Princeton University has for a while been host to a number of computerized studies of random number generators. The Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research Lab (PEAR) is one. Another of them is the Global Consciousness Project (GCP), whose data is available on the web at http://noosphere.princeton.edu/ . The GCP has a network of 40 random number generators (called eggs) around the world, creating numbers at the rate of 200 per second each. During events of global import, the project has noticed statistically significant variations from complete randomness in the numbers generated. The most intense global event measured by this system was the recent World Trade Center attack. It was not just a reported event. For the first time in history, a globally connected population watched on TV as 6000 people were killed in real time. This produced a correspondingly intense activity in the GCP network. The site contains detailed statistical analysis of the data (as well as the raw data itself), and is worth a look. Here is a quote from the narrative that accompanies it: "When we ask why the disaster in New York and Washington and Pennsylvania should appear to be responsible for a strong signal in our world-wide network of instruments designed to generate random noise, there is no obvious answer. When we look carefully and discover that the eggs might reflect our shock and dismay even before our minds and hearts express it, we confront a still deeper mystery. This network, which we designed as a metaphoric EEG for the planet, responded as if it were measuring brain waves on a planetary scale. We do not know if there is such a thing as a global consciousness, but if there is, it was moved by the events of September 11, 2001. We do not know how, but it appears that the coherence and intensity of our common reaction created a sustained pulse of order in the random flow of numbers from our instruments. These patterns where there should be none look like reflections of our concentrated focus, as the riveting events drew us from our individual concerns and melded us into an extraordinary coherence. Maybe we became, briefly, a global consciousness."