This is part 3 of the first chapter from Dean Radin's book.

Why should anyone take psychic phenomena seriously?

 

The answer rests on the strength of the scientific evidence, which stands on its own merits.

But to fully appreciate why the scientific case is so persuasive, and why has there been any scientific controversy at all, we have to take a bit of a circuitous route.

That route will first consider the language used to discuss psi to show how many confusions over this topic are due to misunderstood and misapplied words (Chapter 2).

 

This is followed by examples of common human experiences that provide hints about the existence and nature of psi phenomena (Chapter 3).

We will then consider the topic of replication, where we will learn what counts as valid scientific evidence (Chapter 4).

 

And we'll end with meta-analysis, where we will see how replication is measured and why it is so important (Chapter 5).

In sum, the motivations underlying this scientific exploration can be found in mythology, folk tales, religious doctrines, and innumerable personal anecdotes.

While sufficient to catch everyone's attention, stories and personal experiences do not provide the hard, trustworthy evidence that causes scientists to confidently accept that a claimed effect is what it appears to be.

Stories, after all, invariably reflect subjective beliefs and faith, which may or may not be true.

Beginning in the 1880s and accumulating ever since, a new form of scientifically valid evidence appeared - empirical data produced in controlled, experimental studies.

While not as exciting as folklore and anecdotes, from the scientific perspective these data were more meaningful because they were produced according to well-accepted scientific procedures. Scores of scientists from around the world had quietly contributed these studies.

Today, with more than a hundred years of research on this topic, an immense amount of scientific evidence has been accumulated.

 

Contrary to the assertions of some skeptics, the question is not whether there is any scientific evidence, but,

As we'll see, the question of replicability - can independent, competent investigators obtain approximately the same results in repeated experiments - is fundamental to making the scientific case for psi.

Theme 2 discusses the main categories of psi experiments and the evidence that the effects seen in these experiments are genuinely replicable.

 

The evidence for these basic phenomena is so well-established that most psi researchers today no longer conduct "proof-oriented" experiments.

 

Instead, they focus largely on "process-oriented" questions like, What influences psi performance, and How does it work?

Also presented are experiments exploring how psi interacts with more mundane aspects of human experience like unusual physical effects associated with the "mass mind" of groups of people (Chapter 11), psi effects in casino gambling and lottery games (Chapter 12), and applications of psi (Chapter 13).

The wealth of scientific evidence discussed in Theme 2 will show that some psi phenomena exist, and that they are probably expressed in more ways than anyone had previously thought.

 

The vast majority of the information used to make this case has been publicly available for years. 

One might expect then that the growing scientific evidence for genuine psi would have raised great curiosity. 

Funding would flow, and researchers around the world would be attempting to replicate these effects.

 

After all, the implications of genuine psi are profoundly important for both theoretical and practical reasons.

But this has not yet been the case.

Few scientists are aware that any scientifically valid case can be made for psi, and fewer still realize that the cumulative evidence is highly persuasive.

In Theme 3 we consider why this is so.

One reason is that the information discussed here has been suppressed and ridiculed by a relatively small group of highly skeptical philosophers and scientists (Chapter 14).

 

Are the skeptics right, and all of the scientists reporting successful psi experiments over the past century simply delusional or incompetent?

Or there is another explanation for the skepticism?

We will see that because scientists are also human, the process of evaluating scientific claims is not as pristinely rational or logical as the general public believes (Chapter 15).

 

The tendency to adopt a fixed set of beliefs and defend them to the death is incompatible with science, which is essentially a loose confederation of evolving theories in many domains.

Unfortunately, this tendency has driven some scientists to continue defending outmoded, inaccurate worldviews.

 

The tendency is also seen in the behavior of belligerent skeptics who loudly proclaim that widespread belief in psi is due to a decline in the public's critical thinking ability.

One hopes that such skeptics would occasionally apply a little skepticism to their own positions, but history amply demonstrates that science progresses mainly by funerals, not by reason and logic alone.

Understanding why the public has generally accepted the existence of psi and why science has generally rejected it requires an examination of the origins of science (Chapter 16).

In exploring this clash of beliefs, we will discover that the scientific controversy has had very little to do with the evidence itself, and very much to do with the psychology, sociology and history of science.

Discussions about underlying assumptions in science rarely surface in skeptical debates over psi, because this topic involves deeply held, often unexamined beliefs about the nature of the world.

 

It is much easier to imagine a potential flaw in one experiment and use that flaw to cast doubt on an entire class of experiments, than it is to consider the overall results of a thousand similar studies.

A related issue is how science deals with anomalies, those extraordinary "damn facts" that challenge mainstream theories.

 

Along with an understanding of the nature and value of anomalies, and how scientists react to them, we will explore the role that prejudice, in the literal sense of "pre-judging," has played in controlling what is presumed to be scientifically valid.

 

Other issues, like how scientific disciplines rarely talk to each other, and the historical abyss between science and religion, make it abundantly clear that if psychic experiences were any other form of curious natural phenomena, they would have been adopted long ago by the scientific mainstream on the basis of the evidence alone.

Beyond the themes of motivation, evidence, and understanding, resides the question, So what? Why should anyone care if psi is real or not?

The eventual scientific acceptance of psychic phenomena is inevitable.

 

The origins of acceptance are already brewing through the persuasive weight of the laboratory evidence.

 

There are converging theoretical developments from many disciplines offering glimpses at ways of understanding how psi works (Chapter 17).

There are explorations of psi effects by major industrial labs, evaluation of claims of psychic healing by the Office of Alternative Medicine of the National Institutes of Health, and articles about psi research appearing in the "serious" media.

As acceptance grows, the implications of psi will become more apparent. 

But we already know that these phenomena present profound challenges to many aspects of science, philosophy and religion (Chapter 18).

 

and matter.

 

Philosophers will rekindle the perennial debates over the role of consciousness in the physical world.

Theologians will reconsider the concept of divine intervention, as some phenomena previously considered to be miracles will probably become subject to scientific understanding.

These reconsiderations are long overdue.

An exclusive focus on what might be called "the outer world" has led to a grievous split between the private world of human experience and the public world as described by science.

In particular, science has provided little understanding of profoundly important human concepts like hope and meaning.

The split between the objective and the subjective has in the past been dismissed as a non-problem, or as a problem belonging to religion and not to science.

But this split has also led to major technological blunders, and a rising popular antagonism toward science.

 

This is a pity, because scientific methods are exceptionally powerful tools for overcoming personal biases and building workable models of the "truth."

There is every reason to expect that the same methods that gave us a better understanding of galaxies and genes will also shed light on experiences described by mystics throughout history.

Now let's explore a little more closely what we're talking about.

 

What is psi?

Remote Viewing: The Last Frontier – Library of Rickandria

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Four general themes by Dean Radin (1997) (basecamp.com)

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Four general themes by Dean Radin (1997) – Library of Rickandria