Global Consciousness - Should I Be a Skeptic?

Global consciousness, as an idea, has been debated widely and fiercely. The theory that an event affecting a large number of people creates a scientifically measurable energy shift across the world sends many skeptics into a frenzy. ‘Pseudoscience,’ they mutter and dismiss it out of hand. Could group consciousness be a genuine and measurable phenomenon? I picked up on the debate at Skeptiko.com, but the origins of the science of measuring this phenomena begin with the Global Consciousness Project.nnThe Global Consciousness Project, started by Princeton University’s Dr. Roger Nelson and Dr. Dean Radin, has been running for more than 10 years. Nelson and Radin attached small industrial-strength random number generators to PCs and placed them at over 60 spots around the world. Next, they and set about monitoring them 24/7. These little boxes generate a random series of 0s and 1s (200 every second) which are recorded and analyzed. Under normal conditions the numbers produce a random pattern as one would expect. nnHowever, researchers predicted that during an event involving large groups of people, whether a positive one like a Live Aid concert, or a negative one like 9/11, a shift in our energy field would produce a measurable change in the pattern of the data collected by the random number generators. This theory was based on similar results they had seen in the Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research (PEAR) laboratory, where they observed that certain people were able to affect the output of similar random number generators just by concentrating.nnSkeptics of the research have claimed the methods used in collecting and analyzing the data weren’t up to snuff. They claimed researchers were just looking for patterns after the fact, and that the data wasn’t checked to make sure it hadn’t been affected by possible physical causes such as sunspots or cell phone interference.nnRecently, Skeptiko.com host Alex Tsakiris interviewed Roger Nelson, a retired professor from Princeton University in order to answer these criticisms:nn1) As to whether the researchers were merely seeing patterns that don’t really exist, Nelson and Radin point out that half of their predictions are published in advance, and that the rest have clearly defined parameters. So, data mining doesn’t seem to be a reasonable explanation.nn2) Regarding interference, they point out the great lengths they have gone through to prevent such contamination of the data. Most importantly, they point out any such anomalies have not show up in the data. For example, they have compared data from generators close to big cities with the data from rural areas in order to see if cell phone interference was involved – it wasn’t.nn3) Finally, they point out that the ten years of data collected is open to examination and analysis, and that while many skeptics have tried to find a smoking gun of impropriety, none have succeeded.nnWith this solid bank of data, and extensive testing and re-testing over the years, Nelson and Radin have convincing proof of the existence of measurable effects of group consciousness. The transparency of their work, and their willingness to invite skeptics to perform their own analysis of their data is another argument in their favor. Several skeptics who have set out to disprove their theories have ended up becoming part of their project, conducting their own research into the data. All this seems to point to a strange, but undeniable conclusion – we are all linked together in a global consciousness.