Philosophical Interactions with Parapsychology: The Major Writings of H. H. Price on Parapsychology and Survival

311 Pages·1995·32.26 MB·English

by  Frank B. Dilley (eds.)

PHILOSOPHICAL INTERACTIONS WITH
PARAPSYCHOLOGY
LIBRARY OF PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGION
General Editor: John Hick, Fellow of the Institute for Advanced Study in
the Humanities, University of Birmingham, England.
This series of books explores contemporary religious understandings of
humanity and the universe. The books contribute to various aspects of the
continuing dialogues between religion and philosophy, between scepticism
and faith, and between the different religions and ideologies. The authors
represent a correspondingly wide range of viewpoints. Some of the books
in the series are written for the general educated public and others for a
more specialized philosophical or theological readership.
Philosophical
Interactions with
Parapsychology
The Major Writings of H. H. Price on
Parapsychology and Survival
Edited by
Frank B. Dilley
Professor of Philosophy
University of Delaware
Newark, Delaware, USA
M
St. Martin's Press
Selection, editorial matter and Introduction © Frank B. Dilley 1995
Text © Miss Katherine Price 1995
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1s t edition 1995
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of
this publication may be made without written permission.
No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or
transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with
the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988,
or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying
issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court
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Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this
publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil
claims for damages.
First published in Great Britain 1995 by
MACMILLAN PRESS LTD
Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS
and London
Companies and representatives
throughout the world
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978-1-349-24110-1 ISBN 978-1-349-24108-8 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-24108-8
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
04 03 02 01 00 99 98 97 96 95
First published in the United States of America 1995 by
Scholarly and Reference Division,
ST. MARTIN'S PRESS, INC.,
175 Fifth Avenue,
New York, N.Y. 10010
ISBN 978-0-312-12607-0
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Price, H. H. (Henry Habberley), 1899-1984
Philosophical interactions with parapsychology: the major
writings of H. H. Price on parapsychology and survival/edited by
Frank B. Dilley.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-312-12607-0
1. Parapsychology and philosophy. 2. Future life. I. Dilley,
Frank B. II. Title.
BF1045.P5P75 1995
133--dc20 95-8229
CIP
Contents
Acknowledgements vii
Editor's Introduction ix
PART I WRITINGS ON PARAPSYCHOLOGY 1
1 Some Aspects of the Conflict between Science and
Religion 3
2 Haunting and the 'Psychic Ether' Hypothesis - I 17
3 Some Philosophical Questions about Telepathy and
Clairvoyance 35
4 Mind Over Mind and Mind Over Matter 61
5 Four Book Reviews 77
Professor C. D. Broad's Religion, Philosophy and
Psychical Research
Raynor C. Johnson's The Imprisoned Splendor
J. B. Rhine's The Reach of the Mind
W. T. Stace's Mysticism and Philosophy
6 The Philosophical Implications of Precognition 125
7 Paranonnal Cognition and Symbolism 140
8 Haunting and the 'Psychic Ether' Hypothesis - II 161
9 Apparitions: Two Theories 182
PART II WRITINGS ON SURVIVAL 201
10 Mediumship and Human Survival 203
11 The Problem of Life After Death 221
v
vi Contents
12 Survival and the Idea of'A nother World' 237
13 What Kind of a 'Next World'? 263
14 Comments on Ducasse on Survival 270
Review of Nature, Mind and Death
C. J. Ducasse on the Problem of Survival
Bibliography 291
Index of Discussions 294
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Miss Katherine Price for giving me her
approval for producing this volume of her brother's work, Tony
Macnabb, godson of H. H. Price, for his support and for enabling
me to go through a box of the unpublished papers of H. H. Price
which he has in his possession, and to Charles West-Sadler and
John Brocklebank, Literary Executors for Donald Macnabb, who
was the Literary Executor for H. H. Price, and who have provided
blanket permission for all Price publications. I also thank:
The Editor of the Aristotelian Society for permission to reprint The
Philosophical Implications of Precognition' as Chapter 6.
John Beloff, Editor of the Proceedings of the Society for Psychical
Research, for permission to reprint 'Hauntings and the "Psychic
Ether" Hypothesis', as Chapters 2 and 8, 'Survival and the Idea of
"Another World"', as Chapter 12, and the review of W. T. Stace's
Mysticism and Philosophy in Chapter 5.
Butterworth, for permission to reprint 'Paranormal Cognition and
Symbolism' as Chapter 7.
Cambridge University Press, for permission to reprint 'The
Problem of Life After Death' as Chapter 11, 'Some Philosophical
Questions about Telepathy and Clairvoyance' as Chapter 3, and a
generous portion of 'Some Aspects of the Conflict between Science
and Religion' as Chapter 1.
Eileen Coly of the Parapsychology Foundation, Inc., for permission
to reprint 'What Kind of a "Next World"?' as Chapter 13.
Oxford University Press, for permission to reprint the review of
J. B. Rhine's The Reach of the Mind in Chapter 5.
K. Ramakrishna Rao, Executive Director, the Foundation for
Research on the Nature of Man, for permission to reprint
'Mediumship and Human Survival' as Chapter 10, 'Apparitions:
Two Theories' as Chapter 9, the reviews of Raynor C. Johnson's The
Imprisoned Splendour in Chapter 5 and of C. J. Ducasse's Nature,
Mind, and Death in Chapter 14.
vii
viii Acknowledgements
Rhea A. White, Editor of the Journal of the American Society of
Psychical Research, for permission to reprint the review of Professor
C, D. Broad's Religion, Philosophy and Psychical Research in Chapter
5, and 'c, J. Ducasse on the Problem of Survival' in Chapter 14.
I would like also to express my thanks to the Parapsychology
Foundation, Inc. for supporting this research by awarding me the
first D. Scott Rogo Award for Parapsychological Literature in 1992
in support of this publication project.
FRANK B. DILLEY
Editor's Introduction
H. H. Price (born 1899, died 1984), former Wykeham Professor of
Logic at Oxford University, is known to the philosophical world for
his rigorous works on perception, belief, and the relation between
experience and understanding. Scattered through those works are
tantalising references to parapsychological topics, mentioned in
passing but never developed. He did publish one psychical
research paper in a regular philosophical journal early in his career.
Late in life he published a book of essays in the philosophy of reli
gion which introduced his views on psychical research more fully,
but he never fully integrated his two worlds of scholarship into one
comprehensive system.
Many times Price proclaimed that one of the difficulties affecting
the ability of philosophers to take survival and psychical research
seriously was the lack of a comprehensive theory, a theory which
rendered those phenomena intelligible and integrated them with
the rest of what we believe. He held the perhaps optimistic view
that philosophers might be persuaded to take psychical research
and survival seriously if they could be persuaded that those topics
make sense, that they deal with phenomena which can be made
intelligible to the modem western mind.
Parapsychologists, on the other hand, are aware of a whole series
of articles, reviews, and discussions which Price wrote on various
parapsychological topics - on telepathy, clairvoyance, telekinesis,
apparitions, hauntings, mediumship, the psychic ether, and sur
vival of death. These writings appeared in a wide variety of places,
some of which are virtually inaccessible. It was a major research
effort to locate these papers, and it is quite likely that not all have
been found yet. In his papers on psychical research, Price said
almost nothing about his philosophical views on perception and
the external world.
The present volume is one person's attempt to make Price's para
psychological work available to scholars and other interested
people. There were size limitations, but included are most of the
major long pieces and a few of the important shorter ones. The
pieces that are included in this volume are presented in their
entirety with one exception, a long section on religion that was part
of the first piece that introduces this collection.
ix