Talk:Remote viewing/Archive 5

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Link to Scientology

This may be a point of some controversy, however I feel a link the link between RV and Scientology should be made on this page. I think it is a very important part of how we RV is perceived in modern culture and its links to a widely known religion. The following is taken from the wiki page ["Supernatural abilities in Scientology doctrine"]:

[Telepathy and remote viewing]

Two Scientologists, Hal Puthoff and Ingo Swann, researched remote viewing at Stanford Research Institute for the CIA in the 1970s.[3][4] Most of the SRI team, including project director Puthoff, and the CIA's star "psychic spies", Price and Swann, were Scientologists, a fact that skeptic Martin Gardner noted disparagingly. Puthoff and Swann were of the "original" Operating Thetan (OT) VII level (the Church has since 'changed' OT VII from the level these two completed), and credited Scientology with their success in the CIA remote viewing program.[5][6]

From the book What is Scientology?: "Can OTs read minds? ...to answer the question bluntly - yes, with varying degrees of ability". (First printing, 1978, pg.215)

The two important cited articles are:

5 Hubbard, L. Ron (October 1977) [1950]. Have You Lived Before This Life? (1977 edition ed.). Los Angeles, California: Church of Scientology of California Publications Organization. ISBN 0-88484-055-0 {{isbn}}: Check isbn value: checksum (help). 6 http://www.scientologyhandbook.org/SH6_4.HTM accessed 2006-10-22

I hope this will be helpful, I don't want to change the article myself as I think this is perhaps the validity of these claims are in debate. Have Puthoff and Swann both openly admitted to being Scientologists? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 168.209.92.254 (talk) 08:27, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

Link: Supernatural_abilities_in_Scientology_doctrine#Telepathy_and_remote_viewing. --Enric Naval (talk) 18:55, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

remote desktop / remote access

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Remote_viewing&diff=next&oldid=338636353

I added this because I know 'vnc viewer' is what most vnc client software clals iteself. I wasn't trying to be funny. What's people's opinions on this? I know they are in different subject areas but the names are similar enough to be confusing imo. —Crazytales (talk) 06:55, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Recent developments in Remote Viewing

The article does not seem to accurately reflect the current state of Remote Viewing. Recent developments in Physics, ascribed to Stephen Hawking no less, point towards a Multiverse view of the Universe. This is a simple extension of the Four Dimensional view of Einstein taking into account the unresolved queries of Kaluza-Klein. Similarly no reference is made to the extensive works of Jung where a central postulate is the reach of the Psyche into areas beyond our comprehension. Declassified programs have lead to the recent release of GeoLoc and RVChronos which are very helpful in providing evidence for the veracity of the Remote Viewing protocols. There is a sneaking suspicion that Intelligence Agencies might use debunking as a convenient way of hiding evidence that would compromise their darker secrets. In all a biased and unhelpful article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Eiscan (talk • contribs) 18:09, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

What is project Starlight?

Inserted here:

"'In 2000 it is alleged that the United States Military under the Defense Intelligence Agency has resumed experiments in remote viewing and intelligence gathering operations under project Starlight. DIA Analyst Michael Serris, the rising star in the military's remote viewing program has disappeared under mysterious circumstances and the fate of the program is unknown."

Their website describes them as a private initiative to get UFO information from the government. If no reliable sources are provided for remote viewing involvement, I'll just go and remove it. --Enric Naval (talk) 00:49, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

OK, so Project Starlight is a conspiracy theory society, and now the editor has added claims that a living person has "disappeared under mysterious circumstances". I am removing this until someone can provide something that passes for a reliable source. --Enric Naval (talk) 06:18, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Project Starlight the conspiracy theory society and the project under the DIA is named coincidentally and has nothing to do with each other. From project Stargate to project Starlight. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cdward (talk • contribs) 08:35, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Well, ok, I believe you. But from what source did you get this information? From a website, a book, a newspaper article, a blog, a forum? You need to cite sources for the information.

(The only thing I can find not related to Greer is a forum post with an alleged email filtration ). --Enric Naval (talk) 09:16, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

real experiments with RM through a cat?

It probably doesn't go along with this article's subject but it IS remote viewing, I came here looking for it. Anyone hear of this/have a source, for a research project where they had electrodes on a cat's head and saw through its eyes? a wiki article relevant to it? anything? Batvette (talk) 11:43, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

This article is a joke. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.137.143.64 (talk) 19:32, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

Modify Early Background

I've reinstated the short historical background material, which summarizes the citations from skeptics Hyman (ProcIEEE 1986) and Wade (Science 1973). It seems to provide a better context for the opening description of Putoff & Targ's research, which otherwise sounds like they started the work completely out of the blue. jxm (talk) 17:07, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

remote viewing assessment bias

I was surprised by key absences, points noted even in the thesis by L R Bremseth at the Marine University Marine War College. 1) The AIR report assessment under the CIA was clearly biased against remote viewing by the choice of psychologist Hyman and exclusive focus on the final two years under the CIA. The project had lasted 20 years and had had better trained people before the CIA took the project back from the DOD. One possibility is that the CIA wanted to debunk the project to discourage private research but continue research itself. 2) It is clearly false that RV was never used successfully for intelligence, since President Carter made a public statement related to one such use. Material related to McMoneagle also seems to contradict the claim. 3)Promising points for later research were not noted, e.g., potential effects of local sidereal time at the experiment site and expertise of particular remote viewers. I'm no expert, but even I know about these things. I wouldn't want the article to pander to gullibility, but it seems to have pandered to the biased skepticism of those who have already decided not to be open to fresh possibilities. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Criticx (talk • contribs) 00:11, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Do you have specific suggestions for improvement of the article in the way of specific wording and reliable sources? Please provide them here for discussion, improvement, and possible use in the article. -- Brangifer (talk) 03:24, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Prof. Jessica Utts, who has just been elected future president of the American Statistical Association (which should say something about her credentials) wrote a report "AN ASSESSMENT OF THE EVIDENCE FOR PSYCHIC FUNCTIONING" for the CIA, reprinted at http://www.ics.uci.edu/~jutts/air.pdf (related material can be seen at http://www.lfr.org/lfr/csl/media/ciaairreport.html), much of which is concerned with Remote Viewing. Here is an extract:

Using the standards applied to any other area of science, it is concluded that psychic functioning has been well established. The statistical results of the studies examined are far beyond what is expected by chance. Arguments that these results could be due to methodological flaws in the experiments are soundly refuted. Effects of similar magnitude to those found in government-sponsored research at SRI and SAIC have been replicated at a number of laboratories across the world. Such consistency cannot be readily explained by claims of flaws or fraud

Now the question arises whether the sceptical reports (characterising RV as pseudoscience) are of equally good scientific standard. Let us not forget an editors comment that it is our 'righteous duty' to keep out 'low quality stuff'. --Brian Josephson (talk) 19:08, 10 May 2014 (UTC)

After reading the assessments of both Utts and Hyman, the CIA decided to cancel the program. The CIA said that RV had not made any significant contribution to any investigation.

And that was written back in 1996. Since then, the PEAR lab has closed due to lack of funding (caused by utter lack of any tangible/replicable results, I would say), And the UK make a secret program that was also closed due to lack of results. In 2014, 18 years after Utts' text, the only consistency has been the lack of results.

I consider this to be outdated material, of limited utility out of its historical context. --Enric Naval (talk) 23:28, 10 May 2014 (UTC)

Advertisement spamming.

A couple of lines, that was put under the Scientific studies and claims section, were advertising some kind of monetary challenge show, and is to be considered as spam. It seems to feature in a large amount of wikipedia articles. If someone can justify how it should be relevant here please tell us. (Slorri (talk) 18:40, 13 April 2013 (UTC))

I believe the bit about the challenge should be left in. The One Million Dollar Paranormal Challenge is not a game show, but rather an opportunity for individuals to demonstrate paranormal abilities for a one million dollar reward, should they succeed. I feel the paragraph reads better with additional details about a specific organization and set of experiments, and I wouldn't characterize those details as spamming. However, I will defer to whatever consensus is reached. Dustinlull (talk) 21:58, 13 April 2013 (UTC)

I'd also like the reference to the challenge to be left in, since it adds balance to the remote viewing article, and since as Dustinlull said it is not a gamseshow, but directly relevant to a scientific section on testing remote viewing. Rjmail (talk) 22:27, 13 April 2013 (UTC)

Well you are the one entertaining these advertisements Rjmail, so we should weigh your words lightly. A quick investigation of that monetary challenge reveals that it is orchestrated by a stage magician named Randall James Hamilton Zwinge, bearing no scientific credence, but looks mostly like a way to make money and claim to fame. And the massive amount of entries on wikipedia supports this notion. I say, stick to facts, keep the wikipedia clean. If one show is allowed to advertise then soon all want in. (Slorri (talk) 21:07, 15 April 2013 (UTC))

Randi's monetary challenge applies across the board to any putative demonstration of paranormal abilities, not just to remote viewing. As it says in the second paragraph here, the prize is offered to "eligible applicants who can demonstrate evidence of any paranormal, supernatural or occult power or event under test conditions agreed to by both parties". Unless someone can point to challenge-related experiments that specficially claim to demonstrate powers of remote viewing, as defined in this article, then the link/reference has no place here. jxm (talk) 00:25, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

I absolutely disagree with classifying it as advertising or spamming, though I agree that it doesn't belong in this article on a paranornal phenomenon unless some direct relevance can be shown. And if someone chooses to add it back in, he should edit it so that Wikipedia doesn't cite itself as a source. —Frungi (talk) 03:13, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

Remove uncited material

Since the following items have been cn-d since Aug 2009, I suggest we scrap them and any material that is relying on them.

• Kress 1977/1999
• AAAS consciousness symposium (Puthoff, et al., 1981)
• Targ 1996

 jxm (talk) 01:34, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Odd Richard Wiseman quote

From the Daily Mail article being quoted as a source:

"Professor Richard Wiseman, a psychologist at the University of Hertfordshire, refuses to believe in remote viewing. He says: "I agree that by the standards of any other area of science that remote viewing is proven, but begs the question: do we need higher standards of evidence when we study the paranormal? I think we do.""

Agreeing that something is "proven" but refusing to believe in it seems a little strange. WP:BLPSOURCES says we shouldn't use a tabloid newspaper source when a better one is available - has Wiseman written anything clearer about his opinions on remote viewing? --McGeddon (talk) 10:38, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Digging a little, it looks like Wiseman himself raised concern on Twitter in 2009 that Wikipedia was using a misleading interview quote: "It is a slight misquote, because I was using the term in the more general sense of ESP - that is, I was not talking about remote viewing per se, but rather Ganzfeld, etc as well. I think that they do meet the usual standards for a normal claim, but are not convincing enough for an extraordinary claim." --McGeddon (talk) 10:43, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

So, should we remove the misleading quote? Or add the clarification? --Enric Naval (talk) 20:14, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

WP:BLPSOURCES seems clear on this: if the only source for a statement about a living person is a tabloid newspaper, we should cut it. I'll do that now, but if anyone can dig up a better quote from Wiseman as the voice of open-minded science, it'd be good to have one. --McGeddon (talk) 08:58, 4 July 2013 (UTC)

Additional material available

At present, the article has little to say about the actual techniques that were used in the early RV experiments. Some time ago, this text was (wisely imho) dropped from the WP entry for SRI. While some of it is POV, I think that it also includes material (with several reputable citations) about the technical processes that were used for experimental testing, such as ELF shielding, faraday cages, EEG, etc. Any thoughts about including some limited amount of this text, possibly between the History and Scientific Reception sections? jxm (talk) 16:38, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

I added Alcock 1988 report to the Further reading section. This report from the National Research Council, published by the National Academies Press is weighty and contains a scholarly analysis of much of the material discussed in the article now. I suggest using it as a reference. - - MrBill3 (talk) 19:25, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Infobox proponents

I'm confused by the Original and Subsequent proponents of remote viewing in the info box.

First, it seems to me that, according to the article, others (Guiley, Faraday, Rhine, etc) were the actual original proponents of RV, but they aren't listed there.

Second, Russell Targ is listed as both an Original and a Subsequent proponent, and yet Harold Puthoff is only an Original proponent. A quick skim over the article reveals nothing to indicate that Harold Puthoff renounced his beliefs in RV. If Targ is in both categories, why isn't Puthoff? -Ca2james (talk) 19:40, 31 May 2014 (UTC)

Look again! Faraday etc. are described as proponents of research into psychic phenomena, not remote viewing. And the fact that Puthoff stopped being active in the field doesn't mean he renounced his beliefs. There is no contradiction there. --Brian Josephson (talk) 20:10, 31 May 2014 (UTC)

OK, so Faraday, et al don't belong in with the Original group. And as I thought, Puthoff didn't renounce his beliefs. Why, then, is Targ included in both the Original and Subsequent groups? I see no reason for him to be included as a Subsequent proponent. Or am I missing something? -Ca2james (talk) 02:40, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

The reason for the difference is that Targ continued working on RV while Puthoff moved to other subjects like zero-point energy. I agree that it is confusing to have Targ and not Puthoff in the second list and will therefore remove him as we are agreed on this and I don't think it's that controversial, but people should be free to suggest alternatives as it may still be open to misinterpretation (but one can't put very much in an infobox). I considered changing 'proponents' to 'investigators' but people such as Swann weren't really investigators (they did not investigator other people). --Brian Josephson (talk) 07:25, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Thank you! It is difficult to convey enough information in a limited infobox. I have another question/suggestion. Currently the article uses the pseudoscience infobox template but since the article is part of a series on the paranormal, why not use the paranormal infobox template instead? The paranormal template has a "Coined by" field that could be used in place of "Original proponents". If we were to keep the pseudoscience infobox, I'd suggest changing "Original proponents" to "Founders" and "Subsequent proponents" to "Adherents" or "Practitioners". -Ca2james (talk) 14:53, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

It looks to me as if the paranormal template is in fact the one used here (yes? -- go into 'edit' to see), and this template has been doctored so the word 'pseudoscience' is there and cannot be edited out (try it -- replace it by paranormal and preview the result). This is the kind of silly thing that happens when editors impose their PoV, but here is a global change, rather than one that biases just one article. --Brian Josephson (talk) 16:53, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

@Brian: No, the paranormal template is the small box under the pseudoscience infobox. It appears that there has been significant opposition to the use of this pseudoscience infobox over the years with some attempts to eliminate it. The usual argument is that whether or not an issue can be so described it is appropriate to do so within the article...NOT a hardwired infobox template. It is I believe currently being left up to talk page consensus. I vote with you for removal or replacement of this infobox template. (Though I am for such a designation within the body of the article.) Juan Riley (talk) 17:40, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

To be specific something like the following could be inserted in place of the pseudoscience infobox Juan Riley (talk) 18:03, 1 June 2014 (UTC):

Remote viewing

Claims	The alleged paranormal ability to perceive a remote or hidden target without support of the senses.
Year proposed	1970
Original proponents	Russell Targ and Harold Puthoff
Subsequent proponents	Ingo Swann, Joseph McMoneagle, Courtney Brown

Since the categorization as pseudoscience is made in the first paragraph of the lead, I have decided to be bold and eliminate it in the infobox...using the infobox immediately above. Juan Riley (talk) 18:22, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Good. Evidently infoboxes are more complicated things than I had assumed they were.
To change the subject a little, a ;ong time ago there was a TV series which included a nice demo of RV, where the research assistant acted as viewer, and you can see her describing the randomly selected location almost as if she was there herself. A single demo like this proves nothing of course, but it is quite instructive. What do you think of including it? The URL is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nn2grEJPw70. --Brian Josephson (talk) 18:46, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

I would view it as specious...without some serious documented scientific controls it amounts to little more than another Uri Geller performance. Juan Riley (talk) 18:53, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

You seem to be doubting the integrity of the people who produced the programme (broadcast by the BBC). Have you actually watched the video, and do you understand the experiment? --Brian Josephson (talk) 19:07, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

You know that the fundamental basis of scientific experiments is repeatability and quantifiability. On trust? This type of "theatrical" demonstration fails not only those essentials but also double blind controls on the participants. To quote Feynman: "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool." Juan Riley (talk) 19:27, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

I did not suggest that this was science. The demonstration did however make clear certain things and I think many people who were unfamiliar with RV experiments would have found it instructive. Are you suggesting that viewers were deceived, and if so in what way? --Brian Josephson (talk) 19:37, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

How would I know how people could fool themselves and/or others in such a theatrical demonstration? Tis a Russell Teapot argument to say I need to know the details. Moreover, we will be hit with a "this is not a forum template" if we discuss this too much longer. Juan Riley (talk) 19:44, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Clearly you are not prepared to look properly into this question, so let's leave it now. It is the common refuge of the sceptic to say 'there must be something wrong', armchair criticism of the kind described in Dan Drasin's 'How to Debunk just about Anything'. --Brian Josephson (talk) 19:52, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Here we go with Russell's Teapot again. 'Taint my role to debunk extraordinary (to be polite) propositions, 'tis the proposer's onus to scientifically establish them. Juan Riley (talk) 19:57, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Indeed. And according to the analysis of the statistical expert appointed to assess the Stargate investigations, RV functioning was definitively established in that investigation. Sceptic Hyman agreed that he could not find a flaw, and had content himself with saying 'I am not convinced there isn't a problem', the universal 'get out of jail free' card. Anyway, this is a fruitless argument and I'm going to uncheck 'watch this page'. --Brian Josephson (talk) 20:16, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Clarification

In the early 1970s Harold Puthoff and Russell Targ joined the Electronics and Bioengineering Laboratory at Stanford Research Institute (SRI).[5] In addition to their mainstream scientific research work on quantum mechanics and laser physics, they initiated several studies of the paranormal.

the above quote makes it seem as if they were doing quantum and laser work while at SRI. Is that actually true? what became of that work?-- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 20:21, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Seems to be no references to those assertions given or that I am aware of..have only begun to read thru this article. Certainly I am skeptical of QM claims--but just my knee0jerk reaction. Juan Riley (talk) 20:31, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Just checked to confirm that none of the "physics" references in Targ article ascribe his affiliation as SRI. Doesn't say that others might not exist but up to '72 xenon laser paper his affiliation is given as Sylvania. Juan Riley (talk) 20:49, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

I haven't seen any published work on lasers attributed to SRI nor as JR said any affiliation with SRI listed on any laser work published by Targ. What mainstream scientific research was going on in quantum mechanics at that time? Is there any mainstream publication on quantum mechanics attributed to SRI or giving SRI as the author's affiliation? - - MrBill3 (talk) 08:27, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

QM is to some degree involved in all laser and electro-optics. To my knowledge, Targ was certainly not involved in any fundamental research on QM. Puthoff on the other hand could have had some involvement. On the other hand, in this case (the RV article not the Targ article) documenting the backgrounds of all the actors is not necessary. Juan Riley (talk) 22:56, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

I.e., I will rewrite to eliminate the questionable clause and start with "They initiated several studies...." ...revert if there is significant disagreemtn. Juan Riley (talk) 23:00, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Primary sources

The entire section "Persinger claims" is based on primary sources. See the policy No original research at § Primary, secondary and tertiary sources for an explanation of what a primary source is. See also the essays Independent sources and Third-party sources. The policy Neutral point of view at § Due and undue weight and § Fringe theories and pseudoscience also provides guidance as does the guideline Fringe theories. This section needs a secondary source finding this original research notable and providing evaluation/commentary/context etc. It should not rely on the extraction/summary/interpretation of a WP editor from the original publications. - - MrBill3 (talk) 03:16, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Okay - agreed, point taken. I don't know if there've been any reliable follow-up studies on this Persinger work that would serve as a secondary source; maybe someone else can explore that issue. For that matter, I'm not sure where the whole Persinger section came from in the first place. It seems way too Ingo Swann-specific, and maybe should be moved to that page instead.

OTOH, if we treat Persinger's paper as a primary source, shouldn't we therefore also view Putoff & Targ's Proc. IEEE (1976) and Nature (1980) papers in the same way? Hmmmm...... jxm (talk) 05:51, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

I think the whole Persinger section has to go if no secondary source is found.

Puthoff & Targ's publications are used only as a reference that they were published in those particular journals, which are both rather notable journals. The discussion of the substance of the research in those articles occurs later in the WP article and has multiple secondary sources. The notability of those articles is supported by 1)The prestige of the journals 2)Extensive discussion/evaluation etc in multiple secondary reliable sources. I certainly wouldn't use Puthoff & Targ to support a claim of fact based on their original research/it's primary publication, and indeed this article instead uses the secondary sources extensively, see the section "Scientific reception" if you read the secondary sources, you will note many of them discuss Puthoff & Targ's publications specifically as well as other work in the field.

I have added some tags to the section "U.S. government-funded research" as much of the sourcing is primary and/or low quality or involved. - - MrBill3 (talk) 06:35, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

I don't think James Randi's flim flam book should be included in the references as it he admitted that some of the information he presented in the book is not true. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.25.201.254 (talk) 12:52, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree entirely. Randi has completely impeached himself as anything resembling a reliable or authoritative source. He was a lounge-lizard illusionist seeking sensational attention, and his whole life was illusion built on pretense and dishonesty—all, of course, while holding himself up as the king of the moral high ground. Surely we can do better for authoritative sources. I'm going to add a few with some relevant facts from each.Celestia Jung (talk) 18:58, 11 May 2017 (UTC)

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Fiction presented as "fact"

Please don't write false information on this page and state it as "fact." I had corrected this following false statement, then someone came back and reverted it to this fiction:

"The term was coined in the 1970s by physicists Russell Targ and Harold Puthoff, parapsychology researchers at Stanford Research Institute (SRI), to distinguish it from the closely related concept of clairvoyance."

The "source" given for this false claim is Joe Nickell at the Skeptical Inquirer, and he merely states the claim without any foundation at all. This is clear violation of Wikipedia:Verifiability. In the edits I'm doing now, I cite at least five valid sources proving that Nickell's claim is patently false—including Russell Targ himself, who states flat-out in his cited book, page 23, that: "Ingo coined the term remote viewing." That is not a "primary source," because it's Targ talking about Swann, not Targ talking about Targ. Nickell should be disallowed entirely as a source for writing such blatant falsehoods. I have marked the other cites to his article as "citation needed."

I am now editing the article to correct the fictions to fact. I have also added a link to the only existing contemporaneous record of the 8 December 1971 experiment, with Swann and Janet Mitchell, at the American Society for Psychical Research, for which the term remote viewing was coined by Swann at the time. This is a historic record, on file at the University of West Georgia, and the images of the contemporaneous record that Mitchell made are on a page of a valid book publisher who sent two researchers there to research the papers. There is no rational cause for erasing the availability of this historic record of facts.

I have also linked to documents that the CIA has released to the public, and have cited the CIA's own journal, Studies in Intelligence, where the events documented with the CIA documents are described by the CIA officer who oversaw the events, Kenneth Kress. (A pseudonym, but one approved by the CIA for the agent to use in writing the journal article.)

All of the information I have put into my edits is 100-percent verifiable. It is without bias or "slant." None of it at all is "original research." The CIA is a third party to all the named individual participants, so is a valid secondary source. The information is all 100-percent neutral fact—unlike the very biased Nickell.

Please do not keep writing fiction into these pages and passing it off as "fact." — Preceding unsigned comment added by Celestia Jung (talk • contribs) 21:55, 22 May 2017 (UTC)

Edited to add: Sorry; forgot to sign. Also, the "Arlington Institute Presents" citation was a dead link. I removed it with my edits. Also, under the "Remote viewing" box on the right of the page, where it says "Original" and "Subsequent," this needs to be changed, given that Ingo Swann clearly, inarguably was "original," and Targ and Puthoff were "subsequent proponents." I have further CIA documents that prove that, and I will post them when I have a chance.Celestia Jung (talk) 22:07, 22 May 2017 (UTC)

The sources for the changes you wish to make need to be objective and independent, per our independent sources policy. Jim Marrs is an author of WP:SENSATIONal conspiracy/UFO books, so not a reliable source. And of course anything by Chalet Books is definitely a WP:FRINGE source, as noted by the disclaimer on their site. A publisher that "takes on subjects the mainstream won't touch" is not a reliable source for facts to be written in Wikipedia's voice. Same goes for "official documents" hosted on the Chaletbooks.com site. I've looked over Reading the Enemy's Mind: Inside Star Gate: America's Psychic Espionage Program by Paul Smith, however I don't think Smith is quite objective or independent, as he seems to be in the business of selling "remote viewing" learn-at-home instructions. Not sure about Targ's book; it would help if some mainstream sources could back up a claim that differs from our higher quality sources (Sorry, Kendrick Frazier and Joe Nickell are considered excellent sources for mainstream scientific opinion). Although we could probably get away with specific attribution, e.g. something like, "The term was coined in the 1970s by physicists Russell Targ and Harold Puthoff, parapsychology researchers at Stanford Research Institute (SRI), to distinguish it from the closely related concept of clairvoyance, and according to Targ, Ingo Swann had suggested the term during experiments at the American Society for Psychical Research". - LuckyLouie (talk) 02:44, 23 May 2017 (UTC)

I've added a slightly better copyedited version of the above suggestion here, which is consistent per WP:FRIND and WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV guidelines. - LuckyLouie (talk) 03:10, 23 May 2017 (UTC)

I'm afraid you're still writing fiction and passing it off as "fact." You have been given positive proof, in the form of a contemporaneous document that's in the permanent collection of Ingo Swann's papers at the University of West Georgia, collected and presented by responsible researchers, and you refuse to accept it it because it's on the site of a publisher you don't like and so smear with the broad brush of the WP:FRINGE—when it doesn't even apply. That article at Chalet Reports doesn't have a single breath of "fringe" anything in it; it simply reports on papers supplied to it by an accredited and well recognized curator of such collections at an accredited and well recognized university. Even in attempting to smear them you seem to write fiction: LuckyLouie: "A publisher that 'takes on subjects the mainstream won't touch' is not a reliable source for facts to be written in Wikipedia's voice." Please link to where that's said on the Chalet Reports site, or retract the claim.

LuckyLouie: "Kendrick Frazier and Joe Nickell are considered excellent sources." Not by me, and I just proved conclusively—with numerous sources—that Nickell wrote a flat-out lie about who coined the term "remote viewing." You still haven't addressed the matter of Wikipedia:Verifiability in those claims. They can't be verified, because they are fiction. I don't use sources who willfully lie, and at all relevant times Nickell had implied notice and constructive notice that what he wrote was false. If he's so sloppy a researcher that he didn't bother to find out the facts before spouting off, then he is not a reliable source at all. If Frazier just parroted Nickell (or vice versa), two people telling the same baseless lie don't make it true, no matter who they are. I'm about to post further proof that is irrefutable and that can't be twisted to fit a set of biases such as Frazier and Nickell manifest.

LuckyLouie: "I've looked over 'Reading the Enemy's Mind: Inside Star Gate: America's Psychic Espionage Program' by Paul Smith, however I don't think Smith is quite objective or independent, as he seems to be in the business of selling 'remote viewing' learn-at-home instructions." I really don't care if he sells hens' teeth; it's irrelevant to his statement about the source of the term "remote viewing." You must have overlooked this part of his bio: "Dr. Paul H. Smith [was] one of the longest-serving remote viewers in the Star Gate military psychic espionage program. Dr. Smith was personally taught controlled remote viewing by the legendary Harold E. Puthoff, Ph.D. and Ingo Swann, the originators of remote viewing." That goes to his unique percipient knowledge of the origin of remote viewing and the use of that term for it, and he says unequivocally on page 56 that in the wake of the 8 December 1971 viewing at ASPR, Swann, in discussion with Dr. Karlis Osis, Dr. Gertrude Schmeidler, and Janet Mitchell, came up with the term "remote viewing."

Also, the second paragraph I had posted—supported by CIA documents—goes vitally to the dates on which the CIA first tested Swann, in conjunction with Puthoff, which was before Swann actually joined the SRI program with Puthoff and Targ. It was only months after the August tests that the CIA gave the longer contract on 1 October 1972 to Puthoff, et al. You deleted that wholesale, with no reason given. I make note here that in making your wholesale reversion to my edits, you also wiped out the vital CIA documents that I had cited. I'm going to fix it, and am adding more.

Hi Luckylouie, Before I go to the trouble of editing this wiki, do you consider a retired deputy director of the KGB to be objective and independent source? Otherwise I just won't bother with the edit with this update. (i ask first, as we have Nobel Laureates on here arguing with people who so strongly object to anything which threatens there worldview?) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Nemesisevangelion (talk • contribs) 21:37, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

This isn't even arguable. Any reasonable person can see that the vast weight of relevant sources attribute the term "remote viewing" to Swann's creation at ASPR—including both Targ and Puthoff! (See my new edits and citations.) I may be wrong—and I hope I am—but what you keep doing here with this matter militates toward a conclusion that you have some kind of vested interest in keeping patently false statements by a handful of people alive as a myth, while suppressing well-documted facts. At the very least, it seems that you are uninformed about the genesis of remote viewing and important documented historical facts about it. I invite you to inspect your own motives in this matter, and consider recusing yourself from further edits on this topic until you become better informed and more impartial. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Celestia Jung (talk • contribs) 05:57, 23 May 2017 (UTC)

I have explained the relevance of the encyclopedia's editorial policies regarding sourcing, and offered an in-text attribution to Targ's crediting the term "remote viewing" to Swann, which you have apparently rejected. Please note that the topic of the article falls under WP:FRINGE guidelines, which is why your attempts to showcase (in the article lead section) various laudatory claims about the effectiveness of remote viewing from a document written by Targ and Putoff to the CIA gives WP:UNDUE weight to fringe views. I'm sorry that you don't agree with Wikipedia policies and guidelines, but edit warring is not a practical solution here. We operate by WP:CONSENSUS rather than argumentation, and continued disruption of the article and the Talk page could result in sanctions. Additionally, an Arbitration Committee decision enables discretionary sanctions regarding fringe science and pseudoscience to be used against an editor who repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, any expected standards of behaviour, or any normal editorial process. - LuckyLouie (talk) 18:01, 23 May 2017 (UTC)

Question about having a quote from Targ

Hello all - I was approached by Addidy on Twitter to ask if I have been the one to thwart their attempts to the edits they were making on the remote viewing page. Let's just set aside that Addidy approached me off Wikipedia - seriously I'm okay with that, I'm public and I'm happy to answer questions when I can. After I explained in many tweets what I saw was the problem with Addidy's editing style and lack of edit history, Addidy asked why we can't have a quote from Targ on the remote viewing page that says something like "Targ does not think remote viewing is pseudoscience" and then sum up why he does not think it is pseudoscience and cite this article http://www.espresearch.com/russell/russell-targ-response-to-wikipedia.shtml. I explained to Addidy that User:LuckyLouie has been trying to explain why Addidy's edits aren't sticking and I suggested that Addidy spend a quantity of time reading the talk page and learning how to edit Wikipedia correctly starting with grammar and spelling on a page they don't have an agenda on. But besides all that, I said I would make a talk page discussion to ask if others would be okay with us stating Targ saying he does not think the word pseudoscience fits remote viewing and briefly why. I await your discussion of the matter. Sgerbic (talk) 22:59, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

Hi, Sgerbic, I got your notification ping. Why we can't cite fringe/self published sources such as Targ's website has been discussed to WP:EXHAUSTION on this Talk page. That "Targ does not think remote viewing is pseudoscience" is a given. Every pseudoscience advocate strenuously objects to their avocation being called pseudoscience, it's an expected denial (see WP:MANDY). However unless these objections are notable in WP:FRIND sources, they don't belong in the article. - LuckyLouie (talk) 01:03, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

Thank you - just wanted to make sure I asked and got a clear answer for Addity. I'm going to state one more time for Addity's sake - if you want to become a serious Wikipedia editor then learn the rules, read though this talk page - all of it. Make a user page for yourself so that we know that you are here to stay awhile. And start with pages that you don't have an agenda. As Louie says it would be odd to write that Targ does not agree, because that is implied in the article. Sgerbic (talk) 04:16, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

And thank you for that article on MANDY that's the first I've heard of that. Years I've been here and still have a lot to learn. Sgerbic (talk) 04:19, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

Good point. I've added it to WP:FLAT. - LuckyLouie (talk) 20:55, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

And another one I've never heard of. Sgerbic (talk) 01:55, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

David Marks Exposed, The original Targ-Puthoff outbounder experiments are legitimate.

https://singularityquest.com/so-you-asked-for-proof-of-psychic-abilities/

The sensory cues that were last discovered by Marks were irrelevant as they pertain to the psychic's location, not the demarcation team. Although this allows you to order the transcripts to some degree, this provides no discernible advantage when the list of target sites were randomized. Therefore the original Targ-Puthoff experiment is valid and should be considered scientific evidence. More importantly than the cues. A basic empirical analysis would clearly show those with common sense psychic functioning took place. Price said "Hoover Tower" for Hoover Tower.

This finding wipes out probably at least half the testimonies against Remote Viewing listed here. I look forward to debunking the next goalpost provided.

We should begin heavily editing the cues section and correcting history. As it stands, this entire page looks like one massive hit piece using solely the opinions of those that have no idea how, or even at times, what remote viewing is. MIND-REACH isn't even listed for further reading. What even is this page.--Addidy (talk) 10:05, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

I understand you want us to read the arguments in singularityquest.com as a basis for removing reliably sourced critique of Remote Viewing by James Randi, and perhaps all others. However singularityquest.com is a blog and not a WP:RS (or in this case, a WP:FRIND source). Wikipedia has a number of editorial policies you may not be familiar with, so you may want to review them. One relevant policy guideline is WP:FRINGE. - LuckyLouie (talk) 16:14, 10 January 2021 (UTC)

Fine, don't read the blog, read the argument I made here. It makes sense doesn't it? You can agree this is grounds for heavily editing the cues section. You don't need to look at the blog you can just compare the 1974 Nature article on the original Targ-Puthoff experiment with the 1986 "Remote Viewing Exposed" article by David Marks and the 1980 nature article from Charles Tart to see he randomized the target locations in the rejudging. based on those resources (all included and explained in great detail in the blog) should suffice I take it? The blog isn't the source, The Nature article references are. I take it this should be satisfactory to you?Addidy (talk) 21:23, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

Unfortunately, we'd need a third party source that passes WP:RS to make those conclusions for us. What you are suggesting is WP:OR (basically, changing the text because you personally have come to conclusions that disagree with a source). - LuckyLouie (talk) 21:34, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

The Nature science journal, as far as I am concerned MUST be a WP:RS. As for the rest, this is a contested opinion between two parties to come to a conclusion. We can use our brains to identify that David Marks purposely skewed the dataset by omitting 44% of the original dataset to come to a conclusion that completely ignores basic empirical evidence and tries to use the same logical fallacy to discredit the research that he did in 1981 which was was corrected by Targ in the same year... all in a reliable published WP:RS all explained in explicit details in that blog with actual quotes from the WP:RS. We have to use our brains to select the conclusion that was correct. It is quite obvious Marks either acted in bad faith to make such a flawed investigation or he just simply messed up quite a few times. From the evidence it is clear that the original outbounder experiments are still scientifically valid based on Tart's rejudging. Tart is having his name dragged through the mud because the misinformation published on wikipedia. Only we can correct history. This isn't WP:OR, it is merely correcting a mistake from the past. The blog is an explanation. The sources are all Nature science journal publications, you can compare them side by side and you will come to the same conclusion. It's all in there. Please, this is vitally important we clear someone's name and correct history.Addidy (talk) 18:12, 12 January 2021 (UTC)

I am sorry, Wikipedia just doesn't work that way. We can't do side by side comparisons of sources, then insert our own analysis into the article that concludes one source is wrong and another is right. We can only summarize what reliable sources have published about a subject. Regarding your request to "clear someone's name and correct history", see WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS. - LuckyLouie (talk) 18:35, 12 January 2021 (UTC)

First off, I want to thank you for being patient. This isn't 'inserting our own analysis', it's common sense based on the information provided. Look at the state of this article... I know I have to play nice but I have to be blunt... it's complete trash. The whole thing reads like something designed to falsify RV as quickly as possible. There are at best 2 sentences that teach you what RV is and even those are skeptically sourced. Do you have any idea how much pain this article brings to the people who have had enough sense to at least try it before coming to conclusions? You guys don't think Targ could've been the one to source the definition?... or maybe have any information on whether there is scientific evidence sourced from the original proponents? It took me 12 hours to start seeing evidence this worked and I look at this garbage to remind myself every day that this world is ruled by dogmatists who don't know any better but drive the narrative anyway. How is anyone supposed to know to try RV with an article like this? Doesn't everything here pretty much violate WP:NPOV. Why aren't the people who actually know what the RV methodologies and protocols are writing this article instead of skeptics that don't know anything but assumptions? It's quite clear the Marks-Kammann investigation was flawed. I knew it would be from the start and I knew that my anecdotal wasn't worth anything. But that's why I wrote that blog. TO PROVE the marks-kammann investigation was a flawed hit piece rife with idiocy. This wikipedia article is a stain on humanity and it's a poison to scientific progress. Everything in that blog is verifiable by trusted sources. I wrote it for the people here so that maybe they could understand: the debunking of RV is a lot shakier than you think, based on a lot less than you might assume.2A01:4B00:8070:E400:139:5EF3:437F:1C40 (talk) 20:51, 13 January 2021 (UTC)

Maybe too late, but: the remote viewing experiments had the chance to provide CIA with actionable intelligence, but failed to do so. The proof is in the pudding. Tgeorgescu (talk) 19:10, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

Also, many people call their own analysis "common sense", but it is still their own analysis.

You need to get that stuff published in a reliable source. Then you will have fulfilled the minimum requirement for using it here. --Hob Gadling (talk) 08:31, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

"Rvvv" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Rvvv has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 February 17 § Rvvv until a consensus is reached. CycloneYoris ^talk! 10:11, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

CIA

Stargate Project of CIA must be added. You can go to this website and type "remote view". Thousands of documents will be revealed. Looks like CIA involved "pseudo-scientific" operations. Psycics has been used for operations by CIA. Not adding this information on this page and calling remote view "pseudo-science" is highly biased and suspicious move.

https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/home 159.146.121.8 (talk) 21:50, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

You need to be able to read and comprehend the existing article. What you want to add to the article is already in the article. - LuckyLouie (talk) 22:13, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Remote viewing has been in operative use for decades

I find the description and discussion about remote viewing quite bizarre. After it was made available to the public in the mid 1990:s a number of the former military remote viewers started to provide courses. The community of viewers has continued growing and developing. There is a generally accepted scientific protocoll containing key points making sure there is no cheating. Many remote viewing projects have been made available to the public giving the oppotunity for anyone to get an insight by going through the raw data. An obvious objection would be that we can't tell if the viewer knew about tha target before doing the viewing. However, for the last decade or so projects looking into the future have been available to the public. E g Farsight Institute and Cryptoviewing have provided mothly predictions a month in advance. This means that the public including myself have the opportunity to first take part of the results of the remote viewing session and then during the month or so after the feedback will play out. Over and over the mentioned groups have produced stunning results. Remote viewers have described unique events of which there was totally impossible to have prior knowledge. The detail och specificness has many time been overwhelming and when the event played out there could be no doubt about that this was what the Remote viewer had described. 155.4.33.198 (talk) 14:26, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

@155.4.33.198 Remote viewing is overwhelmingly considered WP:FRINGE pseudoscience. To give more weight to its scientific viability in this article would require significant amounts of reliable sources from a variety of reputable scientific venues. StereoFolic (talk) 15:32, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

You'll need some robust sources for that. Guy (help! - typo?) 21:30, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

President Carter and remote viewers who located a downed Soviet plane in Africa

There are many reliable sources for this:

• https://www.google.com/search?q=president+carter+on+remote+viewing+a+soviet+plane+that+crashed+in+africa

Compiling sources and info. Whether one thinks Carter and the CIA, etc. are lying or not is not important as to whether the Carter incident should be in the article or not. It is a matter of obvious notability concerning remote viewing. Discussion can occur in the thread farther down about the Carter incident.

Harold Puthoff talks about it in this recent 2025 interview at around 25 minutes 45 seconds in: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gf_tKn9TaP8 Writing in his diary on April 11, 1979, President Jimmy Carter described a CIA briefing where he was informed that a plane carrying sensitive information had crashed in Africa. According to Carter, "An American parapsychologist had been able to pinpoint the site of the crash. We've had several reports of this parapsychology working; one discovered the map coordinates of a site and accurately described a camouflaged missile test site. Both we and the Soviets use these parapsychologists on occasion to help us with sensitive intelligence matters, and the results are unbelievable." In a contemporary annotation accompanying the diary entry Carter wrote, "The proven results of these exchanges between our intelligence services and parapsychologists raise some of the most intriguing and unanswerable questions of my presidency. They defy logic, but the facts were undeniable." According to Carter's daily schedule, he met with CIA Director Stansfield Turner on April 11, 1979. Carter provided additional details regarding the incident in 2005 interview with GQ, stating, "We had a plane go down in the Central African Republic — a twin-engine plane, small plane. And we couldn't find it. And so we oriented satellites that were going around the earth every ninety minutes to fly over that spot where we thought it might be and take photographs. We couldn't find it. So the director of the CIA came and told me that he had contacted a woman in California that claimed to have supernatural capabilities. And she went in a trance, and she wrote down latitudes and longitudes, and we sent our satellite over that latitude and longitude, and there was the plane." In his 2015 memoir A Full Life, Carter wrote that the crashed aircraft "contained some important secret documents. We were searching for the crash site using satellite photography and some other surreptitious high-altitude overflights, but with no success. With some hesitancy, a CIA agent in California recommended the services of a clairvoyant woman, who was then consulted. She wrote down a latitude and longitude, which proved to be accurate, and several days later I was shown a photograph of the plane, totally destroyed and in a remote area. Without notifying Zaire’s President Mobutu, we sent in a small team that recovered the documents and the bodies of the plane’s occupants." A declassified CIA document, dated March 28, 1979, describes an Air Force "sensitive" individual who "after a vision provided coordinates, the name of the country, and a description of the terrain in which the plane crashed." In 1982, the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency office responsible for tracking U.S. troops who are missing in action stated that "Some of these psychics’ leads have checked out… they have been able to visualize aircraft crashes, and we have found the wreckage where they indicated.” In a 1978 document, CIA project officer Dr. Kenneth Kress outlines operational successes in the remote viewing program. Writing a year before the 1979 plane crash described by Carter, Kress concludes, “Tantalizing but incomplete data have been generated by CIA-sponsored research. These data show, among other things, that on occasion unexplained results of genuine intelligence significance occur. This is not to say that parapsychology is a proven intelligence tool; it is to say that the evaluation is not yet complete and more research is needed.”

References

Discussion concerning the Carter incident can continue in the thread farther down. --Timeshifter (talk) 02:09, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

Few people can do remote viewing well

That is what this Wikipedia article gets wrong. It is a red herring to say that studies show that remote viewing can not be replicated in large studies. Of course not.

Even those who do it well aren't 100% right. Hal Puthoff discusses who got the best results in this recent 2025 interview:

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gf_tKn9TaP8

--Timeshifter (talk) 05:03, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

Zero people can. 2804:18:1080:2865:1:0:FD0F:623C (talk) 21:27, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

Hal Puthoff (Harold Puthoff in this Wikipedia article) was one of the main researchers. I suggest you get a username so we can see your biases (if any) in how you edit Wikipedia articles. --Timeshifter (talk) 05:11, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

Discussion concerning the President Carter incident

@LuckyLouie -Can you please explain why a book published by former President of The United States is not considered a legitimate source? There were several additions made by user @NRO Constellation that you deleted. This person listed two books an article, and the the published White House schedule for President Carter, and an official CIA document confirming the event.Mattford1 (talk) 20:12, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

Having had political authority doesn't make Jimmy Carter an authority on parapsychology, especially not when actual specialists and researchers call remote viewing pseudoscience, and when experiments under controlled conditions have never, AFAICS, given positive results. Many, many rulers throughout history have employed, and believed in, astrologers. Would you say pronouncements about astrology by these rulers are also legitimate sources for the reliability of astrology? Bishonen | tålk 21:15, 26 May 2025 (UTC).

Hello - thanks for your comment. Please see here: https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP96-00787R000200020022-6.pdf. I will be providing additional sourcing shortly. Thanks! NRO Constellation (talk) 21:42, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

Thanking me for my comment while ignoring my question is not very good discussion etiquette. Again, would you say pronouncements about astrology by historical rulers with astrologers are also legitimate sources for the reliability of astrology? Also, you did right to discuss here, but it would have been better to have waited for consensus on this page before restoring your edit. Bishonen | tålk 21:54, 26 May 2025 (UTC).

Apologies, but I believe the CIA document addresses your point re: "rulers." Hopefully the additional information and sourcing included in the updated revision helps add some nuance. Thank you for engaging. NRO Constellation (talk) 22:04, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

This collection of quotations from politicians and CIA officers is massively WP:UNDUE. They're not reliable sources for this topic and should not be used to try to undercut the sources that actually are reliable. And pulling from primary source documents like daily schedules is even worse. MrOllie (talk) 22:12, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

Thank you. The daily schedule was included to show that Carter met with DCI Turner on the day that he described a "remote viewer" idenifying a missing aircraft in Africa.

This is confirmed by this CIA document from a few days prior to Carter CIA briefing: https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP96-00787R000200020022-6.pdf

Perhaps I am misunderstanding, but is the insinuation that this event did not occur and that Carter made it all up, despite the documentation? NRO Constellation (talk) 22:15, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

The 'insinuation' is that anyone who took the CIA of that era's claims on this topic at face value, including a former president, is not a reliable source on the subject. MrOllie (talk) 22:28, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

Thank you. For clarity, are you suggesting that the CIA director (Stansfield Turner, whom Carter knew from their time at Annapolis) intentionally lied to Carter about how the aircraft was located and, additionally, that the CIA fabricated a Directorate of Operations "meeting minutes" document several days prior to aid in this deception? NRO Constellation (talk) 22:34, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

I am suggesting exactly what I stated, no more and no less. I'm not really interested in discussing the topic in general here per WP:NOTFORUM. MrOllie (talk) 23:17, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

I am sorry, but you have articulated no good reason to censor a former president's detailed, nuanced comments - backed by the documentary record - on this topic. Your objection appears rooted in a highly conspiratorial and ahistoric (e.g., Carter nominated Turner to reform CIA after its abuses were exposed in the early 1970s) theory of what occurred in the incidents described by Carter.

Censorship is not becoming - and certainly not the intent - of Wikipedia. The edits, along with the additional supporting information, will be restored. NRO Constellation (talk) 23:27, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

Disagreeing with you is not 'censorship'. You have no particular right to push whatever you like into a Wikipedia article. Edit warring about this will only get you blocked and/or the article locked down. MrOllie (talk) 23:30, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

All credit to @Mattford1:

These sources are both notable and verifiable, and excluding them while allowing references from publications like Skeptical Inquirer creates an unbalanced portrayal of the subject. President Carter’s statements on remote viewing are a matter of public record and were made in interviews and speeches. As a former U.S. President and former head of U.S. intelligence (prior to his presidency), his remarks are historically and contextually significant, especially in an article dealing with government involvement in remote viewing. While his statements may not serve as scientific endorsement, they are noteworthy as political and historical testimony, and their inclusion would enhance the reader’s understanding of the broader social and governmental context. Furthermore, declassified CIA documents are primary sources that demonstrate how U.S. intelligence agencies investigated remote viewing over a span of two decades. Excluding them while retaining only secondary sources critical of the practice violates Wikipedia’s neutral point of view policy by presenting only skeptical interpretations while omitting government-sponsored inquiries and admissions that the program existed and was evaluated. If Skeptical Inquirer, a magazine with a clearly defined skeptical editorial stance, is considered a reliable source for this article, then it is only reasonable and fair to also allow historically credible, non-fringe primary and secondary sources like official CIA documents and direct quotations from a U.S. President. This is especially true when those sources are being used not to promote remote viewing, but to illustrate the factual historical engagement of government agencies with the phenomenon. Wikipedia’s core content policies—Verifiability, No Original Research, and Neutral Point of View—support inclusion of verifiable and relevant information from credible sources, even if they do not align with the editorial stance of skeptical publications. NRO Constellation (talk) 23:33, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

Copy and pasting comments like this is deeply unhelpful. Kindly do not fill up the talk page with redundant text. MrOllie (talk) 23:34, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

I'll rephrase - excluding detailed, nuanced comments from a former president (and government documents directly related to those comments), violates Wikipedia core content policy of a neutral point of view.

This is not in promotion of any particular point of view; it is provided in the pursuit of completeness and accuracy. Removing this information does a disservice to all readers looking for a fulsome overview of the topic.

Are you suggesting Carter's comments and the supporting documentation should be entirely absent? NRO Constellation (talk) 23:42, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

Following up here: There appears to be consensus among other editors (Randy Kryn and Timeshifter) that the Carter information, which is directly relevant to the topic and corroborated with contemporaneous documentation, should be included. Randy Kryn even suggested giving it its own section, which seems logical. Thanks. NRO Constellation (talk) 01:17, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

Counting only the people who agree with you is not consensus. MrOllie (talk) 01:38, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

Are you suggesting Carter's comments and the supporting documentation should be entirely absent? NRO Constellation (talk) 01:46, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

It is already covered at Stargate Project (U.S. Army unit). We don't need it on this article as well, nor do we need WP:UNDUE expansion with reams of redundant quotes. MrOllie (talk) 01:54, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

Also, kindly stop trying to put words in my mouth with this 'Are you suggesting' business. MrOllie (talk) 01:56, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

Given that three editors have supported the inclusion of nuanced comments from a major American political figure on this topic, along with corroborating contemporaneous documentation, the edits will be restored in the name of neutrality and completeness. Thank you for understanding. NRO Constellation (talk) 02:35, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

1) That's not how consensus works and 2) Edit warring on multiple articles simultaneously is a terrible idea. MrOllie (talk) 02:37, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

I would welcome escalation to administrators or another competent authority.

All edits are reliably sourced, directly relevant to the subject matter, and provided in accordance with Wikipedia's core principles of objectivity, neutrality, and for historical completeness. Thank you. NRO Constellation (talk) 02:43, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

You're already blocked from one article, but if you want more admin attention WP:ANI is always open. MrOllie (talk) 02:44, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

NRO Constellation, I agree with MrOllie. First, As mentioned the subject is already covered in the Stargate Project article. That specific event seems to be relatively minor so it looks to me that the existing coverage is sufficient and more would be undue. Second, edit warring is a very bad idea, you should stop before you get blocked. As a reminder, thinking that you are right will in no way be a valid excuse. --McSly (talk) 02:45, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

The broader claim is that remote viewing is "pseudoscience" and "fringe."

Yet there is compelling information from a major American political figure, corroborated by other documentation and sources, that it has had notable successes. Censoring such information is unbecoming of Wikipedia and is in directly violation of commitments to neutrality and objectivity.

How can this, along with recent unjustified deletions to the All-domain Anomaly Resolution page, be escalated to a competent authority? NRO Constellation (talk) 02:57, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

So, what you are saying essentially is that most if not all known laws of physics as currently understood are wrong. And that the proof for that fantastic claim is hearsay testimony. Am I correct in my understanding? --McSly (talk) 03:04, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

I am saying that either (a) remote viewing has had some limited operational successes (as a former president and reliable documentation all state) or (b) DCI Turner, despite being nominated to reform the CIA, lied to a U.S. president about the efficacy of remote viewing (and the CIA fabricated a contemporaneous document to further this deception). NRO Constellation (talk) 03:10, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

It's evidence that the CIA saw it as a promising technique. However, those promises never came to fruition. tgeorgescu (talk) 15:02, 13 September 2025 (UTC)

As MrOllie wrote above, WP:ANI is always open. That's where you can "escalate" your concerns to a "competent authority." JoJo Anthrax (talk) 03:07, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

These sources are both notable and verifiable, and excluding them while allowing references from publications like Skeptical Inquirer creates an unbalanced portrayal of the subject. President Carter’s statements on remote viewing are a matter of public record and were made in interviews and speeches. As a former U.S. President and former head of U.S. intelligence (prior to his presidency), his remarks are historically and contextually significant, especially in an article dealing with government involvement in remote viewing. While his statements may not serve as scientific endorsement, they are noteworthy as political and historical testimony, and their inclusion would enhance the reader’s understanding of the broader social and governmental context. Furthermore, declassified CIA documents are primary sources that demonstrate how U.S. intelligence agencies investigated remote viewing over a span of two decades. Excluding them while retaining only secondary sources critical of the practice violates Wikipedia’s neutral point of view policy by presenting only skeptical interpretations while omitting government-sponsored inquiries and admissions that the program existed and was evaluated. If Skeptical Inquirer, a magazine with a clearly defined skeptical editorial stance, is considered a reliable source for this article, then it is only reasonable and fair to also allow historically credible, non-fringe primary and secondary sources like official CIA documents and direct quotations from a U.S. President. This is especially true when those sources are being used not to promote remote viewing, but to illustrate the factual historical engagement of government agencies with the phenomenon. Wikipedia’s core content policies—Verifiability, No Original Research, and Neutral Point of View—support inclusion of verifiableand relevant information from credible sources, even if they do not align with the editorial stance of skeptical publications.

Mattford1 (talk) 23:23, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

Very well said. Thank you. NRO Constellation (talk) 23:28, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

You appear to have misread Wikipedia's policies, which specifically reject the idea that we should balance articles in the manner you suggest. See WP:FALSEBALANCE and WP:FRINGE. Wikipedia is designed to reflect the mainstream view. MrOllie (talk) 23:35, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

Whether one thinks Carter and the CIA, etc. are lying or not is not important as to whether the Carter incident should be in the article or not. It is a matter of obvious well-documented notability concerning remote viewing and its history.

And whether or not most remote viewing large-sample trials show no statistical significance is a red herring. Those most familiar with it have said that some individuals are much better at it than others. Even those who do it well aren't 100% right according to the main researchers. Hal Puthoff (Harold Puthoff in this Wikipedia article) discusses who got the best results in this recent 2025 interview:

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gf_tKn9TaP8

Making claims that Carter and the CIA are lying is based on WP:Original research. Maybe you can find an "expert" at Skeptical Inquirer to say so, and put that in the article. --Timeshifter (talk) 12:12, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

No editor has said Carter and the CIA are lying, only that the data plucked from WP:PRIMARY sourced documents and selective excerpts from memoirs don't warrant the kind of WP:WEIGHT that is being suggested here. The scientific consensus regarding remote viewing and other paranormal concepts is pretty clear, and the sources suggested by NRO Constellation can't be leveraged to imply that some credible breakthrough data exists and has been ignored. The Carter anecdotes are given appropriate treatment here, i.e. a passing mention framed as historical detail illustrating the brief era when such stuff was being funded by the government. - LuckyLouie (talk) 13:28, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

This well-sourced Jimmy Carter/CIA event surely deserves a paragraph (if not a section) on the page. Since it is confirmed, and supposedly accurate, it's both a historical occurrence and an example of what this page discusses. Thanks. Randy Kryn (talk) 14:10, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

Agree with Timeshifter .. its ridiculous on its face that the Carter source is being excluded. MasterBlasterofBarterTown (talk) 17:00, 29 May 2025 (UTC)

Thank you for joining the discussion! NRO Constellation (talk) 17:11, 29 May 2025 (UTC)

@NRO Constellation, Randy Kryn, and Mattford1: And others. I think the next stage is a request for comment. See:

• Wikipedia:Requests for comment.

The President Carter info deserves more than a sentence that doesn't even point out that the remote viewing Carter was told about was successful (at least according to the people who informed Carter). --Timeshifter (talk) 05:04, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

Carter's report is a widely-known claim, and its omission from the article is kinda glaring. But we have to be careful and provide enough context so the reader can understand that Carter isn't making a FRINGE claim that Remote Viewing works, he's just saying that someone once told him at it had worked. He's not saying he believed that person. Above, Bishonen likens this case to rulers who consult astrologers, which is an apt analogy, but one that actually argues for including the Carter anecdote -- the Astrology article covers Reagan's notable dependence upon them. Feoffer (talk) 11:07, 30 May 2025 (UTC)

CIA admits that remote viewing isn't bull

A statement was posted to the CIA website confirming that they believe it to be a real phenomenon. It's not obvious to me where this might go – could someone who's inclined include it? — TARDIS builder^💬   |     07:57, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

The consensus view is that CIA got no actionable intelligence through remote viewing, so whether they believe it to be genuine or not is irrelevant. Verbatim quote: but that the phenomenon was too unreliable, inconsistent, and sporadic to be useful for intelligence purposes. So, yeah, taking the report at face value, they concluded that it works, but it works so badly as to be practically useless. As in general with psi phenomena: they provide some significant correlations, but they are useless in the real world. tgeorgescu (talk) 08:23, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

Regardless, replacing "significant" with "real" is a rookie mistake because correlation is not causation. And it would be very weird if all the CIA had a single opinion about it. There are bound to be people working there who are very smart and knowledgeable and others who are not. --Hob Gadling (talk) 08:31, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

If the CIA thought it was bull, they wouldn’t have continued the program for so long as well as army intelligence. Not to mention the Chinese and Russian programs. 2605:59C8:99C:8910:2140:49BA:B5A9:137B (talk) 20:11, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

That is your opinion and not relevant to this article. Programs take a while to be funded and also to be dismantled, "for so long" is relative. It was also only pennies of their budget so they probably didn't really think much of it. The Chinese and Russians were doing what the USA was doing, and we don't completely know what they were doing. So your argument is not relevant. The rules of FRINGE apply here. Sgerbic (talk) 20:19, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

The issue at question is whether the phenomenon was observed, not whether it is practical or useful. 70.28.13.197 (talk) 15:11, 22 July 2025 (UTC)

"observed" what the first statement was in that the CIA said that it was a "real phenomenon"? How does "real" equate to "observed"? Sgerbic (talk) 23:52, 22 July 2025 (UTC)

If we can say that it “works but works badly” shouldn’t this be in the article? I understand the lack of repeatability but it seems willfully misleading to leave this out. Frankincents (talk) 15:25, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

A tidbit extracted from a 1970s document isn't the definitive last word on the subject. More contemporary mainstream science has commented that any positive results are either chance or invalidated by methodological flaws: see Remote_viewing#Scientific_reception. - LuckyLouie (talk) 15:52, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

I don't see how it not working, or not being real at all for that matter, means the info from the CIA website shouldn't be added. The page is about Remote Viewing, it seems relevant enough to add. 2600:6C67:1A00:3F02:7A26:DCD4:EF3A:A0E5 (talk) 22:44, 12 September 2025 (UTC)

There are heaps of bad sources on subjects like this, and we have to select the best ones. You have not given a reason why this source is good, let alone one of the best. --Hob Gadling (talk) 10:39, 13 September 2025 (UTC)

As I argued below, the CIA saw it as a promising technique, but such promises never came to fruition. tgeorgescu (talk) 15:05, 13 September 2025 (UTC)