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Plain English Summary
This landmark study, published in the respected physics journal Foundations of Physics, asked a deceptively simple question: can people influence random number generators (basically electronic coin-flippers) just by thinking at them? The researchers gathered a massive haul of 832 experiments spanning nearly three decades and 68 different investigators. The result? A tiny but stubbornly consistent effect that just wouldn't go away -- not when you weighted for study quality, not when you checked for cherry-picking. To explain this away by missing studies alone, you'd need over 54,000 unreported experiments hiding in file drawers, roughly 90 times the known database. The quality-rating system they built became the gold standard for every mind-over-matter meta-analysis that followed.
Abstract
Speculations about the role of consciousness in physical systems are frequently observed in the literature concerned with the interpretation of quantum mechanics. While only three experimental investigations can be found on this topic in physics journals, more than 800 relevant experiments have been reported in the literature of parapsychology. A well-defined body of empirical evidence from this domain was reviewed using meta-analytic techniques to assess methodological quality and overall effect size. Results showed effects conforming to chance expectation in control conditions and unequivocal non-chance effects in experimental conditions. This quantitative literature review agrees with the findings of two earlier reviews, suggesting the existence of some form of consciousness-related anomaly in random physical systems.
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- New Year's Eve as a Case Study in Experimental Metaphysics: Exploring Global Consciousness in Random Physical Systems — Radin, Dean I. (2025)
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Companion
- "Future Telling": A Meta-Analysis of Forced-Choice Precognition Experiments, 1935-1987 — Honorton, Charles. (1989)
- Effects of Mass Consciousness: Changes in Random Data During Global Events — Nelson, R.D. (2011)
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Extends
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Evidence for Anomalistic Correlations Between Human Behavior and a Random Event Generator: Result of an Independent Replication of a Micro-PK Experiment
📋 Cite this paper
Radin, Dean I., Nelson, Roger D. (1989). Evidence for Consciousness-Related Anomalies in Random Physical Systems. Foundations of Physics. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00732509
@article{radin_1989_evidence,
title = {Evidence for Consciousness-Related Anomalies in Random Physical Systems},
author = {Radin, Dean I. and Nelson, Roger D.},
year = {1989},
journal = {Foundations of Physics},
doi = {10.1007/BF00732509},
}