Parapsychology is, by common definition, the study with scientific methods of unexplained mental phenomena that appear to violate the laws of established science. The topics of parapsychology fall into two broad categories. Extra-sensory perception (also known as anomalous cognition) includes telepathy, clairvoyance, and precognition. Anomalous operation includes primarily telekinesis (more recently termed psychokinesis), out-of-body experiences such as near-death experiences, and past life studies which some take as evidence of reincarnation. The field of parapsychology is generally frowned upon by mainstream scientists who often dismiss it as pseudoscience, although it is acknowledged by others that some serious investigations into these subjects have taken place.
Parapsychologists claim that there are phenomena which have no clear explanation within the parameters of established science. They generally maintain that gathering evidence in a controlled environment to prove the existence of any such phenomenon has been very problematic, due to the high incidence of fraud. Some parapsychologists also contend that these phenomena are relatively rare or small in effect, and therefore require difficult controls. They complain that skeptics repeatedly extend their standards of proof.
Every claimed case of such a phenomenon to date has failed to convince mainstream science, even those tests performed in a controlled setting and with controls for fraud such as those applying ganzfeld procedures have been found unacceptable (usually on methodological grounds or because of lack of verifiability). Therefore, part of the mission of parapsychologists has been to establish, using repeatable, well-controlled experiments, whether or not the various parapsychological phenomena are real, and to distinguish them from phenomena that might be explained by coincidence, fraud, imagination, or auto-suggestion.
It would follow that if the validity of such occurrences could be proven, explaining why they happen could require revising existing philosophical, physical and psychological models. Verified precognition, for example, would challenge well established notions about causality and the unidirectional nature of time. Skeptics generally feel that, as per Ockham's Razor, simple explanations should be preferred.
Parapsychology is sometimes considered a sub-branch of psychology. There is a well-known professorship and program at the University of Edinburgh in parapsychology and a handful of other programs around the world, including those at Duke University and the University of Utrecht. Historically organisations such as the Society for Psychical Research have represented parapsychology.
The Parapsychological Association ( http://www.parapsych.org/ ) is the professional association of parapsychologists and is affiliated with the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).
Famous Parapsychologists
- Wolf Messing - Stalinist seer.
- Uri Geller - Israeli telekineticist, famous for "remote bending" of spoons in television shows
- Edgar Cayce
Psychic investigations
- Remote Viewing (includes Stargate project)
- Global Consciousness Project
Literature
- The Conscious Universe, by Dean Radin, Harper Collins, 1997, ISBN 0062515020.
Also see Parapsychology basic topics.
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