What Psi is not: The Necessity for Experiments

Published in:
Edge, H.L., Morris, R.L., Palmer, J., & Rush, J.H.,
Foundations of Parapsychology,
Boston: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

INTRODUCTION

When we consider the evidence for psi, we must bear in mind that there are many ways we can be misled into thinking that we have witnessed or experienced an instance of psychic functioning. In some cases. we naturally mislead ourselves because we are not fully aware of all the factors involved. Unfortunately, we can also be deceived by deliberate fraud perpetrated by those who would fool us for their own purposes. In this chapter we survey some of the factors involved in producing events that may seem to be psychic but are not. We need to understand these factors so that we can better evaluate the likelihood of true psychic occurrences in our daily lives and in controlled laboratory research. As the next section indicates, there are also some socially important reasons why we must be aware of the strategies of deception.