UPDATED 10th and 13th September
I’m delighted to report that British-born physical medium David Thompson has responded to my report on a “materialisation” séance I attended last month. I had hoped that it might open up a dialogue in which he would participate, on an immensely important subject and one that has been hotly disputed for more than a century, since the photo of the spirit of Katie King (left) was taken by Sir William Crookes.
His criticism of my Blog was posted on the website of his Circle of the Silver Cord. He also submitted it to me for inclusion as a Comment here and also as a comment on the SpiritofPN website where a healthy debate has also ensured.
Rather than publish it as just another Comment, I think it is important that Thompson’s views are not buried among the many other opinions that have been expressed, and for that reason I am treating it as a new topic. Besides, that gives me an opportunity to correct many of the misstatements and false assumptions he makes (see below). Unlike David, however, I am not going to suggest any ulterior motive – just his lack of knowledge in certain areas.
I expressed the hope that David would enter into the same spirit of openness by publishing my responses (and corrections) on his website so that his visitors are given both sides of the argument. He has refused to do so, which I believe will tell unbiased observers a lot about him and his mediumship. He first acknowledged the fact that I had responded to his comments with these words:
9th September: “In response to my last posting “Setting The Record Straight” the person it was addressed towards has replied by placing a new blog upon his website. In fairness to him please feel free to see his spin upon my answers to my previous article. I don’t wish to get into a backwards and forwards with him, trying to justify my mediumship to him, or to promote his website or meet his needs. As I stated in my previous post:
“I don’t deny that physical mediumship is not for everyone. If you are sceptical and can’t accept the possibility of materialisation in the dark, it’s not for you. Don’t apply to attend a séance that is clearly stated as being held in the dark on the protocol forms.”
David Thompson doesn’t give a link to this website, but hopefully his supporters will be able to find their way to ParanormalReview.com. If they do so, they will see that I did not put any “spin” on his words, simply corrected his inaccuracies and misrepresenations and put seven questions to him about his mediumship. But after just a few days on his website, “Setting the Record Straight” has been removed. Thompson explains why:
12th September: I have decided to remove the posting “Setting the Record Straight” [as] I do not wish to give these people any more of our time and certainly do not wish to help promote their obvious negativity on this website. Needless to say the article can be viewed on other websites if anyone wishes to read my answers to some of these somewhat dubious individuals.
Intriguingly, this statement is published alongside an image of Thompson with ecotplasm streaming from his mouth down over his knees which has the following caption: “Taken during a public seance in red light in Auckland, NZ (2009)”. Strange that a man who insists his seances are only held in the dark should publish a picture of himself producing ecotplasm in red light. It is this sort of discrepancy or inconsistency that leads people to make false assumptions about the conditions under which his seances are held and the phenomena that will be “witnessed” when they attend. At the same time, Thompson responded to my Comment on SpiritofPN with these words:
“Dear Mr Stemman. You are quiet correct, I have chosen not to answer your questions, why should I? I am only answerable to the spirit world, not you or any other person. I choose not to engage with you any longer to promote your website or your forthcoming ventures. Please feel free along with your few cohorts to slap each other on the back and believe that you have made a contribution to a subject you only have limited knowledge about. Along with your cohorts please hear this: I AM NOT IN THIS LIFE TO LIVE UP TO YOUR EXPECTATIONS OR TO MEET YOUR NEEDS. Best Regards – David Thompson”
I am sorry that Thompson has decided not to enter into a dialogue about his mediumship, either on his own website or on others. I think now it is just a matter of time before the voice of reason forces him to change his mind and to be more open, and hopefully Spiritualist organisations will take an active role in putting pressure on him to do so. Needless to say, I will continue to take a keen interest in the claims that are made for his mediumship and the evidence that is produced, despite the snub.
Without more ado, here’s what he had to say in his original post, under the headline. To help readers get the most from this exchange, I am giving my responses in purple type:
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT. The negative and damaging article by Roy Stemman.
Materialisation mediums have, historically, had to put up with lies, distortions and personal attacks. It’s bad enough when these come from the materialists but after many years of keeping silent in the face of such attacks and most unfair provocations by a tiny number of people claiming to be “spiritual” I feel it is time to set the record straight for the sake of decent people who may inadvertently come across those attacks on the internet.
Recently, while I was on tour in the UK and Spain, Roy Stemman wrote a very negative article about my mediumship on the basis of one sitting. In it he made many inaccurate claims which I want to set straight.
First I want to point out that Roy Stemman is not a qualified afterlife investigator. As far as I know he is a journalist and knows nothing about scientific method. His article was written as a “layperson” and with an “agenda”. It also shows he does not know about the refinements of physical mediumship.
Wrong! And also very silly. If David wants to dismiss my qualifications, that’s up to him. And I’m quite comfortable to be referred to as simply an investigative journalist. But that does rather overlook the fact that I first sat in a physical circle before David Thompson was born. I have since sat with a number of mediums claiming to possess physical mediumship and written about those experiences. I also have a large library of books on the subject so I understand better than most the historical significance of materialisations to the Spiritualist movement, as well as the many cases of fraud – one of which I was involved in exposing – that have given physical mediumship a bad name.
On the other hand, Montague Keen, who was the president of the Survival Committee of the Society of Psychical Research and a member for this SPR for 55 years, investigated my mediumship and wrote a glowing report. His conclusion was that my mediumship is genuine.
Monty was a good friend. As a long-standing member of the Society for Psychical Research I am, of course, well aware of the séance he had with David Thompson. Nothing I wrote about my own experience undermines Monty’s findings. It is not unusual, in the field of psychic research, for investigators to come to different conclusions about what they witness. Their debates, however, should lead to a better understanding of the phenomena being investigated and, hopefully, help produce results that are less questionable. For the record, I must point out that, like me, Monty was not a scientist – like me, he was a journalist. Also, let’s not forget that Monty’s verdict was based on a single session. I’m not criticising that, but David can’t have it both ways. My report, he argues, is unreliable because I am just a journalist who had only one séance with him. Montague Keen’s report, on the other hand, is reliable – presumably because it was favorable. David, it might also interest you to know that a report I published of the SPR debate on the Scole Experiment resulted in Monty writing a letter to me to say it was the best summary of the very complex case that he had seen. So, please don’t try to convince your followers that Monty and I are very different researchers. Our findings might differ but our approach is very similar.
After Montague Keen died he materialised through my mediumship on a number of occasions and a speech he dictated while materialised was read out at his funeral. He spoke to his wife, Veronica, while materialised, and she confirmed that it was genuinely Montague. And recently, while I was on the same tour, Robin Foy wrote three detailed and highly favorable reports on my mediumship. He claimed that he received evidential personal messages through my mediumship for which he had been waiting for a number of years. He is probably one of the most experienced afterlife investigators today, someone who has investigated physical mediumship for more than 50 years and was one of the key sitters in the highly regarded Scole Group.
I was also investigated thoroughly and systematically over a long period of time by a specialist in evidence – a lawyer – and by a psychologist. Both have professional degrees in scientific methodology and professional experience. Because they were totally convinced of the validity of my mediumship they asked me if they could join The Circle of the Silver Cord.
The True Facts
1) Roy says that he was expecting the séance to be conducted in red light yet he is on record for criticising the fact that my sittings, like those of Rita Gould and Stewart Alexander, are held in total darkness. The first sentence on the form that all sitters have to sign before attending states: “All sittings are held in total darkness” and this is made clear repeatedly in the pre-séance talks.
Wrong! Though the forms we were sent before the séance did talk about darkness, I had read reports that David was producing some phenomena in red light. One of those attending the séance (Bill Meadows, I believe) told me in advance that we could expect phenomena in red light. However, his partner Christine, the circle leader, told us that the guides had informed her that red light would not be used on the evening I attended – and that seems to be the norm. A couple of additional points of accuracy. David’s spelling of Rita’s surname is wrong: it should be Goold. A minor point, I know, but it suggests he is not as familiar with other physical mediums as he claims. Certainly, his statement that Stewart Alexander’s seances are always held in the dark is false. Someone who has taken part in many of his public seances tells me that they have seldom failed to use “at least some red light”. Most often, she adds, “this is to enable people to see the materialisation of a hand or wrist. More recently, there has been a further experiment in red light where two sitters participate by placing their hands on the table, after which a spirit hand materialises close to their own. This is all clearly visible and Stewart’s own hands are on the table at the same time, controlled by the sitters at the table.” So, David, please check your facts before making false claims.
2) In the séance forms and pre-séance briefing it is made very clear that having a negative mindset can seriously interfere with the energy and affect the phenomena. People who have not investigated physical mediumship do not understand this fundamental fact. Having even one person in a room with a negative mindset can reduce the number of materialisations that happen and the strength of the phenomena. Coming to a séance with an already preconceived belief that unless the mediumship is held in lighted conditions it is not genuine is totally unethical. By having a fixed negative mind, Roy himself contributed to ‘lowering’ the energy of the séance.
I did? Then why was it that I was one of only four people to receive “personal” messages? Why did William not only place a hand on my head but also stand on my feet? And why did David Fontana pat me on the shoulder? No, I’m sorry, that negative attitude excuse doesn’t add up at all.
3) Roy says “that there was no evidence of anything paranormal in the séance” that he attended. Yet other people who were there commented on the extraordinary precision of the trumpets that flew around the room at lightning speed without hitting anyone and the fact that my chair was levitated and moved several meters at the end. Both my feet were strapped in. Tony Pappard, a journalist with mediumship skills, is on record for stating that his partner came through with highly evidential messages. Dr David Fontana, who investigated the Scole Experiment, left a highly evidential message for a person who sits in another circle: Ray Lister, Stewart Alexander’s circle leader, confirmed this and complimented myself and Christine after the séance.
I will comment on the experience of Tony Papard (not correct spelling of his name) later.
4) “The medium controlled everything.” That is blatantly untrue. I did not do the searching, did not lead the circle, did not see the forms before the séance, did not strap myself into the chair, did not secure the gag and the binds, did not hold the clippers, did not control the music. The only thing I did was scan everyone with the metal detector and seat people (see next point). Given that my life is on the line because of the highly sensitive ectoplasm, I am unwilling to put both these responsibilities onto others. These kinds of misrepresentations I am informed amount to malicious writing against me.
David, you must learn to distinguish between reasonable observations, which was what I was making when considering events from a sceptical viewpoint, and what you term “malicious writing”.
5) “The medium placed the sitters and would have been in a position to know where people sat.” Again this shows Roy’s inexperience with energy work as explained in point 2. Anyone who has sat in a darkened séance room knows that it is extremely difficult to move around without bumping into people and impossible to walk across the room and touch someone on the head without first groping around to find them. In any event, as Robin Foy remarked at a subsequent séance, the materialised forms moved from one side of the large room to the other in an instant – something impossible for a bumbling human to do in the dark.
It was probably just coincidence that the people who had messages or who were touched by the “materialisations” were all sitting in easily accessible positions. But sceptics would find that suspicious, since David directed them to those seats.
6) Roy continues to misrepresent when he claims that I knew who would be attending and saw their forms and in advance of the séance, implying that I would use the information to search out facts about people attending. I had a quick look at the list and did not object to anyone – even Roy Stemman who is on record for having been sceptical of my mediumship before the séance. However I did not see any of the forms which are kept by the organisers who checked the IDs.
Wrong! There’s clearly no misrepresentation in my report. David admits that he had “a quick look” at the list of sitters in advance. He doesn’t say how much in advance. But the need to provide names and photo ID are highly suspect in my view.
Asking people to sign the form and provide evidence of their identity again on entry is a way of reducing the likelihood of someone giving their ticket to another person whose intent may not be of a positive nature and out to prove the medium is a fraud by grabbing the materialisations. This is done because of legal advice given to me. The form was introduced because a New York lawyer stated that if he was allowed to attend he would do a football tackle onto the materialised spirit.
I don’t see how asking people for photo ID is going to prevent someone doing something they should not do during a physical séance, though I am fully in agreement with making people aware of their legal responsibilities during such events.
Such things have happened in the past e.g. to Alec Harris when a trusted sitter obtained tickets and then passed them on to two sceptical journalists who tried to grab a materialized form. As a result Alec was almost killed and his mediumship was never the same.
Legal advice stated it was important to make every potential sitter aware of his/her legal duty and liability should they violate the strict security protocols. This is important so that they will take seriously their obligations and know that they will be held legally accountable for their behavior and cannot plead ignorance afterwards. The Circle never had problems with decent people, but it is critically important to follow legal procedures. I make no apology for doing everything to protect my health and my safety since in the past I have been cut, burned and bruised by sitters who were not aware of the danger.
7) In any event, the kind of evidence that comes though in a personal reunion is not the kind of thing that can be researched in advance on the internet – things like what was put into the coffin of your loved one, pet names, the way a loved one behaved, the last words you said to them.
Unfortunately, no such stunning evidence was produced at the séance I attended.
8) Roy’s misleading report claims that a competent stage illusionist could have escaped from the cable ties and run around the room in the dark for one and a half hours, manipulating the trumpets and creating the voices of William, Timothy, Louis Armstrong, Quentin Crisp, May, David Fontana, Tony Pappard’s partner George and the lady’s grandfather. He would have had to re-attach the plastic straps and obtain new cable ties and clip them off to the same length. This would mean that I would also have had to have created all the hundreds of the voices of loved ones who spoke in hundreds of reunions over the last ten years including voices in Russian, French and Chinese as well as imitating barking dogs which jumped on their owners’ laps.
I remind Roy that I am not a competent stage illusionist – I worked in the aviation industry. And I have a strong English accent. If I could do what he claims I would be making a lot more money in a magic act in Las Vegas.
I also remind him that a number of experienced investigators including Montague Keen and Robin Foy have thoroughly inspected the plastic one way cable ties I always use and concluded that it is not humanly possible to escape from them.
I suspect that they might have said the same thing about the way in which an escape artist is trussed up … only to see him get out of them. So, I’m going to suggest an experiment shortly that would overcome that criticism.
Montage Keen’s report stated – in his own words:
“It is almost an article of faith among many psychical researchers that unless physical phenomena are capable of being clearly witnessed, or alternatively that infra-red video recording is available, no persuasive evidence of anything paranormal is possible. Although the spirit portrayed as Sir William Crookes explained why an infra-red video camera might be damaging to the medium at his present stage of development, the general rule of evidentiality may be broken if the other security measures justify an unambiguous assertion that deception on the part of the medium was impossible. The nature of the ties would have prevented the medium, no matter how strong or agile, from escaping his bonds without first managing to cut the ties. Even had he been able to do so, he could not have regained his seat and retied the knots unaided, employing a new set of uncut ties, unless he had been helped by someone able to work deftly, accurately and swiftly in pitch dark. No-one in the séance room could have attempted that without ready detection. Moreover my careful examination of the chair showed no sign of any movable join. Finally, the reversal of the medium’s cardigan while he was still bonded to his seat defies normal explanation. The precautions here were superior even to those employed by Schrenck Notzing on Eva C, who was sewn into a single garment, or on the physical medium Jack Webber, where less sophisticated tying methods, and materials, were used. The voices themselves could not have come from the gagged medium. The only other ‘regulars’ on whom suspicion might rest were his wife, Paul the leader who was seated next to me, and whose voice and location would have clearly identified him, and DF, the host, who was seated at the opposite end of the room from the medium. Any of these possibilities would have easily and immediately been detectable by those present, as well as likely to be defeated by listening to the tape recording.”
9) The report claims falsely that Harry Houdini is a member of the spirit team and implies that he gave me instructions in escapology. Please!!! A spirit claiming to be Harry Houdini came through – as a visitor – just a few times in 2007 and has not done so since and all visits were recorded. His main purpose was to apologise for his persecution of the Davenport Brothers and Margery Crandon. At no time did he even mention escapology.
Totally false! I implied no such thing. I made the point that “since Harry Houdini is said to be one of his regular séance visitors” David should be aware that a competent stage illusionist (which Houdini was, of course) could easily escape from restraints. I never suggested Houdini had taught David to do so. How absurd.
10) On a number of special occasions when the energy is right William allows sitters to approach the cabinet, turn on a red light, and see that I am still unconscious in the chair at the same time as he or other spirits are talking in direct voice. During the recent tour Robin Foy witnessed two independent checkers doing this. In the home circle lawyer Victor Zammit and medium Sunny Burgess have had this experience. However the energy field has to be extremely good for this to happen and the person approaching the cabinet has to have William’s complete trust.
11) Roy Stemman unfairly accuses me outright of fraud when he says that the materialisations felt like a normal human being – “which they clearly were”. This shows he has not done his research. Everyone who has ever experienced contact with a fully materialised figure states that they feel normal to the touch and sound, like a normal human being. In one case a doctor examined a fully materialised figure produced by Mirabelli and found that he had a pulse and heartbeat. Clearly this shows Roy is limited in his knowledge about materialisations.
This is David twisting words again. What I was saying was that a materialised spirit is just like a living, breathing, walking, talking person. No difference. So, if you are sitting in the dark and someone puts their hand on your head and claims to be a spirit, how are you to know that it really is a ghostly form and not a human? Without some form of light, or superbly evidential messages, making that judgment is not easy.
12) Again Roy implies fraud – a very serious damaging and unfounded claim – by saying that the boot William placed on Roy’s foot had a ridge on it ‘like David’s trainers’. How can he tell the difference between boots which have ridged soles and trainers? Did he not notice that the voice of William who was six foot two was much higher in the room than mine would have been and that William’s hand placed on his head was much larger than mine? At a subsequent séance in Spain, and specifically in relation to Roy’s claim, Robin Foy asked William to demonstrate the sound of his boots on the floor and showed it was completely different to the sound of trainers. This also shows that Roy ‘had an agenda’ before the séance.
Correct! I do have an agenda. It is to encourage those who claim to possess physical mediumship to develop it to the point where they can demonstrate it in a way that dispels doubts – as Alec Harris clearly did. I’m not sure why William has to waste ectoplasm by materialising boots, but let’s leave that discussion to another day.
13) Roy Stemman found it peculiar that the materialised David Fontana knew that Roy was writing a book but didn’t know that Roy had recently sent it to publishers when Roy wrote about it on his website. More credible is that David Fontana heard his colleagues in the spirit world mention the book in connection with the fact that Roy Stemman would be sitting. Why would Roy think David Fontana would be interested to read his website? Just because we go to the spirit world we don’t suddenly become all knowing.
Wrong again. David, once more, is twisting my words. He omits the fact that David Fontana told me he had been helping me with my book. The point I made was that, if he were doing so, he should have known that I had finished it. I didn’t suggest that Fontana would be reading my Blog in the spirit world.
14) The report claims that David Fontana offered no survival evidence when he would have been acutely aware of the need for such evidence. However, Ray and June Lister confirmed that they were given a message to take to someone not present about something they knew nothing about. Is this not the best kind of survival evidence?
I’ll make contact with Ray and June to find out more about that particular message.
15) The report claims that Tony Papard was unhappy with the quality of evidence he received when the very next day Tony confirmed that he had been in contact with his deceased partner who confirmed everything. Tony has gone on record that he was very happy with the survival evidence. He writes:
” At the last sitting in August this year my partner came thru with some …evidential stuff including the name of a friend’s dog and an analogy about barriers dividing loved ones concerning something we disagreed about in life -the Berlin Wall. It was significant that the 50th anniversary of its erection was the night of August 13th/14th 2011 and the séance was on August 15th 2011.
“My partner mentioned the 28 years this barrier stood, i.e. the barrier between this world and the next. My partner spoke in a soft, shy voice as in life (he hated speaking in public and there were about 30 people at the séance.) I felt his small hands touch my cheeks. Although he couldn’t get the voice right as a first-time communicator by this method, I know it was him. He also said he was a ‘pain’ in life, and another medium gave me a similar message from him, that he could be ‘selfish’. This was also evidential, though as I replied to him at the séance I could be a right pain too at times.”
I think, David, that visitors to your site should be made aware that most of what Tony has written, above, emanates from his own mediumship. All that he received at your séance was one name, Sandy, which is a dog he had written about on his website, and a number – 28. He has decided what significance that number has, rightly or wrongly. To me, it demonstrates the lack of real evidence from these “materialisations”. In fact, Tony agrees with me. In a subsequent comment on my Blog he wrote: “But, I have to agree with you, I’ve had better evidence of survival at a clairvoyance meeting at the Fairfield Halls with Colin Fry who described my grandmother’s death, gave her first name, and intricate details of what happened to my mother’s kitchen which he couldn’t have possibly known about …”
16) The report claims that there was nothing strikingly evidential in the father-daughter reunion but he then says that Tony Papard was the only person he spoke to after the séance. How would he know what was evidential to the daughter if he didn’t ask?
True. But as the séance was in total darkness, I not only could not see the materialisations but I couldn’t see who they were talking to either!
17) He then goes on to suggest that more survival evidence would be produced in my mental mediumship and trance sessions. Clearly this shows his bias against physical mediumship. I am also informed by another reliable member of my Circle that Roy had expressed anti-materialisation views well before the séance.
Wrong. I believe there have been some outstanding materialisation mediums over the years.
I don’t deny that physical mediumship is so logically impossible to people who have not studied it that their minds go into turmoil trying to find whether it is a trick. This is why we bend over backwards to include as many security protocols as we can without jeapardising the phenomena.
However, the way that Stemman rushed into print the very next morning without checking the above facts and his subsequent actions in allowing a few people who had existing grudges against me to post on his forum without giving their names shows a total disregard for ethics.
I did not rush into print next morning. I simply reported on what I experienced while it was fresh in my mind (it’s the sort of thing investigative reporters do, David) and if I had waited a week my report would have said exactly the same things.
Also, most serious, was when he deliberately omitted any mention of the reports of Montague Keen and Robin Foy and others like Ann Harrison, Tom and Lisa Butler, the directors of ATransC, who have written positive reports of their experiences and the personal evidence they received.
There are very good reasons why! First, I was reporting on a single séance that I attended, not writing a review of your past mediumship. Secondly, some of the reports of seances you refer to (Ann Harrison, Robin Foy) had not even taken place when I sat with you.
It is no coincidence that the main people posting on his forum and the Spirit of PN forum where he immediately placed his article are people who have a long-standing personal agenda against me, who I will reveal the reasons for with back up evidence in the future.
Wrong again, David. You seem to be making a habit of this. Spirit of PN kindly made a PDF version of my Blog available when my website ‘s servers went out of action for two days. Once it was up and running, Spirit of PN simply gave a link to my site. Nothing sinister in that, I’m afraid.
Others who supposedly support them anonymously have no credibility – it is very easy to create multiple fake accounts for anonymous posting on a forum.
Sadly, this little group of cohorts was and still is allowed to jump on the bandwagon created by Roy Stemman’s willfully biased reporting – to intentionally hurt me. There is a saying ‘Birds of a Feather flock together”.
There’s also a saying about feathering one’s own nest … but let’s not go there.
I don’t deny that physical mediumship is not for everyone. If you are sceptical and can’t accept the possibility of materialisation in the dark it’s not for you. Don’t apply to attend a séance that is clearly stated as being held in the dark on the protocol forms.
Also don’t try to score cheap points by omission and distortion. A fair and balanced view is to give ALL facts not just the ones that fit a person’s personal agenda. In the end, you will only be hurting yourself because decent people will avoid any forum that encourages spitefulness, envy, hatred and negativity.
David Thompson (Circle of the Silver Cord)
While it’s true that some people go too far in their criticisms (or support), I’m keen that this dialogue should not descend into a war of words that gets nobody anywhere. Instead, I’d like to put seven questions to David:
1. Is it the goal of yourself or your spirit helpers to ultimately produce materialisations or other physical phenomena in a red light?
2. If so, when do you expect that to happen?
3. In the meantime, is it sensible to continue to demonstrate in total darkness, leaving some participants (as evidenced from responses to my Blog) unconvinced by the results?
4. Are your spirit helpers striving to provide more personal survival evidence in the future and less show business entertainment from the likes of Quentin Crisp and Louis Armstrong?
5. Can your main spirit helper, William, explain why the materialised Gordon Higginson was unaware that his good friend Heather Hatton had passed over to spirit a year earlier when he communicated in Australia?
6. Have your spirit helpers been asked about the introduction of night vision goggles or infra-red light to view and even film the materialised entities?
7. Instead of being tied up during a séance, would you agree to being tested by SPR researchers using simple weighing devices that would monitor not only your presence in a chair throughout the séance proceedings, but also the independent existence (by weight) of any spirits that materialised? Such a method would be totally unobtrusive as far as light is concerned, if total darkness continues to be a necessary condition of your mediumship.
I look forward to receiving your responses to these seven questions, and also to seeing my responses to your comments posted on the Circle of the Silver Cord website.
ROY STEMMAN, www.ParanormalReview.com
As the update to this post has already pointed out, David Thompson has refused to answer the questions posed or to share my responses with visitors to his website. And he has now removed “Setting the Record Straight” from his own website. I leave my readers to draw their own conclusions.