Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The supposed process of communicating through means other than the senses, as by the direct exchange of thoughts.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The direct communication of one mind with another otherwise than in ordinary and recognized ways; the supposed action of one mind on another at a distance without the use of words, looks, gestures, or other material signs; also, the resulting mental state or affection.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The sympathetic affection of one mind by the thoughts, feelings, or emotions of another at a distance, without communication through the ordinary channels of sensation.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun parapsychology The capability to communicate directly by psychic means; the sympathetic affection of one mind by the thoughts, feelings, or emotions of another at a distance, without communication through the ordinary channels of sensation.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun apparent communication from one mind to another without using sensory perceptions

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From tele- + -pathy.

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Examples

  • The term telepathy is sometimes used, in conformity with its derivation, to mean the direct communication between minds at a great distance.

    The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 14: Simony-Tournon 1840-1916 1913

  • We have the elements, not merely in what we call telepathy, or mind reading, but in our everyday converse.

    A Columbus of Space 1890

  • I am not certain but that we have lost another power that I suspect the lower animals possess -- something analogous to, or identical with, what we call telepathy -- power to communicate without words, or signs, or signals.

    The Wit of a Duck and Other Papers John Burroughs 1879

  • Many intellectual lights of the day were attracted to the movement: writers Tennyson and John Ruskin, philosopher William James, Nobel Prize-winning physiologist Charles Richet, prime ministers W.E. Gladstone and Arthur Balfour, and especially Frederick Myers, the inventor of the word "telepathy," and Trinity College professor Henry Sidgwick.

    The Globe and Mail - Home RSS feed REVIEWED BY M.A.C. FARRANT 2011

  • And resistance to telepathy is an automatic human reaction to that sudden feeling of mental intrusion?

    Superhero Nation: how to write superhero novels and comic books » Problematic Superpowers and How to Make Them Work 2009

  • The fact that journals like Nature and Scientific American aren't interested in reading about the evidence for telepathy is because they are run by dogmatic materialists.

    An Interview with Elisabet Sahtouris 2007

  • She shared with me how telepathy is the one true universal language, how self-imposed dream states were, for her, the equivalent of a day at the beach; I shared with her Bruce Springsteen and episodes of ‘Survivor.’

    The Downlink: Ken Goldman | SciFi UK Review 2007

  • There's no right to keep your telephone company profitable when telepathy is developed.

    Science press releases 2006

  • So to you telepathy is a-priori excluded from the realm of things science should investigate, just because.

    A Big-Picture Look At Darwinism 2006

  • Don't try the 'if we all felt like that one' because my canvassee (?) doesn't believe in telepathy .....

    The Highs and Lows of a Political Canvasser 2006

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