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.

Stella Cranshaw

London nurse (1900–1986) who produced abundant phenomena in investigative sittings organized in the 1920s by Harry Price.

Coover Telepathy Experiments

Early telepathy experiments, once thought a failure, now considered statistically significant.

Stanislawa Tomczyk

Polish woman whose ability to produce visible psychokinetic effects in controlled conditions is well documented.

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.

Near-Death Experiences (Overview)

This article describes anomalous mental events reported by people who have survived a near-fatal accident or illness.

Spirit Release Therapy

Clinical treatment used with patients who appear to be ‘possessed’ by harmful spirit entities.

Marilyn Schlitz

American social anthropologist and psi researcher, studying distant intentionality, healing and special gifted populations.

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.

Hester Travers Smith (Hester Dowden)

British automatist who believed she was in contact with the deceased Oscar Wilde.

Cold Reading

Discusses the psychological strategies that can be used to simulate a mediumistic communication or psychic reading.

Anna Prado

Brazilian spiritist medium (1883–1923) reputed to produce direct writing, levitations, apports and materialization phenomena.

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 of Tibetan Lamas in the West

Tibetan lamas reincarnate as Westerners with the intention of spreading Buddhist teachings to other countries.

Regression Therapy

In hypnotherapy, apparent past-life memories are treated less as descriptions of true events than as metaphors that aid in healing.

Reincarnation: An Introduction

This introductory article covers beliefs in reincarnation, evidence for reincarnation, and sceptical views of the research.

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.

David Vernon

British psychologist specializing in neuroscience, cognition and research methods, who has carried out psi research as well.

Rollin McCraty

Rollin McCraty is an American psychophysiologist who has carried out research in the relationship between heart and mind.

Hans Holzer

Austrian-born American author (1920–2009) and lay paranormal investigator, largely of hauntings and poltergeists.

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.

Parapsychology Foundation (PF)

US-based forum, founded in 1951 by Eileen J Garrett, that supports parapsychology internationally.

Southern California Society for Psychical Research

Organization founded in 1961 and merged with the International Foundation for Survival Research, now also defunct, in 1983.

Boston Society for Psychic Research

Organisation that split from the American Society for Psychical Research in 1925, reuniting with it in 1941.

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.

Martin Gardner

American critic of parapsychology and paranormal claims (1914–2010), a founding member of the modern sceptical movement.

Susan J Blackmore

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

Cold Reading

Discusses the psychological strategies that can be used to simulate a mediumistic communication or psychic reading.

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.

Richet’s ‘Traité de Métapsychique’ (‘Thirty Years of Psychical Research’)

A classic review of the literature, published in 1922.

Dowsing

Traditional method of locating underground water or minerals by the movement of a pair of metal rods, a forked stick or a pendulum.

Orbs (Light Anomalies)

Light anomalies often seen in photographs and video are attributed by some to the presence of ghosts or spirit entities.