American Society for Psychical Research, INC.Serving the public since 1885
The American Society for Psychical Research has over a century of experience in advancing the growth and position of psychical research in the United States. Through its research and educational programs, the ASPR supports the efforts of both laypersons and professionals to use the study of psychical research to expand andimprove the full understanding of human nature and the broad scope of human abilities.
From programs in basic research to seminars, workshops and conferences, the Society serves as a central resource for the American public to explore and learn more about these important personal and social issues.
What are the implications and applications of psychic functionning?
Do we have capacities for awareness, communication andbehavior that are not fully realized?
How can you learn to distinguish the genuine psychic happening from the illusory or fraudulent?
Where do you find that special book or resource to help you explore these kinds of questions?
How can you locate the national experts on psychic phenomena and experience?
The Society specializes in supplying reliable information relevant to these questions.
"A man should never be required to choose between doubt and belief. He should be able to intermingle both in due proportions. The spirit of open-mindedness and impartiatiality is to the intellectual world what brotherhood is to the ethical world."
-James H.Hyslop, Professor of Logic and Ethics, Columbia University, founder ofthe American Society for Psychical Research and Executive Director 1906-1920.
A Brief History of the ASPR
The American Society for Psychical Research, first organized in 1885 with astronomer Simon Newcomb as president, later became a branch of the British Society for Psychical Research, founded in 1882,and functionned in Boston under the guidance of Richard Hodgson, formely of Cambridge University, until his death in 1905. A newly-organized and independent ASPR was soon thereafter established in New York with James H. Hyslop, formely Professor of Logic and Ethics at Columbia University, as its secretary and treasurer. During the years between 1906 and his death in 1920, Professor Hyslop greatly expanded the scope of the Society's work and built up its endowment fund. Publication of the Journal was initiated in 1907 and has continued uninterruptedly to the present. Publication of the Proceedings was returned, and a vast amount of valuable scientific data thus been recorded over the years.
The close relationship between psychic phenomena and important scientific and philosophical issues is evidenced by the fact that the investigation of such phenomena has enlisted the interest and active participation of a number of outstanding scientists and philosophers. Among the distinguished contributors of the past may be mentioned the physicists Sir William Barrett and Sir Oliver Lodge; the psychologists William James and Gardner Murphy, both of whom played major roles in the development of the ASPR. The contemporary scene in psychical research includes philosophers, psychologists and physicists, many of them on the faculty of distinguished universities and colleges here and abroad.
The Endowment
The work of the Society is supported by membership fees and by income from a general endowment fund. This takes care of office expenses and the cost of printing and distributing the Society's basic educational publications. It leaves but little, however, to apply to the Society's scientific investigations and other special public information and educational programs. These are supported largely by donated funds from members, patrons, founders, benefactors, and other friends of the Society.
Monies and property given or bequested to the Society are applied by the Board of Trustees strictly to the purposes for which the Society has been incorporated. TheSociety is a nonprofit organization, and gifts made to it are deductible for income tax purposes."I have no doubt whatever that most people live, whether psycisally, intellectually or morally, in a very restricted circle of their potential being. They make use of a very small portion of their possible consciousness...
We all have reservoirs of life, to draw upon, of which we do not dream."
- William James, Professor of Philosophy Harvard University, active in the early American Society for Psychical Research.AMERICAN SOCIETY for
PSYCHICAL RESEARCH, INC.
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