Talking About Experience - Special Issue

Very excited to read this issue. It seems like "clinical approaches to exceptional experiences" is picking up popularity in the parapsych community. The university I attend (University of West Georgia) even has a course on it this semester. So it definitely seems like paranormal experiences are being considered in a therapeutic capacity, which is great. Long time coming!

From a sociological point of view, I'm always puzzled by the fact that what skeptics consider to be simply explaining a phenomena is always perceived as "explaining away" by psi-proponents.

Since when explaining a phenomena has become something "bad" in science, something people should fight against?

For example, is the theory of evolution "explaining away" the diversity of life? Or is it just "explaining" it? If it's "explaining away", thus that mean that the goal of the "away" in "explaining away" is to leave room for a designer (aka God)?

I would be interested when and why that epistemological divide came about.

OK. I agree with that, but I think many people in parapsychology uses it differently.

Let's say someone see a UFO. He has a profound experience because of it. His worldview changes. Maybe he gets involved in a UFO group or joins a UFO cults... Then a ufo-skeptic comes around, does an investigation, and proves beyond doubt that he saw Chinese lanterns.

Not being reductionist in the usage you propose here means that science should not only try to explain the source of the perceptual mistake (here Chinese lanterns) but also the effect that this experience had on that person (the change in worldview).

Of course! That's what anthropology, sociology and psychology are all about. The sociopsychological model for explaining the UFO phenomena will try to do just that: not just explain what people really saw when they claim they saw a UFO, but why people believe in it, what it is such a powerful narrative in Western culture and so on.

But many UFO-proponents will say that ufo-skeptics try to "explain away" the UFO phenomena, not to "explain" it; because they're convinced that there are extraterrestrial visitors. So when a skeptic explains a case, he's labelled "debunker".

I agree that science shouldn't be reductionist in the way you defined it above. I don't think the UFO phenomena is explained only by explaining sightings. But my feeling is that most people don't use "explain" vs. "explain away" in the same sense as you do here.

Very good article. I will be dealing with a few of these issues as well..

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