Society for Psychical Research

Abstract

THE Society for Psychical Research has issued a pamphlet de ribing its work (31 Tavistock Square, Londoftf C.l. Pp. 20. 3d.). It is not generally that the Society is a scientific society with aMkfiory of more than sixty years work. It originated a distinguished group of trained thinkers in the University of Cambridge who were interested in the problem of those mental phenomena which appeared to fall outside the recognized laws of mental life. The Society sets out to examine phenomena of this class in a scientific spirit, and has during its existence collected and sifted evidence for and against: (1) the acquisition of knowledge without the use of the ordinary channels of sense, (2) communications purporting to come from the dead, (3) certain types of physical phenomena alleged to occur in the presence of a particular type of medium. The fact that some phenomena are apparently contradictory of recognized scientific laws is not in itself an adequate reason for thinking them to be unworthy of study. Already a considerable body of research exists concerned with telepathy, clairvoyance, the relation of such conditions to psychotherapy and the problems of survival. Modern methods of statistical analysis have proved of great value in the interpretation and arrangement of data. The Society is not concerned with mere trickery or trivial anecdotal evidence; but aims at trying to understand, in the interests of truth, phenomena which, if eventually proved, will have an important bearing on our concept of personality.