What is the meaning of Parapsychology? Concept, Definition of Parapsychology

1 Concept of parapsychology in the Wikipedia Encyclopedia

Parapsychology («for» the Greek παρά "next", "Psycho" ψυχή, soul or mental activity, and «lodge»,-λογία, treated, study) is a pseudoscientific discipline that studies Paranormal phenomena such as extra-sensory perception, telekinesis, telepathy, precognition, clairvoyance, extracorporeal experiences, spiritualism or the poltergeist. The parapsicólogos refer to these events as psi phenomena.
Parapsychology is considered a pseudoscience by the scientific community, since the very existence of the paranormal is not scientifically provable. Since 1964, the James Randi Educational Foundation offers the sum of one million dollars who get, under conditions controlled and supervised laboratory, to demonstrate a single paranormal phenomena such as those mentioned above. So far nobody has been able to make a successful demonstration and the prize remains unclaimed for forty-five years.
Currently, research parapsicologica uses methodologies of fieldwork and laboratory research, and is carried out in some universities and laboratories with private funds. Although some work on parapsychology have been published in scientific journals (Psychological Bulletin, Foundations of Physics and the British Journal of Psychology), the publications about parapsychology are concentrated in magazines of associations dedicated to the subject, as the Journal of Parapsychology (published between 1959 and 1968, and then from 2000 to 2001) and the European Journal of Parapsychology (which stopped publishing in 2010 due to lack of articles).

2. Definition of parapsychology

Parapsychology is a discipline that is dedicated to the analysis of Paranormal phenomena. His field of study covers those events that cannot be explained by Psychology nor by the rest of the traditional Sciences.
You may qualify to parapsychology as a pseudoscience, since it lacks a widely accepted scientific method and also provides evidence of scientific type on their alleged discoveries. Even so, the parapsychological usually occur as real scientists.
The human being has always tried to understand phenomena that cannot be explained by science. Since the 19th century, the parapsychology began to develop procedures and similar studies to which scientists carry out though, by mentioned above, never reached the status of science.
It is important to highlight that mainstream science tends to give rational explanations to most of the paranormal events that analyzes the parapsychology. The display of Spectra, ghosts and other supernatural beings usually attributed to hallucinations, while psicofonías should alterations of magnetic fields interact with an electrical device.
Phenomena poltergeist, on the other hand, are explained by science as a result of various processes produced by electromagnetic fields, ionization and static electricity, among other physical issues.
Arguably, in short, that parapsychology has failed to demonstrate the existence of any paranormal phenomenon throughout its history. All the facts related by this pseudoscience or the alleged achievements of the parapsicólogos are in the field of guesses and theories.

3. Concept of parapsychology

P. is a branch of general psychology. Deals with impressions and perceptions operations and actions) of man - and even living organisms - which so far is unexplained physical. The concept was proposed in 1886 by Max Dessoir and nowadays is used internationally. Phenomena that are called "psychic" or "paranormal"; the prefix 'para' gives to understand that such phenomena arise or seem to occur regardless of the facts of experience which we are familiar and which we can understand through the regular categories in our way of understanding the world.
P. avoids the term used many times, of «supernatural», that points to a concept of nature too narrow and conditioned by time.
Always with remarkable homogeneity are extraordinary facts: information about events which could not be received by normal organs of the senses; unexplained operations on the corporeal world. The first group includes: premonitores dreams, announcing something hidden today or in the future, the proscopia and retroscopia, the premonitions, apparitions of dead, clairvoyance; and in the second group: announcements of death by breaking mirrors, shock, disappearance and reappearance of objects; the small and the great obsession and, especially in the legends of the Saints, the elevation above the ground (levitation). The "great mystery" men perceived since the most remote times, has seemed to oscillate for a long time between the '-> miracle ' by a party and the operations or "demonic" influences on the other (cf. - > diabolical possession). P. is proposed to investigate the phenomena in question as 'unclassified waste of our experience' with scientific methods (William James). Apart from the stories about extraordinary spontaneous events («spontaneous phenomena»), the observation of extraordinary actions intentional - clairvoyance of hidden things, prophecies, «media» Diagnostics of diseases, so-called appearance and disappearance of objects by charm, etc. - has led to distinguish two classes or groups of phenomena, that they become subject of scientific research:
1St. the question of an experience (perception) over the bodies of sensory acquaintances is investigated under three modalities: telepathy, clairvoyance and prediction.
2Nd. the question of a dependent of the subject, physically unexplained until now, effect on materials systems; a phenomenon which is called psicocinesis or telecinesis.
The three modes of 'experience or extraordinary perception' are defined as follows: the telepathy is transmission of a psychic process (sensations, feelings, images, ideas) of one subject to another without mediation of the known sensory organs; clairvoyance is the extrasensory experience of something not known by anyone: the prediction is advance knowledge of a fact future, which cannot know be by normal means, or occurs as a result of a previous feeling. This last limitation is required to exclude events causing oneself consciously or unconsciously by influence of faith in the accuracy of a 'prophetic experience», by way of an obsession of compliance. Thus, p. ej., the dream of a future accident can operate as a decisive trend leading to the accident.