Psyence

(noun) /ˈsīəns/ – from “psych” + “sense”

A system of knowledge that influences or manipulates the senses and perceptions of reality, often under the guise of truth. Unlike traditional science, which seeks to understand, psyence is the illusion of understanding—knowledge constructed to psych, seduce, or suppress the intuitive senses.

Origin:
Coined by Joshua J. Horton in S.H.E. (Serenity Healing Eternal) book 1, to describe the subtle dissonance between natural knowing and programmed perception.

Example 1:
“We were raised on psyence, not science. They didn’t teach us truth—they taught us to trust only what they could control.”

Example 2:
“So you really tried to psyence me like I’m slow! That’s manipulation in a slow cooker, man! I’m too aware for that!”

Philosophical Notes:
Psyence serves as both a caution and a compass. It warns of how easily humanity trades intuition for instruction. In the wrong hands, it is a veil. In the right hands, it becomes a key—because to psych the senses is also to understand how they work.

by J. J. Johnson April 22, 2025

Psychic Sciences

The endeavor to study and quantify extrasensory perception (ESP), telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, and psychokinesis under controlled conditions. Think remote viewing experiments for the CIA, Zener card tests, or random number generator influence studies. The field is plagued by the "shyness" of psychic phenomena—they often vanish under strict laboratory scrutiny. It's the science of maybe, where significant but small statistical anomalies are the holy grail, and fraud is the constant nemesis.

Example: "The lab for Psychic Sciences was full of Faraday cages, truly random number generators, and deeply skeptical researchers. Their biggest breakthrough was a subject who could consistently skew results by 0.001% above chance. The science was solid, but the effect was so tiny it was practically philosophical."

by Abzugal January 30, 2026

Psychic Mechanics Theory

Essentially synonymous with Psionic Mechanics Theory, but often with a slightly softer, more organic or spiritual connotation. Where "psionic" sounds technological, "psychic" might imply a natural, innate human potential. The mechanics might be framed in terms of "energy channels," "vibrations," or "morphogenetic fields" rather than tachyons.

Example: "The new-age healer's Psychic Mechanics Theory described auras as bio-plasmic energy fields, with clairvoyance working by 'resonating' your field with a distant person's to receive impressions. It was a biomechanical metaphor, painting the psychic as a sensitive organic instrument rather than a mental radio transmitter."

by AbzuInExile February 1, 2026

Psychic Theory

The broader framework for understanding psychic ability as a natural, if rare, human faculty. It encompasses the study of mediums, sensitives, and intuitives, often from a folk-psychological or spiritual perspective. It's the worldview that accepts "psychic" as a valid category of human experience.

Example: "Her Psychic Theory held that everyone has latent intuition, but 'psychics' are like radios with the volume cranked up, naturally receiving more signal from the collective unconscious or spiritual world. It was a descriptive model of a talent, not an engineering diagram of its parts."

by AbzuInExile February 1, 2026

Psychic Hypothesis

A broader, more general proposition that some people possess a natural sensitivity or faculty allowing them to perceive information or influence the world through means other than the known five senses. This encompasses intuition, clairvoyance, precognition, and healing. Unlike the mechanistic "psionic" term, "psychic" often carries connotations of innate, intuitive gift, connection to a spiritual whole, or heightened emotional sensitivity. It's a faculty, not a technology.

Example: "My grandma's 'gut feelings' about people were so accurate we joked she was psychic. The Psychic Hypothesis we lived by wasn't about bending spoons; it was that her lifelong practice of deep empathy and observation had tuned her unconscious mind to pick up on micro-signals and patterns the rest of us missed, creating an impression of 'knowing' that felt supernatural but might just be hyper-attuned natural perception."

by Abzunammu February 2, 2026

Psychohistory

A fictional social science, coined by Isaac Asimov in his Foundation series, which combines history, sociology, and mass psychology to predict the broad, statistical future of galactic civilizations across millennia. The core premise is that while individual behavior is chaotic, the reactions of human masses are predictable, like molecules in a gas. A true psychohistory would allow its practitioners to guide the future with minimal, calculated interventions, steering the course of empires as one might nudge an asteroid.

*Example: “My startup’s ‘psychohistory’ was just aggressive data analytics. We didn’t predict the fall of an empire, but we modeled that if we offered a 15% discount to users in City A, it would trigger a social-media cascade leading to a 5% market share gain in City B within three months. We weren’t Hari Seldon; we were just playing with fire and demographic spreadsheets.”*

by Abzunammu February 2, 2026

Psychohistory Theory

The grand, fictional social science framework from Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, proposing that the future of galactic civilizations can be predicted with mathematical certainty through the analysis of mass human behavior. The core axiom is that while individual actions are random, the behavior of very large populations is statistically predictable, much like the physics of gases. This theory posits that a sufficiently advanced mathematical model could forecast societal collapse, dark ages, and recoveries millennia in advance, allowing a small, knowledgeable elite to guide history with minimal, precisely calculated interventions. It's history as a deterministic physics problem, where humanity is the equation.

Example: "Our corporate strategy team thinks they're using Psychohistory Theory. They feed social media sentiment, commodity prices, and birth rates into a model that spits out a 78% probability of a 'cultural fatigue event' in our key demographic by Q4. They're not predicting the fall of the Galactic Empire, but they did buy all the ad space for mindfulness apps six months before the burnout wave hit. They guide markets the way Hari Seldon guided millennia."

by Abzunammu February 2, 2026