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Journal of Consciousness Studies
2003
Give the Null Hypothesis a Chance: Reasons to Remain Doubtful about the Existence of Psi
⚡ Contested ↗ Alcock, James E. • 2003 Modern Era • skeptical
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Plain English Summary
Psychologist James Alcock lays out a no-punches-pulled case for why we should stay skeptical about psi -- things like telepathy and psychokinesis. His argument hits nine big problems. Nobody can clearly define what psi actually is. The results don't reliably replicate: physicist Jeffers ran a double-slit quantum experiment looking for psychic influence and got nothing, and a major multi-lab effort called PortREG also came up empty. Whenever an experiment fails, supporters invent new excuses -- bad experimenter vibes, subject boredom, mysterious "decline effects" -- conveniently making the whole idea impossible to disprove. Psi research also leans entirely on statistics rather than a repeatable, observable effect, and clashes with everything we know about physics and neuroscience. This essay remains arguably the single best summary of the skeptical position.
Related Papers
Same Research Program
Companion
- A Compendium of the Evidence for Psi — Parker, Adrian. (2003)
- Of Two Minds: Sceptic-Proponent Collaboration within Parapsychology — Schlitz, Marilyn J. (2006)
- Consciousness and the Double-Slit Interference Pattern: Six Experiments — Radin, Dean. (2012)
- Psychology and Anomalous Observations: The Question of ESP in Dreams — Child, Irvin L. (1985)
- Skepticism and Negative Results in Borderline Areas of Science — Kennedy, J.E. (1981)
- Searching for the Impossible: Parapsychology's Elusive Quest — Reber, Arthur S. (2019)
Critiques
- The Persistent Paradox of Psychic Phenomena: An Engineering Perspective — Jahn, Robert G. (1982)
- Mind/Machine Interaction Consortium: PortREG Replication Experiments — Jahn, Robert G. (2000)
- Information transmission under conditions of sensory shielding — Targ, Russell. (1974)
- Psychophysical Interactions with a Double-Slit Interference Pattern: Exploratory Evidence of a Causal Influence — Radin, D.I. (2021)
- Testing a Language-Using Parrot for Telepathy — Sheldrake, Rupert. (2003)
Cites
- Anomaly or Artifact? Comments on Bem and Honorton — Hyman, Ray. (1994)
- Evaluation of a Program on Anomalous Mental Phenomena — Hyman, Ray. (1996)
- Does Psi Exist? Lack of Replication of an Anomalous Process of Information Transfer — Milton, Julie. (1999)
- Skepticism and Negative Results in Borderline Areas of Science — Kennedy, J.E. (1981)
Cited By
- Searching for the Impossible: Parapsychology's Elusive Quest — Reber, Arthur S. (2019)
- Lessons from the First Two Years of Operating a Study Registry — Watt, Caroline. (2015)
- The Capricious, Actively Evasive, Unsustainable Nature of Psi: A Summary and Hypotheses — Kennedy, J.E. (2003)
- Parapsychological Phenomena as Examples of Generalized Nonlocal Correlations—A Theoretical Framework — Walach, Harald. (2014)
- A Compendium of the Evidence for Psi — Parker, Adrian. (2003)
- Of Two Minds: Sceptic-Proponent Collaboration within Parapsychology — Schlitz, Marilyn J. (2006)
- We Should Have Seen This Coming — Schwarzkopf, D. Samuel. (2014)
- Evidence for Anomalistic Correlations Between Human Behavior and a Random Event Generator: Result of an Independent Replication of a Micro-PK Experiment — Walach, Harald. (2020)
- Inner Experience – Direct Access to Reality: A Complementarist Ontology and Dual Aspect Monism Support a Broader Epistemology — Walach, Harald. (2020)
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📋 Cite this paper
APA
Alcock, James E. (2003). Give the Null Hypothesis a Chance: Reasons to Remain Doubtful about the Existence of Psi. Journal of Consciousness Studies.
BibTeX
@article{alcock_2003_give,
title = {Give the Null Hypothesis a Chance: Reasons to Remain Doubtful about the Existence of Psi},
author = {Alcock, James E.},
year = {2003},
journal = {Journal of Consciousness Studies},
}