Introduction: The primary purpose of this review and exploratory survey of experienced remote viewers was to discover which types of projects they are engaged with today, and to what extent, and to understand their backgrounds, methods, approaches, practices, philosophies, beliefs, and phenomenological experiences related to this work. Another goal was to discover whether the original definitions and tenants of remote viewing defined within its specific historical context have changed.
Methods: In designing our novel survey, we examined RV projects discussed in the scientific, archival, and popular literature spanning the past 50 years since remote viewing inception. These past projects, along with their methods, approaches, and philosophical underpinnings, informed our multiple-choice question construction (46 in all) as we operated from the hypothesis that we would likely see, at least to some extent, a continuation of these themes, or reminiscences of them, through present day remote viewing applied work. Still, we anticipated there could be some changes related to the decentralization-deinstitutionalization of remote viewing from its shift to governmental and military culture into a far less structured one. We also anticipated there could be changes related to developing technologies.
Only respondents who have participated in real-life applied/operational remote viewing projects other than for training practice or research purposes were invited and allowed to participate. We were interested in polling only those who would fall under the stricter definition of remote viewing, and not just any type of psychic practitioner such as an intuitive or clairvoyant reader or medium.
Results: One hundred-six remote viewers participated in the survey, although not all responded to every question. We consistently had between 70 and 73 responses per question. Participants came from over a dozen countries, spanned in age between 35-55, with twenty participants over the age of 65 (19.61%). Professions included tax analyst, financial auditor, investors, insurance claims adjuster, economic development consultant, systems analyst, business school professor, software developer, software engineer, geophysicist, medical surgeon, registered nurse, pharmacist, nutritionist, law enforcement officers, teachers, and artists.
Responses were analyzed through the use of a mixed-methods approach. The main findings are that remote viewing applications are wide, spanning from business to scientific and intelligence applications, and for the use of personal, corporate, and public agencies. RV is often used for finding missing items and pets. Twenty-three percent of the participants declared that their remote viewing job was paid. The range of the training and experience with remote viewing was expansive, and the majority used mixed methods, depending on the project. We found that most respondents expressed both awareness of and respect for the scientific principles related to blinding and separation of roles, yet there was a range of views regarding the practicality of adhering to these for application purposes.
Discussion: While only 23.4% declared that their RV job was paid, for some, this is a real professional job. All viewers had some level of training, ranging from less than one year to more than 20 years of training and less to 50 to over 2000 RV completed sessions. They are also trained in a wide range of modalities. Differences between remote viewers today and those who emerged from the earlier research labs and government RV programs are that viewers today are without monitors in terms of the actual conducting of the RV sessions. While some stick to a single modality (such as controlled remote viewing), many reported adjusting their approaches based on a project’s needs and using a mixed-methods approach. In terms of the overall project setup, many continue to work in groups, or at least with taskers. Respect for blinding protocols was mentioned, but there was a range of beliefs about the practicality of remaining blind for applied projects. Working with front-loading appeared to be viewed as a higher-level skill.
We were impressed by the expressions of strong enthusiasm, excitement, and personal benefits of remote viewing during applications work. The phrase “remote viewing makes me high” was repeated several times, as were words such as “thrilling” and “love” and “fascinating.” Our participants gave different definitions of success, not just accuracy-driven. Our final conclusion is that remote viewing continues to be carried out in the spirit in which it was intended, for practical use and as an information gathering tool, by articulate, thoughtful, and engaged participants.
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https://linktr.ee/scientificexploration
Published on June 24, 2023
