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THE ASSOCIATIVE REMOTE DREAMING EXPERIMENT: A NOVEL APPROACH TO PREDICTING FUTURE OUTCOMES OF SPORTING EVENTS

Authors:
  • International School of Clairvoyance

Abstract and Figures

This double-blind study utilised dreaming instead of remote viewing as a precognitive tool within an Associative Remote Viewing (ARV) protocol. In the spirit of Participatory Action Research, but using a quantitative design, a cohesive group of experienced remote viewers (who varied in experience) designed and participated in a year-long study that included 56 trials in which they attempted to have precognitive dreams that would enable them to produce descriptions and sketches that would match a photograph they would be shown at a future time. Five out of 7 remote viewers/dreamers were able to consistently produce dreams at will. Their 278 transcripts were utilized for the purpose of making predictions and wagers on the outcomes of sporting events. They produced an overall rate of 17 hits out of 28 predictions, which a binomial test showed to be marginally above chance (one-tailed). Nevertheless, the overall monetary gain was a little under 400 percent of the initial stake. Further, one individual dreamer had a 76 percent correct hit rate based on 13 hits and 4 misses with 20 passes, while another had 16 hits and 9 misses. These points are discussed along with the notion that raising the threshold of Confidence Ranking Scores (up to a CR of 6) for dream based ARV predictions may help to improve the overall hit rate.
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65
Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 2019
Vol. 83, No. 2, 65–84,
www.spr.ac.uk
THE ASSOCIATIVE REMOTE DREAMING EXPERIMENT: A NOVEL
APPROACH TO PREDICTING FUTURE OUTCOMES OF SPORTING
EVENTS
By DeBra Katz, NaNcy Smith, michelle Bulgatz,
Dale graff aND JameS laNe
ABSTRACT
This double-blind study utilised dreaming instead of remote viewing as a
precognitive tool within an Associative Remote Viewing (ARV) protocol. In the
spirit of Participatory Action Research, but using a quantitative design, a
cohesive group of experienced remote viewers (who varied in experience)
designed and participated in a year-long study that included 56 trials in which
they attempted to have precognitive dreams that would enable them to
produce descriptions and sketches that would match a photograph they would
be shown at a future time. Five out of 7 remote viewers/dreamers were able to
consistently produce dreams at will. Their 278 transcripts were utilized for the
purpose of making predictions and wagers on the outcomes of sporting events.
They produced an overall rate of 17 hits out of 28 predictions, which a binomial
test showed to be marginally above chance (one-tailed). Nevertheless, the
overall monetary gain was a little under 400 percent of the initial stake.
Further, one individual dreamer had a 76 percent correct hit rate based on 13
hits and 4 misses with 20 passes, while another had 16 hits and 9 misses.
These points are discussed along with the notion that raising the threshold of
Condence Ranking Scores (up to a CR of 6) for dream based ARV predictions
may help to improve the overall hit rate.
iNtroDuctioN
Remote viewers are those who utilize their clairvoyance and other intuitive
perceptual abilities in a systematic way to produce a written and pictorial
transcript of an assigned “target” (Smith, 2015). Such targets can range from
simple pictograms (Warcollier, 2001), photographs and videos (May, Utts,
Humphrey, Luke, Frivold & Trask, 1990; Wiseman & Milton, 1998), specic
locations (Puthoff & Targ, 1976), objects (Targ & Puthoff, 2005), people
(Buchanan, 2003; Katz & Bulgatz, 2013), as well as microscopic organisms
(Katz, Beem & Fendley, 2015), organic materials (Vallee, 1988) and less
veriable but more “esoteric” based targets (Swann, 1998; Knowles, 2017).
Remote viewing has also been utilized to describe situations related to past,
present and future activities and events (McMoneagle, 1998; Brown, 2006).
While protocols differ somewhat between experimental versus applied/
operational based projects, inherent in all remote viewing designs is the use
of blinding procedures, separation of roles, open response activities and the
Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 2019, 83(2)
66
participant’s use of intentional mental processes to access information not
otherwise accessible via logical or analytic processes (Swann, 1993).
Remote viewing has a rich and colorful history, having been birthed in
research labs and utilized by over a dozen U.S. military and government
intelligence agencies from 1973 through 1995, who contracted with the
Stanford Research Institute (SRI) and SRI International to develop remote
viewing capabilities. Former directors and advocates of these programs point
to continuous approval of oversight committees, contract renewals and
funding as evidence of the efcacy of remote viewing (May & Marwaha,
2018). There also exists inter-agency reports that can be found in the Ingo
Swann archival collections housed at University of West Georgia’s Ingram
Library, such as the one drafted by the Defense Intelligence Agency (1984).
This declassied report asserts that during the three-year Grill Flame
Program, spanning from 1980 to 1983, it was well established that “remote
viewing is a real phenomenon and is not degraded by distance or shielding.
Remote viewing ability can be improved by appropriate training procedures.
Remote viewing has potential for United States intelligence applications”
(p. 21).
Formal assessments by May et al. (1989) of experiments utilizing a variety
of protocols and consisting of over 25, 000 trials within SRI International and
Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) from 1992 to 1994,
and later veried by Utts (1996), found “The statistical results of the studies
examined are far beyond what is expected by chance. Arguments that these
results could be due to methodological aws in the experiments are soundly
refuted” (p.3). However, other researchers who assessed a much smaller
sampling of the conducted studies (Mumford, Rose & Goslin, 1995; Milton &
Wiseman, 1998, 1999) disagreed, suggesting that “perceptual information
leakage” by researchers could have theoretically impacted ndings. What
these quarrelling parties did agree on was that future experiments should
focus on how to make these phenomena as “useful as possible” (Utts, 1996, p.
3) and that the challenge to parapsychology is to “go beyond the demonstration
of signicant effects” (Hyman, 1996, p. 58).
Since the declassication of these programs in the mid-1990s, remote
viewing has largely taken root within the public sector, with the development
of dozens of training programs (Katz, 2018); alongside which, businesses,
organizations and social media outlets have emerged for purposes related to
solving crime (Coronado, 2019); corporate consulting (Vivanco, 2016;
Williams, 2014) and precognitive, nancial based projects (Katz, Grgi ´c &
Tressoldi, 2018).
Associative Remote Viewing (ARV) is a specic application and subeld of
remote viewing, involving a rather complex, double blinded set of procedures
initially developed by Schwartz (1977) and used by researchers, personally
and professionally, at the Stanford Research Institute. These researchers
sought to bypass some of the difculties of using psi to describe potential
outcomes of future events, such as in sporting events or stock market
uctuations, in which the possible winning options are too familiar or too
similar to each other for judges to determine which outcome is being described
(Katz & Bulgatz, 2013). Unlike such traditional psi based approaches ARV
The Associative Remote Dreaming Experiment: Predicting Outcomes of Sporting Events
67
involves the random pairing of the possible outcomes of an event with
unrelated photographs/images.
While applied ARV protocols can vary, they will usually include the nine
phases outlined in Table 1 below.
taBle 1.
Showing the nine phases of a typical ARV protocol
Phase Process
1 Event selection
2 Photo pairing
3 Tasking of the remote viewers
4 Remote viewing
5 Judging/scoring
6 Prediction issuing
7 Wagering (optional)
8 Event occurs
9 Feedback
All phases, except for the remote viewing and feedback, are carried out by
the manager or researcher. The process is illustrated in the following example
of a wager placed on a future sporting event:
Phase One — Event Selection: Suppose it is the World Cup, and there is
an upcoming soccer match between the Brazilian team and the English team.
An ARV manager has been asked by a sports enthusiast to help predict which
team will win the game.
Phase Two — Photo Pairing: To set up the trial, the manager can choose
any two photos, providing the photos are as different from each other as
possible in terms of color, shape, size, and overall conceptual content.
Furthermore, the pictures will not be related to the teams, or the game; one
will simply be randomly paired with the Brazilian team, and one will be
paired with the English team. For example, a photo of an ofce building in a
city environment may be paired with the Brazilian team (Photo A), and a
photo of black horses running through a green eld is paired with the English
team (Photo B).
Phase Three — Tasking: The manager sends a random target number to
the remote viewers, who are blind to the photo options. The remote viewers
are told the target number is representative of the feedback photo they will
receive at a future date. They are given a deadline by which to submit their
written remote viewing session transcripts.
Phase Four — Remote Viewing (which for the present study was replaced
with dreaming). This is the only phase in which the participants’ intuitive
faculties are utilized. Here remote viewers attempt to tune into the feedback
photo that they will see in the future and record their impressions on paper.
This written transcript will include data about the viewer and will usually
Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 2019, 83(2)
68
include words and sketches. Some of these impressions may be based on
visual images received by the viewer, while some may have come in on an
internal auditory or somatic level. Viewers will then submit their transcripts
to the manager.
Phases Five and Six — Judging and Issuing Prediction: In this example,
the manager notices that the remote viewers’ transcripts included words
such as “movement”, “animals”, “several”, “open spaces” and “green elds”,
and there is even a sketch resembling a four legged animal that is shaded in.
There is no mention of a manmade structure or anything having to do with a
city environment. The manager would rate how well each transcript matched
each picture; in this example assigning a high score to the photo of the horses
(Photo B) and a low score to the city building photo (Photo A). It can be
assumed therefore, given that in the future the remote viewers will only ever
be shown the photo attached to the winning outcome, that in this example
because Photo B is a strong match to the transcripts, that this is the photo
they will be shown. Since photo B has been paired/associated with the English
team, the manager can have a strong degree of condence that the English
team will be the winner. Thus, the English team is recorded as the prediction.
However, it should be noted that if the manager was not condent about
either photo being a strong match, or if both photos had an equal level of
matching elements, or if one of the remote viewer’s transcript strongly
matched one photo and another matched the other photo, instead of issuing
a prediction, he/she might issue a “pass” — which is essentially a non-
prediction that is generally not factored into the hit/miss rates within applied
ARV projects as there is no nancial loss or gain (Katz, Grgi ´c & Fendley,
2018).
Phase Seven — Wagering: The manager contacts the client and lets them
know that the English team will be the winner, so the client can place his
wager.
Phase Eight — The Event: The game is played; the winning outcome is
known.
Phase Nine — Feedback: In order to facilitate the process and keeping
with the theoretical retro-causal assumptions underlying the ARV process,
soon after the game is completed the remote viewers will be shown the photo
associated with the winning team, regardless of whether the prediction was
correct. This is considered essential, since the target originally assigned to
the viewers was the feedback photo attached to the winning team.
Theoretically, if the correct photo is not seen by the viewers, there is no
feedback, and hence there was never a target for the remote viewers to
describe in the rst place.
A Brief History of Successes and Failures in ARV
ARV has resulted in substantial nancial gain by various researchers over
the past four decades. Harary and Targ (1985) earned $100,000 by forecasting
changes in closing prices of the silver futures market, with the aid of nine
ARV trials. However, in a follow up experiment, they had nine consecutive
losses which researchers attributed to an increase in daily ARV trials per
viewer, rendering receiving feedback for one trial impossible prior to
The Associative Remote Dreaming Experiment: Predicting Outcomes of Sporting Events
69
beginning another. This may have led to the viewers describing the feedback
photos from the upcoming trial, as opposed to the present one (Houck, 1986;
Targ, 2012).
Targ, Kantra, Brown and Wiegand (1995) repeated the earlier “silver
experiment” carried out by Harary and Targ (1985), with some notable
adjustments to the design. This included limiting trials to one per day per
remote viewer, and adaptation of what the authors referred to as an “error
detecting protocol”, in which two remote viewers, rather than one, were
utilized per trial to ensure that both their transcripts indicated the same
target photo. Also, “passes” were called if the remote viewers both accurately
described photos in discrepant directions, or if a condence rating of four was
not reached on the SRI 7 point Condence Rating (CR) scale with a two-point
spread between scores. Passes meant predictions were not issued, nor wagers
made, and the trial was omitted from overall hit/miss tallies. Twelve of 18
trials resulted in forecasts (i.e., predictions) and from these, 7 forecasts were
recorded as trades, even though no monies were wagered. Six of these 7
forecasts were correct (Targ, Kantra, Brown & Weigand, 1995). Had monies
been wagered, prots would theoretically have been quite lucrative.
Puthoff (1984) successfully conducted twenty-one of thirty trades with the
help of seven select remote viewers, yielding prots of $25,000. Kolodziejzyk
(2012), acting as a single operator over a 13-year period, utilized a unique
computer-based approach to the ARV protocol that combined remote viewing,
logic, and knowledge of the stock market, yielding a prot of $146,587.30.
More recently, Smith, Laham, and Moddell (2014) conducted a series of only
seven ARV trials with university students turned novice remote viewers,
earning approximately $16,000 by wagering substantial amounts of $10,000
at a time.
However, it should be noted that ARV has also resulted in the loss of
signicant investment. For instance, experienced remote viewers using a
forced-choice type ARV protocol completed 100 initial trials, which were not
wagered on, and resulted in a stunning 99.8 hit rate. However, once
investments were made across 3,500 trials, results evened out around chance
levels (Rosenblatt, 2000). While reasons for the decline in results can only be
speculated on, participants have suggested in personal interviews that
attitudes towards money, and completing too many trials over too long a
period of time may have been mitigating factors.
Most recently, approximately 60 remote viewers contributed 177
predictions generating 240 foreign exchange (FOREX) executed trades,
resulting in a loss of $52,186 (Katz, Grgi ´c, & Fendley, 2018). The authors
attempted to demonstrate that these losses may have been due to having
more underperforming groups of viewers making predictions than those with
previous higher hit rates, which impacted the use of a particular mathematical
wagering strategy, in that too high wagers were made too early in the process.
They also suggested that as in the early Harary and Targ (1985) experiment
“too many predictions may have been made in too short a time-span” (p. 44).
ARV in the last couple of decades has also been the focus of formal research
projects (Targ et al., 1995). However, a greater number of investigations have
been conducted by remote viewing enthusiasts who operate outside of
Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 2019, 83(2)
70
academia or formal research venues. Even so, these investigations include
double-blinding procedures and careful protocols, which qualify them as
exploratory or informal research projects (Katz & Bulgatz, 2013). While some
work independently, as did Kolodziejzyk (2012), the majority operate in
groups, which allows for the separation of roles and responsibilities. Also
today, most work at a distance with the assistance of web-based
communications and delivery technologies (Rosenblatt, Knowles & Poquiz,
2015).
One such group is known as the Sublime Remote Viewing Group, which
formed at a conference sponsored by the Applied Precognition Project and
began its rst set of informal trials in June, 2012. The group consists of ve
experienced remote viewers and a manager that have been working together
on various informal, applied and exploratory projects, many involving the
use of an ARV protocol, although they have also worked on criminal
investigations.
After hearing Dale Graff at an International Remote Viewing Conference,
describe a decade-long project that he and Patricia Cyrus conducted (Graff,
2007; Graff & Cyrus, 2017) in which the two utilized a precognitive dreaming
protocol they had developed for the purpose of intentionally describing a
specic newspaper or magazine page they would be shown at a near future
date, some members of the Sublime Group came up with the novel idea of
designing the current project in which they would utilize Graff and Cyrus’
(2017) dreaming methodology, but within an ARV protocol. This would mean
essentially swapping out conscious waking psi (i.e., remote viewing) with
unconscious precognitive dreaming to describe a future feedback photo
associated with the winning outcome of a predetermined event. The Sublime
Group would utilise a very similar dreaming protocol to that of Graff and
Cyrus (2017), but instead of describing future newspaper articles, they would
describe photographs attached to winning outcomes of sporting events. The
Sublime Group members were simply motivated by their curiosity to see if
they could individually (and as a group) produce dreams on demand about
future feedback photos.
Further encouragement for the possibility of utilising dreaming as a
precognitive tool came from a review of literature focusing on ESP dream-
related performance (Krippner, 1993; Sherwood & Roe, 2003; Storm et al.,
2017). While all of these studies concluded that psi was in fact demonstrated,
they differed in their conclusions about whether dream studies within a
laboratory setting (with the use of REM monitoring) were more effective
(Sherwood & Roe, 2003) than those conducted outside of it, or as Storm et al.
(2017) suggest are approximately equivalent. Graff and Cyrus’ (2017) ten
year study was performed outside of a dream or experimental lab, without
the aid of any sort of monitoring equipment, but rather from the privacy of
their own homes, which is how the Sublime Group was used to operating as
well.
The present double-blind study represents a novel approach that is the
rst to utilize dreaming as a precognitive tool within an ARV protocol. A
cohesive group of experienced remote viewers, who varied in experience with
intentional ESP precognitive dreaming practices, took part in a year-long
The Associative Remote Dreaming Experiment: Predicting Outcomes of Sporting Events
71
study that aimed at completing 50 trials for the purpose of predicting the
outcomes of sporting events, with the end goal of increasing wagering prots
and hit/miss ratios. While the project is quantitatively based, it borrowed
some of the tenets and was carried out within the spirit of Participatory
Action Research (Mcdonald, 2012) that seeks “to study things in their natural
setting” (p. 35).
This project was designed as a hybrid operational/research project.
Attempts would be made to duplicate the group’s typical “real life” ARV
operating procedures while adhering to sound scientic principles and
practices. This included submitting the proposal to the Rhine Research
Institute’s review panel, maintaining double blinding of both dreamers and
manager/judge to the content of the target photographs, and using
computerized randomization procedures.
The overall goal of the project was for the group manager to make at least
40 predictions that would be used to make a specic wager on a particular
outcome in a systematic way. The results of this would be calculated in terms
of both the nancial gain or loss for the overall group wager as well as the hit
rate for both the aggregate group as well as for individual remote viewers. It
was predetermined that only trials resulting in predictions would be used to
calculate hit rates, beyond tracking how many trials resulted in predictions
versus passes.
Per past informal Sublime Group projects involving remote viewing, it
was reasonable to expect that in order to reach 40 wagerable predictions, 50
dream trials would need to take place, as a certain number of trials would
likely result in passes. Passes are essentially calls made by the manager to
guard against monetary losses and could be called for a number of reasons,
such as inadequate/insufcient information within a dreamer’s transcript,
not enough dreamers providing transcripts, photo sets being too similar for
judges to distinguish between them, no clear difference in scores for either
photo (whether both high or both low), or other breakdowns in the protocol.
Traditionally in applied ARV projects, passes are considered a manager’s
“best friend”, as they can help to minimize erroneous predictions and nancial
loss when wagering is involved. However, they can also lead to projects
having to go on for longer than planned or, as in the present study, mean that
fewer predictions than planned were made.
The project’s designers debated as to whether to set the goal of continuing
indenitely with the project until 40 predictions could be reached, but felt
that having an unknown completion date exceeding the duration of one year
would put too much strain on the participants, and therefore capped the total
number of trials at 50. Each prediction would be for an “over-under” outcome
of a particular sporting event (e.g., baseball game). An over-under total game
score is a common type of bet offered by sportsbooks/casino’s where
statisticians have calculated what is likely to be the total sum of both teams’
scores. They set this as the betting line, and then patrons can make predictions
as to whether or not the total end score of the game will be over that set
betting line or under it (Total Bets and Over/Under Bets, 2018). For the
present project, each of the aimed for 40 predictions would result in an
outcome of either a “hit” or a “miss”.
Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 2019, 83(2)
72
Two specic apriori planned predictions were made. The rst was that
participants would be able to dream on demand, recall their dreams, and
produce transcripts of these dreams in a manner consistent with previous
remote viewing sessions of future feedback photos. This would lead to a
nancial gain, though the specic dollar amount was not specied. The
second, was that the aggregate group hit rate would be above that expected
by chance alone. Exploratory analysis was also conducted on the individual
dreamer’s hit rate, although no formal hypothesis was made.
methoD
Participants
The group of seven dreamers consisted of four men and two women aged
between 48 years and 80 years (mean 59, SD 14). The members of the RV
group all had a variety of experience, as outlined in Table 2.
taBle 2.
Showing various levels of training/experience for the six remote viewers
RV
Trained in
controlled
RV
Trained
in
extended
RV
Training in
non-RV
clairvoyance
Number of
RV
sessions
completed
Regular
meditator
Regular
dreamer
RV1 Ye s Yes Yes 500–1000 Yes Yes
RV2 No Ye s No 40 years Yes Yes
RV3 Ye s No Ye s 200–500 Yes Ye s
RV4 Ye s Ye s No 500–1000 Yes Yes
RV5 Ye s No No 100–200 Ye s No
RV6 No No Ye s 100–200 No Yes
RV7 No No No 51–100 Yes Yes
They all believed it was possible to dream through intentional precognition,
and yet they also said that precognition was not the main reason they believed
they dream. RV2 was the only participant who had experience with intentional
dreaming of a future feedback photo, although all believed it was possible,
and reported having had at least one or more spontaneous and unintentional
precognitive dreams in the past.
Alongside these there was one manager/rater (Nancy Smith: NS) who was
responsible for all phases of the project and management, including choosing
events, judging, communicating with participants, and tracking data.
In order to maintain separation of roles, once the experimental phase
began, co-researchers DK and MB acted only as dreamers until all trials
were complete, giving all authority and management responsibilities to NS.
At no time did they have access to any of the photos, prior to being sent their
feedback photo at the designated time. Further, they have never and will
never have access to the un-actualized photos (i.e., those photos attached to
non-winning outcomes) from the sets.
The Associative Remote Dreaming Experiment: Predicting Outcomes of Sporting Events
73
Materials
Sixty high resolution static photo pairs (each associated with a binary
outcome within a single event) were selected by an independent team of ARV
managers (Jon Knowles, Alexis Poquiz, and Igor Grgi ´c) experienced in
selecting photo pairs in terms of orthogonality (i.e., they must be different
from each other in every respect), and interest level. These colored photos
were mostly of real locations existing somewhere in the world, but also
included some photos of objects. Some locations included people, animals, or
other objects or activities taking place. The pairs were encrypted and
randomized by the photo selection team using an online computer program
that paired each set with a random target number. The numbers were then
sent to the manager, NS, who did not access the photo sets until after all
transcripts were submitted for each trial.
Scoring of the match between dream transcripts and photos was conducted
using the SRI 7 point Condence Ranking (CR) scale. This scale was originally
developed at SRI in the early 1970s (Targ et al., 1995) and ranges from zero
to seven. Where a score of zero indicates no correspondence; a score of one
when there is little correspondence; a score of two when there is some
correspondence, but too little to indicate more than is operating at chance
expectation. A score of three indicates a mixture of correct and incorrect
elements with more of the former, indicating contact has been made with the
target. A score of four indicates good correspondence with some incorrect
data; a score of ve indicates good correspondence with unambiguous
matching elements, but still some incorrect information. A score of six
indicates good correspondence, including some analytic (such as naming the
function of the target) and very little incorrect information; and a score of
seven indicates excellent correspondence with no incorrect data.
Procedure
To capitalize on the group’s cohesiveness (which traditionally includes
sharing transcripts following completion of a trial), and mitigate the
likelihood that some of the viewers might not be able to dream at will or
remember their dream for each trial, it was decided that all six group
members would participate in the same trials and that their transcripts
would be assessed using a group aggregate approach. This meant that the
manager/judge would utilize all available transcripts to make a single
prediction and wager per trial (although as noted above, individual scores
leading to what could be individual predictions would be tracked and
evaluated in the nal analysis).
Furthermore, all dreamers operated from the same photo sets, receiving
the same photo feedback. This was to minimize the likelihood of dreamers
“peaking” at each other’s feedback photo when engaged in their psi related
task, which has been an issue in the past when each of the team members
were assigned different photo pairs. While decisions such as this have been
criticized by some parapsychologists concerned with a stacking effect,
according to Brier (1970), who rst discussed the stacking effect in relation
to forced choice task type experiments involving multiple trials in one setting
(such as when a deck of 52 cards is being “guessed” at), there are valid reasons
Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 2019, 83(2)
74
to sometimes assign all participants the same target types, in the same order,
and this should never disqualify a design as being awed (Thouless & Brier,
1970). The specic timing and order of each phase of the task is summarised
in Table 3.
taBle 3
.
Key phases of the ARV protocol
Phase Event Action
Phase 1 Event Selection Manager visits ESPN website, chooses a sporting event.
Manager then visits 5 Dimes Wagering website and
records over-under betting line set by sportsbook. The goal
will be to predict if the total sum of the two teams will be
over or under the line set by the sportsbook (gaming
statisticians).
Phase 2 Photo Pairing Outside photo creation team chooses and pairs photos that
are different from each other, randomized via computer
and attached to target numbers. Photo A is paired with the
over outcome, Photo B is paired with the under outcome.
Phase 3 Tasking Manager sends target number with deadline to viewers.
Phase 4 Remote Viewing/
Dreaming
Viewers/Dreamers tune into future feedback with psi
protocol, create a transcript containing words and
sketches, and then send it in to manager.
Phase 5 Judging/Scoring Manager compares transcripts to each photo; assigns score
based on SRI 0-7 Condence Ranking Scale.
Phase 6 Predicting Manager either issues prediction for outcome attached to
highest rated photo or “passes” if scores were too low or
the same for both.
Phase 7 Wagering Manager places wager through online betting platform.
Phase 8 Event Happens The game is played; the outcome is announced and
recorded.
Phase 9 Feedback Manager sends feedback photo attached to winning
outcome to dreamers. They spend time comparing
transcript to feedback to complete feedback loop, and may
debrief with manager.
Trials were carried out once a week, so as not to overwhelm the dreamers
or judges, with pre-planned breaks in between sets of 10 trials and occasional
pauses when the manager (NS), required them. Details of the nine phases of
the trials are mapped out above.
For ‘event selection’ the manager would go to www.ESPN.com which is a
popular website that offers up-to-date information and statistics about
upcoming and past sporting events. She would then look up the game
schedule under a specic category (e.g., Basketball, Baseball or Football),
and always select the 3rd game listed to be played on the upcoming Sunday.
She would look up and record the Over/Under spread, published on both the
ESPN website and 5 Dimes website, for that particular game. The spread is
The Associative Remote Dreaming Experiment: Predicting Outcomes of Sporting Events
75
a common wager that is set up to identify what the combined points of the
two teams will be when the game is over. This includes a “line” so that bets
can be made predicting whether or not the actual number will be higher or
lower than the set number (Williams & Siegel, 2014). For the current project,
the Over/Under predictions were chosen instead of the winning team
predictions because the O/U has been found to be less emotionally volatile for
those who are avid sports fans.
Having decided the event the photo pairing phase involved selecting pairs
of photos from a list of encrypted sets and pairing them in the master
document with the target number for the upcoming event. The photo-pairs
were already labeled (A) and (B). Hence, for example, photo A was paired
with the “over” outcome, and Photo B was paired with the “under” outcome.
The third and fourth stages involved tasking the group to dream and then
recording their dreams. Each dreamer participated and operated from their
own homes as is their typical procedure, given they live in different parts of
the United States. The exception to this is one of the remote viewers, RV7,
who is husband of and lives with the group manager (NS).
NS sent out emails of the upcoming dream task to each participant a few
days prior to the chosen event. The email reminder contained the target
number that would be paired with the feedback photo for each particular
event/trial. Target numbers were made up of the date the feedback would be
given, which was also the deadline for submission of transcripts. This email
also included a brief reminder to dream on that Saturday evening (or Friday
if that was more convenient) and to email back their written transcripts
containing words and sketches by the deadline, which was typically 9:00 a.m.
Central Standard Time (CST) on that Sunday morning.
The dreamers specically followed protocols to increase the likelihood of
dreaming and recall (Graff & Cyrus, 2017). These instructions included
purchasing a dream journal of their choice. On the Saturday evening, they
would write out an intention statement on a page in their journal with the
freedom to add to it as they saw t. Some dreamers found it useful to add in
a congratulatory message about what a great job they were about to do while
conjuring up enthusiastic emotions over this imagined success. Dreamers
were advised to write down the target number in their journals or papers, as
they have all been trained to do at the start of the remote viewing session,
except instead of proceeding with a remote viewing session, they would go
directly to sleep. This intention/tasking included telling their subconscious to
have the needed information appear during the nal dream of the evening,
prior to waking, so that it could easily be recalled and distinguished from the
earlier dreams of the night. It included the intention to have visual
information come into the dream that could easily be converted to a sketch
upon awakening. It was also recommended that, when possible, they give
their dream a title.
Dreamers were instructed to record all dream impressions of the evening
without delay upon awakening into their dream journal or onto a piece of
paper if they didn’t have a journal nearby. If they awakened prior to having
a dream that could be recalled, they needed to either try to go back to sleep if
time allowed, or to simply send an email to NS with the words “no dream”.
Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 2019, 83(2)
76
They were advised that it was never a problem if they could not dream and
were instructed and reminded to never supplement the dream with attempts
at retrieving information psychically while awake.
Some of the dreamers reported occasionally being uncertain as to whether
information came in while asleep or just upon awakening. If they were not
sure if it was a dream or not they could submit the information. However, if
they knew they had obtained the information through conscious remote
viewing related activities, they were encouraged to not send this information
in. All dreamers were required to turn in their transcripts or report “no
dream” by 9:00 a.m. CST time. They did this by taking pictures of the page(s)
of their journals with their camera phones, uploading these to their computer
and emailing them to the manager.
The fth phase provided NS with a narrow window of time to judge which
photo matched the dream transcripts to see if there was a viable prediction.
NS would start with one dreamer’s transcript and compare this to one photo
in the set (e.g., photo A paired with the option of “over” for the over/under
wager). NS would assign each transcript a CR score before looking at the
next photo paired with the option of “under”. Once she had assigned CR
scores to both photos she would evaluate whether the dreamers scores were
high enough for one photo and also assess the spread in between the sum of
CR scores for both photos, per dreamer and collectively. According to informal
guidelines established by several managers who participated in the Applied
Precognition Project Conferences (including NS and other researchers
here), and in alignment with other researchers (see, Targ et al., 1995), it is
generally accepted as good practice to only proceed with a prediction if there
is at least a CR score of 4 (i.e., good correspondence), and a 2-point gap
between the scores or sums of scores for the two photos. However, there were
no predetermined guidelines for how NS would handle situations where two
or more dreamer’s transcripts were matches for different photos, or if half of
the dreamers had strong transcripts and half had weak ones for the same
photo. Therefore, decisions regarding how to handle this situation, which
occasionally did occur, were left to the discretion of the manager.
The sixth and seventh phases involved predicting and wagering. If a
prediction was issued, NS would then return to the 5 Dimes online Betting
Website (www.5Dimes.eu), go to her account, and place a wager of $110,
which could potentially result in a payoff of $100. If a pass was called instead
of a prediction, no wager would be made.
The nal phase of the procedure involved feeding back the winning
outcome. Within an ARV protocol, focusing on the feedback photo by the
remote viewer or dreamer is seen as critical as it is only this photo that will
be paired with the actual outcome. In order to close the “feedback loop” it is
critical that the dreamers received their feedback photo in a timely manner
and actually do what Rosenblatt et al (2016) refer to as a feedback session.
This involves time spent by each remote viewer/dreamer closely comparing
his/her earlier transcript and impressions/experiences with the feedback
photo. This involves looking at each word and sketch in a transcript and
evaluating whether it was correct or not, trying to understand what worked
and what did not, and making some notes to share with the manager. For our
The Associative Remote Dreaming Experiment: Predicting Outcomes of Sporting Events
77
project, dreamers were asked to send a short, informal email back to NS
sharing their thoughts, so that she could ensure they had in fact spent time
engaging with their feedback photo and also as a debrieng, stress relieving
measure. Occasionally, a day or two following completion of the trial, NS
would put together a compilation of parts of the dreamers transcripts that
had matched the feedback photo, and it would be sent to all dreamers in
order to boost morale and group cohesiveness, examples of this can be seen in
Figures 1 and 2.
reSultS
It was anticipated that 50 trials would result in 40 predictions. However,
a total of 56 trials were conducted leading to 28 predictions and 28 passes.
The extra 6 trials were run when it became evident that the number of
predictions was lower than that anticipated. Passes were due to low CR
scores for both photos (i.e., neither photo matching the dreamer’s transcripts),
or due to high scores for both photos, with a lack of a two-point gap between
scores for both photos. Sometimes they were due to contradictory scores
Figure 1. Example of feedback with group’s compilation of words and sketches
provided to dreamers (target image top-centre).
Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 2019, 83(2)
78
between participants. However, despite the lower than expected number of
predictions it was not possible to continue the project beyond this point as
some of the dreamers moved onto other projects.
Aggregate Group Earnings
A total of $110 was invested for each of the 28 predictions. There were 17
hits leading to a nancial gain of $410.
Aggregate Group Totals for 56 Trials
Of the 28 predictions, 17 resulted in hits and 11 resulted in misses, bringing
the hit/miss ratio to 61 percent, see Table 4. This was below the hoped-for rate
of 65% typically achieved in prior remote viewing attempts when remote
viewing has been the preferred method of psi as opposed to dreaming.
Figure 2. Example of feedback with group’s compilation of words and sketches
provided to dreamers (target image top-centre).
The Associative Remote Dreaming Experiment: Predicting Outcomes of Sporting Events
79
However, a binomial test indicated that the proportion of hits at 0.61 was
marginally greater than chance expectations at 0.5, p = 0.07 (one-tailed).
taBle 4.
Showing aggregate group total hits, misses, passes and cancellations as a function of
the total 56 trials and the 28 predictions
Prediction Frequency Percent of
56 Trials
Percent of
28 Predictions
Hit 17 30% 61%
Miss 11 20% 39%
Pass 23 41%
Scratch or Cancel 5 9%
Individual Dreamer Totals
A total of 278 dream transcripts were provided by the seven dreamers
across 56 trials. Because ve of these trials were canceled, Table 5 shows the
results of each individual viewer/dreamer for all 51 viable session trials.
Some of the individual dreamers did quite well. Four out of seven of the
remote viewer’s individual hit rates were well above the 50% rate, with two
dreamers hitting chance and one below chance. Results suggest that ve of
the seven dreamers, operating from their own households, without REM
monitoring equipment, were able to dream on demand. RV1 reported at least
three times where she had woken up within an hour of the deadline without
having had a dream, and then told herself (and her family) she had to go back
to sleep to retrieve a dream and was able to do so in time to turn in a
transcript. On one occasion this was accomplished within 30 minutes of the
deadline, producing a transcript resulting in a hit.
taBle 5.
Individual viewer/dreamer results (225 total dream transcripts submitted out of 357)
Viewer Total Trials Missing1Passes1Predictions1 Hits2Miss2
1 51 14 (27%) 20(39%) 17 (33%) 13 (76%) 4 (23%)
2 51 10 (20%) 17(33%) 24 (47%) 15 (62%) 9 (37%)
3 51 11 (22%) 17 (33%) 23 (45%) 13 (56%) 10 (44%)
4 51 41 (80%) 4 (8%) 6 (12%) 3 (50%) 3 (50%)
5 51 32 (63%) 12 (24%) 7 (14%) 4 (57%) 3 (43%)
6 51 12 (24%) 11 (22%) 28 (55%) 15 (46%) 13 (54%)
7 51 12 (24%) 15 (29%) 24 (47%) 12 (50%) 12 (50%)
1 Percentages given as a function of the total number of trials.
2 Percentages given as a function of the total number of predictions made.
Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 2019, 83(2)
80
The bulk of missing transcripts came from just two dreamers, one who
dropped out after the rst ten trials due to being in a place in his life where
dreaming was not practical; the other who participated sporadically. Other
participant’s missed transcripts were attributed to changes in sleep schedules
related to house guests, traveling, and special circumstances out of their
control. Most of the dreamers reported disturbances in their sleep cycles on
the designated dream evenings.
Examination of 7-point Condence Rating Scale
As noted above the CR scale ranges from 0 to 7 and while not the main
focus of this project, it was felt that some examination of the CR scores
relating to hit and miss outcomes would enable researchers to discover
whether setting the prediction threshold at a CR score of four or higher was
effective. This data is summarised in Table 6.
taBle 6.
Showing number of hits and misses and total combined as a function of the
average CR score. Only CR scores above 3 are given.
Average CR Score (from 3 to 7)
3 3.5–3.75 4 4.5 5 5.5–5.75 6 6.5 7
Number of Hits 23 30 46 18 41 11 9 1 0
Number of Misses 20 34 37 20 29 10 2 0 0
Total 43 64 84 38 70 21 11 1 0
A visual inspection of the data in Table 6 shows that the CR scores for both
photos in the sets revealed that 103 CR scores were 5 or higher. Of these, 62
resulted in hits and 41 resulted in misses. According to the scale, scores of 5
or higher should have “good correspondence with unambiguous, unique,
matchable elements, but some incorrect information”. Furthermore, scores of
6 should have “good correspondence with unambiguous, unique, matchable
elements, but some incorrect information”. Of all the CR scores for both
photos in the judging sets only 12 transcripts resulted in CR scores of 6 or
more. Of these 12, ten resulted in hits and only one in a miss. Scores of
5.5–5.75 resulted in an equal number of hits and misses and scores of 4 and
below were also fairly close. There were more scores of 5 that resulted in hits
than misses, but there were still 29 leading to misses.
DiScuSSioN
This project examined whether experienced remote viewers, most new to
intentional precognitive dreaming, could sufciently describe a future
photographic target which would be linked to a positive sporting outcome
that would lead to a prot. The data show that from an investment of $110 a
prot of $410 was obtained. Furthermore, the overall hit rate was marginally
better than chance. Exploration of individual dreamer trials showed four out
of seven were above the 50% rate.
The Associative Remote Dreaming Experiment: Predicting Outcomes of Sporting Events
81
Results of this project are modest but promising. While $400 is a small
amount as far as earnings go, one has to take into account the conservative
amounts of $110 that were wagered. Prior ARV projects may have made more
prot but this relied on individual wagers of as much as $10,000. Given this,
and the reported success rate reported here, one could postulate that had a
more ambitious wager been made of $1000 per bet, a prot of $4000 could
have been made. This would translate into a potential prot of $40,000 if
wagers of $10,000 had been placed per bet. Hence, future research needs to
give consideration to the amount of money that should be wagered. Future
projects therefore might consider wagering higher amounts. Also, given that
a few individual dreamers’ stats were higher than the group’s stats as a
whole, with one dreamer’s hit/miss ratios as high as seventy six percent;
future projects might incorporate using selected individual dreamers versus
a group aggregate approach. For example, JL the project statistician,
performed simulated calculations on how much money could have been made
for the one individual remote viewer who had a 76% hit rate. He calculated
that if $110 was risked on each bet to make a $100 win, or a loss of $110,
“individual performances would have been quite protable, growing the
investment to $860”. One could then postulate that if $1000 had been wagered
each time $8,600 would have been earned.
The overall average hit rate at 61% was only marginally above chance at
50%. Given that this was only marginal and one-tailed it needs to be
interpreted with caution. Nevertheless, this is an encouraging trend. As
mentioned earlier, this marginal effect may have been due to a lack of
statistical power given the low number of trials. Therefore, it is suggested
that one major adjustment to the protocol for future research is to have a set
number of predictions rather than a set number of trials.
Several suggestions are also recommended for further projects related to
scoring and decision making around issuing predictions.
Targ et al. (1995) have suggested that a CR score of 4 was sufcient to
proceed with a prediction. However, for our present study, close to half of the
transcripts earned scores ranging from 3.5 to 6.5, and yet many of these higher
scores resulted in predictions made to the incorrect photo-option pairing,
resulting in 10 misses out of 29 predictions and to many of the passes when the
higher scores were split amongst options. Our assessment of individual
viewer’s performance showed that more transcripts assigned a 4.5 CR score
would have resulted in misses than in hits, if wagered upon individually.
The reason for having so many high scores pertaining to the wrong photo
cannot be easily deduced from the data. Overly permissive judging would be
the rst suspect. Judging biases towards a particular dreamer may also have
played a role in scoring and prediction issuing, by NS’s own admission.
Therefore, it is recommended that for future projects, the manager teams up
with another judge or judges, to help provide checks and balances which
might mitigate potential biases towards one of the photos in the pairs;
towards certain content within a viewer’s transcript; or towards one of the
dreamers over another.
Further, it is speculated that in addition to correct data, the dreams may
have produced a substantial amount of extraneous and irrelevant content
Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 2019, 83(2)
82
compared to that which is typically produced during waking remote viewing
efforts by experienced participants, especially when multiple dreams were
reported. This data may have matched the wrong photo (or the correct photo
at the wrong time) simply due to chance. It does appear that occasionally,
displacement to the wrong photo may have occurred.
In light of the above, it is recommended, that for ARV trials involving
dreaming, that the threshold for which a prediction can be made when
applying the SRI 7 Point CR Scale be raised from the currently established
score of 3.5 or 4, to a CR score of 6. If the threshold is set higher, however, as
noted above, it would be imperative to adjust the experimental design by
swapping out a set number of total trials with a set number of predictions to
be reached.
Another suggestion would be to disallow the assignment of half points or
other percentages to the SRI 7 point CR scale (i.e., scores of 4.5 or 5.75). This
would force the judge to make a more concrete decision in one direction or
another. Half scores were not included by the originators of the SRI 7 point
CR scale and there is no precedence to suggest they add anything to the
judging procedure, except indicating where the judge may be conicted.
Targ et al (1995) in their redundancy experiment, suggested that
predictions and wagers should not be made and instead passes called, in
situations where one or more remote viewers had the same or close scores for
both photos, or when one team member has a high score for one side, and
another team member has a high score for the other side. In the present
project, the judge did not always follow this rule. Our analysis showed some
of these trials did result in misses; however had the rule been followed in all
cases, some hits would have not been achieved. The recommendation of
whether or not to follow this rule would therefore be based on the nancial
stakes and risks involved with the bottom line being, how important it is to
avoid such misses.
University of West Georgia
DeBra Katz
debra@debrakatz.com
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acKNowleDgemeNtS
Many thanks to the Sublime Group Members: Dave Silverstein, Sam
Smith, Nancy Smith, Chris Georges, Dale Graff, Michelle Bulgatz, Debra
Katz. Thank you to the Rhine Research Institute for Reviewing our Proposal.
... He ran experiments at his Mobius lab and tested ARV in partnership with colleagues from SRI's psycho-energetics programme (Schwartz, 1977(Schwartz, -1979Schwartz, 2007;Schwartz, 2020). ARV has a specific and rather complex double-blinded set of procedures used to bypass the typical pitfalls of having remote viewers tune into potential outcomes of a future event (such as sporting events or stock market fluctuations) in which the possible winning options are too familiar or too similar to each other for judges to determine which outcome is being described (Katz et al., 2019). ...
... The present researchers have provided an extensive history of ARV research in two recent studies (Katz et al., 2018;Katz et al., 2019). Therefore, included here are highlights of only a few relevant ARV studies regarding financial gain and loss. ...
... Some speculated that shortening the time interval between trials, which resulted in the remote viewer having to perform a subsequent trial before receiving feedback for the preceding one, may have impaired performance (Houck, 1986;Targ, 2012). In a recently published interview (Katz & Bulgatz, 2019), Targ explained that in at least one trial for this experiment, during the judging process they discovered the photos in the judging set were too similar. Their project design did not specify a way to deal with such a situation, meaning at that time they didn't issue passes, so they were forced to issue a prediction that had to be wagered on. ...
Article
Full-text available
Associative Remote Viewing (ARV) is a psi-based methodology used by individuals and for-profit organizations to predict such things as sporting-event outcomes, stock market moves, and for research purposes. Documented studies have shown the successful application of psi using ARV to predict future events, leading to profits, and unsuccessful applications, leading to losses. To better understand the contributing factors, 86 completed ARV trials, which included 220 remote viewing transcripts for individual sporting or financial events, were collected. Three teams of judges operating under blind conditions-some working independently, some working as teams-repeated the process of judging, scoring, and predicting, while keeping all other variables stable. To gauge inter-rater reliability, the new scores and predictions were compared to the original scores and predictions, as well as to each other. Rating variance was clearly demonstrated. Judges were in 100% agreement in only six (6.9%) of 86 trials. In seventeen trials (19.7%), eight of nine judges agreed with each other. Original judges did better than all new judges, and judges with more experience obtained statistically significant higher hit rates than less experienced judges. The results were virtually the same for the two ranking scales used. This project points to a variety of factors in need of further testing, both in future ARV projects and in parapsychology projects that involve independent judging of tasks and photosets.
... Types of objects used in successful free-response telepathy, clairvoyant, dream ESP, GESP, Ganzfeld, and remote viewing experiments and applied projects spanning the past 100 years have included: simple drawings (Carrington, 1941;Sinclair, 1930;Warcollier, 1948); video clips (Krippner & Zeichner, 1974;Storm et al., 2010); picture compilations or collages including a mixture of photos and cartoon-like drawings (Honorton, 1985;Krippner et al., 2018); photographs of real locations (Katz et al., 2019a(Katz et al., , 2019bMüller et al., 2019); actual locations (May et al., 1990;Schwartz, 1977Schwartz, , 2019Targ & Puthoff, 1977, 2005; and real objects (Mitchell, 1988;Targ & Puthoff, 1974Targ et al., 1995). ...
... This is based on findings from past studies that certain remote viewers did consistently better in ongoing projects then others (Utts, 2018) and that "select subjects" did better than non-select (Storm & Tressoldi, 2020). Further, a recent study found that had results been assessed individually, rather than collectively for the group of viewers, results (in terms of both hit/miss rate and amount of earnings from wagers made on predictions for sporting events) could have been significantly better (Katz et al., 2019a). ...
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Photographic images of physical objects are common targets in remote viewing projects today. This exploratory experiment investigated whether the background within which the object is positioned may impact the accuracy of remote viewing. Twelve experienced remote viewers each completed 30 open-response, triple-blind remote viewing trials, requiring them to utilize extrasensory perception to describe the photographic image they would receive via email a few days later. Investigators created a photographic target pool of complex objects set within one of three background conditions: 1) White: devoid of information 2) Normal: a setting in which the object would typically be found. 3) Unusual: a setting which the object would typically not be found. Participants completed a total of 360 in-depth transcripts consisting of 8460 written descriptors and 1472 sketches. Two methods were used to analyze the transcripts for accuracy, the traditional sum of ranks matching procedure and an exploratory method involving the scoring of each item and sketch by both the participant and an independent judge. These two methods revealed significant but opposite differences for photographic targets of objects set within white backgrounds compared to the other two backgrounds. Better scores for targets with a white background were found for the traditional matching procedure, but worse scores were found for this background when each item and sketch were rated individually. In addition, the individual items and sketches were found to describe the target object more frequently than the background when normal or unusual backgrounds were present. Results suggest that object background can affect the outcome of remote viewing sessions, although the effect may depend on the scoring method applied. Keywords: Remote viewing, target material, extrasensory perception, anomalous cognition, photographic target material.
... PRV has been employed in several non-experimental applications, including predicting the outcomes of sporting events and fluctuations in stock prices (Katz et al., 2019(Katz et al., , 2021Kolodziejzyk, 2013;Smith et al., 2014;Tait, 2019) and answering important research questions about the future of humanity and the planet (Mossbridge & Vivanco, 2022;Schwartz, 2021). Looking towards future PRV applications, artificially intelligent systems could be used to better select participants, transcripts, and targets with the aim of creating a four-dimensional map of the future that would better inform decisions in the present based on additional information about surprising or concerning effects in the future (Mossbridge, 2023b). ...
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Objective. To better characterize the relations between accuracy on precognitive remote viewing (PRV) tasks and potentially relevant trait, state, and target parameters, we gathered PRV data in two online experiments and examined accuracy relative to: sex-at-birth, gender, age, anxiety, unconditional love, and target interestingness. Method. In experiment 1 we used a forced-choice, uncontrolled-time, self-judged PRV task for which 682 unpaid participants contributed a total of 5,432 trials. Experiment 2 used a free-response, controlled-time, independently judged PRV task for which 307 paid participants each contributed a single trial. In neither case were the participants pre-screened for precognition ability. Results. In experiment 1 (forced-choice PRV task), there was no significant target precognition and no effect of age on PRV performance, but we found a complex effect of sex-at-birth. We also found that targets most likely to be correctly predicted were also more likely to be judged as interesting compared to targets most likely to be incorrectly predicted; a pre-registered analysis confirmed this effect. In experiment 2 (free-response PRV task) we found significant target precognition, no effect of age on performance, and a weak and indirect effect of gender. Feelings of unconditional love and anxiety were both correlated with higher accuracy in experiment 2. Again, target interestingness was positively related to accuracy. Conclusion. These results suggest that accuracy on PRV tasks is related to the emotional state of participants and target interestingness, and that task characteristics mitigate overall performance. We provide recommendations for future research based on these observations.
... ARV projects are sometimes undertaken for research and applied purposes within the same project. Substantial profits for predicting stock market movements have been reported by some researchers (Harary & Targ, 1985;Puthoff, 1984), while others have reported modest earnings using RV (Smith, Laham, & Moddel, 2014) and ESP dream work within an RV protocol (Katz et al., 2019). However, substantial losses have also been reported by Houck, 1986;and Katz et al., 2018. ...
... Second, our focus was on interpreting intuitive insights to stimulate creativity in climate science, not on creating rigid controls or documentation. The spirit of these differences echoes applied precognitive remote viewing approaches that are currently being used, for example, to predict global shifts that may occur by the year 2060 (Schwartz 2018), the outcomes of sporting events (e.g., Katz, Smith, Bulgatz, Graff & Lane 2019) and stock market fluctuations as well as other financial indices (for a popular press review of recent finance prediction efforts, see Tait, 2019). ...
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While it is clear that climate change is affecting many species including humans, it is not clear whether humankind could or should try to remedy Earth’s warming climate. The situation requires cross-disciplinary, out-of-the-box thinking. Here we describe the use of a novel collaborative approach to developing creative hypotheses related to climate change. In most scientific explorations, the scientific method is used to explore a topic of interest. In contrast, in this case report, we used a topic of interest to us (intuition) to explore new ways of inspiring science. We did not test a hypothesis about intuition or try to prove that a psychic aspect of intuition exists. Instead, we explored how using an intuition-guided research approach might help address several questions pertinent to climate science. Seven intuitives who were not climate scientists were asked to use their intuition to address questions they would be shown in the future, most of which currently do not have clear answers. The content of the questions, which we called “objectives,” was informed by a collaboration between the project leads and two atmospheric scientists. To respond to the unknown objectives, the intuitives used a technical form of psychic functioning called remote viewing. This project was strictly intended to spark creativity and new ideas in climate science, so we did not attempt to prove that the intuitives were using psychic abilities in their work. Instead, we used an interpretation-heavy process, similar to Rorschach blot interpretation, that nonetheless offered insights, ideas, hypotheses, and motivations to examine new directions in climate science. Based on what we learned within this project, we provide very tentative suggestions for understanding climate change and its mitigation as well as suggestions for those considering using an intuition-guided research approach to stimulate new scientific ideas.
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This is the first meta-analysis of all studies related to remote-viewing tasks conducted up to December 2022. After applying our inclusion criteria, we selected 36 studies with a total of 40 effect sizes. Both frequentist and Bayesian meta-analyses revealed a strong average effect size of .34; 95% confidence interval: .22 -.45, after the exclusion of outliers, without signs of publication bias and a minimal decline effect. In terms of raw scores, these average results correspond to a difference in hits score of 19.3%; 95% confidence intervals:13.6%–25%, above the expected chance. Among the meta-analyses of moderators, a small nonstatistical difference emerged between the precognitive and clairvoyance tasks, particularly for those with an outbound agent. A comparison among meta-analyses results observed with other experimental protocols testing extrasensory perception showed the clear superiority of remote viewing. After more than 50 years of investigation into extrasensory perception, remote-viewing experimental protocols appear to be the most efficient for both experimental and practical applications.
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This is the first meta-analysis of all studies related to remote viewing tasks conducted up to December 2022. After applying our inclusion criteria, we selected 36 studies with a total of 40 effect sizes. Both frequentist and Bayesian meta-analyzes revealed a strong average effect size of a minimum of .34; 95% confidence intervals.22 -.45, after the exclusion of outliers, without signs of publication bias and a tiny decline effect. In raw scores, these average results correspond to a difference in hits score of 19.3%; 95% confidence intervals:13.6%–25%, above the expected chance. Among the meta-analyses of moderators, a small non-statistical difference emerged between the precognitive and clairvoyance tasks, particularly for those with an outbound agent. A comparison with meta-analytical results observed with other experimental protocols testing extrasensory perception shows the clear superiority of remote viewing. After more than 50 years of investigation of extrasensory perception, remote-viewing experimental protocols appear to be the most efficient for both experimental and practical applications.
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Precognition, the capacity to use non-ordinary means to accurately predict future events that are seemingly unpredictable, has been well established by examining performance on laboratory- based free-response precognitive remote viewing (PRV) tasks. However, advancements in the understanding of precognition mechanisms are slowed at least partly because state, trait and target parameters seem to have complex influences on task performance, necessitating relatively large sample sizes compared to other empirical phenomena studied in experimental psychology. Here we gather PRV data in two online experiments designed to examine the relationships between accuracy on PRV tasks and trait (sex-at-birth, gender, age), state (feelings of anxiety and unconditional love), and target (interestingness) parameters. Experiment 1 used a forced- choice, uncontrolled-time, self-judged PRV task for which 682 unpaid participants contributed a total of 5,432 trials. Experiment 2 used a free-response, controlled-time, independently judged PRV task for which 307 paid participants each contributed a single trial. In neither case were the participants pre-screened for PRV ability. The results revealed significant overall PRV performance in experiment 2 but not experiment 1. In experiment 1 (forced-choice PRV task), there was no effect of age on PRV performance, but sex-at-birth and independently rated target interestingness was highest among targets most likely to be correctly predicted, with a pre- registered analysis of target interestingness confirming this effect. In experiment 2 (free-response PRV task), gender had no effect on performance, but feelings of unconditional love and feelings of anxiety were correlated with higher accuracy, with the anxiety effect especially clear among women. Further, in experiment 2, independently rated target interestingness was again positively related to accuracy. Taken together, these results strongly suggest that sex-at-birth, gender, emotional state, and target interestingness all influence accuracy on PRV tasks, and that task characteristics mitigate some of these effects. Based on these results, recommendations for future research are provided.
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Between March, 2015 and October 2017, an exploratory online survey was conducted to study remote viewers perceptions about whether or not remote viewing related instruction had helped them, and if so, to what extent. Approximately 85 percent of all respondents indicated training had helped to some extent, with apx. 5 percent indicating it had not helped at all. Of the 85 percent who indicated it had helped, a majority of remote viewers indicated it had strongly helped.
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More than 60 remote viewers contributed 177 intuitive-based associative remote viewing (ARV) predictions over a 14-month period. These viewers comprised pre-established, self-organized groups cooperating under the rubric of "Project Firefly" (PFF), and were supervised by experienced ARV group managers operating under the umbrella of the Applied Precognition Project (APP), a for-profit organization exploring precognition and leveraging ARV methodology as an investment enhancement tool. Based on predictions from the ARV sessions, PFF used the Kelly wagering strategy to guide trading on the Foreign Exchange (FOREX) currency market. Viewers performed under typical scientific protocols, including double-blind conditions, appropriate randomization, etc., using a variety of ARV application methodologies. Investors, many of whom were also participants (viewers and judges), pooled investment funds totaling $56,300 with the stated goal of "creating wealth aggressively." Rather than meeting that goal, however, most of the funds were lost over the course of the project. Beyond merely reporting on an extensive remote viewing experiment, the present study is an examination of what went wrong, providing lessons learned for further ARV research whether involving for-profit activities or basic research, as the principles are relevant to both. Associative remote viewing is a research paradigm that harkens back to early days in science where competent non-academic researchers can provide datapoints and breakthroughs in a field typically peopled solely by professional researchers. Adapting a form of ethnographic study, we refer not only to the statistical results produced by the PFF effort, but also employ a mixed-methods qualitative approach to exploit the information and insights contributed by numerous participants about what happened, what worked, and what didn't. This creates a reference we believe will be useful for those conducting future applied precognition projects involving multiple participants or groups. We feel that the insights gleaned from this study will improve both ARV experimental design and execution of research protocol, benefitting professional and amateur researchers alike in their future ARV experimentation. © 2018 Society for Scientific Exploration. All rights reserved.
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In order to further our understanding about the limits of human consciousness and the dream state, we report meta-analytic results on experimental dream-ESP studies for the period 1966 to 2016. Dream-ESP can be defined as a form of extra-sensory perception (ESP) in which a dreaming perceiver ostensibly gains information about a randomly selected target without using the normal sensory modalities or logical inference. Studies fell into two categories: the Maimonides Dream Lab (MDL) studies (n = 14), and independent (non-MDL) studies (n = 36). The MDL dataset yielded mean ES = .33 (SD = 0.37); the non-MDL studies yielded mean ES = .14 (SD = 0.27). The difference between the two mean values was not significant. A homogeneous dataset (N = 50) yielded a mean z of 0.75 (ES = .20, SD = 0.31), with corresponding significant Stouffer Z = 5.32, p = 5.19×10-8, suggesting that dream content can be used to identify target materials correctly and more often than would be expected by chance. No significant differences were found between: (a) three modes of ESP (telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition), (b) senders, (c) perceivers, or (d) REM/non-REM monitoring. The ES difference between dynamic targets (e.g., movie-film) and static (e.g., photographs) targets was not significant. We also found that significant improvements in the quality of the studies was not related to ES, but ES did decline over the 51-year period. Bayesian analysis of the same homogeneous dataset yielded results supporting the 'frequentist' finding that the null hypothesis should be rejected. We conclude that the dream-ESP paradigm in parapsychology is worthy of continued investigation, but we recommend design improvements.
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This report covers two experiments, each involving two viewers in independent sessions. Both experiments test the hypothesis that there exists an information channel that has come to be known as Remote Viewing (RV). The hypothesis is affirmed by each experiment. This information access allows individuals to provide sense impressions concerning a target, to which they are blind by reason of time
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Participatory Action Research (PAR) is a qualitative research methodology option that requires further understanding and consideration. PAR is considered democratic, equitable, liberating, and life-enhancing qualitative inquiry that remains distinct from other qualitative methodologies (Kach & Kralik, 2006). Using PAR, qualitative features of an individual's feelings, views, and patterns are revealed without control or manipulation from the researcher. The participant is active in making informed decisions throughout all aspects of the research process for the primary purpose of imparting social change; a specific action (or actions) is the ultimate goal. The following paper will contextualize PAR in terms of its history, principles, definitions, and strengths, as well as discuss challenges and practical suggestions for using PAR. In addition, it will examine focus groups and interviews as methods for data collection, the role of PAR in education, and the types of research for which PAR is best suited. "You cannot understand a system until you try to change it" (Lewin, 1946) Participatory Action Research (PAR) is one option in qualitative research methodology that should be considered and understood. Qualitative research integrates the methods and techniques of observing, documenting, analyzing, and interpreting characteristics, patterns, attributes, and meanings of human phenomena under study (Gillis & Jackson, 2002; Leininger, 1985). The purpose of qualitative methodology is to describe and understand, rather than to predict and control (Streubert & Carpenter, 1995). Qualitative methods focus on the whole of human experience and the meanings ascribed by individuals living
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Ten inexperienced remote viewers attempted to predict the outcome of the Dow Jones Industrial Average using associative remote viewing. For each trial in the experiment, each participant remotely viewed an image from a target set of two images, one of which he or she would be shown approximately 48 hours from that time. Of the two images in the target set, one corresponded to whether the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) would close up, while the other corresponded to whether it would close down at the end of the intervening trading day. For feedback, the viewers were shown only the picture actually associated with the actual market outcome. In aggregate, the participants described the correct images , successfully predicting the outcome of the DJIA in seven out of seven attempts (binomial probability test, p < .01). Investments in stock options were made based on these predictions, resulting in a significant financial gain.
Conference Paper
Thirty-three exploratory psi investigations were recently performed using Conscious State Psi and Dream State Psi protocols for photographic material that did not exist at the time of the psi sessions. Results would provide evidence for retrocausation if the future photographs had influenced the sessions’ data. The psi targets were Associated Press (AP) news photographs published in a Reading, PA area newspaper on a specific page three days in the future. These photographs were taken one day after the psi sessions. Following each psi session, and prior to the photograph’s existence, perceptions were recorded in project records and email transmitted for date validation. Feedback was provided when the photograph was published. There were two phases: Phase I was an informal investigation performed by the principle author to evaluate project feasibility. Phase II was a formal investigation with a colleague 1,000 miles from the principle author and the area newspaper location. All data were evaluated by direct comparison to the intended photographs using numerical assessment scales and noting unique features. Data from 21 of the 33 sessions (64%) yielded sketches and narratives with medium and high degrees of correlations with the future news photographs. A subsequent binary analysis using control photographs yielded p = 0.040. Visual informational content of these future newspaper photographs had interacted with the brain’s cognitive processes in a retrocausal sense. The future photographs affected the sessions’ data. A subconscious interaction between the future and the present or past may be an on-going feature of the mental and physical universe. Suggestions for follow-on investigations into retrocausation are provided.
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This paper presents results from a 13-year experiment using a unique approach to the associative remote viewing (ARV) protocol which allows a single operator to conduct the full ARV process beginning to end. A total of 5,677 ARV trials were conducted from May 11, 1998, to September 26, 2011. of these, 52.65% were correct in predicting the outcome of their respective future events (whereas only 50% would be expected by chance), yielding a statistically significant score of z = 4.0. These 5,677 trials addressed a total of 285 project questions. Most of these project questions were intended to predict the outcome of a given futures market. of these project questions, 60.3% were answered correctly, resulting in a statistically significant z = 3.49. By increasing the number of trials in a project question, and giving more weight to higher subjective confidence scores reflecting the quality of the match between the remote viewing and one of the two target images, the success rate increased to above 70%. One hundred eighty-one project questions resulted in actual futures trades where capital was risked. Of these, 60% of the trades were profitable, amounting to approximately $146,587.30.
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An informal exploratory study of psi that occurs while asleep and dreaming was performed to determine if it was possible to experience precognitive dreams about photographs that would be published in future newspaper articles. Operational constraints were newspapers (USA Today and two local newspapers), specific pages and the future time of publication. Sketches of dreams that occurred on the nights when future news photographs were the intended target were compared to all possible photographs within the operational constraints. Selection of the photograph that best correlated with the dream imagery was based on a pattern matching process of comparing forms, spatial relationships, colors and dynamics in the dreams and the photographs. This exploratory precognitive dream series yielded dream-photograph matches with a high degree of correlation, thereby providing strong evidence for precognition. This series also provided insight into the psi dream or dream state psi process. Some concepts on the source or origin of precognition are considered.