Skeptic2 the article you posted for a rebuttal is a ridiculously stupid article. The article gives absolutely not one sound reason to prove the study wrong for example:
Seven to eight minutes before each trial, the experimenter sent an e-mail to the randomly selected e-mailer saying that he had been chosen, asking him to think about the participant and then send an e-mail at exactly the specified time, with a copy to the experimenter.”uhm … hang on a minute. So … you tell one of my mates he’s the chosen one at 10.02, and then I have to guess which mate it is by 10.09? I’m not sure, but I have a hunch I might be able to manage that. Are me or my friend kept in isolation from … well … our mobiles?“The participants used their own computers at home or computers at their place of work or study.”Fuck me! And Sheldrake is surprised he gets results as high as 45% - I’m surprised it was as low as that. I bet me and my mates could get 100% with controls on the experiment like that. Even with only two mates and two unfamiliars who wouldn’t text me and say “Uh … it’s me”, I could get better than 50%.
Can you follow the reasoning here? THE PERSON AT THE COMPUTURE DOES NOT KNOW! ONLY THE PERSON SENDING THE EMAIL KNOWS WHOM HE IS TOLD TO SEND IT TO. You still only have 25% chance because the person guessing has four people to chose from, the person guessing had no clue which one of the four was going send the email.
Skeptic I am not saying there is not some unknown reason the study is unsound but the article you posted does not prove in any way study was slanted to get a desired answer.