I haven't personally done much formal testing of mediumistic claims -- though I've done some observation, and even participated in some. I am familiar with the psychological literature (not Skeptical -- just mainstream experimental literature) as well as the techniques used by psychic entertainers and prestidigitators, and have experimented with these (conventional) phenomena. I believe that people have much greater subconscious ability to react to subtle cues and to make brilliant deductions than they are aware of.
I do believe in psi. I also believe that many people mistake the astounding capabilities of the human mind, in themselves and others, for psi.
Given those capabilities -- to demonstrate that non-conventional communication is taking place you have to eliminate the conventional communication channel. That you are unaware of using such channels does not suffice -- particularly for anyone but you.
That's not Skepticism (note the capital "S") -- its just science.
Your experiment might be interesting. It might demonstrate the astounding capabilities of the human mind. It just doesn't demonstrate, as it stands, the astounding parapnormal capabilities of the human mind.
A screen would help, but is not sufficient. The problem is -- we don't know the limits of those conventional capabilities and sound would still be a factor.
How about two isolated rooms a significant distance apart with a camera in the readee's and a screen in the intuiter's room. Transcripts of the intuiter's statements would be edited to remove any information that might identify the readee (e.g., something hinting at hair color) and to include only the type of information you indicate. Reedee's would be given lists of statements taken from their own and from others' "readings" as well as statements from the "Inquirer" for themselves and for others. Their task is to identify statements that apply to them. The inquirer would make his/her reading simultaneously with the intuiter.
This design is not perfect -- it depends on the reliability of being able to effectively edit out conventional hints -- but with some careful design it could be pretty tight.  |