Remote viewing

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Remote viewing (RV) is a procedure developed by parapsychologists, and psychical researchers at various labs (ie:American Society for Psychical Research, Stanford Research Institute, etc.) to perform protocols of clairvoyance under controlled conditions. Somewhat similar to astral projection, this phenomenon involves a belief in the projection of consciousness to remote locations. Though it has been proven under scientific lab and field conditions, it is still considered a pseudoscience by most present day mainstream scientists.

Contents

Proponents' claims

Remote viewing allegedly allows a viewer to use his or her clairvoyant abilities to "view", i.e. gather information on a target consisting of an object, place, person, etc., which is hidden from physical view of the viewer and typically separated from the viewer in space by some distance, and sometimes separated in time (future or past) as well. Supporters claim that the existing experimental evidence supports the validity of these techniques, and claim that remote viewing is a method of clairvoyance which is better suited to experimental testing.

Proponents argue that remote viewing is distinguished from other forms of clairvoyance in that it follows a specific experimental protocol (or some variant of it). The critical aspect common to these protocols, proponents contend, is that the viewer is blind to the target in the sense of being given no (or negligible) information regarding the target being viewed.

Early History of Remote Viewing

Aspects of early remote viewing have existed as far back to the 1800's. In various aspects of what was called "Sleep Waking", participants reported back the sence of leaving their human bodies (OOBE), and experiencing a form of traveling from one place to another. This aspect of Astral Traveling has been noted for many centuries by many noted sages, religious clerics, and indivuals who experienced various forms of acute psychical-mental thrama's. Noted writers like Percy B. Shelley, Alexis Didlier, Edgar Allen Poe as direct observers and participants varify such a psychical reality.

At the dawning of early Parapschology in the mid-1800's, the Society for Psychical Research was founded in England. The SPR was an early clearinghouse, collecting and researching factoidal information deemed 'psychical in nature'. They were composed of noted members of the Medical, Religious, and Scientific communities. One such individual, was Dr. Rufus Osgood Mason, a renown surgeon from New York. He began to make clinical case studies in aspects of OOBE,astral traveling,clairvoyant episodes, and what would be termed today as eary forms of remote viewing. As a professional, he would send his reports to the SPR for study. Over the years he wrote various articles in The New York Times, and wrote books on his findings. In one of his case studies, he describes (even in some illustrations) that were too strikingly like present day "Remote Viewing". Other associates and collegues would discover similar aspects and variations. In the early 1900's, the later forming of The American Society for Psychical Research in New York, would continue the research and development of parapsychology and psychical research.

In 1957, The Parapsychological Association was founded, in an attempt to bring and share a better understanding of present day psychical research discoveries closer to main stream scientific community. One of it's co-founders, noted antropologist, Margaret Mead, felt that present day parapsychology needed to be re-assessed by the scientific community, and the developement of present day "Remote Viewing" is an example of such re-assessments.

Skepticism

Though most of the research and development has been done within the scientific scope-quidelines and lab conditions, Some critics of remote viewing still claim that it is a pseudoscience, and that the experimental evidence is inadequate. Some critics liken remote viewing to dowsing, and accord remote viewing just as much validity as that procedure. And some say that remote viewing is just clairvoyance under a new name, made to seem more credible.

While proponents call the remote viewing technique "scientific", it has only a minority acceptance among scientists. Skeptics contend that an incorrect description of an object by a remote viewer is often considered a "hit" due to small similarities, and that visual cues and extraneous evidence under poorly designed testing protocols account for the more accurate descriptions. Positive results have only been achieved in tests that were properly designed and run by remote viewing proponents.

Scientific Proof and Repeatability

In the present acceptance of the scope of science, lab conditions must be conducted within particular scientific guidelines. Even if an experiment was to succeed or fail, it was to the final discretion of the present basic scientific community that it meet approval or dis-approval. In the case of various studies that were done in remote viewing, there were a mixed number of lab successes and failures. this is a normal condition in any research. To increase the validity, "Scientific Repeatability" was a crucial element taken in some of the research, understanding and developemnt of what is remote viewing. In spite the results and various final reports made, acute or fast scientific judgements can make a difference with any study that is deemed within or out of the scope of acceptability. Inner politics in the scientific community has also play a part in the success or failure of any research project, be it scientific or otherwise. Though at the present, weighing the pros and cons, there is some scientific acceptability and support of what we call "Remote Viewing", but there is still others in the scientific community that continue to dismiss it at this time.

Protocol

Under the remote viewing family of protocols, the viewer is blind to the target, i.e. is not explicitly told what the target is; rather it is specified in one of several ways. One common method is that the target is described either in writing or by a photograph or by some set of coordinates (e.g. latitude & longitude), the latter of which may be encrypted.

The description is then placed in a double-set of opaque envelopes which may be shown to the viewer or its location described to the viewer, but which the viewer is not allowed to touch or open during the viewing session. The viewer then writes down whatever information he can gather about the target, typically including drawings and gestalt impressions as well as visual details (and sometimes auditory or kinesthetic details as well). The viewing session is often administered or facilitated by a second person called the monitor.

The output of the viewing session is evaluated by a third person, the analyst or evaluator, who matches or ranks the output against a pool consisting of the actual target with some number of decoy or dummy targets. In research scenarios (experiments) the monitor and analyst are also blind to the target along with the viewer until the evaluation is complete. The viewer is typically given information about the target after the evaluation is complete, especially during training sessions.

In the opinion of most of its proponents, remote viewing is a skill that typically improves with training, and certain variations of the protocol are used during training.

Some variations on the remote viewing protocol include:

  • Outbounder Remote Viewing, in which a person (the outbounder) physically present at the target site acts as a "beacon" to identify the target site. This was one of the earliest protocols used in the SRI program.
  • Coordinate (or Controlled) Remote Viewing (CRV) in which target sites were originally described in terms of geographical coordinates, and later any (non-descriptive) identifying code used to identify a target to the viewer.
  • Technical Remote Viewing (TRV), a term trademarked by a company called PSI TECH, based upon CRV.
  • Associative Remote Viewing (ARV), a variant which adds a level of indirection, specifically proxy targets associated with events in order to answer binary (yes/no) questions. Often applied to predicting future events.
  • Predictive Remote Viewing (PRV), developed by researchers Simon Turnbull and Charles Scarf, originally for use in predicting stock market fluctuations.

Remote Viewing During The Project Stargate Period

The word "Remote Viewing" was re-coined in the 1970's. In the late 1960's and 1970's, during the OOBE/Beaconing experiments in early development of present day remote viewing, was done at The American Society for Psychical Research by noted members;Dr. Karis Osis, Janet Mitchell, and single pioneer remote viewer; Ingo D. Swann. For scientific repeatability, another experiment was done, which included pioneer remote viewers,Keith Harary, A. Edward Moch etc.. these early experiments at the ASPR resulted in successful breakthroughs by these and other remote viewing pioneers. It's primary sponsors were the CIA. At it's peak, it was reported that over "14" labs were researching and developing similar and/or various applications of what would become present day remote viewing.

At the behest of the CIA a process or applied protocol of remote viewing was developed by Russell Targ and Harold Puthoff at the Stanford Research Institutein 1972. The program -- initially codenamed Scanate -- apparently came as a response to Soviet research into psychic phenomena, on which the USSR was believed to have spent 60 million rubles in 1970. Initially, the project focused on a small number of individuals who appeared to show potential, most famously New York artist Ingo Swann, Patrick Price and later Keith Harary.

The remote viewing program, under the umbrella auspices of "Project Stargate" went through a number of changes over the years, both in structure and in name. Later sub-code names include Gondola Wish, Grill Flame, and in 1991, Star Gate. Over the course of twenty years, the United States spent $20 million on Star Gate and related projects. Over the course of its existence more than forty personnel worked on the project, including more than twenty remote viewers. Though the program was classified throughout its existence, columnist Jack Anderson wrote about it in the mid-1980s. It is worth to note that from 2003 the entire scanate/grillflame/gondola wish/centrelane programs documents have now been mostly declassifed (1% or less still classified) and are available to the general public under the FOIA.

Though there were successes in the research and development of some protocols of remote viewing, in the late 1980's, concerns about the program's effectiveness led the CIA to contract the American Institutes for Research (AIR) to provide an evaluation. Their final report included an endorsement from statistician Jessica Utts, who found the government psychics' 15% success rate statistically significant; and a rebuttal from noted skeptic Ray Hyman, who pointed to flaws in the ways the experiments were conducted and results were tabulated. AIR's final recommendation to the CIA was to terminate the program, which it did in 1995. According to the CIA, ESP has never provided data used to guide intelligence operations.

Since the end of the government's involvement with Project Star Gate, remote viewing has entered the private sector. Companies such as PSI TECH claim to teach remote viewing procedures, and hundreds of books that detail remote viewing history and methods exist by various authors. Though a minority of the psychical and scientific communities believes strongly in the procedure, to date the existence of remote viewing as a psychic phenomenon has not been proven to the satisfaction of other mainstream scientific communities.

Since the abrupt ending of "Project Stargate" by the CIA, before the final report in 1995, indications point that before the terrorist attacks of September 11th. 2001, some developed remote viewing protocols were transferred from the CIA to The National Security Agency and re-activated for limited use.

Trivia

The Capitol Conspiracy, starring Don "the Dragon" Wilson, was a 1998 film about an FBI agent who was sent on a case to track down remote viewers, only to realize later that he was a remote viewer too.

Minority Report, starring Tom Cruise, was a 2002, science-future movie using 'precogs' as psychical "RV" predictors to prevent future crimes in which Anderton (Cruise) is accused of a pre-crime, and must proove his innocence to catch the real culperate.

Suspect Zero, starring Ben Kingsley and Carrie-Anne Moss, was a 2004 film about an ex-FBI remote viewer who used remote viewing to stalk and kill serial killers.

Next, starring Nicholas Cage and Julianne Moore, was a 2007 film about a Las Vegas lounge lizard magician who was tested for his psychical ability as a youngster, finding he can (Remote View) the future, and a special section of the FBI trying to convince him to join in finding terrorists threatening to nuke Los Angeles, but both the FBI and the terrorists find him... the chase is on.

Knowing, starring Nicholas Cage, was a 2008 film about a professor from MIT that stumbles on a set of futuristic dates and GPS codes that were put into a school time capsule, (remote viewed) by a little girl in grade school in 1958. Most have come to pass and the professor(Cage) tries to warn everyone of the events.

Men Who Stare At Goats, starring George Clooney, a 2009 film of a special forces unit created that learns, tests and succeeds-fails in various legit and non-practical psychical applications for future military warfare applications.

Remote Viewers and Professional Participants

  • Aaron Donahue, remote viewer
  • Jennifer Sharpe, remote viewer
  • Ed Dames, military remote viewer, associated with PSI TECH, Inc.
  • Jonina Dourif, remote viewer.
  • Courtney Brown, remote viewer and founder of the Farsight Institute.
  • Edwin May, program member since mid-1970s and Stargate program director from 1986 until the close of the program.
  • David Morehouse, military remote viewer during Stargate program
  • Lyn Buchanan, military remote viewer.
  • Dr. Judith Orloff, MD, board-certified psychiatrist, psychic and remote viewer. On the October 29, 2005 show of Coast to Coast AM, she stated that she remote views her patients before they arrive for appointments, and trains some of her patients in remote viewing
  • Pat Price one of the early successfully tested civilian remote viewers
  • Paul Smith, military remote viewer credited with authoring/editing the original CRV training manual.
  • Ingo Swann, one of the first successfully tested at the ASPR in what would be present day remote viewing.
  • Glenn Wheaton, military remote viewer and founder of Hawaii Remote Viewing Guild
  • A. Edward Moch, Psychical analyst-consultant, one of youngest pioneer remote viewers sucessfully tested at the ASPR.
  • Keith Harary, Clinical Psychologist, early successfully tested pioneer remote viewer at the ASPR.
  • Dr.Karlis Osis, Director of Research, early OOBE/Remote Viewing organizer tester from the American Society for Psychical Research (ASPR).
  • Dr. Robert Monroe, founder of the Monroe Institute where various studies in remote viewing were tested under his directorship.
  • Frederick "Skipp" Atwater, A U.S. Army official who was an overseer of military remote viewing applications at Fort Meade.
  • Joseph McMoneagle, former military remote viewer, originally from Fort Meade who was succesfully tested at The Monroe Institute.
  • Dr. Rufus Osgood Mason, A medical surgeon who done early clinical research and study for The Society for Psychical Research in the late 1880's, that would develope later into present day clarvoyant-Remote Viewing.
  • Dr. Janet Mitchell, psychical research associate at ASPR and later at SRI

References

  • Courtney Brown, Ph. D., Remote Viewing : The Science and Theory of Nonphysical Perception. Farsight Press, 2005. ISBN 0976676214
  • David Morehouse, Psychic Warrior, St. Martin's, 1996, ISBN 0312964137
  • Jim Schnabel, Remote Viewers: The Secret History of America's Psychic Spies, Dell, 1997 , ISBN 0440223067
  • Paul H. Smith, Reading the Enemy's Mind: Inside Star Gate -- America's Psychic Espionage Program, Forge, 2005, ISBN 0312875150
  • Ronson, Jon, The Men who Stare at Goats, Picador, 2004, ISBN 0330375474 - written to accompany the TV series The Crazy Rulers of the World)
  • Buchanan, Lyn, The Seventh Sense: The Secrets Of Remote Viewing As Told By A "Psychic Spy" For The U.S. Military, ISBN 0743462688
  • F. Holmes Atwater, Captain of My Ship, Master of My Soul: Living with Guidance, Hampton Roads 2001, ISBN 1571742476
  • McMoneagle, Joseph, The Stargate Chronicles: Memoirs of a Psychic Spy, Hampton Roads 2002, ISBN 1571742255
  • Tim Rifat, Remote Viewing : What It Is, Who Uses It and How To Do It, Vision 2003. ISBN 1901250962

External links

Copyright

"Original data received from Wikipedia on April 23, 2006. Credit given to original authors can be seen Here."

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