Updated June 13, 2025
"Exploring the mind frontier is essential and the key to successful exploration is a greater psychic awareness. The mind is rich in unfathomed resources ripe for exploration, a limitless source of treasures for advancing all mankind, and a serious threat to those who ignore its potential. We must overcome our psychic inhibitions, stop denying the existence of paranormal events, and start trying instead to understand the nature of these phenomena."—Dolan M. McKelvy, Lieutenant Colonel, USAF, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, May 1988
I have a primary interest in the fundamental nature of consciousness and the practical applications of the knowledge gained from such research. I agree with McKelvy's assessment. We have barely begun this work and the impact of the practical applications is enormous. My lines of research in the past, in chronological order, have included mathematical logic, quantum mind, beliefs about consciousness and reality, mathematical modelling of consciousness using category theory, altered states of consciousness, anomalous phenomena, self-transformation, the flicker theory of reality, the theory of meaning fields, and instrumental transcommunication. Rather than summarizing them here, readers can just follow the paper trail on the Publications page. Completed student projects can be found on the Thesis Supervision page. What I will do here is to list recently completed projects and projects that my students, collaborators, and research assistants, and I are involved with at this time.
Moi: Ten years ago I was interviewed by an editor from Wired magazine about readers who claimed to be getting messages from the deceased on their cell phones. With funding from the Bial Foundation, my research assistants and I have completed the second year of a project to examine possible after-death communication with cell phones. This research has three components: a survey, interviews, and documentation of cell phone apps whose purpose is to commincate with the deceased. What we have found so far is that some people are having profound, meaningful experiences, that they interpret as communication from the deceased, which do not fit the usual facile dismissal of such events. So far these results have been communicated in a student thesis, three international presentations, and two papers. We are currently continuing with the third year of this project.
PhD student in Theory and Criticism: A philosophical inquiry about the veridical nature of near-death experiences. Successfully completed and graduated. You can read her dissertation here: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/7895/.
BA student thesis in Psychology: A second survey of Finders Course alumni to seek to determine the level of integration of living in persistent transcendent states of consciousness with social functioning. Completed and graduated. Paper published in Psychology of Consciousness. See the Publications page.
Undergraduate Independent Study student from the Faculty of Science: Psychological parameters in random event generator experiments using both psychologically healthy participants as well as psychiatric out-patients. Completed. Presented at an annual meeting of the Society for Scientific Exploration as well as several other research venues. Manuscript published in The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease. See the Publications page.
BA student thesis in Psychology: Spiritual aspects of global crises. Completed. Received King's Thesis Award. Presented at American Psychological Association Annual Convention in 2022, published as a paper in the International Journal of Transpersonal Studies in 2025.
BA student thesis in Psychology: Survey of posttraumatic growth during the COVID-19 pandemic. Thesis completed. Found that posttraumatic growth acts as a buffer against the adverse impact of the pandemic. Presented as a poster at the 2023 Annual Meeting of the Society for Scientific Exploration at the University of Indiana.
BA student thesis in Psychology: Survey of the social self in people with and without near-death experiences. Thesis completed. Found that greater authenticity was associated with having had a near-death experience, even after controlling for the effects of age. Presented as a poster at the 2023 Annual Meeting of the Society for Scientific Exploration at the University of Indiana.
BA student thesis in Psychology: Survey of attributions of anomalous object displacement experiences. Thesis completed. Anomalous attributions were associated with greater spirituality. Presented as a poster at the 2023 Annual Meeting of the Society for Scientific Exploration at the University of Indiana.
MA student thesis in Theory and Criticism: The epistemology of pure consciousness.
BA student thesis in Psychology: Student use of artificial intelligence. The thesis has been completed and updated data are being reanalyzed for submission for publication.
PhD student at Riga Stradins University: Beliefs about consciousness and reality and their relationship to various psychological measures of participants in an RSU Experimental research-based continuing education programme: Toward a New Paradigm: Postmaterialism, Consciousness, and Spiritual Self-Transformation, and compared to participants at the Science of Consciousness Conference in Barcelona, Spain, July 6 - 11, 2025.
BA student thesis in Psychology: Differences in characteristics of out-of-body experiences between near-death eperiences, spontaneous, and induced out-of-body experiences.
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