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The Cognitive Sciences Laboratory
330 Cowper Street, Suite 200, Palo Alto, CA 94301
Voice: 415.327.2007— Fax: 415.322.7960
An Employee-Owned Company
e-mail: may@hildegard.saicmp.com
Memorandum
Date:
6 June 1995
To:
I
From: Edwin C. May, Ph.D.
Re:
Project Evaluation
I welcome the opportunity
for an in-depth, comprehensive, and fair evaluation of the
project.
In anticipation of such a review, I have been examining the issues for years from
the perspective of how I would approach the task incorporating what I have learned from
the previous extensive evaluations.
In this memorandum,
I
will
describe an
efficient,
rapid,
and comprehensive program
review that specifies questions to be answered, evaluation criteria, analysis methodology,
and decision thresholds for the continuation of the program.
General Approach
One difficulty with all the previous reviews was that the evaluation questions were not
clearly delineated.
Typically they were amalgams of sometimes conflicting issues that
include the
existence of valid phenomena,
external
threats,
and
actual
or perceived
application potential. Each of the domains imply different evaluation methodologies and
have vastly different criteria to assess their validity. Within each there may be additional
questions that require different and specific evaluation criteria. For example, the criterion
to validate the existence of anomalous cognition
(i.e., the acquisition, by mental means
alone, of information
that
is secured by
distance,
time, or shielding)
is considerably
different from that to validate the existence of anomalous perturbation
(i.e., the influence,
by mental means alone, of physically
isolated and secured matter).
In the application
domain, the hit-rate criterion for bang useful in one arena such as finding hidden or lost
objects might be an order of magnitude lower than
is required by
those who request
architectural-level
descriptions
of remote
locations.
In
addition,
these
criteria
are
relatively independent of the quality of the anomalous cognition and generally can only be
specified by the product recipient.
Figure
1 shows a schematic representation of the evaluation problem.
The evaluation
must proceed
within
the
context of the
sponsoring
agency,
in
this
case from
the
intelligence perspective.
A
detailed discussion on the
points
in Figure
follow the
schematic.
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Figure 1. Evaluation Domain
All anomalous mental phenomena can identified as belonging to two categories:
•
Information
Acquisition.
Traditional names
for these phenomena
include
ESP,
telepathy,
clairvoyance, and precognition. We have adopted
the term anomalous
cognition (AC) because
it does not imply
a mechanism and
is descriptive of the
observables.
•
Physical Interaction.
Traditional names for these phenomena include, psychokinesis
(PK), materialization and dematerialization,
healing, and teleportation.
We use the
term anomalousperturbation (AP).
For research and evaluation, these negative definitions pose a serious problem.
That
is,
AC and AP are what happens when nothing else should.
For anomalous cognition,
it is
relatively straight forward to secure targeted information in an application environment or
laboratory experiment from inadvertent leakage to a receiver (i.e., subject, remote viewer,
etc.); however, for AP it is very expensive and nearly impossible.
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Top-Down Decision
About Applications
Given that a government-sponsored program in anomalous mental phenomena has existed
for 20 years, the overriding consideration to continue to include such an activity within
the intelligence community must rest primarily upon applications.
That is, we must:
•
At
least show prima
facie evidence
for
successful
applications
in
the
historical
archive, or
•
Given that anomalous mental phenomena can be shown to
exist, demonstrate that
either technically
and/or administratively,
previous
attempts
to apply
anomalous
mental phenomena have been misguided.
If we are unable to show that one or both of these conditions are true, then
I would
recommend
^that
the
intelligence
community
abandon
any
further
research
or
applications.*
About Research
The existence of anomalous mental phenomena cannot be statistically determined from
the results of a single laboratory.
The
requirements for a replication of a
statistical
phenomenon and the methods
for
the
analysis
of cross-laboratory
results
are
well
developed. The established criteria set by meta-cmalysis, have been met by AC across
laboratories and within the government sponsored program.
From the Cognitive Sciences Laboratory’s perspective, minimal standards have not been
met to claim that
large-scale anomalous perturbation
exists.
Micro-AP
(i.e.,
statistical
effects on the output of physical devices such as random number generators) can be
interpreted as a manifestation ofAC—see the dashed line in Figure 1.
Anomalous perturbation on biological targets
is
still in question.
The research in the
Former Soviet Union (FSU) strongly suggests that bio-AP has been successful both on
large-scale systems (i.e., the aggression behavior of laboratory animals) and on statistical
systems (i.e., brain wave patterns of humans). We have sponsored two studies in the US
that support the FSU findings.
Recommend Approach
Current Tasking
In my view, the current approach is unlikely able to answer the primary question:
should
the intelligence community continue supporting anomalous mental phenomena activity.
The reason is, to my knowledge, applications are not being addressed.
In addition, by
just
examining the
contractor’s
archive, we
are unable
to
make
a
valid
statistical
assessment with regard to existence of the phenomena. The most that can be learned is an
assessment of the
quality of the
scientific
methodology.
But
since FY
1986,
the
government has established an on-going Scientific Oversight Committee whose
charter
was, in part, to assure the sponsors that the best possible science was being used.
Thus,
by any measure, the high quality of the research has already been established.
If the
published literature beyond the government sponsored research
is considered, then the
Regardless of existence issues, anomalous mental phenomena might be of intelligence interest if foreign
powers are pursuing the area Foreign assessment will not be discussed further in this memorandum.
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case for the existence of some anomalous mental phenomena has already been establish
according to generally accepted criteria.
A
Different
Direction
To
satisfy
the
Congressional
directive
and
to
determine
whether
the
intelligence
community should support the activity, let us conduct a two-day meeting in late June for
the Blue Ribbon
Panel.
The
first
day
should
be
devoted
to
the
assessment
of
applications.
Such a meeting would be classified at an appropriate
level and include a
number of customers—both satisfied and not, current and selected previous government
officials who are/were responsible for the applications, the program’s research director
(when appropriate), and selected current/past receivers.
The objective of this meeting is assess the prima facie application evidence first with
regard to
its
utility and second to determine in which domains
it has or has not been
effective.
In addition, the Blue Ribbon Panel may want to assess the management and
infrastructure of the application activity.
The
second
day’s
unclassified
meeting
should
include
selected
members
of
the
contractor’s
Scientific Oversight Committee, other respected members of the
scientific
community, responsible representatives from the scientific skeptics, representatives from
the open research community, and the program’s research director.
The agenda for both days should include:
•
Establishing acceptance criteria for applications and adopting the standard ones for
research.
•
Reviewing previous program evaluations, assessing the published meta-analyses, and
examining current research efforts.
•
Determining if the acceptance criteria have been met in their respective domains.
If the overall program cannot meet these standards, then the sponsor should recommend
to Congress to close the activity.
1^ however, these criteria are met, then the sponsor should request sufficient funds to
adequately continue the applications and research.
The Blue Ribbon Panel’s findings and the minutes of the two-day
conference should
easily satisfy the Congressional directive.
I am confident that with adequate preparation,
this
two-day
meeting
is
capable of
resolving the question of further participation by the intelligence community.
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