colour, number five could be a blue colour.

390
00:22:20,000 --> 00:22:28,000
And we think that it's probably hereditary conditions, so people with synesthesia typically might have other members of the family.

391
00:22:28,000 --> 00:22:33,000
They might also have synesthesia, their father, their grandmother might have it.

392
00:22:33,000 --> 00:22:37,000
Research is currently looking to see what genes are associated with synesthesia.

393
00:22:37,000 --> 00:22:42,000
It's an amazing concept, but how could it result in super memory?

394
00:22:42,000 --> 00:22:49,000
Dr. Spiller believes people like Bob may have a rare form of the condition called time-space synesthesia.

395
00:22:49,000 --> 00:22:57,000
People with time-space synesthesia see time. For example, someone may think of the months of the year as being located in a circle around their body.

396
00:22:57,000 --> 00:23:04,000
So January could be here, and then February, March, April, May, and so on, around their body.

397
00:23:04,000 --> 00:23:06,000
And this can work for years as well.

398
00:23:06,000 --> 00:23:12,000
Could the ability to see time allow people to keep their memories perfectly organised?

399
00:23:12,000 --> 00:23:19,000
If you ask the synesthesia, where is this particular Monday in 1978, they always know where in space that moment in time is.

400
00:23:19,000 --> 00:23:22,000
Almost as if they're looking it up in a filing cabinet.

401
00:23:22,000 --> 00:23:28,000
This gives people with time-space synesthesia an advantage when it comes to remembering when things happened.

402
00:23:28,000 --> 00:23:33,000
Sure enough, when people with super memory are asked to remember an event, they speak like they're seeing it.

403
00:23:33,000 --> 00:23:41,000
When I see where May 1st is, I see the year, and I see the month, and then I get the cues into the day.

404
00:23:41,000 --> 00:23:48,000
Could this be proof that Bob and others with super memory have some form of time-space synesthesia?

405
00:23:48,000 --> 00:23:55,000
I think it's definitely possible that other individuals with highly superior autobiographical memory could have time-space synesthesia.

406
00:23:55,000 --> 00:24:01,000
Having a 3D sense of time could potentially have huge benefits for someone when storing memories.

407
00:24:01,000 --> 00:24:07,000
Does the ability to see time explain Bob's near total recall?

408
00:24:07,000 --> 00:24:13,000
Or is it because he has a slightly different brain than the rest of us?

409
00:24:13,000 --> 00:24:20,000
Or are people with super memory such fans of their own lives, they can't stand to forget a minute of it?

410
00:24:20,000 --> 00:24:22,000
Weird or what?

411
00:24:22,000 --> 00:24:24,000
I gave him a choice.

412
00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:41,000
You know, it was my birthday the other day, as you can see I got some really great presents.

413
00:24:41,000 --> 00:24:44,000
I brought them as with this new fangle package.

414
00:24:44,000 --> 00:24:47,000
It's a miracle, you can get them.

415
00:24:50,000 --> 00:24:52,000
Hang on.

416
00:24:55,000 --> 00:24:57,000
This should do the job.

417
00:24:57,000 --> 00:24:59,000
Yeah!

418
00:25:10,000 --> 00:25:13,000
Oh well, at least I got it open.

419
00:25:16,000 --> 00:25:20,000
But do miracles, even small ones, have a rational explanation?

420
00:25:20,000 --> 00:25:24,000
Or are they gifts from a divine and superior power?

421
00:25:24,000 --> 00:25:27,000
Or are they something else?

422
00:25:27,000 --> 00:25:34,000
In 1993, Julie Spahn was living a happy life with her children and husband Greg.

423
00:25:34,000 --> 00:25:40,000
But one August night, her life was suddenly ripped apart.

424
00:25:40,000 --> 00:25:52,000
We were having a dinner and suddenly Julie sat down and I heard a cracking sound like a broken baseball bat and saw her head fall to the table.

425
00:25:52,000 --> 00:25:58,000
In a horrible freak accident, Julie had smashed her head on a shelf behind her seat.

426
00:25:58,000 --> 00:26:04,000
And that's the last time I saw my wife for many years as far as the Julie I knew.

427
00:26:04,000 --> 00:26:12,000
I fractured the temporal bone in the back of my head, which led to a significant brain bleed.

428
00:26:12,000 --> 00:26:19,000
It's a very serious injury. In that moment, Julie's world turned upside down.

429
00:26:20,000 --> 00:26:24,000
For the next 13 years, to put it bluntly, my life was pure hell.

430
00:26:24,000 --> 00:26:28,000
I literally had headaches every single day.

431
00:26:28,000 --> 00:26:34,000
I had visual problems. I couldn't walk. I couldn't sleep.

432
00:26:36,000 --> 00:26:41,000
Julie visited some of the best doctors and specialists in the world, but they were unanimous.

433
00:26:42,000 --> 00:26:48,000
Julie's brain injury would leave her in excruciating pain for the rest of her life.

434
00:26:49,000 --> 00:26:54,000
I looked at my lowest point. Part of me was terrified for my life.

435
00:26:56,000 --> 00:27:03,000
Then one afternoon, in 2008, Julie sees a TV show featuring a controversial faith healer.

436
00:27:03,000 --> 00:27:07,000
Immediately, she knows something phenomenal is happening.

437
00:27:09,000 --> 00:27:14,000
It was just incredible. I just had a really distinct peace come about me.

438
00:27:14,000 --> 00:27:18,000
And I thought, I really want to go see this man.

439
00:27:20,000 --> 00:27:26,000
The faith healer is Ohio-based anesthesiologist Dr. Issam Memmon.

440
00:27:26,000 --> 00:27:30,000
He claims to heal terminal illnesses through prayer.

441
00:27:31,000 --> 00:27:36,000
Two months after seeing him on TV, Julie decides to meet him.

442
00:27:37,000 --> 00:27:43,000
And when he doctor named me walked in, I started feeling a great deal of warmth in my lower back.

443
00:27:43,000 --> 00:27:48,000
And I'm automatically thinking, OK, wait a minute.

444
00:27:49,000 --> 00:27:51,000
What can be happening already?

445
00:27:53,000 --> 00:27:57,000
Could the power of Dr. Nemes prayer really be having an effect on Julie?

446
00:27:58,000 --> 00:28:01,000
The life came back into her eyes and had been gone for all these years.

447
00:28:02,000 --> 00:28:10,000
I just saw a total transformation in all aspects of muscle tone and color and warmth and just life.

448
00:28:10,000 --> 00:28:13,000
It was really amazing.

449
00:28:14,000 --> 00:28:17,000
Incredibly, Julie's pain is gone. The headaches disappear.

450
00:28:18,000 --> 00:28:20,000
Her vision comes back. She can move normally again.

451
00:28:21,000 --> 00:28:23,000
I said, I don't think I need this cane anymore.

452
00:28:23,000 --> 00:28:28,000
And I proceeded to walk right out to the car and get in the car all by myself, which I couldn't do before.

453
00:28:29,000 --> 00:28:32,000
It was obvious something major had happened.

454
00:28:33,000 --> 00:28:38,000
Her doctors can't explain her recovery, but Julie has no doubts.

455
00:28:39,000 --> 00:28:44,000
I definitely feel like I received a miracle. There is no other explanation for it.

456
00:28:45,000 --> 00:28:47,000
But Julie is far from alone.

457
00:28:48,000 --> 00:28:50,000
Thousands claim that Nemes prayers have healed her.

458
00:28:51,000 --> 00:28:54,000
The Lord took the pain from me, relieved me of it.

459
00:28:55,000 --> 00:28:57,000
I had my own personal miracle.

460
00:28:58,000 --> 00:29:05,000
From cancer to multiple sclerosis, it appears no disease, ailment or condition is too powerful for Nemes healing powers.

461
00:29:05,000 --> 00:29:10,000
As word spreads, people travel from all over the world to attend to services.

462
00:29:13,000 --> 00:29:16,000
But what's happening to people like Julie?

463
00:29:17,000 --> 00:29:20,000
Are they really experiencing miracles at the hands of a faith healer?

464
00:29:21,000 --> 00:29:25,000
Or is their recovery an incredible demonstration of the power of the mind?

465
00:29:26,000 --> 00:29:30,000
Gilbert Ross is the medical director of the American Council on Science and Health.

466
00:29:31,000 --> 00:29:33,000
Being a skeptic is part of his job.

467
00:29:33,000 --> 00:29:41,000
Nearly because a patient undergoes a miraculous recovery after seeing a faith healer,

468
00:29:42,000 --> 00:29:47,000
in no way means that the faith healer had any actual active role in the improvement.

469
00:29:48,000 --> 00:29:50,000
Ross has a more rational explanation.

470
00:29:51,000 --> 00:29:56,000
He believes the power of healing comes from the extraordinary power of the human mind.

471
00:29:57,000 --> 00:30:03,000
The successful faith healing is entirely the result of the placebo effect.

472
00:30:04,000 --> 00:30:08,000
It's purely dependent upon the patients to believe that the faith healing is effective.

473
00:30:10,000 --> 00:30:13,000
The placebo effect is a recognized medical phenomenon.

474
00:30:14,000 --> 00:30:17,000
People who believe they're getting treated get better.

475
00:30:20,000 --> 00:30:23,000
Incredibly, in some clinical trials,

476
00:30:23,000 --> 00:30:27,000
placebos have proven more effective than surgery.

477
00:30:28,000 --> 00:30:34,000
If you give the patient a jar of sugar pills and you encourage them to believe that it's some sort of medication that will help them,

478
00:30:35,000 --> 00:30:39,000
you can provoke a placebo response which may have some actual beneficial effect.

479
00:30:40,000 --> 00:30:47,000
Also, you'll be avoiding any potential for side effects or complications from giving the patient any sort of active medication.

480
00:30:48,000 --> 00:30:51,000
Now the downside of that, and there's a very strong case to be made,

481
00:30:51,000 --> 00:30:53,000
is that this is unethical.

482
00:30:54,000 --> 00:31:00,000
That a doctor who gives the patient a medication, including a sugar pill as a placebo,

483
00:31:01,000 --> 00:31:08,000
knowing that it's inactive and yet not telling the patient that is lying to the patient.

484
00:31:09,000 --> 00:31:15,000
And whatever the good intentions of that act are, it's unethical on its face.

485
00:31:16,000 --> 00:31:18,000
Nobody knows exactly how it is that placebos can be so powerful,

486
00:31:18,000 --> 00:31:22,000
but it's accepted that the mind has awesome healing abilities,

487
00:31:23,000 --> 00:31:25,000
and that just believing in a cure is a powerful medicine.

488
00:31:26,000 --> 00:31:32,000
The placebo effect is real in that a certain percentage of patients will feel better just from the intervention.

489
00:31:33,000 --> 00:31:37,000
Is it psychological? Well, of course it's psychological if you're not administering an active ingredient,

490
00:31:38,000 --> 00:31:43,000
but that doesn't mean that it's not real and it doesn't mean that it's not biochemical or physiological either.

491
00:31:44,000 --> 00:31:47,000
The psyche is an extremely powerful force,

492
00:31:48,000 --> 00:31:56,000
and the brain does indeed manufacture neuro-urineal factors that come into play in the body's metabolism.

493
00:31:57,000 --> 00:32:04,000
This is well known. I mean the antidepressant pills, like the serotonin reuptake inhibitors, act on brain chemicals.

494
00:32:05,000 --> 00:32:11,000
So we know very well that mood and affect and behavior are to some extent chemical based.

495
00:32:11,000 --> 00:32:19,000
So why shouldn't a psychological factor generate chemicals that also help patients to feel better?

496
00:32:20,000 --> 00:32:23,000
So can this phenomena explain Dr. Nemes' success?

497
00:32:24,000 --> 00:32:28,000
Could faith healing be a placebo that cures only because people believe?

498
00:32:29,000 --> 00:32:40,000
Patients who have strong beliefs in spirituality, including religion, would be more receptive to all sorts of placebo effects, including faith healing.

499
00:32:41,000 --> 00:32:51,000
What it has to do with some kind of ritual and the patient's sincere belief that what they're going through with the faith healer is going to help them.

500
00:32:52,000 --> 00:32:58,000
Can the success stories of faith healers like Dr. Nemes be explained by medical mind over matter?

501
00:32:59,000 --> 00:33:07,000
If this was just placebo effect, if it was just temporary, you would find a handful of stories. You don't, you have hundreds, you have thousands.

502
00:33:08,000 --> 00:33:17,000
Christian radio host Trapper Jack Keller has no doubt that Dr. Nemes is performing bona fide miracles, something he's witnessed first hand.

503
00:33:18,000 --> 00:33:28,000
I have retinitis pigmentosa. I'm legally blind. It's a degenerative retinal disease, but twice in the 11 years I've known Dr. Nami, my vision's been fully restored.

504
00:33:29,000 --> 00:33:35,000
Both amazing dramatic moments that certainly got my attention. I haven't been able to see in the dark since I was 13.

505
00:33:35,000 --> 00:33:40,000
I get up at 2.30 in the morning to do my radio show and I actually woke up before the alarm went off.

506
00:33:41,000 --> 00:33:47,000
I get up and I just suddenly realize I can see everything. I can see the dresser, I see the chair, I see the table, the lamp, the fan.

507
00:33:48,000 --> 00:33:53,000
I can see everything and I'm looking for the light source. How can I see these things? It's pitch black, but where's the light source?

508
00:33:54,000 --> 00:33:57,000
There was no light source. It lasted about 60 seconds and then the blackness came back.

509
00:33:57,000 --> 00:34:04,000
But for me, a beautiful sign, beautiful sign of things to come and it's my belief that it will come back when it most serves God.

510
00:34:05,000 --> 00:34:10,000
But how can someone perform these cures? Where does Dr. Nemes' healing power come from?

511
00:34:11,000 --> 00:34:20,000
He's not doing the healing. He takes no credit for it. God does it all. But he gets to be the spectator. He gets to watch it happen. He's the connector.

512
00:34:21,000 --> 00:34:26,000
So how does it work? What does Dr. Nemes do at his services?

513
00:34:27,000 --> 00:34:37,000
Something happens and it happens over and over again, thousands of times over. I've seen people with MS. I've seen people with blindness.

514
00:34:38,000 --> 00:34:43,000
People who have been told they're going to die of cancer suddenly, literally, in the blink of an eye. The tumor's gone.

515
00:34:44,000 --> 00:34:51,000
For Kellerman, Dr. Nemes' healings are part of a tradition as old as Christianity itself.

516
00:34:52,000 --> 00:35:01,000
The healing stories are written about in the Bible. You take them back to Jesus' time and then the apostles were healing. And you realize that it's always been there.

517
00:35:02,000 --> 00:35:08,000
Absolutely, there are so many stories about miraculous healings from the apostles. Nothing's changed. Nothing's changed.

518
00:35:09,000 --> 00:35:15,000
But why Dr. Nemes? Why is it that he has the gift and not anyone else?

519
00:35:17,000 --> 00:35:31,000
I believe Dr. Nemes was put on this earth to help people find their way to God. And God gave him that extra portion of faith. And that faith is being utilized beautifully. Miracles are happening to get your attention.

520
00:35:32,000 --> 00:35:45,000
This is an incredible story. But is it just that? A story? Do faith healers hold the power to heal the sick or the dying in the palm of their hands?

521
00:35:46,000 --> 00:35:56,000
Do they possess something that science cannot identify, something beyond this world? Or are they less than angels?

522
00:36:01,000 --> 00:36:05,000
And in modern-day miracles, should we take faith healers seriously?

523
00:36:06,000 --> 00:36:10,000
Faith healers are either knowing or unconscious frauds.

524
00:36:12,000 --> 00:36:25,000
Thousands of seriously ill people report being cured at the hands of a faith healer. Some say it's a miracle. Others think it's all simply the power of suggestion.

525
00:36:25,000 --> 00:36:34,000
Faith healers are either knowing or unconscious frauds. They use various conscious tricks to lead people to believe that they've been healed and they have not been healed.

526
00:36:37,000 --> 00:36:46,000
Terrence Hines is a professor of psychology at Pace University in New York. He takes a rational approach to Dr. Nemes' success stories.

527
00:36:47,000 --> 00:36:55,000
The patient's own belief that they're going to be cured certainly plays a role. Getting people excited so that they won't feel pain through perhaps endorphin release is another trick.

528
00:36:56,000 --> 00:37:05,000
Endorphins are the body's natural painkillers. They're released under situations of high stress and arousal. So the patient will in fact believe, getting it correctly, that they've been cured.

529
00:37:07,000 --> 00:37:14,000
Hines has spent time undercover investigating faith healers. He found that in some cases they relied on trickery.

530
00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:24,000
We went undercover at a faith healing meeting held in Brooklyn, New York. And about half way through the healing session, an elderly gentleman was brought up on stage in a wheelchair.

531
00:37:25,000 --> 00:37:36,000
The faith healer laid his hands on this gentleman in the wheelchair and bade him walk. And this gentleman got out of his wheelchair, walked up and down the stage to grade applause. It was a miracle.

532
00:37:37,000 --> 00:37:45,000
But in fact, one of the other members of the team had noticed this gentleman walk into the meeting hall under his own power earlier in the performance.

533
00:37:46,000 --> 00:37:51,000
As he neared the stage, one of the faith healers assistants walked up to him and said, Sir, would you like a wheelchair?

534
00:37:52,000 --> 00:37:57,000
So this gentleman sits in the wheelchair. 45 minutes later, he finds himself brought up on stage and asked to walk.

535
00:37:58,000 --> 00:38:04,000
Well, he can walk. And he doesn't have the power to grab the microphone from the healer and say, Well, but I walked in here by myself.

536
00:38:06,000 --> 00:38:11,000
Thus a miracle is performed. At the end of the meeting, the faith healer did something that I find reprehensible.

537
00:38:12,000 --> 00:38:21,000
He said, even if you haven't been called up tonight, you're all cured. You go home, you throw away that medicine. You don't need your insulin anymore.

538
00:38:22,000 --> 00:38:28,000
You don't need that heart medicine. You've been cured by Dr. Jesus. Throw that medicine away. That's disgraceful.

539
00:38:29,000 --> 00:38:36,000
But why would some faith healers set out to do people? According to Hines, it's a profitable game.

540
00:38:38,000 --> 00:38:44,000
All faith healers that I've come across don't charge admission to their services. It's free.

541
00:38:45,000 --> 00:38:51,000
But during the service, they certainly ask for donations. At the faith healing meeting I went to, I became a volunteer usher.

542
00:38:51,000 --> 00:38:59,000
And I was given a collection bucket. Yay big. And I thought, they're crazy if they're going to get this thing filled with money.

543
00:39:00,000 --> 00:39:07,000
I was the crazy one. I was pushing the $50, $100 bills and $20 bills down into the bucket. I think I probably cleared about $6,000.

544
00:39:08,000 --> 00:39:16,000
Now there were 12 ushers. 12 times 6 is $72,000 taken out of that community in one night. I would call it a license to steal.

545
00:39:17,000 --> 00:39:25,000
Because at least in the United States, since they are a religious entity, they are exempt from any and all taxes. So there's no income tax on this money.

546
00:39:26,000 --> 00:39:32,000
So yes, it's a license to steal. And at least in the United States, they are probably not in fact doing anything illegal.

547
00:39:33,000 --> 00:39:39,000
And I'm not sure they should be. I'm not sure I could not be a lawyer. Could draft a law that would be constitutional and make it illegal.

548
00:39:39,000 --> 00:39:48,000
Heinz believes it's easy to hoodwink people into believing they've been cured. To prove it, he set up a demonstration of the power of suggestion.

549
00:39:49,000 --> 00:39:59,000
So we have an actor who will play a doctor, a healer, and one of the gimmicks that he has is a neural stimulator. The patient will be told this will reduce their pain.

550
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:05,000
In fact, the neural stimulator is a classic placebo, a product that does nothing.

551
00:40:05,000 --> 00:40:14,000
And what we expect to find is that a number of people, not everybody, but a number of people will say, my God, my pain's really gone. I can feel that.

552
00:40:15,000 --> 00:40:20,000
The first volunteer reports a pain in her. Our fake doctor assures her he can help.

553
00:40:21,000 --> 00:40:29,000
So I'm going to turn it on. I want you to keep breathing. And when I turn it on, you're going to feel the energy coming out through your head. Okay? Here we go.

554
00:40:31,000 --> 00:40:33,000
Do you feel the difference that this is making already?

555
00:40:33,000 --> 00:40:35,000
Yeah, it feels relaxing.

556
00:40:36,000 --> 00:40:39,000
Phenomenal. Look at that. She's moving it already, right?

557
00:40:40,000 --> 00:40:52,000
Yeah. Didn't see how it would work, but actually, like I had a pain like right at the top of my foot and now I couldn't even like bend it, but now it seems to be better. Like I can move it. It doesn't hurt as bad anymore.

558
00:40:53,000 --> 00:41:02,000
Heinz's theory seems to prove correct as volunteer after volunteer are easily deceived by the fake doctor. So much so, he feels it might have been a profitable day.

559
00:41:03,000 --> 00:41:14,000
The people who reported a positive change probably would have given it a donation. Not a huge amount because again, they didn't come prepared for that. But yes, I suspect a donation could have been rung from them.

560
00:41:16,000 --> 00:41:28,000
So are faith healers conmen who prey on the weak and vulnerable? Or can healers like Dr. Nema channel science defying miracles into alien bodies?

561
00:41:28,000 --> 00:41:36,000
Or is it simply that our own minds are so medically potent that people like Julie can heal themselves with the power of belief?

562
00:41:37,000 --> 00:41:40,000
Weird or what?

563
00:41:40,000 --> 00:42:06,000
So there we have it. Three stories exploring the untapped power of the human mind. A woman's paranormal vision helps solve a murder. Can horrific crimes be solved by psychic powers?

564
00:42:07,000 --> 00:42:16,000
A Californian man can remember nearly every moment from every day of his life. Can we all one day have total recall?

565
00:42:17,000 --> 00:42:29,000
And a faith healer cures terminal illnesses through prayer. Is it a modern day miracle or an awesome demonstration of mind over matter? You decide.

566
00:42:29,000 --> 00:42:37,000
Join me again next time for more stories that will undoubtedly be weird or what.