Thanks Linda, I love this answer!

1. Pietro D’Abano
A medical doctor from Padua, 400 hundred years before Mesmer, held the view that suggestion when practiced by a kind but authorities person had definite positive effects on mentally disturbed people.
He also had definite ideas about what constituted scientific knowledge, holding only sciences depending upon inductive and deductive reasoning to be worthy of the name.

I would like him to meet-

2. Irvine Kirsch, to discuss response expectancy theory, that suggests that hypnotic responses are initiated by the same mechanisms as voluntary responses, and that it is possible to increase responses to suggestions, potentially to quite a substantial degree

And also –
3. Theodore Barber whose extensive studies concluded that some people are superb subjects who are able to fantasize in a hallucinatory way, and the rest can respond to suggestions far more than hypnotists have realized if the suggestions are given firmly–and without the complexities of calling it hypnosis or administering a hypnotic-induction procedure.

The 4th I would like to bring to the table would be

4. John Kihlstrom, because he argued for hypnosis being an altered state of consciousness in which the subject responds to suggestions by the hypnotist for alterations in perception, memory, and the voluntary control of action, and now suggests that the stance for ‘state or non state’ should be abandoned, and construe hypnosis as
“Simultaneously as both a state of (sometimes) profound cognitive change, involving basic mechanisms of cognition and consciousness, and as a social interaction, in which hypnotist and subject come together for a specific purpose within a wider socio-cultural context.”

Elliotson does not sound like a very agreeable character from what I have read and so I’d only let him in if we have bouncers like they have on Jeremy Kyle or Jerry Springer. I think he’d be spoiling for a rumble at any opportunity.

As for Mesmer, by all accounts he wanted to do a lot of good and helped many people who could not afford him, I like his philanthropic side. However, I deeply dispute that Mesmerism is really anything much to do with hypnosis beyond it stimulating Braid to disprove it and in the process discovered and coined hypnosis. Plus, I suspect his continual passes would be highly distracting….. 😉

Thank you for your highly valued contribution as always, Adam.

For me the issue with Erickson is more fundamental regarding the entire approach regardless of the point in his career. Some of the points I’d raise feature on a thread here from a few years ago:
http://www.adamshypnosishub.com/topic/211/pros-and-cons-of-ericksons-approach

Depends at want point in his career that you are taking to Erickson.

Okay, I will get rid of Mesmer. I just want to see him do his passes.

That would be a fantastic interview group and probably a lot more fun than mine!! You have really made me smile here Lindsay, brilliant!

Best wishes to you, Adam

Clark Hull – I’d like to ask how his opinion on the modern day study of hypnosis & the current level of academic study, research and evidence base. Has the field developed as he expected or hoped?

Kreskin – Why not! I’d love to chat and spot the suggestions worked into his conversation, ask about his work with the police and what he thought of the film “based” on his work.

Theodore Sarbin – Given his work in Role Theory I would be especially interested in discussing with him the current trend for ‘ being authentic’.

Someone who worked in a Greek or Egyptian Sleep Temple – Was it ‘just a job’, did they have specific training, did they realise that they could be doing something that people still talk about today?

Thanks Scott,

– I mentioned my reasons for not having Erickson there. I doubt I would make it to the end of the interview awake.

– You picked five and you’re only permitted a top 4.

😉

Good hearing from you, my very best wishes to you, Adam.