August 11, 2008
Parapsychology in a nutshell:
Today's featured article on Wikipedia is a rather splendid article on parapsychology - the scientific study of the supposed paranormal phenomena of the mind.
Academic parapsychology is notable for the exceptional quality of the experiments it conducts and the inconclusive nature of its findings - at least to mainstream science.
Large reviews of many studies (meta-analyses) tend to find that 'psi' effects are statistically significant but of small effect. The disagreement comes in over whether this small effect is a genuine reflection of paranormal ability or just an artefact of research - such as negative findings being published less often.
The history and process are fascinating though, with some of the great luminaries of psychology, such as William James, having been interested in experimental studies of psychic powers.
Link to Wikipedia page on 'parapsychology'.
