Past Events
July 5, 2012
Callum Cooper will present the findings of his recent study, as described at the 2011 Annual SPR Conference in Edinburgh, which have formed the basis of a new book on the subject of anomalous telephone calls "from the dead". In the past, the topic received considerable attention from D. Scott Rogo and Raymond Bayless as well Gertrude Schmeidler.
June 14, 2012
Stainton Moses was a famous mental and physical medium who helped found the SPR in 1882 and became an SPR Vice President. He has featured in many books about the history of psychical research, and was given the unusual distinction of a long two-part article in the SPR's Proceedings about his mediumship. Leslie Price will focus on a number of mysteries in the life of Moses, and attempt to explain them.
May 17, 2012
This is a GWEN TATE MEMORIAL LECTURE.
Dr Rubenstein qualified in medicine from the University of Nottingham in 1978. He works at Eagle House Surgery in Enfield where he has been a GP since 1984. He is the author of Consulting Spirit. He writes: 'One morning during a busy surgery my dead grandfather popped in for a chat. This set me off on a journey, a mad dash through territory populated by mediums, psychics, poltergeists and ghost hunters. On the way I met some fascinating and…
Dr Rubenstein qualified in medicine from the University of Nottingham in 1978. He works at Eagle House Surgery in Enfield where he has been a GP since 1984. He is the author of Consulting Spirit. He writes: 'One morning during a busy surgery my dead grandfather popped in for a chat. This set me off on a journey, a mad dash through territory populated by mediums, psychics, poltergeists and ghost hunters. On the way I met some fascinating and…
April 28, 2012
Psychical research will not attain scientific respectability until it has some agreed theoretical basis. But the subject impinges on many disciplines, so various levels of explanation have been proposed – physical, biological, psychological, philosophical and mystical. A full theory of psi must surely involve all of these.
In this Study Day leading representatives of each of these fields, all sharing an interest in an interdisciplinary approach to the subject, will come…
In this Study Day leading representatives of each of these fields, all sharing an interest in an interdisciplinary approach to the subject, will come…
March 15, 2012
Many researchers today see the eventual reduction of consciousness to underlying biology as inevitable, but major obstacles remain. Current mainstream theory provides no coherent account of how subjective experience arises. The author traces his growing dissatisfaction with mainstream accounts and, following William James, proposes a pluralistic universe where subjective experience is irreducible to material processes.
February 2, 2012
Nigel Peace will present what he considers to be “documented hard evidence of precognitive dreams and synchronicities that challenge all conventional beliefs about the nature of time and of human consciousness”.
December 8, 2011
A lecture by Christopher Josiffe about the famous "talking mongoose" case. The strange saga of Gef the talking mongoose began in Autumn 1931 in an isolated farmstead on the Isle of Man called Doarlish Cashen (Cashen's Gap). In 1936, Harry Price published the results of his investigation in a book co-authored with journalist Richard Lambert entitled The Haunting of Cashen's Gap: A Modern "Miracle" Investigated. Christopher Josiffe has re-examined the material from…
November 5, 2011
This Study Day will celebrate the life of David Fontana, recalling his many contributions to both psychical research and transpersonal psychology, and emphasizing how he used his influence and esteem to bring these fields together.
October 6, 2011
GWEN TATE MEMORIAL LECTURE to be given by Dr. Gregory Shushan, Perrott-Warrick Researcher at the Ian Ramsey Centre for Science and Religion, University of Oxford. He is researching comparative afterlife beliefs in small-scale societies worldwide, in the context of shamanic and near-death experiences. His book, "Conceptions of the Afterlife in Early Civilizations: Universalism, Constructivism, and Near-Death Experience", was nominated for the 2010 Grawemeyer Award.
September 2, 2011
The SPR’s 35th annual conference will be held at the University of Edinburgh between Friday 2 and Sunday 4 September and a very full programme will cover topics ranging from spontaneous cases to laboratory research, Speakers have come from as far as Japan, and the international aspect of the conference can be demonstrated by talks on subjects as diverse as emergency healing in Northern Norway, Icelandic mediumship, the relationship of ayahuasca and psi, and Tibetan Buddhist meditation...