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Volume 17: Number 4: Article 4
Effects of Frontal Lobe Lesions on Intentionality and Random Physical Phenomena
Morris Freedman, Behavioural Neurology Program and Rotman Research
Institute, Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care; Department of Medicine
(Division of Neurology), Mt. Sinai Hospital, University Health Network,
and Unversity of Toronto, Toronto, Canada
Stanley Jeffers, York University, Toronto, Canada
Karen Saeger, Behavioural Neurology Program, Baycrest Centre
for Geriatric Care, Toronto, Canada
Malcolm Binns, Behavioural Neurology Program, Baycrest Centre
for Geriatric Care, Toronto, Canada
Sandra Black, Rotman Research Institute, Baycrest Centre
for Geriatric Care; Department of Medicine (Division of Neurology),
Sunnybrook and Women's College Health Sciences Centre and University
of Toronto, Toronto, Canada
Although data from the PEAR program at Princeton University appear
to support a role for intentionality in determining physical phenomena,
the use of theoretically based controls raises concerns about validity
of the findings. We re-examined claims from PEAR lab using experimentally
derived control data in a study of patients with frontal lobe brain
damage and normal subjects. The rationale for including frontal patients
follows a suggestion that reduced self-awareness may facilitate effects
of intentionality on physical phenomena. Frontal patients may have reduced
self-awareness, a state not easily achieved by normal subjects, and
may provide a good model for studying the role of consciousness on physical
events within a conceptual framework that maximizes the likelihood of
detecting possible effects. We found a significant effect of intentionality
on random physical phenomena in a patient with left frontal damage that
was directed contralateral to his lesion. Moreover, the effect was replicated.
Keywords: consciousness, self-awareness, intentionality, frontal lobe
damage, random event generator
FULL TEXT:
Effects of Frontal Lobe Lesions on Intentionality and Random Physical Phenomena
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