PSYCHIC RESEARCH: NEW DIMENSIONS OR OLD DELUSIONS? ROBERT G. JAHN. PRINCETON UNIVERSITY

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• Collection: STARGATE
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP96-00787R000500380001-7
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• Document Creation Date: November 4, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 11, 1998
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• Publication Date: November 8, 1979
• Content Type: PAPER

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Psychic Research: New Dimensions or Old Delusions?
Robert G. Jahn
Princeton University
No field of scholarly endeavor has proven more frustrat-
ing, nor has been more abused and misunderstood, than the
study of psychic phenomena. Dealing as it does as much with
impressionistic and aesthetic evidence as with analytical
substance, and carrying by its nature strongly personal and
numenistic overtones, it has been incessantly prostituted
by charlatans, lunatics, and sensationalists, categorically
rejected by most of the scientific establishment, and seri-
ously misunderstood by the public at large. The purpose of
this presentation is to review some of the history, nomen-
clature, and contemporary serious effort in this area; to
discuss whether, once the overburden of illegitimate activity
and irresponsible criticism is removed, there is sufficient
residue of valid evidence to justify continued research; and,
if so, to suggest how this research might best be styled,
facilitated, and evaluated.
Presented at the New Horizons in Science Seventeenth
Annual Briefing, Council for the Advancement of Science
Writing, Inc., Palo Alto, California, November 8, 1979.
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At the risk of some immodesty, it is probably worthwhile
to set my remarks in the context of a bit of the personal
history which leads me to this task. My formal training is
that of an engineer and applied physicist, and the bulk of
my research has concerned a sequence of topics in the broad
domain of the aerospace sciences: fluid mechanics, ionized
gases, plasmadynamics, and most recently, electric propulsion.
My appointments have been primarily in the academic sector,
at Lehigh, Caltech, and Princeton, where for the past eight
and one-half years I have been Dean of the School of Engineer-
ing and Applied Science. This school, which currently enrolls
850 of the university's 4400 undergraduates, features a sub-
stantial amount of independent work in its curriculum, and
it was in that context three years ago that I was requested
by one of our very best students to supervise a project in
psychic phenomena. More specifically, this young lady pro-
posed to bring her talents and background in electrical engi-
neering and computer science to bear on a study of controlled,
low-level psychokinesis. Although I had had no previous ex-
perience, professional or personal, with such topics, for a
variety of pedagogical reasons I agreed, and together we map-
ped a tentative scholarly path, involving a literature search,
visits to appropriate laboratories and professional meetings,
and the design, construction, and operation of simple experi-
ments. My initial oversight role in this project led inexo-
rably to a degree of personal involvement, and that to a
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growing intellectual bemusement, to the extent that by the
time this student graduated, I was persuaded that this was
a legitimate field for a high technologist to study. It is
in that spirit I have continued to consider the problem and
in that tone I speak to you today.
To proceed with the effort, I obtained the appropriate
approval from my university, assembled a small staff, and
secured the requisite funding from a few private sources.
I should emphasize that my fractional involvement with this
program is quite minor in comparison to my other responsibil-
ities, and that the work is still very preliminary and tenta-
tive, but it provides the base of cognizance for my broader
.remarks on the field.
I confess that I shall make these remarks with some
trepidation, borne of previous unpleasant experiences. For
example, an earlier lighthearted article in the Princeton
alumni magazine' in which I attempted to share some of our
experiences in this field with the university community
brought an intensity and breadth of reaction for which I was
totally unprepared, ranging from irresponsible and categori-
cal condemnation on one extreme, to equally irrational messi-
anic accolades on the other. Rather than precipitating fur-
ther such distracting outbursts, I have largely avoided op-
portunities for public presentation, a guideline I am setting
aside on this occasion only because I believe that this audi-
ence can have an unusually significant effect on the development
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of the field by the manner in which it chooses to represent
it to its respective constituencies. It is my request that
you treat this as a tutorial presentation, hopefully contrib-
uting to your cognizance of, and attitude toward psychic re-
search, rather than as any claim of specific individual
achievement therein.
To get on with the matter in terms of a brief historical
background, I would remind you that whereas human interest in
psychic phenomena is at least as old as recorded history,
clearly displayed in the cave drawings of ancient man, in var-
ied articles of the early Greek, Roman, and oriental civiliza-
tions, in the Bible, and in medieval and renaissance art and
literature, systematic scholarly search for understanding of
these phenomena is just one century old. It was in 1882 that
the Society for Psychical Research was founded in London, pro-
viding the first professional forum for presentation of con-
trolled experiments in telepathy and clairvoyance. The Ameri-
can counterpart, ASPR, was formed three years later, with
William James as one of its leaders. The most familiar and
substantial academic effort in this country was initiated at
Duke University in the 1930's, when J. B. Rhine and Louisa
Rhine established a parapsychology laboratory and began pub-
lication of the Journal of Parapsychology. A second profes-
sional organization called the Parapsychological Association
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was formed in this country in 1957, and in 1969 was recog-
nized as an affiliate by the American Association for the
Advancement of Science.
Over this first 100 years of scholarly effort, the field
has attracted a significant number of eminent scholars from
established fields. The SPR alone has numbered among its
presidents three Nobel laureates, ten Fellows of the Royal
Society, one Prime Minister, and a substantial list of physi-
cists and philosophers, including Henry Sidgwick, William
James, Frederic W. H. Myers, Lord Rayleigh, Edmund Gurney,
Sir William Crookes, Sir William Barrett, Henri Bergson,
Gardner Murphy, and G. N. M. Tyrell.
At the present time, there are seven English language
journals covering this field, supplemented by numerous less
formal magazines and countless books of widely varying qual-
ity and relevance. Research activity is reported from over
twenty U.S. universities and colleges, and many foreign in-
stitutions, but in most cases it is of very small scale.
There are very few credible academic programs of study, al-
though some fifty M.A. and Ph.D. theses have been accepted
on psychic topics at reputable universities over the past
forty years. (Cambridge University has just awarded its
first Ph.D. for a thesis in this area.) 2 Some ten research
institutes and private corporations in the United States have
also authorized publications and reports in the field. The
extent of Eastern Bloc effort and of classified research in
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this country are matters of considerable speculation on which
I cannot comment with authority.
In many respects the present status and growth pattern
of this field resemble those of the natural sciences in their
earliest days, or perhaps even more those of the incubation
of clinical psychology, in terms of the absence of replicable
basic experiments and useful theoretical models, the low level
of financial support and internal professional coordination,
and the low credibility in the academic establishment and
public sectors.
For purposes of constructing a concise catalogue, I shall
define psychic phenomena to include all processes of informa-
tion and/or energy transfer which involve animate conscious-
ness in a manner not presently explicable in terms of known
science. By psychic research, I shall imply any scholarly
study of such phenomena employing scientific methodology, or
a quasi-scientific variation of it suggested later, as opposed
to any dogmatic, ritualistic, or theological approaches. With
this definition, the field may be roughly divided into two
major categories: (1) extrasensory perception (ESP), which
includes such information transfer processes as telepathy
(perception of another's thoughts or emotions), clairvoyance
(perception of hidden objects or events), precognition (per-
ception of future events), and various animal ESP indications
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(homing, trailing, group consciousness, etc.); and (2) psy-
chokinesis, which subsumes a variety of effects wherein energy
is transferred to a physical system, either in controlled or
spontaneous effort, and over a wide range of energy levels.
(A few types of psychic process, such as survival/reincarna-
tion, psychic healing, out-of-body experiences, etc., while
not fitting these categories quite so neatly, actually involve
aspects of both at a more fundamental level.) Note that in
this subdivision, the field conforms to the two major thrusts
of present-day science and high technology, i.e. the extrac-
tion, processing, transmission, and storage of information,
and of energy.
In my opinion, a comprehensive, objective survey of the
scholarly research into psychic phenomena over the past one
hundred years would support the following conclusion: some
of the results are suggestive, some even provocative; none
is fully convincing in the traditional scientific sense.
Obviously, more extreme opinions have been voiced on either
side of this position. On the one side, there are zealots
who claim the case has been made, by their own experiments or
others; I cannot claim that for my own work, or for any other
I have seen. On the other side, there are critics who reject
the field categorically for an assortment of reasons, includ-
ing instances of outright fraud; naivete of method, such as
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sensory cueing of subjects, application of improper statis-
tics, or other theoretical incompetence; failure of repli-
cability, evasiveness of the phenomena under close scrutiny,
and sensitivity of results to the observer, all of which
violate the scientific method; and the vague conviction that
since nothing totally convincing has been demonstrated during
this century of study, the domain must be fundamentally
invalid.
In my view, all of these criticisms are justified to some
degree, but in some cases they have been overworked. This
field, by the nature of its phenomena and its inherent numen-
istic overtones is immensely vulnerable to fraudulent exploi-
tation and naive gullibility, and such have indeed prevailed
to a distressing degree. Yet, it seems shortsighted and
irresponsible to tar all sincere and scholarly work with this
brush. To my knowledge, there have been no totally replicable
experiments yet performed; what yield there has been has been
anecdotal, or at best, statistical. It should be noted, how-
ever, that numerous areas of modern science percolate content-
edly on less statistical yield than is offered by some of the
better psychic studies. The sensitivity of psychic experi-
ments to the particular observer could indeed be indicative
of fraud or delusion; but it could also be an important clue
to the role of human consciousness in such processes. The
frustrating evasiveness of the phenomena to more precise and
refined experimental techniques is perhaps the most damning
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criticism from a scientific standpoint; yet even this may
offer a legitimate indication of a basic characteristic of.
the processes: e.g., just as great art, great music, or great
creative thought in general may be stifled or sterilized by
excessive analysis or constraint, so psychic effects may be
intrinsically casual and free-flowing, rather than deliberate.
Finally, the complaint that enough effort has already been
squandered on this psychic goose-chase could be ameliorated
by the recent availability of far more precise instrumentation,
and far more powerful theoretical tools and data handling
methods than have heretofore been deployed.
On balance, then, categorical rejection seems to me
equally as untenable as blind acceptance. Rather, I prefer an
attitude which first strips away the overburden of illegiti-
mate and sloppy work, and then submits the residue to close
individual scrutiny. This done, one finds a few--to be sure,
a very few--experiments which provide sufficiently provocative
anecdotal evidence to justify further serious and systematic
study. From my own point of view, I am most interested in
three such categories of study: (1) the so-called "remote
perception" work of a number of laboratories, notably SRI,3
Mundelein College,4 and our own, which has provided an a.de-
quately large data base, of sufficiently high yield, to allow
quantification and parametric correlations of the inexplicable
results; (2) certain experiments in controlled, low-level
psychokinesis, such as performed by physicists at the Mind
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Science Foundation in San Antonio,5 at Birkbeck College,
University of London,6 and also in our laboratory, which have
the advantage of focusing on quantifiable physical systems,
wherein the departures from classical behavior can be made
more explicit; and (3) the rare and spectacular poltergeist
events, or so-called recurrent spontaneous psychokinesis
(RSPK), which in the magnitude of their effects, and the
demonstrated correlations with neurologically extraordinary
adolescents,7 seem to offer rich, yet largely unutilized
opportunities for insight.
This list is not exhaustive; others would point to an
extensive series of "ganzfeld" or sensory deprivation studies
of free response clairvoyance and telepathy as pioneered at
Maimonides Hospital8 and replicated at other laboratories9;
to the systematic and conservative reincarnation studies at
the University of Virginia10; to the modern psycho-physiolog-
ical studies at Duke University11; or to a few other deliberate
programs elsewhere.
Since even the best extant research has been tediously
slow to yield convincing results, if a new round of experiments
is to be considered it seems important to reexamine, ab initio,
the criteria, topic selection, and philosophical attitude that
should prevail. For example, given the preceding pattern of
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violations of the normal requisites for scientific credibil-
ity, what is the healthiest attitude toward data collection
and assessment in this field? Should one reject out-of-hand
all results that do not rigidly conform to the normal tenets
of replicability and insensitivity to observer? Should one
waive those requirements and attempt to theorize and deduce
solely on the basis of anecdotal phenomenology? Or is there
a useful intermediate position--a quasi-scientific approach,
if you will--which while retaining full rigor in the experi-
mental design and protocol, and still striving for some degree
of reproducibility in the observations, tolerates imperfect
replicability as possibly indicative of as yet unidentified
parameters, of an intrinsically statistical nature of the
phenomena, or even of a basic flaw or incompleteness in the
established physical models?
Whatever the attitude, it seems clear that, at this
primitive stage of understanding, the specific experiments
selected should be as clearly posed and conceptually simple
as possible, with a minimum of reasonable alternative inter-
pretations of any positive results. In addition, they should
lend themselves logistically to rigorous, tightly controlled
experimentation, and demonstrate sufficient positive yield to
permit accumulation of a significant data base and its subse-
quent correlation with variable experimental conditions.
Given these attributes, it would also seem best to focus on
those studies which seem to have the greatest significance
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in terms of basic understanding of the phenomenology, contra-
diction of established scientific models, and ultimate prac-
tical application.
In all of the zeal for quasi-scientific rigor, there
may be some risk of over-sterilizing the experimentation. If
the phenomena derive to any significant degree from conscious
or subconscious processes of the human mind, it is important
that such not be ignored or inhibited in the design and oper-
ation of the experiments. More specifically, it is probably
essential to include the insights, interpretations, and in-
tuitions of those who have dealt most effectively in such
processes, including not only the academics and professional
observers, but most particularly those who have demonstrated
creative capabilities in the generation of the phenomena.
It is quite possible that the difference between a sterile
experiment and an effective one of equal rigor lies in the
more aesthetic aspects of its ambience and feedback than in
the elegance of its instrumentation, and the former need to
be well-tuned to the human subjects who are asked to function
as components of the experimental system.
On the basis of this sort of logic, our own program at
Princeton has selected two classes of experiments for its
principal foci.l The major portion of the program revolves
about a number of table-top experiments in controlled, low-
level psychokinesis, using relatively simple physical systems--
mechanical, optical, thermal, electrical, atomic, etc.--each of
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which involves a specific element or process that is vul-
nerable to disturbance, and which signifies such disturbance
by a relatively large change in some feedback display for the
subject. So, for example, our interferometer can indicate a
disturbance of one of its optical plates of less than one-
millionth of a centimeter by a perceptible change in an attrac-
tive pattern of luminous concentric circular fringes displayed
before the subject. Using this display much like a biofeed-
back indicator, that subject can then experiment with his own
conscious or subconscious strategies for achieving the desired
disturbance of the system. Other experiments monitor the de-
viations in temperature of thermistors to one-thousandth of a
degree with a progressive pattern of small colored lights;
the variations in electrical noise from a solid-state diode
interface with an illuminated digital display; or the develop-
ment of the statistical deflections of 10,000 marbles cascading
through an array of obstructing pins by direct visual and
photographic observation.
It is far too early to claim any definitive results from
these experiments. On numerous occasions we have seen effects
that to the best of our understanding and control of the pre-
vailing conditions are classically inexplicable, but these
effects vary from experiment to experiment, from subject to
subject, and alas, from day to day. Whether substantial in-
crease in our data base will sort any of this out remains to
be seen.
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The minor portion of our program addresses certain as-
pects of the "remote perception" problem mentioned earlier.
In this type of study, the subject attempts to perceive as-
pects of a randomly selected target scene in which a colleague
in the experiment, termed the agent, is immersed at a given
time. Typically the percipient records his impressions of
the target on tape, by sketch, or by notes, which then are
rank-ordered against a pool of alternative targets by inde-
pendent judges. Our particular effort has been to replace
the necessarily subjective human judging process which is
inherently vulnerable to personal biases and interpretations,
by a more analytical method for evaluation of the degree of
information transfer in such perception efforts. Briefly,
the strategy involves coding of both the targets and percep-
tions in terms of some thirty binary descriptions, e.g. out-
side/inside; dark/light; noisy/quiet; motion/none; water/none;
etc., and allowing a variety of scoring and ranking algorithms
to derive quantitative indices of the quality and quantity of
the information transfer.
Again it is too early to make firm claims, but this
method clearly holds promise of reducing the ambiguity in in-
terpretation of this class of experiment, which has shown some
of the highest yields of any controlled psychic studies.
It should be added that our particular experiments have dealt
primarily with the precognitive mode of remote perception,
wherein the percipient completes his report substantially
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before the target site is selected. We find the yield to
be at least as high as for similar experiments performed in
"real time," and we prefer this mode for two reasons. First,
the logical impossibility of the task is heightened, forcing
the subjects to abandon various unproductive strategies for
the perception and rely more completely on "paranormal" mental
process. Second, the, contradiction with established physical
conception of space/time is more stark, hence potentially more
generally illuminating.
Next to the evasiveness of the phenomena under controlled
experimentation, the second greatest frustration in the study
of psychic processes has been the absence of viable theoreti-
cal models with which to begin the traditional dialogue between
theory and experiment on which all scientific progress eventu-
ally depends. For perhaps naive reasons, early hypotheses
tended to presume wavelike propagation of psychic effects,
usually in the electromagnetic modes, but many experimental
results have raised serious doubts that such models are ten-
able. Only recently has the attention of a significant number
of theoretical physicists been drawn anew to this task, with
the result that broader and more elegant representations are
now being attempted which hold higher hope of accommodating
the diverse and bizarre phenomena characteristic of this
field.
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Attempts at theoretical explication can proceed from
any of several levels of presumption as to the fundamentality
of the effects observed. For example, one may presume that:
a) the effects observed are illusory, e.g. arti-
facts of poor experimentation;
b) the effects can be assigned to known physical
processes, not deliberately precipitated by the subject (e.g.
heat transfer, vibration, aerochemistry, etc.);
c) the effects are deliberately precipitated by
the subject, but involve only known physical and physiological
processes (e.g. electromagnetic radiation from brain circuitry
or intercardial potentials);
d) the effects are deliberately precipitated by
the subject, but can be accommodated within existing physical
formalism only after identification of heretofore unrecognized
modes of energy/information transfer;
e) the effects cannot be handled within existing
physical formalism (e.g. the fundamental laws need further gener-
alization, perhaps similar to the evolution of classical mechanics
into quantum mechanics, or into special and general relativity);
f) the effects, although observable under controlled
conditions, cannot be handled within a scientific paradigm
(e.g. they are intrinsically irreplicable).
Obviously the subtlety of the model required, and the breadth
of its significance increase markedly as one proceeds through
this hierarchy of possibilities.
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Present theories of psychic phenomena tend to cluster
into four or five broad groups which can only be described.
here in the most superficial terms. As mentioned, the first
serious models dealt in terms of electromagnetic waves,
usually in the very low frequency bands,12 some versions of
which proposed modulation of the earth's magnetic field, or
of prevalent electrostatic fields of the ambient environment.
Other types of geophysical waves have since been considered,
such as geoseismic waves, infrasonic waves, and barometric
fluctuations, 13 but all of these now seem to be fundamentally
inadequate to deal with certain classes of psychic phenomena,
most particularly precognition.
More recent efforts have involved applications of the
formalisms of various other categories of physical mechanics,
for example:
a) statistical mechanics and statistical thermo-
dynamics, whereby the subtle interplay of the thermodynamic
concept of entropy with information theory is allowed to take
on a. broader implication in terms of the role of human con-
sciousness in influencing random processes 14;
b) hyperspace theories, whereby the basic laws
of physics are recast and re-solved in more than the four
coordinates of normal experience (3 space, 1 time), and the
consequent new terms are applied to the representation of
paranormal effects15;
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c) quantum mechanics, whose inherently probabi-
listic approach lends itself to representation of phenomena
that depart significantly from strictly deterministic se-
quences of cause and effect 16-18
d) holographic inversions, whereby all of reality
is regarded as deployed in an infinite syllabus of amplitude/
frequency information, and the brain is hypothesized to func-
tion as a Fourier transform device to provide the familiar
space/time localized imagery.19
Although none of these has yet produced anything approach-
ing a satisfactory theoretical model, each probably has some-
thing to contribute to our conceptualization of the phenomeno-
logical processes addressed. For example, their application
in various forms to the anecdotal experimental evidence assem-
bled to date leads me to speculate that the following rather
drastic possibilities may be worthy of more detailed examina-
tion:
1) The phenomena. may be inherently statistical,
rather than directly causal, and we may be observing them "on
the margin," i.e. the observed phenomena may represent margi-
nal changes from normal behavior, on a very grand scale, and
with fluctuation times which tax human observational capa-
bility.
2) Human consciousness may have an information-
ordering capability that can be projected into an external
system as well as received from it.
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3) Quantum mechanics may be more than a system of
physical mechanics; it may be a fundamental statement about
human consciousness and perception processes, and the empirical
pillars of this formalism, such as the uncertainty principle,
the exclusion principle, the indistinguishability principle,
and the wave/particle dualities may be more laws of conscious-
ness than laws of nature.
4) Psychic processes may be inherently holistic,
and thus the ultimate model may need to integrate both the
scientific and the aesthetic aspects in order to identify the
sources of the phenomena. That is, psychic processes may be
manifestations of the intersection of the analytical scien-
tific world with the creative aesthetic, and thus to represent
them effectively, it may be necessary to balance insights of
both perspectives, without sacrificing the integrity of either.
Clearly, any of these intuitions would have to be developed
in far more philosophical and analytical detail before a
trenchant theoretical model could emerge, but at this primi-
tive stage it is probably healthy to consider a few such
radical possibilities, along with more prosaic explications.
Let us close by returning to the basic questions which
undeniably underlie our attention to this topic. Namely,
are psychic phenomena real; and, if so, should they be
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studied? The latter question begs a sequence of others, i.e.
can such phenomena be studied systematically; would the knowl-
edge derived from such study be significant; would that knowl-
edge be useful; etc.? The honest response to all of these
is that at present we simply do not'know. The jury is still
out--or more accurately, it has not even left yet; adequate
evidence has not yet been presented to it. At this phase,
therefore, everyone is entitled to his own informal and con-
sidered opinions on such questions, and is equally entitled
to the tolerance of others toward those opinions.
But to the much broader, and indeed even more signifi-
cant question: "do we have the right to inquire?", as a
scientist and an academic I must make much firmer response,
and if need be, defense. The fundamental requisites of sci-
entific methodology: dispassionate rigor; humility in the
face of observations; limitation on extrapolation of results;
and openness of mind apply to any sincere scholarly endeavor,
including psychic research. When these criteria are met,
the results should be heard openly and fairly.
And these criteria are equally appropriate to the process
of criticism. When they are honored, that criticism can play
a healthy and constructive role. But when the criticism lacks
any of these; when it is tainted by categorical rejection,
guilt by association, or sloppy logic, it should be at least
as suspect as the object of its attack.
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I have spoken to you thus not as an advocate of psychic
phenomena as valid science, but as an advocate of the right--
indeed the obligation--of science to inquire into this field,
with the same diligence, patience, integrity, openness, and
tolerance--in both its study and in its criticism--that have
characterized its noblest achievements of the past.
As recorders, transmitters, and interpreters of such
activities for the public benefit, you have the same right,
and--if you will permit me--the same obligation, to maintain
that same high tone.
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