Thoughts are things, Mr. Coram. If I might spend a night here – upon the very spot of floor where the poor conway fell – I could from the surrounding atmosphere (it is a sensitive plate) recover a picture of the thing in his mind – indicating Conway – at the last! (…)

What is it, continued the weird old man, but the odic force, the ether – say it how you please – which carries the wireless message, the lightening? It is a huge, subtile sensitive plate. Inspiration, what you call bad luck and good luck – all are but refelections from it. The supreme thought preceding death is imprinted on the surrounding atmosphere like a photograph. I have trained this to reproduce those photographs!

Excerpt from The Dream Detective, 1925 by Sax Rohmer, Double Day Edition