Research source

The following pages aim at presenting in brief compass a selection of the evidence upon which the hypothesis of…

Date of account: Published 1894
Source: Apparitions and thought-transference: an examination of the evidence for telepathy
Reference: Apparitions and thought-transference: an examination of the evidence for telepathy · selected passage 5
Rights: public_domain
Language: English
Record updated: 2026-08-24

Record summary

The following pages aim at presenting in brief compass a selection of the evidence upon which the hypothesis of thought-transference, or telepathy, is based

Published source text

Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.

Source passage

Source text · mention only

The following pages aim at presenting in brief compass a selection of the evidence upon which the hypothesis of thought-transference, or telepathy, is based. It is now more than twelve years since the Society for Psychical Research was founded, and nearly eight since the publication of _Phantasms of the Living_. Both in the periodical _Proceedings_ of the Society and in the pages of Edmund Gurney's book,[1] a large mass of evidence has been laid before the public. But the papers included in the _Proceedings_ are interspersed with other matter, some of it too technical for the taste of the general reader; whilst the two volumes of _Phantasms of the Living_, which have for some time been out of print, were too costly for the purse of some, and too bulky for the patience of others. The attention which, notwithstanding these drawbacks, that work excited on its first appearance, the friendly reception which it met with in many quarters, and the fact that a considerable edition has been disposed of, encouraged the hope that a book on somewhat similar lines, but on a smaller scale, might be of service to those--and their number has probably increased within the last few years--who take a genuine interest in this inquiry.

Historical context

Contextual commentary · mention only

This comes from historical psychical research. Methods, witness handling and standards of evidence differ from present-day research and should be assessed from the cited passage and edition.

Modern context

Contextual commentary · mention only

The passage can support a history of claims and recurring descriptions. It does not establish a paranormal mechanism, and competing psychological, social and physical explanations remain relevant.

Investigate related details with Anomaly Graph’s account-based search, or read how matching and provenance work.