Tag Archives: paranormal

Terminology and Usage Lesson

Today, terms describing phenomena normally reserved for science fiction, science fantasy or paranormal genre stories also appear in romance, mystery and historical fiction books. Thus, it is important to stay current with terminology and correct usage of trending language and terms, whether you are a writer or editor.

The lesson today centers on the term psi power. It is appearing frequently in literature or articles. From the website wyndology.com:

Psi Power

The term psi comes from the 23rd letter of the Greek alphabet and is used as an informal abbreviation for “psychic phenomena.” As such it covers all uses of the mind beyond the reach of accepted science. It is not an acronym and should therefore not be typed as “PSI.”

What Is Psi? What Is ESP?

The term psi refers to any ability to achieve apparently paranormal or psychic phenomena through the power of the mind. There is no generally accepted mechanism in conventional  science by which such abilities could operate.

Although “psi” is sometimes used interchangeably with ESP they’re not quite the same: ESP stands for “Extra Sensory Perception.” As such ESP covers phenomena known as “anomolous cognition”, for example mental telepathy. Psi is a more general term that also covers “anomolous operation”. In other words, ESP is the subset of psi that deals with knowing things – psi itself is a much wider field that also includes using the power of the mind to do things.