Absent Healing
Healing that takes place when the healer is not actually in direct contact with the person being healed.
Absent Sitter
A person, not present during a sitting, and on their behalf readings are given.
Ba
Ancient Egyptian concept of a person's presence, believed to be immortal.
Daemon (Daimon)
A guardian spirit who communicates inspiration and advice to the living. These are also similar and often known as guardian angels.
Earthquake Effect
A phenomenon produced by the physical medium D.D. Home, which involved the room shaking as if there was an earthquake occuring.
Faith Healing
Healing process that is associated with prayer or belief in the Divine power.
Ganzfeld
A technique for investigating ESP in which the person experiences an absence of patterned stimulation. This usually involves the subject wearing halved table-tennis balls over the eyes while listening to white noise through headphones.
General Extrasensory Perception (GESP)
ESP in which it is unclear whether the results are due to one of the following; clairvoyance, telepathy, precognition or retrocognition.
Hallucination
A sensory experience that does not correspond to the physical reality.
Haunting
Paranormal phenomena such as apparitions, unexplained sounds, smells or other sensations that are associated over a lengthy period of time with a certain location.
Ka
Ancient Egyptian phrase for the double or astral body.
Karma
Hindu and Buddhist ethical doctrine of "as one sows, so shall one reap". Meaning how you treat people and other living things will in fact affect the rest of your life and certain situations that may occur for the better or worse.
Laying on of Hands
A healing practice, in which the healer's hands are placed on or near the body of the sick person.
Magic
(a) Practices that aim to use paranormal or spiritual means to influence events.
(b) The art of conjuring.
Near-Death Experience (NDE)
Experiences of people after they have been pronounced clinically dead, or if they have been very close to death. Typical accounts of the NDE are an OBE including visions of, life review, a tunnel experience, light, coming to a boundary marking death, seeing dead friends and relatives, experiencing a loving or divine presence, and making a choice (or being told) to return to their body. Occasionally NDEs can be frightening and distressing. NDEs often have massive effects on the person's later life.
Palmistry
The art of assessing a person's character and forecasting life changing events by examining features of the persons hand.
Paranormal
Beside or beyond what is considered to be the normal. Unexplainable in terms of our ordinary understanding or current scientific knowledge on the events.
Qualitative Method
A research method that involves the collection of non-quantitative data (e.g., observations, interviews, subjective reports, case studies).
Radiesthesia
Theories based on the assumption that living organisms emit some kind of radiation or emanation that is possible to detect using instruments or by dowsing.
Table-Tilting
Unexplainable movements of a table, usually occurring in a séance when a group of people place their hands on the surface of the table. Often the movements are interpreted as being spirit communications.
Up Through Technique
An experimental test for clairvoyance in which the subject guesses the order of a stacked series of target symbols (e.g., cards) from bottom to top. The opposite way round being known as the down through technique.
Veridical
Information or an experience that is then confirmed by facts and or events.
Veridical Dream
A dream that is relevant to real events (past, present or future) that are unknown to the dreamer at that time.
Xenoglossy
The ability to speak or write in a language that has not been learned by the person speaking or writing it.
Yoga
Religious philosophy originating from India. It advocates the use of physical and psycho-spiritual techniques to lead the person to higher consciousness, and is now used throughout the world by many different types of people.
Zener Cards
Set of 25 cards (5 each of circle, square, Greek cross, five-pointed star, three wavy lines) designed by the psychologist Karl Zener for use in card-guessing tests of ESP (this being why they are also known as ESP cards).