Human mental intentionality on the aesthetics of cooked rice and Escherichia coli growth

Abstract

This study examines the "intentionality hypothesis"-i.e. subjects' ability to mentally influence microbial growth in samples of cooked rice. Over a 30-day period (under triple-blind conditions), subjects focused their positive and negative thoughts ('mental intentionality') toward three randomly formed groups of cooked rice samples (positive intentionality, negative intentionality, and a control group). After 30 days, pictures were taken of the nine rice samples (three groups, each group was conducted in triplicate), which were then judged for visual aesthetic value. Findings show aesthetic ratings of 'positive' rice samples to be signifcantly higher than those for 'negative' and 'control' ones (p = 0.05), with no signifcant difference between negative and control sample ratings (p = 0.05). A further test entailed a 7-day study measuring an Escherichia coli strain (a type of coliform that is closely associated with food safety, whose presence often indicates food poisoning and spoilage) in vitro under the same conditions of stimuli as the rice samples. Results show positive intention to be associated with lower E. coli division rate when compared with the "control" and "negative intention" groups, thereby further supporting the hypothesis, as well as suggesting an emerging inference, that intentionality might be associated with microbial growth and visual aesthetic ratings.