A Commitment to Education in Parapsychology

This blog has two goals: to highlight the sustained commitment of the Parapsychology Foundation (PF) to education of students and researchers in the field; and to shine a light on how one of the PF’s programs — the YouTube Channel — can help with self-education.

The PF’s Focus on Education and Research

The Parapsychology Foundation has been dedicated to furthering education in the scientific study of psychic phenomena from its first day of operation. Founder Eileen J. Garrett was clearly interested in how and why her own abilities developed, as well as concerned about what she could give to scientific research that would test her abilities, illuminate her understanding, and disseminate her own intellectual reflections and feelings to those who could turn that understanding into new lines of research. She gave to the field by writing and speaking about her experiences and by funding research and establishing the Parapsychology Foundation.

The PF’s Vice President and major donor, the Honorable Frances P. Bolton, a long-time member of Congress as one of the representative from the state of Ohio, was also dedicated to education in the field, especially professional education. Not only did Mrs. Bolton make sure, using her personal funds, that the Parapsychology Foundation had everything it needed from its beginning to her death in 1977, but she took steps as Vice President to make sure that Mrs. Garrett could feel free to do her best for the global community of scientists and scholars.

One of the events Mrs. Bolton financially supported to a high level was the conference in Utrecht in the early 1950s that is now called Utrecht I. This event played a pivotal role not only in creating a more connected international community of serious researchers, but it also may have played a role in the conversations that led to the founding of the Parapsychological Association in 1957, conceived of as an international professional association for those same serious researchers. The two different and often congruent goals and wishes of those two friends, Eileen Garrett and Frances Bolton, laid an international foundation for the future of the field. I am sure the optimism and effectiveness of their acts and of the efforts of Eileen and Robert Coly, and their daughter, the current President Lisette Coly, significantly impacted on the overall hopes we all had for the scientific progress in our field over the last so many decades.

In publications and conferences across the nearly five decades since Mrs G. passed, the PF has kept up these commitments to education through its funding of small grants for students and researchers, it’s support of library fellows and the joy it takes in the

accomplishments of the PF’s extended family, while downplaying, in my opinion, the key role they’ve played in many of our lives and work. The PF’s commitment to education and research has operated in recent decades in a context of dwindling funding to the PF’s own coffers, partly caused by the fact that foundations don’t fund other foundations, and largely through the volatility of the American stock market that routinely peaks and dives — sometimes with the highs and lows replacing each other at a dizzying pace. And still that PF nest egg finds new ways to keep research and education in our field in the minds of the public, and in the realm of possibility for students and grantees.

The Consequence of the Context

The PF has had a great deal of success in its own efforts, and certainly those who it has followed and funded have had some success, but both research and education lag well behind the shared experiences built up by more conventional or mainstream fields. Very few universities provide sustained education on the experiences and phenomena that are included in parapsychology’s remit. While a handful of universities offer advanced degrees in which this type of research is possible, a few more on-site and online universities offer single courses, and a very few reputable adult education efforts also cover the scientific side of the field, things now are the same as they have always been in our field. For the majority of individuals who have serious interests in aspects of our field, education is most often a self-initiated and self-sustained occupation. In a busy world, what amounts to targeted “independent study” can fall by the wayside, especially for those who believe their previous education in other fields qualifies them completely for work in our field. Advanced education in any other discipline is a plus, but it is not solely sufficient to do productive and informed work in our field. The scientific study of psychic phenomena has a long history, a primary literature, and a great deal of knowledge that’s often ignored by those who come into the field, PhD from some other discipline in hand. If, however, our academically or scientific emigres realize more education is needed, the usual institutional fixes that other disciplines enjoy are even less available in our field. Not a lot of laboratories to visit, not a lot of room for those on sabbatical, exceedingly few post docs to gather up a new specialty. So self-initiated and self-structured study is even more important for those late career learners.

However, the good news is, the PF has made direct contributions to these efforts to bridge the gap that our marginal and controversial status in science as a whole has maintained, sometimes very vigorously. Utrecht I in 1953 was, of course, one of those contributions, the PF International Conferences including Utrecht II in 2008 are another, and the Perspectives Lecture series, the various publications of the field, and the Eileen J. Garrett Library itself, and the full financial support from 2016 through 2018 of the Parapsychology Research and Education annual course (also known as ParaMOOC) that PF Research Fellow Carlos S Alvarado and I developed and first offered on our own in 2015. (PF was one of the donors in that first year and will continue as a donor in the 2019 version of the course that will be offered later this spring.)

Along with these few ways to achieve structured and substantive education available to learners at all stages, the PF has understood that there are times when a learner needs accessible education that’s always “on”. Hence, the PF YouTube Channel.

How the PF YouTube Channel Can Help You and How You Can Help the PF

The other day when I was thinking about the PF’s central place in education in the field, it occurred to me that individuals coming into the field from other academic and scientific disciplines, or just being pushed into our direction by their own personal interests and experiences, could put together a significant program of learning using the content of the YouTube channel.

So while it has been my goal to focus on what the PF has done, and how important to the forward movement of the field those accomplishments have been and still are, it has also been my goal here to point folks towards this one largely unrecognized and accessible resource the PF provides. The almost 1500 followers on the PF YouTube Channel who have found this resource are so appreciated, and it is hoped that more people will subscribe to the channel in the future. Not only do they keep alive our hope that one day, the PF will be able to derive some income from the channel, they also comment and share and help the content get to other people who want it. Their support in just watching and sharing has been of immeasurable important to use, and their practical help in donating and spreading the word has been very valuable as well. So forgive me for this, but speaking of donating: There are donation buttons at the bottom of every page on this website, and donations are so helpful to the PF nest egg. There are mugs and other things on the PF Zazzle page, the income from which helps with the PF’s ability to sustain the library and other programs and the click throughs from links in our below-the-video description box have made a big difference for us. The PF is so appreciative of any help that anybody gives us in our efforts to keep the work continuing.

Back to self-initiated and self-sustained education: Yesterday, in preparation for this blog, I went through the PF video list and compiled some links to specific videos that when combined can provide a look at various aspects of the field of parapsychology. I made some changes depending on the overall views each video got, and also included things that I thought would really give a flavor of research over the 20th century and into the 21st. What follows is the results of that review of our videos, and believe me, the entire list of videos on the PF YouTube channel have not been exhausted.

An Introductory Course on Scientific Parapsychology, Its Past, Its Research, Its Findings: Using the YouTube Channel Now and in the Future as a Source of Self-Education in the Field

Here is a selection of the YouTube videos I chose for this blog with their clickthroughs. Arranged by topic, these videos constitute a kind of independent study list that can be used to get a handle on the scientific study of psychic phenomena, then and now.

If you bookmark this blog, you can return to the list as you go, or you can copy and paste it out into a doc you can access from your phone, tablet, or laptop at any time.

Phenomena: Extrasensory Perception

Creativity & ESP: https://youtu.be/qFGCuVSq2cA

Emotions & ESP: https://youtu.be/COtP92hFaPE

Extrasensory Perception Theory & Research: https://youtu.be/KTlxsPOPGzk

Phenomena: Precognition

Prediction and Productivity: https://youtu.be/KxRZrvyQBc8

Global Consciousness: https://youtu.be/oAiTdnOMah0

Phenomena: Reincarnation

What Evidence Do We Have for Reincarnation? https://youtu.be/VW0W8B2VdmA

Research on Children’s Memories of a Previous Life: https://youtu.be/kuMD4OPsHfQ

On Return to Life: https://youtu.be/5s7VU51TvJ0

Phenomena: After Death Communication

Sensing Contact with the Dead: A Common Experience: https://youtu.be/Biyfo3ycZac

Opening Heaven’s Door: https://youtu.be/gRASvqVZDLw

The Role of Anomalous Experiences in Bereavement: https://youtu.be/8HCTmxxr6Bg

Do Dream Encounters with the Dead Provide Any Support for the Survival Hypothesis: https://youtu.be/W-esEwy5GZo

Phenomena: Mediumship

Brief History of Mediumship: https://youtu.be/6T703aKIWzs

Brief History of Physical Mediumship: https://youtu.be/SujsqTEAqq0

Duelling Psychics: Edgar Cayce & Eileen J. Garrett: https://youtu.be/E5dhY9ba1dw

The Bindelof Material: Séance Phenomena in the 1930s: https://youtu.be/ldiZJ66ViSg

On the Bindelof Case:  https://youtu.be/bHijBukJqkY

On the Hamilton Group: https://youtu.be/M-y-GeOPYaY

A Counselling Approach to Mediumship https://youtu.be/CljNmN1fZDs

Phenomena: Ghosts and Hauntings

The Reality of Ghost Busting Part 1: https://youtu.be/8dT6V1qtx6k

The Reality of Ghost Busting Part 2: https://youtu.be/Y_3Nf_pHIGM

The Q & A from The Reality of Ghost Busting: https://youtu.be/GZaeVTt03QM

Is the Merchant House Haunted? https://youtu.be/tLCIQVo5Qo4

Research in the Field as a Whole

Introduction to the Scientific Study of Psychic Phenomena: https://youtu.be/NeETXXB1sS8

Geographical View of Parapsychology: https://youtu.be/iPJLb7XKSeo

Parapsychology: Handbook for the 21^st Century: https://youtu.be/qE2aGp4jots

Recent Work on the History of Parapsychology: https://youtu.be/A7BBTjkfQ94

Parapsychology in the 21^st Century: https://youtu.be/HScEpCCgYzI

International Research

Research in Parapsychology in Argentina (1980-2015): https://youtu.be/75D44LwWpvk

Parapsychology in Brazil (1970s to 2000s): https://youtu.be/mA391Z2e-_c

50 Years of Parapsychology à la Française: https://youtu.be/oMa8mw92Bas

Parapsychology Research and Education in the UK: https://youtu.be/CwiaxPhjwLY

A Graduate Student’s Research in Hungary: https://youtu.be/MZwXjC-ZQrg

Psychology and Parapsychology

Taking Spirit Seriously with Dr Charles Tart (2001): https://youtu.be/zoSAa11ISTI

First Sight: ESP and Parapsychology in Everyday Life with Dr Jim Carpenter (2016): https://youtu.be/9ET7Aa_9bcw

Varieties of Anomalous Experience with Dr Etzel Cardeña (2002): https://youtu.be/D-REm5xvuiU

Dreams from Another Dimension? With Dr. Stanley Krippner (2016): https://youtu.be/PIE5-lWFVt0

Face to Face with the Researchers

Dr Robert Van de Castle: https://youtu.be/izP0Tu3wCtA

Dr Rex G. Stanford: https://youtu.be/mQIgLwlZ8uU

Dr. Stanley Krippner: https://youtu.be/-rzjdn-2Jcs

Dr. John Palmer: https://youtu.be/msJf3tQy_lk

Dr. Sally Rhine Feather: https://youtu.be/txyHPzPCnRs

Dr Robert L. Morris: https://youtu.be/ZhMKNu2wbGk

Dr. Lawrence LeShan: https://youtu.be/QXAKF9OS8eQ

And more to come!

A Final Word

As initially scholarship recipients and grantees, and on and off staffers and as proud Research Fellows, both Alvarado and I can’t emphasize enough the depth that the PF brings to the table, especially in its commitment to its support of education and research. Our best advice is to make sure that you’re checking in on the main PF website regularly and that you subscribe to the Parapsychology Foundation YouTube channel and click the notification bell to be alerted when something new is uploaded. And be sure to explore the offerings of PF’s recommended colleagues on YouTube. Happy Hunting!