Do people create "consciousness fields" in the space around them, that change with mood, concentration, or group focus? Could this phenomenon be stable enough to develop technologies based on it? This is the question that PEAR tried to answer in the FieldREG experiments.

With ample evidence from their intention studies, PEAR wondered if the mind could influence the REG, even when it isn't directly trying to. They reasoned that if one person can influence quantum probabilities, perhaps they influence macroscopic probabilities in their daily lives. Furthermore, they wondered what effect many minds might have on the physical space all around them, especially when they are working together productively, or experiencing group "resonance." Perhaps certain locations of human significance, such as ancient temples or other "sacred sites" somehow affect the local physical space.

Since the REG is part of the physical world around us, PEAR decided to collect REG data in different conditions, to see if the REG responds. Some of these conditions included concerts, business meetings, group meditations, and ancient ritual sites. These became known as the FieldREG experiments, first because REGs were adapted to portable computers for "field use," and second, because it references the idea of consciousness fields, such as those proposed by Cambridge scientist Rupert Sheldrake (1).

According to the FieldREG experiments, the REG does seem to respond to our state of mind, even when we're not trying to affect it. The REG also responds to occasions of group "resonance," such as effective group brainstorming, or powerful musical performances. This points to the existence of consciousness fields (or something like them), and suggests that they actually have a measurable impact on nearby physical matter.

In 1997, PEAR summarized dozens of their FieldREG studies (2). Collected FieldREG data was examined during events of emotional significance and focus, for individuals and groups; and also at locations of human meaningfulness, such as ancient ritual sites. This data was then compared to data collected during times of "mundane" emotions and thought, or mundane locations. The instances and locations of meaningfulness (a statistically significant body of data, examined cumulatively) showed an imbalance in REG output, which had p = 2.2x10^-6 odds of happening by chance, while the mundane body of data (also statistically significant) had odds of p = 0.91—what you would expect from chance.

In other words, the REG seems to behave normally in mundane environments and human circumstances, until some subjectively powerful event or location is introduced. In these instances, the REG the affected enough to generate measurably imbalanced events. (Note: it is unclear whether meaningful locations themselves affect the REG, or whether they affect the consciousness of the experimenters involved, which in turn influences the REG.)

It seemed the PEAR team had invented a technique to identify powerful situations and locations. Using FieldREG to ferret out which conditions are most powerful (that is, those that result in the strongest impact on the local physical world, including the REG), PEAR arrived at some important conclusions.

Small groups tend to have significant impacts on FieldREG more often than large groups (3). This may be because there are more opportunities for group resonance and cooperation in small groups. The implication is that small groups are more likely to work harmoniously, toward ideas or situations that have a real, physical impact on the world.

Group rituals such as symbolic ceremonies and guided meditations also tend to alter the physical world. So do concerts, theater performances, and many varieties of sacred sites, old and new.

On the other hand, the least effective circumstances, according to the FieldREG data, are academic conferences, business meetings, and similar. This may suggest that the mundane, rigid nature of these restricts group resonance, and therefore restricts the emergence of ideas and situations with a real, measurable impact. As such a unique and useful tool, FieldREG became ubiquitous in PEAR's formal and informal excursions.

(1) Sheldrake, R. A New Science of Life: The Hypothesis of Formative Causation. Los Angeles: J.P. Tarcher, Inc. 1981.

(2) http://www.princeton.edu/~pear/pdfs/FR3.pdf

(3) http://www.princeton.edu/~pear/pdfs/FR3.pdf

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