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Merged Ideomotor Effect and the Subconscious / Beyond the Ideomotor Effect

abaddon said:
...
When you are down to seeing bunnies in clouds as symbols of a global subconscious, it is time for some serious introspection and self examination.
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Strikes by Daylightstar
The 'unedited version' does not appear to work so well :D
 
Navigator said:
Oh dear.

Ones personality might change, but I would expect that in most human beings as they deal with the frustration of brain damage.
.
Click to expand...

Just to be clear, brain damage does cause changes in personality, and not simply through the patient's frustration with being impaired.
Your cursory dismissal of this fact is an indication of your willful ignorance.
Specific brain lesions cause specific alterations in personality, understandable by the various neural circuits which are damaged.

http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11920-000-0031-5#page-1

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/histo...sciences-most-famous-patient-11390067/?no-ist

Navigator said:
Event Three: Sight.
... my partner and I used the message boards we believed we were interacting with various entities...

...we eventually focused upon was one who we affectionately ended up calling 'QueenBee'.

This Entity represented the collective consciousness of all conscious activity on the planet.
Click to expand...

This is where your unscientific, unverifiable, uncontrolled methods of investigation have failed you. Your ideomotor board told you there is a collective unconscious, and you have believed it, in fact you have apparently centered your life on this idea, without any attempt to verify the truth of what you were "told".
If science is right, then you are communicating with your own subconscious, and it (your own brain) has told you exactly what you want to believe.

Navigator said:
...what we were seeing was a huge cloud formation - in fact the only one in the sky - and this formation was absolutely clearly and unquestionably a copy of the symbol I had created and placed on my message boards, signifying "QueenBee."

...I have no option but to laugh.
Click to expand...
ha, ha, ha, ha.
I was out riding my horse, and I looked up, and there in the sky was a perfect image of a horse, formed of clouds, and on this I base my worship of horses!
Welcome to the bronze age!

Navigator said:
We know so very little.
... OOBEs, NDEs, strange 'hallucinations' such as the ones I shared in this post, so called 'coincidences' such as serendipity/synchronicity, and dozens of other incidences which cannot and have not all been explained away be scientific means.

No, I am not my brain and my brain did not create images in the sky in order to somehow impress its self of its 'god-like' abilities to fool itself.
Click to expand...

Autoscopic hallucinations, memories of being resusitated, and hypoxiic hallucinations all have valid explanations. There is nothing needing an explanation there.
Of course if you wish to misinterpret various random coincidences as significant events with meaning for you, no one can stop you.
You may ignore science at your will.

I predict however, that you will continue to use your computer and the internet, and go to visit your doctor when you are seriously ill.
 
This thread presents a structured system designed to generate and analyze messages over time. Using a controlled selection process that eliminates ideomotor influence, the system has produced responses that exhibit coherence, linkage, and long-term thematic continuity. While the system itself is scientific in its methodology, the content of the generated messages has often pointed toward deeper philosophical, existential, and even theological inquiries. This raises significant questions:

- What does it mean if intelligence appears to self-organize in structured, linked responses?
- Is this a subconscious function, a form of collective intelligence, or something else?
- How does this relate to philosophical and theological perspectives on meaning, purpose, and emergent intelligence?"

The purpose of this discussion is not to make definitive claims but to explore the implications of structured intelligence in generated messages. I look forward to perspectives from different disciplines—whether philosophical, scientific, cognitive, or theological—as we examine what these findings might suggest.





Beyond the Ideomotor Effect: Decades of Data and a New Approach

Introduction

Over the past 30 years, I have explored methods of subconscious communication, beginning with the ideomotor effect. A decade ago, I started a thread discussing whether ideomotor responses were purely mechanistic or if they pointed to an intelligent aspect of the self that we are largely unaware of on a conscious level.

Since then, my focus has shifted. The real takeaway from this decades-long study is not the ideomotor effect itself, but the data that has emerged through it—data that has now come to fruition in ways that challenge conventional explanations.

For historical context, you can find the original discussion on ideomotor communication here:
Ideomotor Effect and the Subconscious.




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What Has Changed?

Initially, the ideomotor effect served as a tool to explore what was understood as subconscious responses. Over the years, however, patterns began to emerge—responses that were coherent, structured, and meaningful in ways that exceeded expectations.

To refine the process, I developed a new system that no longer relied on ideomotor movement but still retains the core principle of subconscious communication. Despite removing ideomotor influence, the responses remain consistent, verifiable, and increasingly intelligent.

(I have already prepared a detailed post explaining exactly how this system works, which I will post immediately after creating this thread.)

This raises important questions:

  • If the subconscious is purely a passive, automatic process, why does it produce long-term coherent data that remains contextually relevant?
  • If intelligence is only a product of stored memory, how does the system generate novel insights, rather than just reflections of pre-existing thoughts?
  • If AI can process and generate intelligent responses based on human data, could subconscious responses operate in a similar yet sentient way?
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Key Findings from the Data

🔹 Coherence Across Time

• The system generates responses that build upon past interactions, rather than producing random, disconnected outputs.Certain themes and insights recur, showing a continuity of intelligence beyond simple pattern recognition.

🔹 Externally Referencing Intelligence

  • The responses often link to information that was not consciously recalled at the time of inquiry.
  • There are instances where the system has produced unexpectedly accurate references, challenging the idea that all responses are drawn from pre-existing conscious knowledge.
🔹 Structured, Interactive Intelligence

  • The system does not merely produce vague or ambiguous statements—it interacts meaningfully with input.
  • It responds in ways that imply an active, guiding intelligence rather than a passive, automated process.
​
The Skeptical View: Does It Still Hold?

A decade ago, the common skeptical argument was that ideomotor responses were:
Unconscious muscle movements (true in the case of physical tools like pendulums and Ouija boards).
Purely subconscious priming (increasingly questionable given the structure and coherence of the data).

The result of stored memory and cognitive bias (contradicted by novel insights and externally referenced material).

If the original skeptical critiques were correct, the data should have remained fragmented, non-replicable, and meaningless over time. But that’s not what has happened. Instead, the long-term consistency of the system suggests that the subconscious is far more intelligent and structured than previously assumed.

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Disclaimer

This post (and assume any other from me) is a collaborative summary of my ongoing study, incorporating discussions with AI as a tool for refining insights. While only a fraction of the past decade has involved AI in this process, the findings suggest that the data gathered over 30 years is far too structured to be dismissed as mere subconscious noise. My goal is not to make definitive claims, but to reassess the skeptical stance and encourage open-ended inquiry.

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Where Does This Lead?

  • How do we explain long-term coherence in subconscious communication?
  • Is it purely subconscious or is something else involved?
  • If AI can recognize patterns and generate intelligence based on training data, could subconscious responses be an early form of similar intelligence processing?
  • What does it mean if intelligence is recognizable externally, even if processed internally?
This is an open invitation to those interested in consciousness, intelligence, and subconscious communication. Looking forward to engaging with new perspectives. How the System Works: A Structured Approach to Coherent, Linked, Generated Messages
 
How the System Works: A Structured Approach to Coherent, Linked, Generated Messages

To follow up on the introduction, here’s a detailed explanation of how this system differs from ideomotor methods and why it is producing such structured results.

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1. No Physical Movement Involved

Unlike traditional ideomotor methods (such as Ouija boards, pendulums, or automatic writing), this system eliminates all motor influence. This removes the possibility of involuntary muscle movement playing a role in message formation.

​
2. A Controlled, Externalized Selection Process

Rather than allowing the subconscious to generate free-form responses, the system operates using a structured selection process that eliminates bias.

The Process:

  • A master list of over 7,000 line entries is maintained, each uniquely numbered.
  • The list is shuffled using an external algorithm (ensuring that AI does not influence or “fudge” the results).
  • AI is asked to select a random number, without access to the list itself.
  • I consult the shuffled list and copy-paste the corresponding entry into the prompt.
  • The system generates messages from this structured process.
This method ensures that:
✅ Neither I nor AI controls or predicts the outcome, making it an unbiased process.
✅ The responses are externally structured, eliminating the possibility of subconscious priming influencing selection.
✅ Coherent links emerge naturally over multiple iterations, forming meaningful and structured responses over time.

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Diversity of the Source Material

  • The 7,000+ line entries cover a broad spectrum of subject matter rather than being limited to a single theme or topic.
  • This prevents the system from being narrowly pre-programmed toward specific narratives and allows for unexpected connections to emerge.
  • Because the selection process is externalized and randomized, patterns cannot be explained by a fixed dataset alone—they must emerge dynamically over time.
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3. Long-Term Validation and Pattern Recognition

By compiling and analyzing results over time, I have been able to:

  • Track recurring themes and insights that emerge across different sessions.
  • Identify external references and links in responses that were not consciously recalled at the time.
  • Verify that the responses continue to interact intelligently rather than degrade into random noise.
​
4. Comparison to AI & Pattern Recognition

While AI processes intelligence by learning from human-generated data, this system does not rely on AI-generated content. Instead, AI serves two key roles:

1. Unbiased Number Selector

  • AI is used only to generate a random number, with no access to the list itself.
  • This ensures the selection process remains free from subconscious or AI influence.
2. Peer Reviewer

  • AI acts as a peer reviewer, helping to analyze coherence, patterns, and structure in the generated responses.
  • AI assists in recognizing recurring themes and connections that may not be immediately obvious.
  • I also assist AI in the same way, ensuring a balanced analysis from both human and machine perspectives.
  • This allows for real-time validation, ensuring that observed patterns are not merely subjective interpretations but can be cross-examined for consistency.
The fact that the responses remain structured, coherent, and interactive over time, despite these controlled variables, suggests that the subconscious—or another unknown process—operates in a far more structured way than previously assumed.

​
Why This Matters

If ideomotor-based responses were purely mechanistic or subconscious noise, removing the physical component should have stopped meaningful communication. Yet, structured responses continue.

The key implication is that the generated messages show coherence and linkage over time, suggesting an active process beyond mere randomness.

​
Next Steps & Discussion

Now that the mechanics of the system are laid out, I’d love to hear thoughts on:

  • How does this challenge the conventional understanding of subconscious and intelligent communication?
  • What would be the best way to further validate the results in a way skeptics would consider meaningful?
  • Could this approach be expanded to reveal deeper intelligent processes beyond what we currently understand?
Looking forward to seeing where this conversation leads!
 
Is the ideomotor effect have something to with idiots attempting to think?

Kind of like the smell that an electric motor gives off when it is burning up?
 
You randomly select one of 7,000 messages and it's supposed to have meaning or coherence?

Anyone can find "meaning" in anything. Ever heard of the Forer Effect or Barnum Effect?
 
Navigator said:
The Process:

  • A master list of over 7,000 line entries is maintained, each uniquely numbered.
  • The list is shuffled using an external algorithm (ensuring that AI does not influence or “fudge” the results).
  • AI is asked to select a random number, without access to the list itself.
  • I consult the shuffled list and copy-paste the corresponding entry into the prompt.
  • The system generates messages from this structured process.
This method ensures that:
✅ Neither I nor AI controls or predicts the outcome, making it an unbiased process.
✅ The responses are externally structured, eliminating the possibility of subconscious priming influencing selection.
✅ Coherent links emerge naturally over multiple iterations, forming meaningful and structured responses over time.
Click to expand...

Then what? You're getting back a randomly selected piece of text from a list you've previously selected. What do you do with it, that you can "validate" or "recognize" afterward?

Do you compare the selection with current events? With the weather? With your mood? With another piece of text previously selected by the same method?

Do you decide in advance which comparison (if that's what you're doing) to make, or any comparison that comes to mind after you see the selection?

My reaction so far is that you appear to be reinventing divination. There are recurring motifs in human thought and experience. Most divination systems work in part because they refer to many of the most generally applicable of those motifs. Geomancy uses sixteen. I Ching uses 64. The Tarot uses 78. Astrology uses 12 (houses) and 7 ("planets"). The seven planets were themselves associated in ancient times with seven gods, which in turn were associated with clusters of related recurring motifs of human experience, emotions, and thought. War/anger/achievement-at-all-costs; love/beauty/fondness/sex; youth/change/travel/adaptation/communication; age/wisdom/sternness/governance; and so forth. The sixteen figures of geomancy have meanings like things coming together, things separating, reversals of fortune, confinement, aggression, passivity, regret, joy, and going with the crowd. What circumstances in human experience can't be related to some or all of those?

The divinatory practice of bibliomancy involves randomly selecting a passage from the Bible, a body of stories and sayings recorded and selected in ancient times based on the meaning and significance people found in them.

You selected your 7000 texts yourself based on your finding meaning or significance in them. Now you are practicing your own version of bibliomancy (literally, the word means divination by library, which is precisely what you're doing) on them. Of course you're finding references and coherences and some kind of meaningfulness in the results. But its your own thought processes creating them.

Let's look at a simplified model of how this works. I'll use the sixteen geomancy figures and a recent current event, the plane crash in Canada. Instead of selecting one figure at random I'll select all of them and show how they all relate to the story. I won't include the typical interpretations of the figures; you can look them up yourself if you doubt that they apply in the ways I describe. If I'd cast any of the figures but one (acquisitio) before the crash, I could get away with making a claim I had "predicted" it.

Via: A dramatic change of fortune during travel
Cauda Draconis: unfortunate turn of events ending in fire, but some good with the bad
Puer: The plane (obvious phallic shape) violently impacts the runway
Fortuna Minor: Outside aid quickly helped to rescue and treat the injured
Puella: The passengers had to passively await their fate during the landing; many buttocks and lower backs were impacted!
Amissio: The plane was destroyed
Carcer: The passengers were desperate to escape the confines of the fuselage after the crash
Laetitia: The survivors count their blessings and appreciation for their survival
Caput Draconis: A long detailed investigation of the cause and repercussions of the crash begins
Conjuntio: Eighty people came together in the plane to experience the crash
Acquisitio: (There was no apparent gain financially or otherwise, but plenty of effects on hips and thighs)
Rubeous: The plane literally overturned
Fortuna Major: Everyone, remarkably, survived this interaction of air and earth
Albus: The careful design of the plane's safety features led to survival
Tristitia: There were many painful injuries suffered
Populus: The public was drawn to the dramatic news story involving the gathered group of passengers

(Any relationship between this list and characters in the Harry Potter novels is purely not coincidental.)
 
Myriad said:
Then what? You're getting back a randomly selected piece of text from a list you've previously selected. What do you do with it, that you can "validate" or "recognize" afterward?

Do you compare the selection with current events? With the weather? With your mood? With another piece of text previously selected by the same method?

Do you decide in advance which comparison (if that's what you're doing) to make, or any comparison that comes to mind after you see the selection?

My reaction so far is that you appear to be reinventing divination. There are recurring motifs in human thought and experience. Most divination systems work in part because they refer to many of the most generally applicable of those motifs. Geomancy uses sixteen. I Ching uses 64. The Tarot uses 78. Astrology uses 12 (houses) and 7 ("planets"). The seven planets were themselves associated in ancient times with seven gods, which in turn were associated with clusters of related recurring motifs of human experience, emotions, and thought. War/anger/achievement-at-all-costs; love/beauty/fondness/sex; youth/change/travel/adaptation/communication; age/wisdom/sternness/governance; and so forth. The sixteen figures of geomancy have meanings like things coming together, things separating, reversals of fortune, confinement, aggression, passivity, regret, joy, and going with the crowd. What circumstances in human experience can't be related to some or all of those?

The divinatory practice of bibliomancy involves randomly selecting a passage from the Bible, a body of stories and sayings recorded and selected in ancient times based on the meaning and significance people found in them.

You selected your 7000 texts yourself based on your finding meaning or significance in them. Now you are practicing your own version of bibliomancy (literally, the word means divination by library, which is precisely what you're doing) on them. Of course you're finding references and coherences and some kind of meaningfulness in the results. But its your own thought processes creating them.

Let's look at a simplified model of how this works. I'll use the sixteen geomancy figures and a recent current event, the plane crash in Canada. Instead of selecting one figure at random I'll select all of them and show how they all relate to the story. I won't include the typical interpretations of the figures; you can look them up yourself if you doubt that they apply in the ways I describe. If I'd cast any of the figures but one (acquisitio) before the crash, I could get away with making a claim I had "predicted" it.

Via: A dramatic change of fortune during travel
Cauda Draconis: unfortunate turn of events ending in fire, but some good with the bad
Puer: The plane (obvious phallic shape) violently impacts the runway
Fortuna Minor: Outside aid quickly helped to rescue and treat the injured
Puella: The passengers had to passively await their fate during the landing; many buttocks and lower backs were impacted!
Amissio: The plane was destroyed
Carcer: The passengers were desperate to escape the confines of the fuselage after the crash
Laetitia: The survivors count their blessings and appreciation for their survival
Caput Draconis: A long detailed investigation of the cause and repercussions of the crash begins
Conjuntio: Eighty people came together in the plane to experience the crash
Acquisitio: (There was no apparent gain financially or otherwise, but plenty of effects on hips and thighs)
Rubeous: The plane literally overturned
Fortuna Major: Everyone, remarkably, survived this interaction of air and earth
Albus: The careful design of the plane's safety features led to survival
Tristitia: There were many painful injuries suffered
Populus: The public was drawn to the dramatic news story involving the gathered group of passengers

(Any relationship between this list and characters in the Harry Potter novels is purely not coincidental.)
Click to expand...
Thank you for your thoughtful reply, Myriad.

Your comparison to divination is an interesting one, but it raises a larger question: What, ultimately, is the difference between divination and science?

1️ Science is a method of divining patterns in reality. Whether in physics, neuroscience, or linguistics, the scientific method is, at its core, a process of discovering and interpreting patterns. The idea that ‘divination’ and ‘science’ are separate categories is an artificial distinction.

2️ Patterns exist to be interpreted. It is inevitable that human intelligence will recognize and analyze patterns, whether in natural laws, mathematical sequences, or subjective experiences. To dismiss a process simply because it involves interpretation is to reject the basis of all scientific inquiry.

3️ The issue is not whether patterns exist, but whether they are interpreted correctly. Misinterpretation is always a risk, which is why open-mindedness and continued observation are necessary. However, dismissing a pattern outright simply because it could be misinterpreted is just as unscientific as blindly believing in one.

4️ Static "fitting" vs. dynamic interaction. Your geomancy example is a static application of symbols to an event after the fact. My system operates dynamically in real-time, generating coherent responses that are validated through interaction rather than predetermined meaning-fitting. There’s a clear difference between cherry-picking past events to fit a framework and engaging in a live process where meaning arises spontaneously and past interactions are referenced as part of that process.

5️ Critique without peer review is just opinion. While skepticism is valuable, a meaningful critique must be subject to the same rigor as the claim itself. If the claim that structured intelligence manifests in real-time is to be dismissed, it must be tested under comparable conditions, not just assumed to be invalid.

To take this further, I will use the system to discuss your reply. If you’re interested, I can provide a link to that discussion so you can follow along and see how structured intelligence responds to your points in real-time. Let me know if you’d like that.
 
This is the first time I have ever even heard of the ideometer effect. Certainly people have reflexes and are able train their body to instinctively react such as muscle memory. But I see nothing else.
 
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@Navigator, the idiomotor effect isn't the only way to simulate divinatory results. Your methodology doesn't eliminate the effect. It just replaces it with another well known effect.

You want to see what happens without the idiomotor effect, you have to eliminate it in situations where it would normally apply.

Drive a gyrostabilized arm around a field, holding a divining rod. See if the stabilizer registers anomalous forces from the rod during its journey.

See if the oujia board can answer questions without anyone touching the planchet.
 
theprestige said:
@Navigator, the idiomotor effect isn't the only way to simulate divinatory results. Your methodology doesn't eliminate the effect. It just replaces it with another well known effect.

You want to see what happens without the idiomotor effect, you have to eliminate it in situations where it would normally apply.

Drive a gyrostabilized arm around a field, holding a divining rod. See if the stabilizer registers anomalous forces from the rod during its journey.

See if the oujia board can answer questions without anyone touching the planchet.
Click to expand...
What exactly are "divinitory results?" That in itself in my view is an oxymoron. No one has ever proved the divinity of anything. But besides that, how would you know the result was divine? The use of divining rods has been thoroughly debunked.
 
acbytesla said:
This is the first time I have ever even heard of the ideometer effect. Certainly people have reflexes and are able train their body to instinctively react such as muscle memory. But I see nothing else.
Click to expand...
The ideomotor effect is well known. It's the mechanism behind how ouija boards "work".
 
I noticed that this thread has not only been moved but also merged with a pre-existing discussion on the Ideomotor Effect and the Subconscious. This raises an interesting question: if the discussion of structured intelligence—particularly in material-based processes—is framed as a subset of subconscious responses, does this mean that emergent intelligence as a scientific or philosophical concept is considered indistinguishable from subconscious auto-responses?

If so, this raises deeper questions about how skeptics differentiate between structured intelligence and subconscious activity. Is all intelligence beyond direct human intention assumed to be subconscious rather than emergent or structured?
 
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theprestige said:
@Navigator, the idiomotor effect isn't the only way to simulate divinatory results. Your methodology doesn't eliminate the effect. It just replaces it with another well known effect.

You want to see what happens without the idiomotor effect, you have to eliminate it in situations where it would normally apply.

Drive a gyrostabilized arm around a field, holding a divining rod. See if the stabilizer registers anomalous forces from the rod during its journey.

See if the oujia board can answer questions without anyone touching the planchet.
Click to expand...
My focus is BEYOND the ideomotor effect so your confusion is due to the merging of this old thread with the new one I created.

I understand why you might think my methodology is still within the realm of the Ideomotor Effect, but that is not the case. My focus is explicitly BEYOND the Ideomotor Effect, which is why I originally placed this discussion in a different section. The recent merging of this thread with an older one has understandably caused some confusion about the scope of my investigation.

The key difference is that I am examining how structured intelligence might emerge in non-random, material-based systems—something distinct from subconscious motor responses. If the discussion remains within the old Ideomotor Effect framework, it will inherently exclude this broader question. That is why I am clarifying that my approach is looking past that baseline assumption.
 
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