Anomalous phenomena and the scientific mind: some insights from “psychologist” Louis Favre (1868-1938?)

Abstract

At the turn of twentieth century, in France, psychical research wasn’t fully separated from psychology. The Institut général psychologique (IGP) was created in 1900 as an attempt to integrate the scientific study of anomalous phenomena in modern science. One forgotten actor of this society was “psychologist” Louis Favre, a polymath researcher with a passion for scientific methodology and the “scientific mind.” He developed a pioneer experiment on the influence of magnetic passes on plants and microbes, with a control group. He also participated to IGP’s 3-years study of physical medium Eusapia Palladino, from which he suggested several general ideas on the study of anomalous phenomena. Later in his life, he offered to classify this study at the forefront of scientific dynamics, under the name of “Anomalialogy of the phenomena.” According to him, this field is highly compatible with scientific method, and may even be the best place to train our “scientific mind.”