The Magazine of the Society for Psychical Research 18 (2025)
One of the many ways that the Society for Psychical Research interacts with member and non-members alike is through The Psi Encyclopedia. If you’ve never visited it before it can be found at https://psi-encyclopedia.spr.ac.uk/. The name makes it obvious what it does and how it does it, and how it was set up, is covered nicely by Robert McLuhan in our first article. Robert goes into the history of how it started and how it has changed over the ten years of its existence. Robert has now stepped down from leading the project, and the new editor is James G Matlock. We will hear in a future issue from James about how he is taking The Psi Encyclopedia forward.
Our next article is one of a potential case of reincarnation, witnessed by the author of the article, Philip Brown. As well as concordances between the two individuals in terms of their lives Philip also looks at physical similarities and astrological charts with many similarities.
Mark Porrovechio looks at the work of former Society for Psychical Research president F C S Schiller and the question of life after death. In this he examines the ideas Schiller put forward about memory and the survival of personality, post mortem.
The final article of this issue is a review of a conference attended by Neil Nixon. I’ll be honest I had not heard of the group before, they are the Unitarian Society for Psychical Studies and Neil was invited to speak at their 60th anniversary conference. It's always interesting to hear of other groups with similar interests.
And in the News section we have an option to apply for funding from the Helene Reeder Memorial Fund for Research into Life After Death.
A reminder as well that the 49th SPR International Annual Conference for 2026 will be taking place from Friday the 27th to Sunday the 29th of November at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, Stratford-Upon-Avon. Full booking details are on the SPR website, which you should check frequently to keep abreast of events that are happening such as the Web Events and Study Days. 2027 will see the 50th SPR International Annual Conference and I will be asking for some help to celebrate this landmark occasion in The Magazine so watch out for the details of that next issue.
As always I express my gratitude to all who have taken the trouble to contribute to this and indeed every issue of The Magazine. If you are thinking of doing so then please get in touch through email at [email protected]. Alternatively if there are articles you would like to see or areas covered then please let me know.ψ
Gordon Rutter [email protected].
Editor