This is the third entry for the Zener card diary redux where we run new tests and collect more data. The last entry covered missing psi and being able to psychically perform beyond the expected levels of chance in card-guessing. These tests showed that despite my covid19 encounter, my psychic ability was not only unaffected but possibly improved.
If you need to be caught up, the test went like this. You have 5 targets to guess. In this case, I used a custom-made deck that is based on the elements, fire, earth, water, air, and spirit. Make the guess, reveal the answer, record if it was correct, then shuffle the deck again. The expected level of chance would be 1 correct guess out of 5. Anything above that is considered significant.
Real Life Lab
These next test sessions are inspired by the idea of “psychic shuffling.” This idea is found on page 86 of ESP: In Life and Lab: Tracing Hidden Channels by Lousia E. Rhine. The concept is that the subject would be able to shuffle the cards in such a way that it could match a pre-shuffled deck.
The experimenter would have already shuffled and prepared a deck of cards. The subject would be told to shuffle another deck of cards. The experimenter would then inspect both decks for matches.
The text does not indicate what cards were used and how they detected matches. It may have been assumed that Zener cards were used. It is also possible that regular playing cards could have been used during the test. In my case, I will be using tarot cards and my custom elemental deck to detect literal tarot matches, and matches based on the card’s elemental association.
My Real Life Lab
My test will be different than what Lousia E. Rhine describes as “psychic shuffling.” I will be using three decks. Two of the decks will be tarot, and the third will be my custom elemental deck.
The elemental deck and the two tarot decks are configured to 50 cards. The elemental deck contains 10 sets of 5 elemental symbols for earth, fire, water, air, and spirit. In the two tarot decks, I removed the court cards, the fool, and the major arcana cards past the wheel of fortune. This would also give me 50 cards.
The test would be to shuffle each deck well, then draw cards off the top and record if there are any matches.
There will be multiple match possibilities. One possibility would be between the two tarot decks to detect exact matches. As an example, Ace of Cups and Ace of Cups would be an exact match. Another match would be to detect if the elemental deck matched any of the two tarot deck’s elemental associations. For example, if the elemental deck drew fire, wands would be a match from the tarot decks. Another example is spirit. If spirit comes up from the elemental deck a major arcana card (Magician, Empress, Hermit, etc.) would be a match.
Either the tarot deck can match with the elemental deck to create multiple matches, and the tarot decks can also match each other’s elemental association. In cases where the tarot cards match exactly, they can count for an exact match due to their elemental association.
Match Possibilities
The tarot decks can match exactly.
The tarot decks can match their elemental associations.
One or both of the tarot decks elemental associations can match with the elemental deck.
Matches of three are scored differently. As an example a match of three counts for 2. One hit for the pair then another hit hit for the additional card.
When the tarot decks match exactly they count as two hits, one for the elemental association, and one for the exact match.
The Data
On December 20th, 2020 I ran two different tests. In test one, I did 50 draws that gave me 21 hits. 19 of them came from the elemental deck matching the tarot cards elemental association, and 2 hits came from two tarot cards matching exactly. Overall this gave me a 42% hit chance.
The second test on December 20th gave me much higher results. I got 28 hits from the elemental cards matching the tarot cards elemental association. 6 hits from the tarot cards matching their elemental association. Finally, I got 2 hits from the tarot cards matching exactly. 2 of the 6 tarot elemental association hits came from the tarot cards matching exactly. The total was 36 overall hits giving me a 72% hit chance.
You can look at the data in different ways. If you don’t want to consider certain hits you can remove them to reduce the possibility of hits.
I did two follow-up tests again using the three decks configured the same way. I would do only 12 draws from each of the decks.
One test on December 27th captured the highest results so far. I scored 9 hits from the elemental cards matching, and 1 hit from the tarot cards matching their elemental association. This gave me 10 total hits out of 12 draws for an 83% hit chance.
The second follow-up test was done on December 29th and gave me 5 hits from the elemental card matching the tarot cards’ elemental associations. The 5 hits gave me a 42% hit chance.
Based on all four of the tests we can say that the lowest hit chance is 42% with the highest being 83%.
Two Way Testing
We had a look at what could happen when three pre-shuffled decks are used. Now we can see what happens with only two pre-shuffled decks. This will mimic the test condition of having a subject and tester more closely. We should expect the results to be somewhere near the expected level of chance with card-guessing.
On January 12th, 2021 I did two tests of 50 draws with two decks. One deck was the elemental deck, and the other was a tarot deck. They were configured in the same way as the previous tests. In this test, the only hits can come from the element matching the tarots elemental association. No other match possibilities are possible.
The first test had 8 hits out of 50 giving me a 16% hit chance.
The second test gave me 16 hits out of 50 giving me a 32% hit chance.
We can see these ranges resemble the results one would get from the historic 25 card zener test. 20% hit chance would be expected by chance.
Two Way Test Conclusion
We could conclude that the psychic shuffle done with the elemental deck and a tarot deck resembles the results one would get if you were card-guessing. 32% seems notable, but it’s achievable. Remember, I was able to guess 2 out of 5 cards right in a previous article making a 40% hit chance.
If using two decks is analogous to one subject card-guessing, then three decks are like having two subjects guessing from the same deck. Each subject has its conscious intuition. When you cross-reference the guesses from the two subjects it will create the possibility of extra hits.
The result is clear. When you introduce another entity capable of the expected level of chance, and you allow the cross-referencing of guesses, you end up with more hits. In fact, you will should see the results double.
I look forward to next series of tests where I increase the amounts of decks used. I wonder what we will see next.
References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zener_cards