Based on your subjects of study I think you might be interested in The Electric Fortune Cookie. If you are familiar with some of the random number and coin flip generator experiments that have been conducted, you may have been amazed to hear that a person’s intention seems to affect the outcome of the “random” generation. When one wills a number to come up it tends to come up more than it should according to what we know about probability. This perplexing phenomenon is one of the greatest scientific mysteries of our age and in an effort to better understand the nature of how this works, my partner developed a random word generator http://www.askefc.com.
For the last few years I have been witness to strange coincidences and synchronicities galore. Because of my scientific personality I began creating controlled situations in which these coincidences are more likely to occur. For example, I pick a random radio station and (during a commercial) I grab a book I am not that familiar with and when the song begins, I start reading from a random page. I’ve frequently found astonishing correlations between the lyrics and the book. Over the years, I’ve met people who have similar experiences, and the amount has been increasing more recently, (possibly because of the impending mass enlightenment of 2012?) Psychologists refer to this as ‘apophenia’ which is a condition common amongst schizophrenics and geniuses like John Nash alike.
Apophenia was originally deemed a state of psychosis by Klaus Conrad in 1958. It seems that these experiences can disturb those who get overwhelmed by it’s various implications. It can result in feelings of alienation since most people don’t notice the correlations between ‘unrelated’ events. Later, Jung studied the phenomenon and found mentally healthy individuals can also experience apophenia and it is especially prominent in creative, artistic type people. Jung was the one to coin the term synchronicity, which has a better connotation.
Delving into the depths of this enigma is opening a can of worms. It is the meat of great philosophical and mathematical debate. Some say if you look for a pattern in anything you can find one whether there is one or not. This is a logical fallacy because there is a pattern observed; The real question is what are the chances of a pattern appearing in respect to probability and why does the specific pattern in question seem profound to the perciever. Those who don’t see the pattern (or coincidental event) and it’s importance may not have the same psychic experience as someone who does notice the coincidence. It seems there must be a psychic aspect to this phenomenon. Apophenia is most common in creative people, which makes perfect sense. Here is an example. A person is daydreaming about a crush; they decide to turn on the T.V. And on the news is a story about someone with the same name as their crush who was just murdered! If the person wasn’t imaginitive they may not have been daydreaming in the first place, therefor no coincidence would have taken place. Of course everyone is mentally active and imaginitive to some extent, so it is my mission to investigate what specific brain activity/state of mind is present in those noticing (and possibly generating) these occurrences. It makes me wonder about psychedelic patterns which are clearly visible to the tripper but ordinarily not present. Why do we see things that ‘just aren’t there’? What makes us think they are? Maybe we are seeing what we ordinarily are blind to because of our limited perception while sober? After all, we’re always seeing only a representation of reality and filtering out tons of information. Who’s to say one person’s filter is more accurate than that of the person in a psychedelic state? What kind of brain activity is responsible for this strange pattern sight? Why do people on psychedelics get more ‘hits’ than sober ones in psychic experiments? What kinds of things react with the brain to produce these patterns and apophenia and what things are responsible for blocking it out?
The EFC is a random word generator which picks from a bank of 6500 words. To consult this online oracle, you pose a question, hit the ask button, and contemplate the result. The responses don’t appear to be significant to the question every time, but frequently they are incredibly relevant to the question. I urge you to use it and see for yourself. Go to http://www.askefc.com
 
Here are some examples of some recent readings I found astounding:
 
What affect will a past life regression have on my tooth ache?
 
STABLE JUBILANT ERODE
ACHE IMAGINATION FADED
LATENT HYPNOTIZE ALWAYS CHANGING
 
 
Words on Akbar and Annemarie’s spiritual dicussion circle
 
séance MINIATURE PREACHER
SUBCONSCIOUS NEW AGE TUNE IN
 
 
Why is Kate’s boss Gary being sadistic to her, now that she is pregnant?
 
1.TENACIOUS SATISFY INSANITY STUBBORN
2.BASIS FOR FUND PSYCHO
3.LUSTY COOPERATION REGRESS
 
Dear God, I’m upset about losing all of our data…
 
DESTINED TO HIRE CONFIDE IN RECANT
 
Will Jim succeed in fixing our laptop?
 
INFORMED BEYOND REPAIR HEAL BY
 
Suicide?
PERISH FUNCTION TRANSIENT GUTSY UNCOMMITED
 
These are some of many readings that clearly directly address the question. Those who are spiritually inclined often consider the response to be a message from “God” or some kind of divine sign. The program seems to have a mind of it’s own and sometimes a sense of humor. The readings have a tendency to exhibit patterns. It’s almost as if it wants to converse considering the way a series of a few readings seem to have some unified theme as if it picks up on the thought the last message left off on. I was fascinated by the book “The Bible Code” and I’ve realized the principle of their being some kind of miraculous code in it’s text also applies to the Electric Fortune Cookie. Although we are yet to incorporate gematria into the program I’ve found new ways of reading the message by seeing the correlations between the generated words themselves, independent of how they relate to the question. I started noticing how sometimes the first letter of the words spell out a word which relates to the question -or the words in the message. More often than you might expect, the same word will come up twice in a reading or in 2 or 3 of 4 readings which is extremely improbable based on what we know about probability laws pertaining to randomly generated sequences. Some readings could be called prophetic because they make more sense in the future than they do when they’re generated. I do not wish to mislead anybody. Although I picked some of the better readings they stand as a basic example of how the readings often come out startlingly relevant. I remain conscious of each and every reading and try not to block out one’s that I can’t make sense of.
Dean Radin is one of the leading scientists in the field of metaphysics and consciousness and has conducted and researched hundreds of experiments concerning the affect of consciousness on randomly generated data and found that if consciousness is not indeed influencing the outcome there must be some awful flaw in the probability laws that are currently accepted. There is something termed retro-psychokinesis which pertains to a theory (based on this myriad of experiments) that a person’s conscious intention can seemingly influence the randomly generated data which has been determined prior to their participation (willing a specific outcome), as if the present can somehow influence the past. This study is relatively new and there is much room for further investigation and elaboration. The EFC could play a vital role in this general study although the reading is ‘predetermined’ only in the sense that the equation used for the generation was developed in the past. It uses a seed that’s dependent on fluctuating information and the moment the ask button is pressed is crucial to the outcome, (although I don’t know the details of what exactly the seed is.) It is some kind of equation incorporating time.
It is now proven that consciousness affects matter in a metaphysical manner. Emoto’s water study and Backster’s plant study have shown that a mere thought affects the water and plant the thought is projected at (the water’s molecular structure – the plants polygraph reading) indicating there is a definitive psychic connection between ‘separate’ entities. This is apparent in the subatomic realm as well because of the bizarre connection between entangled particles, regardless of distance in space.
I imagine these theories can partially explain the EFC enigma, and I’ve designed some experiments to clarify what may affect the relationship between the asker’s thoughts and the reading they get. Here is a list of pertinent questions:
 
If the asker is “psychic” (or believes in psychic activity?), are they more likely to get a response that is relevant to the question?
 
If the asker is passionate about the question, will the answer be more profound and relevant because of their brains reaction to the question posed?
 
Do some people tend to get more comprehensive readings than others?
 
How does the affect of one person asking the question compare to the affect of a whole group asking?
 
What kinds or results do you get if several people all ask different questions for the same reading?
 
How do interpretations differ depending on personality?
 
Is there a mathematically sound way to determine if a reading is a “hit”? (based on relevance)
 
How do the brain wave measurements of the asker relate to their answer?
 
How does the answer affect their brain wave activity?
 
How do practices such as meditation and remote viewing affect the process?
 
How does a person’s mental state and brain chemistry play into the result? (intoxicated vs. sober)
 
How can we account for readings with relevancy that is based on esoteric knowledge and personal experience? (maybe some creative writing/drawing/artsy activity?)
 
How can we make this into a game?
 
How can we incorporate this into an interactive network? (There could be daily questions and everyone posts their personal answer) sharing readings done for others, group mind experiments where everyone hits ask simultaneously, using readings for artistic inspiration and creative writing, best interpretation contests, reading text sent to phone at random times, blogging for those who want to share interpretations, personal philosophies, synchronistic results etc. ARCHIVE for all results so you can look up a question or word and see other readings on that question or with that word…
 
So, I’ve touched base on how EFC can be applied to these groundbreaking metaphysical phenomenons, which have been discovered only recently, in order to better understand the details of mind-matter relationships and the fascinating ‘entanglement’ enigma and the ‘strange attractor’ in chaos theory. For the spiritually inclined (such as myself) the EFC is a way to communicate with ‘God’ or ‘Great Spirit.’ I’ve been blessed with many astounding readings I believe to have had a healing effect. It makes me feel one with the universe in which all is being guided by some invisible ‘force.’ It makes me marvel at the wonder of my own mind and it gives me faith in a higher power conducting the Chaos of the Cosmos: Creating the beautiful symphony of our Universe.
However for those of us who aren’t spiritually or scientifically inclined, keep in mind the EFC is also a great tool for psychology and can be used like an ink blot. It’s interesting to note how people interpret the readings differently, accentuating different words and grouping or pairing up words differently to elicit a whole different message. Take two people arguing over something and have them consult the EFC about who is right or how to handle the controversial matter. The psychologist or analyzer can see how each subject picks up on a specific nuance or accentuates a word or idea because of their personal belief system, obsession, or mindset. It’s funny how they tend to be blocking other, equally valid and obvious interpretations that the other picks up on right away. This process is useful for mediation because it puts the opponents in a contemplative state of mind and encourages them to consider the thinking process of the other person and the reasons behind their individual creative interpretation. It also makes one question one’s own stance by making habitual thought patterns more evident to the interpreter himself. It can be used to resolve inner conflict just as well.

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Zachary John and Neşe Lisa Şenol like this.

Ray Ferretti · 4 mutual friends
I miss the actual edible cookie housing the paper fortune. I guess it’s a downside to the electric world.
September 15, 2011 at 7:05pm · Unlike ·  1

Willy Dee Also, let me just say, I hope that I am projecting bad vibes right now because I am none too pleased with the answers I got, although, indeed, all the answers seemed extremely relevant.
September 17, 2011 at 12:42am · Unlike ·  1

Willy Dee That’s probably thanks to my severely deficient prepulse inhibition.
September 17, 2011 at 12:43am · Unlike ·  1

Becky Lee I had to stop using it for awhile for the same reasons. I was happy with the answers for being so germane, but at the same time freaked out that they were so bleak. There’s more or less a balance of negative and positive words. I thought maybe it was just me; My tarot card readings tend to turn out ominous, too. Thanks for trying it out, I’ve been dying to get some feedback. I just put in “Willy Dee uses EFC” the answer it gave was ”UNIMPAIRED NAG IMPERCEPTIBLE RUSH” notice how the first word starts with UNI and the first 3 words start with U-N-I? maybe you and I would benefit from slowing down and meditating before asking.
September 17, 2011 at 1:15am · Like ·  1

Becky Lee I just looked up deficient prepulse inhibition… for those who don’t know “Deficits of prepulse inhibition manifest in the inability to filter out the unnecessary information; they have been linked to abnormalities of sensorimotor gating. Such deficits are noted in patients suffering from illnesses like schizophrenia and Alzheimer’s disease, and in people under the influence of drugs, surgical manipulations, or mutations. Human studies of PPI have been summarised in reviews by Braff et al. (2001)[3] and Swerdlow et al. (2008).[4]” – LATENT INHIBITION is a related term which is also a fascinating thing to study.
September 17, 2011 at 2:03am · Like

Becky Lee wow, after reading about prepulse inhibition the EFC answer i got regarding you using the EFC seems even more relevant! Let me premise this by saying i only asked this once so I’m not ‘filtering out’ unimportant readings. According to the wikipedia site the prepulse inhibition is often found in drug users and smokers, which makes sense cause that affects the heartbeat. the RUSH is the sensation you get when you smoke or do a drug which one is often propelled to do maybe because of being NAGGED too much. IMPERCEPTIBLE is relevant cause apparantly this pulse thing effects your perceptions (or vice versa?) making things that are ordinarily imperceptible- perceptible! I personally don’t think this condition is necessarily an IMPAIRMENT because who’s to say any information is unnecessary? As far as I’m concerned filtering out information means youre blocking something out cause of a trauma or something, whereas absorbing as much info as possible could lead to great insights (as long as it doesn’t induce a decapacitating paranoia)
September 17, 2011 at 2:22am · Like

Erron Gransden NUMNUMNUM!!!!! LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!
September 17, 2011 at 6:28pm · Like

Jason Wallach You bring up some interesting questions and propose some good experiments. You should carry these out. I find my self very objective (maybe too much) and subscribe to the idea that humans can make connections between almost any thing with a little effort. I do realize this is not mutually exclusive with your view. Our “pattern finder function” after all is a major function of the brain in normal processes like sensory perception, learning and behavior. Although skeptical of a psychic role I am always open to any possibility. A test for a non-psychic effect could be to have a uninformed friend (or computer) gather a list of “unrelated questions” (like from a book) and see how a single randomly generated word string relates to each of them. The question list could be gathered before and/or after the word string is generated but always by one not involved in generating the string and thus not aware of it. People blind to the experiment should then attempt to relate the string to the different questions. These results (number of “defined” meaningful hits) could be compared with the results from the actively asked questions.
September 20, 2011 at 1:26am · Unlike ·  1

Becky Lee this is a very valuable suggestion. I was thinking of getting a panel of people together to experiment with it and bring their own expertise into the study, would you be interested? I would love to conduct that experiment…Dean Radin who’s a trailblazer in noetic sciences conducted random coin flip experiments in which the coin flip was generated prior to the group of people willing, say tails, to come up. they didnt know which one would come up but their will seemed to have an effect on the pre-generated data which seems to suggest a time-transcendent quality to the interaction or a psychic one, which i think is more probable. i know this is out there but its kinda something you gotta see to believe, thats why i wanna get more people involved.
September 25, 2011 at 4:10am · Like

Jason Wallach yea i’d be down. Let me know
September 27, 2011 at 3:52pm · Like

Zachary John i think.. next time we hang out im bring my tarots and and asking efc the same question after a reading.. haha you wanna?
October 15, 2011 at 12:26pm · Like

Becky Lee yeah! great idea. sounds trippy. its fun to pick tarot cards for movie scenes, they say it might be easier to get a good reading when youre doing it for someone or something else other than yourself
November 7, 2011 at 10:03pm · Like

My question: can I not only tell my SEs, but also expect to discuss their here?

I was eating lunch with a coworker describing a musical event I saw the night before, in which projectors were aimed at an oddly shaped cubic surface to create an impressive visual display. I was musing as to how this could have been done, as we are in the lighting and audio business, but I was still unclear as to the exact equipment used to create the effect. As we got up from out lunch table and walked toward the exit, a client of mine approached and asked if I knew how to use Pixelwarp projection software. I said no and asked what it was for, and he explained it was used to project images onto oddly shaped surfaces! When I got back to the shop, I looked up the software along with the name of the artist I saw the night before and discovered Pixelwarp was exactly what he used to create the visual effect I saw the night before. How’s that for synchronicity?