A billion people watch the sun and moon sweep across the sky, but more sophisticated observers know that is not exactly what happens. Untrained observers do not know what to look for or how to interpret it. They do not know the pitfalls which lead to inaccurate observation, nor are they fully aware of the tricks their own limitations and biases may play on them.
Starting reports of phenomena generally come from uneducated, unsophisticated persons, and are discounted by the experts. When some remarkable observations are reported, the scientist will want to know:
(1) What is the observer's general level of education and sophistication? Is this person a member of a superstition-ridden folk group, or of a well-informed and somewhat skeptical population?
(2) What is his or her special knowledge or training in this particular field? Does this observer have the knowledge to tell whether this event has a perfectly natural explanation? Thus, the biologist among the ship's passengers is less likely to see a sea monster than are the members of the crew and the meteorologist sees fewer UFOs (Un Indentified Objects) than people with no special knowledge of atmospheric phe-nomena.
In recent years public interest in psychic and occult phenomena has exploded. A book claiming that plants have consciousness and are responsive to human feelings has been a best-seller [Tompkins and Bird, 1973], al-though scientists are generally unimpressed [First, 1973], and there are no authenticated reports that anyone has yet "hated" the crabgrass out of the lawn.
A one-time stage magician, Uri Geller, has attracted great attention as a psychic and has even impressed a team of physicists at Stanford Research Institute. But physicists and other scientists, whatever their credentials as scientists, are not trained observers of sleight-of-hand deception. Stage magicians consider scientists as easy to fool as anyone else, and generally dismiss Geller and other psychics as showmen with no psychic powers. Obviously, a "trained observer" must be trained in the particular kind of observation he or she is conducting.

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