Pronounced sigh. The term is commonly used by parapsychologists to refer to both esp and psychokinesis taken together. The term was coined by R.H. Thouless and B.P. Weisner in their 1942 article "The Present Position of Experimental Research into Telepathy and Related Phenomena," (Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, 47, part 166, pp. 1-19).

Suggested reading

Evaluation of Program on Anomalous Mental Phenomena by Ray Hyman

Gardner, Martin. Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1957), ch. 25.

Hansel, C.E.M. The Search for Psychic Power : ESP and Parapsychology Revisited (Buffalo, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1989).

Hines, Terence. Pseudoscience and the Paranormal (Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1990).

Hyman, Ray. The Elusive Quarry : a Scientific Appraisal of Psychical Research (Buffalo, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1989).

Randi, James. Flim-Flam! (Buffalo, New York: Prometheus Books,1982).

reader comments

09 Aug 1996
I am curious why you spend so much time and effort to produce the pages to disclaim the paranormal. For some reason the subject seems to draw you. I think you should look into the real world and not the view you get from a lab. The reason psychic phenomena is hard to study in a lab, is because it is not a constant. Science can anly analyse constants. If there are two many variables science usually fails. I am a believer in science but in this instance it seems to have failed. Maybe it hasn't. Duke and Berkley seem to have given some credence to paraspychology.

I wish, you as a scientist, would look at everything woth a more open mind and realize that everything is not studied in a lab.

Tommy

reply: What follows from your line of reasoning? That the facts that psi researchers can't get consistent results unless they cheat, can't duplicate any experiment, can't do anything more useful with their powers than predict card numbers or spots, or bend keys, and can't prove anything, are to be taken as strong evidence for the belief that psychic phenomena "is not a constant." Perhaps. But it seems more reasonable to me that this is evidence that psi is non-existent.

Are we also to accept as a reasonable explanation for the fact that good, incontrovertible evidence for the existence of Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, etc., is because these phenomena "are not constant." What belief couldn't be defended by this notion? Every contradiction in the universe could be equally justified if we could assume your inconstancy principle.

Now, in human affairs, it is a different story. Inconstancy may be the only constant in human affairs.

10 Aug 96
I have read some of your Skeptic's Dictionary. I am of the belief that skepics are just as bad as those that believe without proof. I have studied ESP and the like for many years and have found that there is very little proof of its existence. BUT there are also events experienced by me and others to say that there is somthing going on.

reply: Yes, "there is something going on." I agree with that, but I wouldn't spin my worldview out of such flimsy cloth.

In reading on the changes in scientific beliefs through history what we know is that what is considered fact today may be proven wrong tomorrow, such as the earth being the center or the universe or there being only 4 elements: earth, wind, fire, and water; and most recently with the discovery of old life in a meteor.

reply: Yes, very true. Hardly very interesting but very true, nonetheless.

We are less than a speck in the realm of the universe and have existed for less than half a wink. And your type is there saying that it is impossible for somthing to exist. You must be a very wise man to say something does not exist without knowing what does.

reply: I like that stuff about being a speck in half a wink. It has a nice poetic ring to it and expresses my sentiments exactly. However, I never say that it is impossible for psychic phenomena to exist. It is neither logically nor empirically impossible for psi to exist. Which part of that statement is not clear? What I say, or imply, is that there is only insubstantial, incompetent, implausible and insufficient evidence to believe in psi.

Now, I'm going to share with you something that just happened. While typing the previous sentence, I made a typo and went back to correct it. I hit a key...I don't know which key, since I don't look at the keys while I type, but I was aiming for the backspace. Anyway, the word 'incompetent' disappeared from the screen. I hit another key...again I don't know which one and I can't remember which one I was aiming for, but the word 'incompetent' reappeared. Someone else might interpret this as a sign from the other world. Some spirit or force was trying to communicate with me by doing this, to let me know that psi exists and tha I am incompetent. I, however, interpret this as having something to do with the way Eudora is programmed. Anyway, I haven't gotten any more "signs" while adding this note, so I'll stop commenting.

Don't get me wrong I would like to discus these things with you in the future and perhaps learn more about the universe through these discussions.

Goats do dream
Garrett

reply: That's an ambiguous claim, but I'll remember it the next time I encounter a goat.

Psychic knowledge of something in advance of its occurrence.

reader comments

22 Aug 1996
I was wondering if you personally think that there is a possibility that there is a non-physical component to life ?

reply: If by "life" you mean the world of sense perception and what gives rise to it, then "no." If you mean do I believe there is a possibility for a reality that is not part of the electromangetic spectrum, then "yes."

I have read the highly biased remarks of many "skeptics" but have yet to see real objectivity.

reply: What do mean by "objectivity"? If you are looking for completely neutral view of things, then I think you are not going to find "objectivity."

I am a scientist (mass spectroscopist), fairly intelligent, and skeptical, but I have had a "paranormal" experience involving the acquisition of knowledge about distant events. I know it happened, have no real need to prove anything, but just wanted to raise the issue in the face of the many ney-sayers.

You say your experience was "paranormal." Are you sure you are being "objective"?

I know that there is a lot of crap out there, but I just have to say that true objective skepticism is a good thing and can lead to the truth, but the brand of name calling, innuendo ridden attempts by the popular so called skeptical organizations is wrong.
Phil Sanders

What is "true objective" skepticism? Are you talking about the need to test hypotheses before accepting empirical claims? Or are you talking about something more general, like admitting it is possible you are wrong about some empirical notion? Anyway, I hope you're not insinuating that I am a name-caller, for I would resent such innuendo.

A type of clairvoyance involving knowledge of something after its occurrence through psychic means. Related to precognition.

My sister related an apparent case of retrocognition to me. She was watching television when a report came on about a woman who claimed that her two young children had been kidnapped by a black man who carjacked her in some small town in the south. She claimed the black man drove out near a lake and let her out of the car and drove off with the two children. My sister said she immediately sensed that the children were dead and that they were in the lake. About a week later, the world was told that the woman herself had driven her car to the lake and with the children alive and strapped into the back seat, she put the car in drive and watched as the car sunk into the lake with her sons, drowning them.

My sister tells me that she has no desire to be clairvoyant, and while the only other person who can testify that she had a precognition about the death in the lake of the children is her husband, I believe her story is essentially correct. That is, I don't think, after talking to her and her husband that she filled in the details of the retrocognition after the fact.

Did she foresee an event? No. She couldn't have, since the event had already occurred when she had her clairvoyant experience. So it wasn't really a precognition but a retrocognition. Still, isn't it uncanny that her feeling at the time she saw the news broadcast turned out to be essentially what happened? Not really. It is a sad commentary on our times, but false reports of crimes are not uncommon and mothers killing their children are not uncommon. They are probably less common than black carjackers kidnapping little boys. In any case, the suspicious feelings which my sister had concerning the mother/murderer were probably shared by many people who saw the broadcast. It is evident that the police in the small southern town were skeptical from the getgo, not because they are clairvoyant but because they know a little bit about human nature and human behavior. If one was suspicious of the mother's story, the fact that she said she was driven to a lake leaves little to the imagination to fill in the blanks.

I'll admit that I've had similar feelings myself. About a year ago an alleged rape victim was interviewed on television. I had a feeling she was lying while I watched the broadcast. It turned out that she had been lying. Other people I talked to had seen the news broadcast, too, and also weren't convinced that her story was true. Were we clairvoyant? I don't think so. We all make judgments about people's stories. Sometimes we're right and sometimes were not. We tend to forget the times we're not. If we didn't, we wouldn't find the occasional correct "feeling" to be so surprising.

A psychic power which enables one to divine facts by handling objects. This power is demonstrated much like the power to read palms, crystal balls, tea leaves, auras or astrological charts. All are related to cold reading and selective thinking.

Geraldine Smith, a Toronto psychic, is typical of psychics who claim to to have psychometric powers. Give her a bracelet and she can tell all kinds of things about the owner just by handling the object. She says she can see auras from the object which tell her about auras of the wearer of the object which tell her about the character, personality, trials and tribulations of the bracelet owner. So she said, but when tested under conditions where the subject was coached in cold reading techniques and advised not to give away any specific information in answering the psychic's questions, Mrs. Smith failed miserably.

Psychometry is also common among psychic detectives.

Suggested reading

Randi, James, Flim-Flam!, (Buffalo, New York: Prometheus Books,1982), pp. 265ff.

Lyons, Arthur and Macello Truzzi, The Blue Sense: Psychic Detectives and Crime (New York: Warner Books, 1991).

psychokinesis

Telekinesis is the movement of objects by scientifically inexplicable means, as by the exercise of an occult power. Psychokinesis is the production of motion in physical objects by the exercise of psychic or mental powers. Uri Geller claims he can bend spoons and stop watches using only his thoughts to control the external objects. Others claim to be able to make pencils roll across a table by a mere act of will. The variety of parlor tricks used to demonstrate psychokinetic powers is endless.

Suggested reading

Gardner, Martin. Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1957), ch. 25.

Houdini, Harry. A Magician Among the Spirits (New York: Harper, 1924).

Houdini, Harry. Miracle Mongers and Their Methods : a Complete Expose (Buffalo, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1981).

Randi, James, Flim-Flam!(Buffalo, New York: Prometheus Books,1982).

Randi, James, The Truth About Uri Geller, (Buffalo, New York: Prometheus Books,1982).

Literally, "distance feeling;" but the term is often a shortened version of mental telepathy and refers to mind- reading, discerning another's thoughts through esp.

26 May 1996
About a year ago, I was sleeping, and at roughly 2:45 AM, from a deep sleep, I QUICKLY sat up in bed with my eyes wide open. I looked around the room for about 30 seconds, and just kept thinking, "something's wrong!" Sure enough, my phone rang! My phone was right next to my bed, so I picked it up, and a girl I had the hots for was crying and was in trouble.

Harsh eh? I've NEVER woke up like that before in my life until that night, and it scared the shit out of me. Anyways, the girl and I are very good friends now. I actually think of her as a sister.
"John \"Magnus\" Altinger"

reply: Experiences such as yours are uncanny and those that have them find it very difficult to believe it was just co-incidence that one thing happened after another. There is a strong urge to believe in a causal connection in such cases. However, from a logical point of view, there are several things to consider. First, such cases are examples of post hoc reasoning. The fact that one thing precedes another is not sufficient evidence to support a belief that the former caused the latter. Your anxious thoughts may have preceded your friend's call, but that is not good reason to believe either that her troubled thoughts caused you to have anxious thoughts about her which caused her to phone you.

Secondly, she probably would not have called you at 2:45 am unless she thought you would be sympathetic. You may not have been good friends before the call, but she probably got some signals from you that you had the "hots" for her and were open to friendship or at least had a waiting shoulder to cry on. You probably also got some signals from her that not all was well in her life. Your combination of "hots" and concern for her were most likely why you woke up feeling anxious. You probably already knew that what was wrong was that the girl was having problems.

Finally, even you probably do not know what part of this story has been left out. Are you sure you didn't mention to her that she could call you any time about her problems? Or, give her any kind of hint that you were the kind of guy always available with a symathetic ear? For, it is very odd for someone to call another person for help in the middle of the night unless the caller is reasonably confident she will not be told to bugger off.