Psychokinesis

1
Psychokinesis

• Lecture 9
• Parapsychology
• Paul Staples

2
Learning Objectives

• By the end of this session you will be able to
• Appreciate the history of PK and the early
  findings
• Recognise the different methodologies employed to
  investigate PK
• Understand the methods used in micro-PK
• Understand the methods used in macro-PK
• Interpret later findings

3
The History of PK

• Comes from the Greek psyche and kinein (soul and
  move)
• Occurences from ancient times include
• Levitation
• Miraculous healings
• Apports
• Objects materialising during a séance
• Table-tipping
• Manipulation of a table during a séance
• Raps
• Knocking sounds produced by spirits

4
The History of PK

• PK is recorded in the bible in the Book of Acts
• The use of the evil eye has been classed as PK
• In the 19th century, D D Home was known to be
  able to levitate and to handle hot coals
• Others at that time were known as electric
  people who experienced high-voltage syndrome
• They made knives cling to their skin and could
  send furniture flying with just a light touch

5
Early 20th Century PK

• Fielding, Baggally, and Carrington (1909) were
  experienced and skeptical observers of seances
• In a series of sittings in Naples they were
  convinced that Eusapia Palladino was capable of
  PK
• Price reported on Stella Cranshaw who could make
  small musical instruments inside a double cage
  move and play
• Price also reported levitations by Rudi Schneider
• The control conditions were quite strict and it
  would have been difficult to manipulate the
  environment by physical means.

6
Early 20th Century PK

• Paranormal raps were commonly reported but it is
  difficult to establish whether they are genuine
• Crookes observations of Kate Fox in 1874
  suggested she could make noises occur on a range
  of different objects (tambourine, tree, sheet of
  paper)
• Photographic effects abound and materialisations
  have often been reported. These have ranged from
  foggy masses to well formed and solid hands,
  faces, or even full bodies

7
Recurrent Spontaneous PK

• Poltergeists - at least 500 years (Gauld and
  Cornell, 1979).
• Moving objects, sometimes breaking
• Unexplained noises, knockings
• Electrical disturbances
• Sometimes explanations, e.g., rats apples.
• Unhappy spirits, or young or stressed?

8
The Development of Methodologies

• A systematic study of PK requires more rigour
• There are two type of PK methodology
• Micro-PK
• PK that is weak or slight in magnitude
• PK that is not detectable with the naked eye
• Requires the application of statistics for
  detection
• Macro-PK
• PK that is directly observable
• Large and strong effect (e.g. metal bending)
• Only observable in a handful of people

9
Macro-PK Methods

• With macro-PK, a success is much easier to detect
• Types of test include
• Movements of objects
• Metal bending
• Photographic effects (thoughtography)
• Effects on electronic apparatus
• Acoustical effects

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Macro-PK Methods

• Movements of objects
• This is the expected side of PK
• Recent reports have centred around a Soviet woman
  called Nina Kulagina
• Most tests involve small objects that rest on a
  horizontal surface
• Sometimes the object to be moved is one of many

11
Macro-PK Methods

• Metal bending
• This was initiated by Uri Geller in 1965
• Safeguards need to defend against substitution or
  bending by normal means
• Photographic effects
• Experiments done with Ted Serios
• Investigator would sit with Polaroid camera in
  lap and aimed at Serios head, then trip the
  shutter
• Serios would produce an object on the photo

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Macro-PK Methods

• Effects on electronic apparatus
• A few cases have been reported where a piece of
  electronic equipment such as an oscilloscope
  trace was made to alter
• Acoustical effects
• Voices at seances do not have sufficient
  opportunities for control to be included
• However, raps have been recorded in quiet rooms
  using tape recordings

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Micro-PK Methods

• The object to be manipulated must require a
  minimum of energy to alter it
• Standard tests involve
• Dice test
• Placement tests
• Random event generators
• Ambient energy
• Biological systems

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Micro-PK Methods

• Dice test
• Influence die to fall with a certain face
  uppermost
• Electromechanical device used to release the die
• Die released down a bevelled incline plane to
  randomise the roll
• Chance level is one in six

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Mechanical

• Many early experiments with dice
• Highly significant scores
• BUT
• Dice bias and unobserved/no witness
• Got better! e.g., Gibson et al. (1944)
• 33,696 trials, 171 above MCE (3 above chance,
  p.01).
• Witnessed and random selection of 1 of 3 die

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Studies with Dice 2

• Highly consistent internal decline (e.g. Pratt,
  1944 Rhine et al., 1945).
• Looked at response of quartiles.
• MCE 8.0 6.5 6.0 4.5.
• 18 studies comparison of 1st and 4th quartiles
  gt plt.00000001.
• Some studies find later incline or new increase
  after break.

17
Studies with Dice 3

• Radin and Ferrari (1991) meta-analysis.
• 73 studies (148 expts) from 52 investigators from
  1935 to 1987
• 2,569 participants 2.6 million trials.
• 31 control studies 150,000 trials.
• Hit rate for control studies 50.02
• Hit rate for expt 51.2 gt1 in a billlion.

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Studies with Dice 4

• Not dependent on a few investigators or a few
  exceptional studies.
• File drawer problem and Homogeneity
• but 17,974 studies needed and 35 deletion.
• Quality related to chronology. Studies got better
  over time.
• BUT hit rates not related to quality
• Die-Face Analysis still better than controls.

19
Placement tests

• Similar setup to dice test except landing surface
  divided into two halves
• Task is to influence die to land in one half or
  the other
• Chance level is one in two
• Can combine with dice test to yield a need to
  influence both the number and the surface half
• Placement tests are not restricted to dice

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Other Mechanical

• Placement tests.
• Role ball into one of a pair of chutes.
• Cox (1974) witnessed trials 2 confirmatory
  studies, p.0006.
• Nelson et al. (1984) multiple shoots gt normal
  Gaussian distribution. But could be shifted to
  left or right (plt.0001).

21
Random Event Generators

• Usually computer-generated number sequences based
  on random generation
• Randomness often achieved by radioactive decay
• Can be used to generate tasks like those where
  the aim is to get a light to move around a
  circular display of lights in a clockwise
  direction

22
Studies with REGs

• http//www.psiexplorer.com/guided_tour.htm
• Will it work today?

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Studies with REGs 2

• Schmidt (1970) deliberately tried to discourage
  15 participants.
• Negative deviation significant (p.001).
• Later looked across studies (Schmidt, 1973).
  440,000 trials, p10-9
• Now, trials completely automated.

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Studies with REGs 3

• Nelson and Radin (1987) meta-analysis.
• 152 references from 1959 to 1987.
• 597 (258 PEAR lab) expt and
• 235 (127) control studies.
• Hit rate approx 51 controls approx 50 one
  trillion to one.
• No diffs over time. But quality improved over
  time.

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Studies with REGs 4

• Radin (1989) predicted results should be at about
  51.
• Confirmed from later studies in PEAR labs. 1,262
  independent studies involving 108 people.
• Pairs of people did better than single.
• Bonded couple did even better (4x than singles).

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Ambient Energy

• An example is to try to influence a thermometer
  by changing the ambient temperature at a
  particular location
• The control is the recording of temperature
  changes at other nearby locations
• The desired thermometer must be made to change
  more than the control thermometers
• Biological systems - similar but target is a
  biological system such as heart rate or GSR.

27
Healing

• Grad (1976) mice on goiter (enlarged thyroid
  gland) producing diet.
• Treatment give cages to known healer Oskar
  Estebany.
• Control nothing OR warmth.
• Controls not different.
• BUT slower in expt (p.001)

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Healing 2

• Grad (1961) wound healing in rats.
• Remove square of tissue.
• Healer vs. student touch vs. nothing.
• Healer related to quicker recovery (p.01).
• Other studies too in mice.

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Healing 3

• New studies with humans controversial.
• e.g., Columbia Miracle study (Cha, Wirth and
  Lobo, 2001).
• IVF treatment randomised to distant prayer
  (blind).
• BUT Flamm (2004) SI critical.

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Healing 4

• Byrd (1988).
• Double-blind intercessory prayer for 193 CCU pts.
• Randomly matched controls.
• Prayed for 5x less likely to need antibiotics,
  3x less likely pulm edema, less deaths.

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Healing 5

• Retroactive prayer see
• Olshansky and Dossey, BMJ. 2003 Dec 20327(7429)
  1465-8.