From a survey of the literature of Psychical Research one might
readily draw the inference that whereas Psychology studies the
recognized and explicable phases of mental phenomena, Psychical
Research is occupied with the disputed and mysterious. One might also
conclude that whereas Psychology is concerned with the phenomena
commonly associated with mental activities and their variation
under normal as also under unusual and pathological circumstances,
Psychical Research is interested in the demonstration of supernormal
faculties, and in the establishment of forms of mentality that
diverge from and transcend those with which every-day humanity
is permitted to become familiar; and that, moreover, in some of
its excursions Psychical Research does not limit itself to mental
manifestations, but investigates undiscovered forms of physical
energy, and seriously considers whether behind and beyond the world
of phenomena there is another and a different world, in which the
established order and the mental and material laws of this planet
do not obtain. But the unwarranted character, not to say absurdity,
of such a differentiation or classification is at once apparent,
if we attempt to carry it over into other departments of science.
Speculations in regard to the constitution of the earth's centre
or as to the future of our planet, if legitimate in character, are
as readily incorporable into geology as the consideration of more
definite and better known phenomena; biologists recognize that there
are mythical as well as anomalous portions of their domain, but do
not consider that freaks of nature either destroy the validity of
anatomical and physiological principles, or demand a totally distinct
and transcendent organization or method for their study. The chemist
may become interested in the examination of what was really done
when it was supposed that other metals were converted into gold; the
physicist may become interested in the applications of electricity
and magnetism, of optical reflections and images in the production
of stage illusions; but the conception of chemistry and of physics
naturally embraces considerations of the growth, the errors, and
the applications of these sciences. And while these comparisons
do not furnish a complete parallel to the relation that seems to
pertain between Psychology and Psychical Research, yet it is as
true in the one case as in the others, that the differentiation of
a group of problems on the basis of unusualness of occurrence, of
mysteriousness of origin, of doubtful authenticity, or of apparent
paradoxical or transcendent character, is as illogical as it is
unnecessary. The legitimate problems of Psychical Research are
equally and necessarily genuine problems of Psychology, that require
no special designation. They need not be especially important, nor
interesting, nor profitable, nor well comprehended problems of
Psychology, but they belong there if they are scientific problems
at all.
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