Russell Targ is an American physicist who co-founded the U.S. government-sponsored remote-viewing research program at Stanford Research Institute (SRI) in 1972, alongside physicist Harold Puthoff.1 The program attracted classified funding from the CIA and Defense Intelligence Agency and operated for over two decades under the umbrella later known as Project STAR GATE, at a total cost of approximately $20 million.2 Targ is simultaneously a credentialed laser researcher and a central figure in what the broader scientific community regards as pseudoscience: despite publishing remote-viewing results in peer-reviewed journals, subsequent analysis found the underlying experiments to be fatally flawed.3
Early Career and Laser Research
Born in Chicago on April 11, 1934, Targ earned a B.S. in physics from Queens College in 1954 and completed two years of graduate study at Columbia University without obtaining a doctorate.1 In the early 1960s he worked at Technical Research Group alongside laser co-inventor Gordon Gould, contributing to research on homodyne detection with laser light. He later joined Sylvania Electronic Systems, where he contributed to frequency modulation and mode-locking techniques in laser systems.1
From 1986 to 1998, after the remote-viewing program had ended for him, Targ served as a senior staff scientist at Lockheed Missiles and Space Company, where he developed airborne Doppler lidar systems for detecting wind shear — work with direct aviation-safety applications and a legitimate contribution to applied physics.1
The SRI Remote-Viewing Program
In 1972, Targ joined SRI's Electronics and Bioengineering Laboratory and began collaborating with Puthoff on experiments they termed "remote viewing" — the claimed ability of individuals to perceive distant or shielded targets using only their minds.2 Initial CIA interest arrived through Project SCANATE, and funding grew steadily as the program moved through successive classified codenames: GRILL FLAME, CENTER LANE, SUN STREAK, and finally STAR GATE.2
Targ and Puthoff published their findings in high-profile venues, most notably a 1974 paper in Nature titled "Information transmission under conditions of sensory shielding," and a 1976 paper in Proceedings of the IEEE.4 These publications, unusual for parapsychological research, gave the program a veneer of scientific legitimacy. Prominent subjects tested at SRI included celebrity psychic Uri Geller. Targ left the program in 1982, reportedly disillusioned by its shift toward classified intelligence operations and away from scientific inquiry. He subsequently co-founded Delphi Associates, a psychic consulting firm, and has authored or co-authored nine books, including Mind Reach (1977, with Puthoff), The Reality of ESP (2012), and the 2019 documentary Third Eye Spies.5
Methodological Criticisms
The experimental record underpinning Targ's remote-viewing claims has been extensively critiqued. Psychologist David Marks and Richard Kammann identified that the SRI experimental transcripts contained dates, references to previous trials, and other contextual cues that inadvertently allowed judges to match transcripts to targets by non-psychic means — a fatal methodological flaw that undermined the statistical conclusions.6
Independent replications of the SRI experiments failed to produce consistent results. A 1988 National Research Council report concluded that the Targ–Puthoff studies were "fatally flawed."6 The CIA's 1995 American Institutes for Research (AIR) evaluation, commissioned to assess whether Stargate deserved continuation, produced a split verdict: statistician Jessica Utts found statistically anomalous laboratory results, but psychologist Ray Hyman argued the statistical controls were insufficient and that no psychic mechanism had been demonstrated.2 The CIA ultimately concluded there was "no case in which ESP had provided data used to guide intelligence operations" and terminated the program.2
Scientific Consensus
The broader scientific community classifies remote viewing as pseudoscience. No reproducible, rigorously controlled evidence for the phenomenon has been established, and the appearance of positive results in the SRI trials is best explained by methodological weaknesses including cueing, inadequate blinding, and post-hoc flexible interpretation of what counts as a match.6
Targ's personal credibility as a physicist working on legitimate laser and lidar applications is distinct from the evidentiary status of his remote-viewing claims. His 1974 Nature paper remains a documented historical event — a parapsychological study published in one of the world's leading scientific journals — but the peer-review process did not catch the cuing problems later identified by critics.4 The CIA's declassified reading room preserves the original SRI documentation, which allows independent scrutiny of the methodology.3
Personal Life
Targ was married to Joan Fischer, sister of chess champion Bobby Fischer; Joan died in 1998. Their daughter Elisabeth Targ was a psychiatrist who pursued research into distant healing before her death from brain cancer in 2002.1 Targ is legally blind but has reportedly been an avid motorcyclist.1