Are Psychics Real?
Frederick Gimino asked:
If you have ever wondered “are psychics real?” you are not alone. Many people ask them selves this very same question every day. The answer is often not an easy one but for thousands of years, people have turned to psychics, and clairvoyants for love, romance, and life advice. Some say psychics even have the ability to communicate with the spirits of the departed.
However, over the years claims of spiritualism and psychic powers have been so widespread and the reports of its effects so numerous and impressive that it was inevitable that scientists would be attracted to the alleged phenomena. Parapsychology the science that studies these phenomena focused on many areas including telepathy, clairvoyance, hypnotism, spirits, spiritualism, and the history of spiritual manifestations.
Although Parapsychology is still considered a fringe science by many scientists it still merits the attention of renowned educational institutions such as Princeton University and Berkley. Princeton offers the Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research (PEAR) degree and the University of Berkley in California awarded the only American accredited degree in Parapsychology to Jeffery Mishlove in 1980. But in saying this I am putting the cart before the horse.
The pioneers of modern Parapsychology began using the experimental approach to psychic phenomena at Duke University in the 1930s under the direction of Joseph Rhine. Subsequently Karl Zener one of J.Rhines associates developed the world renowned Zener card test for testing ESP abilities using the scientific method. These ESP tests were conducted at Duke University in one of the first Pavlovian conditioning laboratories.
So, whether you believe in psychics, paranormal activity, or spiritualism the fact of the matter is there is currently hard scientific data documenting the anomalous psychic events which occur in the everyday world around us. In addition for thousands of years unexplained phenomena have been documented throughout history. Are millions of people crazy? I think not. I assure you that the spiritual realm does exist and I am not alone in that belief. Many scientists, layman, and spiritualists share the same views about our universe. Even some world renowned physicists speculate the need for more than one dimension to explain life as we know it.
My best advice is to try to keep an open mind and an objective outlook about things that we do not fully understand. that is unless you believe the sole criterion of reality is our limited human ability to quantify, tag, and label it. After all we can not see the wind but we do see the affect it has on the leaves as they blow about. Does this mean wind does not exist just because we cannot see it?
In closing I leave it up to you the reader to decide for your self the answer to the question at hand. But, know this my answer to the question “are psychics real?” is yes. Psychics, psychic abilities, spirits, and ESP are real whether you believe in them or not.
If you have ever wondered “are psychics real?” you are not alone. Many people ask them selves this very same question every day. The answer is often not an easy one but for thousands of years, people have turned to psychics, and clairvoyants for love, romance, and life advice. Some say psychics even have the ability to communicate with the spirits of the departed.
However, over the years claims of spiritualism and psychic powers have been so widespread and the reports of its effects so numerous and impressive that it was inevitable that scientists would be attracted to the alleged phenomena. Parapsychology the science that studies these phenomena focused on many areas including telepathy, clairvoyance, hypnotism, spirits, spiritualism, and the history of spiritual manifestations.
Although Parapsychology is still considered a fringe science by many scientists it still merits the attention of renowned educational institutions such as Princeton University and Berkley. Princeton offers the Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research (PEAR) degree and the University of Berkley in California awarded the only American accredited degree in Parapsychology to Jeffery Mishlove in 1980. But in saying this I am putting the cart before the horse.
The pioneers of modern Parapsychology began using the experimental approach to psychic phenomena at Duke University in the 1930s under the direction of Joseph Rhine. Subsequently Karl Zener one of J.Rhines associates developed the world renowned Zener card test for testing ESP abilities using the scientific method. These ESP tests were conducted at Duke University in one of the first Pavlovian conditioning laboratories.
So, whether you believe in psychics, paranormal activity, or spiritualism the fact of the matter is there is currently hard scientific data documenting the anomalous psychic events which occur in the everyday world around us. In addition for thousands of years unexplained phenomena have been documented throughout history. Are millions of people crazy? I think not. I assure you that the spiritual realm does exist and I am not alone in that belief. Many scientists, layman, and spiritualists share the same views about our universe. Even some world renowned physicists speculate the need for more than one dimension to explain life as we know it.
My best advice is to try to keep an open mind and an objective outlook about things that we do not fully understand. that is unless you believe the sole criterion of reality is our limited human ability to quantify, tag, and label it. After all we can not see the wind but we do see the affect it has on the leaves as they blow about. Does this mean wind does not exist just because we cannot see it?
In closing I leave it up to you the reader to decide for your self the answer to the question at hand. But, know this my answer to the question “are psychics real?” is yes. Psychics, psychic abilities, spirits, and ESP are real whether you believe in them or not.
Disproving Psychic Abilities
Frederick Gimino asked:
Psychics provide an opportunity to explore a mysterious world that lies just beyond our five senses. Opening a door to the supernatural realm of spirits and other worldly phenomenon psychics hold the key to the future that is yet to be.
Some skeptics say psychics do not exist but many experts disagree. Considering the expansive collection of unexplained phenomenon, in the world, it is hard to dispute the possibility of psychic powers.
We do know that we only use about 10% of our brains resources. So, what is the other 90 % for? It would stand to reason that it has some function. Right? So, is it not possible that somewhere, in that untapped potential, resides a sixth sense?
A sense that allowed us to survive a much darker time when man was forced to compete with oversized predators and elusive prey. Only armed with the power of the human mind, steely wits, and an opposable thumb mankind was already a formidable adversary. However, the addition of keener senses or an additional sixth sense would have made humanity unstoppable.
The ability to sense, that which lies beyond our five senses, would have been an invaluable tool to early man. It may have allowed the survival of the human species, as we know it today. However, as time went on and living conditions became easier with the domestication of animals, honing of learned skills, and the ability to form agrarian societies these abilities may have atrophied.
Our psychic abilities may have atrophied to the point that they became anatomically and physiologically vestigial in nature. The genetic combination responsible for the psychic trait may now rarely appear except aberrantly, in a chosen few, whose genotype allows phenotypical expression of the dormant trait or traits responsible for psychic abilities.
Just because we do not understand something fully does not mean it does not exist. The possibility of psychic ability, in our mysterious universe, is still a plausible explanation for many unexplained phenomenon.
Even with all of the advancements over the last 100 years there is still much debate and speculation, in the scientific community, about a plethora of topics. From the big bang to evolution scientists agree to disagree.
It stands to reason according to the scientific method that until all the explanations, hypothesis, and theories regarding psychic abilities are disproved that it must be considered as a viable alternative explanation to recognized unexplained paranormal phenomenon such as deja vu, precognition, and clairvoyance.
Some scientists studying psychic phenomenon, in children, utilizing the Zener card test regularly encounter statistically significant data that suggests more than chance outcomes at work. In fact many children regularly defy the odds by scoring 30%, 40%, 50%, and 60 % accuracy on a test with a statistical mean of 20% by chance. If that were a drug trial being run and that was the incidence of death for participants the FDA would certainly consider that significant. Right?
In addition to genetic factors that may predispose children to exhibit psychic abilities human development may hold some clues as to the reason children seem to possess a higher degree of psychic ability than adults. Human development occurs in stages each with its own marked physiological characteristics. During childhood it should come as no surprise to find out that we have the highest number of synaptic pathways that we ever have during the course of our lives. Do these extra connections provide a medium to the psychic realm? Is our brain wired towards the paranormal at earlier stages of human development due to anatomical and physiological processes that are occurring during the first several years of our lives?
Furthermore, according to Comparative Embryology during the first 6 weeks of human development, in our mother’s womb, we go through an evolution of sorts. In fact up until the time we differentiate we remain almost morphologically indistinguishable from lower life forms, in the same phase of development. From a single cell to pharyngeal gill slits to lanugo (body hair in utero) to human morphology we comparatively exhibit similar traits to our animal ancestors.
Is it possible that this comparative morphology extends past the physical development of the human body and into our development outside the womb? Maybe, our cognitive development goes through an “evolution” of sorts were the anatomy and physiology of our minds comparatively resembles our ancient psychic ability possessing human ancestors.
So, the question becomes can we disprove all plausible explanations, hypothesis, and theories regarding psychic ability. Not can we prove psychic ability exists. In addition many skeptics spend their entire lives trying to prove that psychic abilities do not exist rather than trying to disprove their own explanations, hypothesis, and theories about its non-existence. This type of objective scientific inquiry is tainted with bias and must not be considered credible.
Only when all the possible plausible explanations, hypothesis, and theories have been tested subjectively using the scientific method and disproved can any true scientist or skeptic state with 95% confidence that psychics and human psychic abilities do not exist.
Psychics provide an opportunity to explore a mysterious world that lies just beyond our five senses. Opening a door to the supernatural realm of spirits and other worldly phenomenon psychics hold the key to the future that is yet to be.
Some skeptics say psychics do not exist but many experts disagree. Considering the expansive collection of unexplained phenomenon, in the world, it is hard to dispute the possibility of psychic powers.
We do know that we only use about 10% of our brains resources. So, what is the other 90 % for? It would stand to reason that it has some function. Right? So, is it not possible that somewhere, in that untapped potential, resides a sixth sense?
A sense that allowed us to survive a much darker time when man was forced to compete with oversized predators and elusive prey. Only armed with the power of the human mind, steely wits, and an opposable thumb mankind was already a formidable adversary. However, the addition of keener senses or an additional sixth sense would have made humanity unstoppable.
The ability to sense, that which lies beyond our five senses, would have been an invaluable tool to early man. It may have allowed the survival of the human species, as we know it today. However, as time went on and living conditions became easier with the domestication of animals, honing of learned skills, and the ability to form agrarian societies these abilities may have atrophied.
Our psychic abilities may have atrophied to the point that they became anatomically and physiologically vestigial in nature. The genetic combination responsible for the psychic trait may now rarely appear except aberrantly, in a chosen few, whose genotype allows phenotypical expression of the dormant trait or traits responsible for psychic abilities.
Just because we do not understand something fully does not mean it does not exist. The possibility of psychic ability, in our mysterious universe, is still a plausible explanation for many unexplained phenomenon.
Even with all of the advancements over the last 100 years there is still much debate and speculation, in the scientific community, about a plethora of topics. From the big bang to evolution scientists agree to disagree.
It stands to reason according to the scientific method that until all the explanations, hypothesis, and theories regarding psychic abilities are disproved that it must be considered as a viable alternative explanation to recognized unexplained paranormal phenomenon such as deja vu, precognition, and clairvoyance.
Some scientists studying psychic phenomenon, in children, utilizing the Zener card test regularly encounter statistically significant data that suggests more than chance outcomes at work. In fact many children regularly defy the odds by scoring 30%, 40%, 50%, and 60 % accuracy on a test with a statistical mean of 20% by chance. If that were a drug trial being run and that was the incidence of death for participants the FDA would certainly consider that significant. Right?
In addition to genetic factors that may predispose children to exhibit psychic abilities human development may hold some clues as to the reason children seem to possess a higher degree of psychic ability than adults. Human development occurs in stages each with its own marked physiological characteristics. During childhood it should come as no surprise to find out that we have the highest number of synaptic pathways that we ever have during the course of our lives. Do these extra connections provide a medium to the psychic realm? Is our brain wired towards the paranormal at earlier stages of human development due to anatomical and physiological processes that are occurring during the first several years of our lives?
Furthermore, according to Comparative Embryology during the first 6 weeks of human development, in our mother’s womb, we go through an evolution of sorts. In fact up until the time we differentiate we remain almost morphologically indistinguishable from lower life forms, in the same phase of development. From a single cell to pharyngeal gill slits to lanugo (body hair in utero) to human morphology we comparatively exhibit similar traits to our animal ancestors.
Is it possible that this comparative morphology extends past the physical development of the human body and into our development outside the womb? Maybe, our cognitive development goes through an “evolution” of sorts were the anatomy and physiology of our minds comparatively resembles our ancient psychic ability possessing human ancestors.
So, the question becomes can we disprove all plausible explanations, hypothesis, and theories regarding psychic ability. Not can we prove psychic ability exists. In addition many skeptics spend their entire lives trying to prove that psychic abilities do not exist rather than trying to disprove their own explanations, hypothesis, and theories about its non-existence. This type of objective scientific inquiry is tainted with bias and must not be considered credible.
Only when all the possible plausible explanations, hypothesis, and theories have been tested subjectively using the scientific method and disproved can any true scientist or skeptic state with 95% confidence that psychics and human psychic abilities do not exist.
