The Capricious, Actively Evasive, Unsustainable Nature of Psi: A Summary and Hypotheses
🧐 Skeptical/Critical ↗📌 Appears in:
Plain English Summary
Here's a puzzle that sounds almost like a ghost story about ghost stories: after a hundred years of research, psychic phenomena (psi) seem to actively dodge every attempt to pin them down. Kennedy -- himself a parapsychology insider, not an outside critic -- documents a striking pattern. When researchers get promising early results and try to confirm them, the effects often flip direction or simply vanish. Entire research programs experience slow fadeouts. One remarkable finding: after major meta-analyses (studies that pool many experiments together) were published, effect sizes shrank by a whopping 90% on average. It's as if psi knows when you're watching. Kennedy considers several explanations but lands on the most provocative one: maybe psi is supposed to be mysterious, serving some deeper purpose tied to wonder and consciousness rather than lab predictability.
Actual Paper Abstract
Many parapsychological writers have suggested that psi may be capricious or actively evasive. The evidence for this includes the unpredictable, significant reversal of direction for psi effects, the loss of intended psi effects while unintended secondary or internal effects occur, and the pervasive declines in effect for participants, experimenters, and lines of research. Also, attempts to apply psi typically result in a few very impressive cases among a much larger number of unsuccessful results. The term unsustainable is applicable because psi is sometimes impressive and reliable, but then becomes actively evasive. One of the most testable models for this property is that psi effects occur against a background of supporting and opposing motivation and psi influence due to the extreme polarization of attitudes toward psi in the population. These attitudes may have genetic and gender associated components. Another possible explanation is that the primary function of psi is to induce a sense of mystery and wonder. Other possible functions of psi also need to be investigated. For example, psi could contribute to evolution by briefly influencing random processes to enhance diversity, without specifically guiding evolution or having sustained effects. Some type of higher consciousness may influence or control psi effects.
Research Notes
The most systematic treatment in the library of why psi effects resist reliable demonstration. Kennedy (writing from within parapsychology, not as an external skeptic) documents the 'unsustainability' pattern across all major research programs. Directly foundational to Controversy #10 (meta-debate) and cited by 7+ subsequent library papers.
After a century of psychical research, many investigators have concluded that psi may be capricious or actively evasive. Evidence includes negative reliability (significant direction reversals from pilot to confirmation), shifts from intended to unintended secondary effects, pervasive decline effects for subjects, experimenters, and entire research lines, and persistent failure of practical applications. Houtkooper found meta-analytic summary followed by 90% average reduction in effect size across seven series. Three hypotheses are evaluated: competing psi motivation from a polarized population, mechanistic constraints (Lucadou's pragmatic information model), and higher consciousness inducing mystery and wonder. Kennedy favors the last, arguing psi may be inherently unsustainable.
Related Papers
Cites
- Why Is Psi So Elusive? A Review and Proposed Model — Kennedy, James E (2001)
- Mind/Machine Interaction Consortium: PortREG Replication Experiments — Jahn, Robert G (2000)
- Evaluation of a Program on Anomalous Mental Phenomena — Hyman, Ray (1996)
- An Assessment of the Evidence for Psychic Functioning — Utts, Jessica (1996)
Cited By
- Searching for Global Consciousness: A Seventeen Year Exploration — Bancel, Peter A (2017)
- Searching for Global Consciousness: A Seventeen Year Exploration — Bancel, Peter A (2017)
- Bayesian and Classical Hypothesis Testing: Practical Differences for a Controversial Area of Research — Kennedy, J.E (2014)
- Remote Viewing as Applied to Futures Studies — Lee, James H (2008)
- Conclusions about Paranormal Phenomena — Kennedy, J.E (2013)
- Can Parapsychology Move Beyond the Controversies of Retrospective Meta-Analyses? — Kennedy, J.E (2013)
- Why Most Research Findings About Psi Are False: The Replicability Crisis, the Psi Paradox and the Myth of Sisyphus — Rabeyron, Thomas (2020)
Extended By
- Spirituality and the Capricious, Evasive Nature of Psi — Kennedy, J.E (2006)
- Information in Life, Consciousness, Quantum Physics, and Paranormal Phenomena — Kennedy, J.E (2011)
- Can Parapsychology Move Beyond the Controversies of Retrospective Meta-Analyses? — Kennedy, J.E (2013)
- Bayesian and Classical Hypothesis Testing: Practical Differences for a Controversial Area of Research — Kennedy, J.E (2014)
- Conclusions about Paranormal Phenomena — Kennedy, J.E (2013)
Same Research Program
- Skepticism and Negative Results in Borderline Areas of Science — Kennedy, J.E (1981)
- Methods for Investigating Goal-Oriented Psi — Kennedy, J.E (1995)
- A Proposal and Challenge for Proponents and Skeptics of Psi — Kennedy, J.E (2004)
- Planning Falsifiable Confirmatory Research — Kennedy, James E (2024)
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📋 Cite this paper
Kennedy, J.E (2003). The Capricious, Actively Evasive, Unsustainable Nature of Psi: A Summary and Hypotheses. The Journal of Parapsychology.
@article{kennedy_2003_capricious_psi,
title = {The Capricious, Actively Evasive, Unsustainable Nature of Psi: A Summary and Hypotheses},
author = {Kennedy, J.E},
year = {2003},
journal = {The Journal of Parapsychology},
}