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fMRI-Meditation study of presentiment The role
of coherence in retrocausal processes (Bial
34-04) Dick BiermanUniversity of Amsterdam and
University for Humanistics, Utrecht The
Netherlands
Introduction The rationale behind this
experiment is that presentiment, the apparent
response BEFORE a stimulus is presented, is
supposed to be explained as an example of
time-symmetry in physics. Time symmetry has not
been observed in physical systems, but
theoretical considerations by Wheeler and
Feynman (1945) suggest that this breaking of
time-symmetry is due to the asymmetry in the
availability of coherent multi particle
transmitters, such as lasers, and coherent multi
particle absorbers. Time symmetry might
therefore occur when a multiple particle
information absorbing system, like the brain, is
extremely coherent. Meditation is thought to be a
practice resulting in such coherent brain states.
Therefore our main hypothesis is that meditators
show larger presentiment effects than control
subjects.
Results A total of 32 Regions of Interest
were found by comparing the effect of meditation
on processing of visual stimuli irrespective of
the type of stimulus and by comparing meditors
with controls processing visual stimuli (these
results will be published in a separate paper).

• Conclusions
• Caveats
• The semi-qualitative approach that was used so
  far does not allow for sound statistical
  conclusions. Most notably, it is not allowed to
  treat the 36 Regions of Interest as totally
  independent. Therefore, statistics based upon the
  table should be considered with caution.
  Furthermore the unequal number of presentations
  of emotional and neutral stimuli could have an
  impact on the bump count method to construct that
  table. However, this latter aspect does not apply
  to the relative effects of erotic and violent
  stimuli because on the average an equal number of
  these were used.
• Preliminary conclusions
•  Based upon the over-all averages of the time
  course showing a clear effect of stimulus type
  and most notably on the average violent time
  course preceding the stimulus and in combination
  with the table with bump counts we feel that we
  can conclude that the original fMRI-over-all
  presentiment results of non-meditators presented
  in Bierman Scholte (2002) is replicated.
• More confidently it is concluded that
  meditation results in a decrease in violent
  presentiment and an increase in erotic
  presentiment.
• Next
• At present we are analyzing the data for a few a
  priori brain regions like the Amygdala and the
  Caudate. In exploratory analyses of the previous
  fMRI-presentiment experiment of Bierman Scholte
  these areas showed some interesting effects which
  for the Caudate were expected on the basis of
  presentiment effects in skin conductance. Also we
  will develop a more quantitative approach to the
  bump count method taking into account
  dependencies and unequal number of observations.

Effect of Meditation on Presentiment For each of
the Regions of Interest time courses preceding
the three types of simuli were calculated for
meditators while meditating and while not
meditating and for controls. For each of these
time courses the largest bump preceding any of
the three stmuli was assessed.
Table with number of largest bumps preceding a
stimulus in the interval (-8,0 )seconds as a
function of stimulus-type and condition.
A simple binomial test assuming independence
shows that the percentage presponses before a
neutral stimulus of 11.7 is significantly lower
than the chance expectation value of 33.3.
(corresponding z-value 5.6 but see caveats).

• Method
• Eight experienced meditators were trained to
  meditate in the hostile environment of a brain
  scanner. There they were presented with, in
  total, 64 random neutral, erotic and violent
  visual stimuli during meditation and during a non
  meditation session in the scanner
  (counterbalanced in order).
• 8 control subjects, matched on age and sex,
  participated in the study but did only a single
  session in the scanner.
• Presentiment effects are measured by comparing
  the brain activity, as represented by the BOLD
  signal, before emotional stimuli with the brain
  activity before neutral stimuli. Because these
  stimuli which are presented for 2 seconds with an
  interval of about 16 seconds are randomly
  selected, the subject, and in fact nobody, can
  know which type of stimulus will be presented,
  there should be no difference in brain activity
  preceding the stimuli.
• Brain Regions of Interest were obtained in two
  ways First, by comparing the effects
  irrespective of stimulus type of meditation. And
  second by comparing the effect of all stimuli
  comparing meditators while not meditating with
  control subjects. The major hypothesis was then
  tested by comparing the effects of neutral and
  emotional stimuli before stimulus presentation in
  these regions.

Regions where meditation results in larger (upper
left), or smaller BOLD responses (right). The
lower figure gives a cortical display of these
results.
Presentiment-effects (over-all) For all of these
regions combined, the average time course for
neutral and emotional stimuli was calculated
separately for all sessions. The resulting graph
shows a clear bump in the time course preceding
violent stimuli.
Exploratory Results with respect to type of
Emotion As can be seen from the table, a very
interesting pattern that arises is that
meditation seems to have a dramatic effect on the
type of stimuli that show presentiment. For the
non-meditating condition, as well for the control
condition, there are more than twice as much
violent presponses as erotic ones. During
meditation however, this pattern totally reverses
and there are almost 6 as many erotic
presponses. It seems that during meditation the
early warning for violence is switched off.
Again quantitative assessment is difficult, due
to the fact that the different clusters are not
independent. A chi2 assuming independence yields
a strongly significant result (chi2 15.6, df1,
pltlt0.000001 but see caveats)
For further information Please contact Dick
Bierman d.j.bierman_at_uva.nl University of
Amsterdam Phone [phone] Detailed
information on this project, methods, materials,
results etc. can be found in the Bial Final
Report 34-04
AcknowledgmentsThe following persons did
significantly contribute to this project
Jenneke van Ditzhuyzen Stephen Whitmarsh Eva
Lobach
Key References Bierman, D. J. Radin, D. I.
(1998). Conscious and anomalous non-conscious
emotional processes A reversal of the arrow of
time? Toward a Science of Consciousness, Tucson
III. MIT Press, 1999, 367-38 Bierman, D.J.
Scholte, H.S. (2002). A fMRI Brain Imaging study
of presentiment. Journal of ISLIS, 20-2,
380-389. Wheeler J. A. and Feynman, R. P. (1945)
Rev. Mod. Phys. 17, 157