Aduke.2037
net.misc
utzoo!decvax!harpo!duke!bcw
Thu Apr 15 02:47:26 1982
PSI [sic] and other paranormal topics
Re: PSI [sic] and other paranormal topics
From: Bruce C. Wright @ Duke University
There have been a number of comments in this newsgroup about
"PSI" [sic] abilities. The discussion has been extremely
inexact (possibly a reflection on the field...); however, I
think it might be helpful if terminology were used correctly
instead of thrown about in ways which bias the argument. In
particular, the term "PSI" is probably the worst offender,
since it is often used by the parapsychological community to
refer to a hypothetical [!] particle which has something of
the relationship to paranormal abilities as the photon has
to light transmission (especially in the case of telepathy).
This term has already been allocated by the physicists to
name an elementary particle, which is NOT the particle which
has been hypothesized by the parapsychologists.
Even worse is that the term is not too exact anyway; there
are a wide variety of reported parapsychological phenomena,
which that term (as well as the over-used "ESP") lumps into
one box. It would be more exact to use such terms as
telepathy, psychokinesis, or whatever rather than the vague
terms whenever possible.
Much of the discussion has centered around telepathy. This
is in many ways the least far-out of the entire grab bag,
except for the strange ideas brought out for it: for example,
that communication is impervious to physical barriers; that
communication takes place instantaneously rather than at the
speed of light, sound, or whatever (apparently violating
causality); and that it is a mind-mind (or at least brain-
brain) communication with no intervening mediation (as in a
normal sense like sight or hearing). The evidence for the
phenomenon itself is pretty shakey, but the rest is pure
faith; many of the proponents seem to have confused what
they would like to be true with what nature is really like.
Many of the questions have related to the perceived "invasion
of privacy" which might be implied by telepathy. This implies
that the target has no control over whether the percipient can
sense his thoughts (and that those thoughts can be percieved
in detail rather than as a vague outline such as an emotional
state). There is likewise not a shred of evidence that this
is the case.
Nevertheless, the "invasion of privacy" issue has a good deal
of relevance to another area: that of psychology. It does
not seem too farfetched today that in the not too distant
future it will be possible for people (possibly with the aid
of machines) to be aware of a great deal of the mental state
of others through purely mundane means. Much of what has been
said can be translated directly to this far more likely
paradigm.
Are there any other "paranormal" areas whose domain is being
threatened by real science? And if so, what would be the
social consequences of that? An interesting question would
be whether the perfection of the above psychological tech-
niques might give the public the impression of true telepathy,
thereby enhancing the image of the other paranormal topics.
This could badly damage science if the public were to take
all of the other paranormal claims at face value when one
specific "ability" could be simulated by normal means.
Bruce C. Wright @ Duke University
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