Definition of ESP

Ivan Seeking

So as not to hijack Zooby's thread "Eyes in the back of your head", I am posting this in a new thread.

Our physical sense of balance is tied to our sense or hearing...but I think it really comes under our sense of touch.

http://webschoolsolutions.com/patts/systems/ear.htm



I maintain this is just a matter of how we choose to define things. I think it has always meant the senses that we currently acknowledge.

I have never seen this as the definition...this only serves to make ESP impossible by definition. If we find a new sense, one that explains previously unsubstantiated claims, then this is what we have always meant.

russ_watters

So how would YOU define ESP? I would define it as any sense unrelated to our 5 known senses. Typical examples are telepathy, clarvoyance, 'mind over matter' (teleportation?), etc.

You may have already answered it, but this confused me: edit: http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=esp As I am a big fan of unambiguous definitions, I hate (even though I use sometimes) the phrase "your definition" or "my definition." This is THE definition.

zoobyshoe

Balance is completely unrelated to hearing. People born stone cold deaf still have balance.

Balance is intimatly tied to vision. I emphasise tied because , although they are almost always working in close conjunction, one is not a subset of the other.

Touch is processed in the sensory strip located at the front of the parietal lobes.(Cerebral Cortex) As you pointed out balance is processed elsewhere. You are reasoning from the process whereby the sensitive hairs are "touched" by the inert otoliths when we move our heads, to call "balance" part of touch.

I think by the same logic we can call hearing a part of touch since it depends upon the eardrum being physically impinged upon (touched) by compression waves in the air. This makes sence since we can actually feel these compression waves with the touch receptors in our skin when the amplitude is high enough (powerful sound systems) So, actually we've only had four sences all along.

Course, I'm being facetious. The truth is that when we start parsing sences into their component clauses it turns out each thing we call a sence is a conventionalized name for what is, in fact, an aggregate of sences. Touch breaks down into sensation of pressure, sensation of cold, sensation of heat, sensation of pain, etc. Most of these are processed in the sensory strip, but with different circuits for each. Pain never goes to the sensory strip, but is processed in the thalami.

The list of the five sences is pretty much meaningless in scientific terms. It is a non-scientfic convention. However you define balance it is never included in the list of the sences, not because people are mistaking it for touch, but because people are not noticing it when they speak of the sences.

I still haven't brought up proprioception: the seventh sence; also not ESP.
You are correct, sir. The term ESP is very unfortunate because when properly examined it has no meaning. In order to discuss these phenomenon it is going to be necessary to refer to them with different, more accurate terminology.
I more or less agree except that in addition to being denotationally challenged, the term ESP has been the particular favorite of people who like the "inexplicable" connotations.

Occam's Razor dictates that if we prove the existence of a previously disagreed about ability we must first look for its explanation in terms of known quantities. If we don't; it's a free-for-all. My theory of Aetheric vibrations is as good as your theory that life is The Matrix.

I think Persinger has provided the best place to start looking, if such a thing were ever to be proven, without having meant to: it could be, if some non-ordinary perception were proven to exist, that people are very much more sensitive to run-of-the-mill EM waves than we realized. Or, perhaps we can hear in the ultrasonic range without having any conscious knowlege of it, like Hypnagogue's people with blindsight, who don't consciously realize they can see.

Ivan Seeking

I thought that this meant the five [6...7...Zooby are you done yet?] senses. When I checked sense however, there is a more general definition.


Zooby,
By definition b, when you're right, you're right. [6)]

Therefore, ESP refers to information and "powers" that operate outside of the laws of, and all future laws of physics.

I have never considered any such a claim to exist. Therefore, if any of these are possible, telepathy, clarvoyance, 'mind over matter' (teleportation?), etc. they may or may not be due to ESP.


Russ, does God operate outside of the laws of physics?

russ_watters

According to the Christian version, he must.

zoobyshoe

I've been pondering this for a while and don't understand why definition b. strikes your fancy.
This sounds like a syllogism, the first two lines of which I didn't get to hear.
I'm sencing you want to hold onto the term, even if you have to change the meaning. I think it was a badly coined term to begin with, and something more accurate should be found.
Actually Fz+ made much the same point in another one of your threads somewhere.
Or, they may or may not be due to the Matrix, or anything you might care to speculate the cause to be. One theory is that spirits carry messages from mind to mind.
Funny kinda question.

selfAdjoint

First of all, that we have only five senses is folklore, scientists have identified others - post a query on the Biology board and someone will be sure to have a list. One I remember is proprioception, the sense of where your body is, and how its parts are arranged. This is the sense that you use when working on a screw or something like that behind a barrier so that you can't see it. There's nothing mystical about it.

Second, when Rhine or whover invented the term ESP it was intended to refer to talents and powers of perception beyond what the known senses give. So the theory that your feeling when someone stares at you from behind is due to perceiving pheromones would be an explanation of an ESP capability and if accepted and validated would add a sense to the list ans subtract a talent from the ESP list.

russ_watters

Yeah, I was kinda wondering where that came from too.

Ivan Seeking

Definition "a" is specific enough that I would still debate the point. But "a perception or feeling produced by a stimulus" is general enough so as to include any newly discovered abilities that may or may not be considered a sense.

You seem to ignore the more popular mystical interpretations of these claimed phenomena.
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You're missing the point. We don't KNOW that all phenomenon can be explained using physics. I think so; it seems that you do also, and I'm sure that most people here would, but this is an assumption. If such a thing existed, what would we call "non-physical mind reading" for example? Some people believe in this sort of thing; perhaps even in the case of prayer by some beliefs, so a name would be nice. It seems to me that the tradional interpretation of ESP fits rather well.

Ivan Seeking

I completely agree. My orignal use of the term makes a point. If we find some of these things are true, then the true believers deserve to say I told you so; and that there be no confusion that they did.

Of course, I don't mean you personally. [:D]

pelastration

That's correct when you are in the same place, since pheromones are airborne chemicals. But not for staring or observation from a separate room.

The term: proprioception, thanks didn't knew that sense was described.

zoobyshoe

Now I understand what you were thinking.
-----------------------------
To which I responded:
I later realized why what you said sounded like the last line of a syllogism: you were addressing the title of this thread: proffering the definition the thread was set up to ask about.

Strangely, though, you responded: ------------------------------.
"I think so", is not an assumption. More like a tentative stance that doesn't seem rigidly opposed to change. I don't think we have to be on guard against an "I think so" perspective.

What I want to emphasize is what I said earlier:
Let's prove the ability. Then look for it's explanation in terms of known quantities, then, and only then, start looking elsewhere.
What will call it, if it is ever demonstrated to exist, is completely dependent on what we end up discovering about it.

This discussion got started when it came to light that you were ready to apply the term ESP to any hitherto unrecognized sence that might be proven to exist. My response was that information coming in through the sences can't properly be called "extrasensory". I am not arguing for or against the existence of any hitherto unrecognised ability. I am arguing for the accurate use of words. The inaccurate use of words is often a sign of, and also a propagator of, unclear thinking.

zoobyshoe

Please see my post above: 10-28-2003, 10:24 P.M. Where I went into the misconception that we only have 5 physical sences in detail.

Ivan Seeking

Absolutely. I never meant to imply otherwise. Also, I prefer the word investigate, as opposed to prove.

I understand your objection. I don't mean to assign credibility to a concept by giving it a name, but since we have two distinctly different approaches to mysticism - one that looks to science, and another that looks to more ethereal explanations - I was really trying to make the distinction by retaining the ESP designation.

In the case of scientific investigations of claimed phenomenon, I am glad to agree that the term ESP has no meaning and does not apply.


EDIT: Considering the education that I am getting about the senses, I suggest the designation YASP - Yet Another Sensory Perception. [:D]