The Entity Letters: A Sociologist on the Trail of a Supernatural Mystery
This work describes a sociological investigation of the SORRAT sitter group (Society for Research on Rapport and Telekinesis) that witnessed table levitation, poltergeist phenomena, earthquake effects and other startling physical events over a 50 year period. The entities communicated by mail with dozens of SORRAT members, describing life after death, the nature of time, and spiritual development.
- Publisher: Anomalist Books (April 2018)
- Language: English
- ISBN: 978-1-938398-79-7
Wondrous Healing: Shamanism, Human Evolution, and the Origin of Religion
James McClenon explains why beliefs in some supernatural forces – ghosts, poltergeists, souls, and spirits – are based on universal experience. The author maintains that belief in mysterious anomalies such as ecstatic trances, apparitions, extra-sensory perceptions, out-of-body experiences, psychokinesis, fire walking, and miraculous recovery are predicated upon evolutionary psychology. Such beliefs reveal a spiritual impulse in the human species. He aims to demonstrate that age-old healing rituals such as chanting and rhythmic dancing have scientifically verifiable benefits.
- Publisher: Northern Illinois University Press (November 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0875805906
- ISBN-13: 978-0875805900
Wondrous Events: Foundations of Religious Belief
James McClenon examines the relationship between wondrous events—extrasensory perception, apparitions, out-of-body and near-death experiences, sleep paralysis, psychokinesis, fire walking, psychic surgery, and spiritual healing—and the foundations of religious belief.
- Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press; 1st ed edition (November 1994)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0812230744
- ISBN-13: 978-0812230741
Deviant Science: The Case of Parapsychology
- Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press (February 1985)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0812211782
- ISBN-13: 978-0812211788
CHAPTERS IN EDITED BOOKS
Elite Scientists’ Attitudes toward ESP and Parapsychology: A Summary of Questionnaire Results. (Trans. into Japanese by T. Kasahara) in Sai No Senjo: Choshinrigaku Ronso Zenshi [The Battlefield of Psi: History of All the Debates in Parapsychology], Toshio Kasahara, editor, Tokyo: Heibonsha Limited, Publishers, 1987.
A Remote Viewing Experiment Conducted by a Skeptic and a Believer. (Co-authored with Ray Hyman, Ph.D.) pp. 347-361 in The Elusive Quarry, A Scientific Appraisal of Psychical Research, Ray Hyman, editor, Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1989.
Psychical Research as a Social Science: Investigating a Phenomenon That Hides. (Trans. into Japanese by T. Kasahara) Pp. 530-547 in Toraenikusa [The Elusiveness Problem of Psi], Toshio Kasahara, editor, Tokyo: Shunju-Sha Publishers, 1993.
Supernatural Experience, Folk Belief, and Spiritual Healing. Pp. 107-121 in Out of the Ordinary: Folklore and the Supernatural, Barbara Walker, editor, Logan, Utah: Utah State University Press, 1995.
The Sociological Investigation of Haunting Cases. Pp. 62-81 in Spirited Exchanges: Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Hauntings and Poltergeists, James Houran and Rense Lange, editors, North Carolina: McFarland, 2001.
How Shamanism Began: Human Evolution, Dissociation, and Anomalous Experience, Pp. 21-58 in From Shaman to Scientist: Essays on Humanity’s Search for Spirits, James Houran, Editor, Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2004.
How Religion Began: Human Evolution and the Origin of Religion, Pp. 3-10 in Sacred Realms: Essays in Religion, Belief, and Society, Richard Warms, James Garber, Jon McGee, editors, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.
The Ritual Healing Theory: Hypotheses for Psychical Research, Pp. 337-360 in Parapsychology in the Twenty-First Century: Essays on the Future of Psychical Research, Michael A. Thalbourne and Lance Storm, editors, Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Company, 2005.
Origins of Belief in Life after Death: The Ritual Healing Theory and Near-Death Experience, pp. 242-261 in The Survival of Human Consciousness: Essays on the Possibility of Life after Death, Lance Storm and Michael A. Thalbourne, editors, Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Company, 2005.
The Ritual Healing Theory: Therapeutic Suggestion and the Origin of Religion, pp. 135-158 in Where God and Science Meet: How Brain and Evolutionary Studies Alter Our Understanding of Religion, Patrick McNamara, editor, Westport, CN: Praeger, 2006.
Miracles in Kongo Religious History: Evaluating the Ritual Healing Theory, pp. 176- 197 in Miracles: God, Science, and Psychology in the Paranormal, J. Harold Ellens, editor, Westport, CN: Praeger.2008.