Question about ghosts/spirits

Ivan Seeking

Yes I expected to get hung with this one. [g)] Your comments are benign enough but I was waiting for the big hammers. [:D]

I will have to admit that for the first time in my life I did consider such a possibility. I was compelled by the high strangeness and the apparent uniqueness of this event. Einstein is still with us and he has been normal ever since. Would I argue that my cat was chasing a ghost? No; nor would I list this as landmark evidence of such. But, this was a very strange episode that was highly coincidental to the events of the day. To conclude that nothing strange was happening is no more logical than to conclude otherwise.

Ivan Seeking

That would explain the confusion.[:D]

You have heard stories like this before?

Ivan Seeking

I didn't spot anything with a postive spin.

http://www.thegline.com/thought/2001/10-11-2001.htm

I have read some interesting reports that come from Stanford [I think...I will have to do a little digging to come up with the correct reference]. This team is claiming repeatable precognitive events. They go on to assign this ability to a primitive survival mechanism. As reported, a person watches a TV screen that displays pictures at a rate of about once every two or three seconds. The watchers reactions are monitored for certain stress indicators; i.e. skin resistance, brainwaves activity... I'm not sure about the key indicators here. Most of the pictures seen are calming, pleasant scenes of ocean views, rocky streams, cute kitties, etc. At random intervals, repulsive pictures e.g. terrible traffic accidents, industrial accidents, crime scenes and the like are thrown into the mix. The claim is that repeatedly, the person will react to the gory pictures about 1/3 of a second before they are shown. The lead scientist argues this is an evolved survival mechanism. For example, the ability to anticipate a surprise attack yields a maximum advantage at some critical time. We will have to see if this claim can be substantiated by others. I believe this is fairly recent work. I have only heard a little about it so far.

TENYEARS

kauai_diver, I cannot enlighten you, but things that I understand are posted here on this forum in a few places. I like the thinking going on in this thread because it does not make a decision.



"A decision is what make when you do not understand." Me

username

Maybe kitty was bored?

username

Sounds like an interesting line of experimentation.
If precognition does exist it figures it would play an very important role in natural selection. Do you know of any other experiments along this line of thought ?

Ivan Seeking

Except that now all he wants to do is to watch John Edwards the TV medium. [8)]

Ivan Seeking

No. In fact I haven't even followed up on this one yet. If there was really anything to this I am sure we will be hearing more.

nevagil

I usually confine myself to facts and act like an agnostic most my long life, but one experience about 20 yrs ago still has me wondering.
I dropped off a loved pet of 13 yrs to be put to sleep at the vet, and when leaving in my car about the time the dog may of been put to sleep I felt a flush rise up through my body, from feet to head and then leave with me suddenly crying.
Probably that was a unexpected rush of emotions for me, an old war veteran, but it also seemed to fit a suspiciously stretched wild idea that maybe the pet dog was saying goodbye to me in some strange way.
A lot of things in life don't make sense and my website of art and humor is often motivated by my curiousities in these areas. Unfortunately, science during my lifetime hasn't gotten much closer to answering these questions. Just gullible fanatics on one side and closed minded doubters on the other side.

Gil of someplace called www.surrealcity.com and the high desert and sometimes humid spots.

username

If precognition exists and is a result (or manifests itself) of a survival mechanism probably the best place to look for it is in something close to the bottom of the food chain. Maybe even an insect like a silverfish/cockroach or something?

btw: the rabbit picture is interesting

Doc

Ivan, I don't know what you had done to your cat at the vet, but it is possible that something he may have been given affected his vision. Maybe he 'saw something' in his upper field of vision that naturally wasn't there. But the cat doesn't know this, he though it was a grand oppurtunity to chase something he had never seen before. He was maybe so preoccupied with it that he ran into the door. I have seen cats in similar situations where they seem so concentrated on something that they become unaware of some of their surroundings. They can get pretty crazy compared to the seemingly lazy, laid back beings that they usually are.

Ivan Seeking

Sorry, I think my story got a little twisted. The cat that went to the vet never came home [in mortal form at least [:D]]. This was THE trip to the vet for our beloved Mr. Dirt. The other cat was at home - Einstein. He never left home but acted so very strangely right after we returned from having Dirt put down.

I don't mean to argue that no other explanations exist. But IMHO, to ignore these events as not even potentially significant is nothing short of intellectual dishonesty. These events were very striking. I have had cats my entire life and I am pretty familiar with normal cat behavior. I have had Einstein for almost 13 years and this was a completely unique episode. He has never acted like this at any other time.

For years people would catch their cats staring wildly at the walls. For years people thought that cats were imagining things or hallucinating. I read several explanations that focused on cat brain structures, and optical effects causing false images, and some suggestions were made that cats get a little nuts as they age. Someone finally realized that the cats can somehow track mice and rats in the wall. I don’t know if this is by some infrared effect, or if this is by sound, but they weren't hallucinating; they were just two steps ahead of us.