Enrico "Henry" Agostino Morselli (17 July 1852 - 18 February 1929) was an Italian physician and psychical researcher. Morselli was professor at the

University of Turin The University of Turin (Italian: ''Università degli Studi di Torino'', UNITO) is a public research university in the city of Turin, in the Piedmont region of Italy. It is one of the oldest universities in Europe and continues to play an impo ...

. He is best known for the publication of his influential book, ''Suicide: An Essay on Comparative Moral Statistics'' (1881) claiming that

suicide Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Mental disorders (including depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorders, anxiety disorders), physical disorders (such as chronic fatigue syndrome), and s ...

was primarily the result of the struggle for life and nature's evolutionary process. According to Edward Shorter "Morselli is known outside of Italy for having coined the term dysmorphophobia. In Italy, he is known for the psychiatry textbook, ''A Guide to the Semiotics of Mental Illness''." Morselli was a

eugenicist Eugenics ( ; ) is a fringe set of beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic quality of a human population. Historically, eugenicists have attempted to alter human gene pools by excluding people and groups judged to be inferior or ...

and some of his writings have been linked to scientific racialism. Morselli was also interested in

mediumship Mediumship is the practice of purportedly mediating communication between familiar spirits or ghost, spirits of the dead and living human beings. Practitioners are known as "mediums" or "spirit mediums". There are different types of mediumship o ...

and

psychical research Parapsychology is the study of alleged psychic phenomena (extrasensory perception, telepathy, precognition, clairvoyance, psychokinesis (also called telekinesis), and psychometry) and other paranormal claims, for example, those related to near- ...

. He studied the medium

Eusapia Palladino Eusapia Palladino (alternative spelling: ''Paladino''; 21 January 1854 – 16 May 1918) was an Italian Spiritualist physical medium. She claimed extraordinary powers such as the ability to levitate tables, communicate with the dead through he ...

and concluded that some of her phenomena was genuine, being evidence for an unknown bio-psychic force present in all humans.Brancaccio, Maria Teresa. (2014)
''Enrico Morselli's Psychology and "Spiritism": Psychiatry, psychology and psychical research in Italy in the decades around 1900''
Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 48: 75-84.

Selected works

Science *''Suicide: An Essay on Comparative Moral Statistics'' (1881) *''A Guide to the Semiotics of Mental Illness'' (''Manuale di semeiotica delle malattie mentali'') (1895) Psychical research *Morselli, E. (1907). ''Eusapia Paladino and the Genuineness of Her Phenomena''. Annals of Psychical Science 5: 319-360, 399-421. *Morselli, E. (1908). ''Psicologia e “Spiritismo”: Impressioni e Note Critiche sui Fenomeni Medianici di Eusapia Palladino'' (2 vols). Turin: Fratelli Bocca.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Morselli, Henry 1852 births 1929 deaths Italian psychiatrists Parapsychologists Academic staff of the University of Turin