Society for Psychical Research

Society for Psychical Research
Abbreviation SPR
Formation 1882 (1882)
Legal status Non-profit organisation
Purpose Parapsychology
Location
Region served
Worldwide
Membership
Psi researchers
President
 Prof John Poynton
Main organ
 SPR Council
Website SPR

The Society for Psychical Research (SPR) is a non-profit organisation in the United Kingdom. Its stated purpose is to understand events and abilities commonly described as psychic or paranormal. It claims to be the "first society to conduct organised scholarly research into human experiences that challenge contemporary scientific models."[1] It does not however, since its inception in 1882, hold any corporate opinions: SPR members have a variety of beliefs or lack thereof about the reality and nature of the phenomena studied.[2]

History

Henry Sidgwick, a founding member of the SPR
Frank Podmore, a notable sceptical member

Origins

The Society for Psychical Research (SPR) originated from a discussion between journalist Edmund Rogers and the physicist William F. Barrett in autumn 1881. This led to a conference on the 5 and 6 January 1882 at the headquarters of the British National Association of Spiritualists which the foundation of the Society was proposed.[3] The committee included Barrett, Rogers, Stainton Moses, Charles Massey, Edmund Gurney, Hensleigh Wedgwood and Frederic W. H. Myers.[4] The SPR was formally constituted on the 20 February 1882 with philosopher Henry Sidgwick as its first president.[5][6][7]

The SPR was the first organisation of its kind in the world, its stated purpose being "to approach these varied problems without prejudice or prepossession of any kind, and in the same spirit of exact and unimpassioned enquiry which has enabled science to solve so many problems, once not less obscure nor less hotly debated."[8]

Other early members included the chemist William Crookes, physicist Oliver Lodge, Nobel laureate Charles Richet and psychologist William James.[9]

Areas of study included thought-transference, mediumship, Reichenbach phenomena, apparitions and haunted houses and the physical phenomena associated with séances.[10][11]

Research

Much of the early work involved investigating, exposing and in some cases duplicating fake phenomena. In the late 19th century, SPR investigations into séance phenomena led to the exposure of many fraudulent mediums.[12]

Richard Hodgson distinguished himself in that area. In 1884, Hodgson was sent by the SPR to India to investigate Helena Blavatsky and concluded that her claims of psychic power were fraudulent.[13] Among the phenomena that Hodgson investigated was the alleged miraculous Mahatma letters which were said to magically appear over a four-year period in a cabinet in the Shrine Room at the Theosophical headquarters in Madres.[14] Hodgson in his report wrote that the letters were frauds and had been written by Blavatsky herself who had put them in the cabinet from an opening in her bedroom located behind the Shrine room.[14] Hodgson's report was later examined by Vernon Harrison who outlined flaws in his work. Harrison concluded that the letters were forgeries but were not written by Blavatsky but by ex-employees for revenge.[15]

Among the first important works was the two-volume publication in 1886, Phantasms of the Living co-authored by Gurney, Myers and Frank Podmore.[16]

In 1886 and 1887 a series of publications by S. J. Davey, Hodgson and Sidgwick in the SPR journal exposed the slate writing tricks of the medium William Eglinton.[17] Hodgson with his friend, S. J. Davey had staged fake séances for educating the public (including SPR members). Davey gave sittings under an assumed name, duplicating the phenomena produced by Eglinton, and then proceeded to point out to the sitters the manner in which they had been deceived. Because of this, some spiritualist members such as Stainton Moses resigned from the SPR.[17]

In 1891, Alfred Russel Wallace requested for the Society to properly investigate spirit photography.[18] Eleanor Sidgwick responded with a critical paper in the SPR which cast doubt on the subject and revealed the fraudulent methods that spirit photographers such as Édouard Isidore Buguet, Frederic Hudson and William H. Mumler had utilized.[19]

In 1894, the Census of Hallucinations was published which sampled 17, 000 people. Out of these, 1, 684 persons admitted to having experienced a hallucination of an apparition.[20]

The SPR investigated many spiritualist mediums such as Eva Carrière and Eusapia Palladino.[21] Due to the exposure of William Hope and other fraudulent mediums, Arthur Conan Doyle led a mass resignation of eighty-four members of the Society for Psychical Research, as they believed the Society was opposed to spiritualism.[22] Science historian William Hodson Brock has noted that "By the 1900s most avowed spiritualists had left the SPR and gone back to the BNAS (the London Spiritualist Alliance since 1884), having become upset by the sceptical tone of most of the SPR's investigations."[23]

During the early twentieth century, the SPR studied a series of automatic scripts and trance utterances from a group of automatic writers, known as the cross-correspondences.[24] The SPR were to introduce a number of neologisms which have entered the English language, such as 'telepathy', which was coined by Frederic Myers.[25]

The Society is run by a President and a Council of twenty members, and is open to interested members of the public to join. The organisation is based at 49 Marloes Road, Kensington, London, with a library and office open to members, and with large book and archival holdings in Cambridge University Library, Cambridgeshire, England.[26] It publishes the peer reviewed quarterly Journal of the Society for Psychical Research (JSPR), the irregular Proceedings and the magazine Paranormal Review. It holds an annual conference, regular lectures and two study days per year[1][27] and supports the LEXSCIEN on-line library project.[28]

Famous cases investigated by the Society include Borley Rectory and the Enfield Poltergeist.

Criticism from sceptics

Edward Clodd, a critic of the SPR

Sceptics have criticized the SPR for essentially having a secret religious motive. After the publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species (1859), it was difficult for those with a scientific education to retain a belief in tenets of the Judeo-Christian religion. Early SPR members like Henry Sidgwick and Frederic W. H. Myers hoped to cling to something spiritual through psychical research.[29][30]

The sceptic and physicist Victor J. Stenger has written:

Investigations of mediums continued into the twentieth century, and the SPR and ASPR on occasion exposed blatant cases of fraud even their own credulous memberships could not swallow. But their journals have never succeeded in achieving a high level of credibility in the eyes of the rest of the scientific community. Today the psychical research journals continue as forums for believers to press their ideas, to respond to the attacks of sceptics, and to attack the sceptics in return. Nothing is wrong with that, as long as the editorial bias is admitted. The volumes occasionally contain some respectable studies, but most articles usually begin with the assumption that psychic phenomena are demonstrated realities. Since this is a belief and not an empirical fact, one might be justified in viewing the SPR and ASPR today as religious rather than scientific institutions.[31]

Ivor Lloyd Tuckett an author of an early sceptical work on psychical research wrote that even though the SPR have collected some valuable work, most of its active members have "no training in psychology fitting them for their task, and have been the victims of pronounced bias, as sometimes they themselves have admitted."[32] Trevor H. Hall an ex-member of the Society for Psychical Research criticized SPR members as "credulous and obsessive wish... to believe." Hall also claimed SPR members "lack knowledge of deceptive methods."[33]

Rationalist writer Edward Clodd claimed that the SPR members William F. Barrett and Oliver Lodge were incompetent researchers to detect fraud and suggested that their spiritualist beliefs were based on magical thinking and primitive superstition.[34] Clodd analyzed the SPR and saw nothing more than "barbaric spiritual philosophy", he mocked the language of SPR members "subliminal consciousness" and "telepathic energy" as a disguise for "bastard supernaturalism."[35]

Some sceptical members have resigned from the SPR. Eric Dingwall resigned and wrote "After sixty years' experience and personal acquaintance with most of the leading parapsychologists of that period I do not think I could name half a dozen whom I could call objective students who honestly wished to discover the truth."[36]

Psychological study

A psychological study involving 174 members of the Society for Psychical Research completed a delusional ideation questionnaire and a deductive reasoning task. As predicted, the study showed that "individuals who reported a strong belief in the paranormal made more errors and displayed more delusional ideation than sceptical individuals". There was also a reasoning bias which was limited to people who reported a belief in, rather than experience of, paranormal phenomena. The results suggested that reasoning abnormalities may have a causal role in the formation of paranormal belief.[37]

Presidents

The following is a list of presidents:

Society for Psychical Research
1882-1884   Henry Sidgwick (1838–1900), Professor, Trinity College, Cambridge; Philosopher and Economist
1885-1887 Balfour Stewart (1827–1887), Professor, Owenham College, Manchester; Physicist
1888-1892   Henry Sidgwick (→ 1882), Professor, Trinity College, Cambridge; Philosopher and Economist
1893 Arthur Balfour KG, OM, PC, DL (1848–1930), later Prime Minister, known for the Balfour Declaration
1894-1895 William James (1842–1910) Professor, Harvard University; American Psychologist, Philosopher and Physician
1896-1899 Sir William Crookes (1832–1919), Physical Chemist, discovered the element Thallium, invented the Crookes tube
1900 Frederic W. H. Myers (1843–1901), Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge; Classicist and Philosopher
1901-1903 Sir Oliver Lodge (1851–1940), Professor, University College, Liverpool; Physicist and Mathematician, developer of wireless telegraphy
1904 William F. Barrett FRS (1845–1926), Professor, Royal College of Science, Dublin; Experimental Physicist
1905 Charles Richet (1850–1935), Professor, Collège de France, Paris; French Physiologist, Nobel Prize in Medicine/Physiology 1913
1906-1907 Gerald Balfour (1853–1945), Politician, brother of Arthur Balfour; Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge
1908-1909 Eleanor Sidgwick (1845–1936), Principal, Newnham College, Cambridge; Physicist
1910 Henry Arthur Smith (1848–1922), Barrister-at-Law, Middle Temple, London; Lawyer and author of legal treatises
1911 Andrew Lang (1844–1912), Fellow, Merton College, Oxford; Classicist and writer on folklore, mythology, and religion
1912 William Boyd Carpenter KCVO (1841–1918), Pastoral Lecturer, Theology, Cambridge; Bishop of Ripon
1913 Henri Bergson (1859–1941) Professor, Collège de France, Paris; Chair of Modern Philosophy; Nobel Prize, Literature 1927
1914 F. C. S. Schiller (1864–1937), Fellow, Corpus Christi College, Oxford; Philosopher
1915-1916 Gilbert Murray (1866–1957), Regius Professor of Greek, University of Oxford; Classicist
1917-1918 Lawrence Pearsall Jacks (1860–1955), Professor, Manchester College, Oxford; Philosopher and Theologian
1919 John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh OM, PRS (1842–1919), Cavendish Professor, Trinity College, Cambridge; Physicist, Nobel Prize, Physics 1904
1920-1921 William McDougall FRS (1871–1938), Professor, Duke University; Psychologist, founder J B Rhine Parapsychology Lab
1922 Thomas Walker Mitchell (1869–1944), Physician and Psychologist, Publisher of the British Journal of Medical Psychology 1920-1935
1923 Camille Flammarion (1842–1925), founder and first president of the Société Astronomique de France, author of popular science and science fiction works
1924-1925 John George Piddington (1869–1952), Businessman, John George Smith & Co., London
1926-1927 Hans Driesch (1867–1941), Professor, Universitaet Leipzig; German Biologist and Natural Philosopher, performed first animal cloning 1885
1928-1929 Sir Lawrence Evelyn Jones (1885–1955) Honorary Fellow, Balliol College, Oxford; Author
1930-1931 Walter Franklin Prince (1863–1934), Clergyman
1932 Eleanor Sidgwick (→ 1908) and Oliver Lodge (→ 1901)
1933-1934 Edith Lyttelton (born as Edith Balfour; 1865–1948), Writer
1935-1936 C. D. Broad (1887–1971), Philosopher
1937-1938 Robert Strutt, 4th Baron Rayleigh (1875–1947), Physician
1939-1941 H. H. Price (1899–1984), Philosopher
1942-1944 Robert Henry Thouless (1894–1984), Psychologist
1945-1946 George Nugent Merle Tyrrell (1879–1952), Mathematician
1947-1948 William Henry Salter (1880–1969), Lawyer
1949 Gardner Murphy (1895–1979), Director of Research, Menninger Foundation, Topeka, Kansas; Psychologist
1950-1951 Samuel Soal (1889–1975), Mathematician
1952 Gilbert Murray (→ 1915)
1953-1955 F. J. M. Stratton (1881–1960), Astrophysicist, Professor in Cambridge University
1956-1958 Guy William Lambert (1889–1984), Diplomat
1958-1960 C. D. Broad (→ 1935)
1960-1961 H. H. Price (→ 1939)
1960-1963 E. R. Dodds (1893–1979), Hellenist, Professor in Birmingham and Oxford
1963-1965 Donald J. West (born 1924), Psychiatrist and criminologist
1965-1969 Sir Alister Hardy (1896–1985), Zoologist
1969-1971 W. A. H. Rushton (1901–1980), Physiologist, Professor in Cambridge
1971-1974 Clement Mundle (1916–1989), Philosopher
1974-1976 John Beloff (1920–2006), Psychologist at the University of Edinburgh
1976-1979 Arthur J. Ellison (1920–2000), Engineer
1980 Joseph Banks Rhine (1895–1980), Biologist and Parapsychologist
1980 Louisa Ella Rhine (1891–1983), Parapsychologist, wife of Joseph Rhine
1981-1983 Arthur J. Ellison (→ 1976)
1984-1988 Donald J. West (→ 1963)
1988-1989 Ian Stevenson (1918–2007), Psychiatrist
1992-1993 Alan Gauld (born 1932), Psychologist
1993-1995 Archie Roy (1924–2012), Professor of Astronomy in Glasgow, founded the Scottish SPR in 1987
1995-1998 David Fontana (1934–2010), Professor of Psychologist in Cardiff
1998-1999 Donald J. West (→ 1963, → 1984)
2000-2004 Bernard Carr, Professor of Mathematics and Astronomy in London
2004-2007 John Poynton, Biologist
2007-2011 Deborah Delanoy, Parapsychologist
2011- Richard S. Broughton, senior lecturer in psychology at The University of Northampton, UK

Other societies

A number of other psychical research organisations use the term 'Society for Psychical Research' in their name.

See also

References

  1. 1 2 SPR website
  2. ↑ "Join the SPR!". Society for Psychical Research. Membership does not imply acceptance of any particular opinion concerning the nature or reality of the phenomena examined, and the Society holds no corporate views.
  3. ↑ Oppenheim, Janet. (1988). The Other World: Spiritualism and Psychical Research in England, 1850-1914. pp. 136-138. ISBN 978-0521347679
  4. ↑ Luckhurst, Roger. (2002). The Invention of Telepathy, 1870-1901. Oxford University Press. p. 51. ISBN 978-0199249626
  5. ↑ Schultz, Bart. (2004). Henry Sidgwick: Eye of the Universe: An Intellectual Biography. Cambridge University Press. p. 276. ISBN 978-0521829670
  6. ↑ McCorristine, Shane. (2010). Spectres of the Self: Thinking about Ghosts and Ghost-Seeing in England, 1750–1920. Cambridge University Press. p. 110. ISBN 978-0521747967
  7. ↑ Alan Gauld, The Founders of Psychical Research (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1968), p. 138.
  8. ↑ Grattan-Guinness, Ivor. (1982). Psychical Research: A Guide to Its History, Principles and Practices: In Celebration of 100 Years of the Society for Psychical Research. Aquarian Press. p. 19. ISBN 0-85030-316-8.
  9. ↑ Christie, Drew. Societies for Psychical Research. In Michael Shermer. (2002). The Skeptic Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience. ABC-CLIO. pp. 217-219. ISBN 1-57607-653-9
  10. ↑ Thurschwell, Pamela. (2004). Literature, Technology and Magical Thinking, 1880–1920. Cambridge University Press. p. 16. ISBN 0-521-80168-0
  11. ↑ McCorristine, Shane. (2010). Spectres of the Self: Thinking about Ghosts and Ghost-Seeing in England, 1750-1920. Cambridge University Press. p. 114. ISBN 978-0-521-76798-9
  12. ↑ Moreman, Christopher M. (2010). Beyond the Threshold: Afterlife Beliefs and Experiences in World Religions. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. p. 163. ISBN 978-0-7425-6228-8 "SPR investigators quickly found that many mediums were indeed, as skeptics had alleged, operating under cover of darkness in order to perpetrate scams. They used a number of tricks facilitated by darkness: sleight of hand was used to manipulate objects and touch people eager to make contact with deceased loved ones; flour or white lines would give the illusion of spectral white hands or faces; accomplices were even stashed under tables or in secret rooms to lent support in the plot... As the investigations of the SPR, and other skeptics, were made public, many fraudulent mediums saw their careers ruined and many unsuspecting clients were enraged at the deception perpetrated."
  13. ↑ Oppenheim, Janet. (1988). The Other World: Spiritualism and Psychical Research in England, 1850-1914. pp. 175-176. ISBN 978-0521347679
  14. 1 2 Melton, J. Gordon. (2007). The Encyclopedia of Religious Phenomena. Visible Ink Press. pp. 210-211. ISBN 978-1578592098
  15. ↑ Berger, Arthur. (1988). Lives and Letters in American Parapsychology: A Biographical History, 1850-1987. McFarland. p. 19. ISBN 978-0899503455
  16. ↑ Oppenheim, Janet. (1988). The Other World: Spiritualism and Psychical Research in England, 1850-1914. pp. 141-142. ISBN 978-0521347679
  17. 1 2 Oppenheim, Janet. (1988). The Other World: Spiritualism and Psychical Research in England, 1850-1914. Cambridge University Press. pp. 139-140. ISBN 978-0521347679
  18. ↑ "The Belief in Spirit Photography". Martyn Jolly.
  19. ↑ Edmunds, Simeon. (1966). Spiritualism: A Critical Survey. Aquarian Press. p. 115. ISBN 978-0850300130 "The early history of spirit photography was reviewed by Mrs Henry Sidgwick in the Proceedings of the SPR in 1891. She showed clearly not only that Mumler, Hudson, Buguet and their ilk were fraudulent, but the way in which those who believed in them were deceived."
  20. ↑ Williams, William F. (2000). Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience: From Alien Abductions to Zone Therapy. Routledge. p. 49. ISBN 1-57958-207-9
  21. ↑ Anderson, Rodger. (2006). Psychics, Sensitives and Somnambules: A Biographical Dictionary with Bibliographies. McFarland & Company. pp. 14-132. ISBN 978-0786427703
  22. ↑ Nelson, G. K. (2013). Spiritualism and Society. Routledge. p. 159. ISBN 978-0415714624
  23. ↑ Brock, William Hodson. (2008). William Crookes (1832–1919) and the Commercialization of Science. Ashgate Publishing. p. 206. ISBN 978-0754663225
  24. ↑ Edmunds, Simeon. (1966). Spiritualism: A Critical Survey. Aquarian Press. pp. 178-180. ISBN 978-0850300130
  25. ↑ "Online Etymology Dictionary". Etymonline.com. Retrieved 10 September 2011.
  26. ↑ Cambridge University Library
  27. ↑ Edinburgh University Website
  28. ↑ "LEXSCIEN Library of Exploratory Science". Lexscien.org. Retrieved 10 September 2011.
  29. ↑ Dingwall, Eric. (1985). The Need for Responsibility in Parapsychology: My Sixty Years in Psychical Research. In Paul Kurtz. A Skeptic's Handbook of Parapsychology. Prometheus Books. pp. 161-174. ISBN 0-87975-300-5 "When the British SPR was founded, the public was led to believe that at least a scientific survey was to be made, and I have no doubt that even some of those closely associated with the early days thought so too. But Myers, among others, had no such intention and cherished no such illusion. He knew that the primary aim of the Society was not objective experimentation but the establishment of telepathy. To understand why this was so it is necessary to realize the position in which so many educated and intelligent people found themselves during the 1870s and later in Victorian England. With the emergence of new scientific concepts touching the origin of man and his place in the universe, the very foundations of their religious beliefs began to give way."
  30. ↑ Grant, John. (2015). Spooky Science: Debunking the Pseudoscience of the Afterlife. Sterling Publishing. pp. 23-24. ISBN 978-1-4549-1654-3
  31. ↑ Stenger, Victor J. (1990). Physics and Psychics: The Search for a World Beyond the Senses. Prometheus Books. pp. 161-162. ISBN 978-0-87975-575-1
  32. ↑ Tuckett, Ivor Lloyd. (1911). The Evidence for the Supernatural: A Critical Study Made with "Uncommon Sense". K. Paul, Trench, Trübner. pp. 8-9
  33. ↑ Spangenburg, Ray; Moser, Diane. (2004). The Age of Synthesis: 1800-1895. Facts on File. p. 134. ISBN 978-0816048533
  34. ↑ Clodd, Edward. (1917). The Question: A Brief History and Examination of Modern Spiritualism. Grant Richards, London. pp. 265-301
  35. ↑ Luckhurst, Roger. (2002). The Invention of Telepathy: 1870-1901. Oxford University Press. p. 163. ISBN 978-0199249626
  36. ↑ Dingwall, Eric. (1985). The Need for Responsibility in Parapsychology: My Sixty Years in Psychical Research. In Paul Kurtz. (1985). A Skeptic's Handbook of Parapsychology. pp. 161-174. Prometheus Books. ISBN 978-0879753009
  37. ↑ Lawrence, E., & Peters, E. (2004). Reasoning in believers in the paranormal. Journal of Nervous & Mental Disease, 192, 727–733.
  38. ↑ Australian Institute of Parapsychological Resesarch ers.ozemail.com.au/~amilani/ufo.html
  39. ↑ Peter Mulacz. "Austrian Society for Parapsychology". Parapsychologie.ac.at. Retrieved 10 September 2011.
  40. ↑ [McMullin, Stan (2004) Anatomy of a Séance: A History of Spirit Communication in Central Canada (Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press), p. 87.]
  41. ↑ http://www.parapsykologi.dk/
  42. ↑ "La lumière sur " L'ombre des autres "". Metapsychique.org. Retrieved 10 September 2011.
  43. ↑ Richet, Charles. Traité de Métapsychique. Bruxelles: Artha Production, 1994, p.63. ISBN 2-930111-00-3
  44. ↑ "Sálarrannsóknarfélag Íslands". Icelandic Society for Psychical Research. Retrieved 5 February 2015.
  45. ↑ Gissurarson, Loftur Reimar; Haralsson, Erlendur. "History of Parapsychology in Iceland" (PDF). International Journal of Parapsychology. 12 (1): 29–50.
  46. ↑ "Parapsychologie in Nederland (Dutch website)". Parapsy.nl. Retrieved 10 September 2011.
  47. ↑ [Barrington, Stevenson and Weaver, (2005) A World in a Grain of Sand: The Clairvoyance of Stefan Ossowiecki, Jefferson, NC, and London, McFarland, ISBN 0-7864-2112-6]
  48. ↑ http://www.sspr.co.uk
  49. ↑ http://parapsykologi.se/spf.html
  50. ↑ http://www.aspr.com/
  51. ↑ Berger, Arthur S., and Joyce Berger. The Encyclopedia of Parapsychology and Psychical Research. New York: Paragon House, 1991.

Further reading

SPR histories

Scholarly studies

Sceptical

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