02 Ganzfeld and PK Research and Controversies

8/3/2019 02 Ganzfeld and PK Research and Controversies

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3s9nGMfgr8


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What is ESP?What does ganzfeld mean?

What is the Sheep-Goat effect?What is a meta-analysis?What is the file-drawer effect ?

Explain how autoganzfeld (Zener cards,random numbers, soundproofing) deals withsome of ganzfeld s methodological issues.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2TOLxfeFHs


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Autoganzfeld Separates the researcher, receiver and

sender Automatically chooses the senders materialleaving less room for bias

How do these alterations help to deal withpseudoscience claims?


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French et al

Asked to evaluate remote viewing evidence.

Looked at images from locations and transcripts fromreceiver and rated how well they matched (i.e.whether it was a hit)

Results: believers rated probability of there being amatch much higher than disbelievers even when therewas no relationship.

Many Ganzfeld studies use free association,how might this give opportunities for bias?What effect is this an example of?


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Meta Analyses Bem & Honorton Milton & Wiseman

Explain how theseresearchers came toopposite conclusionsusing theFile Drawer Effect


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11 autoganzfeld studies selected on the basis of strictexperimental procedures (computer administration,soundproofing, electrical shielding, one-way intercom).240 participants in total. Experience of participants andfilm/static images compared.

Hit rate at chance would be 25%. Individual studiesvaried between 24% and 54%, with an overallpercentage of 32.5%Experienced participants did better than newbies , andresults were better with video than static images.What do these results suggest?


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Milton & Wiseman (1999) suggested thatmethodological flaws in some of Bem & Honorton s

studies, e.g. low-level sensory leakage, could haveaccounted for their positive findings.Their own meta-analysis of 30 studies found verylittle deviation from chance there was a 24%

chance of the results occurring by chance.However S torm & Ertel (2001) have responded witha meta-analysis of 79 Ganzfeld studies supportingBem & Honorton s findings

What does all this mean?


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Some people do better than othersFrom Bems Meta Analysis

Sheep Extroverts Experienced meditators and Telepaths

Wisemans meta analysis only found thatexperienced meditators did better.

Is there any explanation we can come upwith of why this might be true?


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What is an investigator effect ? Wiseman (a goat ) and Shiltz (a sheep )

conducted similar experiments into gazedetection (can participants tell when they arebeing stared at using ESP?) Shiltz found anESP effect but Wiseman didn t.The following slide is a quote from theabstract of the joint study they thenconducted:


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Such "experimenter effects" are common withinparapsychology and are open to several competinginterpretations. For example, M. S.'s study may havecontained an experimental artifact absent from R. W.'sprocedure. Alternatively, M. S. may have worked with morepsychically gifted participants than R. W. had, or may havebeen more skilled at eliciting participants' psi ability. It is also

possible that M. S. and R. W. created desired results viatheir own psi abilities, or fraud. Little previous research hasattempted to evaluate these competing hypotheses. This isunfortunate, because it is clearly important to establish whyexperimenter effects occur, both in terms of assessing pastpsi research and attempting to replicate studies in the future.For these reasons, the authors agreed to carry out a jointstudy in the hope of learning why our original studiesobtained such dramatically different results.


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Both acted as experimenters on differenttrials, using the same pool of participants

(opportunistically assigned), location andmethod.Shiltz s subjects showed differences in EDA(electro-dermal activity) between stare andnon-stare trial, Wiseman s did not.H ow can we explain these results? http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2320/is_n3_v61/ai_20749205/pg_3/?tag=content;col1


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Uri Gellar James Randi challenge (opaqueglass, spoon bending) failed even though he

was studied at Stanford and believed.Nina Kulagina Russian who could movethings but always performed at home or hoteland needed a few hours to prepare herself first... Someone discovered her moving itemswith a hair attached to her leg.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4FFUL6qu3U


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How did Uri Geller convinceparapsychologists at the Stanford Research

Institute that his powers were genuine?What did Shafer et al at WashingtonUniversity claim to have found?What problems with their researchmethodology did James Randi reveal withProject Alpha, and how did he do it?


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More scientifically studiedPrinceton Random Event Generator (coin flipper)

Jahn (97) 12 years of trials. With small number of trials

the results were just above chance but over 12 years theresults were highly significant (1 in 10,000,000,000,000!)Operators could work at a distanceCould influence outcome even when machines were notoperating

2 volunteers who were emotionally close had stronger effectthan one.

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Random+Event+Generator&search_type=&aq=f http://library.thinkquest.org/C0120993/onlinepk.html - test yourself


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A im : to establish whether combined results of PKstudies suggest that PK is real, or that positive resultsare the result of methodological issues.

P rocedure : 380 studies included. Number of trials,behaviour of experimenter, setting and quality of controls considered.F indings : combined results suggested a small but

significant PK effect, but older, smaller and less well-controlled studies demonstrated the bigger effects thannewer, larger and better controlled studies.What conclusion can be drawn from this? What issues arise with this research?


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Fraud Uri Gellar Desire to believe in

audience (Randi)Effect size decreasing Bierman (Analysedresults over time andfinds the effect reduceswhich is the opposite of usual science)


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ESPClairvoyance

FalsificationEmpiricismMethodologicalPluralism

Hypothetico-Deductive MethodPsi PhenomenaTelepathy

PrecognitionVibrational

FrequenciesQuasi-scientificWhite noisePink noise

File Drawer effectSheep-goat effectMacro PKMicro PK


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1 . Bem2. Jahn3. Wiseman and Shiltz4. French5. Walter Levy6. Soal7. Wiseman

8. Sargent9. James Randi

Sheep interpretambiguous information inline with the theoryShackleton fake ESPMan who faked rat resultsof PKCoin flipper significantover 1 2 yearsMeta Analysis in favour of ESPMeta Analysis against ESPSheep-goat experimentereffectGanzfeld studyAlpha Project

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02 Ganzfeld and PK Research and Controversies