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Testing for telepathy in connection with e-mails.
Rupert Sheldrake1, Pamela Smart
1ars@dircon.co.uk
Perceptual and Motor Skills
|February 24, 2006
Summary
This study explored telepathic communication via email, with participants guessing the sender. Results showed significantly higher-than-chance accuracy, suggesting potential psychic abilities in email communication.
Area of Science:
- Parapsychology
- Anomalistic Psychology
- Information Theory
Background:
- The study addresses the intriguing possibility of telepathic communication.
- Investigates whether psychic phenomena can manifest in digital communication, specifically email.
Purpose of the Study:
- To determine if participants could accurately guess the sender of an email above chance levels.
- To explore the potential for telepathic signaling in a controlled experimental setting.
Main Methods:
- Participants guessed the sender of an email from four possibilities.
- Data collected over 552 trials with 50 participants.
- Further trials with 5 participants were videotaped for continuous observation.
Main Results:
- Overall accuracy was 43% (235/552 hits), significantly exceeding the 25% chance expectation.
- Videotaped trials showed 47% accuracy (64/137 hits), also significantly above chance.
- Findings suggest a non-random element in sender identification.
Conclusions:
- The results indicate a statistically significant ability to identify the sender of an email beyond random guessing.
- This suggests that telepathic communication might play a role in email exchanges.
- Further research is warranted to explore the mechanisms and reliability of this phenomenon.