A Sixth Sense?

Discussion in 'Human Science' started by SkinWalker, Feb 19, 2005.

  1. s0meguy Worship me or suffer eternally Valued Senior Member

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    I knew I was going to get this kind of pathetic replies.

    Did you actually try it yourself? If not, then you cannot know.
     
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  3. Dinosaur Rational Skeptic Valued Senior Member

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    sOmeguy: Go post in the SciFi, Pseudo-Science, or parapsychology forum.

    The believers are there, and they will accept your claims. It is my understanding that this is one of the real science forums which requires more than anecdotal evidence.

    Oddly enough, I did try some experiments in parapsychology before I understood that the so called experts use invalid experimental designs which are guaranteed to get positive results in the absence of any paranormal abilities.

    I often wondered if Rhine at Duke and those who followed in his footsteps were ignorant or if they knew that their experimental design was bad. Id est: were they fools or charlatans?
     
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  5. sparkle born to be free Registered Senior Member

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    That's an interesting thread, but I would like to concentrate on this:
    Emphasis on "cultural norms". I live in a country where shamanism is still widely practiced and noticeable in day-to-day life. Personally, I am more inclined towards wanting to believe that there IS something out there, but despite frequent occasions to witness evidence of supernatural power I have to say that most phenomena can be explained easily (and just by using our five senses)

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    1. Premonitions: Yes, they exist. Yes, there are people who are quite successful at that. But according to my observations it all boils down to what skinwalker says above: those people have the extraordinary skill of being good observers. Take the example of the indigenous people who were able to flee the tsunami waves. Western friends of mine did that, too. They were there at that time and, as far as they know, are the only ones that survived in their holiday resort. However, in their home country they live on an island near the sea. They immediately sensed that something was not right (humming sound, change of light, air changed), grabbed their belongings and ran to the next hill. There was nothing supernatural about that. They had the experience, they had their sense of observation and they acted. Yes, it seems to be a process of computing the inputs from your five senses, rather than a new sixth one.

    2. Alertness vs. estrangement from nature: Very often, western people are astonished at what shamans (and others) can do. However, they lack observation skills (and experience) that come from living close to nature. Who of you has EVER experienced a completely dark night? No lights, except for stars. You will be amazed what your hearing is able to do when you are surrounded by nothing, but darkness. Many of us don't even know simple things about their own bodies (e.g. that we all breathe through one nostril at any time), let alone being able to observe that in others. We don't pay attention from where the wind comes, we are unable to predict the weather ourselves, we cannot read tracks, etc. And then we wonder when we see people who effortlessly can do things we cannot and draw conclusions we think unlikely (and they turn out correct).

    3. Deception and diversion: Shamans (and magicians!) use this technique. I don't know whether I already posted the case of the man who claimed he could cut himself with a knife, but the knife would not be able to penetrate his skin? Anyway, I think there is a rule: the more arrogant we are, the easier we are to distract. Rather than admitting that our sense of observation is not what we expect it to be, we accept that something supernatural has happened.

    4. States of mind: The ordinary person knows only two states of mind - we are either awake or not. However, there are more. According to what I have seen, many supernatural phenomena (related to shamanism) occur when the mind is NOT in those familiar states (yes, dinosaur is right: those states can also be drug-induced)

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    This also explains why experiments under controlled conditions fail. Let me give you an example: You can set your mind to a state where it is somewhere "in-between". Let's say, whenever you approach your car/home you ALWAYS have the right key in your hand. Then you begin to wonder. Next time you arrive at your doorstep, you consciously set you mind to find the right key. It will not work. Only if you are not consciously searching for the key, you can find it - you have to be neither conscious nor completely oblivious.
    Or another phenomenon: the ability to see and hear things that don't exist in the "awake state" and to communicate with other beings. I have talked to several people (hermits) who were able to communicate with beings from another world (no, not aliens, more like spirits, both animal and quasi-human). However, even they admitted that those apparitions are very common in people who meditate for hours every day. They said probably those beings don't exist, but are projections of their own mind. Those people ARE able to predict the future (without wanting it), to heal and to determine who is curable or terminally ill. But before attributing such things to a sixth sense, I think we should come back to what we said before: it all is possibly just another case of keen observation (even unconsciously), and drawing the right conclusions. Why shouldn't people like hermits, who are so close in contact with the mind be able to explore it much much deeper than the ordinary person can? Aren't most of us "outward people"? How can we possibly even think of trying to determine what is naturally possible and what not? And why shouldn?t there be the possibility that some "normal" people have this ability naturally, without training? (The people I talked to who had those experiences all have meditation practice of decades.) I also want to stress that those people are NO fortune tellers. They don't practice, because they want to predict the future or they want to heal. Those things are "by-products" the hermits don't want.

    However, there also are things I am not able to explain (and will never be), but they are not related to a sixth sense.

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