Preface and Acknowledgments
Introduction (Edward F. Kelly)
Chapter 1: A View from the Mainstream: Contemporary Cognitive Neuroscience and the Consciousness Debates (Edward F. Kelly)
The History of Cognitive Psychology: A Thumbnail Sketch
From James B. Watson to the Cognitive Revolution
Problems in Classic Cognitivism
The Second Cognitive Revolution: Connectionism and Dynamic Systems
John Searle’s Critique of Computational Theories of the Mind
Biological Naturalism: The Final Frontier
Problems with Biological Naturalism
Psi Phenomena
Extreme Psychophysical Influence
Informational Capacity, Precision, and Depth
Memory
Psychological Automatisms and Secondary Centers of Consciousness
The Unity of Conscious Experience
Genius-Level Creativity
Mystical Experience
The Heart of the Mind
Conclusion
Chapter 2: F. W. H. Myers and the Empirical Study of the Mind-Body Problem (Emily Williams Kelly)
The Historical Context
The Roots of Scientific Psychology: Dualism, Mechanistic Determinism, and the Continuity of Nature
Psychology as Science: A Fundamental Conflict
The Naturalization of Mind: Limiting Psychology
The Unresolved Dilemmas of Psychology
An Attempted Solution: Methodological Parallelism
F. W. H. Myers: Purposes and Principles
Tertium Quid
Continuity
Empiricism
Expanding Psychology
Psychophysiological Concomitance
The Study of Subliminal Phenomena
The New Physics
Mind and Matter
An Expanded Naturalism
Myers’s Theory of Human Personality
The Unity-Multiplicity Problem: “Unitary” versus “Colonial” Views of Mind
An Expanded View of Consciousness
A Jacksonian Model of Mind
An Evolutionary View of Mind
The Subliminal Self: A “Tertium Quid” Theory of Consciousness
The Permeable Boundary: A Psychological Mechanism
Evolutive and Dissolutive Phenomena
Automatisms and the Expression of Subliminal Functioning
A Law of Mental Causality
Methods for Psychology
Empirical Phenomena for the Study of Mind: An Introduction to Human Personality
Chapters 2 and 3 - Hysteria and Genius
Chapter 4 - Sleep
Chapter 5 - Hypnotism
Chapters 6 and 7 - Hallucinations: Sensory Automatisms and Phantasms of the Dead
Chapters 8, 9, and the Epilogue - Motor Automatisms, Trance, Possession, and Ecstasy
Conclusion
Chapter 3: Psychophysiological Influence (Emily Williams Kelly)
Psychosomatic Medicine
Psychoneuroimmunology
Mind and Disease
Bereavement and Mortality
Sudden and “Voodoo” Death
Possible Mechanisms Behind Psychological Factors in Mortality
Mind and Health
Postponement of Death
Religion and Health
Meditation and Healing
Faith Healing
Placebo and Nocebo
Specific Physiological Changes Appearing Spontaneously
Sudden Whitening of Hair or Skin
False Pregnancy
Stigmata
Phenomena Related to Stigmata
Specificity of the Wounds
Predisposing Characteristics
Hysteria
Multiple Personality and Dissociative Disorders
Specific Physiological Effects Induced Deliberately
Yogis
Specific Physiological Changes Induced by Hypnosis
Autonomic Effects
Sensory Effects
Hypnotic Analgesia
Skin Conditions: Healing
Allergies
Bleeding
Burns
Warts
Other Skin Diseases
Skin Conditions: Induction of Bleeding, Blisters, and Markings
Attempted Explanations of Hypnotic Skin Marking and Related Phenomena
Changes in Another Person’s Body
Spontaneously Occurring Phenomena
Sympathetic Symptoms
Maternal Impressions
Distant Mental Influence on Living Systems
Community of Sensation
Suggestion at Distance
Distant Intentionality Studies - Clinical
Distant Intentionality Studies - Experimental
Birthmarks and Birth Defects in Cases of the Reincarnation Type
Conclusion
Chapter 4: Memory (Alan Gauld)
Memory and the Brain
Trace Theories: General Issues
Modern Approaches: Cognitive
Modern Approaches: Neuroscientific
The Problem of Survival
Myers’s Approach to the Problem of Survival
Problems of Personal Identity
Myers’s “Broad Canvas” Revisited
Myers, Memory, and the Evidence for Survival
Conclusion
Chapter 5: Automatism and Secondary Centers of Consciousness (Adam Crabtree)
Historical Background
The Views of F. W. H. Myers
Related Views of Some Major Contemporaries
Pierre Janet
William James
Morton Prince
T. W. Mitchell
William McDougall
Freud
Jung
Psychological Automatism: More Recent Work
Ernest Hilgard
Stephen Braude
Unconscious Cerebration Revisited
Sociocognitive Theorists
The Cognitive Unconscious
Neurobiological Research
Automatism and Supernormal Phenomena
Automatism and Creativity
Sensory and Motor Automatisms and Mediumship
Automatism and Experimental Psi Research
Conclusion
Chapter 6: Near Death Experiences and Related Phenomena (Emily Williams Kelly, Bruce Greyson, and Edward F. Kelly)
Near-Death Experiences: An Introduction
Explanatory Models of Near-Death Experiences
Psychological and Cultural Theories
Expectation
Birth Models
Depersonalization
Personality Factors
Physiological Theories
Blood Gases
Neurochemical Theories
Neuroanatomical Models
“Transcendent” Aspects
Enhanced Mentation
Veridical Out-of-Body Perceptions
Visions of Deceased Acquaintances
Converging Lines of Evidence
The Larger Context
Out-of-Body Experiences
Autoscopy
Lucid Dreams
Apparitions
Veridical Apparitions
Collective Apparitions
Deathbed Visions
Mystical and Conversion Experiences
A Psychological Theory?
The Challenge of Near-Death Experiences
General Anesthesia
Cardiac Arrest
Conclusion
Chapter 7: Genius (Edward F. Kelly and Michael Grosso)
Myers’s Theory of Genius: General Features and Scope
The Creative Process: A Descriptive Model
Myers’s Psychology of Creative Inspiration
Continuity
Automatism
Calculating Prodigies
Senses
Hallucinatory Syndromes
Automatisms in Genius
Genius in Automatists
Incommensurability
Non-Linguistic Symbolisms
Associationism and Its Limits
Coleridge and the Theory of Imagination
Psychoanalytic Theory: Primary and Secondary Process
The Crucial Role of Analogy and Metaphor
The Failure of Computational Theories of Analogy
Implications for Cognitive Theory
Summary
The Creative Personality
Genius and Mental Illness
Genius as Personality in Transformation
The Creative Nisus: A Drive Toward Wholeness
Art as Transformative
Transpersonal Roots of Genius
Creativity and Psi
Genius and Mysticism
Conclusion
Chapter 8: Mystical Experience (Edward F. Kelly and Michael Grosso)
Phenomenology of Mystical Experience: An Introduction
The Problem of the Universal Core
Steven Katz and the Contructivist Backlash
The Problem of Objective Significance
Stace’s Philosophical Argument for Objective Significance
Empirical Arguments for Objective Significance
Mysticism and Genius
Mysticism and Supernormal Phenomena
Neurobiological Approaches to Mysticism
Mysticism and Temporal Lobe Epilepsy
Gellhorn and Ergotropic/Trophotropic Systems
The Model of d’Aquili and Newberg
James Austin’s Zen and the Brain (1999)
Mysticism and Psychedelics
Psychodynamic Approaches to Mysticism: Toward a Working Model
Freud and Jung
Myers and James
Opportunities for Further Research
General Considerations
Sources of Relevant Phenomena
Further Guidelines for Future Research and Theory
Conclusion
Chapter 9: Toward a Psychology for the 21st Century (Edward F. Kelly)
Contemporary Reviews of Human Personality
A Re-assessment of Myers’s Theory of Personality
Myers’s Methodological Principles
Myers’s Natural History of the Mind
Myers’s General Theory of the Psyche – The Subliminal Self
Post-Mortem Survival
Myers’s Generalized Concept of Evolution
Myers/James Filter Theory and Contemporary Science: Toward Reconciliation
Non-Cartesian Dualist Models
Neutral-Monist Models
Summary and Prospectus
Appendix: An Introductory Bibliography of Psychical Research
References
About the Authors
Index