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Precognition
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===Early 20th century=== In the early 20th century [[J. W. Dunne]], a British soldier and aeronautics engineer, experienced several dreams which he regarded as precognitive. He developed techniques to record and analyse them, identifying any correspondences between his future experiences and his recorded dreams. He reported his findings in his 1927 book ''[[An Experiment with Time]]''. In it he alleges that 10% of his dreams appeared to include some element of future experience. He also persuaded some friends to try the experiment on themselves, with mixed results. He noted a strong cognitive bias in which subjects, including himself, were reluctant to ascribe their dream correspondences to precognition and determinedly sought alternative explanations.<ref>Dunne (1927), pp.62-3. "''The waking mind refuses point-blank to accept the association between the dream and the subsequent event. For it, this association is the wrong way round, and no sooner does it make itself perceived than it is instantly rejected. The intellectual revolt is automatic and extremely powerful.''"</ref> Dunne concluded that precognitive elements in dreams are common and that many people unknowingly have them.<ref name="dunne1927">Dunne (1927).</ref><ref>[[Antony Flew|Flew, Antony]]; "The Sources of Serialism'', in Shivesh Thakur (Ed). ''Philosophy and Psychical Research'', George Allen & Unwin Ltd. 1976, pp. 81β96. {{ISBN|0-04-100041-2}}</ref> He suggested also that dream precognition did not reference future events of all kinds, but specifically the future experiences of the dreamer. He was led to this idea when he found that a dream of a volcanic eruption appeared to foresee not the disaster itself but his subsequent misreading of an inaccurate account in a newspaper.<ref name="dunne1927" /> [[Edith Lyttelton]], who became President of the [[Society for Psychical Research]] (SPR), regarded his theory as consistent with her own idea of the [[superconscious]].<ref>Lyttelton, Edith. ''Our Superconscious Mind''. Philip Allan. 1931.</ref> In 1932 he helped the SPR to conduct a more formal experiment, but he and the Society's lead researcher [[Theodore Besterman]] failed to agree on the significance of the results.<ref>Inglis (1986) p.92.</ref><ref>Dunne (1927), 3rd Edition, Faber, 1934, ''Appendix III: The new experiment''.</ref> Nevertheless, the Philosopher [[C. D. Broad]] remarked that, "The only theory known to me which seems worth consideration is that proposed by Mr. Dunne in his Experiment with Time."<ref>C. D. Broad; "The Philosophical Implications of Foreknowledge", ''Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes'', Vol. 16, Knowledge and Foreknowledge (1937), pp. 177β209</ref> ''An Experiment with Time'' was widely read and "undoubtedly helped to form something of the imaginative climate of [the interwar] years", influencing many writers of both fact and fiction both then and since.<ref>Anon; "Obituary: Mr. J. W. Dunne, Philosopher and Airman", ''The Times'', August 27, 1949, Page 7.</ref> According to Flieger, "Dunne's theory was so current and popular a topic that not to understand it was a mark of singularity."<ref>Flieger (1997) p.46.</ref> Major writers whose work was significantly influenced by his ideas on precognition in dreams and visions include [[H. G. Wells]], [[J. B. Priestley]] and [[Olaf Stapledon]].<ref>Flieger (1997) p.136.</ref><ref name="stewart">Stewart, V.; "J. W. Dunne and literary culture in the 1930s and 1940s", ''Literature and History'', Volume 17, Number 2, Autumn 2008, pp. 62β81, Manchester University Press.</ref> [[Vladimir Nabokov]] was also later influenced by Dunne.<ref>Vladimir Nabokov (ed. Gennady Barabtarlo); ''Insomniac Dreams: Experiments with Time'', Princeton University Press, 2018.</ref> In 1932 [[Charles Lindbergh]]'s infant son was kidnapped, murdered and buried among trees. Psychologists [[Henry Murray]] and D. R. Wheeler used the event to test for dream precognition, by inviting the public to report any dreams of the child. A total of 1,300 dreams were reported. Only five per cent envisioned the child dead and only 4 of the 1,300 envisioned the location of the grave as amongst trees.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Murray | first1 = H. A. | last2 = Wheeler | first2 = D. R. | year = 1937 | title = A Note on the Possible Clairvoyance of Dreams | journal = Journal of Psychology | volume = 3 | issue = 2| pages = 309β313 | doi=10.1080/00223980.1937.9917500}}</ref> The first ongoing and organised research program on precognition was instituted by husband-and-wife team [[Joseph Banks Rhine]] and [[Louisa E. Rhine]] in the 1930s at [[Duke University]]'s [[Rhine Research Center|Parapsychology Laboratory]]. J. B. Rhine used a method of forced-choice matching in which participants guessed the order of a deck of 25 cards, each five of which bore one of five geometrical symbols. Although his results were positive and gained some academic acceptance, his methods were later shown to be badly flawed and subsequent researchers using more rigorous procedures were unable to reproduce his results. His mathematics was sometimes flawed, the experiments were not double-blinded or even necessarily single-blinded and some of the cards to be guessed were so thin that the symbol could be seen through the backing.<ref>[[Harold Gulliksen]]. (1938). ''Extra-Sensory Perception: What Is It?''. American Journal of Sociology. Vol. 43, No. 4. pp. 623β634.</ref><ref>Wynn & Wiggins (2001), p. 156.</ref><ref>Hines (2003), pp. 78β81.</ref> [[Samuel Soal|Samuel G. Soal]], another leading member of the SPR, was described by Rhine as one of his harshest critics, running many similar experiments with wholly negative results. However, from around 1940 he ran forced-choice ESP experiments in which a subject attempted to identify which of five animal pictures a subject in another room was looking at. Their performance on this task was at chance, but when the scores were matched with the card that came ''after'' the target card, three of the thirteen subjects showed a very high hit rate; Rhine now described Soal's work as "a milestone in the field".<ref name="colman">{{cite book|last=Colman|first=Andrew M.|title=Facts, Fallacies and Frauds in Psychology|publisher=Unwin Hyman|year=1988|pages=175β180|isbn=978-0-04-445289-8}}</ref> However analyses of Soal's findings, conducted several years later, concluded that the positive results were more likely the result of deliberate fraud.<ref name="hyman">Hyman (2007).</ref> The controversy continued for many years more.<ref name="colman" /> In 1978 the statistician and parapsychology researcher Betty Markwick, while seeking to vindicate Soal, discovered that he had tampered with his data.<ref name="hyman" /> The untainted experimental results showed no evidence of precognition.<ref name="colman" /><ref>Betty Markwick. (1985). ''The establishment of data manipulation in the Soal-Shackleton experiments''. In [[Paul Kurtz]]. ''A Skepticβs Handbook of Parapsychology''. Prometheus Books. pp. 287β312. {{ISBN|0-87975-300-5}}</ref>
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