Reprinted from Darkrealm Labs (link to article) with permission.

One of the biggest problems I see with most paranormal groups is how they collect their data. Many investigators wander around with a single EMF meter and get excited when they observe a spike in their reading. Many also will be quick to conclude that the spike was paranormal in nature with nothing more to support it. Some go on to claim that because they collected an EVP at the same time as the EMF anomaly, the EVP substantiates their EMF readings.

First, let’s deal with the single meter issue. By using a single meter you are only sampling one data point. Not much can be proven with a single data point, and drawing conclusions from a single data point can easily lead to false conclusions.

Example:
Let’s say a car manufacturer produces 100,000 cars of a particular model. Out of the 100,000 cars, 0.1% has a manufacturing defect. You purchase one of these cars and find that it’s defective. Now, because the car you purchased is defective, you conclude that the model of car is a lemon, or worse yet, you decide that the manufacturer produces junk cars. Does this seem like a fair assessment? After all, you can show people that the car you have is defective.

This is how much of the data is collected and analyzed by many paranormal investigators. Let’s go back to the single EMF meter. What most investigators do is very similar to the example above. They get a spike on an EMF meter and think that it’s something significant or that they can draw conclusions from that one spike. About all that can truly be concluded by their evidence so far is that there was a spike. With only a single meter they can’t even determine if the spike is confined to a small area, as in a particular room in a building, or if the spike is much larger, perhaps covering an area of several hundred acres. Determining that a single EMF spike is paranormal in nature is just as irresponsible as concluding that the model of car in the above example is defective.

For investigators to be able to start making any sort of reasonable conclusions from their data they must first look at their collection methods. Does the method create a single data point or does it produce multiple data points? If your data collection only produces a single data point, then it’s time for a change unless you wish to spend your time collecting useless data. In the instance of EMF, multiple meters need to be employed. The more meters, the more data points. The more data points, the more accurate your conclusions are likely to be, especially if you are trying to determine the area affected by an EMF spike.

Once again let’s look at the car example. Let’s say we buy 2 more cars so that we now have a total of three. Again, the two additional cars are defective. Odds are against us getting three defective cars, but it is possible. Now, while we’ve expanded our sample size, effectively increasing its size by 100%, overall we still have a very small sample in comparison to the total number of vehicles that exists. Because we coincidentally purchased two more defective cars, we mistakenly drew the conclusion that all cars of that model are lemons. But look at what happens when we purchase a total of 1,000 cars. Even if we did somehow manage to purchase all the defective vehicles (total of 100 out of 100,000 at a 0.1% defect rate) we would only find a 10% defect rate, not the 100% defect rate that we had previously assumed. This example with a larger sample size shows us that the car is not a lemon as we had initially concluded in our original samples and illustrates, in general, how easy it is to make an inaccurate judgment based on insufficient data.

So as can be seen, one data point does not provide sufficient evidence and surely does not give an investigator enough data from which to draw any sort of conclusions that would be considered acceptable by any peer group in the scientific community.

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This has to be the worst meter an investigator can add to their arsenal of equipment, but has received great attention and enthusiasm because of its use on the Ghost Hunters TV series, where they use it for “Spirit” communication. Unfortunately all the show has done is to set the world of paranormal research back to the stone-age.

The K-II was designed at the height of the EM scare in the early 90’s, and is designed to pick up EM noise. The readout only has four LEDs (the fifth is always lit) to display a reading, which gives it very poor resolution and supplies the user with very little information about the strength of the signal. That in itself should raise major concerns about the usefulness of this product, but it gets even worse from here.

Because the meter uses LEDs, which are very quick to respond with a readout, any little spike in EM will generate a response. While some may think this is a good thing, it is actually not desirable because there are such spikes generated by know sources all the time. The sun, beginning and ending radio transmissions, electrical appliances switching on and off, and a number of other man made and natural influences.

Another thing that makes this meter undesirable is that it is has a single pole detector.  What this means is that it is polarized and simply turning the meter on any axis will greatly affect the strength of the reading.  This again adds to the confusion and influence that random noise will have on the meter.

Now when it comes to spirit communication, I think people need to reign in on their emotions and think about this logically. The K-II is not the first EMF meter, nor is it the only one. The only difference between it and a number of others on the market is the LED readout. As I mentioned earlier, this is a bad thing, and if you were to hook up an LCD display to this device, you would find that it would produce similar results to a Sperry Meter. In other words, if it works with the K-II, it should work with any meter out there, but investigative teams such as T.A.P.S. would have us believe that it is special and unique to this ability to communicate with spirits.

Here’s another interesting observation that people should be aware of and consider: When the K-II meter was first used by TAPS on the show Ghost Hunters, with Chris Fleming as a guest, they used the cheap on off button that comes stock on the meter. This is a momentary switch that only stays engaged as long as you hold the button down. Another interesting thing about the K-II is that it swings full scale when first powered on, then half scale, then sits idle with the first LED lit. Exactly like it did during the communication episode on Ghost Hunters, when they were in Dave Oman’s house. In fact, if you watch that episode, you can see the first LED wink out momentarily, indicating they let off the power button momentarily. This happens each and every time they get a response. Now some have suggested that maybe it is like a Ouija board and that it’s subconscious, but I say hogwash to that. To do this requires to much conscious effort to trigger it with as little power interruption as is seen on the show. In other words, it’s all staged, and if you notice that after being called into question about it, they ceased using the meter in such a fashion.

Now what Ghost Hunters does is to jam a quarter in the power button. This is the keep the switch engaged, but as a side effect it also makes it more susceptible to influence from things such as family band radios. This influence can easily be seem by anyone who momentarily pushes the talk button and releases it. It can also be seen by simply holding the talk button down and simply moving the radio side to side in any direction or pivoting it in a twisting motion, which is how I believe they are rigging their responses now.

In short, because of all the drawbacks of this meter, the results are highly questionable and should be ignored. Because of all its flaws, the K-II is more toy than a useful piece of equipment for paranormal investigation. Those who think otherwise are encouraged to open up a few books on electronics, scientific methodology, and examine the schematic for the K-II.

In closing, I’d like to present a couple of video clips I shot with the K-II. The first is using the same method TAPS used in the Manson Murders episode. The second is using a family band radio.

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