Pseudoscience and the scientific status of parapsychology

I am ill today - your work is to write this essay:

"Discuss the scientific status of the study of paranormal cognition and paranormal action." (8 + 16 marks)

Researchers in this field (carrying out ganzfeld studies into ESP, or looking for evidence of Micro- or Macro-PK) claim they are carrying out well-controlled scientific investigations. You need to outline the claims made against them (that parapsychology is in fact a 'pseudoscience') - for AO1 - and assess the validity of these claims, and their importance - for AO2.

There is some overlap here with other questions we have looked at - the methodological issues in ganzfeld and PK research - but there are other issues too. Where you are using the same material as previous essays you need to use it in a slightly different way, to comment on the reputation of the subject.

Issues that we have already looked at that you can use:

• Subjective rather than objective measures of 'success' - lack of objectivity. 
• Researchers looking for evidence of the paranormal, rather than attempting to falsify their hypotheses - lack of falsifiability - and parapsychologists being fooled by 'charlatans'. 
• Investigator effects suggesting that experiments are not well controlled - confounding variables may well be giving an illusion of psi abilities.

Anther important issue:

• The impact of cases of confirmed scientific fraud - where the researcher has deliberately cheated to produce false data (Soal's ESP research, and Walter Levy Jr's PK research).

For AO2:

• Give some evidence to back up the claims made against parapsychology.
• Explain why these issues matter so much, especially in this field.
• Defend parapsychology - is it really so different from other fields? Arguably autoganzfeld experiments are better controlled, with more objective measures and better falsifiability than most psychological research!