Talk:Parapsychology

Lead statement needs some clarity

From the lead:

“ In the US, interest in research peaked in the 1970s and university-based research is now slight, although private institutions still receive considerable funding. ”

With the reference:

“ (Odling-Smee 2007) "The status of paranormal research in the United States is now at an all-time low, after a relative surge of interest in the 1970s. Money continues to pour from philanthropic sources to private institutions, but any chance of credibility depends on ties with universities, and only a trickle of research now persists in university labs." ”

We should be clear that the "considerable funding" is done because there are "philanthropic sources" who fund them. Not governments, not universities, and not respectable foundations. Currently, the reader could be lead to believe that parapsychology is being funded in respectable ways when it, in fact, is not. In short, the poor credibility of parapsychology is not well addressed in this sentence even though the source is clearly indicating that this is the reason these facts are of interest.

ScienceApologist (talk) 21:26, 21 December 2009 (UTC)

One of the funny points of this criticism is that it highlights the, I would argue, unique position of Parapsychology 'parapsychology is not being funded in respectable ways'. Im happy to see that we can all agree with the statement 'parapsychology is underfunded'. Forced to produce what research it can in a very hostile environment. Despite 100 years of research, which has improved considerably over time, no funding is being made available - any other areas of science able to claim this? There is then the flip side, criticism of positive results = no one is replicating it, although no mention of a lack of funding and support for what can be time consuming and complex experiments is given. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Caernunos (talk • contribs) 11:29, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

No one agreed that parapsychology is being underfunded, in my opinion parapsychology is being over-funded. Why continue to fund a dead end like parapsychology, with it's consistent methodologically flawed studies and hazy if not meaningless theoretical framework and subject matter?71.126.177.145 (talk) 09:19, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

I believe someone stated earlier that parapsychology is funded privately...meaning someone finds it important to our future. I'm also assuming you haven't had a precognitive experience. I have always been a firm believer in God and found my vision to change everything I had thought of before. Im swf 29 and feel this could link us to something like time travel. Which would allow us to talk with Einstein if we needed to. Which may lead to curing cancer. As much as I would love to give you the information that could solve the problem I'm keeping it to myself because like I said, Im a single white female and I know you men would love to take this info and run with it...ta ta! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.111.200.121 (talk) 05:44, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

In other words, SWF IP, you know absolutely nothing, and you're just trying to be "cheeky" and intrigue people. Which, by the way, failed miserably. Anyone who claims to have "precognitive experiences" or "powers" of any kind... take the James Randi test! Get a million dollars pretty much for free! If you won't, you don't have "powers". If you fail the test, you don't have "powers" - you get to set your own parameters for the test, so you can't fault the experiment for your failure. If psychics were actually real, there wouldn't be "misses". Why would people have such an unequivocal ability? How useless is that?! It's all confirmation bias. You had a similar dream to a plane crash, or whatever, then when plane crash occurs you're unconsciously embellishing your memory of the dream to make it identical. Truth is, we only have your word to go on, therefore there's no evidence. 203.45.42.121 (talk) 03:39, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Psychotronics

Anybody around here speak Czech? The psychotronics subsection was added in good faith and appears to be well-sourced, but the English in most places is incomprehensible. Might be good for someone with dual fluency to have a look at the sources and try to decipher the passage. Cosmic Latte (talk) 08:48, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

My colleague is in China. When his come back - correktions mistakes. I am sorry to do not know obout it. Will be patient.--94.74.204.16 (talk) 18:26, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good to me! Thank you for your contributions. The parts of the subsection that I do (or think I do) understand sound interesting, and your colleague's help will be much appreciated. Thanks again, Cosmic Latte (talk) 09:35, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

Is is better quality, do you understand?--94.74.204.16 (talk) 19:28, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Psychotronics was deleted a while ago, I then redirected it here since the only RELIABLE source I could find suggested that it was just a new word used by Russians and other Eastern Bloc countries to make parasychology sound like real science. I added this fact into the article when I made the redirect. The psychotronics section from this article was recently moved to psychotronics which brought my attention to it again.

It was still incomprehensible in my view and the sources did not look remotely reliable - symposium notes from advocates of psychotronic research forming their own associations? I therefore reverted to the redirect. If there is to be any progress in this section, it needs to be made here BEFORE being split off. This article has a higher editor complement, so there is more chance of useful progress. Splitting it off is just avoiding the problem of how to deal with a badly written, badly referenced section. GDallimore (Talk) 13:20, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree that the sources for the added section do not look appropriate. There is more of a problem here than just the readability of the language. MartinPoulter (talk) 13:41, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

physics ≠ (Not Equal to)mechanics, physics ≠ optics ... parapsychology ≠ spiritism, parapsychology ≠ psychotronics ... skepticism ≠ science, skepticism ≠ stupidity--194.50.64.137 (talk) 14:27, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

This source would appear to disagree with you. GDallimore (Talk) 23:32, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Parapsychology ≠ Psychotronics

M. Ryzl does not make psychotronics. Psychotronics is specially nonacademic activity.--194.50.64.137 (talk) 06:04, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Only "Psychotronics by Russians and other Eastern Bloc countries" (Psychotronics who was deleted) ≠ "Parapsychology", but "Psychotronics by USA and other Western Blog coutries" (there is not information obout) = like "Parapsychology". Your deleted is very bad.--188.175.139.22 (talk) 16:31, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

YOUR PSYCHOTRONICS CENSURE AND REDIRECT IS AWFUL. THE TERM PARAPSYCHOLOGY DON'T TELL NOTHING AT ALL ABOUT PSYCHOTRONICS. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Notthatwisen00b (talk • contribs) 10:35, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Astrology?

Ok, so I was reading this for an essay in ToK, but it offers conflicting information about astrology in parapsychology. In the header it says astrology is a part of parapsychology, but further down it says that it is not studied. Some consistency would be nice. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.110.95.115 (talk) 20:48, 23 January 2011 (UTC) In the header there are a lot of topics not investigated by parapsychology. This article is severely hampered by misunderstanding of the scientific endeavour. Ghosts are also not studied under a strict definition of parapsychology, neither are tarot cards or astrology for instance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Caernunos (talk • contribs) 10:45, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

75.111.200.121 (talk) 05:56, 2 May 2012 (UTC)Hi, I noticed that too...That the two were not linked together. When in fact they have alot to do with each other. The "meta" meaning beyond has a lot to do with astrology. Astrology is intertwined with God, spiritual beings, and our soul. People who are studying this but haven't actually had a precognitive experience without it being natural are wasting their time...I would never be able to understand this if it didn't just happen to happen. Does that make sense. How do you explain the feelings involved when you haven't actually been there? How do you explain how you got there to begin with? This happening is a gift from God. God is supposedly the master of the universe when I think in reality every part of our world and beyond is interconnected. God IS the universe...he has angels, spirits, the stars, and who knows really what else...UFO'S. I've never seen one but now I believe they are a part of something bigger.75.111.200.121 (talk) 05:56, 2 May 2012 (UTC)Whitney Weatherford

Theory building

I like the new theory section, lots of well-referenced material there and it's an area that needed to be covered. I have an issue with the presentation of the "Evaluation" section though, particularly this sentence:

“ However, there are some aspects of parapsychology which are characteristic of a "young science". ”

This seems rather declaratory, I think it needs to be couched more as an opinion of the source, Irwin, because it's a statement that many equally reliable sources would contradict. The following sentence is better, attributing similar statements to "proponents of parapsychology". Assuming that Irwin is also a proponent of parapsychology, perhaps this could be merged into a single sentence such as:

“ However, proponents of parapsychology state that it has aspects that are characteristic of a "young" or "frontier" science. [four refs] ”

Also, I think if the whole "Evaluation" subsection could be moved up to the top of the section with the title removed, and edited into an introduction and overview of the "Theory building" section. It's very close to being an overview already, and I don't think it looks right as a final subsection. Ryan Paddy (talk) 23:47, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

I have softened the wording (see bold type) of this paragraph and believe it should be retained as is, to provide a good balance:

Parapsychological theories are currently viewed as pseudoscientific by the scientific community as they are incompatible with well established laws of science, and parapsychologists have no agreed framework for discussing and testing its claimed phenomena. However, there are some aspects of parapsychology which could be interpreted as being characteristic of a "young science". Proponents of parapsychology have seen it as an "embryo science", a "frontier science of the mind", and a "frontier discipline for advancing knowledge".

I am concerned at the repeated use of the word "pseudoscience" in the article, and note that the word finder says that "pseudosci" is used 12 times. This really is too much. Johnfos (talk) 15:19, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Ryan the stuff about parapsychology being a "new science" is utter nonsense, it doesn't need to be in the evaluation section at all, it is already mentioned at the top of the article, as far as I can see Johnfos included it in hes also been deleting other references which define these parapsychology theories as pseudoscience or condradict known scientific laws but I now understand why he has done this as he claims there are too many references claiming psi is pseudoscience, but you have to understand that is the view of the scientific community. Also the "evaluation" sub section was also added by Johnfos, the original version that I created never had that subsection instead it was included at the beginning of the section as an Introduction. 90% of parapsychology theories are pseudoscience and that needs to be made clear in the article, one of the only theories which isnt was the electromagnetic theory as it has been tested which has a couple of peer reviewed papers, see the work of Persinger for example in its support but has since fallen out of favour it seems and most parapsychologists oppose it. GreenUniverse (talk) 03:27, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

"Utter nonsense", indeed. I think it is fair to say that GreenUniverse has some strong views on parapsychology. I have acted in good faith to try and make his contributions more neutral and encyclopedic, and I would have thought that my edits and edit summaries here made that very clear. Johnfos (talk) 07:31, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

It has nothing to do with my personal views, it comes down to what the sources say. The majority of scientists claim parapsychology is a pseudoscience and that is what the sources say and that is what wikipedia goes with it has nothing to do with personal views. Do you also want to claim angels and astrology is not pseudoscience? GreenUniverse (talk) 11:13, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

You seem intent on making this personal. I find this sometimes happens when an editor has run out of rational arguments. Johnfos (talk) 14:18, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

John you you refuse to answer the question. We have repeatable third party references saying that the majority of parapsychological theories are pseudoscience, this has been well documented for over 50 years. It does not matter what you, nor I or any other wikipedia editors thinks about this, wikipedia is not about personal belief, it is about what the sources say, do you understand that? You seem to be desperate to remove any criticism or tone down references which claim parapsychology is a pseudoscience on the article, can you explain yourself? GreenUniverse (talk) 14:32, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

I've already answered your question. I said above that "I am concerned at the repeated use of the word "pseudoscience" in the article, and note that the word finder says that "pseudosci" is used 12 times. This really is too much." Even though this is the predominant view it doesn't need to be repeated over and over in every section of the article. Your material on theories twice said that parapsychological theories are pseudoscientific, and I think (from memory) I removed one of those, as I felt that having it said twice in one section was excessive. Johnfos (talk) 16:21, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for making a change John, but unfortunately I don't think it works. To say something "could be interpreted as x" is still an unattributed declaration. Also, that phrasing doesn't sound encyclopedic. There are reliable sources who would state that parapsychology cannot and should not be "interpreted as" a young science, so what you've got is still a contentious statement from a source, and it's not appropriate to couch such opinions in such a declaratory fashion. I think you need to attribute the statement to the source in some manner, either as a "proponent of parapsychology" or perhaps by using the source's name. I'm unclear why this particular statement can't be run together with the other, very similar, statements as I suggested, assuming that the source is also a "proponent of parapsychology". Saying that these repetitive sentences are there to "provide a good balance" doesn't explain their repetitiveness. Ryan Paddy (talk) 19:01, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

• If John is well read and has access to sources, then perhaps he might want to help in adding a quantum physics sub section to the theories section. We don't want to overpact the section and I think that might be the last one, QM seems to be advocated by quite a few parapsychologists it is notable and we have much criticism of their theories in this area, of course their spiritual interpretations of QM is pseudoscience and have been criticised in many publications, but it should be easy to locate sources for this and describe what they are advocating. GreenUniverse (talk) 02:32, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

• There is an overview here of theories some of which relating to quantum physics by proponents of parapsychology.Link GreenUniverse (talk) 20:12, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

OMG. You have no idea what you're talking about Johnfos. PSEUDOSCIENCE means "fake" science. And the phenomena behind this science is that parapsychology has everything to do with everything. In a way, it's almost like a secret society. God chooses who he wants in it. I'm not 100% sure of this but I do know experiencing this is not a choice. I'm a psychology major at Tech barely getting by in school because of boredom. The energy gets sucked out of me because I can sense everyone's stresses. I am a completely normal girl with a normal life. Except that I'm gifted. You cannot understand any of this Johnof because it's not something you can teach yourself. A person has to be born truly gifted and blessed. I would have to disagree with the statement this fairly new. I think people cannot talk about it because society rejects this because of Christianity and religious views...Im sure some of the greatest minds knew all this, the term parapsychology wasn't coined until the 1900's.75.111.200.121 (talk) 06:13, 2 May 2012 (UTC)Whitney Weatherford

• Perhaps "God chooses who he wants in it", but until a reliable source says so, well, we'll just stick with what reliable sources say. if this god is real, perhaps it could provide some evidence. bobrayner (talk) 13:09, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

OFFENSIVE

I think that classifi]ying "life after death" under paranorma would be offensive to some people. Glenzo999 (talk) 19:22, 16 April 2012 (UTC) 19:22, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

So? — Jeraphine Gryphon ^(talk) 20:47, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

bosch picture

Guyonthesubway and I have been edit warring over an image from bosch that is of a luminous indication of divinity and he is trying to keep it included as an image of a NDE. I say that bosch's use of light and "tunnels" is actually a study of crepuscular rays and refraction which is seen in many of his paintings such as War in Heaven. the point is, however, that the opinions of neither of us are relevant to Wikipedia. If there is a source which connects bosch to NDEs, please show it. Otherwise, don't insult the art history of this Bosch piece. 24.215.188.24 (talk) 05:02, 6 June 2012 (UTC)

A reasonable person would take a quick google search and find that many NDE authors use this painting as an example of a depiction of an NDE. That's enough for a reasonable man to source it as 'many NDE authors use this painting as a depiction of an NDE'. Lets see... death.. check. tunnel of light. check. supernatural figures. check. Anybody else care? Guyonthesubway (talk) 13:34, 6 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree that the Ascent of the Blessed has been explicitly connected by several NDE researchers as an illustration of the NDE: Pim van Lommel, Evelyn Elsaesser-Valarino, PMH Atwater and others. The first two have explicit references in the NDE article, now that the edit has been restored. The reference made by PMH Atwater is in The Big Book of Near-Death Experiences, p. 5. There is also Beyond the Light: Files of Near-Death Experiences by Marisa St. Clair that features the picture on the back cover. --EPadmirateur (talk) 06:16, 7 June 2012 (UTC)

Those references don't make a serious contention that this picture is of a NDE; it's for "filler" purposes rather than any claim that it is an attempted illustration of NDE. This would be akin to if our article on horror films using Munch's The Scream since there are books on horror which use the image as filler. 50.74.135.246 (talk) 20:32, 7 June 2012 (UTC)

The image is relevant and not just a filler, and so needs to be included. I agree with what EPadmirateur has said. Johnfos (talk) 06:25, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

Ostensible?

In my day (it has been a long while), words like "ostensible" were thought to be superfluous violations of WP:NPOV. See intro. Tom Haws (talk) 02:08, 29 July 2012 (UTC)

They still are considered that, as far as I know. Have removed. I've also not been very active for a while, but I recall there is a ruling by ArbCom stating you can't use language like that about subjects like these. Hardly surprising that people aren't aware of that though, given that I can't find it even though I know it exists. Have had a look through the overview of fringe theory cases article but couldn't spot the ruling in those cases. Ryan Paddy (talk) 18:52, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

Copyright problem removed

Prior content in this article duplicated one or more previously published sources. Copied or closely paraphrased material has been rewritten or removed and must not be restored, unless it is duly released under a compatible license. (For more information, please see "using copyrighted works from others" if you are not the copyright holder of this material, or "donating copyrighted materials" if you are.) For legal reasons, we cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or published material; such additions will be deleted. Contributors may use copyrighted publications as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously, and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. While we appreciate contributions, we must require all contributors to understand and comply with these policies. Thank you. IRWolfie- (talk) 22:36, 26 August 2012 (UTC)

Possible copyright problem

This article has been revised as part of a large-scale clean-up project of multiple article copyright infringement. (See the investigation subpage) Earlier text must not be restored, unless it can be verified to be free of infringement. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or printed material; such additions must be deleted. Contributors may use sources as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously. IRWolfie- (talk) 22:40, 26 August 2012 (UTC)

It says on the talkpage copyright concerns that the user had done a few unattributed merges, - not copyright infringement. Theres no evidence any of that information in the theory section is taken or copied from anywhere, hence no reason for it to be deleted. Start scanning through it and theres no evidence for copyright infringement. Ghosts Ghouls (talk) 19:28, 29 September 2012 (UTC)

I have found incidents of copyright infringement by this banned sockpuppet. Here is an example of text you have inserted: "there is no need to base a theory of psi on physical principles." is almost verbatim from "Entangled Minds: Extrasensory Experiences in a Quantum Reality". It's up to your to do the checks if you restore the material because you are accepting responsibility. You reverted me 8 minutes after I removed the text, I'm going to guess you haven't done your due diligence on restoring the banned sockpuppets material. IRWolfie- (talk) 19:35, 29 September 2012 (UTC)

You havn't found any incidents, if you did you would point out the page numbers etc. I also find it strange that you deleted all of GreenUniverse's material regarding the theories but keep his references for the "Evaluation" where he claimed there is no evidence for a theory of parapsychology in science. You are like a creationist quote mining bits and pieces you like and don't like, whilst deleting the rest as "copyright infringement". There is no copyright infringement in what that user added, and according to his case page was banned for merging articles together not copyright infringement. You obviously havn't done your research and have been exposed as biased on this matter. You are also now claiming GreenUniverse is me well that is false becuase I believe in the paranormal, perhaps you should scan of some of that users edits and every paranormal article on wikipedia he claimed none of it exists and offered the skeptical viewpoint. Ghosts Ghouls (talk) 20:57, 29 September 2012 (UTC)

IRWolfie writes on the sockpuppet article Sockpuppet investigations "he makes claims about GreenUniverse, including that he was skeptical (this was not the case) while he is not etc". Please do your research on GreenUniverse and you will see he was banned from wikipedia for merging and deleting articles not copyright infringement, check out his edits on things like ectoplasm or spirit photography and you can see he wrote these articles in a position to conclude these things do not exist, he was a skeptic of the paranormal this is the opposite of myself. You are not making any sense by claiming I am GreenUniverse. Yes I have just looked through this users edits and perhaps I have similar interest to this user, but unlike her/him not to "debunk" them. It is true I have just created the Jule Eisenbud article but only becuase it came up red on the parapsychology page. Eisenbud was a psychologist who believed ESP was real. Ghosts Ghouls (talk) 21:27, 29 September 2012 (UTC)

We blocked GreenUniverse as a sockpuppet, not for merging articles. See Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/BookWorm44/Archive. Dougweller (talk) 12:17, 1 October 2012 (UTC)

Rebuttals

The section on rebuttals is completely WP:UNDUE and contrary to WP:FRINGE. I've started a discussion on the talk page. IRWolfie- (talk) 20:12, 29 September 2012 (UTC)

The removed section looks to me like parapsychology apologetics with special pleading for the lack of scientific evidence.

I don't think such content is encyclopedic in nature and as Wolfie pointed out, it appears to run afoul of WP:FRINGE. The article should present the mainstream, scientific evaluation of the subject without the juxtaposition of minority claims; doing so gives the appearance of an equal validity not reflected by academic sourcing. Sædon^talk 21:23, 29 September 2012 (UTC)

I concur. It's special pleading and speculation, and a good bit of irrelevent griping, too. There are major problems with weight, and some of the sources are not reliable. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 05:18, 30 September 2012 (UTC)

Much of what I removed was put there by the banned sockpuppet GreenUniverse. If people want to re-insert material by a banned sockpuppet they require consensus, some of the material has copyright issues as I indicated above. IRWolfie- (talk) 10:44, 30 September 2012 (UTC)

Indicating what certain scientists in the parapsychological community have responded to criticism is perfectly DUE. You're coming from the standpoint that parapsychology is like other FRINGE issues, which the article makes clear it is not. As with any other science -and it's not up to you to define science- we should note what scientists in the field believe. This allows for responses to criticism. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.103.95.226 (talk) 03:58, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

You need reliable third party sources, not apologia by advocates. ----Snowded ^TALK 05:12, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

Good point, although I suspect that such sources would also be attacked as apologetics. But deleting it due to a purported WEIGHT issue is wrong. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.103.95.226 (talk) 05:22, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

The edit was not justified by wikipedia principles, until you do that any experienced editor will delete it and you are wasting everyones time. ----Snowded ^TALK 06:23, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

Indeed, I would have deleted it myself. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 10:14, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

It's likely that these are more sockpuppets of BookWorm44. They are back trying to push his contributions. IRWolfie- (talk) 11:43, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

The education of the parapsychologists

It's worth noting that many or most of the parapsychologists have actually a psychologists' degree. I hope you may add this to the article in order to further the seriousness of it (because they are not off the street or some con-artists like that...) 37.200.45.6 (talk) 09:06, 6 January 2013 (UTC)