New insights into the links between ESP and geomagnetic activity

By Adrian Ryan, in the Journal of Scientific Exploration, Fall 2008

A database of 343 free-response ESP trials conducted at centers in the U.K. was constructed in order to test the hypothesis that the relatively fast varying components of geomagnetic activity, geomagnetic pulsations, might be driving the reported associations between ESP, geomagnetic activity and local sidereal time. Local geomagnetic field-strength measurements taken at 1-second intervals during 99 trials, and at 5-second intervals during 244 trials, were converted by fast Fourier transform into power within five frequency bands. Two patterns were observed: ESP was found to succeed only during periods of enhanced pulsation activity within the 0.2-0.5 Hz band, but ESP effect was absent during the most disturbed periods of activity in the 0.025-0.1 Hz band.

The pattern of ESP effect by local sidereal time was similar to that found by Spottiswoode (1997b), and this shape was found to be attributable to the pattern of ESP results by pulsation activity in the 0.2-0.5 Hz band.

The observed patterns were demonstrated to have excellent explanatory power in terms of accounting for findings previously reported in the literature.

Go here for the full paper

Comments

David Bailey said…
These results seem incredibly hard to understand theoretically. I mean, treating ESP as some form of manifestation of a higher reality (my way of looking at it) seems totally at odds with a dependence on the geomagnetic field strength! NB, I think I am right in saying that conventional electromagnetic effects have been ruled out as an explanation of ESP)

Would I be right to assume that these fluctuations arise from variations in the solar wind?

Dean - can you speculate on what this really means? Are you going to try to add an oscillating magnetic field to your presentiment experiment (or to correlate the results to the geomagnetic field (or the assumption that geomagnetism affects a range of psi effects).
Friday, November 28, 2008
Dean Radin said…
Yes, these fluctuations are largely driven by the solar wind. I suspect that they reflect what other correlation studies have shown: Physiology and behavior of all sorts of living things are modulated by subtle fluctuations in the Earth's geomagnetic field.

Psi performance is a form of human behavior, so the fact that it too is modulated by the GMF is not unexpected. It doesn't necessarily suggest anything about underlying physical mechanisms for psi. To my knowledge, only James Spottiswoode and Michael Persinger (or others in his lab) have explicitly tested whether artificially manipulating the magnetic field in the vicinity of the head would influence psi performance. I think more studies like those are warranted.
Friday, November 28, 2008
Blue Mystic said…
I wonder...could this have anything to do with "ley lines"...
Friday, November 28, 2008
Klaus S said…
If there are "higher planes" of reality, they have to interact with "lower planes". Essentially, they presumably are the same reality, like clouds, water and ice are H20. I can see nothing strange with that.
M Persinger has done a lot of works regarding the influence of magnetic fields on the human brain, which surely, somehow, must be a link in the chain making PSI possible to perceive or work.

Otherwaise - se would be stuck in some kind of dualism (or trialism or quartalism or) where different "planes" work isolated from each other, whithout being able to interact or influence.
Sunday, November 30, 2008
qraal said…
Might fit with the theory that ESP is communication through the "Anima Mundi" - the World Soul - which is physically a part of the Earth's geomagnetic system. Basically Gaia's Internet. You mentioned Persinger, who has been looking at geomagnetic effects on consciousness for years. There's also Johnjoe McFadden's Conscious ElectroMagnetic Field theory of consciousness, which sees our consciousness as the EM field created by the neuronal activity of the brain, but able to in turn affect changes in that activity directly. Thus ESP might be driven by sensitivity to the much larger EM field we live in, itself modulated by the much larger EM wind created by the Sun.
Sunday, November 30, 2008
eml said…
These correlations don't comment on the possibility that esp'ers of the professional or stellar performing kind might also have the ability to entrain their minds or biofields to the requisite frequencies independant of what is going on in the ambient environment.
Monday, December 01, 2008
anonymous said…
Hi Dean,

Is there any opinion about whether psi varies with geomagnetic activity because the wrong geomagnetic conditions interfere with psi or because the right geomagnetic conditions enhance psi?

If geomagnetic activity can increase psi maybe someone can create more intense magnetic conditions than occur naturally and get even stronger psi effects in a laboratory.

Is anyone looking at building an electronic device to create optimal magnetic conditions in a local environment, a room or a helmet that could improve psi?

If this were possible the configuration that worked best, room, vs helmet, vs body suit etc. might tell something about how psi works.

Is there evidence that it is a magnetic effect as implied by the word "geomagnetic" or is there simply a correlation with geomagnetic conditions?
Friday, January 23, 2009
Unknown said…
I am not a scientist, just a mother trying to make sense of her son's descent into schizophrenia. Ronald W. Kay has published an article linking geomagnetic storms in the northern hempisphere during the winter and spring months to factors affecting uterine development and the subsequent onset of schizophrenia. I have found my son to be psychic at times, as people with his diagnosis usually are. He was born in January, and it is known that people with schizophrenia tend to be born in the months of October through March when Earth's magnetic activity is at its lowest level. Do you have any thoughts on this?
__________________
Kay, Ronald W., Schizophrenia and season of birth: relationship to geomagnetic storms .
Schizophrenia Research , Volume 66 , Issue 1 , Pages 7 - 20,
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
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