Modeling ESP

Psi: The Extrasensorimotor Communication Paradigm [From Chapter One of Psi Development Systems]

In the glossary of The Journal of Parapsychology (published by the Institute of Parapsychology), psi is defined as a "general term to identify a person's extrasensori- motor communication with the environment." Psi includes extrasensory perception (ESP) and psychokinesis (PK).

Extrasensory perception is defined in the Journal of Parapsychology as "experience of, or response to, a target object, state, event, or influence without sensory contact." While in the popular mind, ESP or "being psychic" is often associated with mental awareness of auras, spirits, deities, or other archetypal figures, it is clear that Rhine intended to distinguish parapsychology from such popular, unscientific approaches since they are based on assumptions that cannot be proved true or false.

Using an information-flow diagram, Charles Tart (1977) developed graphic representations that mapped out the implicit assumptions that parapsychologists have about ESP.

As Tart explains it, "We begin with the target, a physical event or state of affairs from which information flows through some channel of transmission and reaches the percipient. After reaching the percipient, the information is transformed into mental and/or neural impulses by some sort of receptor and eventually results in knowledge and/or observable behavior, from which we infer that information about the target event has reached the percipient."

The traditional conceptualization of psi is described by Rex Stanford (1977, 1978) as the psycho-biological model or paradigm. Stanford has suggested that the habitual view of psi as a form of "extra-sensorimotor communication" is not entirely supported by the experimental evidence. He points out, for example, that the model assumes the existence of a biological organ of perception for ESP although none has yet been detected.

If the process of precognition were being diagrammed, one must imagine the target object or state as existing in the future and that information flows across the channel backward through time to the percipient. In the telepathic situation, the target object or state of affairs is another individual - although in this model, telepathic transmission actually bears more of a resemblance to psychokinesis.

Psychokinesis (PK) is defined in the Journal of Parapsychology as "the extramotor aspect of psi; a direct (i.e., mental but nonmuscular) influence exerted by the subject on an external physical process, condition, or object." Psychic healing is thought to be PK action on living material.

Tart (1977a) has diagrammed the principles of PK in a manner similar to that used for ESP, although instead of a hypothetical "receptor" we now have a hypothetical "convertor or power generator." The PK force is thought to be guided in a somewhat cybernetic fashion from feedback obtained through ESP (although normal sensory feedback can also operate in some situations):

Although the psychobiological model suggests that PK results should decline with targets of increasing complexity, Stanford (1977) noted that a review of the PK literature did not support this hypothesis.

Many events collected in the spontaneous case histories of parapsychologists and psychical researchers lacked some of the perceptual/cognitive components normally associated with Rhine's paradigm. These events include meaningful coincidences. For example, one case collected by Rex Stanford involved the fate of a man traveling by subway in Manhattan to visit friends. Accidentally, he forgot to change trains and ended up having to exit many blocks from his intended destination. However, upon leaving the subway station, he suddenly encountered the very friends he was intending to visit.

Stanford (1974) has developed a model consistent with Rhine's that explains these events, which he labels "psi-mediated instrumental responses (PMIR). He proposes the existence of an unconscious ESP mechanism that is constantly (or intermittently) scanning the environment, alert to favorable or unfavorable circumstances. Although this information never reaches conscious awareness, Stanford postulates that it is capable of influencing individual behavior instrumental in encountering favorable or avoiding unfavorable events. The reverse may be the case with masochistic individuals.

Similarly, the PMIR model proposes a PK mechanism that also operates unconsciously to affect favorable and unfavorable circumstances. It was because of his intense efforts to reconcile the PMIR model with the experimental data in psychokinesis that Stanford began to develop misgivings serious enough to cause him to question, for the first time, Rhine's entire extrasensorimotor communication paradigm.

Stanford, R.G. Concept and psi. In WG. Roll, R.L. Morris, and J.D. Morris (Eds.), Research in parapsychology, 1973, Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1974.

Stanford, R.G. Are parapsychologists paradigmless in psiland? In B. Shapin and L. Coly (Eds.), The philosophv of parapsychology. New York, Parapsychology Foundation, 1977.

Stanford, R.G. Toward reinterpreting psi events. Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, 1978, 72(3), 197-214.

Tart, C.T. Improving real time ESP by suppressing the future: trans-temporal inhibition. Paper, Electro 77 meeting of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, New York City, April 1977.