Testing Telekinesis

[Brattus]

One thing I learned from this thread. Using only the power of my mind, I can move on to the next thread.
Goodbye.

 

[Femke]

Another way to handle selection of the object would be to have it picked from a very large number. For example, supposed the claimant says he can move a paper clip. Then the protocol could be to go to a paper clip manufacturer where there are millions of paper clips and then let a third party pick one.

Or put three paperclips on the same table, but not touching each other, and ask the claimant to move only number 2.

 

[tsig]

Well, if one has telekinetic powers, then why bother with JREF at all?

Because if I had such powers, then I would just visit various Roulette tables around the world and scoop up and extra few grand here and there, then move on to some other place before they got wise.

It would be easy to do and I could get in a great deal of good travelling to boot.

Why not just reach out mentally and flip a few ones and zeros and etransfer some money into your account?

 

[dlorde]

Rather than a simple 'one item', 'one movement' test, I'd prefer to see a kind of pin-ball rig where multiple wooden balls fall down a tilted board, bouncing off wooden pins, into a number of collection slots. This would allow an isolated set up, remote activation (running balls down a tube to the top of the board or similar), multiple runs to calibrate in the absence of telekinesis, and multiple runs in the presence of telekinesis. If the claimant could influence the cumulative trajectory of the balls over multiple runs to fall into different slots at a significantly greater than random chance, they'd have demonstrated their influence.

 

[RayG]

Robert Park covered this nearly a dozen years ago.

f the mind can influence inanimate objects, why not simply measure the static force the mind can exert? Modern ultramicrobalances can routinely measure a force much less than a billionth of an ounce. Why not just use your psychokinetic powers to deflect a microbalance? [...] The reason, of course, is that the microbalance stubbornly refuses to budge.

—Robert L. Park, Voodoo Science, 2000, page 199




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Quote-mined from here.

RayG

 

[SezMe]

Rather than a simple 'one item', 'one movement' test, I'd prefer to see a kind of pin-ball rig where multiple wooden balls fall down a tilted board, bouncing off wooden pins, into a number of collection slots. This would allow an isolated set up, remote activation (running balls down a tube to the top of the board or similar), multiple runs to calibrate in the absence of telekinesis, and multiple runs in the presence of telekinesis. If the claimant could influence the cumulative trajectory of the balls over multiple runs to fall into different slots at a significantly greater than random chance, they'd have demonstrated their influence.

Why do a complicated test that involves statistics rather than a simple yes/no test whose outcome is obvious....like the one in the post above this.

 

[dlorde]

Why do a complicated test that involves statistics rather than a simple yes/no test whose outcome is obvious....like the one in the post above this.

I don't think it's a complicated test. It allows a baseline control comparison which makes set up and replication relatively easy. It also seems to me reasonably robust against claims of deceitful manipulation (cheating )

I haven't yet heard a protocol for a yes/no test that seems sufficiently robust against claims of deceitful manipulation.

I don't feel particularly strongly about it - I just thought it worth consideration.