Forums IMPORTANT: PLEASE READ PhotoReading, Memory Optimizer The NASA doc

The paper is highly inaccurate and was in fact hidden from Paul Scheele so he could never address it. At my insistence Learning Strategies obtained a copy last year.

You will note that the researcher is also the test subject. In true research this invalidated the work immediately.

The PhotoReading instructor refused to participate in all of the experiment under normal research. This would null and void the experiment.

If you can class this as research then you will find 1000's of people have conducted their own experiment in similar vein on the discussion forum The paper has also been discussed on the forum.

I have investigated numerous brain research articles since learning to PhotoRead myself and found independent evidence that the PhotoReading step is indeed a capability of the brain. It's also evidenced by the technique of direct learning.

I can point you to an equal number of documents that prove that reading doesn't work and one cannot learn to read. because 49% of the population cannot read the instructions on a medicine bottle. Yet that does not explain how 51% of the population can read. There is no proof that anyone can read. Just because you're reading this is not proof. It's a skill you opted to give time to learning.

PhotoReading is something you do. To learn it you must try it and see.Same as those people who can sleep on nails. walk on coal, break bricks with their bare hands. Seeing them do it is not proof that you can do it. Research does not prove that the masses can do it. The only one who can conclusively prove whether you can PhotoRead or not, is if you conduct your own experiment.
It won't prove that every one can learn PhotoReading by the it will prove whether you can or cannot.

Okay to be sceptical. However, scepticism unchecked can prevent you moving towards your goal.

Does Painting work? I don't know if there is any scientific proof that elephants can paint. Lucky this one didn't wait for science to convince it. check it out on my blog http://www.phoenixquest.com.au/alexk/2008/04/14/if-elephants-can-learn-to-paint/

Alex

A great field to check this, is the medical field.

Now, they scramble to create 'triple blind' experiments, because the thinking expectations of every person who 'touches' a thing changes it.

Hey Alex,

What were Pete/Paul's reactions to this document?
What is Learning Strategies going to do about it?


-JackTuff13

Paul and I first discussed researching PhotoReading in 2003 when I met him for the first time. He said, Any research you do that involves a human subject you can throw out the window straight away. The problem with researching reading is you cannot remove the human and their bias. If they volunteer for the research it becomes invalidated because of bias. And we cannot subject our students to testing because that's not what they paid us to do and they want to be there so it's biased and you cannot force someone to learn if they don't want to learn so there is always a bias. Anyway we have reams of testing that we've done and we have proof that there is something in the PhotoReading step but it's not research so we can't put it out there. There are also many variables that need to be considered prior education, skill levels etc. If anyone ever comes up with a protocol by which you can research it we'd be willing to help. What's I'd really like to do is get someone into one of those fMRI chambers but we haven't worked out how someone can PhotoRead in one of them. And then we would want a few people to do the test and that's expensive.

After that discussion I realised that the most controlled environment for testing is a classroom. Age group, demographics and that are much more controlled They live in the same area have the same access to the teacher.... but wait... kids are being tested on what they learn all the time. And some pass brilliantly others fail just as gloriously and then there is the masses in the middle. Just passing. Does it prove that the teacher failed to teach? Does it prove the subject cannot be learned well? Does it mean the course material is poorly designed? The answer is maybe to all of them. The main factor outside our control is the student. How they see themselves as a learner, the interest in the subject, their attitude toward the teacher, like dislike. Paul's words echoed in my mind. Any research that involves a human subject you can throw out the window straight away.

The NASA report is not research. It's a case study and you cannot come to a conclusion when there is only one person being tested. It lacks the decent number of test subjects to be research.

Both Pete and Paul made the same observation as I have we've got lots of case studies right here on the forum.

What's Learning Strategies going to do about it?

Keep moving ahead. If PhotoReading didn't work for Paul, Pete and staff of Learning Strategies we wouldn't be here. Learning Strategies has grown since it started in 1985 and in 1986 PhotoReading was developed. It was investigated by Minnesota Department of Education before they would issue Learning Strategies with a license to teach. They had to hire someone with special reading qualifications from another state to check the course is a valid reading system. Learning Strategies has been licensed to teach PhotoReading because it is a valid reading system. The license has been renewed each year since 1986 and it's now 2008.

AlexK

I agree to Alex, although my main study are not the brain but I show a very big interest in the area of memory and NLP, I have done lots of research into it. After I learn PR, I then start the interest in the area of the brain and I then come across the NASA report.. When I read a couple of page, I have already know that the study was sooooo poor, or lets say totally invalid, the experiment is like testing "who has photographic memory", as a scientist, I couldn't think about how could some people do a study like that, the professor will slap on my face if I become a PHD and do a experiment like that. Like Alex said "Any research you do that involves a human subject you can throw out the window straight away", this is true, the result will be contaminate.

that's NOT PAINTING. I dont know how could you believe this video, Alexk. I tought you will be more more sceptical.

it's just doing this over and over due to negative reinforcements without knowing what it is doing.

If you think it is painting, so a robot can paint after a programmation.

They are "drawing" over and over, day after day, for naives tourists the exact same drawing.


Even monkeys can't paint properly by themself(or as good as a 2-3 years old child according to a reportage) so forget elephants.

How could someone believe that a elephant could draw at the end a colorful flower ? It is so obvious that is from a poetic human mind.

In fact, Elephants in Thailand are suffering of Torture.

If one day, i could see a elephant drawing by itself,many drawing,always differents ones, i will believe in this hype.

Tomorrow, perphaps a elephant will write "i'm happy & i'm hungry" in front of tourists, after endless boring repetitions, would you seriously think it could write ?


Frenchie

Frenchie, Your post belongs on a new thread or my blog not this one because it's off topic.




What makes you think I'm not sceptical? I never discussed it's ability I only pointed out "They can teach an elephant to paint."

Anyone who has tried to draw an elephant knows it is an effort of careful movement. That's an impressive skill they extracted from the elephant.I'm amazed at the intricate skill the elephant and even draw something like that over and over.



I don't know whether the elephant had negative reinforcement or positive reinforcement. Many who are studying are trying to motivate themselves with negative reinforcement.



Yes. Since writing is nothing more than "drawing" symbols in a specific order. Do I think it would understand what it wrote? No and I don't know conclusively that the elephant recognises what it drew so I'll suspend any belief or disbelief because I have no way of knowing.

I don't don't know if the elephant comprehends what it is doing. It was obviously taught. Just as I was taught to paint.

But that's how we learned to read. Endless repetition. How we learned to ride a bike, repetition. Drive a car, repetition. Every skill we acquired and perfected was learned through repetition. With either positive or negative reinforcement.

AlexK

Is this what you are referring to?

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20000011599_2000009345.pdf

Here is what I commented on Amazon.com.

The study referenced above seems to be based upon short dense texts of which a person, probably a student, would be expected to recall a high percentage. Photoreading is beneficial for all reading situations, but the greatest gains in time will be experienced in reading contexts characterized by the '80/20 rule'--indeed, most reading contexts. By and large, when we read a book or manual, we need fairly specific knowledge. The greater the percentage of a book's contents one must know, the more time must be invested in studying and processing the content--even here, though, the Photoreading step and overall process is beneficial. In my experience, a book that I have subjected to the Photoreading step is more accessible to me on further study. This is one way that I know that Photoreading does indeed "work", assuming that one is willing to *work* to the extent necessary.

A long time ago, when I was still in high school, I started a small endeavor known as LucidGame Group, or LGG. The goal of LGG was to design games that could be PhotoRead and then via lucid dreaming, you could interact with the programming that was written out for the game itself. All of the characters, rules, content, and more was in a text document meant to be only PhotoRead, no conscious activation what so ever.

Though there is no way to prove we had the actual results we did (as Alex mentioned, because of bias), we had an amazing thing happen that we consider proof enough. A guy named Bill Perry, who I have worked with on and off for years now, designed a first test game called Tic-Tac-Toe. He even created a programming language for the brain to interpret. The funny thing about this programming language is that it was not fancy at all - it was just like a computer programming language, but even more simple.

After I PhotoRead our Tic-Tac-Toe test game, I never actually got to the point of getting to play the game. Instead, when I was recording my dreams, one night I woke up and told Bill about a dream where Albert Einstein and I were sitting across the table from each other leisurely talking about existence. We were surrounded by beautiful rolling grass eyes and the day was a sky with normal clouds.

Bill got extremely excited and told me to go look at the game document. It was almost exactly as the game was written - minus the game. It was the exact scenario, setup, and environment that Bill had designed. This, to at least us, was solid, undeniable proof that the PhotoReading step succeeds in bypassing conscious interference and is able to be directly processed by the subconscious mind.

After we failed to get many people to take interest in LGG, we have since set it aside. Our next goal following Tic Tac Toe was to design a game based on the movie trilogy, The Matrix. Of course, the fact that I was not able to play the game yet probably meant we needed to do some more testing, or perhaps some further tweaking of the game programming language (maybe integrate concepts of NLP or psycholinguistics?)

Despite the fact we had proof, the odd thing about this story is that I am telling it in regards to proving PhotoReading works. We always knew it did, we simply were wanting to know if we could make the concept behind LGG possible. That has actually yet to be seen fully. =]

In my opinion, this was probably better "research" than the so-called "science" behind the NASA study. One of my possible goals in the coming years would be to design a better research study that could somehow ensure that people were in PhotoFocus and the proper state in order to test the system further and validate that it works, and is in fact real. If a legitimate scientific explanation could properly show that PhotoReading is beyond commercial pursuit, schools may then be encouraged to follow suit with the concept of better learning techniques by utilizing subconscious abilities.

Wish me luck. Who knows? Maybe that will be the subject of my PhD thesis when I get to that point.

Let me add some wrinkles to this very interesting story and its endeavors...

Photofocus is a misnomer. Light contacts the eyes it is recorded. That is all there is to it.

However, I bet if the Photoreading course was presented that way first off you would have to spend an inordinate amount of effort convincing each person that this process is valid.

So I see it now as simply a confidence booster. Just flip the pages and stay focused on your purpose. Which is well utilized by well thought-out mantras.

Chanting!

So here we come now to the closeness of casting spells!!

<smiles>