Dani Caputi

Dani Caputi is an American atomospheric science researcher who has investigated consciousness-related effects in micro-meteorological processes.

Career

Dani Caputi received a PhD in atmospheric science in 2019 at the University of California, and is a co-founder of PEACE Inc. In her doctoral program she has combined a deep interest in parapsychology with her atmospheric research by investigating consciousness-related effects in micro-meteorological processes. Recently, Caputi has expanded these consciousness studies to include effects of mass attention on random number generator behaviour associated with festivals and online music streaming. Caputi cultivates philosophical discourse on consciousness, which she views as a unifying factor between these lines of research.

RNG in Aircraft

Caputi has presented a model1 describing three essential problems of phenomenal consciousness: alleged psi abilities, the hard problem, and the selection problem, and speculating that the nature of randomness might be critical. To further probe these conjectures, Caputi ran two experiments. In the first, participants attempted to influence turbulent wind fluctuations measured by a sonic anemometer in Davis, CA. In the second, a random event generator (TrueRNG) was placed on an aircraft. Analysis of the data found that the TrueRNG output was significantly more ordered when flying through regions of convective turbulence (p = 0.0002). The data from the weather influence research was inconclusive. Caputi concluded that, overall, these data suggest a deep connection between quantum randomness, turbulence and consciousness.

Influence of Mass Attention on RNG Behaviour

The second type of mind-matter interaction research involves probing for mass consciousness effects. In this experiment2  Caputi, along with Leo Madrid and Nathan Bietz from PEACE Inc, arranged for two large mirrored light emitting diode (LED) panels controlled by a random number generator based on electron-tunnelling to be the focal point of the Apparitions 2019 music festival in Rosarito, Mexico. The panels consisted of 18 independent light nodes programmed to change colour according to the RNG input every 3.8 seconds. It was hypothesized that the degree of colour synchronicity between the lights – technically termed autocorrelation – would be associated with both the number of festival goers and/or times at which headliner DJs were performing. This is because the degree of autocorrelation is dictated by the output of the true RNG and is potentially amenable to collective conscious influence.

Analysis of the data revealed a significant relationship with audience size (p = 0.013). Additionally, the maximum autocorrelation observed within a 15-minute sliding window were positively correlated with crowd size (p = 0.011). The effect size of 0.06 exceeded about 90% of other intention-based RNG studies. Caputi concludes that the results of this study suggests a promising research method for obtaining reliable and consistent mind-matter interaction effects, allowing longstanding questions about the role of consciousness in the physical world to be resolved through future data collection with light-immersive crowd feedback.

Caputi has continued to develop formalized experiments involving arrayed colour-based RNG nodes. Two additional physical devices were built that used LED nodes as output for RNG activity. The first device, called the Consciousness Box, is a 30x15x15 cm transparent acrylic box with 140 LEDs on the four side faces. The second device, called the Aetherspheric Modulator 2, is a 45 cm diameter circular plate composed of highly reflective acrylic with 60 LEDs along its outer perimeter.

Between 2021 and 2022, these devices were used in formal experiments at six events including private parties, art gallery openings, LED exhibitions and conventions. Events that used the Consciousness Box resulted in a statistically significant effect (p = 0.032) whereas events that used the Aetherspheric Modulator 2 did not (p= 0.320). The overall result combining all six events is marginally significant (p= 0.058).

Music

A third line of mind-matter interaction research investigates music as a vehicle for micro-PK expression. In this research, melodic tones are generated by a random number generator and a shift in key is caused when the RNG displays a degree of coherence (behaves less randomly). Under purely normal circumstances such shifts in modulations, as Caputi terms them, would be expected once every four minutes, but if consciousness is able to affect RNG operation this frequency would be expected to increase. Four YouTube livestreams were conducted where this music was broadcast to an audience of about 10-20 each time. The overall result was a statistically significant increase in the number of modulations (p = 0.023). 3

In 2022, the PEACE Inc art gallery in Alameda, CA conducted experiments in playing this drone music over an outdoor speaker. Here, statistically significant results were not obtained (p = 0.560).

Artificial Intelligence

With Leo Madrid, Mason Borchard, and Ramses D’Leon, Caputi helped develop algorithms that combine machine learning with RNG-driven lighting and sound to improve their predictions. Together they entered the XPRIZE Pandemic Response Challenge sponsored by Cognizant. This competition had two phases. In the first phase, machine learning models would be developed to predict future Covid-19 cases in 235 global regions out to 180 days. In the second phase, models would be developed to prescribe intervention plans that minimize both Covid-19 cases and the economic/social cost of lockdowns.

The models for both phases developed by the PEACE Inc team (See Music, above) had several points of integration with quantum mechanical systems. First, the predictive model included the Global Consciousness Project (GCP) network as a variable for training data. Including the GCP data demonstrably improved the model’s predictive value (p < 0.05).

Of 104 teams that entered the competition, PEACE Inc was only one of 20 teams to finish. There was no formal ranking of the finishing teams except for the top two that received the grand prize. ]fn]Personal communication, 22 January, 2023.

Philosophical

Caputi states that all of her parapsychological research has been conducted with the goal of increasing effect sizes and consistency of mind-matter interactions. In the atmospheric domain, she theorizes that turbulence can amplify initially small mental perturbations in the air that can eventually create large disturbances that are often reported in Shamanic literature (such as rain dances having the desired effect). From work at PEACE Inc that includes light and music-augmented RNG feedback, she theorizes that such immersive feedback will also drive up effect sizes. Larger effect sizes, she states, will allow differing physical theories of psi (such as Decision Augmentation Theory) to be tested more rigorously. She also proposes that a panpsychist framework may glue together the three problems of phenomenal consciousness (above).

Caputi has also introduced the selection problem of consciousness to the literature. Her model stresses the importance of distinguishing between the subject of conscious experience, which is the thing that experiences are for, from the more complex sense of self.  The selection problem is complimentary to the Hard Problem, and asks: ‘once a physical system is conscious, what makes it a particular subject of experience, as opposed to any other possible subject of experience?’

Michael Duggan

Literature

Caputi, D., Leo Madrid, L., Bietz, N., Ko, A., Pollaine, S. (Atmospheric Science, P.e.a.c.e !nc., Davis, California) (n.d.).Consciousness and Music Festivals: Increasing the Effect Sizes of Psychophysical Interactions. [Abstract] [Web page]

Endnotes

Footnotes

- 1. Caputi (2018): http://www.consciousness.arizona.edu/documents/TSC2018AbstractBookfinal3.pdf (page 175 of 248)

- 2. https://eagle.sbs.arizona.edu/sc/report_poster_detail.php?abs=3766 (this conference has been postponed to 2021)

- 3. Personal communication, 19 January, 2023.

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