Paranormal Investigation Techniques

GuanYin

Just out of curiosity, what techniques to PI currently use for collecting evidence and data during paranormal investigations. Are there any techniques geared towards collecting empirical evidence?

I'm trying to think how I would approach investigation of an alleged haunting and I put these together:

Blueprint/map of site - To investigate structural causes of apparent physical manifestations (draughts, wood contractions etc). Thermometer (all rooms/outside) - monitor temperature changes throughout the site Camera (nightvision/thermal) - Monitor selected fields of vision, night and thermal vision essential for eliminating animal/human interference. Sterile Swab/Tubes - Sample collection for microscopy/DNA analysis. Sound recording equipment - good quality/noise activation. Seizemometers - measure any change in ground stability due to outside influences. Frequency meters (ELF/VLF magnetic fields and Gaussian EMF reader) - (both detection and quantifiable versions) Blacklights and forensic kits - examation for evidence recent natural activity and monitoring integrity of site to outside interference during investigation

these are what I've come up with, I'll add more if I think of any (this was off teh top of my head).

Can anyone replying state if they are a member of an investigative team when answering and tell me anything I've missed or anything that I've mentioned that may be pointless.

Add your own ideas too!

keu

the links to the lads site is all over this board and lists of equipment are there too.
I'm wondering though is it possible to do some experiements online, remote viewing experiements for example?

stormkeeper

Some of what you mentioned we do, but there's a few that we don't do, and by looking at your list, I'm thinking we should give it some thought.

Thanks for the suggestions

stormkeeper

keu wrote:

the links to the lads site is all over this board and lists of equipment are there too.
I'm wondering though is it possible to do some experiements online, remote viewing experiements for example?

I'm sure it's possible to do so, but I can't think of anything myself, but perhaps Ian can?

Peanut

Surprised that no-one here seems to be using (pure) random number generators.

The idea being that during an "event", statistical analysis is done on the random output and any significant deviations from the normal random order can be attempted to be correlated with whatever the "event" is.

Usually it's assumed that any significant deviation for a particular RNG is at least somehow related to the particular geographic location of that RNG source.
Check out the global conciousness project for details of a distributed global network of RNGs:
http://noosphere.princeton.edu/

Of course given that potential psi effects are generally thought to be non-local, it raises the question of exactly what are you measuring when you record statistical variances.

The Koestler parapsychology unit in the university of Edinburgh have some online experiments afaik
http://moebius.psy.ed.ac.uk/

There are many other psi experiments online.

Unfortunately I believe we are currently hopelessly out of date when it comes to attempting to measure potential psi effects. Trying to measure what could be extremely subtle (para)psychological effects with thermometers and cameras just doesn't seem like it will produce reliable results.

Trying to create a reproducible psychological environment is difficult to say the least. There have been some psi experiments done with animals, presumably in the hope that the simpler mental systems may provide a clearer basis for detecting any anomalous effects. It may be worth looking into analysing simpler systems still, plants, yeast etc., under the pretense that all living systems are subject to some form of psi effects (and perhaps non-living systems, although psi effects in living forms should produce more measurable results, and living systems may have been more inclined to have developed evolutionary mechanisms for utilising benefical effects that a psi ability may confer).

If anyone is interested in seriously working on this I'd love to help out.

keu

"Unfortunately I believe we are currently hopelessly out of date when it comes to attempting to measure potential psi effects. Trying to measure what could be extremely subtle (para)psychological effects with thermometers and cameras just doesn't seem like it will produce reliable results."

I agree, to an extent.

"Trying to create a reproducible psychological environment is difficult to say the least"
actually its very easy.
"There have been some psi experiments done with animals, presumably in the hope that the simpler mental systems may provide a clearer basis for detecting any anomalous effects. It may be worth looking into analysing simpler systems still, plants, yeast etc., under the pretense that all living systems are subject to some form of psi effects (and perhaps non-living systems, although psi effects in living forms should produce more measurable results, and living systems may have been more inclined to have developed evolutionary mechanisms for utilising benefical effects that a psi ability may confer)."
I was under the impression that the results have been fairly conclusive.

"If anyone is interested in seriously working on this I'd love to help out."
You might consider contacting the investigative team.

lisa.c

check these guys out http://axgxhxoxsxt.tripod.com/amateurghosthuntersofseattletacoma/
saw them on tv last nite man they got some technology.
they have created some form of computer programme which monitors a whole lot of stuff for them simultainously it is unique in the pi world. you should email them and ask there advice. there website dosent give much on the equipment they use.

Peanut

keu wrote:

"Trying to create a reproducible psychological environment is difficult to say the least"
actually its very easy.

I don't think so, I suppose it depends on what you consider to be a similar environment to a previous one, superficially it may appear the same but how can you tell if it really is considering what may be going on in someone's subconcious mind etc. You may be in a similar hypnotic state on two separate occasions, but who's to say if it's really the same, and what's different...
I should say "reproducible parapsychological environment"..

keu wrote:

"There have been some psi experiments done with animals..."
I was under the impression that the results have been fairly conclusive.

In that they were inconclusive? That's what seems to stick out imho anyway. For the more general trials it seems like in total they give significant evidence for an effect, however if you were asked to reproduce a certain result at will it would often not be possible.

lisa.c wrote:

check these guys out http://axgxhxoxsxt.tripod.com/amate...fseattletacoma/
saw them on tv last nite man they got some technology.
..

Thanks for the link Lisa,
I think it's cool all these people checking out these places and trying to figure out exactly what's going on, however I think that concentrating on the person instead of the place might be more useful.

Just looking at this board here it's clear that a lot of people have experiences they would call paranormal, there's also lots of stories of animals like dogs knowing when their owner is coming home and things like that, however I don't know of half as many people who live in a haunted house (as far as I (or they) know...).

In other words, it seems like small, subtle psychic effects could be more common then large scale effects like temperature changes that you might try to measure when you go to check out a place.

keu

peanuts wrote:

In that they were inconclusive? That's what seems to stick out imho anyway. For the more general trials it seems like in total they give significant evidence for an effect, however if you were asked to reproduce a certain result at will it would often not be possible.

I'll have a look around but I thought I had read of experiments where they exposed mice to a particular frequency (bombarded them with Extreme Low Frequency Magnetic Pulses) which caused paralysis (what seemed to be a hypnotic trance) the same experiments were used to investigate the extent of such influence on the human mind, (psychotronics) which is why I stated that it was easy to reproduce such a psychological environment.

will do my bestest to find the source material (cause I know it exists)

keu

http://www.rfsafe.com/article24.html
thought this was interesting.

yaaaay me off on holidays now..toodles

stevenmu

These people
http://www.lfr.org/
are doing a study at the moment, they subject people to loud noises and measure responses of their skin (glavonic response I think it's called), the idea is that your nervous system responds before the noise.

I've been considering doing up a quick program that would be similar in nature, ie it would play loud beeps at random intervals and you would try to click with the mouse when you think it's going to happen. I'm also going to try and put in a feature where you guess which image appears next. I'd try and setup a website somewhere that people can post their scores and do some kind of analysis on it. Would anybody be interested in something like that or have any ideas for any other features that could go in ?