Historically, efforts to validate parapsychology have not been even moderately successful.
Informal studies of extrasensory perception and telekinesis, such as performers who seem to bend
spoons just by looking at them, are worthless because of their lack of controls that rule out fraud and
selfdeception. When attempts have been made to conduct carefully controlled experimental tests of
extrasensory perception, the results have been at best very weak and open to many methodological
criticisms, such as sloppy design or statistical errors. Hence parapsychology provides no more
support for the existence of the soul than do séances and near-death experiences.