ABSTRACT
There are three fairly standard approaches in the social scientific investigation of the so-called "paranormal". These approaches include: a reductionist approach; the social facts approach; and the phenomenological bracketing approach. This chapter explores the potential for a fourth way, which the author has tentatively called "ontological flooding," as a possible route towards overcoming some of the drawbacks associated with these approaches. It provides a sort of history of social scientific approaches to the transpersonal, religious and paranormal, and concludes with a brief discussion of possible applications of ontological flooding for social research and bereavement counseling. For the bereaved themselves, an ontologically flooded, participatory approach may provide a new means of dealing with the fear that the experience of continuing bonds is an indication of mental or physical pathology. It is an alternative framework for interpreting such experiences; open to a wide range of possibilities regarding the ultimate ontology underlying these enigmatic experiences.
