Telepathy: 36 Years of Science Say Maybe?
Can people guess hidden cards better than chance?
Imagine sitting in a laboratory, staring at a computer screen, trying to guess which of four symbols will appear next—a circle, square, triangle, or star. You'd expect to be right about 25% of the time by pure chance. But what if, across thousands of such experiments over 36 years, people consistently scored just a tiny bit better than chance? That's exactly what researchers Lance Storm and Patrizio Tressoldi found when they analyzed 141 studies involving nearly half a million individual guesses. The effect was small—so small you'd need sophisticated statistics to detect it—but it was remarkably consistent across different labs, different researchers, and different decades.
36 years of card-guessing experiments show small but consistent ESP effects.
For decades, researchers have tested whether people can guess hidden targets like playing cards, symbols, or pictures without any normal sensory information. This meta-analysis examined 36 years of such 'forced-choice' experiments, where participants must pick from a limited set of options. The researchers analyzed 141 studies conducted between 1987 and 2022 to see if people consistently perform better than chance would predict.
Across 36 years and 141 studies, people showed a tiny but statistically significant ability to guess correctly in ESP tests slightly more often than pure chance would predict.
Key Findings
- Across all 141 studies, participants performed slightly but consistently better than chance would predict.
- The effect was small but the statistical confidence was extremely high - the odds of this pattern occurring by pure chance were less than 1 in 10 quadrillion.
- Interestingly, the effects didn't decline over time and were consistent across different researchers and laboratories.
What Is This About?
The researchers collected and analyzed 141 forced-choice ESP studies spanning 36 years. In these experiments, participants typically sit in front of a computer and try to guess which card, symbol, or picture has been randomly selected as the target. Some studies measured how often people guessed correctly (hit rates), while others measured how quickly people responded to different targets. The researchers combined all the results using statistical techniques to see if there was an overall pattern beyond what chance alone could explain.
Meta-analysis combining 141 forced-choice ESP studies from 1987-2022, where participants guessed targets like card symbols or pictures.
Small but statistically significant effect (0.02) with extremely low probability of chance occurrence (p < 10-16).
How Good Is the Evidence?
Effect size of 0.02 - this is smaller than the effect of aspirin on heart attack prevention (0.07) but larger than many psychological interventions. In a typical 4-choice card guessing task, this would mean getting about 25.5% correct instead of the expected 25%.
Supporters argue that the consistency across decades and laboratories, combined with extremely low probability of chance occurrence, suggests a genuine but subtle phenomenon. Skeptics contend that such small effects could result from subtle methodological flaws, publication bias favoring positive results, or statistical artifacts that accumulate across studies. Both sides agree the effects, if real, are much smaller than popular culture suggests.
Mainstream: Small effects likely reflect methodological artifacts or statistical flukes rather than genuine ESP. Moderate: Results suggest something interesting is happening but more rigorous controls are needed to rule out conventional explanations. Frontier: Consistent small effects across decades provide evidence for genuine psi phenomena that challenge materialist assumptions about consciousness.
Common misconception: ESP research means people can read minds like in movies. Reality: The effects measured are tiny statistical deviations from chance - participants might get 26% correct instead of 25% in a four-choice task.
To settle this question would require large-scale, pre-registered studies with rigorous controls, independent replication by skeptical researchers, and identification of the mechanism behind any effects. This meta-analysis meets the criteria for large sample size and consistency across laboratories, but lacks the prospective design and independent skeptical replication that would be most convincing.
These results confirm that the forced-choice design adequately tests extra-sensory perception (ESP).
Stance: Supportive
What Does It Mean?
The sheer scale is staggering—nearly half a million individual guessing attempts analyzed across 36 years, all showing the same tiny but persistent deviation from chance. It's like finding that a coin consistently lands heads 50.1% of the time instead of exactly 50%—barely detectable individually, but unmistakable in aggregate.
Like when you think of someone just before they call, or feel drawn to pick a particular lottery number - this research tests whether such intuitive hunches work better than random guessing in controlled laboratory conditions.
If these results reflect a genuine phenomenon rather than methodological artifacts, they would suggest that human consciousness might interact with information in ways that current scientific models don't account for. This could potentially revolutionize our understanding of the mind-brain relationship and information processing. However, the effect is so small that even if real, it might represent a vestigial capacity with no practical applications, or point to subtle quantum or electromagnetic processes we don't yet understand.
Meta-analyses gain power by combining many small studies, but they can only be as good as the individual studies they include - garbage in, garbage out.
Understanding Terms
What This Study Claims
Findings
The probability of these results occurring by chance alone was less than 1 in 10 quadrillion (p < 10-16)
strongA meta-analysis of 141 forced-choice ESP studies from 1987-2022 yielded a small but statistically significant effect size of 0.02
moderateEffects did not vary significantly between different investigators or laboratories
moderateNo significant differences were found between telepathy, clairvoyance, and precognition studies
moderateThere was no evidence of decline in effect sizes over the 36-year period, with a near-significant increase observed
moderateThis summary is for general information about current research. It does not constitute medical advice. The scientific interpretation of these results is debated among researchers. If personally affected, please consult qualified professionals.