In late June 2008 I was due to speak at the Eric Pearl/Wrage event in Hamburg, which seemed a perfect venue to carry out a first pilot study, particularly as a large percentage of the audience would be Reconnection healers. I showed the audience photos of four bottles, like the one in the photo, below, and asked them to choose one. A member of the audience randomly selected bottle number 4, and I asked the audience to send the following intention to the water: ‘My intention is that all the seeds given water from our target jar will sprout at least three inches by the fourth day of growing.’ Dr. Schwartz and Mark Boccozzi, our lab technician, then used each bottle to water a set of 30 seeds. Each set of seeds was assigned a particular jar of water.

The seeds were then soaked in the intended water (or control water) for 24 hours, rinsed in their respective water, and then planted within their water. The water was poured into an airtight bag, and the seeds placed within the soil within them, so they were imbued with the water’s energy for five days.

On the fifth day, Mark measured all five sets of seedlings, and Dr. Schwartz analyzed them.

When he looked at the average level of growth, the seeds watered with the ‘grow intention’ were slightly higher than the others, but the results were not statistically significant, according to the scientific definition. The average growth was 4.77 cm for the intended water (n=30 seeds) versus 4.66 for the non-intended water (n=90 seeds). The difference is 0.11 cm or 1.1 millimeters.

The little seeds that grew
However, Dr. Schwartz noted one other interesting phenomenon. In this experiment, ordinarily all of the seeds don’t sprout in any given group. In this experiment, within all three control groups, only 90 percent of seeds sprouted (that is, 9 of the 90 seeds in total didn’t sprout). However, the full 100 per cent of the seeds, or all 30, sprouted in the group watered with the intended water.

In other words, intention may have given the seeds more energy and caused more of them to sprout than normal.

A chi square statistic on these numbers reached a p <0.07, which is borderline significant (p <.05 is the cutoff for statistical significance). ‘This observation is encouraging, and deserves replication and extension,' wrote Dr. Schwartz. '‘Since this is a "first ever" long distance (Germany to Tucson) group intention experiment on the effects of intention to water on the germination and growth of seeds, there is reason to do the experiment again.'

Master intenders
On July 25, 2008 we tried the experiment again with the Transformational Leadership Council meeting. Composed of the leaders of the personal development movement, such as Jack Canfield, Steven Covey, Lynne Twist and many others, this group represented a powerhouse of hugely experienced intenders.

Again we attempted to imprint an intention into water to enhance the growth of barley seeds being watered by our sample. After five days, the growth of this batch of seeds was compared with three other batches watered with ordinary water.

Sadly, Dr. Schwartz, who analyzed our results, finally determined that the results of our small study were inconclusive.

The lab technician running the study inadvertently placed our jars of water next to some equipment with high levels of electromagnetic fields, which Dr. Schwartz believes interfered with the signal.