Nina Kulagina the Psychic and the Soviet Experiments in Psychokinesis
During the Cold War, Soviet scientists investigated a Russian woman who appeared capable of doing something that shouldn’t have been possible. 
Nina Kulagina seemed to move physical objects without touching them.
Grainy films show her sitting before a table and concentrating as matchboxes, containers, cigarettes, and other small objects apparently slide across the surface.
A magician could certainly make objects move, but Kulagina wasn’t simply performing on a stage.
Scientists repeatedly tested her under experimental conditions.
The Woman Who Moved Things With Her Mind
Kulagina attracted international attention after footage of her alleged psychokinetic abilities was shown at a parapsychology meeting in Leningrad in 1968.
Western researchers including Jürgen Keil, Benson Herbert, Montague Ullman, J. Gaither Pratt, and J. A. Fahler subsequently batted their curious eyes her way and decided to investigate.
Over roughly 2 decades, she reportedly participated in more than 100 and possibly 200 experimental sessions.
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An object was placed on a table while Kulagina concentrated on it, sometimes moving her hands through the air nearby.
The object would supposedly begin moving toward or away from her.
Researchers reported effects involving glass, plastic, aluminum, copper, bronze, silver, 
, paper, fabric, wood, and other substances.
Keil and his colleagues emphasized that these weren’t merely statistical anomalies.
“Mrs. Kulagina has demonstrated directly-observable voluntary PK effects under a variety of conditions and with a variety of objects.”– Keil, Herbert, Ullman, and Pratt, Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, 1976
If something was happening, researchers could supposedly watch it happen right in front of them.
Her Body Reacted Too
Producing the effects appeared to take a physical toll.
Investigators reported changes in Kulagina’s pulse, breathing, and other physiological measurements.
She sometimes complained of exhaustion, dizziness, pain, and a metallic taste afterward. 
Her experiments eventually caught the eyes and nose of American intelligence.
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A 1972 Defense Intelligence Agency report examining Soviet parapsychology discussed Kulagina and reproduced photographs from one of her alleged psychokinetic demonstrations.
“All of Mrs. Kulagina’s body processes speed up drastically during the PK tests. Her heart beat, breathing, and brain activity all become very excited.”– U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, Controlled Offensive Behavior USSR, 1972
The physical reactions didn’t prove psychokinesis, but whatever Kulagina was doing appeared to require considerable effort.
Then the experiments moved beyond sliding objects.
The Frog Heart Experiment
One of the most extraordinary claims involved an isolated beating frog heart kept alive in solution and connected to monitoring equipment.
Kulagina was reportedly asked to concentrate on it and attempt to influence its activity.
According to accounts of the experiment, the rhythm changed.
American intelligence analysts later summarized the Soviet claim. 
“Kulagina has been able to stop the beating of a frog’s heart in solution and to re-activate it! This is perhaps the most significant PK test done.”– U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, Controlled Offensive Behavior USSR, 1972
The implications stretched far beyond moving matchboxes.
The DIA discussed potential military applications while attaching an important qualification.
“If true, this experiment would seem to indicate a potential capability for influencing biological systems at a distance.”– U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, Controlled Offensive Behavior USSR, 1972
Those opening 2 words hang over the entire Kulagina case.
Was She Cheating
Critics proposed magnets, hidden threads, static electricity, concealed devices, and sleight of hand.
Researchers attempted to eliminate these possibilities with nonmagnetic materials, barriers, changing experimental conditions, and close observation.
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During one experiment, J. Gaither Pratt and Jürgen Keil reportedly watched a wooden block unexpectedly move while Kulagina was concentrating on another target.
“We saw nothing in the least suspicious in her actions before the block moved, nor did we see any physical means by which she could have caused the movement.”- J. Gaither Pratt, quoted in Psychic Warfare — Threat or Illusion
Keil acknowledged that fraud could never be eliminated with absolute certainty.
After years of investigation, however, he and his colleagues argued that ordinary trickery didn’t adequately explain their observations.
“The investigations were carefully controlled to insure that fraud could not explain the phenomena, and precautions were taken against the use of threads, magnets, or other possible means of producing the movements.”– Keil, Herbert, Ullman, and Pratt, Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, 1976
The controversy eventually escaped the laboratory.
In 1986, Kulagina sued a Soviet government owned magazine after it accused her of fraud.
Scientists, a journalist, and a documentary filmmaker testified in her defense, and Kulagina won.
The ruling didn’t establish psychokinesis as real, but it did show that the accusation of fraud hadn’t been proven.
The Films Remain
Kulagina died in 1990 at 63.
By then she had spent roughly 2 decades being observed by Soviet and Western researchers, filmed performing apparent psychokinesis, and physiologically monitored during experiments.
Keil summarized the unresolved problem.
“Although fraud can never be completely ruled out in experiments of this kind, the evidence against fraud in Mrs. Kulagina’s case is quite substantial.”– Jürgen Keil, Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, 1976
The Society for Psychical Research later summarized the investigators’ conclusion.
“It is concluded that her abilities appear genuine and that the phenomena observed cannot readily be explained in terms of normal physical processes.”– Society for Psychical Research summary of Keil and colleagues, 1976
Either Nina Kulagina fooled a remarkable collection of observers under increasingly controlled conditions, or those grainy Soviet films captured something considerably out of this world.
References:
Society for Psychical Research