PARTICIPANT 015 GUIDE TO SCORING 0 = Nothing in your perception of the object was generally or specifically accurate. +1 = One or two general things from your perception correlated with the object or owner's life. +2 = Several specific things from your perception correlated with the object or owner's life. +3 = Your reading generally was on target, with at least a few specific details, about the object and/or owner's life. +4 = Your reading specifically was on target about the object and/or owner's life. +5 = An incredibly accurate perception of the object and/or owner's life from beginning to end of reading. OBJECT G - "PERFUME BOTTLE" WHAT PARTICIPANT SAID/WROTE 1 Connection to airplane or air travel OBJECT G - ACTUAL BACKGROUND OF OWNER/OBJECT OWNER: This object was lent by a female of Chinese descent born in 1984 who lives on her own in a sixth floor condo in downtown Toronto. She graduated a few years ago with a university degree in the fine arts, actively shows her artwork, and works a retail job part-time. She has travelled through Europe, the U.S., China and Hong Kong. She has a boyfriend who does not live with her. She has not had any psychical experiences. STORY OF THE OBJECT: The object she submitted was a bottle of perfume with a dent in it. Her mother gave it to her one day, but she disregarded it because she does not wear perfume and she crammed it into her bathroom cupboard. One day, it fell out (thus the dent) and she found a note in the box that she hadn’t seen from her mother telling her she was so happy her daughter had grown into a woman. This was meaningful, because her mother is not the type of person who openly expresses such feelings. Also, the daughter had recently lost her virginity – and her grandmother had died around that time. Had the object not fallen out of the cupboard, it would never have had such meaning. RESULT = +1 It is true that the object was obtained in an overseas trip. But no further specific information on the object, circumstances, or owner's life came to light in this reading. OBJECT H - "BOY AND GIRL STATUETTES" WHAT PARTICIPANT SAID/WROTE 1 Impression that the objects were somehow connected to a greenhouse with glass walls OBJECT H - ACTUAL BACKGROUND OF OWNER/OBJECT OWNER: This object was lent by a Roman Catholic housewife born in 1935. Originally from northern Italy, she has lived with her husband in Hamilton, Ontario since the late 1950s. She and her husband are retired, and own many rental properties for income. They are active in their cultural community, have three daughters and four grandchildren – three male and one female. They raise rabbits for food in their backyard, and have a garden. She is well-known in her family for her cooking, and serves very traditional rural, northern Italian dishes. She and her family have gone to resorts throughout the Caribbean and Latin America, but otherwise her travels have been limited to Canada and Italy. STORY OF THE OBJECT: She lent two small porcelain busts, one of a boy, the other of a girl. Made in Venice, they were given as a gift when her husband’s brother and his wife visited Canada in 1972. They are displayed on shelves in their living room with family photos and a few other mementos. The bust of the girl was broken when one of her grandchildren accidentally knocked it off a table where it was displayed in 1999. The woman interpreted this as a portent that her youngest daughter was dead – which never came true – and she was only relieved when her grandson confessed to breaking it. This story is a favourite in the family. RESULT = 0 Owner of object and experimenter found no correlation between what was perceived from the object and the object itself or the owner's life. OBJECT D - "PLAQUE OF VIRGIN MARY" WHAT PARTICIPANT SAID/WROTE 1 Some connection to native people in southern US (Arizona perhaps) or Mexico 2 Also getting some connection to a nurse or nursing OBJECT D - ACTUAL BACKGROUND OF OWNER/OBJECT OWNER: The owner is Chris Laursen, a Caucasian university student born in Alberta in 1974 who was living in downtown Toronto at the time of the experiment in an apartment by the harbour with an art student. He studies history, and is making this his second career after having worked in the media as a journalist and then administrator. He was working at a broadcasting association at the time, and was about to return to university to prepare for graduate school. He has travelled in North America, South America and Europe. STORY OF THE OBJECT: This object was purchased a few months prior to the Psychometry Experiment by Chris Laursen from eBay. The previous owner (who lived on Long Island, New York, and claimed to be a paranormal investigator, although this could not be verified) of the plaque contended that it was from a haunted house in Belmez, Spain, where in the 1970s faces inexplicably appeared on the floor (as if they were painted or drawn with charcoal). Laursen was sceptical that this object actually originated from this house, and thought it would be interesting to test it in the experiment to see what people would get from it. RESULT = 0 It is hard to correlate the accuracy of any reading on this object given the circumstances. However, no aspects of the experimenter's life, how the object was obtained, or its alleged history were perceived in the reading. OBJECT B - "GLASS BALL" WHAT PARTICIPANT SAID/WROTE 1 Impression that mathematics is a part of the person who owns this object OBJECT B - ACTUAL BACKGROUND OF OWNER/OBJECT This was a “control object” in the experiment, purchased by the experimenter, Chris Laursen, new from a shop that has good from around the world on Queen Street West in Toronto, Ontario. Once purchased, it was kept in the original bag and hidden away behind books in one of his bookshelves. It was only removed once the Psychometry Experiment commenced, at which point, it was stored on a shelf in boxes with all of the other objects used in the experiment. The idea was to see if those reading could perceive this was a control object in some way. RESULT = 0 Experimenter found no correlation between what was perceived from the object and the object itself or the owner's life.