Williams:ExploringthePsychicNatureofDreams1

ExploringthePsychicNatureofDreams

BryanWilliams

Dreamingisthusoneofourroadsintotheinfinite....Itisonlybyemphasizingourfinitenessthatweeverbecome
conscious of the infinite. The infinite can only be that which stretches far beyond the boundaries of our own
personality.Itisthecharmofdreamsthattheyintroduceusintoanewinfinity.Timeandspaceareannihilated,
gravityissuspended,andwearejoyfullyborneupintheair,asitwereinthearmsofangels;wearebroughtintoa
deepercommunionwithNature.

BritishphysicianHavelockEllis(1911,pp.186187)

Its probably not much of a stretch to say that the mental activity of dreaming has had a
profound effect upon humankind. Dreams have reportedly been the basis for art, innovative
thinking, spiritual enlightenment, calls to action, and a desire to find meaning and direction
within our own lives (for a good overview of how dreaming has influenced various aspects of
human life, see Van de Castle, 1994). At times, the images we see in dreams can be vivid,
compelling,andhighlybizarre.Theycanalsoappeartobesorealisticthatwemaysometimes
findourselveswakingupandsaying,Imgladitwasonlyadream.

But could our dreams ever actually reflect some aspect of reality, in a way that could
havedirectimpactuponourlivesandthoseofthepeopleclosetous?Onedreamwhichseems
to raise this question is the one that a grandmother livingin California had once experienced.
ShelatersentawrittenaccountofherfrighteningdreamtoLouisaRhineatDukeUniversity,in
whichitwasnotedthatthegrandmother

...thoughtshesawherbabygrandsonstrugglingandsmotheringinhisblankets.Hismovements
weregettingweakerandweaker.Itwasalmosttheend.Sheawoke.Itwas3:45A.M.Theyoung
folkslivedacrosstown.Shouldshecallthem?
Asshesays,Afterall,itwasonlyadream.Ithought,IfIcallandwakethemtheyllthinkIm
crazy.ButifIdontandanythinghappens.Soshephonedandgotasurprisedsoninlawonthe
wire.
Whatonearthareyoucallingforatthishour?hecried.

Williams:ExploringthePsychicNatureofDreams2

Gotothebabyatonce,shesaid.Hessmothering.
Yes,hewas.Wereup.Weheardhim(Rhine,1961,p.24).

How did the grandmother know that her infant grandson was in danger? Having been across
townatthetime,therewasntanywaythatshecouldveheardhimcrying.Andtheredoesnt
seemtobeanywayinwhichshecouldvelogicallyinferredthatitwashappening.Assumingthat
thisdreamexperiencehadtakenplaceexactlyasrecounted,isitpossiblethatherexperience
couldveillustratedthemanifestationofapsychicdream?

AnumberofotherdreamrelatedexperiencesthatLouisaRhinedescribesinherclassic
1961 book Hidden Channels of the Mind seem to further attest the possibility that psychic
experiencescanbemediatedthroughdreaming.Whilesomeostensiblypsychicdreamsmaybe
related to moments of crisis (as in the grandmothers experience), others may relate to more
mundaneevents,such asthedreamdescribedbyanamateurgeologistlivingintheAmerican
Southwest,inwhichhesaw

...alarge,beautiful,agateencrusted,crystalgeodelyinginshallowwaterquiteneartheshoreline
in the W River which flows something like fifteen miles southeast of the city. The exact
location,shoreline,alonggravelbar,everythingjustasplainasthoughIwereseeingitasitis,
wasclearlyshown.WhenwearoseonthefollowingSundaymorningItoldmywifeofmydream
experienceandsuggestedwetakeourlunchanddrivetothesceneofmydream.Wehadonly
lived in this city approximately six months at the time and I was unfamiliar with the particular
locationbutinquiredalongthewayacoupleoftimesdescribinglandmarks,etc.,indetail;and
withinahalfhourafterweparkedourcar,wewalkeduptothebig,beautifulgeodelyingexactly
whereIdseenitinmydream.LaterIwasofferedthreehundreddollarscashforitbutdidnot
caretosell(Rhine,1961,p.23).

But could these dreams really have had a psychic natureto them, as opposed to their merely
beingtheproductofchancecoincidence,richimagination,wishfulthinking,orembellishment?
Perhaps one of the most effective ways to address that question would be to have people
attempttopsychicallydreamaboutarandomlychosenvisualtarget(suchasapaintingorafilm
clip)undercontrolledconditions,inordertoseewhetheranynotabledetailsofthetargetare
accurately reflected within the content of their dreams. This was the basis underlying two
extensiveexperimentaleffortstostudythepossibilityofextrasensoryperception(ESP)occurring
indreams.

The first effort consisted of a series of 25 dream ESP experiments conducted by

MontagueUllman,StanleyKrippner,andCharlesHonortonattheMaimonidesMedicalCenterin
Brooklyn, New York, from 1966 to 1972 (Ullman, Krippner, with Vaughan, 1973). Most of the
experimentswereaimedatexploringtelepathyandclairvoyancemanifestinginthedreamstate,
andalthoughthereweresomeslightproceduralvariationsfromoneexperimenttoanother,a
typicaltestsessionfortelepathyroughlyproceededinthefollowingmanner:

Two volunteers participated in the overnight experiment; one person would act as the
telepathicsender,whiletheotherwouldbeactingasthereceiver.Thetwovolunteersmet
brieflytogetacquaintedwitheachother,andthentheywereisolatedinseparateroomsforthe
restofthenight.Thepersonactingasthereceiverwasbroughttoasoundproofroomwhere
electrodeswereattachedatcertainpointsaroundthatpersonshead.Theseelectrodeswould
continually sent brain wave and eye movement signals to equipment being monitored by an

Williams:ExploringthePsychicNatureofDreams3

experimenterinanadjacentroom.Oncetheelectrodeswereattached,thereceiverwasinvited
toliedownintheroomsmonitoringbedandgotosleep.

Thepersonactingasthesenderwasplacedaloneinaroomfurnishedwithalighted
desk,whichwaslocatedbetween30and90feetawayfromthereceiversroom.Inthesenders
handswasanopaqueenvelopegiventothesenderbyanotherexperimenter,whichcontaineda
randomlyselectedvisualtarget(inmostcases,thiswasanartprint).

Throughout the night, the experimenter in the equipment room continually monitored
thebrainwaveandeyemovementpatternsbeingexhibitedbythesleepingreceiver,lookingfor
signsconsistentwithrapideyemovement(REM,astatecommonlyassociatedwithdreaming).
AssoonastheexperimenternoticedthatREMpatternswerepresent,asignalwassenttothe
sender in the distant room through the sounding of a buzzer. Upon hearing this signal while
seatedatthelighteddesk,thesenderopenedtheopaqueenvelope,pulledoutthetargetinside,
and visually concentrated on its features, with the goal of attempting to mentally convey the
targetscontenttothesleepingreceiver.

TowardstheendoftheREMperiod,thereceiverwasawakenedandaskedtorecallthe
content of their dream in as much detail as possible. After the receivers description of the
dreamwasrecordeddown,theexperimenteraskedthereceivertogobacktosleep.Theentire
processwasthenrepeatedforeachREMperiodthatthereceiverexperiencedthroughoutthe
course of the night. The procedurefor testing clairvoyancewas nearly identical, with the only
differencesbeingthattherewasnosenderinvolved,andtheenvelopecontainingthetargetwas
simplyplacedunopenedonthedeskinthesendersroom.

Later on, a judge independently compared the receivers dream reports to a random
collectionofartprintsinordertoassesshowcloselyeachdreamreportseemedtocorrespond
tothedetailsofeachprint.Basedonthisassessment,thejudgearrangedtheprintsintheorder
ofhowsimilartheyseemedtobetothereceiversdreamreports(fromthegreatestamountof
similarity,ondowntothelowest).Oneoftheartprintsinthecollectionwastheactualtarget
thatthesenderhadbeenlookingatduringthenightlytestsession,andifthetargetprintwas
deemedtobeamongthoseprintswithintheupperhalfofthepoolwiththegreatestamountof
similarity,thenthetestsessionwasconsideredasuccess(orahit).Thisconvenientlyreduced
thejudgesassessmentdowntoasimplehit/missscore,withanaveragehitrateof50%being
expectedpurelybychancealone.
A graphical summary of the results from the 25 dream ESP experiments of the

MaimonidesseriesisshowninFigure1below,intermsoftheaccumulatinghitrate(indicated
bythetinyblackdiamonds)overthecourseoftheexperiments.Itcanbeseenfromthegraph
that as the experiments accumulate, the hit rate gradually begins to level out at around 60%,
andthe95%confidenceintervalsexcludetheexpectedchancehitrateof50%.

Fromastatisticalstandpoint,theendhitrateof63%fortheentireMaimonidesseriesis
sofarbeyondwhatwedexpectbychance(z=5.563,p=1.33108)thatithasanassociated
oddsratioofabout75milliontoone!Highlysignificantresultswerealsoreportedinamorein
depth analysis conducted by Yale University psychologist Irvin Child (1985) which appeared in
American Psychologist, one of the main journals published by the American Psychological
Association.

Williams:ExploringthePsychicNatureofDreams4

Maimonides Dream ESP Experiments: 1966 - 1972

100

90

Cumulative Hit Rate (%)

80

70

60

50

40

30

20
1

10

11

12

13

14

15

Study Number

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

Figure1.Resultssummaryshowingtheaccumulatinghitrate(withtheassociated95%confidenceintervals)over
thecourseofthe25dreamESPexperimentsconductedaspartoftheMaimonidesseries.Thethickhorizontalline
at 50% indicates theaverage hit that would be expected purely bychance.Based on thejudges evaluationdata
publishedinthetablefoundinAppendixCofUllmanetal.(1973).

KoestlerGroupStudies

InthetwoandahalfdecadesfollowingthecompletionoftheMaimonidesseries,atotal
of 22 dreamrelated ESP studies were conducted (for a review, see Sherwood & Roe, 2003).
Among these were five studies which comprised the second extensive experimental effort,
conducted by researchers who were affiliated with the Koestler Parapsychology Unit (KPU) at
the University of Edinburgh in Scotland from 1996 to 2001. Four of these five studies were
specificallydesignedtotestforclairvoyance,andinsteadofhavingjustoneparticipantattempt
to dream about the ESP target (as in most of the Maimonides studies), there were multiple
participants attempting to do so. One of the central aims of these studies was to determine
whethercombiningthedreamrelatedimpressionsoftheparticipantswouldbemoreeffective
inachievingsuccessfulESPresultsthanjustconsideringtheirimpressionsindividually.

Theinitialstudy(Dalton,Steinkamp,&Sherwood,1999)involvedthreeresearcherswho
acted as their own participants, spending each night at home attempting to dream about a
targetfilmclip(randomlyselectedfromapoolof4clips)thatwasbeingrepeatedlyplayedona
monitor screen in an empty and locked room at the KPU. The system which selected and
presented the clip was controlled by computer, and was programmed to play the clip roughly
between3:00and4:00A.M.

Thenextmorning,thethreeresearchersgatheredtogetherattheKPUtovieweachclip
inthepooloneatatime,rankingeachoneaccordingtohowcloselyitseemedtomatchtheir

Williams:ExploringthePsychicNatureofDreams5

dreamsfromthenightbefore.Oncetheydrankedthemindividually,theresearchersdiscussed
theirdreamstogetherasagroupandcametoashareddecisiononwhichcliptheyallthought
wasthelikelytarget.Witha1in4probabilityofselectedthecorrectclip(i.e.,scoringahit),
theaveragehitratethatwouldexpectedovertimebychancealoneis25%.

Agraphicalsummaryoftheresultcanbeseenalongthefarleftsideofthegraphshown
inFigure2below.Outofatotalof32individualtesttrials,therewere15directhits,amounting
toasignificantoverallhitrateof46.9%(z=2.514,p=.006),withanassociatedoddsratioof
about160toone.

Consensus-Voting Dream ESP: Koestler Group Studies (1999 - 2002)

70

60

Hit Rate (%)

50

40

30

20

10

-10
Dalton et al 1999

Sherwood et al 2000

Dalton et al 2000

Study

Roe et al 2002

Sherwood et al 2002

All

Figure 2. Results summary for the series of five dream ESP studies conducted by researchers affiliated with the
KoestlerParapsychologyUnitattheUniversityofEdinburghinScotland.Eachblackdiamondrepresentstheoverall
hit rate (with 95% confidence intervals) for each study in the series. The diamond along the far right side of the
graphmarkedAllindicatesthehitrateforallfivestudiescombined.Thethickhorizontallineat25%indicatesthe
averagehitrateexpectedbychance.

Thesecondstudy(Sherwoodetal.,2000)wasanattemptedreplicationofthefirst,with
onlyslightmodificationsmadetotheprocedure.Allthreeoftheresearchersfromthefirststudy
againtookpartasparticipants,withoneofthemnowbeingdistantlylocatedinasmalltownin
England,about220milesawayfromKPU.Toallowhertomakeherrankingsforeachtesttrial,
thisdistantresearcherkeptaduplicatesetofthepoolof4videoclips,whichshecouldwatchat
home.ShethensentacopyofherrankingsandherdreamdescriptiontoaKPUstaffmember
viaemail,whocollectedthemandmadethemavailabletotheothertworesearchers.

When combining their responses together in a consensus vote, the two researchers at
KPUachieved12hitsin28testtrialsforanoverallhitrateof42.9%(z=1.889,p=.029),with
oddsofabout34tooneagainstchance(oddsofatleast20tooneareconsideredsignificantin

Williams:ExploringthePsychicNatureofDreams6

psychology).Thedistantresearcherscored9hitsforatotalhitrateof32%,which,althoughit
wasnt significant, was higher than the hit rates individually obtained by the two KPU
researchers. This study eventually found its way into the mainstream literature by being
publishedinDreaming,thejournaloftheInternationalAssociationfortheStudyofDreams.

Thethirdstudy(Daltonetal.,2000)wasanefforttoreplicatethefirsttwostudies,with
four college students attempting to dream about randomlyselected target film clips on 16
separatenights.Asbefore,thestudentsviewedapooloffourfilmclipsthenextmorning,with
oneoftheclipsbeingthetarget.Afterrankingtheclipsindividually,thestudentsdiscussedtheir
dreamstogetherandcametoaconsensusvoteonthelikelytarget.Atotalof7directhitswere
obtained for an overall hit rate of 43.8% (z = 1.408, p = .079), which is a suggestively positive
outcomewithoddsofabout13tooneagainstchance.1

Threeresearchersagainparticipatedinthefourthstudy(Roeetal.,2002),inwhichthey
attempted to dream about a target film clip being shown by an automated computer system
from 4:00 to 6:00 A.M. The next morning they viewed the clips and ranked them for
correspondencewiththeirdreams,andthenformedagroupconsensusvoteonthelikelytarget.
Therewere9directhitsoutof31individualtesttrials,foranonsignificantoverallhitrateof29%
(z=0.342,p=.366),withanassociatedoddsratioofonlyaboutthreetoone.

Asanaddedmeasureofsecurity,thelaststudyoftheseries(Sherwoodetal.,2002)was
designedtotestforprecognition.Here,threeresearchersattemptedtodreamaboutapicture
thattheywouldbeshownthenextday,aftertheyviewedthefourpicturesinthepool,ranked
them for correspondence with their dreams, and formed a group decision on the likely target
(i.e., it was only after they did all this that the target picture was randomly selected by the
computer).Onlytwodirecthitswereobtainedinall12testtrials,amountingtoahitratethat
wasbelowchance(16.7%)andnonsignificantoverall(z=.278,p=.391),withoddsofagainonly
aboutthreetooneagainstchance.

Althoughtheresultsvariedfromstudytostudy,onecanseefromtherightsideofFigure
2 that when the results from all five studies are combined, the overall hit rate of 37.8% is
significantlyaboveexpectation(z=3.00,p=.001),withanassociatedoddsratioofabout1,000
tooneagainstchance.Thisclearlyseemstoindicatethatsomethingofinterestisoccurringin
thesestudies,somethingotherthanchancecoincidence.

ConsideredalongsidetheanecdotalreportscollectedbyLouisaRhine(1961),theresults
oftheMaimonidesstudiesandtheKoestlergroupstudiesseemtolendweighttowardserious
consideration of there being a psychic nature to some dream reports. We have yet to learn
abouttheexactnatureofwhatmaybeinvolvedhere,butastheBritishphysicianHavelockEllis
(1911)hadoncesurmised,thereseemstobeachancethatitmayinvolvesomething...which
stretchesfarbeyondtheboundariesofourownpersonality.

Itshouldbenotedthatthisresultdiffersfromtheonereportedintheoriginalstudy,whichhadprespecifieda
twochoicehit/missassessmentoftheoutcome(asintheMaimonidesstudies).Whenassessedinthatmanner,
theoverallresultissignificantwithahitrateof81%(p=.01)andanoddsratioofabout100toone.Forthepurpose
ofincludingtheminawaythatwouldmakethemcomparablewiththoseoftheotherfourstudies,theresultswere
reanalyzedhereintermsofadirecthitassessment,witha1in4probabilityofcorrectlyselectingthetargetclip.

Williams:ExploringthePsychicNatureofDreams7

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