Introduction

INTRODUCTION

On June 13, 1997, an invitation was sent to the researchers who had previously contributed to the Gaiamind Global Event project (see Part I) to again take data during a world-wide meditation. The event was called Harmonic Convergence 2, and was organized via electronic mailing lists and the world-wide-web by Barbara Wolfe. It provided an opportunity for a replication in principle of the Gaiamind experiment. The event took place over a three-day period, and the published announcement described the specific intention as follows:

Next month, July 25-27, the world is asked to come together to give a free expression of love for our planet. This event is called Harmonic Convergence 2 (HC2) to honor the first Convergence held ten years ago. ... At 12 noon for the three days of July 25-27, stop a few minutes to meditate or pray to Mother Earth and Humanity. In this way, a band of 12-noon prayers will circle the planet for three days.

This lent itself to a protocol similar to that used previously, but tailored to this event. The protocol specified that data would be taken from 12:00 to 12:05 local time, on those three days, and be accumulated from several time zones and laboratories sampling the "consciousness field" of the harmonic convergence. As in the Gaiamind project, the experimental hypothesis was that the mean of data taken during the specified 5-minute periods would deviate from chance expectation. The event differed in that there was no single time when all participants would meditate, since noon, local time, was specified.