Reinsel's Parapsychological Argument

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Parapsychology is a field of study that is concerned with unique experiences such as physic phenomena which can be described as paranormal. Parapsychology suggests that the human mind is capable of interacting, by receiving messages, with the non physical world such as non physical energy.
Parapsychologists such as Ruth Reinsel argue from experiments that non physical energy must exist because of the above average results in experiments. However in my essay I will analyse his argument, to eventually conclude that he relies on his beliefs more than factual evidence. I will also demonstrate that he relies on an extraordinary hypothesis, that he should not use, because the results can be explained by ordinary circumstances. 
Secondly, I will demonstrate …show more content…

By determining that if we were to accept his argument we would be forced to acknowledge that the whole field of parapsychology is untestable. Which ultimately forces us to recognise that parapsychology is a pseudoscience. Therefore his argument fails.
The writers use of vague language, and the failure to recognise and account for easily explained and logical circumstances, unfortunately does not give us readers any reason to accept their arguments.

Belief over logical evidence and ordinary circumstances
Reinsel began his research into parapsychology by conducting an experiment where he had a subject try to correctly identify a symbol from a pack of cards without coming into sensory or physical contact with the cards. There are twenty five cards in a deck, where there are five sets of symbols- a cross, star, circle, waves and a square. Statistically in one run, the subject should be able to correctly identify five of the symbols in a deck. (Schick and Vaughn)
Out of the 100,000 attempts Reinsel conducted, the subjects averaged 7.1 correct ‘guesses’. Because of this Reinsel argued that …show more content…

That is, if the experimenter believes in non physical energy they will generally yield positive results, but if the experimenter does not believe or they are sceptical of the evidence they will yield negative results.
However, what if experimenters claim to believe in non physical energy but yield negative results? doesn't this deny that hypothesis? (Schick and Vaughn). Well, no it doesn’t, because parapsychologists claim that they must have unconsciously doubted the existence of non physical energy. Obviously this is another form of an Ad Hoc because any data that is produced cannot deny this hypothesis. Moreover any counterexample could be simply dismissed by appealing to the unconscious mind. Additionally if we accepted his hypothesis, we would then make the whole field of parapsychology untestable (Schick and Vaughn). Any unsuccessful experiment that does against the existence of non physical energy could be dismissed because of the experimenters conscious or unconscious bias. 
Thus parapsychology can be considered as a pseudoscience until they can allow for hypothesis that can be

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