Psychic Feelings

[vernonk]

Do you believe that - maybe even have examples of - some people can somehow sense what you're thinking or feeling even if they're a long distance away and haven't seen in you in a long while?

[jomifl]

Jim, we've been here before, it is curious that 'psychic' messages seem to be at the emotional level, not the intellectual leve. They are never like 'when National Widget shares rise to 4d each sell them and buy United Cabbage Dist. PLC.', they are more like 'something is going to happen, it might be bad'. There is a clue there if anyone wants to see it.

[naomi24]

Jom, //Your 'thought' is the expression of a bit of cellular 'rewiring'. //

I know that, but what does that 'expression' consist of? What are its properties?

//DTC, ignoring of course that ESP has never been 'demonstrated' other than on the stage before a paying audience. //

We've already talked about that – that is not what this thread is about. What if we don't yet have the technology to examine it - or what if it it occurs randomly and cannot be produced to order?

Actually, Jom, you’re mocking it, and that should be beneath you because in doing so you’re mocking millions of people who might just be right. Science doesn’t know everything – far from it - and it’s rather blinkered to assume that it does.


Jim, //Thoughts are then the output of internal processes.//

That’s already been established.

//I don't think there are any other "physical properties" //

There’s no doubt that thoughts exist, so what evidence do you have to lead you to that conclusion?

//-- what do you think those might be?//

I have no idea.

[jim360]

I do not assume that Science knows everything. I know that it does not. I just know what the holes are better than most.

I've explained the evidence for my position more than adequately. If you are just running to the "Science doesn't know everything" line. Dara O'Briain put it best: "Science knows it doesn't know everything, because if it did, then Science would stop."

[naomi24]

Jim, I’m not running to any argument. Simply stating a fact.

//I've explained the evidence for my position more than adequately.//

No you haven’t. You’ve explained the processes by which thoughts are produced. You have offered no evidence whatsoever to support your claim that thoughts do not possess physical properties.

Perhaps you should take note of Dara O'Briain’s quote, or better still one from Stephen Hawking:

“The Greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge.”

[jim360]

No, I've said that thoughts have the physical properties of an electrical signal.

[naomi24]

Jim, No. You said, //Thoughts are then the output of internal processes. I don't think there are any other "physical properties"//

You know the processes by which a thought is produced, but face it, neither you nor anyone else knows what it consists of once it’s been produced.

[jim360]

Operative word "other". The physical properties are those of an electrical signal. Hence why a "thought is an electrochemical process".

[jomifl]

Naomi, not mocking at all, attempting to focus attention on the lack of real evidence for ESP. Stage tricks have gone on for so long that a kind of credulity that that there is something to it has seeped into peoples minds. If people believe that such things exist based on such flimsy 'evidence' as purportedly exists then perhaps a bit of mockery will make them think again.
As for what the thought consists of, well, that has been explained, how it manifests itself in your brain is the 'thought'. I think that is as far as it goes. Beyond that it is a bit like trying to lift yourself with your own bootstraps or trying to measure a rule with itself.

[mrs_overall]

Just to drag this thread away from the intellectual & scientific arguments, let me tell you this story.
One morning I went shopping and bumped into a woman I am on nodding terms with. She took hold of my arm and told me that I was pregnant with a boy who would be very tall and would be good with computers.
We were not trying for a baby and had no intentions of having more children, but earlier that morning me & Mr O had had a bit of morning delight. I must have been about 2 hours pregnant.
That boy is now 13, very tall and is a whiz with computers.
Explain that?

[jomifl]

If this was before computers had been invented Mrs.O, I would be impressed.
It is an anecdote, she got the bit about a boy right(50% chance), but how tall is 'tall' and how good is 'good' and what constitutes a 'computer'. OK I'm a sceptic, but there are times when I get hoodwinked that I realise that I am not sceptical enough.

[jim360]

I don't see that I have to. Anecdotal evidence is worth looking into but by itself is not strong evidence at all. How many other people did she bump into and say that, or something similar, to that day and through her life? Why do some people apparently manifest this ability and others do not? Why, once someone decides to make money out of said abilities, does everyone here universally condemn them? If you were psychic and knew it wouldn't you want to make a living out of it? And yet apparently all such people are "just frauds", but the man in the street isn't.

I am sure there are many such anecdotes but on closer inspection a lot disappear. Up until a couple of days ago I thought that animals can predict earthquakes. Unfortunately, this appears not to be the case -- certainly not any more accurately than we can ourselves -- which naturally disappointed earthquake scientists because it would be nice to have more warning of these destructive events.

If I make up any old story and added "explain that" at the end of it, would you trust me and change your views on whatever I was talking about? "I was walking down the street the other day and could swear I saw someone in a red coat on the other side. He fiddled with his zip for a while but then he just seemed to vanish slowly into thin air..."

I'm not calling you a liar Mrs_O by the way, but I hope you can understand my point. When scientists perform an experiment they observe carefully over a long time and under controlled conditions looking for a specific effect. If they find it they note that, if they do not then (hopefully) they say so too. This method of investigating the World yields real, demonstrably correct results. We are, after all, using computers to talk and not psychic communication.

Is it not rational to assume that (a) psychic abilities ought to be experimentally verifiable -- everything else so far has been -- and so (b) note that they have not been despite many attempts to try? The burden is, as far as I am concerned, now on those who would believe in such abilities to provide more convincing and concrete evidence for them.

[jomifl]

A thought may seem like an abstract thing that has some kind of ethereal existence and in a way it does, but it vanishes when the power is turned off.

[mrs_overall]

I hear what you are saying jim and I appreciate your point of view.

This was just one example of an incident that happened to me, and yes, I can see your argument that she could have gone up to numerous strangers and said the same thing and eventually been right.

I have seen several so called psychics in my life and apart from one, I would class them all as frauds.
The one I would say most definitely was not a fraud was accurate beyond belief. I will not bore you with all the details but she made several predictions that were so outrageous that I laughed at her. They all came true within the year. I ended up almost arguing with her when she went into details about a family member called Christopher who had a rare and obscure illness. There was no family member called Christopher - or so I thought. It turned out that a distant relative in Canada had just adopted a boy called Christopher who then developed the exact rare illness she had described.
She also said that it was my birthday the following week and described in detail a very unusual piece of jewellery I would receive unexpectedly from an old school friend who had emigrated to Australia. I said I didn't have such a friend. Lo and behold the following week I received the exact piece of jewellery in the post from an old friend who had (without my knowledge) emigrated.
I could go on.
As I was leaving I asked if I could see her again in a years time. She told me to make it no longer than 10 months and was insistent I could not see her after that. Eleven months later she died in a car crash.

[jim360]

Despite what I said earlier, and you know what my position is ultimately, I still have to say "wow" to that.

[mrs_overall]

Trust me, I was a sceptic before I saw this woman but I now believe there ARE genuine psychics out there, but they are few and far between

[jim360]

After an experience like that it's hard to blame you, but I still disagree. I wonder how people explain why such abilities are not universal.

[mrs_overall]

I don't know the answer to that one jim.
Right I am off soon. I hope you have a good day

[jim360]

Thanks and same to you! Despite my scepticism it was still an interesting story.

[naomi24]

Jom, //If people believe that such things exist based on such flimsy 'evidence' as purportedly exists then perhaps a bit of mockery will make them think again.//

Why would they want to think again? They're subjected to mockery all the time, but that doesn't deter them because they know what they've experienced. The ‘evidence’ isn’t flimsy to them – in their view it is undeniable. It’s only flimsy to those who who have no experience of it - and it's only those who have no experience of it that mock it.

//As for what the thought consists of, well, that has been explained, how it manifests itself in your brain is the 'thought'.//

It hasn’t been explained. The process by which it occurs has been explained, but the nature of that which, in your words, ‘manifests’, hasn’t.

//but it vanishes when the power is turned off.//

You don’t know what it is, so how can you possibly know?

There is no evidence, apart from the anecdotal, but with so much of that available, I fail to understand why those who don’t have personal experience of it refuse to consider it – and worse still aren’t even curious! Where would science be without curiosity? Millions of people report these things – they surely can’t all be delusional – or potty?

Mrs.O, // I don't know the answer to that one jim.//

And neither does anyone else.