"Scientists say it can't be done because we don't have a good theory for why it happens," he said. "Engineers just use what works."
And yet I've never heard of engineers using psychic abilities to make even the tiniest adjustment to some piece of precision metalwork.
However (as with many psychologists he appears to be scientifically illiterate), it isn't the case that "Scientists say it doesn't work because we don't have a good theory of why it happens". That more or less is the exact opposite of the scientific method. Science says it doesn't work because it doesn't work. Science does
not need a theory of why it happens, if it genuinely happens. It does not genuinely happen according to science unless a repeatable experiment has shown that it happens under conditions that
nothing else could be the cause.
"Science" is really the process of designing experiments that eliminate all possible alternative causes for an effect. In the case of spoon bending, a major component of spoon bending is a person - a human being. It is therefore necessary to design your experiment in such as way as you eliminate the most obvious alternative cause for a bending spoon: A fraudulent person. Anybody claiming to bend a spoon with psychic powers could in fact be applying a force to the spoon and either lying about it or not understanding how much their own physical force is affecting the spoon (bouyed up in a group situation like the one described by peer pressure).
The claim of the spoon bender is that by "focussing psychic energy" they can cause a spoon clasped between their fingers and thumb to bend. But when you clasp something between your fingers and thumb you have the potential to apply a force to the spoon.
Solution a) Don't have the subject hold the spoon, but have the spoon clamped in a vice. This of course is not acceptable because even the scientist has to
admit the possibility that the supposed psychic force has to be carried from the mind down the arm and through the skin to the metal.
I have thought of Solution b) which is to build a kind of fixed gauntlet which holds the fingers and thumb firmly while leaving the skin uncovered. The gauntlet is in a fixed position. The spoon is touched by the fingers, but no force can be applied by them.
Probably Randi's test for spoon bending involves this kind of experiment.
Oh, wait, hold the phone!
The people that had success in bending the spoons without the use of physical force were also invited to participate in further analysis. Their names and contact information was collected so they could later be brought into a laboratory setting, where they would try to replicate their feat in a controlled environment for Schwartz.
Schwartz said the laboratory tests would commence within the next couple of weeks.
So where's the follow up report of the "contolled environment" laboratory condition test? This story is almost exactly 4 years old.
This, you see, is a very typical example of why the paranormal brigade continue to claim that there is substance to what they claim. "Look at all the evidence!" they say, and cite story after story after story - stories like this one. But if there is a proper scientific follow up we never hear about it. But surely if science confirmed the paranormal it would be a
much bigger story than this "spoon bending party" that we actually have a report of?
Of course, the reason for this apparent silence is that there was no positive result from the laboratory condition test. That's not a
sexy story, so nobody bothered reporting it. "Science proves yet again what scientists already believe" What on earth would be the point that story? It's not even a problem specifically with the media: Say you, as a scientist, set out to prove the existence of psi-powers. You lick your lips as you imagine the Nobel prize within your grasp as you rigorously abolish all alternative causes for an effect and get ready to truly demonstrate psionic energy and its capabilities. Unfortunately your experiments yield nothing. There is nothing outside the margin of error. There is no obvious movement of a book, or bending of a spoon, or greater than chance card guessing. What can you do? What would you publish? Nobody's interested in a
negative result.
Not publishing your results wouldn't even constitute scientific fraud or lack of integrity!
And the result is that it is very very easy to find anecdotal evidence for psychic phenomena, but very hard to find stories about rigorous scientifically backed tests for said phenomena. You can safely assume that the scientific tests showed no evidence for psi-forces, because if they had shown the opposite, you'd have read about it.
EDIT: talks about scientific rigour but apparently can't subtract 2001 from 2005 and get the right answer! 
