J.B. Rhine: Letters 1923-1939: ESP and the Foundations of Parapsychology

I will be back to say more when I’ve read my copy, but I wanted to alert everyone to this important new book. Here is the website where you can learn more about the book and where you can order your own copy.

My favorite part of researching the Parapsychology Laboratory of Duke University was reading the letters of J. B. Rhine. Sally Rhine Feather, J.B.’s oldest daughter, and journalist Barbara Ensrud have hand-selected some of the best from this period. So for readers, this is a treasure!

J. B. Rhine, Parapsychology

New Book on Life After Death

I guess not so surprisingly given the pandemic and the number of people who have died, I’ve been seeing a lot more written about life after death. This article in the Times about a guy offering a million dollars to anyone who can provide substantial evidence that consciousness survives death was interesting. I followed all the links in this article, by the way, and all those articles were interesting as well.

Michael Prescott has a new book about the subject, The Far Horizon: Perspectives on Life Beyond Death. I trust Stafford Betty’s opinion.

“Michael Prescott’s The Far Horizon is a brilliant meditation on human nature and destiny … Reincarnation cases, deathbed visions, NDEs, apparitions, earthbound spirits, and mediumistic communications form the foundation of his thesis … Reading Prescott was both exciting and humbling: Here was a colleague with perspectives, as far apart as quantum theory and cosmic consciousness, that I had largely ignored in my research on the afterlife, and I found myself taking notes … From beginning to end, an engrossing read.” – Stafford Betty, author of The Afterlife Therapist and Heaven and Hell Unveiled.

Signs of Reincarnation

James Matlock, a Research Fellow at the Parapsychology Foundation, has written a new book called, Signs of Reincarnation. You can buy it at all the usual places online, but if you order it from the publisher’s website, Rowman & Littlefield, you get a 30% discount! Enter the code RLFANDF30 during checkout to receive the discount.

I wrote an article about reincarnation, and the research I found was carefully and painstakingly conducted, and regardless of what you believe, it still requires an explanation. It’s utterly fascinating. (I see Jim has a copy of one of my books on his shelf, thank you Jim!)

Psychics for Psychic Research

The Rhine Research Center, formerly the Parapsychology Laboratory of Duke University, has also launched a GoFundMe campaign.

The Project (which they hope will help raise money for the Center): “Using a technique called Associative Remote Viewing, on Monday the psychics describe a target that they will be shown on the following Friday. There are actually two targets that can represent whether a specific investment will go up or down during the week. If the investment went up, the psychics will be shown shown Target 1. If the investment went down, they will be shown Target 2. Depending on which target the psychics describe Monday, the Rhine makes an investment on Monday, predicting what the value will be on Friday when the psychics will be shown the picture representing the ACTUAL status of the investment (up or down).”

“This is a very important project because it will help us to demonstrate the practical value of using psychic abilities in a way that can help everyone in their daily lives. These skills have been scientifically demonstrated in the Rhine labs, and now it is time to show the world that we not only believe in these skills, but also that we are willing to make an investment in people to show these value of these abilities to the entire world.

“This project is scheduled to begin in May, 2017 and run for about 3 months, but the funds are needed for the initial investment. If you join us in this effort and help us to make our goal, not only will you have the gratitude of the Rhine and our world-wide community, but there are also a number of gifts that we would like to offer our contributors.”

Help Fund SÉANCE: Spiritualist Ritual and the Search for Ectoplasm

Photographer Shannon Taggert has started a campaign to fund a book of photographs she’s taken of seances over the past sixteen years. You will see how gorgeous these photographs are when you go to her campaign page and watch the brief video about the project. I’m in!!

From Shannon: “I first became aware of Spiritualism as a teenager, after my cousin received a reading from a medium who revealed a secret about my grandfather’s death that proved to be true. Since then, I have been deeply curious about how someone could know such a thing.

“In 2001, I began photographing at the place where my grandfather’s message was received: Lily Dale, New York, the town which is home to the world’s largest Spiritualist community. I quickly immersed myself in Lily Dale’s world – I received readings, experienced healings, joined in séances, attended a psychic college and sat in a medium’s cabinet, always with my camera. I expected to spend one summer figuring out the tricks of the Spiritualist trade. Instead, Spiritualism’s mysterious processes, earnest practitioners, surprising cultural history and bizarre photographic past became a resource and an inspiration for my own body of work. I began a sixteen-year quest to document contemporary Spiritualism and to find and photograph ‘ectoplasm’ – the elusive substance that is said to be both spiritual and material.”

Shannon Taggert

Retiring this Blog

Attention: After seven years of operation, I’ve decided to retire this blog. I will no longer be adding posts, except on special occasions. I’m leaving it up because the information and advice in the links and posts are still useful, and I will still respond and answer questions in the comment sections. Thank you for visiting!

Parapsychology Foundation YouTube Channel

How exciting! The Parapsychology Foundation now has a YouTube Channel. Here is a video about their library, which I would love to explore again. The last time I was there I was very specifically researching the Parapsychology Laboratory of Duke University. I’d like to go back and widen my search.

You can view their other videos and subscribe here.