It was a tragic case of a man in a coma for 23 years. Recent reports in the Daily Mail and the Guardian said he wasn't really in a coma, he was awake but paralyzed -- aware of all that happened around him but unable to communicate. But then it became apparent that his means of communicating was a woman who manipulated one of his finger over a keyboard to type out eloquent responses. So which one was doing the communicating?
Watch the video, and the whole thing is looking like a hoax. It was a story so amazing that people hearing it wanted so much for it to be true that they didn't want to look too closely for fear of seeing the flaw.
James Randi has, and he makes a strong case that it's a fraud. It's just too unlikely that someone could type the way Mr. Houben is supposed to be typing -- note that he is supposed to be doing it with one finger which is taped to a stick and guided by the facilitator. Mr. Houben doesn't appear to be paying much attention as his finger glides over the keyboard typing out those articulate phrases. The facilitator is the one with total focus on the screen, and she appears from the video to be in complete control of that finger.
It's a shame, really. It was such a great story. It was too good to check even though a test could be easily conducted. And coming on the heals of the huge global warming research scandal it should make us all aware that we need to stay on constant guard against hucksters.
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