ESP & Psychokinesis

Extra-sensory perception (ESP) comprises telepathy, clairvoyance and precognition. Psychokinesis (PK) is the direct influence on matter by mind alone. Both ESP and PK have been tested in the laboratory and studied in real life situations. Together they constitute psi, in the strict sense of the term. Subcategories group together overviews and general topics in psi studies, tests of ESP and PK, and researcher biographies.

Preventing Researcher Fraud

Preventive research practices offer the strongest protections against fraud in parapsychology.

Malcolm Bessent

English-born Malcolm Bessent participated as a subject in successful dream precognition experiments carried out in the US.

Robert Morris

American psychologist and parapsychologist (1942–2004) who chaired Edinburgh University's Koestler Parapsychology Unit.

Mind & Body

This category contains articles that treat consciousness in relation to the body. Subcategories focus on consciousness and psi; dreams and psi; and distant healing and psychotherapy. Also included are sitter groups and macro-psychokinesis as well as poltergeists, often assumed to relate to discarnate entities but now known more often to have living agents. A final subgroup is concerned with out-of-body and near-death experiences and events reported on the threshold of death.

Sense of Being Stared At – Theories of Vision

This article discusses theoretical implications of findings with regard to theories of vision.

‘The Boy Who Came Back from Heaven’ (recanted NDE)

Best-selling American book describing the supposed NDE of a 6-year-old child.

Distressing Near-Death Experiences

Although most reported near-death experiences (NDEs) are pleasant, almost one in five are disturbing.

Survival of Death

Life continued in a spiritual or purely mental form after bodily death is a staple of religious beliefs worldwide, and likely is as old as humanity. The question of evidence for it has been central to the Society for Psychical Research since its founding in 1882. Subcategories focus on hauntings and apparitions and on psychic (also called mental) mediumship.

Hafsteinn Björnsson (medium)

Icelandic trance medium (1914-1977) who produced 'drop-in' communications and xenoglossy.

Investigation of Rudi Schneider by Eugène Osty

Tests of an Austrian physical medium with instruments suggested psychokinesis.

Rosemary Brown

Twentieth-century British medium who specialized in musical compositions she claimed were dictated to her by deceased composers.

Reincarnation

Reincarnation beliefs are widespread in the world and in recent decades researchers have found what they believe is evidence of them through the study of people (mainly children) who claim to have lived before. Subcategories highlight case studies, past life regression, and biographies of major researchers.

Reincarnation and Suicide

Unexpectedly, cases of reincarnation after suicide have unusually short intermissions and returns in family lines or among friends.

Satwant Pasricha

Indian clinical psychologist known for her research on childhood past life memories and near-death experiences.

Jagdish Chandra (reincarnation case)

An Indian boy remembered a previous life as the pampered son of a corrupt official in a distant city.

Researchers & Authors

Here can be found more than 300 biographical profiles of key figures who have been involved in psi research and parapsychology as field investigators, experimentalists, theorists and commentators. The biographies are grouped in subcategories by 30-year age cohorts, highlighting contemporaries.

Marieta Pehlivanova

Marieta Pehlivanova is a researcher at the University of Virginia, with interests relating to near-death and related experiences. 

Peter Fenwick

British neuropsychiatrist and neurophysiologist (1935–2024), leading authority on near-death and end-of-life experiences.

Dennis Bardens

English journalist and author (1911–2004), founder of the BBC news programme Panorama.

Organizations

The oldest organizations devoted to parapsychology were member organizations like the Society for Psychical Research, established in London in 1882. Since JB Rhine founded the Parapsychology Laboratory at Duke University in 1930, there have been university-based units as well. This category comprises both historical and contemporary bodies concerned with research and education in parapsychology.

Australian Institute of Parapsychological Research (AIPR)

Australia’s oldest extant psi research organization, founded in Sydney in 1977.

Rhine Research Center

Successor to the Parapsychology Laboratory at Duke University, dedicated to psi research, education and community activities.

Noah’s Ark Society for Physical Mediumship

The NAS originated in a home circle in 1990 and indirectly fostered the later Scole Circle.

Sceptical Views

Sceptics argue that psychics and mediums achieve their effects by trickery, that psychic experience is an illusory effect caused by a combination of brain misperceptions and confirmation bias, and that evidence of psi in laboratory tests can be attributed to poor methodology. This category includes biographies of leading sceptics as well as general articles discussing their allegations.

Richard Wiseman

British psychology professor, media personality and bestselling author who is a high-profile critic of parapsychology.

Marcello Truzzi

American sociologist known for distinguishing open-minded scepticism of psi phenomena from simple debunking.

Susan J Blackmore

British psychologist, consciousness researcher and psi sceptic, who has frequently appeared in the media promoting her views.

General Topics

This category contains articles on a variety of topics that do not fit well in any of the main categories, from dowsing to crop circles and other anomalistic phenomena, the Miscellaneous Anomalistic subcategory. Other subcategories list articles on psychics and mystic and on important articles, books and journals in the field of parapsychology.

Francis Bacon and the Occult

Francis Bacon (1561–1626) believed in the possibility of psi but opposed its investigation on theological grounds.

Forteana

Collective term for anomalous or paranormal-seeming phenomena, as exemplified in the writings of Charles Fort (1874–1932).

Crop Circles

The intricate patterns that sometimes appear in crop fields have been attributed to various factors, including supernatural ones..