Dani Caputi is an American atmospheric science researcher who has investigated consciousness-related effects in micro-meteorological processes, particularly related to turbulence. A longtime piano instructor, she has also experimented with random number generators in musical settings.
Contents
Life and Career
Dani Caputi (b 1992 as Daniel Caputi in New York state, USA) was very afraid of loud, sudden noises as a child. She hated thunderstorms until her father taught her how to track them using radar. This she thought was ‘the coolest thing in the world’ and led to wanting to study meteorology professionally. It also attracted her to flying. She became a student pilot and flew gliders with the Long Island Soaring Association.1https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/ureca/feature/_bio/2014/January2014.php More recently, she became a certified flight scientist for Scientific Aviation Inc.
Caputi graduated from Stony Brook University’s School of Marine & Atmospheric Sciences with a major in Atmospheric Science in 20132https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/ureca/feature/_bio/2014/January2014.php and received a PhD in Atmospheric Science from the University of California at Davis in 2019.3Personal communication from Dani Caputo to James Matlock, 25 February 2026. In her doctoral program she combined a deep interest in parapsychology with her atmospheric research by investigating consciousness-related effects in micro-meteorological processes. Recently, Caputi has expanded these consciousness studies to include effects of mass attention on random number generator (RNG) behaviour associated with festivals and online music streaming. She cultivates philosophical discourse on consciousness, which she views as a unifying factor between these lines of research.
Caputi is presently an independent scholar. On her Facebook page, she describes herself as ‘Consciousness researcher, atmospheric scientist, musician. Not a flat earther.’ She is a co-founder of PEACE Inc in Alameda, California.
Philosophical Orientation
At the start of her graduate studies, Caputi published a journal paper4Caputi (2014). in which she described three essential problems of phenomenal consciousness – alleged psi abilities; what David Chalmers termed the ‘hard problem’;5Chalmers (1996) identified the hard problem of consciousness as explaining how subjective experiences can arise from physical processes in the brain. and what she calls the ‘selection problem’, how conscious self-awareness is related to the larger sense of self that includes the unconscious – speculating that the nature of randomness might be critical in how they play out. Her model stresses the importance of distinguishing between the subject of conscious experience and the more complex, layered sense of self. As she sees it, the selection problem is complimentary to the hard problem. The central issue is: ‘Once a physical system is conscious, what makes it a particular subject of experience, as opposed to any other possible subject of experience?’6Caputi (2014, 2019b, 2021).
Caputi states that all of her parapsychological research has been conducted with the goal of increasing effect sizes and consistency of mind-matter interactions. In the atmospheric domain, she theorizes that turbulence can amplify initially small mental perturbations in the air that can eventually create large disturbances that are often reported in shamanic literature (such as rain dances having the desired effect). From work at PEACE Inc that includes light and music-augmented RNG feedback, she theorizes that such immersive feedback will also drive up effect sizes. Larger effect sizes, she states, will allow differing physical theories of psi (such as Decision Augmentation Theory) to be tested more rigorously. She also proposes that a panpsychist framework may glue together the three problems of phenomenal consciousness.7Personal communication from Dani Caputi to Michael Duggan, January 2023. See also Caputi (2019a, 2021).
Research with Random-Number Generators
RNG in Aircraft
Caputi has run experiments to test her theories. In one, participants attempted to influence turbulent wind fluctuations measured by a sonic anemometer in Davis, California. In another, a random event generator (TrueRNG) was placed on an aircraft. Analysis of the data found that the TrueRNG output was significantly more ordered when flying through regions of convective turbulence (p = 0.0002). The data from the weather influence research was inconclusive. Caputi concluded that, overall, these data suggest a deep connection between quantum randomness, turbulence and consciousness.8Caputi (2021).
Influence of Mass Attention on RNG Behaviour
Caputi, along with Leo Madrid and Nathan Bietz from PEACE Inc, arranged for two large mirrored light emitting diode (LED) panels controlled by a random number generator based on electron-tunnelling to be the focal point of the Apparitions 2019 music festival in Rosarito, Mexico. The panels consisted of 18 independent light nodes programmed to change colour according to the RNG input every 3.8 seconds. It was hypothesized that the degree of colour synchronicity between the lights – technically termed autocorrelation – would be associated with both the number of festival goers and/or times at which headliner DJs were performing. This is because the degree of autocorrelation is dictated by the output of the true RNG and is potentially amenable to collective conscious influence.
Analysis of the data revealed a significant relationship with audience size (p = 0.013). Additionally, the maximum autocorrelation observed within a 15-minute sliding window were positively correlated with crowd size (p = 0.011). The effect size of 0.06 exceeded about 90% of other intention-based RNG studies. Caputi concludes that the results of this study suggests a promising research method for obtaining reliable and consistent mind-matter interaction effects, allowing longstanding questions about the role of consciousness in the physical world to be resolved through future data collection with light-immersive crowd feedback.9Caputi (2019a, 2020.
Caputi has continued to develop formalized experiments involving arrayed colour-based RNG nodes. Two additional physical devices were built that used LED nodes as output for RNG activity. The first device, called the Consciousness Box, is a 30 x 15 x 15 cm transparent acrylic box with 140 LEDs on the four side faces. The second device, called the Aetherspheric Modulator 2, is a 45cm-diameter circular plate composed of highly reflective acrylic with 60 LEDs along its outer perimeter.
Between 2021 and 2022, these devices were used in formal experiments at six events including private parties, art gallery openings, LED exhibitions and conventions. Events that used the Consciousness Box resulted in a statistically significant effect (p = 0.032) whereas events that used the Aetherspheric Modulator 2 did not (p= 0.320). The overall result combining all six events is marginally significant (p= 0.058).fn]Personal communication from Dani Caputi to Michael Duggan, January 2023.[/fn]
Music and RNG Behaviour
A third line of mind-matter interaction research investigates music as a vehicle for micro-PK expression. In this research, melodic tones are generated by a random number generator and a shift in key is caused when the RNG displays a degree of coherence (behaves less randomly). Under purely normal circumstances such shifts in modulations, as Caputi terms them, would be expected once every four minutes, but if consciousness is able to affect RNG operation this frequency would be expected to increase. Four YouTube livestreams were conducted where this music was broadcast to an audience of about ten to twenty each time. The overall result was a statistically significant increase in the number of modulations (p = 0.023). 10Personal communication from Dani Caputi to Michael Duggan, 19 January 2023.
In 2022, the PEACE Inc art gallery in Alameda, California, conducted experiments in playing this drone music over an outdoor speaker. On this occasion, statistically significant results were not obtained (p = 0.560).
RNGs in Artificial Intelligence Training
With Leo Madrid, Mason Borchard, and Ramses D’Leon, Caputi helped develop algorithms that combine machine learning with RNG-driven lighting and sound to improve their predictions. Together they entered the XPRIZE Pandemic Response Challenge sponsored by Cognizant. This competition had two phases. In the first phase, machine learning models would be developed to predict future Covid-19 cases in 235 global regions out to 180 days. In the second phase, models would be developed to prescribe intervention plans that minimize both Covid-19 cases and the economic/social cost of lockdowns.
The models for both phases developed by the PEACE Inc team (See Music, above) had several points of integration with quantum mechanical systems. First, the predictive model included the Global Consciousness Project (GCP) network as a variable for training data. Including the GCP data demonstrably improved the model’s predictive value (p < 0.05).
Of 104 teams that entered the competition, PEACE Inc was only one of twenty teams to finish. There was no formal ranking of the finishing teams except for the top two that received the grand prize.11Personal communication from Dani Caputo to Michael Duggan, 22 January 2023.
Ionosphere Project
At a symposium in February 2026, Caputi described a new project designed to assist in RNG research.12Caputi, Borchard, & Beach (2026). As described in the presentation abstract:
A new research platform, Ionosphere, is being developed to accelerate investigations into mind-matter interactions. The Ionosphere system is designed to engage participant attention and create a feedback loop: as RNG coherence increases, the lighting and sound become more aesthetically pleasing, which captures participants’ attention and encourages them to focus more on the system. Beyond lighting and sound, Ionosphere also supports external applications, making it possible to link coherence states to virtually any process that involves randomness. Through coherence cycling, an iterative process in which machine learning algorithms refine operational definitions of coherence across successive trials, the system can be adapted for tasks such as financial forecasting, weather prediction, or interactive games. Taken together, rather than chasing small effect sizes in repetitive mean-shift RNG studies, Ionosphere begins with creativity and usefulness without sacrificing the ability to do rigorous hypothesis testing. This approach may amplify coherence itself, creating the very conditions under which stronger and more reproducible effects emerge.13Abstract from ACORN Symposium, Anomalous Cognition & Occurrences Research Network, February 20–22, 2026, Richmond Hill Monastery, Richmond, Virginia, USA.
Gender Dysphoria
In May 2023, Caputi held a conversation with Jeffrey Mishlove for his New Thinking Allowed YouTube channel in which she discussed her childhood discomfort with being in a male body, the strong gender dysphoria she experienced beginning at puberty, and her medical transition to a female identity while in graduate school.14Caputi (2023).
Works
Caputi has spoken about her philosophical views and her experimental tests with RNGs for New Thinking Allowed15Caputi (2019a, 2019b, 2021). and a meeting of the Society for Scientific Exploration,16Caputi (2020). but has published nothing on these topics since her 2014 student paper.17Caputi (2014).
For a comprehensive list of her mainstream publications, see here.
Michael Duggan and James G Matlock
Literature
Caputi, D. (2014). On the mystery of the self & the selection problem: A mathematical approach. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research 5/8, 701-20.
Caputi, D. (2019a). Psychokinetic weather influence with Dani Caputi. New Thinking Allowed. [Video, recorded 12 January, published 24 January.]
Caputi, D. (2019b). Subjectivity, the self, and the soul. New Thinking Allowed. [Video, recorded 12 January, published 27 January.]
Caputi, D. (2020). New random event strategies in parapsychology. New Thinking Allowed. [Video, recorded 8 October, published 19 October.]
Caputi, D. (2021). The nature of randomness as a gateway to a theory of consciousness. Presentation to Society for Scientific Exploration 2018 annual meeting, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA. [Video.]
Caputi, D. (2023). Gender transformation with Samantha Danielle Caputi. New Thinking Allowed. [Video, recorded 9 May, published 22 May.]
Caputi, D., Borchard, M., & Beach, T. (2026). Ionosphere: A new path for consciousness research. Presentation to Anomalous Cognition & Occurrences Research Network seminar, 20 February 2026, Richmond, Virginia, USA.
Chalmers, D. (1996). The Conscious Mind: In Search of a Fundamental Theory. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.