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IV
TARGET STORAGE AND ACCESS
The target
cards are numbered and placed in individual envelopes,
similarly numbered,
by the target
selection team;
they are then turned
over
to the project
Special Security Officer
(SSO) who maintains them in
a GSA-approved secure
container.
At the start
of an RV session the
interviewer,
remote viewer,
and
target
person rendevous
in the
laboratory and establish the
trial
start
time
(30 minutes hence).
The target
person then leaves
the laboratory
for
the
SSO station,
generates
a random number
in the presence of
the
SSO
by the use of the
random-number function on
a Texas
Instruments
Model
SR-51 hand calculator,
obtains
the associated envelope
(which is recorded
by the SSO),
and departs
for the target
site.
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V
REMOTE VIEWER ORIENTATION
During the period that the target person
is enroute
to the target,
the interviewer and remote viewer have
a period to relax and discuss
the
protocols.
The
goal
of
the interviewer during this period
is
to make
it
"safe"
for
the remote viewer to experience remote viewing.
For the initial
orientation of
a new remote viewer,
this typically includes
a discussion
as
to how remote viewing appears
to be
a natural rather than abnormal
function,
and
that many people appear to have done
it
successfully.
The remote viewer
is told that memory and imagination constitute
noise
in the
channel, and therefore
the
closer
he
can
get
to raw uninter-
preted imagery,
the better.
He
is encouraged to report
raw perception
rather than analysis,
since the former tends
to
be correct while the
latter
is often wrong.
Since remote viewing
is
a difficult task,
apparently similar to the
perception of subliminal
stimuli
,
B
it
takes
the full attentive powers
of
the remote viewer.
Therefore,
the environment,
procedures,
etc,,
are
designed
to
be as
natural and
comfortable
as possible
so
as
to minimize
the diversion
of attention to anything other than the
task
at
hand.
No
hypnosis,
strobe
lights,
or sensory-derivation procedures
are used,
since
in our view such
(novel) environmental
factors would divert
some
of
the
subject's much-needed attention.
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VI
INTERVIEWER BEHAVIOR
The interviewer arranges ahead of
time
to have pen and paper available
for
drawing
,
and
a tape recorder*
The room lighting
is
somewhat
subdued
to prevent after-image highlights,
shadows on eyelids,
etc.
When the agreed-upon RV trial
time arrives,
the interviewer simply
asks
the remote viewer to "describe what
impressions
come
to mind with
regard to where
the target person is,"
The interviewer does
not
pressure
the remote viewer to verbalize continuously;
if
he were
to,
the remote
viewer might
tend to embroider descriptions
to please
the interviewer,
a well-known syndrome
in behavioral studies
of this
type.
If the remote
viewer tends toward being analytical
("I
see Macy's")
the interviewer
gently leads him into description,
not analysis,
("You don't have
to tell
me where
it
is,
just
describe what
you see,")
This
is
the
most
important
and difficult
task of
the interviewer,
but
is apparently necessary for
good results,
especially with inexperienced remote viewers.
It
is also useful
for the interviewer
to "surprise" the
remote viewer
with new viewpoints.
("Go above
the scene and
look down—what
do
you see?
If
you
look to the
left, what
do you
see?")
The remote viewer's viewpoint
appears
to shift rapidly with
a question
like
this,
and
the
data
come
through before
the viewer's
defenses activate
to block
it
out.
The shifting
of viewpoint also obviates
the problem of the remote viewer spending
the
entire session time giving meticulous
detail on
a relatively trivial
item,
such
as
a
flower, which,
even
if
correct,
generally will
be
of
little use
in assessing the
session,
(Once
a remote viewer
feels
he
sees
something,
he tends
to hang on to this perception rather than commit
himself
to
a
new
viewpoint.)
It
is
important
to recognize again that with
the
division of
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labor outlined in Section
II
it
is
the interviewer
’ s
(not
the remote
viewer’s) responsibility to see that
the necessary information to permit
discrimination among the
range
of target possibilities
is
generated,
the
remote viewer’s responsibility being
confined
to exercise
of
the
RV
faculty
,
The remote viewer
is encouraged to sketch what
he sees,
even over
his
objections that
he
is
not an artist,
can’t
sketch,
etc.
He may do
so throughout,
or wait until
the end of the session
if
intermittent
drawing would distract his concentration.
Since drawings
tend to be more
accurate than verbalizations,
this
is an extremely important
factor for
good results.
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VII
TARGET PERSON BEHAVIOR
After obtaining
a target
card in the manner described in Section
V,
the
target person proceeds
to the target
site indicated.
He
is asked to come upon the target
location at the starting time
so that his
view of
it
is
fresh at the beginning of the remote viewing
period.
He
is
to then simply pay attention to the environment
as
dictated
by instructions
on the target
card.
At the end of
the agreed-upon target
viewing time
of
15 minutes the
target person returns
to the
lab.
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VIII
POST-EXPERIMENT FEEDBACK
When the target person returns,
and after all the raw data has been
turned over
to the
SSO,
the interviewer,
remote viewer,
and target person
proceed directly to the target site for feedback.
This helps
to develop
the remote viewer’s sense of which aspects
of his mental
imaging process
are correct, which are
incorrect.
This appears to bring the
RV trial
to
closure for the remote viewer, so that when he has
a following session,
his mind
is
no longer involved with wondering how he did on the previous
one.
Only a very experienced subject
can function well
time after time
without feedback,
so this
is done for each trial
to optimize
the potential
for success.
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IX
EVALUATION PROCEDURE
In
a sense,
the most
critical part
of
the remote-viewing procedure
is
the evaluation procedure.
Any single experiment
in remote viewing,
even if perfect,
could in principle
be dismissed as
possibly
a coincidence.
Further,
any result
less than pefect might
be
called into question as
a
generalized "grass
is green,
sky
is
blue"
transcript
that
fits every target.
Only blind differential discrimination
of transcripts across
a series
of
targets
can provide
a basis
to discriminate between these dismissals and
the RV interpretation.
To obtain a numerical evaluation
of the accuracy of
a standard six-
trial remote viewing series with
a given remote viewer,
the results are
subjected to independent
judging on a blind basis by an SRI research
analyst not otherwise associated with the series.
In preparation for
judging,
the remote viewer's
tapes
are transcribed.
The resulting transcripts
are then edited only
to
the extent
of
deleting
information which might
act
as artifactual
cues
to
a
judge,
such as
references
to other targets,
or phrases which might
indicate
the temporal
order of the transcripts.
The transcripts
(including associated drawings)
and target
cards,
each arranged
in their own random order different from the order
of target
usage,
are then turned over to the
judge.
The
judge
is instructed to
visit
the target
locations
on the basis
of
the target
card instructions,
and
to blind rank order,
on
a
scale of
1-6
(best
to worst
match),
each
of
the
six transcripts against each
of
the six target
sites,
generating’
a
6X6 matrix
as
in the example
shown in Table
1.
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TYPICAL 6X6 JUDGING MATRIX
Distribution of
Judge's
Rankings
TARGET
TRANSCRIPT LETTER
A
B
C
D
E
F
©
5 ©
6 ©
3 ©
6 ©
3 ©
A precise measure
of
the statistical significance
of
the matrix
of
target/transcript
relations
is given by
a direct-count-of-permutations
method
of great generality. 6
It
is an exact
calculation method requiring
no approximations
such
as
normality assumptions.
Furthermore,
the
judging
process
that went
into generating
the matrix
is
not required
to be
inde-
pendent
transcript-to-transcript
nor target-to-target
.
Finally,
the
statistical evaluation procedure
is
general enough that,
in addition to
being applicable to
the blind rank order procedure
in use at
the present
time,
it
can be applied
to analyses
in which numerical
estimates
of
target/transcript
correspondences are
made on the basis
of
other rank-order
or rating scales.
This
includes
rating
1-7,
zero
to complete correspondence
arbitrary scale rating arrived at
by some
complex procedure involving
many
factors
such
as occurs
in multiple- judge voting;
cases
in which,
for
a
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given target
,
several transcripts
are given the same rating,
all transcripts
are rated zero,
a
few transcripts
are assigned rank order numbers
and
the
rest
are assigned the mean of
the remaining rank order numbers
,
and
so
forth.
The only requirement
is
that
no artif actual information
is provided
as
to
the order
of targets and transcripts.
In particular,
it
can be
shown that
if targets are used with replacement
or are non-orthogonal
,
then the method applies even in the case
in which there
is trial-by-trial
feedback and the target pool
is known
a priori
to both remote
vi ewer and
interviewer
.
Thus
the possibility of interviewer cueing
or subject
guessing based on
a priori knowledge
of the target
pool
is handled at
a
fundamental
level by
a statistical procedure that assumes
the worst.
The argument
is
as
follows.
In the absence
of knowledge
as
to which transcript was
generated
in
response
to which target,
one observes
that
in setting up
the matrix there
are
nl
possible ways
to
label the
columns
(transcripts), given any
particular order
of
the rows
(targets),
and vice versa.
Thus,
there are
nl
possible matrices which could
be constructed from the
raw
judging
data,
all
of them equally likely
a priori
in the absence
of knowledge
as
to
the
order
of targets
and transcripts.
Each has
its associated sum on the
diagonal
corresponding to
a possible alignment
of targets
and transcripts.
The significance
level for
the experiment
is then determined by
counting the number of possible matrices
that would yield
a result
(diagonal
sum)
equal
to or better
(i.e
#
,
lower sum of ranks
in the rank-
order
case,
higher sum of
scores
in the
correspondence-rating
case, etc.)
than that obtained for the matrix
corresponding to the
key,
and dividing
by
n!
This ratio gives
the probability of obtaining by chance
a result
equal
to or better than that obtained
in the actual
judging process.
For
the 6X6 matrix used as
an example
(Table
1) we have,
by direct
computer
count
of
the
matrices obtained
by interchanging
columns,
-3
p
= 2/61
=
2.8 X 10
.
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This
statistical procedure,
in use
for more than two decades
by many
researchers, was specifically designed
to handle narrative material
of
the
remote viewing type,
and
it
cannot
be stressed enough that
it
is
constructed
sufficiently conservatively so
as
to apply even in the
limiting case in
which
the target
pool
is
completely known
a priori
to all
involved,
thus
handling any possible contamination due to remote viewer guessing
or
interviewer cueing in protocols
of
the type used in
the
SRI
RV procedure.
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