How can telepathy be tested in a laboratory?

Thinking of someone just as they call you can make you wonder what happened. To investigate possible thought transmission, researchers need a setting in which they know what information each person can access.

One method is called the “ganzfeld”. The person describing their impressions sees uniform light and hears a continuous sound. The aim is to reduce the sensory changes that normally draw their attention.

In a classic version of the test, another person watches an image or a video at a distance. The recorded impressions are then compared with several possible targets. If four choices are equally likely, random selection produces one correct answer in four on average.

The challenge is to prevent any unintended clues: sounds, exchanges between participants or information passed on during the judging process.

The 4 September bulletin describes a project involving six centres in four countries. Shared tools and data are intended to help researchers compare experiments and check their analyses.

The question is whether specific information can be identified more often than expected under controlled conditions. Making the tools available does not yet provide the answer.

Further reading: Bulletin of 4 September 2026 (in French).

Source: Official Ganzfeld Project website.