A Teacher
Edmund Gurney
He tried to put ghosts and telepathy under the discipline of evidence.
The transmission
Edmund Gurney was an English psychologist and one of the founders of the Society for Psychical Research in 1882, serving as its honorary secretary. He was the principal author of ‘Phantasms of the Living’ (1886), a two-volume work co-written with Frederic W.
H. Myers and Frank Podmore that gathered over 700 case studies of apparitions and crisis hallucinations. Gurney sought to explain such phenomena through a theory of telepathy and conducted extensive experiments in hypnotism. He died in 1888 at Brighton from an overdose of chloroform.
What they gave
Phantasms of the Living: Principal author of the 1886 two-volume work gathering over 700 case studies of apparitions and crisis hallucinations.
- Founding the SPR: A founder and honorary secretary of the Society for Psychical Research in 1882.
- Theory of telepathy: Sought to explain apparitions through telepathy, putting ghosts and thought-transference under the discipline of evidence.
- Hypnotism experiments: Conducted extensive experimental work in hypnotism alongside his survey of spontaneous cases.
The line they stand in
Taught by / Influenced by: Henry Sidgwick, who anchored the Cambridge circle; Frederic W.
H. Myers, his close collaborator; William James in the wider psychical-research network.
- Taught / Influenced: Frederic W. H. Myers and William James, who carried forward his evidence-based approach to psychical research.
Revelations they taught
Essential Works
- Phantasms of the Living1886