On Remote Viewing Training: An interview with Debra Lynne Katz, PhD.
This is an interview between Daz Smith and Debra Katz, about remote viewing training,published by Eight Martini’s Magazine. Page 37 - 50. It was part of a series of articles by remote viewing trainers.
Merten J. Mandeville Library of Parapsychology and Occultism Explorations and Adventures in Library Research at the University of Illinois
Author: Debra Lynne Katz, Ph.D
Publication: Mindfield Bulletin, published by the Parapsychological Association in May 2020. www.parapsych.org,
Introduction:
When I received an email about a new travel grant from the University of Illinois (U of I) library offering funding for visiting scholars to study any one of their collections, I initially disregarded it. I had promised myself, my PhD director, and almost everyone else I wouldn’t take on anything else until my dissertation was complete. Also, I doubted they would have a parapsychology collection. Still, curiosity got the better of me, and I checked their website. There it was: the Merten J. Mandeville’s Occult Sciences Collection. Darn. The application only took ten minutes to complete, but there was one problem; they required the applicant be sponsored by someone at their university. I asked the grant sponsors to direct me to faculty who researched topics covered in the collection, visited it, or used it in teaching. They referred me to Nancy O’Brien, curator of the Mandeville collection, who had been working within the library system for 40 years. While she didn’t know of any interested faculty, she was willing to sponsor me herself. The award notice arrived a few weeks later, offering $1250 to study the Mandeville collection any time over the next year, provided I gave a presentation while there. Shortly after accepting, the UWG Psychology department Informed me they had money left in their travel budget which I could use if I could spend it within the next 48 hours. With both grants I was able to visit U of I for 10 days. Ms. O’Brien kindly arranged for an office for me to use during my visit
Explorations into Remote Viewing Microscopic Organisms
Researchers: Lance William Beem and Debra Lynn Katz
Summary article written by T.W. Fendley
Publication: Aperture Magazine, Published by the International Remote Viewing Association, Fall/Winter 2015.
Introduction:
This project’s proposal was the winner of the very first IRVA-IRIS Warcollier Research Award. It focused on investigating real-life applications of remote viewing, such as describing the structure of a virus. It was initiated after the researchers conducted a series of informal studies testing whether viewers could identify the presence of the Tomato Mosaic Virus in plants, utilizing a variety of remote-viewing protocols. A comprehensive literature review found only two other studies that focused on the intuitive exploration of microscopic biological Occult Chemistry, was originally published in 1895 by Charles Webster Leadbeater and Annie Besant, in which they described atoms via their clairvoyance. The other was a study conducted by Edwin C. May, Ph.D. and Beverly S. Humphrey, Ph.D. at Stanford Research Institute (SRI), which tasked remote viewers with identifying the presence of the Salmonella bacterium. According to Dr. May, this study has not yet been published.
The goal of this study was to determine whether remote viewers could describe a Bacteriophage (aka Phage or “bacterial virus”) in enough detail to provide useful information to scientists. It was an ideal subject for remote viewers, who might have the ability to observe a Phage in its natural environment within bacteria, without the need to destroy or alter it for observation. Bacteriophage is widely used in many countries outside the United States in place of antibiotics for the treatment of illnesses such as diphtheria, cholera, and scarlet fever.
As part of a free-response, double-blind study, idea of what the target was. They only later learned that they had remote viewed a microscopic target, a one scientist new to remote viewing to exclaim, “This is blowing my mind. How is this possible?”
Predicting the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election Using a Double-Blind Associative Remote Viewing Protocol
Abstract In this double-blind Associative Remote Viewing Project, 41 moderate to highly experienced Remote Viewers were tasked with describing a feedback photo they would see at a future date. The photo was to be associated with the winner of the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election. Researchers compared the remote viewers’ written transcripts to a set of four photos – two associated with to the Republican and Democratic frontrunners, one with a third-party candidate opinion, and one with an impossible opinion that served as the control group. A formal prediction was issued for a short period with some viewers being exposed to it and some not, to assess whether exposure to a potentially wrong prediction might result in displacement to the wrong photo. Other variables such as viewer preferences and voting behaviors were also assessed. Based on the suggestion to reject the null hypothesis during the hypothesis test summary a Wilcoxon test was conducted to assess the judge’s scoring value of viewer transcript across photos. The results indicated a significant difference where, z = -3.147, p<.01. The mean of the ranks of Hilary (the popular vote front-runner) was 13.71, while the mean of the ranks in favor of Trump (the electoral vote front-runner) was 17.28. Results indicated that rather than describing the photo the remote viewers consciously saw at the future date, they instead tuned into photos they would not see. Why did this happen? Is a large group consensus-based approach really the best to use in projects such as these? And what does this mean for the future of Associative Remote Viewing projects that encounter similar incidents of displaced psi despite what seems to be a logical and theoretically sound design?
Clairvoyant Reading and Healing as a Therapeutic Practice Draft Book Chapter by Debra Lynne Katz
Author: Debra Lynne Katz, Ph.D
Unpublished Draft
ABSTRACT
This study is a novel attempt to assess the efficacy of teaching mind/body, metaphysical, transpersonal, and intuitive development oriented classes via tele-seminar and webinar using technology that allows for synchronous learning.
Synchronous learning can be defined as that which takes place when students and instructor(s) are present together in real time, and are able to communicate without delay.
Distant training is defined as classes where students and instructor’s bodies are not physically in the same room, but rather they share the same virtual space, with the use of telecommunication technologies, involving both hardware (computers, telephones, etc.) and online accessible software programs.
Intuitive development is defined as the process by which a person goes through to discover and gain conscious awareness and control over their innate perceptual abilities related to non-local, anomalous perception and cognition.
The following paper includes a write-up of results mostly from multiple choice questions of a self-administered survey that was sent to approximately 300 graduates via email, using blinding procedures and randomization techniques. 64 former students responded. The survey was originally administered specifically for and in advance of a presentation given by the present author and therapist Lisa Watts, given at the Conference for Meaningful Living in a digital world, held in Savannah, Georgia during the spring of 2018.
All student participants had completed at least one 12 week teleseminar or webinar program offered through the International School of Clairvoyance (ISC). Most of these classes were taught by the present researcher. These classes involve discussion, meditations, visualizations, and a number of direct practice opportunities within class and outside of class designed to help students develop and make use of their intuitive perceptual abilities.
One aim of the present study was to find out from students if the course goals were being met, especially in light of many people’s beliefs that “distant” training via technology (or technology itself) is oppositional to these qualities (Heidegger, 1977). The purpose was not to assess student’s performance, although some questions were asked about this. The focus instead was to learn about students experiences, beliefs, and perceptions as to whether the intuitive oriented classes, taught via synchronous learning platforms through the ISC, were found to be personally and socially meaningful, productive, informative, and worth their time and money.
Keywords: Teleseminars, Webinars, synchronous webinar platforms, distant learning, clairvoyant training, intuitive development programs; psychic development, remote viewing; online surveys, case study method.
Associative Remote Viewing Projects: Assessing Rater-reliability and Factors Affecting Successful Predictions
Publisher: Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, 2021, Vol. 85, No. 2, 65–90, www.spr.ac.uk
Researchers: By Debra Lynne Katz, Igor grgIc´, PatrIzIo tressoldi and T.W. Fendley
Abstract
Associative Remote Viewing (ARV) is a psi-based methodology used by individuals and for-profit organizations to predict such things as sporting event outcomes, and stock market moves, and for research purposes. Documented studies have shown the successful application of psi using ARV to predict future events, leading to profits, and unsuccessful applications, leading to losses. To better understand the contributing factors, 86 completed ARV trials which included 220 remote viewing transcripts for individual sporting or financial events, were collected. Three teams of judges operating under blind conditions — some working independently, some working as teams — repeated the process of judging, scoring, and predicting while keeping all other variables stable. To gauge inter-rater reliability, the new scores and predictions were compared to the original scores and predictions, and to each other. Rating variance was clearly demonstrated. Judges were in 100% agreement in only six (6.9%) of 86 trials. In seventeen trials (19.7%), eight of nine judges agreed with each other. Original judges did better than all new judges, and judges with more experience obtained statistically significantly higher hit rates than less experienced judges. The results were virtually the same for the two ranking scales used. This project points to a variety of factors in need of further testing, both in future ARV projects and in parapsychology projects that involve independent judging of tasks and photosets.
The Other Half of Hella’s Brain: An Intimate Conversation with Russell Targ.
Authors: Debra Lynne Katz, Ph.D & Michelle Freed (aka Bulgatz).
Publisher: Eight Martinis | issue 17
Abstract: In early June, 2018, Debra Lynne Katz and Michelle Freed-Bulgatz, (aka the“psi chicks”) conducted a phone interview with Russell Targ. They were already familiar with the work he did at SRI, the research arm of the clandestine military programs that operated from 1973 through the mid-1990s. But whereas so many interviewers merely skimmed the surface, they wanted to go deeper and further into Targ’s psyche than any had gone before. Their mission: to discover the secret to the program’s success in terms of what it was that Russell did with those “non-psychics”, “civilians, senators, generals” who came to SRI as skeptics and left not only as believers but with pledges to continue financial support of the psycho-energetics program which brought in well over a million dollars each year. By the time the interview ended, they had remote viewed Targ’s most prized possession and not only revealed the secret to Targ’s successful outbounder experiments but learned more about Scientology’s possible hold on one of the program’s remote viewers, Targ’s connection to Bobby Fischer and how his secret mission to corral a publisher at his church led to meeting his true love.
Click here to access the pdf file for the full interview.
A 50 year history of remote viewing
By Debra Lynne Katz
Applied Remote Viewing is a term that is synonymous to operational remote viewing, which was the term used in the U.S. government-sponsored programs to denote projects in which remote viewing was not simply being used for experimental purposes, but rather for practical ones in which information was truly needed by the requesting agency or client. I have been an active participant in IRVA, the Applied Precognition Project, and several remote viewing-related social media groups. At the same time, I have been heavily involved in parapsychological research communities. Even though both these have an interest in remote viewing, I became aware of a growing divide in perceptions and beliefs about the present status of remote viewing. From my own observations and participation as a remote viewer, project manager, instructor and researcher, remote viewing communities and the efforts flowing from these are robust and thriving. However, those who engage in more formal, scholarly research have pointed o the lack of published RV-related studies in formal journals as evidence that RV is not what it used to be. When private discussions with the most ardent naysayers did not budge them from their positions, I decided that a more systematic approach to exploring the state of remote viewing today was needed—not an experimental study, but rather one that would be in alignment with other sociological/anthropological projects that seek to understand the practices, norms, behaviors, products, relationships, and outputs of social groups
An Ethnographical Assessment of Project Firefly:A Yearlong Endeavor to Create Wealth by Predicting FOREX Currency Moves with Associative Remote Viewing
Title: An Ethnographical Assessment of Project Firefly: A Yearlong Endeavor to Create Wealth by Predicting FOREX Currency Moves with Associative Remote Viewing
Researchers: Debra Lynne Katz, PhD., Igor Grgic’, T.W. Fendley
Published: March 31, 2018 by the Journal of Scientii c Exploration, Vol. 32, No. 1, pp. 21–54, 2018
Abstract
More than 60 remote viewers contributed 177 intuitive-based associative remote viewing (ARV) predictions over a 14-month period.
These viewers comprised pre-established, self-organized groups cooperating under the rubric of “Project Firefly” (PFF), and were supervised by experienced ARV group managers operating under the umbrella of the Applied Precognition Project (APP), a for-profit organization exploring precognition and leveraging ARV methodology as an investment enhancement tool.
Based on predictions from the ARV sessions, PFF used the Kelly wagering strategy to guide trading on the Foreign Exchange (FOREX) currency market. Viewers performed under typical scientific protocols, including double-blind conditions, appropriate randomization, etc., using a variety of
ARV application methodologies. Investors, many of whom were also participants (viewers and judges), pooled investment funds totaling $56,300 with the stated goal of “creating wealth aggressively.” Rather than meeting that goal, however, most of the funds were lost over the course of the project.
Beyond merely reporting on an extensive remote viewing experiment, the present study is an examination of what went wrong, providing lessons learned for further ARV research whether involving for-profit activities or basic research, as the principles are relevant to both. Associative remote viewing is a research paradigm that harkens back to the early days in science when competent non-academic researchers could provide data points and breakthroughs in a field typically peopled solely by professional researchers.
Adapting a form of ethnographic study, we refer not only to the statistical results produced by the PFF effort, but also employ a mixed-methods qualitative approach to exploit the information and insights contributed by numerous participants about what happened, what worked, and what didn’t. This creates a reference we believe will be useful for those conducting future applied precognition projects involving multiple participants or groups. We feel that the insights gleaned from this study will improve both
ARV experimental design and execution of research protocol, benefiting professional and amateur researchers alike in their future ARV experimentation.
Keywords: associative remote viewing—remote viewing—precognitionKelly wagering—FOREX—Applied Precognition Project—intuitive wagering—controlled remote viewing—parapsychology—predicting the future—sociology of science—ethnography of parapsychology research—non-academic contributions to science.
Fridays with Ingo: Scientist and Psychic
When I first began volunteering in the Ingo Swann archival collection, located in the basement of University of West Georgia’s Ingram’s Library (which doubles as the university’s tornado shelter), I thought of Swann mostly as a talented psychic. I was aware he had exhibited convincing evidence of PK and was the creator of the controlled remote viewing (CRV) methodology, which I had been studying and practicing for several years. By the time I left campus after spending most Fridays with Ingo (posthumously) for two and a half years, my view of him had dramatically changed. From what I had learned through cataloging his correspondence files, followed by an independent study of his SRI files as part of my doctoral work, I was convinced Ingo was not just a psychic subject - he was as much a scientist in his own right as anyone he had worked with at the Stanford Research Institute (SRI), the laboratory overseeing the clandestine U.S. governmental remote viewing operational programs that spanned two decades. I’d classify Swann as both an experimentalist and social scientist. I also discovered he was not merely a naturally gifted psychic, but rather had spent an exorbitant amount of time developing his skills and then trying to figure out how he could pass on his knowledge to others, even while continuing to hone his own.
Remote Viewing the Outcome of the 2012 Presidential Race: An Expedition into the Unexplored Territory of Remote Viewing and Rating Human Subjects as Targets within a Binary Protocol.
Researchers: Debra Lynne Katz & Michelle Freed (formerly Bulgatz).
Title: An expedition into the unexplored territory of remote viewing and rating human subjects as targets within a binary protocol.
Publication: Aperture Magazine, 2013, published by the International Remote Viewing Associaiton.
Introduction
In early October 2012, Michelle Bulgatz and Debra Lynne Katz designed a project to determine whether remote viewers could accurately predict the outcome of the then-upcoming presidential election on November 5, 2012. With the primaries completed, the two candidates in the general election would be the incumbent, Barack Obama, and Republican challenger Mitt Romney. Polls indicated that it would be a very close race. This experiment set out with the following questions:
1. Can remote viewers from a variety of backgrounds, even with little experience viewing human targets, predict the outcome of a presidential election when utilizing a double-blind protocol.
2. How does a project involving a human target differ from those utilizing objects and locations?
3. Is the use of human targets in remote-viewing related research projects or applied-precognition projects involving binary outcomes, something that researchers or project managers may want to consider in the future?
4. Which method/system of rating/judging sessions is most helpful when evaluating sessions with human subjects as targets?
5. How strongly will a viewer’s candidate preference affect their session?
While this modest study was not intended to produce a huge data set (and therefore statistical significance cannot be calculated), its value lies in the knowledge gained and lessons learned about remote viewing and the rating of human targets within a bi- nary blind protocol; this has the potential to be useful to those designing and implementing their own remote-viewing projects in the future.
Remote Viewing Training Survey
Researcher: Debra Lynne Katz, PhD
Between March, 2015 and October 2017, an exploratory online survey was conducted to study remote viewers’ perceptions about whether or not remote viewing-related instruction had helped them, and if so, to what extent. Participants were recruited from various remote viewing-related Facebook groups and online industry forums; and from email lists associated with the International Remote Viewing Association (IRVA), the Applied Precognition Project (APP) and the International School of Clairvoyance. About one-half of respondents were from all regions of the United States. Others were from the UK, Canada, Ireland, Australia, Sweden, Hungary, Poland and India.
The Associative Remote Dreaming Experiment: A novel approach to predicting future outcomes of sporting events.
This double-blind study utilised dreaming instead of remote viewing as a precognitive tool within an Associative Remote Viewing (ARV) protocol. In the spirit of Participatory Action Research, but using a quantitative design, a cohesive group of experienced remote viewers (who varied in experience) designed and participated in a year-long study that included 56 trials in which they attempted to have precognitive dreams that would enable them to produce descriptions and sketches that would match a photograph they would be shown at a future time. Five out of 7 remote viewers/dreamers were able to consistently produce dreams at will. Their 278 transcripts were utilized for the purpose of making predictions and wagers on the outcomes of sporting events. They produced an overall rate of 17 hits out of 28 predictions, which a binomial test showed to be marginally above chance (one-tailed). Nevertheless, the overall monetary gain was a little under 400 percent of the initial stake. Further, one individual dreamer had a 76 percent correct hit rate based on 13 hits and 4 misses with 20 passes, while another had 16 hits and 9 misses. These points are discussed along with the notion that raising the threshold of Confidence Ranking Scores (up to a CR of 6) for dream based ARV predictions may help to improve the overall hit rate.
Don't Judge a Book by Its Cover: A Case Study and Comparative Analysis of Popular vs. Academy Psychology Books
Don't Judge a Book by Its Cover: A Case Study and Comparative Analysis of Popular vs. Academy Psychology Books HIGHLIGHTS A review of selected 'pop psychology' books shows that they do not inevitably contain misreported facts or findings from the original research studies they reference. This result suggests that negative sterotypes of such lay books should be reconsidered. ABSTRACT Many academic psychologists hold negative and stereotypical views about popular psychology books, even though there have been few formal investigations into these materials to understand their content, construction, purposes, or orientations, or their authors’ credentials. This paper explores the origins of these views within the Sociology of Scientific knowledge literature and psychological literature. Through formal case study methodology, an extensive review and comparative analysis of books with the psychological construct of “Attention” in their title was undertaken to determine whether the current delineations between scholarly and popular materials and those who write them are as clear-cut as they seem, or if an alternative model of the relationship between academic and popular psychology literature could be offered. A bibliography of 145 books was compiled, followed by what turned out to be an arduous and at times impossible task of sorting these books into either popular or scholarly categories. This revealed flaws in the dualistic nature of this activity that is often required of university students, instructors, and scholars alike. Six popular and six scholarly books (Table 3) revealed that while some of the popular books were less rigorous in referencing and representing experimental or original findings, they offered bibliotherapeutic benefits and were cited by others within journal articles, books, and dissertations across multiple disciplines, thus suggesting that popularization is not simply a trickling down of knowledge from the scientific arenas to the public, but that science can be informed by professionals with expertise in applied areas. Meanwhile, the six books designated as scholarly only had a collective of 14 Amazon reader reviews. This project’s findings have implications for educators, researchers, librarians, and journal editors who may presently disqualify useful materials without fully understanding them, and for writers seeking to improve in their research and writing skills. KEYWORDS Popularization of science, popular science, attention, scholarly books, pop psychology, popular psychology, bibliotherapy, self-help books
Remote Viewing: A 1974- 2022 Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis
Researchers: Patrizio Tressoldi, PhD & Debra Lynne Katz, PhD.
Publication: Journal of Scientific Exploration, 2023.
https://doi.org/10.31275/20232931
HIGHLIGHTS Statistical analysis of the available evidence suggests that remote-viewing is the most efficient way to study “extrasensory perception” for experiments and practical applications. ABSTRACT This is the first meta-analysis of all studies related to remote-viewing tasks conducted up to December 2022. After applying our inclusion criteria, we selected 36 studies with a total of 40 effect sizes. Both frequentist and Bayesian meta-analyses revealed a strong average effect size of .34; 95% confidence interval: .22 -.45, after the exclusion of outliers, without signs of publication bias and a minimal decline effect. In terms of raw scores, these average results correspond to a difference in hits score of 19.3%; 95% confidence intervals:13.6%–25%, above the expected chance. Among the meta-analyses of moderators, a small nonstatistical difference emerged between the precognitive and clairvoyance tasks, particularly for those with an outbound agent. A comparison among meta-analysis results observed with other experimental protocols testing extrasensory perception showed the clear superiority of remote viewing. After more than 50 years of investigation into extrasensory perception, remote-viewing experimental protocols appear to be the most efficient for both experimental and practical applications.
KEYWORDS Remote viewing; meta-analysis; clairvoyance; precognition; extrasensory perception.
Remote Viewing Applications: A Survey of Present-Day RV Practitioners
Title: Remote Viewing Applications: A Survey of Present-Day RV Researchers: Patrizio Tressoldi & Debra Lynne Katz, Ph.D
Abstract: The primary purpose of this review and exploratory survey was to discover which types of projects experienced remote viewers are engaged with today, and to what extent, and to understand their backgrounds, methods, approaches, practices, philosophies, beliefs, and phenomenological experiences related to this work. Another goal was to discover whether the original definitions and tenets of remote viewing defined within its specific historical context have changed. One-hundred-six remote viewers participated in the survey, although not all responded to every question. We consistently had between 70 and 73 responses per each question. Responses were analyzed through the use of a mixed methods approach. The main findings are that remote viewing applications are wide, spanning from business to scientific and intelligence applications, and for the use of personal, corporate and public agencies. Twenty-three percent of the participants declared that their remote viewing job was paid. The range of the training and experience with remote viewing was expansive, and the majority used mixed methods depending on the project. We found that most respondents expressed both awareness of and respect for the scientific principles related to blinding and separation of roles, yet there was a range of views regarding the practicality of adhering to these for application purposes. Keywords: remote viewing, applications, survey, mixed methods
Physical Mediumship, Healing and Psychic Surgery
Researcher: Debra Lynne Katz, Ph.D
Publication: Journal of Scientific Exploration, 2022
https://doi.org/10.31275/20222463
Abstract
This paper takes a case-collective approach to examine healing phenomena claimed to be produced by physical mediums operating within the spiritualist traditions of Europe, the Philippines and Brazil. In Part I, articles and books that were written about the eight “best-case” examples of physical mediums spanning from the mid-1800s to the present day were searched to discover whether healing had been reported and to discover relevant themes. While all cases of physical mediumship included at least one mention of physical healing, only three of the eight physical mediums had as their primary focus the intention to perform physical healings. Findings suggest that most cases of healings in conjunction with physical mediumship are thought to be carried out by spirit doctors, some who may have been doctors while alive, and some who may work with other spirit doctors to produce healing effects. “Healing lights” and partial or full materializations that interact with the bodies of those who later reported alleviations of long-term suffering, disease, blindness and deafness have been reported. Part II covers some of the best-case examples of the psychic surgeons of Brazil and the Philippines. Included here are results of qualitative studies, paradoxical findings from laboratory tests on materials extracted during healing sessions, and a sharing of the present author’s own direct observations and experiences of several Filipino healers spanning a year’s independent study with them. Recommendations for further research are presented.
Keywords: Popularization of science, popular science, attention, scholarly books, pop psychology, popular psychology, bibliotherapy, self-help books
Effects of Background Context for Objects in Photographic Targets on Remote Viewing Performance
Abstract—Photographic images of physical objects are common targets in remote viewing projects today. This exploratory experiment investigated whether the background within which the object is positioned may impact the accuracy of remote viewing. Twelve experienced remote viewers each completed 30 open-response, triple-blind remote viewing trials, requiring them to utilize extrasensory perception to describe the photographic image they would receive via email a few days later. Investigators created a photographic target pool of complex objects set within one of three background conditions: 1) White: devoid of information; 2) Normal: a setting in which the object would typically be found; 3) Unusual: a setting in which the object would not typically be found. Participants completed a total of 360 in-depth transcripts consisting of 8,460 written descriptors and 1,472 sketches. Two methods were used to analyze the transcripts for accuracy, the traditional sum of ranks matching procedure and an exploratory method involving the scoring of each item and sketch by both the participant and an independent judge. These two methods revealed significant but opposite differences for photographic targets of objects set within white backgrounds compared to the other two backgrounds. Better scores for targets with a white background were found for the traditional matching procedure, but worse scores were found for this background when each item and sketch were rated individually. In Journal of Scientific Exploration, Vol. 35, No. 4, pp. 752–787, 2021 0892-3310/21 Effects of Background in Photo Targets on Remote Viewer Performance 753 addition, the individual items and sketches were found to describe the target object more frequently than the background when normal or unusual backgrounds were present. Results suggest that object background can affect the outcome of remote viewing sessions, although the effect may depend on the scoring method applied. Keywords: Remote viewing, target material, extrasensory perception, anomalous cognition, photographic target material