Rhine Center Administration

• Rhine Board of Directors
• Rhine Advisory Board

Officers:

President: Frank Auman
Frank Auman builds, owns and manages commercial buildings and apartment complexes throughout central North Carolina. Previously he has served on the board of the Psychical Research Foundation, Triad Bank, and the Board of Trustees of Randolph Community College. He is a past president of the Randolph County Homebuilders and has served as chairman of the Randolph County Commissioners. Frank owns and manages over 2 ½ million square feet of real estate and is the largest stockholder and board member of both KBI Biopharma Inc. (Durham, NC) and BlueHighways TV (Nashville, TN). Frank is the owner, creator and producer of two nationally televised musical shows in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. Frank is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and is a resident of Greensboro, North Carolina.

Vice-President: William F. Higgins, B.S.
Mr. Bill Higgins is a graduate of the US Naval Academy, a retired Naval Reserve Captain and former FBI agent. He is a successful businessman, developer and former realtor in the New York - New Jersey area. He is very knowledgeable about and interested in the practical applications of psi. He has been an investor in psi research at the Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research Laboratory. Mr. Higgins is a Director and Vice President of the IRVA (International Remote Viewers Association) and the SSE (Society for Scientific Exploration). As former Director of PEAR Inc, he assisted in the funding of their process patent on the effect of intention on random events. He is also a founding Director for a Charter School in the South Bronx.

Secretary: Sally Rhine-Feather, Ph.D.
As the eldest daughter of JB and Louisa Rhine, Sally Feather grew up in the world of parapsychology in Durham NC. She worked as a research assistant at the Duke Lab before and after a B.A. from the College of Wooster (1951) and as a researcher at FRNM after a doctorate in psychology (Duke University, 1967). Dr. Feather then worked over 30+ years as a clinical psychologist in mental health and psychiatric clinics and in private practice in North Carolina and New Jersey. Since 1995 she has been active at the RRC in various administrative roles, serving on two different occasions as volunteer Executive Director. Currently she is working on a research grant on the phenomenology of spontaneous PK experiencers. In 2005 she co-authored a book The Gift (St. Martins Press) that is an update of Louisa E. Rhine’s books on spontaneous ESP experiences.

Treasurer: Thomas Connolly
Tom holds a BA in History and Psychology from Marist College, Poughkeepsie, NY, where he initially taught high school and then proceeded to a thirty year career at IBM in Executive Management, responsible for Technical Communications, Human Factors, and Industrial Design. Upon his retirement from IBM he joined Sykes Enterprises, where he served as Director of Employee Development and Consulting Services Management. He also served as Director of Marketing and Services for the Northeast Region and manager of Sykes New York Branch. Tom received an IBM Corporate Management Excellence Award, was a member of the IBM Corporate Information Development Council, served as President of the United Way of Ulster County, and was an Adjunct Professor in Technical Communications at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Tom is a member of the Fine Arts League of Cary, is a muralist, faux painter, trompe l'oeil artist, woodwork designer, and operates his own decorating business. Tom is also a REIKI and Quantum Touch healing practitioner.

Members:

Arlan Andrews, Sr. Ph.D.
Arlan Andrews is a Registered Professional Engineer (North Carolina) who has been involved in technology design, development and entrepreneurial activities for over 40 years. With a Doctorate in Engineering from New Mexico State University, he has worked with White Sands Missile Range, AT&T Bell Labs, Sandia National Labs, the White House Science Office and the U. S. Navy Environmental Program. He is a co-founder of Kinetic Biosytems, Inc., and other high tech startups, and has been granted six patents. He is also a science fiction and non-fiction writer, with over 300 publications in 80 venues worldwide. Dr. Andrews has maintained a lifelong interest in the paranormal, and has been actively and continuously involved in investigations into hauntings and poltergeists, PK, precognition, psychometry, remote viewing and other aspects of the field. He also has a specific interest in ancient technologies.

Steve Baumann, Ph.D.
Dr. Steve Baumann is a biomedical engineer and neurophysiologist who received a B.S. in psychology (1973), a M.A.T. in teaching science (1974) and a Ph.D. in biomedical engineering (1982), all from Duke University. He holds adjunct appointments at Duke University in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. He has worked closely with Dr. Bill Joines in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering on developing techniques for the measurement of energy from psychic (i.e. biofield) healers. He spends much of his time studying the use of virtual reality (VR) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) for medical and education-related applications at Duke University, RTI International, and Psychology Software Tools where he is the Research Director for VR/fMRI. He is a research associate of the Rhine Research Center and has studied psychic healing, PK and poltergeists, including the Tina Resch case with Bill Roll. He is interested in utilizing the power of science to study the limits of human consciousness.

Larry Burk, M.D.
Dr. Larry Burk, formerly Director of Education at the Duke Center for Integrative Medicine, obtained a B.A. in Chemistry from Duke University in 1977 and completed medical school and radiology training at the University of Pittsburgh. Following a year at the Pittsburgh NMR Institute and a fellowship year at the University of Pennsylvania Hospital, Dr. Burk spent four years as an Assistant Professor at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. Later, while in private practice in radiology in Virginia Beach, VA, he began studying the work of Edgar Cayce at the Association for Research and Enlightenment. Dr. Burk returned to Duke University in 1993 as an Associate Professor of Radiology and co-founded the Duke University Medical Center's Mind-Body Medicine Study Group. Dr. Burk has made presentations on research methodology in intuitive diagnosis at the NIH Conference on CAM Research Methodology and the Parapsychological Association. Dr. Burk left Duke in 2004 to start his own consulting company, Healing Imager, Inc., specializing in musculoskeletal teleradiology and Emotional Freedom Techniques(EFT).

Jim Carpenter Ph.D.
Dr. Carpenter received his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Ohio State University. He is Board Certified in Clinical Psychology, ABPP, and is a Fellow in the Academy of Clinical Psychology. He was editor of the Bulletin of the American Academy of Clinical Psychology. After teaching in the Department of Psychology at the University of North Carolina, he entered full time private practice and has worked in that field for over 20 years. He has published widely in the areas of self-disclosure, group process, professional affairs, and human potentials, including parapsychology in which he has been especially active for several decades. He served on the Rhine Center Board of Directors for seven years and was President for three years. Dr. Carpenter is currently Clinical Associate Professor with the UNC Department of Psychiatry.

Thomas Hardison
Thomas Hardison is a Financial Advisor in the Durham, NC office of Merrill Lynch. Tom is a Durham native and graduate of NC Wesleyan College where he received a BA in English. Prior to entering the investment field he held positions as US National Marketing Director of Pirelli, an international radial tire maker and as vice president of a family-owned retail firm. Tom's relationship with the Rhine dates back to his junior high days when he prepared a science report on Parapsychology with the assistance of the Rhine staff. Since then, Tom has harbored a keen interest in the field and in The Rhine, particularly. He is especially interested in the Rhine's work on business intuition. Tom is also active in the American Heart Association and is a Rotary International Paul Harris Fellow.

William Joines, Ph.D.
Dr. Bill Joines has a B.S. and M.S. degree from North Carolina State University and a Ph.D. from Duke University in electrical engineering, where he is now a Professor in the Depaerment of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He has published over 100 peer-reviewed articles in technical journals and numerous book chapters. Currently he is collaborating with Dr. Steve Baumann on a BIAL grant for measuring and analyzing mentally induced optical photon emission from the body and electrical charge accumulation on the body of practiced healers and volunteers (shamans). The continuation of this work (when funded) will be conducted at the Rhine. In the 1960's and 1970's Dr. Joines served as a consultant-investigator at the Psychical Research Foundation (PRF) with Dr. William Roll on poltergeist and haunting events, as well as in investigations of channeling or mediumship, where the goal was to record, via instrumentation, as much data as the situation allowed. Dr. Joines continues to seek a clearer understanding of the conscious and non-conscious mechanisms that drive paranormal events.

Stefan J Kasian. Ph.D.
Stefan J Kasian is a real estate entrepreneur, author, mentor, and international public speaker. He holds a Ph.D. in Psychology from Saybrook Graduate School in San Francisco, CA, and a B.A. from Duke University. His dissertation topic was “Dream homes: When dreams seem to predict real estate sales.” After a brief stint on Wall Street, he founded several companies to buy, sell, and manage residential and commercial real estate investments. He has published dozens of articles and several books, including Auction Fever: Winning Strategies to Buy Sell and Rent Real Estate which he co-authored with New York Times bestselling author Dr. Dolf de Roos. Serving as adjunct faculty member in Psychology at Akamai University, in Hilo, Hawaii, Kasian shares his experiences and research at real estate investing seminars and conferences on consciousness internationally.

John Palmer
Dr. John Palmer received his Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Texas in 1969. He was on the staff of the Rhine Research Center (formerly Foundation of Research on the Nature of Man) from 1984 to 2004, serving as Director of Research from 2000 to 2004. He was Director of Education from 1988 to 2004, in which capacity he was in charge of the 8-week Summer Study Program. He has been Editor of the Journal of Parapsychology since 1994. He was President of the Parapsychological Association in 1979 and 1992. He has published numerous research articles in professional journals and is co-author of the book Foundations of Parapsychology. His research has focused primarily on psychological factors associated with ESP performance in the laboratory, and in 1979 he published a random survey of psi experiences in an American city.

Gigi van Deckter
An international consultant/futurist and real estate entrepreneur, Ms. Van Deckter has worked as an advisor to CEOs and Presidents of such global concerns as SONY, SEGA, NTT, Industrial Bank of Japan, ASCII Corp., Swiss Banks, and others in the USA and abroad. With an undergraduate degree from City University of New York, and now a current doctoral candidate at Akamai University, Gigi has an extensive background in writing, teaching, and producing/directing in the theatre world before entering the real estate world where she has used her intuitive skills to invest for others and herself. She is now working as a Real Estate Broker in NYC, having closed over ten million dollars in residential real estate in the last year. Gigi was a presenter on the Business Intuition Panel at the Rhine Center Spring Conference that was held in March 2006 in Myrtle Beach SC.