The Why Files
The Basement #013: Jeffrey Mishlove | The Dark Side of Psychic Ability
Specials • E100 Apr 27, 2026 2h 53m
Jeffrey Mishlove has spent 50 years at the intersection of science and the paranormal.
He holds the only PhD in parapsychology ever awarded by an accredited American university, earned at UC Berkeley in 1980 — and successfully defended it in court when organized skeptics tried to have it revoked.
He hosted the long-running television series Thinking Allowed, conducting over 1,500 interviews with the world's leading researchers in consciousness, mysticism, and the paranormal.
He was embedded in the SRI research community during the Stargate era, working alongside Targ, Puthoff, and others operating under CIA funding.
In 2021, he won first prize — unanimously — in Robert Bigelow's $500,000 competition for the best scientific case that consciousness survives death.
He holds the only PhD in parapsychology ever awarded by an accredited American university, earned at UC Berkeley in 1980 — and successfully defended it in court when organized skeptics tried to have it revoked.
He hosted the long-running television series Thinking Allowed, conducting over 1,500 interviews with the world's leading researchers in consciousness, mysticism, and the paranormal.
He was embedded in the SRI research community during the Stargate era, working alongside Targ, Puthoff, and others operating under CIA funding.
In 2021, he won first prize — unanimously — in Robert Bigelow's $500,000 competition for the best scientific case that consciousness survives death.