Lecture 2: A Brief History of Parapsychology

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Lecture 2 A Brief History of Parapsychology

• 1. Introduction and basic terminology
• 2. Evidence from antiquity
• 3. The rise of spiritualism
• 4. The Society for Psychical Research
• 5. 1930-1960s The Duke University Period
• 6. Fraud within parapsychology

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Precognitive Dreams
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Miraculous Healing
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Strange Powers
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Divination
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Telepathy
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Historical Perspective

• Shows that ostensibly paranormal experiences are
  an important part of human experience
• Either paranormal forces exist
• Or we learn something useful about human
  psychology
• Makes us question our own assumptions

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Do you believe in fairies?
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Fairies in Folklore
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Cottingley Fairies (1917)Elsie Wright (13)
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Cottingley Fairies (1917)Frances Griffiths (10)
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Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
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Cottingley Fairies Articles
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Phrenology
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Basic Terminology

• Psychokinesis (PK) "the influence of mind on
  external objects or processes without the
  mediation of known physical energies or forces"
  (Wolman, 1977)

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Psychokinesis (PK)Nina Kulagina
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Basic Terminology

• Psychokinesis (PK) "the influence of mind on
  external objects or processes without the
  mediation of known physical energies or forces"
  (Wolman, 1977)
• Extrasensory Perception (ESP) "knowledge of or a
  response to an external event or influence not
  apprehended through known sensory channels"
  (Wolman, 1977)

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ESP includes

• 1) telepathy (transference of thoughts between
  two people)

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Telepathy?
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ESP includes

• 1) telepathy (transference of thoughts between
  two people)
• 2) clairvoyance (awareness of remote objects or
  events)

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Clairvoyance?
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ESP includes

• 1) telepathy (transference of thoughts between
  two people)
• 2) clairvoyance (awareness of remote objects or
  events)
• 3) precognition (knowledge of events before they
  occur, other than as a result of inference)

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Precognition?
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Psi

• a general term to identify a person's
  extrasensorimotor communication with the
  environment (Wolman, 1977).
• NB Strict definition of the paranormal, as used
  by parapsychologists, limits subject matter to
  PK, ESP, and (possibly) issues relating to
  life-after-death.

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Oracles in Ancient Greece
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The Delphic Oracle
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King Croesus of Lydia(c. 550 BC)
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Biblical examplesPrecognitive dreams
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Apparitions
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Healing
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Physical Phenomena
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Prophetic Visions
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The Rise of SpiritualismHydesville, NY, March
1848
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The Fox Sisters
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Rapping Sounds in the Bedroom
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Communicating with the Spirits?
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Typical Seance
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Other Strange PhenomenaLevitation
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Playing of Musical Instruments by Unseen Hands
and Lips
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Lights in the Dark
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Apports
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Materialisation of Spirit Forms
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Ectoplasm
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Spirit Photographs
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Written Communications
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Table Tilting
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Michael Faraday
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Robert Hare,American Chemist
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Alfred Russell Wallace,Cofounder Theory of
Evolution
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Sir William Crookes,Discoverer of Thallium
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Florence Cook
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Katie King
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More than a passing resemblance?
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All down to trickery?
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The Society for Psychical Research

• Founded in UK in 1882
• American Society for Psychical Research founded
  in 1885
• One major aim was to scientifically prove that
  the soul survived bodily death

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Response to Darwins Ideas
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Daniel Dunglas Home
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Harry HoudiniThe Worlds Greatest Conjuror
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Houdini and Conan Doyle
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Luminous Faces Effect
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Bells rung by spirits?
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Houdinis Ectoplasm
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Houdinis Slate Writing
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Fox Sisters Confess (1888)

• Noises produced in various ways including
  cracking of toe and ankle joints
• Schoolgirl prank had got out of hand
• Spiritualists simply refused to believe confession

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A Time of Transition for Psychical Research
Phenomena most researched

• 1. mental phenomena of psychics and mediums

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Leonora Piper (as a child)
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Gladys Osborne Leonard
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Eileen Garrett
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A Time of Transition for Psychical Research
Phenomena most researched

• 1. mental phenomena of psychics and mediums (e.g.
  Leonara Piper, Gladys Osborne Leonard, Eileen
  Garrett)
• 2. physical phenomena of the type produced by Home

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Eusapia Palladino
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Eusapia in Action
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A Time of Transition for Psychical Research
Phenomena most researched

• 1. mental phenomena of psychics and mediums (e.g.
  Leonara Piper, Gladys Osborne Leonard, Eileen
  Garrett)
• 2. physical phenomena of the type produced by
  Home (e.g. Eusapia Palladino)
• 3. investigations of hauntings and poltergeists

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Poltergeist Activity
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A Time of Transition for Psychical Research
Phenomena most researched

• 1. mental phenomena of psychics and mediums (e.g.
  Leonara Piper, Gladys Osborne Leonard, Eileen
  Garrett)
• 2. physical phenomena of the type produced by
  Home (e.g. Eusapia Palladino)
• 3. investigations of hauntings and poltergeists
• 4. the evolution of controlled experiments (e.g.
  ESP studies of card guessing)

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The Duke University PeriodJoseph Rhine
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Louisa Rhine
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Joseph Rhines Approach

• Large scale investigations of presumed psychic
  ability of ordinary people
• Easily controlled simple tests
• Statistical evaluation of results
• E.g., use of Zener cards

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General Extrasensory Perception (GESP)

• Cannot rule out possibility of clairvoyance in
  telepathy studies
• Cannot rule out precognition in clairvoyance
  studies
• Cannot rule out PK in precognition studies
• So Rhine preferred GESP!

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Rhines Dice PK Studies

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Rhines Book (1934)
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Response to Rhine (1934)

• Attempts at replication
• Some claimed success
• Many failures (especially in Britain)
• Statistical criticisms
• Technically correct, but insubstantial
• Methodological criticisms
• More serious
• Led to improvements in methodology

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Samuel George SoalBritish Mathematician
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Soals Attempted Replication

• Around 160 participants
• 128,350 trials
• Attempted to remove all flaws and weaknesses from
  Rhines design
• No deviation from chance expectation
• But then found displacement effects for Gloria
  Stewart and Basil Shackleton

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New Series of Studies

• Shackletons performance at MCE for direct hits
• But p-value with respect to next card in series
  at 1 in 1035!
• Stewart obtained a direct hit rate with p-value
  of 1079!

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George Prices (1955) Critique

• Review of Soal and Bateman (1954) Modern
  Experiments in Telepathy in Science
• Results in favour of psi must be due to
• "clerical and statistical errors and
  unintentional use of sensory clues" or
• "deliberate fraud or mildly abnormal mental
  conditions."

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Exposing Soals Fraud

• Mrs Gretls allegations
• Published in 1960 by Soal and Goldney
• Medhursts (1971) analysis
• Scott Haskells (1973, 1974) analyses
• Markwicks (1978) analysis
• J G Pratt still maintains Soals innocence

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Fraud Within Parapsychology

• Historical evidence of fraudulent mediums
• S G Soal
• Walter Levy in 1970s
• Circumstantial evidence against Uri Geller
• Geller kids
• Are parapsychologists easy to fool?

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James Randis (1980)Project Alpha

• Steve Shaw and Michael Edwards
• McDonnell Laboratory for Psychical Research,
  Washington University
• Over two year period, performed all standard
  tricks metal bending, mind reading, divining
  contents of sealed envelopes, etc
• Described as gifted psychic subjects

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Acknowledgement

• With thanks to Hilary Evans, proprietor of the
  Mary Evans Picture Library, for permission to use
  illustrations featured in this presentation.
  These illustrations must not be reproduced in any
  form without permission from the Mary Evans
  Picture Library.