CAYCE FLIM-FLAM! PART TWO       by James Randi     Cayce's "cures" actually were pretty funny. He just loved to have his patients boiling the most obscure roots and bark to make nasty syrups. Perhaps the therapy was based on nauseating the victim so much that the original illness was forgotten. And it is no secret that his cures were quite similar to the "home remedies" described in the handy medical encyclopedias that were bedside reading in many rural homes in the late 1800s. Beef broth was one of Cayce's favorite remedies for such diverse diseases as gout and leukemia. Who can fault a nice man who prescribes a cup of hot soup?     But did cures actually result from all this? The matter is hard to prove, either way. The testimony of some of his patients hardly represents the whole. Dead patients cannot complain, and those who were not cured would benefit little by writing a letter of complaint. After all, this good man had tried to help them, and just because it hadn't worked in some cases was no reason to knock the process. As for those who wrote to affirm that they had been cured, there is an important factor to consider. I'm sure you've heard the joke about the man who is found yelling at the top of his lungs in the park. Asked why, he replies that such a procedure keeps rogue elephants away. But, counters his questioner, there are no elephants around here for a thousand miles! Se how well it works? is the triumphant reply. The point is that just because Cayce prescribed a boiled root drink does not mean that the nostrum achieved the cure reported. Nor should we forget that many of the illnesses reported to physicians are totally imaginary or self-terminating.     But can the skeptics prove that Cayce's cures are attributable to ordinary causes? It would require a huge expenditure of money to do the necessary research for such a job, and in most cases the information would not be available anyway. Frankly, the vague, very evasive, simplistic diagnoses and cures attributed to Edgar Cayce hardly need such research. Examination of the record at hand is quite sufficient to deny him sainthood. The large and well-funded organization that he founded survives today as a result of preferred belief, not because of adequate proof.     In a revealing book entitled The Outer Limits of Edgar Cayce's Power, by E. V. and H. L. Cayce, his notable failures are excused in typical fashion. The authors assure us very strongly that the book, though it admits the failures, explains all of them quite satisfactorily. But I'll let you judge for yourself. Here, with the Cayce verbiage stripped awayto the essentials, is what they tell us he divined about the Hauptmann/Lindbergh kidnapping case while in a trance: 1.   The baby was removed at 8:30 (A.M. or P.M. not specified) from the Lindbergh home by one man. Another man took it and there was a third person in the car. 2.   The baby was taken to a small, brown, two-story house in a mill section called Cardova near New Haven. The house used to be green. 3.   Schartest Street is mentioned; also Adams Street, which has had its numbers and name changed. 4.   The house is shingled. Three men and one woman are with the child. The woman and one man were actually named. 5.   The child's hair has been cut and dyed. 6.   Cardova is related to the manufacture of leather goods. 7.   Red shale and a new macadam road on a "half-street" and "half a mile" are mentioned. 8.   The boy has been moved to Jersy City and is not well. 9.   Hauptmann is "only partly guilty." Cayce asks for "no publicity on this case."     Well, that's quite a lot of information, is it not? Unfortunately, most of it is wrong. True, Adams Street was found, and it had been named only a few weeks earlier. But this information was available to Cayce during one of his rare waking periods. Besides, Adams Street proved a dud. "I've always had my doubts about anything very authentic in such matters," says Cayce when confronted with the facts. Well, so have I, Ed, more now than ever before after examining your record. But we should give the disciples (and Cayce) a chance to rationalize this one, so here goes with a list of their excuses: 1.   The readings picked up the mental plans of others who had also planned a kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby. (Poor psychic aim.) 2.   The thought patterns of others involved distorted the readings. 3.   Mental static was very heavy.     No wonder Cayce asked for no publicity! It was a great fiasco, and he had psychic egg on his face. But these excuses are accepted by the believers as quite legitimate - to this day. page 189-190 FLIM-FLAM! Psychics,ESP,Unicorns and other Delusions by James Randi ("The Amazing Randi") Prometheus Books c. 1982