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* Santeria:
A Cuban spiritualist religion. [Also see "Voodoo" for more info.]

* Scrying:
A term used to cover a wide range of divination techniques which parapsychology would tend to classify as types of ESP. Most scrying techniques involve some degree of fixation on a surface with a clear optical depth (crystal ball, a pool of ink or deep water) or on an area which shows random patterns (flames in a fire, smoke), the idea being that subconscious information available to the scrying will be manifested in their interpretation of the imagery or random patterns they see.

* Séance:
A meeting of people to receive spiritualistic messages.

A group of people who gather in an effort to communicate with the dead.

* Second Sight:
Another name for clairvoyance. [Also see "Clairvoyance" for more info.]

* Sender:
Another name for agent. [Also see "Agent" for more info.]

* Sensitive:
Capable of perceiving with a sense or senses; Susceptible to the attitudes, feelings, or circumstances of others.

A person who frequently experiences ESP (Extra Sensory Perception). [See "Extra Sensory Perception (ESP)" for more info.]

* Sensory Deprivation:
Conditions of greatly restricted sensory input. [Also see "Ganzfeld Experiments" for more info.]

* Serpent Power:
See "Kundalini".

* Shadow People:
Spirits or ghosts which are usually black in appearance and have no discernible features. People usually see them out of the corner of their eye, and have also been known to be captured on film.

* Shaman:
A ‘wizard’ in tribal societies who is an intermediary between the living, the dead, and the gods.

A member of certain tribal societies who acts as a medium between the visible world and an invisible spirit world and who practices magic or sorcery for purposes of healing, divination, and control over natural events.

* Shape-Shifting:
Paranormal ability to assume the form of another person, an animal or other entity.

* Siddhis:
Name given to paranormal powers associated with the practice of Yoga. [Also see "Yoga" for more info.]

* Significance:
Results of an experiment are said to be statistically significant when they are very unlikely to be due to chance (and hence, in a psi test, are more likely to be due to psi).

* Simultaneous Dream:
A dream whose elements correspond closely with those in the dream of another person.

* Sixth Sense:
Grasping the inner nature of things intuitively.

An ability of perception seemingly independent of the five senses (touch, smell, sight, feeling, taste); keen intuition. [Also see "Extra Sensory Perception (ESP)" for more info.]

* Skeptic:
One who instinctively or habitually doubts, questions, or disagrees with assertions or generally accepted conclusions.

A person inclined to discount the reality of the paranormal and to be critical of parapsychological research. Generally seeks rational or scientific explanations for the phenomenon. Paranormal Researchers are also skeptics to an extent, but with an open mind. Before we can say it's paranormal in nature, we must first prove that it's not something that can be explained by other means.

* Sleep Paralysis:
A condition in which a person seems to be awake/conscious but is unable to move.

* Soul:
The spiritual element of a person, generally believed to be immortal. [Also see "Ba" and "Spirit" for more info.]

* SPE:
See "Subjective Paranormal Experience".

* Speaking in Tongues:
See "Glossolalia".

* Spectre/Specter:
An unusual appearing ghostly figure or image.

A ghostly apparition; a phantom.
A haunting or disturbing image or prospect.

* Spirit:
People tend to put Ghost and Spirit in the same category and definition, even at Ghost Tracker we have found ourselves switching back and forth from Ghost to Spirit when talking about them because they both basically get the same idea across.. But most paranormal researchers distinguish the two by these definitions:

A Spirit refers to an actual living essence, or soul, of a person that has remained after their physical body has died which usually still retains the entities traits and personality and can communicate with the living, unlike Ghosts which tend to just be psychic impressions left in an area, or "recordings" of time in a location that don't seem to interact and are played over and over. [See "Ghost" for more info.]

* Spirit Guide:
A spiritual being who is assigned to a particular person to assist them in their spiritual or life journey. It is said that each person can have more than one spirit guide. These guides can be highly evolved spirits of people who have lived before.

* Spiritism:
See "Spiritualism".

* Spirit Photography:
Capturing evidence of spirit on film. Spirit photographs, when developed, show anomalies that were not seen at the time the photo was taken. Examples include orbs, vortexes, ecto/mists and, on a more rare scale, apparitions. [See our "Photos" page for examples of what you may capture on film.]

* Spiritualism (Spiritism):
The belief that the dead communicate with the living, as through a medium.

A belief system that spirits of the dead can (and do) communicate with living humans in the material world.

* Spontaneous Cases:
Paranormal phenomena that occur in everyday life, unsought and unexpected.

* Spontaneous Human Combustion (SHC):
Refers to cases in which a badly burned human body has been discovered in circumstances suggesting that the fire originated spontaneously in or on the body of the victim.

* Subjective Paranormal Experience (SPE):
Or Subjective Psi Experience. An experience that the person who has it believes to be paranormal.

* Subjective Psi Experience (SPE):
See "Subjective Paranormal Experience".

* Subliminal Perception:
Perceiving without conscious awareness.

* Succubus:
A female spirit supposed to descend upon and have sexual intercourse with a man while he sleeps.

* Supercharged Orb:
These are orbs that tend to leave long streaks behind them, probably from them moving so fast. Watch for light sources in the area though.. Moving the camera around quickly will usually produce streaks of light on the photo of whatever light sources are present. Keep your camera steady and try not to move it around too much. If the rest of the photo is clear (as in the camera was being shaken around alot) and there weren't any light sources in the area of the streaks of light, Yet you get them in your photo, You may have caught some super charged orbs.

* Super-ESP Hypothesis:
The suggestion that people are capable of unlimited ESP. The super-ESP hypothesis is often presented as an alternative to the survival hypothesis in explaining mediumistic phenomena (the medium is believed to obtain information using super-ESP powers and not directly from the spirit of a deceased person).

* Supernatural:
Of or relating to existence outside the natural world.

Something that exists or occurs through some means other than any known force in nature. As opposed to paranormal, the term "supernatural" often connotes divine or demonic intervention.

* Survival:
The belief that some aspect of the person (e.g., consciousness, mind, personality, soul) lives on after death of the body.