New Frontiers of Human Science: a Festschrift for K. Ramakrishna Rao

Journal of Parapsychology, The, Fall, 2003 by J.E. Kennedy

NEW FRONTIERS OF HUMAN SCIENCE: A FESTSCHRIFT FOR K. RAMAKRISHNA RAO edited by V. Gowri Rammohan. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 2002. Pp. x-221. $30.00 (paperback). ISBN 0-7864-1453-7

This book contains essays in honor of K. Ramakrishna Rao on his 70th birthday. The book, like Rao's work in parapsychology, reflects two parallel tracks. One track focuses on traditional, mainstream parapsychology based on the set of assumptions developed by J. B. Rhine. Like many interested in parapsychological research, my first contact with Rao's thinking was from his 1966 book, Experimental Parapsychology: A Review and Interpretation, which is an articulate, comprehensive summary of Rhine's approach to parapsychology. Rao was one of the main spokespersons presenting this approach. At the same time, some of his writings and certainly his comments at parapsychological conventions discussed Eastern ideas and stimulated thinking beyond this paradigm. These ideas implied that alternative perspectives were needed. As would be fitting, this book in honor of Rao contains some essays that represent the traditional approaches to parapsychological research and other essays that present alternative ideas.

The first chapter is an overview of Rao's professional life. Those of us who know him through parapsychology may be interested to learn of his positions in government and education in India, as well as his role in founding a research center for consciousness studies.

William Braud's review of psi-favorable conditions may be one of the most useful chapters in this book. In recent years, there have been several meta-analyses of individual lines of research such as the ganzfeld and hypnosis. However, there have been few efforts to more broadly integrate research as was done prior to the advent of meta-analyses. This chapter makes a welcome contribution in this area. Braud also appropriately describes the cautions and limitations of existing research. Particularly noteworthy is the statement:

   Until the same investigators study psi under a wider range of
   conditions (including the introduction of rarely employed contrast
   and control conditions), and until the same conditions are used by a
   wider range of investigators, it may be unwise to attribute psi
   enhancement to specific techniques, procedures, or states rather
   than to the demand characteristics of the investigators,
   laboratories, sets, and settings in which those techniques happen to
   be used. (pp. 109-110)

In a chapter discussing and evaluating theories of psi based on physics and systems theory, Walter von Lucadou notes that meta-analyses were initially thought to provide compelling evidence for psi, but have not overcome the impression that psi experiments are not replicable. Only certain researchers obtain significant results, and their results tend to decline to chance over subsequent replications. Lucadou considers a century of non-replicable results as evidence that there is something wrong with the implicit assumptions of the classical or Rhinean paradigm. He discusses his systems theory model, which incorporates the psychological meaning of the situation and predicts that psi effects can occur in isolated, closed systems or experiments, but cannot be used for useful or replicable information transfer.

Lucadou also indicates that the finding in a meta-analysis that z scores did not increase with sample sizes supports this model and is inconsistent with the classical assumptions. However, this argument is not entirely clear because his prediction is that the z score is not related to the "run length" for a subject, whereas the meta-analysis results were for the number of RNG events in an entire experiment. Of course, this distinction disappears if the effects are actually due to psi by the experimenter.

It might also be added that the failure to find larger z scores with larger sample sizes is inconsistent with the statistical assumptions underlying meta-analyses and with the usual methods for evaluating psi experiments. Parapsychological writings generally show little recognition of the profound implications of this fact. Fundamentally different concepts and research methods appear to be needed.

John Palmer discusses the evidence for and challenges of experimenter psi. He notes "there is no more reliable finding in parapsychology than the experimenter effect" (p. 142). He suggests that "psychological involvement" is the critical factor guiding psi and proposes research strategies for addressing experimenter psi.

Palmer does not discuss the lack of correlation between sample size and z score as a possible manifestation of experimenter psi even though that is the most obvious explanation and may provide some of the clearest evidence for paranormal experimenter effects.

In one of the more stimulating chapters, Doug Stokes reviews parapsychological theories that relate to the nature of mind and the concept of Brahma, God, or World Mind. Rao has proposed that these Eastern concepts resemble emerging findings from psi research. Stokes's review includes relevant theories from quantum physics and collective mind theories such as those by Jung, James, Tyrell, Myers, and Murphy. Stokes also summarizes key findings that "the universe we inhabit seems very delicately designed to support the existence of living creatures and hence of conscious minds" and suggests that this provides "evidence that Rao's identification of consciousness with Brahman or God may be quite literally true" (p. 56).