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?

[jim360]

Animals "doing it" doesn't necessarily mean that animals are psychic in the strictest sense. They are probably just better attuned to certain things -- better senses of smell, or hearing, or taste, or goodness knows what. My chickens tend to get excited whenever we make the tiniest move towards the door at the other end of a garden -- doesn't mean that they detected our psychic presence. Just that they heard, or saw us, or happened to be aware that it was time for us to come out.

I don't believe animals are psychic. I do know that we don't fully understand most of what they are capable of doing yet.

[naomi24]

//I do know that we don't fully understand most of what they are capable of doing yet. //

If you know that, why don't you think the same might apply to human beings?

[jim360]

I've given my reasons earlier. While it may not be possible to conclusively rule out psychic abilities of any sort I see no reason to believe in them. Hanging on to some idea of "Well we don't know so it must be psychic" seems to me to be an attempt to explain the unexplained on a par with "we don't know so it was God" of earlier days.

[naomi24]

//Goodness only knows how they do it, though. //

So what does that mean?

[jim360]

It means that -- well, take for example the remarkable flying formations of huge flocks of birds that seem to move as one. I explained earlier that it could be modelled treating each member in the flock as paying attention only to nearest neighbours and having very quick reactions, but that's a model that hasn't quite captured the full details and is bounded by computing power etc., and anyway the birds aren't being run by a computer model so they must be picking up on signals we can't quite discern ourselves.

There's a lot to understand, but I think there is very good reason to believe that the general trend of "de-mystifying" the world will continue.

[naomi24]

//so they must be picking up on signals we can't quite discern ourselves.//

And it's impossible for human beings to experience similar?

[jim360]

Physical signals. Not psychic ones.

[DTCwordfan]

So now you accept there maybe means of communication that we don't yet fully understand, or even may be know about.

How about energy?

Maybe we are slowly getting there and opening your eyes up to the potential for paradigm shift science be it physics, chemistry or whatever.

[jomifl]

what is the difference between a psychic feeling and a non psychic feeling?
I sometimes have a premonition that something terrible is about to happen, but it doesn't so I forget about it. If something terrible did happen I would be able to say that I had a premonition. As someone said elswhere on AB, 'probably down to blood sugar levels.'

[society]

Jim do you think Edgar Cayce, Nostradamus, Helen Duncan - these people are frauds?

[naomi24]

DT, //So now you accept there maybe means of communication that we don't yet fully understand, or even may be know about.//

That’s what I thought he meant – but I think I was mistaken. Curiouser and curiouser. :o/

[jim360]

I don't accept anything of the sort. Animals may be able to pick up sights, smells and sounds that we cannot. It's hardly psychic to do so.

Not heard of two of those people society but Nostradamus' predictions have generally been shown, like most prophecies, to have been badly interpreted.

[Canary42]

Thanks Jim and Jon for sorting my shoal/flock scenario.

[naomi24]

Well, all I can say is that my dog listens to me on the phone when I invite people to dinner - and can smell my husband's after shave from five miles away.

Night all.

[DTCwordfan]

Naomi - perhaps Jim in his Isaac Newton reincarnation thinks that we have tied down all the principal/fundamental laws of science and that everything can be set into that existing framework today.......he'll be in for a hell of a shock when something mind-blowing comes along - or maybe he'll take a stance akin to the Vatican over the centuries who, by and large, have not managed change that well.

I'll give him some credence though for his demystification comment. Hopefully, that will continue on unabounded, assuming we fund the sciences well (and intellegently).

[jim360]

I don't think that either, DTC -- and I fancy that I'm well aware of the gaps in physics at the moment. What I think you are missing is that firstly, those gaps are at "high energies" -- we understand low-energy behaviour of matter and space incredibly well, ridiculously well. Stupendously well. No we have not tied down the laws, what a ridiculous thing to say. But those laws, ultimately, will almost certainly have to match up at low energies to what we have at the moment. In the case of the Standard Model of Physics, the data set that it is being fit to is huge. So massive that they had to invent the World Wide Web to share it all.

Please don't call me closed-minded. As and when concrete evidence emerges for psychic abilities I'd accept their existence. But there is precisely nothing beyond anecdotal evidence with the usual problems of selection bias, etc. Up until today I thought that animals could apparently predict earthquakes, but scientists went and studied it and found no evidence for this beyond random chance and animals reacting after the earthquake had already started.

There is no evidence that anyone manifests psychic abilities. Until that changes I see no reason to believe in them. That is not closed-minded, it is rational

[society]

"Jim360

There is no evidence that anyone manifests psychic abilities. Until that changes I see no reason to believe in them. That is not closed-minded, it is rational "

I predict you will cross path with a psychic/clairvoyant one in time to come.

[naomi24]

Society. ;o)



Science seems to have concluded that millions of people are either potty, or that they suffer delusions, but here’s a thought.

What is a ‘thought’? I don’t mean how is a thought generated? – I mean what does it actually, physically, consist of? We can’t see it, we can’t grasp it, other than from an intellectual perspective, we can’t examine it, and therefore we have no idea of its properties or of how it is capable of behaving. So what is it? Until we can answer that, we cannot claim to ‘know’ that people’s experiences of telepathy, déjà vu, etc., are bogus.

[daisya]

Well put Naomi and something I've often "thought" about. I would love those who say psychic ability doesn't exist because there's no tangible proof etc to explain that one.

[RATTER15]

I have occasionally had a "feeling" about certain things, maybe a trip that I have had a bad feeling about, sometimes even to the point of being a little fearful, maybe a good feeling about something. So far I have never been able to justify these feelings at all.

I would love to be able to believe in these things, like ghosts, I really want to believe, I don't think I have a closed mind, I want to believe but my senses say "don't" not until you have experienced something irrefutable. I have heard stories from people about such things, from people I really trust (including my Mother RIP) and Naomi, these people are certainly telling me the total truth but my brain puts up a barrier and say.... don't go there, it cant be true, I have quite a bit of inner conflict going on because I want to believe but my brain just wont let me! I don't understand it myself. I'm not sure if I'm explaining myself clearly here.

I'm reading back what I have written and am now convinced I'm as mad as a box of frogs!!