Abilities depend on a combination of numerous individual skills.

 For example, it is not enough to know the traffic rules in order to be able to drive a car. Neither is a knowledge of the technology of automobiles sufficient to safely operate a vehicle. The motor skills to engage the brakes, the gas pedal, and turning the wheel of the car— all those must be developed, and the driver should have additional abilities such as a minimal eyesight, etc. as well. 

Again, it is the combination of the various skills that makes driving a car feasible.

 Likewise, in "Remote Sensing" there are different skills that must be developed. All of them are nurturing a higher awareness of Life, the Universe, and Everything— making them valuable far beyond the goal of roaming the landscape at will, without moving a body from place to place.

 The first three parts of this series introduced exercises like branching into multiple, distant viewpoints using the mirror paradigm as a tool, using different body parts as sensory receptacles, and zooming into the microcosmos.

 Each is a vital skills in its own right. Together they open the door to Straightline Remote Sensing.

 In Remote Sensing, the experience of the exploration is paramount to any gathering of information (like "Intelligence" in the military sense). The experience, itself, is the reward, and any abstract information is nothing more than a byproduct of the process.

 There is a significant difference between the immediate experience (sometimes called "extensional" knowledge) and the abstraction of extensional knowledge that results in a classification of an object.

 To give an example, in Viewzone's '"Remote Viewing Challenge" the results of the October trial (see archives) were described as:
 
 

"We had several hundred submissions but only two people managed to get "gold and tall, but lying on side..." and "gold or bronze with a round part and a part that sticks up..." Several described the object as "metal, hard and cold to the touch" and "smooth on the outside but unfinished inside..."

 The usual expectation in a "Remote Viewing Challenge" may be to "guess" the abstracted significance of an object, in this case a brass bell. But the evaluation of the available information through remote viewing to yield a concrete, abstracted object is another, further step beyond the actual "viewing."

 Later on, Viewzone's commentator noted that:
 
 

"... A vast majority of people guessed that it was, in order of frequency, an odd shaped rock, a coffee cup, an apple, and a small figurine with flowers."

 The object in question was in a box. This means that there was no light available. Within a "genuine" Remote Viewing setup, objects must be "lighted" in some way to give a visual expression if a "true" extensional image is to be obtained.

 To make the difference between "truly experienced remote perception" and abstracted and evaluated "intelligence" information even more clear, here is another example:

A "Straightline Remote Sensing" session may yield a set of set of subjectively experienced perceptions, such as a big, cylinder-shaped object. A Far Sight session, using mediated information packages, may come up with an item such as "a bomb." It should be clear that "a bomb" is an abstraction based on an evaluation. An engineer who analyzes the report of a Straightline session may come to the same conclusion (that the object would be "a bomb," for example), but this would happen AFTER the session. 

Any kind of abstraction processes belong to the class of "creative" processes. They will trigger the creation of thoughts (mockups) which, in turn, will significantly disturb an extensional observation.

 Strictly seen, if a sensory image of any kind is not yielded, the name "Remote Viewing" is not correct. If only the abstraction of the object is obtained, it may therefore be better to talk about "Remote Information Gathering" instead.

 The most difficult step in Straightline Remote Sensing is the connection with an initial distinct remote target. This, interestingly, appears to be the easiest part in the Far Sight protocol. It would be favorable if both techniques could be combined.

 In any case, the greatest obstacle for both are "mockups"— thoughts created by the viewer during the process or the protocol.

 The "average" human is mocking up pictures compulsively to such a degree that these pictures continue into the sleep phase of the person, at which time they are being labeled "dreams."

 Turning off the compulsive creation of pictures is, therefore, a considerable feat which, when successful, translates directly into "spiritual freedom."

 Once engaging in remote sensing, a person may be shocked how difficult it seems to distinguish properly between "reality" and internal thought constructs.

 What now is the difference between internal thought constructs and reality, if there is any? One model that provides a functional description of the "reality" problem is the model of the "co-created Universe."

 Beings maintain their own world in their thoughts, and, to the degree that the worlds of different Beings are overlapping, an objective "reality" comes into existence. To decide whether a "reality" is truly an accepted, hence "objective" reality, the viewer, using this model as a guideline, would have to ask a certain number of other observers whether they perceive something similar or not.

 In praxis, this is not easy to do. But, fortunately, there is another clue to the "reality" problem:
 
 

• Since "reality" is formed through the congruence of concurrent observers, the emerging events cannot show discontinuities.

 For practical purposes, once a connection with a remote sensing target has been established, any sudden shift of perception is likely to be caused by the viewer's thought processes. Or, from a different angle, every perception that persists in time or changes only slowly, is likely to be a perception of an "objective reality."

 Let's put this to work by exploring a remote object such as a simple brick.
 

 It is helpful to turn off auditory and visual perceptions in the beginning since they are the most likely source of dubbed-in signals from one's own mind, and are thus distorting the observation of what's out there.

 Ultimately, it doesn't matter how far the investigated object really is. It is easier to start with something nearby and compare the remote sensing results with "normal" perceptions.

 The mirror in the exercise serves as a stable reference point through time and space. Besides helping in the orientation, it also diverts the attention from internal mental processes.

 Of utmost importance is the ability to move without jumps, and to locate fix points in a remote environment.

 Any sudden movements, or the loss of orientation, will cause the analytical mind to add its unsolicited opinion, and will thus de facto abort the entire remote sensing session.

 The first explorations, as exciting as they may be, are yielding just vague impressions of the properties of the investigated object or environment.

 To arrive at more concise and meaningful results, the ability to assess basic dimensional relationships of space and time has to be restored first.

 This is the topic of the next Exercise in Straightline Remote Sensing, and, as with the other exercises, this exercise, too, is leading to some surprising revelations.

 'Til then. Sense you in a week!