Which Kind of ESP Is Remote Viewing?

Introduction

Remote viewing is often described as a specialised way of testing alleged extrasensory perception (ESP), but the type of ESP involved depends on how the target is chosen and how information is supposed to be obtained. A session aimed at describing a hidden location resembles clairvoyance; one involving a person at the target site may be interpreted as telepathy; and a session in which the target is selected or revealed only after the viewing can be framed as precognition. This flexibility is one reason remote viewing occupies an unusual position within parapsychology. Rather than claiming a single psychic mechanism, many remote-viewing protocols are designed so that different interpretations remain possible depending on the experimental design. At the same time, critics argue that changing the proposed mechanism after the fact makes the claims harder to test decisively.[CIA+2PMC]cia.govAN EVALUATION OF REMOTE VIEWING: RESEARCH…A remote viewer is asked to visualize a place, location, or object being viewed by a "bea…

Hidden Targets and Clairvoyance

The form of ESP most closely associated with remote viewing is clairvoyance. In parapsychology, clairvoyance refers to the alleged acquisition of information about an object, place or event without using the ordinary senses and without relying on another person’s thoughts. Remote-viewing experiments commonly fit this description because the viewer attempts to describe a concealed target that nobody in the testing room can directly observe.[CIA]cia.govAN EVALUATION OF REMOTE VIEWING: RESEARCH…A remote viewer is asked to visualize a place, location, or object being viewed by a "bea…

Classic laboratory protocols sought to isolate this possibility by introducing sensory shielding. A target location, photograph or object was randomly selected, the viewer was prevented from seeing it, and impressions were recorded before any feedback. If accurate descriptions occurred under these conditions, supporters argued that clairvoyance was the simplest interpretation because no known sensory pathway connected the viewer with the target. Early Stanford Research Institute (SRI) studies by Harold Puthoff and Russell Targ were explicitly presented as investigations of information acquisition under sensory shielding rather than conventional perception.[CIA+2Wikipedia]cia.govAN EVALUATION OF REMOTE VIEWING: RESEARCH…A remote viewer is asked to visualize a place, location, or object being viewed by a "bea…

However, this interpretation has remained controversial. Critics examining the original experiments argued that subtle sensory cues, transcript editing and procedural weaknesses could account for some reported successes. Later reviews commissioned for the CIA concluded that, although some statistical anomalies were reported in parts of the research programme, the evidence was not sufficiently reliable or operationally useful to establish clairvoyance as a demonstrated phenomenon.[CIA+2Wikipedia]cia.govAN EVALUATION OF REMOTE VIEWING: RESEARCH…A remote viewer is asked to visualize a place, location, or object being viewed by a "bea…

Beacon People and Telepathy

Some remote-viewing experiments introduced a “beacon” or “sender”—a person physically present at the target location while the viewer remained elsewhere. This design raises a different question: if accurate descriptions occur, is the viewer obtaining information directly from the location, or indirectly from the beacon’s mind?[CIA]cia.govAN EVALUATION OF REMOTE VIEWING: RESEARCH…A remote viewer is asked to visualize a place, location, or object being viewed by a "bea…

Within parapsychology, this distinction matters because telepathy concerns alleged mind-to-mind communication rather than direct perception of distant places or objects. If the beacon is concentrating on distinctive features of the target, successful descriptions could be interpreted as telepathic access to the beacon’s mental experience rather than clairvoyant access to the target itself. As a result, some experiments attempted to separate these possibilities by varying whether a human observer was present at the target or by designing targets that no individual knew in advance.[CIA]cia.govAN EVALUATION OF REMOTE VIEWING: RESEARCH…A remote viewer is asked to visualize a place, location, or object being viewed by a "bea…

Researchers also recognised that ordinary information leakage had to be excluded. Experimenters, monitors and judges could unintentionally transmit cues through conversation, body language or document handling. Modern protocol design therefore emphasised blind or double-blind procedures to reduce both conventional cueing and the possibility that any apparent success could simply reflect knowledge shared by participants rather than a paranormal process.[CIA+2Wikipedia]cia.govAN EVALUATION OF REMOTE VIEWING: RESEARCH…A remote viewer is asked to visualize a place, location, or object being viewed by a "bea…

Future Selection and Precognition

Perhaps the most unusual interpretation arises when the target is not fixed until after the viewing session has finished. In these experiments, viewers record descriptions before a random process later determines which target will become the correct one. If correspondences exceed chance expectations, supporters argue that clairvoyance and telepathy become less satisfactory explanations because no present target yet exists to observe and no person knows the future selection. Instead, the proposed mechanism shifts towards precognition.[SciSpace]scispace.comSci Spaceremote-viewing-the-future-with-a-tasking-temporalremote-viewing-the-future-with-a-tasking-temporal-…Abstract—This study uses remote viewing in a predictive manner within the c…

Parapsychologists have long debated whether successful remote viewing in these circumstances represents genuine foreknowledge or some broader phenomenon often labelled “psi”, in which distinctions between clairvoyance, telepathy and precognition become artificial. Some researchers have suggested that feedback itself—seeing the correct target after the session—might somehow influence the earlier viewing, while others argue that such ideas require forms of retrocausality that challenge conventional understandings of time and causation.[ResearchGate+2Journal of Scientific Exploration]researchgate.netResearch Gate(PDF) What Do We Know about Psi?The First Decade of…December 30, 2019 — 7 days ago — Remote viewing is a nonanalytic ability; describing a distant shape, form, or loc…Published: December 30, 2019

These proposals remain highly controversial because they conflict with established physical theories and have not achieved broad acceptance within mainstream science. Independent replication under rigorous controls has also remained inconsistent, leaving precognitive interpretations unconfirmed despite continued interest within parts of the parapsychology community.[PMC+2Wikipedia]pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.govPMCFollow‐up on the U.SCentral Intelligence Agency's (CIA…by Á Escolà‐Gascón · 2023 · Cited by 10 — Since 1972, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) co…

Why the Categories Often Overlap

Remote-viewing researchers have frequently noted that the traditional ESP categories can blur together during experiments. A viewer describing a hidden military installation might appear to demonstrate clairvoyance if the target is already fixed. The same session could be interpreted as telepathy if another participant is observing the location. If the target is selected only after the session, identical descriptions may instead be labelled precognition.

Because these interpretations depend heavily on protocol rather than on the viewer’s subjective experience, many researchers prefer the broader term “anomalous cognition” or simply “psi”. The emphasis shifts away from identifying a specific psychic faculty and towards asking whether any information is obtained beyond ordinary sensory channels. This terminology was adopted in parts of the later U.S. government research programme to avoid assuming a particular mechanism before experimental evidence established one.[CIA+2PMC]cia.govAN EVALUATION OF REMOTE VIEWING: RESEARCH…A remote viewer is asked to visualize a place, location, or object being viewed by a "bea…

What the Debate Means for Evaluating Remote Viewing

The relationship between remote viewing and the classic ESP categories illustrates an important methodological issue rather than proving any particular psychic ability. Experimental design determines which mechanism is being tested:

This flexibility makes remote viewing a more structured testing framework than many traditional psychic practices, but it also complicates interpretation. A positive result does not automatically identify which form of ESP, if any, is responsible. Conversely, negative or inconsistent findings challenge all three interpretations simultaneously. The continuing scientific debate therefore centres less on choosing between clairvoyance, telepathy and precognition than on whether any reliable evidence exists for information acquisition beyond known sensory and cognitive processes.[Wikipedia+3CIA+3PMC]cia.govAN EVALUATION OF REMOTE VIEWING: RESEARCH…A remote viewer is asked to visualize a place, location, or object being viewed by a "bea…

Amazon book picks

Further Reading

Books and field guides related to Which Kind of ESP Is Remote Viewing?. Use these as the next step if you want deeper reading beyond the article.

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The conscious universe

By Dean I. Radin, Radin

First published 1997. Subjects: Parapsychology, Case studies, Cas, Études de, Paranormale verschijnselen, Parapsychologie.

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Limitless Mind

By Russell Targ

First published 2004. Subjects: Remote viewing (Parapsychology), Extrasensory perception, Spiritual life, Peace of mind.

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Real magic

By Dean I. Radin

First published 2018. Subjects: Parapsychology, Magic, Telepathy.

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Phenomena

By Annie Jacobsen

First published 2017. Subjects: Military research, Parapsychology, Extrasensory perception, Psychokinesis, History.

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Endnotes

1. Source: cia.gov
Link:https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp96-00791r000200180006-4

2. Source: pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Title: PMCFollow‐up on the U.S
Link:https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10275521/

3. Source: Wikipedia
Title: Remote viewing
Link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remote_viewing

4. Source: Wikipedia
Link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clairvoyance

5. Source: Wikipedia
Title: Russell Targ
Link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Targ

6. Source: Wikipedia
Link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parapsychology

7. Source: scispace.com
Title: Sci Spaceremote-viewing-the-future-with-a-[tasking]({{ ‘tasking/’ | relative_url }})-temporal
Link:https://scispace.com/pdf/remote-viewing-the-future-with-a-tasking-temporal-outbounder-4ba1gpxihd.pdf

8. Source: researchgate.net
Title: Research Gate(PDF) What Do We Know about Psi?
Link:https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342061969_What_Do_We_Know_About_Psi_The_First_Decade_of_Remote_Viewing_Research_and_Operations_at_Stanford_Research_Institute

Published: December 30, 2019

9. Source: Wikipedia
Link:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precognition

10. Source: journalofscientificexploration.org
Link:https://journalofscientificexploration.org/index.php/jse/article/view/2973/1975

Additional References

11. Source: theosophical.org
Link:https://www.theosophical.org/publications/quest-magazine/questioning-reality-a-physicists-view-of-psychic-abilities

12. Source: academia.edu
Link:https://www.academia.edu/51621266/CIA_Initiated_Remote_Viewing_Program_at_Stanford_Research_Institute

13. Source: ciaotest.cc.columbia.edu
Title: sa jan02srm01
Link:https://ciaotest.cc.columbia.edu/olj/sa/sa_jan02srm01.html

14. Source: youtube.com
Title: Russell Targ teaches Remote Viewing in one simple lesson
Link:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FI_01m-6L30

15. Source: youtube.com
Title: Remote Viewing From the Inside Out with Russell Targ
Link:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6Pn6WGahYI

Published: August 31, 1973

16. Source: youtube.com
Title: Russell Targ & Remote Viewing
Link:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7CXoElaQQ8

17. Source: youtube.com
Link:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_q6d4cIFnY

Published: August 31, 1973