Massimo Polidoro
Massimo Polidoro is an Italian writer, journalist, television personality, and the co-founder and executive director of the Italian Committee for the Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CICAP).
Biography
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Fascinated as a child in the 1970s by magic and by the hype surrounding claims of psychic phenomena, he learned in his teens about the work of James Randi and CSICOP through a TV series and a book by Piero Angela investigating parapsychology from a critical and skeptical point of view. He wrote to both Randi and Angela and was lucky enough to be invited to a meeting in Rome in 1988[1].
The meeting was eventful, since Piero Angela and James Randi agreed that Massimo, though still very young, appeared to have the talent and the passion to become a good apprentice of Randi. With a grant from Angela, Massimo left for the United States and became Randi's only full time apprentice in the art of paranormal investigation and psychic testing.
After a couple of years, in which he helped Randi in his investigations, research, writings and lectures all over the world, Massimo returned to Italy in 1990 where he started CICAP. He later graduated in Psychology at the University of Padua with a master thesis on the psychology of eyewitness testimony of anomalous phenomena.
Massimo became the Executive Director of CICAP, edited its journal "Scienza & Paranormale" and in 1996 also became the European representative for the James Randi Educational Foundation. In 2001 he became a member of the "European Council of Skeptical Organisations" (ECSO) and was nominated "Research Fellow" of CSICOP, the Committee for the Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (now Committee for Skeptical Inquiry). When Martin Gardner left his regular column "Notes from a Fringe Watcher" in The Skeptical Inquirer, the magazine of CSICOP, Massimo was asked to take over, and the column was retitled "Notes on a Strange World".
Massimo continued to investigate strange phenomena and test psychics. Along the years he has put to the test, through CICAP and often on television as well, astrologers, clairvoyants, dowsers, mediums, prophets, psychic detectives, psychic healers, psychic photographers, telepaths and many others. Also he has conducted historical investigations on famous cases and personalities of the past, including Eusapia Palladino, Margery and his childood hero Houdini. Some of this work is collected in his books, two of which, Final Séance and Secrets of the Psychics have been published in America by Prometheus Books.
Massimo's passion for magic led him to start a new magazine, Magia, devoted to the study of the history, the science and the psychology of conjuring.
In 2005 he became the first Italian to hold, at the Psychology Faculty of the University of Milan Bicocca, a course on "Scientific Method, Pseudoscience and Anomalistic Psychology".
A professional journalist, he is the author of 27 books, translated in many languages, a contributor to monthly Italian magazine "Focus" and the host, special guest, author or consultant of many TV shows, both in Italy and abroad. His latest international series, "Legend Detectives", devoted to the investigation of famous European legends, including Dracula, Robin Hood, the Pied Piper, Rennes-le-Château, the Blood of Saint Januarius and the Man in the Iron Mask, was broadcasted by Discovery Channel.
Work
Podcast
In 2006 he created a podcast in Italian titled I Misteri di Massimo Polidoro, dealing with investigation of mysterious subjects both by himself and by other colleagues that participate to the show. The podcast is constantly in the Top 20 Italian podcasts and, in September 2008, subscribers to the podcasts numbered over 40.000.
Books in Italian
Massimo Polidoro is the author of 27 books in Italian, dealing with many subjects related to the mysterious: from a critical history of Spiritualism to a dictionary of Parapsychology, from the wreck of the Titanic to a biography of Houdini, from famous unsolved crimes of the past to the legends related to the strange deaths of celebrities. In 2006 he published his first novel, Il profeta del Reich (The Prophet of the Reich), a thriller loosely inspired by the life of magician Erik Jan Hanussen.
In the Summer of 2007 Italian newspaper La Repubblica, which has the largest circulation in Italy for daily general-interest newspapers, reprinted six of Massimo's books in a series that was sold in newsstands along with the many local issues of the newspaper.
Books in English
Final Séance deals with the strange friendship between Houdini and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, their friendly exchanges first and then the quarrels over their opposing views of Spiritualism.
Secrets of the Psychics is a collection of investigations done by Massimo on psychic phenomena, including tests of psychics, poltergeists, miracles and other strange phenomena.
Both books are published by Prometheus Books.
Trivia
His person has inspired the protagonist of a thriller, L'eredità di Bric by Giacomo Gardumi, e that of a comic book character, Mark Pollard, in Martin Mystere (n. 285) by Alfredo Castelli.
See also
References
- "Introducing Italy's Version of Harry Houdini"
- Review of "Final Séance" by David Britland on MagiWeek.co.uk
- "The Gullibility of Conan Doyle" Another Reviw of "Final Séance" in The Skeptical Inquirer
- A review of "Secrets of the Psychics" on Atheism.com
- A Report on the5th World Skeptics Congress organized by Massimo Polidoro and CICAP
- "No blood, sweat or tears" An interview on supernatural claims on The Guardian
- "Massimo Polidoro. 13 years of of research among extraordinary claims"
- "Secrets of the Psychics. Massimo Polidoro"
- "The Art of Deception Revealed" Anecdotes and tricks revealed by Massimo Polidoro during his apprenticeship with James Randi
- ^ Polidoro, Massimo. "Secrets of the Psychics". Prometheus Books