I conducted a small parapsychology experiment on myself a few years ago, willing a die to come up as 4. I can't find my records right now, but I scored above chance with about a 1 in 4000 chance of fluke. So either I had a loaded die, or I am a liar, or....

From my reading of the parapsychology research, it seems common that many experiments have a few subjects who score way higher than others. The belief in this community seems to be that people with extraordinary concentration abilities have these sorts of powers more than the average Joe. So it'd be interesting for such people to test parapsychology.

I'd love to see some home parapsychology research being done on this forum. Anyone else with me?

There's different things we could do

• Guess Zener cards, coin flips or die rolls to test precognition
• Will a certain die roll, coin flip etc. to come up more often to test psychokinesis
• Guess a Zener card or something that someone else is looking at to test telepathy. (Subtle nonverbal clues have to be excluded; they should be in another room.)
• Telephone telepathy. This yields the most impressive results I've seen in parapsychology research. You get one of four friends to call you and you guess who it is before picking up the phone. (The caller should be randomized by two coin flips or something to avoid subtle patterns. And it doesn't count if you have caller ID :glare Research seems to show best results where people have a strong emotional bond.
• The sense of being stared at. Someone behind you stares at you, or doesn't, and you guess which it is. Again, this needs to be properly randomized by flipping a coin to avoid subtle pattern detection. And reflective surfaces etc. need to be avoided.
• Existing online ESP tests.
• etc.

Anybody confident enough in their abilities to put them to the test?

Anyone that can do this can become an instant millionaire.

Just take the challenge and show you can actually do what you believe you can do.

http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/1m-challenge.html

Indeed, just show James Randi evidence of parapsychological phenomena and he'll hand over a million dollars. Unless, of course, he uses fraudulent data to discredit you (like he did to Michel Gauquelin), dismisses your experiments in a slapdash uncontrolled replication (like he did to Rupert Sheldrake), and publicly attacks your character, competence and ethics. The James Randi Educational Foundation has such a long and inglorious history of bad science, I don't see how they can be trusted when a million of their dollars are on the line.

Check out the work of Dr Charles Tart, such as The End of Materialism, which I am reading now. Interesting stuff...

I've been doing Rupert Sheldrake's online audio anticipation test. Out of 400 trials, I've got it right 113 times, or 28.25% of the time where chance is 25%. The chances of scoring 113/400 by fluke are 7.58%, or about one in thirteen.... Guess I'll have to do another 400 to make sure....

I found a good way of getting significant amounts of data quickly. Hope you like this -

random.org is a free online random number generator. It is a true random number generator, run out of Trinity College, and used in scientific experiments.

It allows you to roll up to 60 virtual dice simultaneously (http://www.random.org/dice/?num=60). I repeatedly rolled the 60 dice while 'willing' the number 4 to come up. This way, you can gather 60 data points in a few seconds, and thousands if you devote ten minutes, so the trend will be plain if it's there.

Annoyingly, though, random.org doesn't display the total number of 4s. I had to count the 4s in a rather roundabout way:

To count pressed Ctrl+U at the results page. In Firefox, this calls up the HTML code. I copied that into a doc, and used the 'replace' function to replace “4.png” with “4.png”. A pop-up then says "Search key replaced X times". This X is the total number of 4s that came up.

I did 27 rolls with 60 dice each: 1620 rolls. There were 304 fours out of 1620. You'd expect around 270, so 34 datapoints were shifted. Odds of fluke (calculated at http://www.stattrek.org/online-calculator/binomial.aspx) are just 1.5%. That's pretty strong evidence of psychic functioning, gathered for free, in less than 10 minutes.

Anyone else want to give it a try? Someone who has mastered 4th jhana or above?

If true, as in there was "something going on": is that prognostication or manipulation and how could you tell the difference, or is the difference of more than intellectual importance?

Further, look at your core interest, the thing that gets the emotions going, the thing that really hits home, and think about how you might want the results to come out, truly.

Would you want a perfect 270? That would seem strange, wouldn't it, perhaps too perfect? What would that make you believe about things? Would it be safer to have no "effect"? If in your heart of hearts, you found the world and your sense of identity to be safer without an effect, but you actually had the power to create effects, in this case the effect you wanted, which was no effect, how can you tell no effect from the effect of creating something that looks just like no effect?

Wouldn't it be more comfortable to live in a world where impossible action at a distance was just as advertised, meaning impossible? Or, would you want to live in a world where that sort of power and causality operated but just not know it or stay content with hints of it and so create a result that gave you that conclusion?

Would you really want to live in and believe in a world where the impossible was possible, the power of the mind was that great, and that all the things like the sense of responsibility, possibility and also of fear that might come along with that?

Would you want, say, 580, or some other number that gave you an odds of it happening "by chance alone", whatever that is, of some astronomically small number?

Same questions as above: What if you thought your mind was that powerful, with this confirmed, certified, a zillion to one against it?

How would it be living in a world like that? What level of mental interest might create an effect on outcomes, on other people, on other situations? What if just casual interest did it? What if subconscious interest did it? What if the primal forces of dreams did it? (Ever seen Forbidden Planet?) What level of mental control, maturity, ethics, wisdom, causal understanding, and the like would be required to handle a mind in a world like that responsibly? If those are not within your ability to achieve, what would be the right thing to do then?

Or, would you want a number like 285, just off enough not to cause too much concern? Would that be easier, safer, less paradigm challenging, and so how could you tell if you created the response you wanted to get at some core level from just that happening "by chance"?

Or, would you want, say, a number that was just far enough different from 270 but not so far as, say, 580, like you got, such that you had the tingling possibility of something going on, just enough to be safe, but also enough to be excited about it, kinda' like a roller coaster: thrilling, but not dangerous, at least most of the time.

Which would actually create the most "juice" in you? Which would you truly want to be true?

How can you tell the difference between creating the effect you think you want and the effect you might really want at the deepest paradigmatic, identity and comfort levels?

What if other people had the same power you did? What if they had more, say much more? What would be the safe range you would be willing to believe in for that sort of power that people might actually possess?

What if they didn't have the morality, the ethics, the control, the wisdom you did? What if they were truly dangerous people, angry people, confused people, greedy people, far more dangerous than you ever thought, creating action at a distance in seemingly impossible ways by all their desires and intentions, their forces of will? What if there was a vast psychic tug-of-war with countless zillions of beings pulling in a zillion directions at the very fabric of causality all the time they were conscious (and possibly unconscious) whose rules you likely would never be able to even be able to start to grasp? What if that was the inherent fabric of the universe itself? Would you create a result that could lead you to conclusions like that?

Why is it that magickal training nearly always begins with defensive rituals and techniques, LBRP, that sort of thing? Why is Dion Fortune's Psychic Self-Defense still a classic? What are the implications of living with that sort of paradigm? Are fear and power inherently bound together? These are hard questions.

I have already done my own experiments and found the results initially very exciting, until I began to really think about the implications, and then I found them totally terrifying. Nothing like really thinking about this stuff to inspire one to try to be moral, work on one's stuff, and have fantastic powers of direct comprehension of what is going on in one's heart, mind and body at all times.

Would I choose to reinforce that conclusion with fresh data? Possibly... ;) I may give it a shot.

Or, to think even more geekishly about it:

As reality is the sum total of the psy^2 fields of every single particle in the universe via the Schrödinger Equation, and yet this massive complexity leads to things that actually seem strangely simple, such as Newtonian Physics, which obey easy, mathematical laws at macroscopic scales, is it that the massive Psy fields of every living thing results in the ordinary, seemingly non-magical universe (at lease when viewed through the materialist lens that discounts all sorts of seemingly magical and hard-to-explain-rationally things, like premonition, dice-rolling experiments, etc.)?

Ah, the things that keep me up at night...

Daniel

love it.

Desire and fear are definitely two sides of the same coin, however....

If one tries to attain certain powers, I don't see that as being any different to attaining a new car, a dreamed-for job or a picket-fenced house using the old fashioned method of study and hard work. The whole thing is a big game, and if you want to play the game in a super-charged fashion, go for it I say.

Say I super-charge my game, and I win the lotto. I'm very happy for a while - great! I haven't stopped you from winning. Instead I've just migrated to a parallel universe where I have won and you haven't. There's an infinite number of parallel universes where I didn't win. I just choose this one because I wanted it. All other details of my universe stayed the same except for the winning lotto numbers. You yourself have infinite parallel universes to choose from yourself. If you win, you don't stop me from winning.

Go big, I say. Eventually when you own a super yacht and a New York penthouse, you will come to the same conclusion as everyone else and decide to collapse your self into Nothingness, just because...well why not? In the mean time, have fun, because it won't last.

There's only 2 reasons why we want anything (super yacht, penthouse etc);

1) to win the attention of others, and thereby solidify a sense of self.
2) to avoid the feeling of not being solid enough as a self, through the distraction that money buys.

So by indulging desires, even through the use of "powers", you must necessarily increase the fear of not being a solid real self. It has to be this way, otherwise you wouldn't have acted in the first place. So as the fear increases, it has to find its expression in your universe, eventually....and you will cycle between abundance and poverty. This is my new interpretation of how karma/samsara works, and I hope you like it. Whichever way you go, you're doomed to non-existence. But yeh, a yacht would be nice wouldn't it?

Thus spoke Zarathustra.


(Also, what's with the royal "we" and "you"?)

What's the Zoro ref about? Am I pontificating again?

Royal we? I dunno, I'm probably trying to convince everyone to agree with me.

Zarathustra is just a reference to fiction: it concerns a human interest in power and being superhuman. So it's just a title that comes to mind when you write about your interest and desire in this kind of thing and when you write in the "we"-and-summary style.

So it seems to me this "powers" topic has been an interest of yours for years. Here (DhO) you have an nice-guy ER doc person who has written about them and has a broad scope of interest; a benevolent source to learn from, some community who can make suggestions and cautions, people who are reading and quiet for months and months. Many another thread for you? You may not like or respect all the comments, but I think maybe some folks could come out of the woodwork over time if your effort were sincere and not harmful, not away from benevolence or equanimity.

If you really like this "powers" stuff and you're paying attention to "why" you want these (because the causes effect outcomes) maybe you should really buckle down and humbly devote yourself to the study of this. There's a long tradition of it in the world religions. There some scientific inquiry as well. Maybe you'll become a skeptic, maybe you'll become a wandering recluse. Maybe you'll keep wondering and posting assured summaries of what is and how is. Maybe you'll start and stop training till you hit a style and rhythm that works for you/time in your life. It seems like significant dietary modification is a starting point and an progressively extended and friendly (not strained nor harsh) concentration practice are two starting points. Anyway, good luck. Between this and the other thread we shared on this, I really have nothing useful to add. I'd reiterate causes effect outcomes (and I;m saying that from just a plain Jane perspective, nothing siddhic). Good luck.

katy, something I said has offended you. I know Daniel is a "good guy".

Say you work hard at school. So hard that you are at the top of the class, beating even the Chinese kids (. You go the extra step and ask your parents for a tutor because you want to get a scholarship at college. You work and work and work.... and you get your scholarship. And then at college you work hard so that you can get that dreamed-for job. And you get it. Did you ever work hard at school, or college?

In both cases your actions resulted in other people missing out - how dare you??? You denied someone the chance of having a scholarship, because you competed for it so selfishly. And you prevented someone else from getting that job that you secured for yourself, because you competed for it so selfishly. In the job interview, you made every effort to impress, just so that YOU could have what you wanted.

Do you feel guilty? Do you fear the negative karma building up against you?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The way I understand it, we are performing "magic" constantly through our dominant thoughts, creating time, space, self, buildings, other people, buildings, and all the circumstances we encounter. I am very aware of how my dominant thoughts create the most amazing synchronicities - events way beyond chance. My mind is a piece of film through which the light shines. I do what I can to change it so that it casts a favourable image on the screen of my reality. Just as you worked hard at school to beat the Chinese kids for a spot in college.

1620 control rolls (with no particular intention) gave 271 fours.

Hi Conor,

So-- hoping that you considered Daniel's thoughts on this-- I'd offer a technical simplification to your experiment. I was just reading about Chevalier de Méré in Weatherall's book, The Physics of Wall Street:

[indent]So you could roll one die over and over again and intend the same number for all of the rolls (say 1000), no? With this your intention would need to show that your number occurred greater than 51.7747% of the time. (Maybe PhD Math Bruno can advise...) Blaise Pascal and Pierre de Fermat helped him select this as his gambling strategy. He did well in gambling then. What do you think?[/indent]

To the suggestion that one try this in an online media: probably not useful unless you know the algorithm behind the website whether it is written to effect something like randomness and to what degree does it accomplish this over 1000 "rolls" and is that degree consistent, blah, blah.. one die + manual counting probably is easier.



Hi Mr. or Ms. C C C:
Okay, where you write "magic" I'd write "cause and effect", "contingent identity" or "dependent origination" and I agree with you, but not in an absolute sense. I am also part of something apparently infinite arising and passing away and to the extent I am causing this and how much seems ____________ ; so I can take responsibility for my actions though no matter their relativity in the scope of things. =]

It's not algorithmic. They read atmospheric noise, and use the stochastic variations in that to produce random numbers

I do know this; that's what the control rolls were for.

Are you kidding? That would have taken hours and been incredibly boring. I got 1620 data points in about 8 minutes; can you imagine how tedious it would be to roll a die and note the results 1620 times?

Rolling one die by hand, it is plausible that you might subconsciously learn to throw 4s by subtle muscle movements, and it would be difficult to distinguish this effect from a psychokinetic one. Virtual dice (or multiple dice) overcome this difficulty.

One of the reasons I used multiple dice together is that some researchers believe that produces stronger effects (http://www.scientificexploration.org/journal/jse_05_1_radin.pdf). Moreover, you get more data faster, which makes the trend clearer.

No.
You're conducting an experiment and you are inviting a community ("citizen science"); the quality of data will speak to how broad of a community are attracted to your work. I like rigorous testing methods (even if your particular test doesn't interest me, which is why I'm specifying that I'd only offer a technical suggestion).

Okay, well, Chevalier de Méré lost money this way (meaning: rolling identical pairs with two die, like double 4s, had lower odds than one die (re-rolling 4s). His friends Blaise Pascal and Henri Pierre! de Fermat determined that identical rolls (say, 4s) with two die are just 49.14%. So de Méré would lose money on his strategy of playing one number over many games with two dice (identical pairs), and he won money using his strategy of playing one number with one dice over the course of many games.

And you might check out Geralmo Cardano, M.D., from the 1500s (also introduced in Weatherall's book) because he was interested in metaphysics and math, too. Learned about the odds of one and two die much early than Fermat and Pascal.

Anyway, without spoiling Weatherall's book, I guess if a person is using multiple dice and consistently intending to roll the same number, which doubling of dice is considered to have lower probability of rolling identical pairs (49.14%), that person would be setting themselves up for a harder challenge than the single die roll of the same number.

So looking at methods early on-- seeing if methods are going to withstand scrutiny even before there's any data-- is useful if one values their experiment and its possible outcomes, the breath of audience that could be attracted to good methodology.

Anyway, good luck. I just wanted to toss out where some famous math folk have gone before you in this area.

[CCC if you want to keep up your thoughts to me, maybe set up a new thread?]

Order! Order in the court! There will be no new thread! The matter is relevant to the OP's subject.

katy, please face the jury and answer the following question: "did you, or did you not study hard at school/college as a way of beating other kids and getting your selfish desires met?"

If you did, is this what you call "responsible action"? How might you have negatively influenced the lives of others in your class?

Were you born with parents who had high IQs? Did you attend a good school? Should you have hidden your light under a bushel so that others may feel better about themselves?

You seem to think that competition and achievement is a bad thing. Or is it more that personal gain is a bad thing? Do you feel guilty before God?

If someone has an ability to *magic* his way into personal gain, how is this different to working ones way into personal gain? Is it that for every gain, one must suffer? That would imply a belief in basic unworthiness.... the Protestant Work Ethic was based upon this, i believe... Gain is only for those who suffer for it.

I think that questions related to "competition" for what would seem to be scarce resources, such as college entrance slots, should be broken down into two aspects: the fact of the scarcity or apparent scarcity and intention.

First, we don't generally think about things like "I breathe this oxygen so as to beat other people to that oxygen and satisfy my selfish desires", as, at least for the moment, there is a general abundance of oxygen. Thus, it is something in apparent scarcity that forms the background to your question, I think.

Second, there are plenty who apply to college and they are not thinking, "I hope I beat out those other schmucks such that I will satisfy my selfish desires", but instead are just going to college. I think the question of intent is important here. I know plenty of people who went to college for all sorts of good reasons: to make the world a better place, learn something useful, enhance their knowledge of life and the world, etc.

I do also know people who are in it for such things as money, power, prestige, and the like (not that a college degree is likely to get you any of those these days without all sorts of other aspects, grad school, connections, luck, etc.), but that doesn't mean everyone is going to college for those reasons.

I had a friend in high school who filled out one of his college applications in faint yellow crayon so that he wouldn't get into that specific, inexpensive, if good, college that his parents wanted him to get into, though, being an accomplished genius, he got in anyway.

I just applied to college and never thought about any competitive aspect when I did it. I got in, went, and never though another thought about it.

There is a real question here about the relative scarcity of positions. While this is true for some specific colleges, it is not true for many, nor it is true for the wider aspect of whether or not someone can go to college at all, and I don't know anyone who wanted to go to college and wasn't able to get in somewhere, but perhaps this is just the geeky circles I run in.

The application process is as much about getting a synchronous fit between the school and the student such that they will be going to an appropriate college for their abilities, personality, and interests. This is very different from competition.

Just my thoughts this evening.

My understanding is that the only thing "wrong" with applying siddhis (not saying I have any) is that it strengthens the self. It's easy to see how this would be the case. However, this is no different from using work achievements or relationships to enhance the self. Relationships have to be one of the most potent ego-enhancing modalities available.

So I don't know why katy and yourself issue all these dire and very non-specific warnings.

Well, it's not about actually having such abilities; in part, it's about craving them --- typically, I think, desires send the mind jumping around to many places in a diffuse way and creates the opposite mental state of concentration skill on par with the skill described in meditative communities (of several traditions, including theistic, not just buddhism)

However, I suppose if you crave something specifically over time, that specific craving will become one expression of concentration. And concentration is often what is said to give rise to siddhis. So an excellent concentration born of a greedy/or harmful desire could have harmful results or just, similar to what I think you're saying, cause something gainful without much other consequence. Personally, I think concentration gives rise to the conventional ability to spot overlooked details and the person who can do this is sometimes ascribed "amazingness", when actually his or her minds are just focused and not diffused by turning to many thoughts.

And so the NY penthouse and super-yacht you mentioned wanting... those are things you can get through normal concentration and a calm mind ("calm" in regards to other arising thoughts that do not relate to the object of your concentration)... very conventional.

About me in response to your questions: I was a sort of regular student, needed some speech and language therapy for a while and was sent to a special school that had animal interaction/care when I was a kid, eventually deemed "stubborn" and that's about it. Almost forgot to apply to college... [edited: blah blah blah] Anyway, take it or leave it; those are my replies to your "court" ;)

What dire and non- specific warning did I make anout using the powers?

My comment was about paradigms, I believe, and how they could influence results.

Sounds pretty dire and non-specific to me.

How long do i have to wait for an answer?

the implications that were frightening is that all intentions in all beings have effects beyond what people might expect, and that includes things like moods as well...

think about that for just a second, and that is what is scarry

Thanks. Moods definitely spread - "emotional contagion", "contact high" and all that.

What I want to know is why you're afraid to use powers for good?