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The Sense in Extra Sensory Perception
Early studies of Extra Sensory Perception
Duke University is credited with the first ESP study based on scientific principle. The study was performed in 1927. In 1934, Dr. J.B. Rhines published his summary report of experiments he did during those years. The monograph was titled, “Extra-Sensory Perception”.
Dr. Rhines’ experiments used the famous ESP deck of cards consisting of 5 non-emotional drawings -a cross, a circle, a wavy line, a square and a star. Subjects picked the card on top of the shuffled deck and without looking at it or showing it to the tester, called out the drawing they “felt” was on the card and the tester wrote it down on a numbered list. They placed the card, still face down in a stack. At this point no one has seen the face of the card.
The next step was to turn the cards and the list over to the supervising attendant who would then check the answers against the list by going through the stack of face down cards. This kind of study is called a double blind study because neither the subject nor the assistant knows the answers. The director of the study then computes the statistical probabilities of how many correct answers versus how many incorrect answers to arrive at a mean average over time.
After 145 experiments over a 60 year time span the results were analyzed. Rhines and Pratt (another director) released the results. Six of the studies revealed a higher than average ESP score suggesting that these six studies indicated an unexplainable ability to sense “mind pictures”. That of itself is certainly not proof that humans have an extra sense, but only that some people have a higher than normal ability to detect “something” that the other 139 studies could not. Certain individuals stood out as having a high ESP score.
In 1955, Dr. George Price studied the results of Rhines and Pratt and concluded that the data could only have been faked if there was deliberate fraud involved or if the directors of the study had mental instabilities, something that was highly doubtful. However, another ESP researcher, S G Soals, did submit a fraudulent experimental result in 1978. Debunkers seize these occasional shams to discredit the entire research field.
Uri Geller known for his phenomenal success with ESP experiments is still considered untrustworthy. Geller was correct in tests nearly 100% of the time. He was asked to guess the number on a die face after it had been shaken in a closed steel box. Several supervisors were present in the room and no one knew the number until the box was opened. Geller guessed the correct number eight out of ten times, declining to guess two times because he did not get a “clear” picture. The Stanford Research Institute in Menlo Park admitted that Geller’s ESP ability was “one in a million”. Doubters studied for years trying to prove that he somehow cheated in these highly publicized tests.
Then there are the men who stare at goats…
George W. Bush, The United States Military and Homeland Security determined that ESP has military applications. Namely, certain individuals testing high for ESP ability can kill goats just by staring at them and thinking them to death. The Men Who Stare at Goats was the title of a “true” book and a movie starring George Clooney as a PSI operative in Iraq and elsewhere.
The Special Forces and Homeland Security at Fort Bragg in North Carolina decided to smuggle in some debleated goats and see if anyone could kill them with mind waves. At least one soldier reveals that he has killed one goat and one hamster just by staring at them.
The First Earth Battalion created in 1979 by the military was encouraged to do all sorts of paranormal things including:
- Walking through walls
- Becoming invisible
- Reading minds
- Killing small animals
President George W. Bush used these operatives after 9/11 and in the war in Iraq. It was thought that they could perceive where Saddam Hussein was hiding and maybe they did. Thank goodness that Barak Obama used real scientific intelligence and technology to find the real hiding place of Bin Laden or we might still be looking for him. Bush, unfortunately, turned the study of ESP into a joke.
The U.S. military has taken ESP to extreme measures using the “powers of the mind” to develop and test torture methods and ways to control people. It’s disturbing to think that an as yet unproven human ability would first be thought of as a weapon.
ESP in today’s world
Imagine you are driving down the freeway on your way to meet some friends and you look down and decide you need to stop for gas. You take an exit that you were not planning to take and when you arrive at the gas station, the friends you are going to meet are there filling up their tanks. This seems like coincidence, but could it be more?
What made you look down at your fuel indicator at that moment? What made you take an unfamiliar exit? Could it be ESP? Did your brain somehow sense that your friends were at or going to be at that particular gas station? How did you feel?
Today’s studies in ESP involve anecdotal evidence such as this. In ‘‘The Uncomfortable Facts about Extrasensory Perception,’’ published in Harper’s Magazine, Ian Stevenson referred both to spontaneous cases and to experiments as primary sources of evidence for the existence of ESP.
Ordinary occurrences of ESP give rise to the construction of scientific experiments.
Case studies as evidence need to be carefully documented and tested in controlled situations if possible. The documentation results are interpreted much like the evidence for Unidentified Flying Objects. For anything to be truly considered scientific it must be objectively observed by many witnesses and thoroughly documented.
Hypnotic and dream states seem to bring on precognitive or extra sensory perception. Dreams related to ESP are quite vivid and appear to be more real than reality. If you have episodes of ESP, be sure to write down who, what, where, when, how and why. This is the first step to identifying and confirming an extra sensory perception incident.
The studies done by Stephenson show a correlation between close family relatives, serious illnesses or accidents and ESP. Distance did not seem to matter. There are documented cases of relatives being very far apart and still “sensing” that there is some communication of distress or great emotion at particular moments in time.
Signs that you have ESP
- The phone rings and without caller ID you know who the caller is especially if you haven’t heard from that particular person in a long while. A very potent indication would be if you also know what the call is about without any foreknowledge.
- A feeling comes over you that you have experienced before and you suddenly know what is about to happen.
- You are going about your day when you get a sudden urge to go to a place you have never been or rarely go to and something happens that would not normally have happened. (meeting someone, stopping something from happening like an accident)
- You intuitively “know” things like where to find a friend’s lost ring or if people are lying to you.
- You get “hunches”.
- A good number of your dreams actually turn out be real or repetitive and precognizant.
Do you believe in extra-sensory perception?
Have you even had an ESP experience?
Learn more about ESP with a Kindle book
This is the original account of the basic experiment in parapsychology at Duke University, out which came the phrase, “extra-sensory perception”—ESP, that now appears in all dictionaries. It was originally published in association with the Boston Society for Psychic Research, but it has been out of print for years.
© 2011 Lela
Comments - Tell us about your paranormal experiences, especially the ones involving extra sensory perception.
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I sense that you are correct, JG Someday we will discover the mechanism of sending and receiving thought waves.
I'll be the party pooper and comment on the original premise of this hub.
To those who believe ESP doesn't exist, imagine you're a time traveler and have gone back to, say, 1820 and are trying to convince anyone you meet that people can talk to and even see each other hundreds of miles away on a device called a "cell phone". Or that people living thousands of miles from each other can send messages called e-mails to one another via a communication system called the internet. Or see and hear what's happening *as it happens* on a device called a TV set.
Cell phones, TV, radio and the internet are, in the larger context, simply methods of communication that people in 1820 would've rejected as something out of Woo Woo Land, as ESP is by many people now. But the reality is we all have ESP, whether we use or acknowledge its existence.
I've been aware of mine since I was 15, and although I can't use it at will, have "known" things that I supposedly shouldn't by "normal" methods. A cousin from my dad's side used to use it every day before she married a man who "blocks" such transmissions.
Cousin and I come by it naturally. Our grandmother, back in the days when most homes didn't have telephones, was somewhat famous in her rural area for "knowing" beforehand when people from out of town were coming to visit. Our uncles and aunts marveled that it was absolutely impossible to make surprise visits to Grandma. By the time they arrived, she would have cleaned the house, made up the beds in the guest rooms, baked pies and the aroma of a roast or a baking chicken would be wafting from the house.
My children and I had it too, and still do to some extent. When they were little, they learned to only glance at the cards in their hand while playing "Go Fish" or similar game, otherwise we could all "see" exactly what cards they were holding.
I have to laugh at "scientific" experiments where two strangers are put on opposite sides of a wall and told to "think" certain phrases or mind pics at each other. In my experience, that's like telling someone to listen to a certain radio program when the radio itself isn't tuned to the correct station. Because that's really all ESP is - transmitting thoughts and images on a certain wavelength no different than conversations transmitted between cell phones.
I have no doubt whatsoever that in a hundred years or so, ESP will be elevated from "Woo Woo Land" to a routine form of communicating with one another and viewing events before or as they happen.
Two years will fly by so yea I would just do my job and ignore everyone. Of course, I'd find a way to have my fun;) I have noticed that some people who are in management - are the very ones who should not be.
About 6 months after I left the lab - I had this really vivid dream. I went to a party and my former boss was there. She was sitting at a picnic bench and I was thinking why did I come here? (in the dream) a slow smile spread over her face and she said, "so when are you coming back to the lab?" I almost lost it in the dream and I woke up,saying,"Never! I'm never coming back!" I was saying it in the dream repeatedly and adamantly:) 6 months after I was gone! I hope the time flies for you - focus on the big picture.
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Yea, my boss is a piece of work. Hard headed and a know it all. Never admits her mistakes.
We caught her issuing the wrong blood to someone once and all she did was blame it on everyone else.
Whatever.
2 more years and I'm outa there!
Austin - sounds like your boss doesn't want you to do your job the way you should. Like she can't let you look better than her? I worked with a lot of people that feed their own emotional needs in their profession. Those people don't care about the science of it as passionately as we do. People like that will never get it. I used to get upset because people would change the time on test administration time if they ran behind because they were afraid they would get in trouble. Very problematic. I understand their jobs are on the line - but they should have fessed up and made it right for the greater good. I screwed up but I always admitted it because the docs know I'm human and not a machine. I wasn't going to get fired. Counseled maybe but when I ever said, I know I messed it up I promise to modify my behavior, they knew I meant it.
Dear Dan Rather: Please change the hearts and minds of the people around Lela to make a way for her to get through to them.
Amen
You know I had a boss like that till April of last year, Austin. On a Thursday night I had a dream that I went to work and her people were celebrating in the hallway. I asked what was going on and they directed me to her office, which was boarded up. The next day, I went to work, and at about 3, my manager called me into the office and told me they had let her go. I was befuddled.
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It's very possible. But the deal is that I left a very lucrative and important job and took a sizeable cut in pay to work here because I needed to quit flying all over the country and work close to home.
They hired me BECAUSE I was a consultant and worked in setting up labs. Then they totally threw up barriers for every little suggestion I made. I tried to be tactful and show them by trial and error and all the little tricks I learned for coaxing people into doing things right.
I swear to Dan Rather that these people I work with are the absolute bottom of the barrel in the health care industry. There is absolutely no way to get through to them. I have a friend that works here too and he and I have decided that this lab is the Twilight Zone and our boss is the black hole of Calcutta (she's from India). Everything has to be done her micro managed way or else.
Sounds right too I have to tell you! And anyone who has worked in a lab should know the importance of doing things consistently and efficiently. That would be very frustrating! I don't even have to see your lab to know have g the printer in a more convenient spot can save hours of time over a years period of time. Save steps is my motto. I did have people that listened to me and it was gratifying. I changes many things that didn't make sense - i could prove that time saved = dollars saved and that was the bottom line. Sounds like you got a manager that's lacking. It annoys me to no end when someone let's a personality conflict get in the way of business. Someone is being resistant to your ideas because maybe they don't want you to look better than them? Is it possible that your co-workers don't want you to succeed?
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I think you nailed it RH. Carp, I just can't get my boss to listen to me at all. Neither do the rest of my coworkers. It's very frustrating to know the answers, but no one takes you seriously. Sometimes it's a curse to be smart.
Did I tell you about the printer incident? When I first came to work there, the main printer we use was stuck in a corner 10 feet from the terminal that generated the print jobs. I simply asked why don't we move the printer next to the terminal?
You would not believe the roadblocks they threw up over that one simple suggestion! It took me a YEAR AND A HALF to convince them to move that damn printer! But I finally did cause I wouldn't give up on it and guess what. It's so much easier for everyone to use! Ta Da!
I've made three other simple suggestions that to this day have not been implemented and it really sucks having to do things the STUPID way. But I've given up. I get paid the same whether I work hard or whether I don't. If they don't care, why should I? I'm ready to retire anyway.
It's just scary having to turn important stuff over to people who don't care and have no sense. These are the people that are going to be taking care of me when I'm old and infirm! I might as well just walk off into the sunset and be done with it.
Wow Austin - crazy dream! Sounds like you have something difficult you need to accomplish and obstacles are getting in the way of it. A tower of mattresses? Oh cheese and rice - that's funny. Or what about feeling like you have something important to do and the right people aren't taking you seriously? Hmmmmm. Sounds like frustration but your being persistent about getting something done the correct way in a timely manner?
That's a good one!
I've had many work dreams in the past but at my job - it was a matter of great interest and we never got in trouble for talking about these things at great length:). I would often dream that I couldn't understand what people were saying - or something would be written down but I couldn't read the words? Weird!
Oh, goodness, Austin! I hope it isn't either. The only dreams I've ever had that were work related did turn out to be prophetic! Good luck to you!
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OK girls, last night I had a dream that I was desperately trying to take a unit of blood to the o.r. because they were operating on someone with a bomb inside of them. All kinds of things kept getting in my way including a tower of mattresses and my coworkers were not taking the whole thing seriously. The phone kept going out when I was talking to the o.r. nurse about where to take the blood and how much they were going to need, etc. The phone would just go dead.
I hope this isn't prophetic!
Screw that! Even if someone's watching, I'll shake till I get the answer I like...LMAO! That's the EXTRA part, right?
Right and if you don't like what it says you can shake it again as long as no one catches you;) haha!
Absolutely...the Magic 8 is much more accurate than the Crystal Ball - cuz it has words. I'm with you, Real!
I let the magic 8 ball make my important decisions. It's been working for me for 30 years;)
I'm with Will - I knew you were going to write this hub because I had a dream about it last night~!
I have a 'touch' of ESP...or is that I'm 'touched'? Hmm - my wires must have a short circuit though because I do dream of things usually that actually happen only they always happen to the wrong person or I see things in the dream not applicable to the actual person. That seems highly unfair as how am I supposed to warn him or her? So now I take my 'talent' and go 'oh no' every time it happens because I know I'm going to not be able to tell the right person what to expect! I now usually tell everyone - just in case. Again, think it must be faulty wiring or a short circuit somewhere. I'm also going to start using my grandmother's crystal ball just for some add-on help!
I don't "believe in" unprovable things nor do I disbelieve in possibilities. We just don't know enough to draw rigid conclusions either way, though many folks do and some seem valid, which is not so surprising. After all, how can we declare anything "impossible"? Our current plane of existence has limitations, but it is a tiny blip in the enormity of "everything", whatever "everything is.
My mother had a guardian angel whom she "saw" and never doubted, & he helped her in numerous situations. I think she thought he was her Dad, who died when she was only 12.
I feel protected myself and definitely have perception beyond actual observation and full knowledge at times. That may define it as "extra-sensory" - or isn't it "super-sensory?" Defining it too much is the beginning of trying to limit it. Mankind has been doing that since we first began to try to harness the unharnessable and contain the uncontainable. Somehow we seem to feel that giving names to those things and defining then by our terms into our comprehension really pulls them into our sphere of influence and power. Maybe it does, but isn't that limiting them? haha What if - - we just allowed them to operate? I doubt if our belief or disbelief actually changes them, if or if not they exist.
As for reincarnation, why not? In a universe in which it's believed that "nothing is destroyed or created" - recycling surely is its nature!
Eh, panty liner....whatever. I'll just pee. They're MY underwear. I can do whatever I want. :P
Yeah but is it going in my adsense account? I still get royalties from being a cockroach lol!!
RH I just gave you a movie to watch too! On your hub!!
Oh and about the PP thing.. I think we're all young enough to just wear a panty liner.. well... or.. something like that. Myself I'm 52 so uh.. I don't buy those anymore LOL
Well pull up your depends peoples!
Kat you're making me tired thinking about crawling on the floor looking for something! Sheesh - y'all Sydney graduated from 5th grade - there was a 3 hour ceremony for 150 kids at the high school. On a school night. A bit over the top, ya think? Today is the last day of school and I skipped! Lol!
Austin - my fagers hurt from clapping!
Right - watch that movie!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA - Have you thought about that pill they give to the incontinent? Of course, if it only happens now when you laugh or sneeze, you're good...lol :-)
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ROFLPP - yep - peeing in pants (but only a little)
Oh, you know, Kat, I think you're right on the ROFLPP...I think I've seen Austin say that before! And, I'd have awarded the answer to you also because that's awesome!
Cool I have it in there so I'll watch it! Oh I love Anthony Hopkins movies!! He's a fantastic actor! I liked him in Instinct. I gotta answer this one quick I "think" it's rollin' on the floor pissin' my pants" PLEASE LET ME BE WRONG! lol
Oh RH I'll look forward to reading that one! I might sleep today my brain hasn't decided what it's doing LOL. I'm rearranging my livingroom (the big one) and it's annoying! My dog KNOWS her area is going to be moved to the other side of my chair so she keeps running and sitting there it's so cute. But my stupid vacuum is broke AND I lost the ring from my dad in here so I don't want to vacuum it up on accident so I have to do it slow and sitting on the floor!
Oh and q & a site, I said I'd come back as a cockroach, cos they live through anything and even a nuclear bomb LOL and they awarded me the answer! LOL Everyone said bird except me! Well, if the flu shits so they say.. er.. shoe fits. ::ahem::
Yup, Kat, that's the one! It's a wonderful movie! I, though, am half in love with Anthony Hopkins. The man is brilliant!!
Austin, what the heck is ROFLPP?
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RH- You ARE a talking bird with a typewriter and a fang or two! ROFLPP
Kat - I'm not sure - it sounds like that year would be right. I should watch it again! I'll let you know if that is the one I saw. I read the book too - scary!
I do believe in the great circle of life. I think we are all connected by energy - some good, some BAD - but energy in the physical world. I'll explain more in a hub I'm going to link to this one - today!
If I got to choose though - I'd like to be a bird! A talking one of course. Would it be too much to ask for a typewriter and a fanger too?
Is it the 1977 version Audrey Rose with Anthony Hopkins? It's in my freeplay on Netflix so I put it in my queue. Oh.. lol I watched the Goat movie last night.. Um, they might of thought they were walking through walls because they were on acid. Um, yeah, I don't want to do either. IF there is reincarnation I thin it's only fair we could choose lol.
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Native Americans believe in the great circle of life. There may be room in there for interpretation of reincarnation.
Personally, I believe that if reincarnation has any validity, you are just as likely to come back as a rock than as a person. In effect, I believe in "reassembly" of our atoms.
Real, Audrey Rose was incredibly well done as a movie! The book was sort of scary too. But, I will be honest. I sit on the fence about reincarnation. I personally don't believe I'll come back as...say...a goat...teehee, but I definitely cannot say that I DON'T believe in it. And, that story is part of the reason.
lol remember it was that private school thing! Well, that and I am a documentary freak/nerd! Actually the story of Buddha is really interesting. Like when his mother gave birth, she felt no pain, (riiiight)LOL although some mom's have little tiny babies! But according to their legends the minute he was born he would walk, and with each footstep a lotus flower would bloom. He could talk right away (all of us who have children, know they "talk" right away, that first scream is a "I'M LIKE HUNGRY NOW" lol... but little ones babbling on, is just them talking! But Buddhist aren't like not having our little trinkets or what nots. And it does have some VERY WISE ways of life. But I can't see worshiping someone who may not have ever existed and it's not Asian or Chinese it's of India's origin, everyplace else just took it over. lol But thanks. I am not totally speaking against it, because I do use some of the "ways" but because they are general common sense. Like eating Cheerios rather than Trix like I like LOL!
Kat I could never be a Buddist:) I'm way too selfish! I like my material goods and what nots! You sure are well read on religion and history - you always surprise me!
OH and I'd missed that Stephanie said "if I believed" in reincarnation.. I thought she said she did, thus, the reason for my question to her! But I see now I missed that she too questions the validity of it. :)
@Austin*: Yeah I was afraid I was going to see dead goats lol, so really that detoured me from even wanting to get farther into the movie than to say "uh huh, cool blu ray" LOL!
I like Shirley McClain's movies, but so far I've never been able to get through any famous person's books unless it's history related, rather than personal conquests. I guess she has her reasons, she seems pretty adamant that it's real, but like RH says, I wish someone had good evidence supporting the whole theory too.
RH: I saw that, but it was a long time ago too, I'll have to do a recap. What detours me away from Buddhism isn't just that it's a religion, but unlike other religions who have solid evidence that the person they worship actually existed. There is NO recorded history that Buddha ever actually even lived. The story was passed down from India through the ages as "good practices to live by." But what really turned me off to even that is the fact that in the fable (and I don't say fable to degrade anyone's religion) is that WHAT person with a good nature that had many good things they wanted to become for other people's lives, why would he have a child, then leave his wife who supposedly loved him very much, with his family to care for them, letting his son grow up without a father to go starve himself under a tree seeking enlightenment, or to know another's life plights! He could have done that, by leaving his kingdom, seeking out poorer area's and being in touch with the people, and learning from them, not going off to be alone, never returning to his wife and child. When the Buddhist religion and theories began to broaden and bleed over into other nations, they adapted it as their cultures religion. So, what is China doing with this great enlightenment by killing their people and having dogs and cats sold as food. When China first realized a one child per family law was bad (i.e. Tiananmen Square 1989) because they became spoiled and started wanting to do as other countries and fight for their rights, they killed them. But their country religion is Buddhism. Oh, after Tiananmen, they changed that law and let people have more than one child, and then the children wanted pets. Many of which are rodents and Rabits, not dogs and cats like the rest of the world. Most of the rest of the world (and us in the East) who choose Buddhism as a religion have no clue if he lived or not, nor to the fact he left his family to raise the child he'd brought into the world. What's there to worship about that. -Just my .2 ;)
Ok I'm butting in:) do you remember the movie Audrey Rose? I guess I saw it when I was really young but it creeped me out! Did you guys see that one?
I personally don't believe in reincarnation but I wish someone had some good evidence of it. It's a cool theory. Buddist people sure believe it!
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Kat, to tell the truth, I couldn't finish the movie. I love George Clooney, but when I started watching the movie he was acting too weird for me to understand, and when the Colonel or whatever kept walking into walls expecting to walk through them, I gave up. the movie was kind of funny and kind of tragic, so I just couldn't finish it and I don't remember if any goats died. My memory is not that great and I block out a lot of stuff.
Reincarnation is beyond my ability to accept, but Shirley McClain sure does. Might want to read her book.
Stephanie & Nellieanna (love that name!!) I have a friend, the first night we met, we took to each other as if we'd known each other all our lives. It was weird. Nobody had mentioned either of us to each other (mutual friends) and the reincarnation thing keeps me wondering. My dad never liked girls to wear too much make up, and she does wear quite a bit, but in a gothic-y kind of way. She's young but wise beyond her years. Well, the first time she came over I was up in MI taking care of dad, she walked in and I introduced them, he got a big smile and said "Rachael is my favorite name, I named my sister Rachael back in the 20's" Needless to say he saw past her make up lol. He liked her. He liked all my friends, the ones who he wanted to sit out and hang in the garage, treated him as if he were one of the crowd! That NEVER was like my dad. Anyway, she's a firm believer in the paranormal and one day, about a year after dad passed she asked me if I'd had ANY relatives close to HIM that died before she was born. (not like my uncles or such) and I told her yeah, dad had a baby sister who fell off a high porch in North Georgia when she was a toddler. Her name was Birdie Lee. She got all, like... "excited" to put it mildly, not that she'd died, but she said THAT IS IT, THAT IS WHO TELLS ME WHEN YOU NEED ME. (She calls me out of the blue or sends me an "what do you need somethings' wrong" email, EVERY TIME there is something wrong) I was like what what what??? She said Birdie is her spirit guide and our link that made her know when things are not right with me, and her vibe comes to her via my dad. She just has a very keen since of knowing my feelings moreso than anybody I've ever known or met. So believing in reincarnation (which myself I'm just a skeptic there, but am always open to others beliefs) do you think it could be a possibility that she could be a reincarnation of Birdie?
Ok, I don't care about everyone's giggles or crackpot jokes go for it :) I can take it, but it's just too uncanny the way we met and my dad does NOT nor never did take to people like he did her. Also, she was the ONLY other person who came to my dad's funeral, and the only person who could speak for me like she knew what words I would have used if I could of spoke a coherent sentence. Is it possible? (anyone else who is serious on this subject please feel free for input, this has been weighing on me since his death in Nov. 09.)
Austin* I said I had the movie on blu ray, well, my friend actually owns it but keeps his movies here cos I have the player, he wanted me to see it, but I didn't want to see dead goats lol, so I only watched enough of it to see the vibrance of blu ray.. lol but now you've got me wanting to watch the movie, so goats really do die? (just bracing myself if they do lol)
Austin - a vey well-presented hub on a fascinating subject. I have theories about it. I doubt if there are "super-natural" powers. More that there are surely natural powers which are less common or less commonly used and explored. Ruling out any possibility is a limitation I can't accept. Whenever I just "know" or "feel" something which turns out to be so, I feel it as natural, possibly a combination of keen intuition and observance and - who-knows-what-other ability. It's interesting! Thanks for a great read and stimulating one!
This is off-the-wall, but if I believed in reincarnation, I might think my attic story had something to do with past lives. Some of my more interesting friends might agree. As for me, I like to deal with one life at a time...
I've read quite a bit about Edgar Cayce, and there is plenty of material for a hub. He certainly has a huge number of followers and believers.
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Hi Jane! Yep, the goat thing is supposed to be for real. Of course, we only have hearsay (and some dead goats) to prove it, LOL. Can you get the movie over in Oz? It's kind of freaky. Or maybe get the book on Amazon.
Merlin - loved the old lady story. I should start a gig like that! How much did she charge?
Stephanie - That's a weird story. I like it. It's just the kind of anecdotal story that researchers are looking for It might be possible to discover what about that attic gave you the willies? I could do a whole hub about Edgar Cayce. I think he is considered legit in certain circles. I need to research him.
If there is a God, I thank the God that I am an American!
Hi Austin,
Unfortunately I don't have any paranormal experiences to share. I wish I did...I'd be able to claim Rhandi's million.
I'm not exactly an *ESP denier* but I am a real skeptic about all this(surprise surprise!). Uri Geller was definitely a fraud..a magician. I did read that as Rhine's experimental designs improved, his subjects paranormal results declined. Is that goat staring for real!? How can that be?
Hey Katharella,
Way to much information for a bloke...! Although it did remind me of a quick story.
Young girl walks into the bathroom as her mother is taking a shower and says, "Mommy you're getting fat !"
With a great sigh her mother explains, "I am not getting fat mommy is pregnant... I am having a baby...we explained all this to you... .. I have a baby growing inside me...do you understand ?"
"Yes Mommy !" And as she turns to leave she asks, "So what's growing in you Ass ?"
PS No I'm not offended, maybe I am called Merlin 'Cos people think I'm Magic !!
I have a man who goes under Ghost-something on my page, I follow the hub about him, we're not supposed to drop links, but you can find him in my followers and see the hub, it is on going EVERYDAY with lots of conversing about it. He's very very tenacious with keeping up with getting to the bottom of that! Just an fyi if you want to check it out.
That's true, Austinstar. Perhaps nestled somewhere between the white matter and grey matter of the brain is some dark matter yet to be understood, lol.
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@Secularist10 - I watched the video by James Randi. Uri Geller did look very uncomfortable on the Johnny Carson show. I was surprised at all the avoidance tactics he was using. He must have been very clever at more than a few "tests" of his abilities.
I think I even remember the show on the Phillipino surgeons. I believe I was in Med Tech school at the time and thought it was hilarious.
I do wonder how valid ESP is and would love to find empirical proof of an "extra" sense that could be developed. I don't think anyone has devised the gold standard test yet. But once upon a time, we didn't know that supersonic speed was possible.
There are more things in this universe than we know of that's for sure!
Hi Stephanie, I had a dream that I was doing my husbands laundry and found a brown paper bag in the mix! When I opened it thinking oh goody, he's left me a present! Because he used to come home from work with things he'd bought for our unborn baby! (like a blue sweater, because we were HAVING a boy)lol, but when I opened it in my dream, there was just a scrap of paper in it, with a phone number. Then I woke up.
I woke up to find him NOT HOME! Um, strange. I looked at my purse, and it was open, the money was gone. I called his friend and asked for him, he said he wasn't there. So I drove over to his other friends house that had no phone and there he was with a girl. They weren't doing anything, just alone together. I was sort of upset obviously then later I realized he most likely was cheating on me. I never told him about the dream, I didn't think it was important, but I made him leave. He called to come back, and I said, he could come back if he left everything there as I wanted to find NOTHING like.. lipstick on the ol' collar thing. But he said he had to bring his jeans n' tshirts so he did. When I was.. well yeah putting the things in the wash, I pulled out a brown paper bag. I opened it, and it contained one thing. A piece of torn paper with a phone number. I went and I called it, and sure enough it was a girl who didn't know he was married. Needless to say that time he was kicked out, I moved on!! Oh, but I am still 33 years later getting child support checks so, a blessing in disguise LOL
You have stired up some very interesting comments. Love to read about this stuff. Great hub....
I've always been interested in ESP and paranormal activity and really enjoyed this hub. One of the strangest things that ever happened to me concerned a recurring dream. For years I would have this dream about entering an attic that had two levels. I was a child and there were other children playing in the attic. Although nothing bad happened in the dream, I always felt very uncomfortable and threatened by the people in the dream. Some years ago, my husband and I were looking for a house and the real estate agent showed us an old Victorian style house in a small village. We both liked the outside of the house with its wrap around porch. All was well until we entered the kitchen and the agent showed us a pull-down stairway to the attic. I immediately felt a little uncomfortable, but walked up to take a look. There was the attic from my dreams! Its hard to explain how creepy it was, but I had to leave the house and after that I even felt uneasy when we drove past it.
One other interesting thing that happened: We visited the Edgar Cayce Institute in Virginia Beach with my son and his family. One of the lectures we attended included a demonstration of an ESP experiment. It turned out that my young grandson and I had a stronger than normal ESP connection. The whole Edgar Cayce story is quite fascinating, too.
@Merlin: Oh, there is another way to tell if a child will be boy or girl that has nothing to do with trickery, and it's "almost" 99% accurate every time, because I've done it, and usually been right. But it's a medical thing not an ESP thing. When a woman is pregnant, "most of the time" if it is carried lower on her belly it will be male, and if it is held higher and more outward, and closer to her breast it will most likely be a girl. I read about it in a medical book back in the 70's. But back then they didn't have all the plethora of tests that they do now. So it kinda bugged me how anyone could know that! WHY was it a way a baby was growing.. did it determine the sex.. no, of course not, but it had something to do with the process of which the fetus grew. I don't remember what it was, but it still bugged me so I paid attention to more women during their pregnancy than I had before. It was more true than not. Then when I got pregnant, my husband and I were determined to have a boy! Darn it we just WANTED a boy. Well, as my belly got larger (along with my a$$) it felt as if it was ALL so low I literally had the "hold the baby lap" type carrying of a baby when I was sitting. After time went by, I just started telling people it was a boy because we didn't want a girl and that's that! But never forgot what I had read. When I was in my last month, it had already dropped, (as it is natural that happen) and I it was so painful that I had to STAND for like 20 minutes before I could take the first few steps then grab my belly and hobble (and wobble) to the restroom as it was weighing heavy on my bladder of course! But, I did, indeed have a boy. Everything we even purchased before his birth was for a boy. So, there could be something to that, I really don't know. I've gone on that theory and predicted just about everyone's child I've known since and been right, or times I never seen the person again I dunno!
As far as your name, you know Merlin the magician? My son had one of the first electronic games of it when he was a kid, so I was sort of just razzin' ya on that, take no offense! Sorry if it did offend you! :)
The movie is awesome BBG! Seriously. I'm not a huge fan of George Clooney, and I laughed my patootie off during that movie.
That was way cool... there was a lot of stuff in there that I wasn't even aware of. I have looked alot into ESP just because I tought it was kind of cool, but I didn't know that (other than the movie) that it was actually used in the military!
Now I want to go get a goat so I can practice my ESP. I wonder how long it will take before I can get it to fall over! LOL
BTW - thanks for the link up... guess I better get going on my related hub :)
p.s. Thank you for the link up there! I shared on my FB too:) Or did you already know that?
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OMG, you're right! I must be getting senile. I will edit this asap. But I knew you were going to find an error somewhere.
Interesting article. I enjoyed Men Who Stare at Goats. Still trying to master 'sparkly eyes technique', but my wife tells me that has more to do with George Clooney's eyes than any of my awesome mental powers.
Not sure if I can use ESP to shape my features though. . . (mmph. mmmph. mmph.) Nope. Still me in the mirror.
Editor note: Barrack found Bin Laden. Bush found Hussein. No?
cheers again!
Where we lived there was this old woman who terrified us kids, we just knew she had to be a witch.
Everybody knew she had this weird gift that she could predict the sex of an unborn baby merely by placing her hands on the pregnant woman's stomach. She made a small charge for this service and the payment was recorded in her little book before she went upon her merry way. She was never wrong.
If anyone ever challenged her that she had got it wrong demanding their money back, a brave person indeed, but to no avail she would demand witnesses before retrieving the book to show that indeed no mistake had been made... there it was proof in black and white and witnesses to prove no alterations had been made upon the page.
‘Twas months after the old Biddy had died that someone found her old tattered note book and revealed how she had been right all these many years. For every prediction she wrote the opposite sex in the book. If her guess had been right then obviously there was no challenge, if she was wrong she just opened the book to prove they were in error, not she. It wasn’t until you saw all the wrong predictions written down that people worked out she’d conned the lot of them.
PS For Katherella... 'Cos it's my name, give me a Google and you'll see.
Interesting hub, Austinstar.
Someone above mentioned James Randi and Uri Geller. I came across this video recently as I was researching for a hub.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9w7jHYriFo
James Randi, Uri Geller and Peter Popoff walk into a bar... lol, just kidding.
Each of the signs you have ESP you mentioned can be explained in various ways:
"1. The phone rings..."
In a human life, people come and go. And then they come back again. Our subconscious brains know this. But more importantly, a person will never notice the, say, 60 times out of 100 when the phone rang and he thought it was X, but it turned out to be Y. He will only notice the coincidences, and those will register in his mind, especially if he is already given to paranormal explanations.
"2. A feeling comes over you that you have experienced before and you suddenly know what is about to happen."
Again, this may happen countless times in a person's life, but the person will only remember it when the expectation lines up with the real-world event. Thus the ONE prediction out of like 1000 will stand out.
"3. You are going about your day when you get a sudden urge ..."
Again, coincidences stand out in our short term and long term memories. This is because the human brain is evolutionarily designed to detect patterns. This is why we see a human face on Mars and assume it means something.
Also, people experience "sudden urges" many times in their lives. Like when you sit in a chair doing nothing for a long time and get restless. This energy burst usually fizzles out, but it can easily snowball in a kind of mobius strip interplay between brain, body and world.
"4. You intuitively “know” things like where to find a friend’s lost ring or if people are lying to you."
Lost ring--buried memories involving people, places and things that don't arise in everyday life.
Lying--we all have this ability in our brains because of how we evolved as social creatures.
"5. You get “hunches”."
Again, only the coincidences will be remembered. The hunches that didn't turn into anything will be utterly forgotten.
"6. A good number of your dreams actually turn out be real or repetitive and precognizant."
Since the brain is heavily affected by its external environment, we would expect this to be the case. We would expect dreams to be tied to reality in various ways, some more than others.
WHorse! Once I thought I lost $5. out of my back pocket, so I went outside searching for it and found $5. up against the fence! I thought GREAT.. I found it! Later on I went in my pocket for the $1.'s and found the $5. I thought I was missing! But I'm gonna start looking for pencils now! LOL! Gas stations are great for found money. Unattached to the guilt wallet so you gotta turn it in LOL.
Oh, better than his pocket pix.. "oh i'm sooo cool I gots an iPhone with facetime" .. I whip out my phone to get that cool wal-mart photo and bam! Oh.. got a pic of MYSELF! Like sooo not funny! lol.
@Merlin.. why is your name Merlin? Is that a trick question?:)
LOL....that is funny, Kat!
You been reading my Books; They are all about this stuff right down to the Military application, or did you sense that's what I wrote about ?
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Kat -that is hilarious - taking pictures of the inside of his pocket!
This is an interesting topic. My mom and dad were traveling from central Ohio to Kentucky to attend my Father's Grandmothers funeral back in the late sixties. They barely had enough money to make the trip down and back. On some nice curvy roads in Kentucky on the way down they had a flat tire and my dad pulled over on a rare area of the road that actually had a shoulder with gravel and enough room to get off the road. He changed the flat and he noticed a pencil several yards away and decided to go pick it up, he thought he might need a pencil sometime. He bent over to pick up the pencil and found six twenty dollar bills folded together right near the pencil. That was about a week's pay back in those days for him.
Mo, what my point was, is that #3 happens to me here all the time! The girl with the deer and, phone calls.
C: Interesting.. my friend's phone takes pix of the inside of his pockets all the time.. they are blank! :) hehe...
Interesting.
I once read an article about a man that could take photographs by pointing the camera at his own forehead.
He took pictures of people and buildings.
I tried to find a link to it but without success. If I do I will post it here.
Thanks for a very good article.
Austinstar - fabulous hub! Love the research! Now - I'm very interested in it because I can find anything that gets lost - in weird places too. Laurel was going to a dance and had lost her ticket - her ride was waiting in the driveway - I got a weird feeling and looked under the stove and there it was. Like that. I also know who's on the phone before it gets answered but I write it off to common sense - what day or time usually is a good predictor who's calling me. Most of my family thinks this is very odd because stuff like that happens to me all the time.
Excellent, fun hub!
Interesting. Of the 6 six signs of ESP, I often experience 3. What does that mean? Love your stuff. So objective - just like a professional journalist. Gotta come back in a bit to read these comments, but got one quick thing to say - the MOVIE "Men Who Stare at Goats" was awesome. As to the truth of it, that sort of disturbs me.
I replied to things you said in your hub. It's auspicious, it's not an ordinary "haunted house."
I'm fascinated by ESP tales, Lela, and this was an extremely well-written account on the subject.
I once tried staring at goats, actually just one goat (named Billy) and it ended up with him giving me an interview. ("Why Everyone Should Own a Goat ...")
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@WillStar - I knew that you knew that I was going to write this hub. Hey, what can I say? I have a thing for goats.
@Qwark - I love magicians and the entertaining things they do. But I really think there is something to this ESP thing. There are parts of the brain that "light up" when an event happens during an MRI session. Hard to fake that.
@Kat - I got about half of those stories. Not sure what, if anything really happened. I think you should write a hub about the house.
@diogenes - I agree and think it would be much more useful to use one's powers for the good of the people. If only they had thought GW to a slow and painful demise.
Or pretty much any politician. MIL's, eh, maybe.
ESP is in the realm of possibility like electricity and sound waves. Perhaps early humans communicated by "thought waves" and we retain that sense but it isn't very observable and quite possibly died out in our genetic code.
I think this is an interesting hub. I have had some strange things happen where I knew things without any explanation but I don't know if I would say I have ESP. I enjoyed the read.
OH I don't know what to video. The first photos I took of the house turned out all white and smudged.
OH, and all of those things you mentioned, actually do happen.
The ex bf I mentioned was here for a weekend. We decided to go rent a moved in town. We got in the truck, and just as I was going to drive off, he opened the door and got out. I was like WHAT? Come on, cut it out let's go. He said, no. He felt something bad. I said, someone could need us then. Let's just go get a movie!! He did not want to go but I insisted, not 2 miles up the road there was a white floating thing in the road, almost looked like an oversized garbage bag. My truck went over it like it was plastic. Not a bump. I saw a van off the side off the road, a girl on the phone crying. I stopped. He kept saying "let's just go back home" I got out, and she was gasping for air, and I took her cell and said what is wrong? She said she hit a deer and it's in the road. I told her I hit the deer and it's dead it's not suffering, and used her cell to call 911 for help, and get animal control to clean it up. She was crying and gasping for her breath, and couldn't talk. Her hubby or bf said they were from VA and it just happened so quik! I said, yeah, it's the forest, so you've got to go slower here, although usually you never hit a deer this late, it's not feeding time, but it's ok they're coming to get it. We had to help her in her van, and get them to go. The police came, so we went on to the video store. On the way back, I stopped at the gas station they hang at, and I asked if they took care of it, they said yeah. So, we came back home, and all was well.
Also there was a time when we split up. about 4 months went by. I got in my truck and just went over to his house, not letting him know I was coming and not even thinking what if he were dating someone else. Just as I crossed the bridge to his house, my cell rang it was him and he said... "I need you to come over I'm afraid here I miss you we need to talk." I turned the corner and was there. How'd I know he was alone, how'd I know he wanted me there. He was like a scared little kid. He had NO CLUE I was going there and nobody could called him at the time because he didn't have a cell or phone. He'd rode his bike to the store to use the pay phone.
ESP is in my Pandora's box of bullcrap. Along with gods, dragons, fairies (non human variety), etc. And why waste time with a goat when there are politicians and mothers-in-law out there!
Great article, though AS, voted up and awesome
Austin* If you haven't seen The Last Mimzy it'd be of interest to you. The boy does exactly what you said, only with an ancient Mandala, the plot is amazingly brilliant.
I've been doing a rent to own on this house for the past 7 years, so quite a bit has happened here. But I just went through closing last week, so the deed is in my name now.
But there has been a lot of strange things happen here. Nothing that would of diverted me from (obviously) leaving. I feel more at home here than I ever have anywhere in my life. I'm never afraid regardless of what happens or things that move or go misplaced or sounds. (when no one is here) For the fear of sounding creepier than I am ;) lol, I more so almost feel invited. There was nothing going to stop me from getting this house. Now the guy who gave me the paper when this house came up for sale. He brought it to me and said "you ARE going to live here".. I looked into it. Ah.. yeah ok, kinda big for one person. The guy I was dating used to say he felt really strange about this guy, like, he was a possessed or something but he never did anything wrong or bad. In fact the opposite. But he was freaked out by him, but not bad enough to not befriend him. Now this was a guy who "was gay" but "turned Christian" and started going to church, and swore off the gay lifestyle. Regardless of how many times we told him he was definitely gay, cut the crap. He did weird things, like, when he said I was going to live here the family had not yet found a house. He said, "they're going to find a house, but it'll have a problem in the attic that will have to be fixed before they can move."
Time went by, FINALLY they did find the house they liked, their kids loved. They wanted a built in pool. Florida. There was a problem in the attic, it had to be fixed before the bank would approve their loan. I gave them, upon TRUST, not knowing them from anybody $5,000. to keep in a Florida bank (shady?)NO! before their loan would approve. It approved, they packed, left me the keys I moved in.
My friend who made my other friend burn the Ouija board, she dabbles, and she said she wants me out of this house. Sure, she wants me back home, but also said, I don't care where you go, but I don't want you living there, just move any place NOT THAT HOUSE.
I'm not leaving this house. I'm not. They valued and insured it at $140,000. I don't care, unless they give me a HUGE amount to put a road through it..I'm NOT going to leave this house. If a tree falls on it, I'll have it fixed, but I'm not leaving.
I knew you were going to write this Hub.
Hi Austin:
Chris angel and David Blane do some pretty good stunts like Geller...they're fakes but incredibly believable.
Good hub and well written but extra sensory perception?
Who knows? :)
Qwark
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Titen - I did hear that the spoon bending thing was a trick, but while doing research for this hub, I found some very interesting ESP studies that were done on Uri. He drew pictures while in a steel locked room that were drawn by others in a different location and the results were amazing. They were almost identical. The die guessing thing blew my mind too because it was observed first hand by many respected researchers. Faking something like that would be nearly impossible. Everyone would have to be in on it.
Kat, you live in a haunted house? the one you're moving from or the one you just bought? Or are they both the same house? Can you video some of that stuff?
Geller was discredited by James Randi who repeatedly called him out for rigging his demonstrations. Whether he has ESP or not is unclear but the whole spoon-bending thing was most definitely a parlor trick.
I certainly think its possible some sort of ESP could exist the issue is that, aside from a handful of studies, most research turns up no sign of such powers. Those that do guess cards correctly may just have mathematical ability similar to the late Kim Peek, an autistic Savant. Perhaps they were card counters with an incredible intuitive grasp on statistics.
I'd like to see someone claim Jame's Randi's million dollar prize, if these powers truly do exist someone should have collected on that by now.
I have Men who stare at Goats on blu ray. lol.. yeah, and my house is haunted according to unseen broken glass and things that fall in the room I am in, but nothing is moved. My neighbors told me the people who owned this house before my previous owners practiced witchcraft. My Ouija board moved from room to room until my friend burned it in the firepit. The upstairs light is on/off at random times.. the list goes on. Groovy hub.
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