Woohoo! My first significant ESP test!

Hi everyone, new member here. I got my first significant score on an ESP test (http://psychiclibrary.com/beyondBooks/apps/esptest/) just now. Screenshot below. I did 25 trials of the "Predict a card unknown to you" test, with colors. Score was 9/25, on a binomial distribution p=0.0468.

This is the first time I've done significantly better than chance. I've tried these tests about 5 times before where I guessed or tried to rationally work out the likely order of colors, and never scored more than 4. What I did this time was slow down, and try to open my heart to the colors. I do loving-kindness (metta) meditation regularly (I got interested in psi through meditation and reading about siddhis in Buddhism/Yoga) and I would send loving-kindness to the colors, then try to feel which one was sending love back the most strongly. So I might get a stronger feeling of yellow back than any of the other colors when I looked at them with metta, and then I'd choose yellow.

I know this is only one test and I will definitely repeat it, posting results here. But I strongly suspect there is something in all this, because when I just guessed or tried to rationally predict the likely order of the colors, I'd get them wrong (scoring in total a 3 or 4). By slowing down and taking the time to feel an emotional resonance with the colors, I did better. There was an unmistakable correlation between being in a calm, loving state and guessing correctly. Any distraction (such as thoughts trying to predict which colors are likely to come up) and I'd guess wrong. Maintaining the loving state of metta as well as I possibly could was when I got them right. I definitely think this is worth pursuing further.


   

Hi everyone, new member here. I got my first significant score on an ESP test (http://psychiclibrary.com/beyondBooks/apps/esptest/) just now. Screenshot below. I did 25 trials of the "Predict a card unknown to you" test, with colors. Score was 9/25, on a binomial distribution p=0.0468.

Well done Oliver!

I moved your post to a sub-folder specially created for personal experimentation. You might enjoy reading some of the other posts in this sub-folder.

Best wishes for future high scores.

Hi everyone, new member here. I got my first significant score on an ESP test (http://psychiclibrary.com/beyondBooks/apps/esptest/) just now. 

Awesome news Oliver.  I would be interested to know if you can do this again.  A consistently high score would be proof positive.  Good luck! 

Good job Oliver, nice to see another person running experiments. Keep Em coming!

Hi everyone, new member here. I got my first significant score on an ESP test (http://psychiclibrary.com/beyondBooks/apps/esptest/) just now. Screenshot below. I did 25 trials of the "Predict a card unknown to you" test, with colors. Score was 9/25, on a binomial distribution p=0.0468.

I just tried it, using symbols. I got the first two right. Then seemed to get most wrong. End result, 8/25 or 32%.

Tried again with colours. Got the first one right. Then got most wrong, ended up with 3/25 !

Actually I wrote a program to do this test using the five Zener-card symbols way back, must have been the 1980s, I think. I know at that time I didn't get any particularly significant results over a long series of tests. But I do find it hard to focus or remain interested. After a while, rather than making any sort of choice, I tend to just click on anything to get the test done quickly, which may or may not be a suitable approach.

The online version linked here gives feedback after each card. I think my implementation didn't show any feedback until the end of the set of 25, which I thought was better - even if the end result was not particularly improved.

I just tried it, using symbols. I got the first two right. Then seemed to get most wrong. End result, 8/25 or 32%.

Tried again with colours. Got the first one right. Then got most wrong, ended up with 3/25 !

Actually I wrote a program to do this test using the five Zener-card symbols way back, must have been the 1980s, I think. I know at that time I didn't get any particularly significant results over a long series of tests. But I do find it hard to focus or remain interested. After a while, rather than making any sort of choice, I tend to just click on anything to get the test done quickly, which may or may not be a suitable approach.

The online version linked here gives feedback after each card. I think my implementation didn't show any feedback until the end of the set of 25, which I thought was better - even if the end result was not particularly improved.

I've heard that as an explanation for the decline effect - that forced-choice tests are boring, and so people don't give them much attention after a while and therefore do worse. That was one motivation for parapsychologists to investigate unconscious-psi. I'm going to repeat the test soon, and maintain interest by thinking how amazing it would be to demonstrate that this stuff is real

However, 8/25 is fairly good. Whatever your mental state was when you got the cards right is worth trying to get into again.

Tried two experiments over lunch just now. First I got 6/25, second 10/25. Screenshot for the second below. Probability of 10/25 is 0.017, and combined the three tests are 25/75, p=0.0047.

The first experiment I was a bit more anxious. I was quite nervous about Friday's test being a fluke. I could feel an anxiety about getting them wrong which I think was affecting my ability to tune in. During the second I had relaxed a lot. Relaxation, no nerves, is key!

In the second experiment I seemed to get future colors in advance. So I would tune in and get a sequence of "blue, green, purple". Then I would try in that order. Sometimes the first one would be wrong (so I guessed blue and it was yellow), but then green and purple would be correct. This happened when I relaxed, watched my breath, and tried to be as meditative as possible. I was able to watch the ordinary verbal thoughts go by and focus on the sequence I'd received. If this happens in future tests it's suggestive of precognition. I will do more meditations that focus on the sense of awareness stretching through time.


   

Two more 9/25 tests just now. Screenshots below

       

One strange way I've found that seems to 'help', is that if you look at the cards in an 'unfocused' way, kind of like the way you look at holograms to see the 'hidden picture' (quite apt actually, when you think about it!   ), then whatever card your eye is drawn to first, is more likely than not the correct card!

It seems to work for me anyway!

EDIT- And don't try to second guess! It works only when you just 'do it'. 

For example, using the method above, I got this;