Searching for the Impossible: Parapsychology's Elusive Quest
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Plain English Summary
This is the heavyweight skeptical takedown of parapsychology, published in the APA's flagship journal as a direct rebuttal to a 2018 paper arguing psi deserves attention. Reber and Alcock don't just say the evidence is weak -- they say psi is flat-out impossible. Their case rests on four physics pillars: no mechanism could cause it, precognition requires time running backward, psychokinesis (mind moving matter) creates energy from nothing, and psychic signals ignore the rule that forces weaken with distance. They dismiss quantum mechanics as justification, call parapsychological meta-analyses a house of cards, and cite Bem admitting his precognition experiments were more rhetorical than scientific.
Research Notes
The strongest principled-skepticism statement in the library, published in APA's flagship journal. Central to the meta-debate (Controversy #10) as it argues psi is impossible a priori, not merely unsupported. Directly critiques Cardeña (2018) and cites Kennedy (2013) on problematic meta-analytic practices.
A broad-based critique of parapsychology published as a direct rebuttal to Cardeña (2018) in American Psychologist. Argues psi phenomena are impossible because they violate four fundamental principles: causality (no mechanism exists), time-asymmetry (precognition requires time reversal unsupported by physics), thermodynamics (psychokinesis creates energy in closed systems), and the inverse square law. Dismisses quantum mechanics and relativity as scaffolding for psi, critiques parapsychological meta-analyses as built on marginal individual studies, and highlights Bem's 2017 interview admission that his precognition studies were "rhetorical devices." Concludes parapsychology persists due to isolation from mainstream science, unfalsifiability, and appeal of secular dualism.
Links
Related Papers
Critiques
Cites
- Feeling the Future: Experimental Evidence for Anomalous Retroactive Influences on Cognition and Affect — Bem, Daryl J (2011)
- Feeling the Future: A Meta-Analysis of 90 Experiments on the Anomalous Anticipation of Random Future Events — Bem, Daryl J (2015)
- Can Parapsychology Move Beyond the Controversies of Retrospective Meta-Analyses? — Kennedy, J.E (2013)
- Effects of Consciousness on the Fall of Dice: A Meta-Analysis — Radin, Dean I (1991)
Companion
Responded To By
Cited By
- Quantum Aspects of the Brain-Mind Relationship: A Hypothesis with Supporting Evidence — Kauffman, Stuart A (2023)
- Cognitive Styles and Psi: Psi Researchers Are More Similar to Skeptics Than to Lay Believers — Pehlivanova, M (2024)
- Why Most Research Findings About Psi Are False: The Replicability Crisis, the Psi Paradox and the Myth of Sisyphus — Rabeyron, Thomas (2020)
Also by these authors
More in Skeptical
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N,N-Dimethyltryptamine and the Pineal Gland: Separating Fact from Myth
Paranormal psychic believers and skeptics: a large-scale test of the cognitive differences hypothesis
Meta-Analyses Are No Substitute for Registered Replications: A Skeptical Perspective on Religious Priming
📋 Cite this paper
Reber, Arthur S, Alcock, James E (2019). Searching for the Impossible: Parapsychology's Elusive Quest. American Psychologist. https://doi.org/10.1037/amp0000486
@article{reber_2019_searching,
title = {Searching for the Impossible: Parapsychology's Elusive Quest},
author = {Reber, Arthur S and Alcock, James E},
year = {2019},
journal = {American Psychologist},
doi = {10.1037/amp0000486},
}