A PERCEPTUAL CHANNEL FOR INFORMATION TRANSFER OVER KILOMETER DISTANCES: HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE AND RECENT RESEARCH

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A Perceptual Channel for Information Transfer
over Kilometer Distances: Historical Perspective
and Recent Research
HAROLD E. PUTHOFF, MEMBER, IEEE, AND RUSSRLL TARG, SENIOR MEMBER, IEEE
Abstract-For more than 100 years, scientists have attempted to
determine the truth or falsity of claims for the existence of a perceptual
channel whereby certain individuals are able to perceive and describe
remote data not presented to any known sense. This paper presents an
outline of the history of scientific inquiry into such so-called paranor-
mal perception and surveys the current state of the art in parapsycho-
logical research in the United States and abroad. The nature of this
perceptual channel is examined in a series of experiments carried out
in the Electronics and Bioengineering Laboratory of Stanford Research
Institute. The perceptual modality most extensively investigated is the
ability of both experienced subjects and inexperienced volunteers to
view, by innate mental processes, remote geographical or technical
targets including buildings, roads, and laboratory apparatus. The ac-
cumulated data indicate that the phenomenon is not a sensitive func-
tion of distance, and Faraday cage shielding does not in any apparent
way degrade the quality and accuracy of perception. On the basis of
this research, some areas of physics are suggested from which a descrip-
tion or explanation of the phenomenon could be forthcoming.
1. INTRODUCTION
T IS THE PROVINCE of natural science to investigate
nature, impartially and without prejudice" [ 1 ] . Nowhere
in scientific inquiry has this dictum met as great a chal-
lenge as in the area of so-called extrasensory perception (ESP),
the detection of remote stimuli not mediated by the usual
sensory processes. Such phenomena, although under scientific
consideration for over a century, have historically been fraught
with unreliability and controversy, and validation of the phe-
nomena by accepted scientific methodology has been slow in
coming. Even so, a recent survey conducted by the British
publication New Scientist revealed that 67 percent of nearly
1500 responding readers (the majority of whom are working
scientists and technologists) considered ESP to be an estab-
lished fact or a likely possibility, and 88 percent held the
investigation of ESP to be a legitimate scientific undertaking
[2].
A review of the literature reveals that although experiments
by reputable researchers yielding positive results were begun
over a century ago (e.g., Sir William Crookes' study of D. D.
Home, 1860's) [3], many consider the study of these phe-
nomena as only recently emerging from the realm of quasi-
science. One reason for this is that, despite experimental
results, no satisfactory theoretical construct had been advanced
to correlate data or to predict new experimental outcomes.
Consequently, the area in question remained for a long time
in the recipe stage reminiscent of electrodynamics before the
Manuscript received July 25, 1975; revised November 7, 1975. The
submission of this paper was encouraged after review of an advance
proposal. This work was supported by the Foundation for Parasensory
Investigation and the Parapsychology Foundation, New York, NY; the
Institute of Noetic Sciences, Palo Alto, CA; and the National Aero-
nautics and Space Administration, under Contract NAS 7-100.
The authors are with the Electronics and Bioengineering Laboratory,
Stanford Research Institute, Menlo Park, CA 94025.
unification brought about by the work of Ampere, Faraday,
and Maxwell. Since the early work, however, we have seen the
development of information theory, quantum theory, and
neurophysiological research, and these disciplines provide
powerful conceptual tools that appear to bear directly on the
issue. In fact, several physicists (Section V) are now of the
opinion that these phenomena are not at all inconsistent with
the framework of modern physics: the often-held view that
observations of this type are a priori incompatible with known
laws is erroneous in that such a concept is based on the naive
realism prevalent before the development of quantum theory.
In the emerging view, it is accepted that research in this area
can be conducted so as to uncover not just a catalog of inter-
esting events, but rather patterns of cause-effect relationships
of the type that lend themselves to analysis and hypothesis
in the forms with which we are familiar in the physical
sciences. One hypothesis is that information transfer under
conditions of sensory shielding is mediated by extremely
low-frequency (ELF) electromagnetic waves, a proposal that
does not seem to be ruled out by any obvious physical or
biological facts. Further, the development of information
theory makes it possible to characterize and quantify the
performance of a communications channel regardless of
the underlying mechanism.
For the past three years, we have had a program in the
Electronics and Bioengineering Laboratory of the Stan-
ford Research Institute (SRI) to investigate those facets of
human perception that appear to fall outside the range of well-
understood perceptual/processing capabilities. Of particular
interest is a human information-accessing capability that we
call "remote viewing." This phenomenon pertains to the
ability of certain individuals to access and describe, by means
of mental processes, information sources blocked from ordi-
nary perception, and generally accepted as secure against such
access.
In particular, the phenomenon we have investigated most
extensively is the ability of a subject to view remote geograph-
ical locations up to several thousand kilometers distant from
his physical location (given only a known person on whom to
target).' We have carried out more than fifty experiments
under controlled laboratory conditions with several individuals
whose remote perceptual abilities have been developed suf-
ficiently to allow them at times to describe correctly-often in
great detail-geographical or technical material such as build-
ings, roads, laboratory apparatus, and the like.
As observed in the laboratory, the basic phenomenon appears
to cover a range of subjective experiences variously referred to
'Our initial work in this area was reported in Nature 141, and re-
printed in the IEEE Commun. Soc. Newsletter, vol. 13, Jan. 1975
Copyright ?1976 by The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc.
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Fig. 1. Airport in San Andres, Colombia, used as remote-viewing target, along with sketch produced by subject
in California.
in the literature as autoscopy (in the medical literature); exteri- than fifty experiments with nine subjects carried out in our
orization or disassociation (psychological literature); simple own laboratory, which represent a sufficiently stable data base
clairvoyance, traveling clairvoyance, or out-of-body experience to permit testing of various hypotheses concerning the func-
(parapsycholdgical literature); or astral projection (occult liter- tioning of this channel. Finally, in Section V, we indicate
ature). We 4hoose the term "remote viewing" as a neutral those areas of physics and information theory that appear to
descriptive term free from prior associations and bias as to be relevant to an understanding of certain aspects of the
mechanisms. phenomena.
The development at SRI of a successful experimental pro- First, however, we present an illustrative example generated
cedure to elicit this capability has evolved to the point where in an early pilot experiment. As will be clear from our later
persons such as visiting government scientists and contract discussion, this is not a "best-ever" example, but rather a
monitors, with no previous exposure to such concepts, have typical sample of the level of proficiency that can be reached
learned to perform well; and subjects who have trained over a and that we have come to expect in our research.
one-year. period have performed excellently under a variety of Three subjects participated in a long-distance experiment
experimental conditions. Our accumulated data thus indicate focusing on a series of targets in Costa Rica. These subjects
that both specially selected and unselected persons can be said they had never been to Costa Rica. In this experiment,
assisted in developing remote perceptual abilities up to a one of the experimenters (Dr. Puthoff) spent ten days traveling
level of usefuli information transfer. through Costa Rica on a combination business /pleasure trip.
In experiments of this type, we have three principal findings. This information was all that was known to the subjects about
First, we have established that it is possible to obtain signifi- the traveler's itinerary. The experiment called for Dr. Puthoff
cant amounts :of accurate descriptive information about remote to keep a detailed record of his location and activities, includ-
locations. Second, an increase in the distance from a few ing photographs of each of seven target days at 1330 PDT.
meters up to 14000 km separating the subject from the scene A total of twelve daily descriptions were collected before the
to be perceived does not in any apparent way degrade the traveler's return: six responses from one subject, five from
quality or accuracy of perception. Finally, the use of Faraday another, and one from a third.
cage electrical shielding does not prevent high-quality descrip- The third subject who submitted the single response supplied
tions from being obtained. a drawing for a day in the middle of the series. (The subject's
To build a coherent theory for the explanation of these response, together with the photographs taken at the site, are
phenomena, it is necessary to have a clear understanding of shown in Fig. 1). Although Costa Rica is a mountainous
what constitutes the phenomena. In this paper, we first briefly country, the subject unexpectedly perceiveejdg the traveler at a
summarize previous efforts in t is field jt eot~je thb b r Po Ye j ~d QW#0 r described an
preseri~~i~tdId A
~r~~ul in 8 3 i K he ocean at the
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PUTHOFF AND TARG: PERCEPTUAL CHANNEL FOR INFORMATION TRANSFER
end (correct). An airport building also was drawn, and shown
to have a large rectangular overhang (correct). The traveler
had taken an unplanned one-day side trip to an offshore island
and at the time of the experiment had just disembarked from a
plane at a small island airport as described by the subject
4000 km away. The sole discrepancy was that the subject's
drawing showed a Quonset-hut type of building in place of the
rectangular structure.
The above description was chosen as an example to illustrate
a major point observed a number of times throughout the
program to be described. Contrary to what may be expected,
a subject's description does not necessarily portray what may
reasonably be expected to be correct (an educated or "safe"
guess), but often runs counter even to the subject's own
expectations.
We wish to stress again that a result such as the above is not
unusual. The remaining submissions in this experiment pro-
vided further examples of excellent correspondences between
target and response. (A target period of poolside relaxation
was identified; a drive through a tropical forest at the base of
a truncated volcano was described as a drive through a jungle
below a large bare table mountain; a hotel-room target descrip-
tion, including such details as rug color, was correct; and so
on.) So as to determine whether such matches were simply
fortuitous-that is, could reasonably be expected on the basis
of chance alone-Dr. Puthoff was asked after he had returned
to blind match the twelve descriptions to his seven target
locations. On the basis of this conservative evaluation proce-
dure, which vastly underestimates the statistical significance
of the individual descriptions, five correct matches were ob-
tained. This number of matches is significant at p = 0.02 by
exact binomial calculation.
The observation of such unexpectedly high-quality descrip-
tions early in our program led to a large-scale study of the
phenomenon at SRI under secure double-blind conditions (i.e.,
target unknown to experimenters as well as subjects), with
independent random target selection and blind judging. The
results, presented in Sections III and IV, provide strong evi-
dence for the robustness of this phenomenon whereby a
human perceptual modality of extreme sensitivity can detect
complex remote stimuli.
II. BACKGROUND
Although we are approaching the study of these phenomena
as physicists, it is not yet possible to separate ourselves entirely
from the language of the nineteenth century when the labora-
tory study of the paranormal was begun. Consequently, we
continue to use terms such as "paranormal,>, "telepathy," and
the like. However, we intend only to indicate a process of
information transfer under conditions generally accepted as
secure against such transfer and with no prejudice or occult
assumptions as to the mechanisms involved. As in any other
scientific pursuit, the purpose is to collect the observables that
result from experiments and to try to determine the functional
relationships between these observables and the laws of physics
as they are currently understood.
2 The probability of a correct daily match by chance for any given
transcript is p = +. Therefore, the probability of at least five correct
matches by chance out of twelve tries can be calculated from
12 121 1 i 6 (12-i)
~~" ~R = 0.02.
Appr[t~ve~Fr~' ase 2001/03/26
Organized research into so-called psychic functioning began
roughly in the time of J. J. Thomson, Sir Oliver Lodge, and
Sir William Crookes, all of whom took part in the founding of
the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) in 1882 in England.
Crookes, for example, carried out his principal investigations
with D. D. Home, a Scotsman who grew up in America and
returned to England in 1855 [3 ] . According to the notebooks
and published reports of Crookes, Home had demonstrated
the ability to cause objects to move without touching them.
We should. note in passing that, Home, unlike most subjects,
worked only in the light and spoke out in the strongest pos-
sible terms against the darkened seance rooms popular at the
time [ 5 1.
Sir William Crookes was a pioneer in the study of electrical
discharge in gases and in the development of vacuum tubes,
some types of which still bear his name. Although everything
Crookes said about electron beams and plasmas was accepted,
nothing he said about the achievements of D. D. Home ever
achieved that status. Many of his colleagues, who had not
observed the experiments with Home, stated publicly that they
thought Crookes had been deceived, to which Crookes angrily
responded:
Will not my critics give me credit for some amount of common
sense? Do they, not imagine that the obvious precautions, which
occur to them as soon as they sit down to pick holes in my
experiments, have occurred to me also in the course of my pro-
longed and patient investigation? The answer to this, as to all
other objections is, prove it to be an error, by showing where
the error lies, or if a trick, by showing how the trick is per-
formed. Try the experiment fully and fairly. If then fraud be
found, expose it; if it be a truth, proclaim it. This is the only
scientific procedure, and it is that I propose steadily to pursue
[3].
In the United States, scientific interest in the paranormal
was centered in the universities. In 1912, John Coover [6]
was established in the endowed Chair of Psychical Research at
Stanford University. In the 1920's, Harvard University set up
research programs with George Estabrooks and L. T. Troland
[71, [8]. It was in this framework that, in 1930, William
McDougall invited Dr. J. B. Rhine and Dr. Louisa Rhine to
join the Psychology Department at Duke University [9]. For
more than 30 years, significant work was carried out at Rhine's
Duke University Laboratory. To examine the existence of
paranormal perception, he used the now-famous ESP cards
containing a boldly printed picture of a star, cross, square,
circle, or wavy lines. Subjects were asked to name the order
of these cards in a freshly shuffled deck of twenty-five such
cards. To test for telepathy, an experimenter would look at
the cards one at a time, and a subject suitably separated from
the sender would attempt to determine which card was being
viewed.
Dr. J. B. Rhine together with Dr. J. G. Pratt carried out
thousands of experiments of this type under widely varying
conditions [ 10 ] . The statistical results from these experiments
indicated that some individuals did indeed possess a paranor-
mal perceptual ability in that it was possible to obtain an
arbitrarily high degree of improbability by continued testing
of a gifted subject.
The work of Rhine has been challenged on many grounds,
however, including accusations of improper handling of statis-
tics, error, and fraud. With regard to the statistics, the general
consensus of statisticians today is that if fault is to be found
in Rhine's work, it would have to be on other than statistical
CIAcxROP96-01YrRo'bl '2`b U8,gij7f fraud, the
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most celebrated case of criticism of Rhine's work, that of reinforcement, he developed several outstanding subjects, one
G. R. Price 1121, ended 17 years after it began when the of whom, Pavel Stepanek, has worked with experimenters
accusation of fraud was retracted by its author in an article around the world for more than 10 years.
entitled "Apol?gy to Rhine and Soal," published in the same Ryzl's pioneering work came as an answer to the questions
journal in which it was first put forward [ 13 ]. It should also raised by the 1956 CIBA Foundation conference on extra-
be noted that; parapsychological researchers themselves re- sensory perception. The CIBA Chemical Company has annual
cently exposed fraud in their own laboratory when they meetings on topics of biological and chemical interest, and
encountered it [141. that same year they assembled several prominent pars s
At the end of the 1940's, Prof. S. G. Soal, an English mathe- chologists to have a state-of-the-art conference on ESP [23].
matician working with the SPR, had carried out hundreds of The conference concluded that little progress would be made
card guessing experiments involving tens of thousands of calls in parapsychology research until a repeatable experiment
[151. Many of these experiments were carried out over ex- could be found; namely, an experiment that different experi-
tended distances. One of the most notable experiments was menters could repeat at will and that would reliably yield a
conducted with Mrs. Gloria Stewart between London and statistically significant result.
Antwerp. This; experiment gave results whose probability of Ryzl had by 1962 accomplished that goal. His primary con-
occurring by chance were less than 10-8. With the publication tribution was a decision to interact with the subject as a per-
of Modern Experiments in Telepathy by Soal and Bateman son, to try to build up his confidence and ability. His protocol
(both of whom;:
were statisticians), it appeared that card guess- depended on "working with" rather than "running" his sub-
ing experiments; produced significant results, on the average.3 jects. Ryzl's star subject, Pavel Stepanek, has produced highly
The most severe criticism of all this work, a criticism diffi- significant results with many contemporary researchers [241-
cult to defend against in principle, is that leveled by the well- [29 ]. In these experiments, he was able to tell with 60-percent
known British parapsychological critic C. E. M. Hansel [171, reliability whether a hidden card was green side or white
who began his examination of the ESP hypothesis with the side up, yielding statistics of a million to one with only a
stated assumption, "In view of the a priori arguments against thousand trials.
it we know in advance that telepathy, etc., cannot occur." As significant as such results are statistically, the information
Therefore, based on the "a priori unlikelihood" of ESP, channel is imperfect, containing noise along with the signal.
Hansel's examination of the literature centered primarily on When considering how best to use such a channel, one is led
the possibility pf fraud, by subjects or investigators. He to the communication theory concept of the introduction of
reviewed in depth four experiments which he regarded as redundancy as a means of coding a message to combat the
providing the best evidence of ESP: the Pearce-Pratt distance effects of a noisy channel [30]. A prototype experiment by
series [ 181 ; the Pratt-Woodruff [ 19 ] series, both conducted RyzI using such techniques has proved to be successful. Ryz1
at Duke; and Soal's work with Mrs. Stewart and Basil Shackle- had an assistant select randomly five groups of three digits
ton [ 15 1, as well as a more recent series by Soal and Bowden each. These 15 digits were then encoded into binary form and
[20]. Hansel shdwed, in each case, how fraud could have been translated into a sequence of green and white cards in sealed
committed (by the experimenters in the Pratt-Woodruff and envelopes. By means of repeated calling and an elaborate
Soal-Bateman series, or by the subjects in the Pearce-Pratt majority vote protocol, Ryzl was able after 19 350 calls by
and Soal-Bowden experiments). He gave no direct evidence Stepanek (averaging 9 s per call) to correctly identify all 15
that fraud was committed in these experiments, but said, "If numbers, a result significant at p = 10-I5 The hit rate for
the result could have arisen through a trick, the experiment individual calls was 61.9 percent, 11 978 hits, and 7372 misses
must be considered unsatisfactory proof of ESP, whether or [311.
not it is finally decided that such a trick was in fact used" [ 17, Note Added in Proof., It has been brought to our attention
p. 18]. As discussed by Honorton in a review of the field that a similar procedure was recently used to transmit without
[211, Hansel's conclusion after 241 pages of careful scrutiny error the word "peace" in International Morse Code (J. C.
therefore was that these experiments were not "fraud-proof" Carpenter, "Toward the effective utilization of enhanced
and therefore in principle could not serve as conclusive proof weak-signal ESP effects," presented at the Annual Meeting of
of ESP. the American Association for the Advancement of Science,
Even among the supporters of ESP research and its results, New York, NY, Jan. 27, 1975).
there remained the consistent problem that many successful The characteristics of such a channel can be specified in
subjects eventually lost their ability and their scores gradually accordance with the precepts of communication theory. The
drifted toward chance results. This decline effect in no way bit rate associated with the information channel is calculated
erased their previous astronomical success; but it was a disap- from [30]
pointment since if paranormal perception is a natural ability, R = H(Y) - ra
one would like to see subjects improving with practice rather
than getting worse. where H(x) is the uncertainty of the source message containing
One of the first successful attempts to overcome the decline symbols with a priori probability p;
effect was in Czechoslovakia in the work of Dr. Milan Ryzl, a 2
chemist with the Institute of Biology of the Czechoslovakian H(x) Pi l0$2 pi (2)
Academy of Science and also an amateur hypnotist [221.
t=l
Through the use of hypnosis, together with feedback and and Hy(.z) is the conditional entropy based on the a posteriori
---?? -?? ?v,c were luagea a
in it double-blind fashion of the type that escaped the criticism of the Hy(x) p(i, j) loge pi (1), (3)
early experiments.
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Probabilities that a received signal was actually transmitted:
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PUTHOFF AND ARG: PERCEPTUAL CHANN OR INFORMATION TRANSFER 333
For Stepanek's run, with pi = 71, pi Q) = 0.619, and an average
time of 9 s per choice, we have a source uncertainty H(x) = 1
bit and a calculated bit rate
R/T - 0.0046 bit/s.
(Since the 15-digit number (49.8 bits) actually was transmitted
at the rate of 2.9 X 10-4 bit/s, an increase in bit rate by a
factor of about 20 could be expected on the basis of a coding
scheme more optimum than that used in the experiments. See,
for example, Appendix A.)
Dr. Charles Tart at the University of California has written
extensively on the so-called decline effect. He considers that
having subjects attempt to guess cards, or perform any other
repetitious task for which they receive no feedback, follows
the classical technique for deconditioning any response. He
thus considers card guessing "a technique for extinguishing
psychic functioning in the laboratory" [32].
Tart's injunctions of the mid-sixties were being heeded at
Maimonides Hospital, Brooklyn, NY, by a team of researchers
that included Dr. Montague Ullman, who was director of
research for the hospital; Dr. Stanley Krippner; and, later,
Charles Honorton. These three worked together for several
years on experiments on the occurrence of telepathy in dreams.
In the course of a half-dozen experimental series, they found
in their week-long sessions a number of subjects who had
dreams that consistently were highly descriptive of pictorial
material that a remote sender was looking at throughout the
night. This work is described in detail in the experimenters'
book Dream Telepathy [33]. Honorton is continuing work
of this free-response type in which the subject has no precon-
ceived idea as to what the target may be.
In his more recent work with subjects in the waking state,
Honorton is providing homogeneous stimulation to the subject
who is to describe color slides viewed by another person in a
remote room. In this new work, the subject listens to white
noise via earphones and views an homogeneous visual field
imposed through the use of Ping-Pong ball halves to cover the
subject's eyes in conjunction with diffuse ambient illumina-
tion. In this so-called Ganzfeld setting, subjects are again able,
now in the waking state, to give correct and often highly
accurate descriptions of the material being viewed by the
sender [34].
In Honorton's work and elsewhere, it apparently has been
the step away from the repetitive forced-choice experiment
that has opened the way for a wide variety of ordinary people
to demonstrate significant functioning in the laboratory, with-
out being bored into a decline effect.
This survey would be incomplete if we did not indicate
certain aspects of the current state of research in the USSR.
It is clear from translated documents and other sources [35]
that many laboratories in the USSR are engaged in paranormal
research.
Since the 1930's, in the laboratory of L. Vasiliev (Leningrad
Institute for Brain Research), there has been an interest in the
use of telepathy as a method of influencing the behavior of a
person at a distance. In Vasiliev's book Experiments in Mental
Suggestion, he makes it very clear that the bulk of his labora-
tory's experiments were aimed at long-distance communica-
tion combined with a form of behavior modification; for
example, putting people at a distance to sleep through hyp-
nosis [36].
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Similar behavior modification types of experiments have been
carried out in recent times by I. M. Kogan, Chairman of the
Bioinformation Section of the Moscow Board of the Popov
Society. He is a Soviet engineer who, until 1969, published
extensively on the theory of telepathic communication [371-
[401. He was concerned with three principal kinds of experi-
ments: mental suggestion without hypnosis over short dis-
tances, in which the percipient attempts to identify an object;
mental awakening over short distances, in which a subject is
awakened from a hypnotic sleep at the "beamed" suggestion
from the hypnotist; and long-range (intercity) telepathic com-
munication. Kogan's main interest has been to quantify the
channel capacity of the paranormal channel. He finds that the
bit rate decreases from 0.1 bit/s for laboratory experiments
to 0.005 bit/s for his 1000-km intercity experiments.
In the USSR, serious consideration is given to the hypothesis
that telepathy is mediated by extremely low-frequency (ELF)
electromagnetic propagation. (The pros and cons of this
hypothesis are discussed in Section V of this paper.) In
general, the entire field of paranormal research in the USSR
is part of a larger one concerned with the interaction between
electromagnetic fields and living organisms [411, [421. At
the First International Congress on Parapsychology and
Psychotronics in Prague, Czechoslovakia, in 1973, for example,
Kholodov spoke at length about the susceptibility of living
systems to extremely low-level ac and dc fields. He described
conditioning effects on the behavior of fish resulting from the
application of 10 to 100 ?W of RF to their tank [43]. The
USSR take these data seriously in that the Soviet safety re-
quirements for steady-state microwave exposure set limits
at 10?W/cm2 , whereas the United States has set a steady-state
limit of 10 mW/cm2 [441. Kholodov spoke also about the
nonthermal effects of microwaves on animals' central nervous
systems. His experiments were very carefully carried out and
are characteristic of a new dimension in paranormal research.
The increasing importance of this area in Soviet research was
indicated recently when the Soviet Psychological Association
issued an unprecedented position paper calling on the Soviet
Academy of Sciences to step up efforts in this area [451.
They recommended that the newly formed Psychological
Institute within the Soviet Academy of Sciences and the
Psychological Institute of the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences
review the area and consider the creation of a new laboratory
within one of the institutes to study persons with unusual
abilities. They also recommended a comprehensive evaluation
of experiments and theory by the Academy of Sciences' Insti-
tute of Biophysics and Institute for the Problems of Informa-
tion Transmission.
The Soviet research, along with other behavioristically
oriented work, suggests that in addition to obtaining overt
responses such as verbalizations or key presses from a subject,
it should be possible to obtain objective evidence of informa-
tion transfer by direct measurement of physiological parame-
ters of a subject. Kamiya, Lindsley, Pribram, Silverman,
Walter, and others brought together to discuss physiological
methods to detect ESP functioning, have suggested that a
whole range of electroencephalogram (EEG) responses such as
evoked potentials (EP's), spontaneous EEG, and the contingent
negative variation (CNV) might be sensitive indicators of the
detection of remote stimuli not mediated by usual sensory
processes [461.
Early experimentation of this type was carried out by
Douglas Dean at the Newark College of Engineering. In his
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search for physiological correlates of information transfer, he
used the plethysmograph to measure changes in the blood
volume in a finger, a sensitive indicator of autonomic nervous
system functioning [47]. A plethysmographic measurement
was made on the finger of a subject during telepathy experi-
ments. A sender looked at randomly selected target cards
consisting of names known to the subject, together with names
unknown to hixrl (selected at random from a telephone book).
The names of the known people were contributed by the sub-
ject and were to be of emotional significance to him. Dean
found significant changes in the chart recording of finger
blood volume vhen the remote sender was looking at those
names known to the subject as compared with those names
randomly chosen.
Three other experiments using the physiological approach
have now been published. The first work by Tart [48 1, a later
work by Lloyd [49], and most recently the work by the
authors [4] all follow a similar procedure. Basically, a subject
is closeted in an electrically shielded room while his EEG is
recorded. Meanwhile, in another laboratory, a second person
is stimulated from time to time, and the time of that stimulus
is marked on the magnetic-tape recording of the subject's EEG.
The subject does not know when the remote stimulus periods
are as compared with the nonstimulus periods.
With regard to choice of stimulus for our own experimenta-
tion, we noted that in previous work others had attempted,
without success, to detect evoked potential changes in a sub-
ject's EEG in response to a single stroboscopic flash stimulus
observed by another subject [50]. In a discussion of that
experiment, Kamiya suggested that because of the unknown
temporal characteristics of the information channel, it might
be more appropriate to use repetitive bursts of light to increase
the probability of detecting information transfer [ 5 1] . There-
fore, in our study we chose to use a stroboscopic flash train of
10-s duration as the remote stimulus.
In the design of the study, we assumed that the application
of the remote stimulus would result in responses similar to
those obtained under conditions of direct stimulation. For
example, when an individual is stimulated with a low-
frequency (< 30 Hz) flashing light, the EEG typically shows
a decrease in the amplitude of the resting rhythm and a
driving of the brain waves at the frequency of the flashes [52 J.
We hypothesized that if we stimulated one subject in this
manner (a putative sender), the EEG of another subject in a
remote room with no flash present (a receiver) might show
changes in alpha (9-11 Hz) activity and possibly an EEG
driving similar to that of the sender, or other coupling to the
sender's EEG [531. The receiver was seated in a visually
opaque, acoustically and electrically shielded, double-walled
steel room about 7 m from the sender. The details of the
experiment, consisting of seven runs of thirty-six 10-s trials
each (twelve periods each for 0-Hz, 6-Hz, and 16-Hz stimuli,
randomly intermixed), are presented in [4]. This experiment
proved to be successful. The receiver's alpha activity (9-11 Hz)
showed a significant reduction in average power (-24 percent,
p < 0.04) and peak power (-28 percent, p < 0.03) during
16-Hz flash stimuli as compared with periods of no-flash
stimulus. [A similar response was observed for 6-Hz stimuli
(-12 percent ir; average power, - 21 percent in peak power),
but the latter result did not reach statistical significance.]
Fig. 2 shows an overlay of three averaged EEG spectra from
one of the subject's 36 trial runs, displaying differences in
alpha activity during the three stimulus conditions. Extensive
k
5 Hz 10 Hz 15 Hz
Fig. 2. Occipital EEG frequency spectra, 0-20 Hz, of one subject (H.H.)
acting as receiver showing amplitude changes in the 9-1 1-Hz band as a
function of strobe frequency. Three cases: 0-, 6-, and 16-Hz flashes
(twelve trial averages).
results were produced by system artifacts, electromagnetic
pickup (EMI), or subtle cueing; the results were negative [4].
As part of the experimental protocol, the subject was asked
to indicate a conscious assessment for each trial (via telegraph
key) as to the nature of the stimulus; analysis showed these
guesses to be at chance. Thus arousal as evidenced by signifi-
cant alpha blocking occurred only at the noncognitive level of
physiological response. Hence the experiment provided direct
physiological (EEG) evidence of perception of remote stimuli
even in the absence of overt cognitive response.
Whereas in our experiments we used a remote light flash as a
stimulus, Tart [48 ] in his work used an electrical shock to
himself as sender, and Lloyd [491 simply told the sender to
think of a red triangle each time a red warning light was
illuminated within his view. Lloyd observed a consistent
evoked potential in his subjects; whereas in our experiments
and in Tart's, a reduction in amplitude and a desynchroniza-
tion of alpha was observed-an arousal response. (If a subject
is resting in an alpha-dominant condition and he is then
stimulated, for example in any direct manner, one will observe
a desynchronization and decrease in alpha power.) We con-
sider that these combined results are evidence for the existence
of non cognitive awareness of remote happenings and that they
have a profound implication for paranormal research.
III. SRI INVESTIGATIONS OF REMOTE VIEWING
Experimentation in remote viewing began during studies
carried out to investigate the abilities of a New York artist,
Ingo Swann, when he expressed the opinion that the insights
gained during experiments at SRI had strengthened his ability
(verified in other research before he joined the SRI program)
to view remote locations [54]. To test Mr. Swann's asser-
tion, a pilot study was set up in which a series of targets from
around the globe were supplied by SRI personnel to the ex-
perimenters on a double-blind basis. Mr. Swann's apparent
ability to describe correctly details of buildings, roads,
bridges, and the like indicated that it may be possible for
a subject by means of mental imagery to access and describe
randomly chosen geographical sites located several miles
from the subject's position and demarcated by some appro-
priate means. Therefore, we set up a research program to
test the remote-viewing hypothesis under rigidly controlled
scientific conditions.
In carrying out this program, we concentrated on what we
considered to be our principal responsibility-to resolve under
control App deftf*eI aSte 20041 /2g1esE( IAi ipPN-Off iM? i00O8()O Wt~7er or not this
 Approved For Release 2001/03/26 : CIA-RDP96-00787WO200080007-7 335
PUTHOFF AND TARG: PERCEPTUAL CHANNE R INFORMATION TRANSFER
class of paranormal perception phenomenon exists. At all tion period, the remote viewing subject was asked to describe
times, we and others responsible for the overall program took his impressions of the target site into a tape recorder and to
measures to prevent sensory leakage and subliminal cueing and make any drawings he thought appropriate. An informal com-
to prevent deception, whether intentional or unintentional. parison was then made when the demarcation team returned,
To ensure evaluations independent of belief structures of both and the subject was taken to the site to provide feedback,
experimenters and judges, all experiments were carried out
under a protocol, described below, in which target selection at A. Subject Sl: Experienced
the beginning of experiments and blind judging of results at To begin the series, Pat Price, a former California police com-
the end of experiments were handled independently of the missioner and city councilman, participated as a subject in
researchers engaged in carrying out the experiments. nine experiments. In general, Price's ability to describe
Six subjects, designated S 1 through S6, were chosen for the correctly buildings, docks, roads, gardens, and the like, includ-
study. Three were considered as gifted or experienced subjects ing structural materials, color, ambience, and activity-often
(Si through S3), and three were considered as learners (S4 in great detail-indicated the functioning of a remqte per-
through S6). The a priori dichotomy between gifted and ceptual ability. A Hoover Tower target, for example, was
learners, was based on the experienced group having been recognized and named by name. Nonetheless, in general, the
successful in other studies conducted before this program descriptions contained inaccuracies as well as correct state-
and the learners group being inexperienced with regard to ments. A typical example is indicated by the subject's drawing
paranormal experimentation. shown in Fig. 3 in which he correctly described a park-like
The study consisted of a series of double-blind tests with area containing two pools of water: one rectangular, 60 by
local targets in the San Francisco Bay Area so that several in- 89 ft (actual dimensions 75 by 100 ft); the other circular,
dependent judges could visit the sites to establish documenta- diameter 120 ft (actual diameter 110 ft). He incorrectly indi-
tion. The protocol was to closet the subject with an experi- cated the function, however, as water filtration rather than
menter at SRI and at an agreed-on time to obtain from the recreational swimming. (We often observe essentially correct
subject a description of an undisclosed remote site being descriptions of basic elements and patterns coupled with in-
visited by a target team. In each of the experiments, one of complete or erroneous analysis of function.) As can be seen
the six program subjects served as remote viewing subject, from his drawing, he also included some elements, such as
and SRI experimenters served as a target demarcation team at the tanks shown in the upper right, that are not present at the
the remote location chosen in a double-blind protocol as target site. We also note an apparent left-right reversal, often
follows. observed in paranormal perception experiments.
In each experiment, SRI management randomly chose a To obtain a numerical evaluation of the accuracy of the
target location from a list of targets within a 30-min driving remote-viewing experiment, the experimental results were
time from SRI; the target location selected was kept blind to subjected to independent judging on a blind basis by an SRI
subject and experimenters. The target pool consisted of more research analyst not otherwise associated with the research.
than 100 target locations chosen from a target-rich environ- The subject's response packets, which contained the nine
ment. (Before the experimental series began, the Director of typed unedited transcripts of the tape-recorded narratives
the Information Science and Engineering Division, not other- along with any associated drawings, were unlabeled and pre-
wise associated with the experiment, established the set of lo- sented in random order. While standing at each target loca-
cations as the target pool which remained known only to him, tion, visited in turn, the judge was required to blind rank order
The target locations were printed on cards sealed in envelopes the nine packets on a scale 1 to 9 (best to worst match). The
and kept in the SRI Division office safe. They were available statistic of interest is the sum of ranks assigned to the target-
only with the personal assistance of the Division Director who associated transcripts, lower values indicating better matches.
issued a single random-number selected target card that con- For nine targets, the sum of ranks could range from nine to
stituted the traveling orders for that experiment.) eighty-one. The probability that a given sum of ranks s or
In detail: To begin the experiment, the subject was closeted less will occur by chance is given by [551
with an experimenter at SRI to wait 30 min before beginning
a narrative description of the remote location. A second ex 1 s k - Nl - 1~
perimenter then obtained from the Division Director a target Pr (s or less) = Nn (-1)i (n) It n -
location from a set of traveling orders previously prepared and i=n i=o
randomized by the Director and kept under his control. The
target demarcation team, consisting of two to four SRI experi- where s is obtained sum of ranks, N is number of assignable
menters, then proceeded by automobile directly to the target ranks, n is number of occasions on which rankings were made,
without any communication with the subject or experimenter and l takes on values from zero to the least positive integer k
remaining behind. The experimenter remaining with the sub- in (i - n)/n. (Table I is a table to enable easy application of
ject at SRI was kept ignorant of both the particular target and the above formula to those cases in which N = n.) The sum in
the target pool so as to eliminate the possibility of cueing this case, which. included seven direct hits out of the nine, was
(overt or subliminal) and to allow him freedom in questioning 16 (see Table II), a result significant at p = 2.9 X 105 by
the subject to clarify his descriptions. The demarcation team exact calculation.
remained at the target site for an agreed-on 15-min period In Experiments 3, 4, and 6 through 9, the subject was se-
following the 30 min allotted for travel.4 During the observa- cured in a double-walled copper-screen Faraday cage. The
Faraday cage provides 120-dB attenuation for plane-wave
radio-frequency radiation over a range of 15 kHz to 1 GHz.
4The first subject (Si) was allowed 30 min for his descriptions, but For magnetic fields, the attenuation is 68 dB at 15 kHz and
d creases to 3 dB at 60 Hz. The results of rank order judging
it was found that he fatigued and had little comment after the first 15
min. The A l ~a C R&6 OQ~$ R*?Q Q,7. a electrical
S2 through S .
 336 Approved For lease 2001/03/26 : CIA-RDP96i78TaQ00200080007-7
EDINGS OF THE IEEE, MARCH 1976
Fig. 3. Swimming pool complex as remote-viewing target. (a) City map of target location. (b) Drawing by Price (S I).
TABLE I
CRITICAL VALUES OF SUMS OF RANKS FOR PREFERENTIAL MATCHING
Number of
Assignable
'Ranks (N)
e
a
are being ranked n P cl cases in which the number of occasions on which objects
g () is equal to the number of assignable ranks (N). Each entry represents the largest
number that is significant at the indicated p-level. Source: R. L. Morris [551.
5
8
13
18
24
30
38
4
7
11
15
20
26,
33
41
49
Note: This table applies only to those s
'
l
shieidirig does not Prevent high-quality descriptions from being
obtained.
As a backup judging procedure, a panel of five additional
SRI scientists not otherwise associated with the research were
asked simply to blind match the unedited typed transcripts
(with associated drawings) generated by the remote viewer
against the nine target locations which they independently
visited in turn. Thd transcripts were unlabeled and presented
in random order. . correct match consisted of a transcript
of a given date being matched to the target of that date. In-
stead of the expected number of I match each per judge, the
number of correct matches obtained by the five judges was 7,
6, 5, 3, and 3, respectively. Thus, rather than the expected
total number of 5 correct matches from the judges, 24 such
matches werWoW ed For Release 2001/03/26
B. Subject S4: Learner
This experiment was designed to be a replication of our pre-
vious experiment with Price, the first replication attempted.
The subject for this experiment was Mrs. Hella,Hammid, a
gifted professional photographer. She was selected for this
series on the basis of her successful performance as a per-
cipient in the EEG experiment described earlier. Outside of
that interaction, she had no previous experience with apparent
paranormal functioning.
At the' time we began working with Mrs. Hammid, she had
no, strong feelings about the likelihood of her ability to suc-
ceed in this task. This was in contrast to both Ingo Swann
who had come to our laboratory fresh from a lengthy and
:S I ' YtsQ0ft 2p1 .'Pertrude
o ew~York 6 and Pat Price
 A PUTHOFF AND-I'ARO PERRCEPTUAL L'A~ ~I1=a6IC~CA"1D1P96-00787F J0200080007-7
PEDESTRIAN OVERPASS TARGET
Fig. 4. Subject Hammid (S4) drawing, described as "some kind of diagonal trough up in the air."
who
TABLE II
DISTRIBUTION OF RANKINGS ASSIGNED TO TRANSCRIPTS
ASSOCIATED WITH EACH TARGET LOCATION FOR EXPERIENCED
SUBJECT PRICE (SI)
3.4
Baylands Nature Preserve, Palo Alto
6.4
Radio telescope, Portola Valley
6.4
Marine, Redwood City
Bridge toll plaza, Fremont
Drive-in theater, Palo Alto
Arts and Crafts Plaza, Menlo Park
Catholic Church, Portola Valley
Swimming pool complex, Palo Alto
e
ew
ng
that he used his remote-v
illustrative purposes only, but rather they procee
felt
locations by list.
of the target
day life. are more
In comparison with the latter two, many people
In another experiment, the subject described seeing "an
influenced by their environment and are reluctant under
barnlike structure with a pitched roof." She also saw
public scrutiny to attempt activities that are generally thought open
of slatted side to the structure making light and dark
to be impossible. Society often provides inhibition and nega a "kind into ra h of the and a tive feedback to the individual who might otherwise
associated wail. shed Her ulli sal egshown in Fig. 5. p(Subjects
e all share bars
"the perceptual ability.
explored his own nonregular
location because drawings they
nd, of f in more mstoning of prophets and the are encourag to odern times, he hospitaliza- and assn i eewith the make
bnurning ning o of f witradition
b ription tion o t e who and,
cl i top ceive things that the majority do make are in general more accurate than their reslbilts ofcthe nine-
not atro~n~I~e~?t1~Q?-1t~0~~$IA-F~ t 07-7
16
(P_2.9X10-6)
ability in his every-
i
i
scientific rigor, one of our primary tasks as researchers is to
provide an environment in which the subject feels safe to
With a new
n
ti
.
o
explore the possibility of paranormal percep
subject, we also try to stress the nonuniqueness of the ability
because from our experience paranormal functioning appears
to be a latent ability that all subjects can articulate to some
degree.
Because of Mrs. Hammid's artistic background, she was ca-
pable of drawing and describing visual images that she could
not identify in any cognitive or analytic sense. When the target
demarcation team went to a target location which was a
pedestrian overpass, the subject said that she saw "a kind of
trough up in the air," which she indicated in the upper part
of her drawing in Fig. 4. She weent will tone exsomething plain, "If liyou
ke
you
stand where they are standing
this," indicating the nested squares at the bottom of Fig. 4.
As it turned out, a judge standing where she indicated would had
drawn, as can have a view closely resembling what she
t I --
hs of the targe
seen seen from the accompanying photograp
tion. It needs to be emphasized, however, that judges did not
have access to our photographs of the site, used here for
d to each
d
 Approved For Release 2001/03/26 : CIA-RDP9 00787R000200080007-7
Aft Pm%
BICYCLE SHED TARGET
DETAIL OF BICYCLE SHED
Fig.:. 5. Subject Hammid (S4) response to bicycle shed target described as an open "barn-like building" with "slats
on the sides" and a "pitched roof."
TABLE III
DISTRIBUTION OF. RANKINGS ASSIGNED TO TRANSCRIPTS ASSOCIATED
WITH EACH TARGET LOCATION FOR LEARNER SUBJECT HAMMID (S4)
Target Location
Distance
(km)
Rank of
Associated
Transcript
Methodist Church,; Palo Alto
1.9
1
Ness Auditorium, Menlo Park
0.2
1
Merry-go-round, Palo Alto
3.4
1
Parking garage, Mountain View
8.1
2
SRI Internationals Courtyard, Menlo Park
0.2
1
Bicycle shed, Menlo Park
0.1
2
Railroad trestle bridge, Palo Alto
1.3
2
Pumpkin patch, Menlo Park
1.3
1
Pedestrian overpas's, Palo Alto
5.0
2
Total am of ranks
13
(p=1.8X10`5)
experiment series were submitted for independent judging on
a blind basis by an SRI research analyst not otherwise associ-
ated with the research. While at each target location, visited
in turn, the judge was required to blind rank order the nine
unedited typed manuscripts of the tape-recorded narratives,
along with any associated drawings generated by the remote
viewer, on a scale I to 9 (best to worst match). The sum of
ranks assigned to the target-associated transcripts in this case
was 13, a result sigtlificant at p = 1.8 X 10-6 by exact calcula-
tion (see Table I and discussion), and included five direct hits
Again, as a backup judging procedure, a panel of five addi-
tional judges not otherwise associated with the research
were asked simply to blind match the unedited typed tran-
scripts and associated drawings generated by the remote viewer,
against the nine target locations which they independently
visited in turn. A correct match consisted of a transcript of
a given date being matched to the target of that date. In-
stead of the expected number of I match each per judge,
the number of correct matches obtained by the five judges
was 5, 3, 3, 2, and 2, respectively. Thus, rather than the ex-
pected total number of 5 correct matches from the judges,
15 such matches were obtained.
C. Subjects S2 and S3: Experienced
Having completed a series of 18 remote-viewing experiments,
9 each with experienced subject S I (Price) and learner S4
(Hammid), additional replication experiments, four with each
subject, were carried out with experienced subjects S 2 (Elgin)
and S3 (Swann) and learners S5 and S6. To place the judging
on a basis comparable to that used with S I and S4, the four
transcripts each of experienced subjects S 2 and S 3 were com-
bined into a group of eight for rank order judging to be com-
pared with the similarly combined results of the learners
S5 and S6.
The series with S2 (Elgin, an SRI research analyst) provided
a further example of the dichotomy between verbal and draw-
ing responses. (As with medical literature, case histories often
are more illuminating than the summary of results.) The ex-
and four
AW0r80? t F r KeIease 2001/03/26: C~/61riRU ~r V/a/K V W~~~ ~d with this
 Approved For Releas QOJfq~,(, q, - 96-00787E A0200080007-7 339
PUTHOFF AND TARG: PERCEPTUAL CHANN
TARGET-TENNIS COURTS
Fig. 6. Subject Elgin (S2) drawings in response to tennis court target.
subject. It was a demonstration experiment for a government
visitor who had heard of our work and wanted to evaluate our
experimental protocol.
In the laboratory, the subject, holding a bearing compass at
arm's length, began the experiment by indicating the direction
of the target demarcation team correctly to within 5?. (In all
four experiments with this subject, he has always been within
10? of the correct direction in this angular assessment.) The
subject then generated a 15-min tape-recorded description and
the drawings shown in Fig. 6.
In discussing the drawings, Elgin indicated that he was
uncertain as to the action, but had the impression that the
demarcation team was located at a museum (known to him)
in a particular park. In fact, the target was a tennis court lo-
cated in that park about 90 m from the indicated museum.
Once again, we note the characteristic (discussed earlier) of a
resemblance between the target site and certain gestalt ele-
ments of the subject's response, especially in regard to the
drawings, coupled with incomplete or erroneous analysis of
the significances. Nonetheless, when rank ordering transcripts
1 through 8 at the site, the judge ranked this transcript as 2.
This example illustrates a continuing observation that most of
the correct information related to us by subjects is of a non-
analytic nature pertaining to shape, form, color, and material
rather than to function or name.
A second example from this group, generated by S3 (Swann),
A with
tt
experiments, he dictates two lists for us to record. One list
contains objects that he "sees," but does not think are located
at the remote scene. A second list contains objects that he
thinks are at the scene. In our evaluation, he has made much
progress in this most essential ability to separate memory
and imagination from paranormal inputs. This is the key to
bringing the remote-viewing channel to fruition with regard to
its potential usefulness.
The quality of transcript that can be generated by this pro-
cess is evident from the results of our most recent experiment
with Swann. The target location chosen by the usual double-
blind protocol was the Palo Alto City Hall. Swann described a
tall building with vertical columns and "set in" windows. His
sketch, together with the photograph of the site, is shown in
Fig. 7. He said there was a fountain, "but I don't hear it."
At the time the target team was at the City Hall during the
experiment, the fountain was not running. He also made an
effort to draw a replica of the designs in the pavement in front
of the building, and correctly indicated the number of trees
(four) in the sketch.
For the entire series of eight, four each from S2 and S3, the
numerical evaluation based on blind rank ordering of tran-
scripts at each site was significant at p = 3.8 X 10-4 and in-
cluded three direct hits and three second ranks for the target-
associated transcripts (see Table IV).
were carried
ain.
indicates the level of proficiency that can be a
To complete the series, four experiments each
h
practice. In the two years since we first started working wit
-
;ubjects Swann,A famed e~~ r _oscenY IAi t lea oRQ~?nd~007~ makennasha
ternal ig
 Approved For ^Iease 2001/03/26 : CIA-RDP96.~1~ R787R000200080007-7
PROCEEDINGS OF THE IEEE, MARCH 1976
TABLE IV
DISTRIBUTION OF RANKINGS ASSIGNED TO TRANSCRIPTS ASSOCIATED
WITH EACH TARGET LOCATION FOR EXPERIENCED SUBJECTS ELGIN (S2)
AND SWANN (S3)
PA.
Subject
Tar et Location
Distance
km
Rank of
Associated
Transcript
S5
Pedestrian overpass, Palo Alto
5.0
3
S5
Railroad trestle bridge, Palo Alto
1.3
6
S5
Windmill, Portola Valley
8.5
2
S5, S6
White Plaza, Stanford (2)
3.8
1
S6
Airport, Palo Alto
5.5
2
S6
Kiosk in Park, Menlo Park
0.3
5
S6
Boathouse, Stanford
4.0
1
Total am of ranks
20
(p=0.08, NS)
suml~
r5 00 71.
1040 am.
Fig. 7. Subject Swann (S3) response to City Hall target.
group, did not differ significantly from chance. For the series
of eight (judged as a group of seven since one target came up
twice, once for Bach subject), the numerical evaluation based
on blind rank ordering of transcripts at each site was non-
significant at p = 0.08, even though there were two direct hits
and two second ranks out of the seven (see Table V).
One of the dirt hits, which occurred with subject S6 in her
first experiment, provides an example of the "first-time effect"
that has been rigorously explored and is well-known to experi-
menters in the I field [57]. The outbound experimenter
obtained, by random protocol from the pool, a target blind
to the experimenter with the subject, as is our standard pro-
Subject
Target Location
Distance
km
Rank of
Associated
Transcript
S2
BART Station (Transit System), Fremont
16.1
1
S2
Shielded room, SRI, Menlo Park
0.1
2
S2
Tennis court, Palo Alto
3.4
2
52
Golf course bridge, Stanford
3.4
2
S3
City Hall, Palo Alto
2.0
1
S3
Miniature golf course, Menlo Park
3.0
1
S3
Kiosk in park, Menlo Park
0.3
3
S3
Baylands Nature Preserve, Palo Alto
6.4
3
Total sum of ranks
15
(p.3.8x10-*)
TABLE V
DISTRIBUTION OF RANKINGS ASSIGNED To TRANSCRIPTS ASSOCIATED
vious experience in remote viewing, began to describe a large
square with a fountain. Four minutes into the experiment,
she recognized the location and correctly identified it by name
(see Fig. 8). (It should be noted that in the area from which
the target locations were drawn there are other fountains
as well, some of which were in the target pool.) As an ex-
ample of the style of the narratives generated during remote
viewing with inexperienced subjects and of the part played by
the experimenter remaining with the subject in such a case,
we have included the entire unedited text of this experiment
as Appendix B.
E. Normal and Paranormal: Use of Unselected Subjects in
Remote Viewing
After more than a year of following the experimental pro-
tocol described above and observing that even inexperienced
subjects generated results better than expected, we initiated a
series of experiments to explore further whether individuals
other than putative "psychics" can demonstrate the remote-
viewing ability. To test this idea, we have a continuing pro-
gram to carry out additional experiments of the outdoor type
with new subjects whom we have no a priori reason to believe
have paranormal perceptual ability. To date we have collected
data from five experiments with two individuals in this cate-
gory: a man and a woman who were visiting government
scientists interested in observing our experimental protocols.
The motivation for the +. I
s
e par lcu ar experiments was twofold.
cedure, and proceeded to the location. The s_ub,[je~ct~y ,a mathe- st e e he level of
matician Al*j9dfs 1R ,_ ~e: 4 #404111 ft 6~ea volunteers. nSJ
 Approved For Release 001/03/26 : CI&- X96-007870200080007-7
PUTHOFF AND TARG: PERCEPTUAL CHAN FOR INFORMATION
Fig. 8. Subject (S6) drawing of White Plaza, Stanford University. Sub-
ject drew what she called "curvy benches" and then announced cor-
rectly that the place was "White Plaza at Stanford."
Second, when an individual observes a successful demonstra-
tion experiment involving another person as subject, it inevi-
tably occurs to him that perhaps chicanery is involved. We
have found the most effective way to settle this issue for the
observer is to have the. individual himself act as a subject so as
to obtain personal experience against which our reported
results can be evaluated.
The first visitor (V1) was invited to participate as a subject
in a three-experiment series. All three experiments contained
elements descriptive of the associated target locations; the
dw.C