Is Telepathy Real? My Personal Experience with Grandparents and a Tractor

[FlexGunship]

No one is saying it can't be telepathy any more than anyone says there can't be a teapot orbiting Jupiter.

First of all, it's around Mars, and it's supposed to be at a Lagrange point. Secondly, I hear that putting a teapot in space in Elon Musk's secret goal with SpaceX.

That is actually an excellent, excellent point. His mom was indeed wrong.

I'm full of excellent points!

 

[DaveC426913]

First of all, it's around Mars, and it's supposed to be at a Lagrange point.

Actually, it's "orbiting the sun between Earth and Mars", but in the manner of classic quotes, it needs to be shortened for maximum pithiness.

 

[FlexGunship]

Actually, it's "orbiting the sun between Earth and Mars", but in the manner of classic quotes, it needs to be shortened for maximum pithiness.

Potato potato.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Much as I hate to, I have to agree w/ you in this case. When you're right, your're right.

Still, I think you're bending over backwards to be scientifically proper and you are giving the OP some hope that he might be right. I DETEST this kind of belief in coincidence far more than the rules of the forum allow me to say in a straightforward way (a great many expetives get brought in ) so I do have to admit that I am less inclined to be scientifically proper, as you are being, in THIS case. This kind of stupidity is one of my hot buttons and other than this sentence, I think I have restrained myself admirably so far.

Knowing the grief it causes you only makes your admission the more scientific, and my respect for you increases accordingly.

The degree of your upset may be symptomatic of an argument against this being telepathy that you haven't managed to articulate. Rest assured that giving the OP hope is not my intention. I just have a sensitivity to cognitive dissonance.

My own opinion is that this story probably demonstrates neither a complete coincidence, nor telepathy. I think the mother probably noticed something unusual about his behavior before he went on the trip, something that struck her as an uncharacteristic reckless edge, perhaps. This probably ate at her till she felt moved to call and the timing of that call ended up, coincidentally, being about perfect to create the impression of a telepathic occurrence. Something like that. In other words, the mother was probably working on some internal emotional calculus over something real she'd noticed from the time he left till when she called, such that her feeling and call wasn't a complete coincidence.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Except that there is a preponderance of evidence for coincidences happening and no credible evidence for telepathy.

No one is saying it can't be telepathy any more than anyone says there can't be a teapot orbiting Jupiter.

Actually Phinds asserted it was clearly evidence of a coincidence:

you are convinced by what to us is clearly anecdotal evidence of a coincidence.

By which "clearly", he ruled out telepathy.

I did cite Occam's Razor. The known cause is to be preferred for an explanation over the "unnecessarily multiplied" suggestion. But if we're going to give lectures about being scientific it is encumbent upon us to be scientific ourselves and admit there's no proof either way: we are unable to examine and test the phenomenon. We are left with a strong preference for the assumption there is no teapot orbiting Jupiter.

 

[DaveC426913]

Actually Phinds asserted it was clearly evidence of a coincidence:
By which "clearly", he ruled out telepathy.

Well, as I think you're pointing out, Occam's razor is a test for picking the likelihood between two theories, all other aspects of the theories being equal. In this case, they are not equal, not by a long shot. One has a preponderance of evidence, the other has (what is generally considered) an extreme paucity of evidence. So yeah, Occam's razor does not apply.But if you prefer a more mathematical vein, rather than a logical one, the event described is not statistically significant.

That's not a trivial statement. Because there is an aspect of this phenomenon that is out of control of the investigators (a hunch and a phone call), the first thing one must do is take into account the null hypothesis. Does the phenomenon fall outside normal distribution of events.

Well, it doesn't. Which means that, as far as investigating, there is actually nothing to investigate. Once you remove the statistical element of probability, you're left holding nothing at all.

 

[Oldfart]

When I was in the vicinity of 9-11 years old, when my mother's snoring kept me awake, I would concentrate on telling (thinking) her to stop snoring, and she always stopped. It seemed like a natural thing to do, it didn't surprise me that it worked. Later in life, when I realized that this was kinda wierd, she and I tried a telepathy test using playing cards, no joy, my "gift" was gone.

Yes, coincidence could explain this, but that seems like a stretch, seeing as how I did this repeatedly. Strange...

 

[DaveC426913]

When I was in the vicinity of 9-11 years old, when my mother's snoring kept me awake, I would concentrate on telling (thinking) her to stop snoring, and she always stopped. It seemed like a natural thing to do, it didn't surprise me that it worked. Later in life, when I realized that this was kinda wierd, she and I tried a telepathy test using playing cards, no joy, my "gift" was gone.

Yes, coincidence could explain this, but that seems like a stretch, seeing as how I did this repeatedly. Strange...

In this case, it's not a coincidence; it's two linked* events that have a time limit. The fact that they occur in a similar time frame is what causes the false connection.

*And they are linked. You would not be doing your concentrating if she were not snoring.

(Please forgive the comparison here). When a dog hears someone approaching the front door, it goes into defense mode, barking and freaking out to chase the intruder off. The mailman drops the mail in the slot - and then leaves. The dog's belief that is has successfully chased off another intruder is reinforced.

What's happening is cause and effect are mixed up. You think communication is from you to her, when in fact, it is from her to you.

 

[Chronos]

Perhaps you gave cues, like vocalization, shuffling your feet, or touching her. That is what I'm thinking.

 

[Oldfart]

Perhaps you gave cues, like vocalization, shuffling your feet, or touching her. That is what I'm thinking.

She was in a separate bedroom, and why would I vocalize, I had no need for that?

 

[Deveno]

i was married to a woman for 24 years. during that time there were several occasions where we had several long, wordless conversations. it was utterly impossible to lie to her. we would "catch each other thoughts" the way some people finish each other's sentences.

there was nothing "mystical" about this, it was just an everyday fact of our lives together. but it defies easy explanation. that's not to say i don't believe there isn't any, and i don't think we possessed any special abilities (or else i'd be doing the uri geller circuit in a heartbeat, there's some serious cash to be had as a "mind-reader").

if the universe is (and it might not be) a pattern of distributed energy, there's no reason to think that sometimes certain sub-patterns might be (more or less) synchronous. some of these might be detectible at ranges near the limits of our thresholds of perception: faint sounds, slight movements, there's a lot of possibilities. it's hard to know just what configurations of events could serve as carrier waves of information that we're just not paying attention to.

now i don't, in general, believe in "magic" (unles the mandelbrot set qualifies), but i do think there's a lot of stuff we don't know. even looking at things from a statistical point of view has its pitfalls: we don't actually know the range of possibilities, we have to make an educated guess, based on (at best) a short window of human observation. mathematics and science only fills in the picture so far...and the very belief that the underlying structure is both consistent and discernable, is perhaps a hindrance to recognition. in lay terms: you only see what you're looking for.

i think this is why paradigm shifts occur so rarely, we find the utility of our beliefs so binding, we're virtually blind to the impossible (which, upon deeper investigation, often reveals flaws in the basis of our thinking). it took a long time for concepts like "negative number" and "complex number" to be accepted, because they ran contrary to what we thought was "real" and "true". any other brand of science currently in vogue, whether it be chemistry, physics, or nanotechnology, has the same problem: as soon as we start to say what IS, we tend to exclude what "isn't", and we have no real proof (just a lot of "validation") that that is the "proper" way to look at things, in terms of accuracy.

of course, a lot of this is pure speculation on my part, and as such, i neither care about nor seek any kind of agreement from others. what i do notice, is that a lot of people who become deeply involved in trying to divine "how things really are", become obsessively rational, to the point of excess.

 

[DaveC426913]

if the universe is (and it might not be) a pattern of distributed energy

of course, a lot of this is pure speculation on my part

It is. And should not be voiced here.

 

[FlexGunship]

When I was in the vicinity of 9-11 years old, when my mother's snoring kept me awake, I would concentrate on telling (thinking) her to stop snoring, and she always stopped. It seemed like a natural thing to do, it didn't surprise me that it worked. Later in life, when I realized that this was kinda wierd, she and I tried a telepathy test using playing cards, no joy, my "gift" was gone.

it was utterly impossible to lie to her. we would "catch each other thoughts" the way some people finish each other's sentences.

if the universe is (and it might not be) a pattern of distributed energy, there's no reason to think that sometimes certain sub-patterns might be (more or less) synchronous.

Woah... this thread is in trouble... I'm out'a here!

 

[dacruick]

Woah... this thread is in trouble... I'm out'a here!

I wish I had myself a FlexJetPack with which I could do the same.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Well, as I think you're pointing out, Occam's razor is a test for picking the likelihood between two theories, all other aspects of the theories being equal.

No. Occam's razor:

"a scientific and philosophic rule that entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily which is interpreted as requiring that the simplest of competing theories be preferred to the more complex or that explanations of unknown phenomena be sought first in terms of known quantities"

-Merriam-Webster's

There is no proviso about "all other aspects of the theories being equal". In fact, the whole point of it is to clear up situations where one proposed explanation has 'unnecessary multiplications', i.e. is not really equal at all to the other theory in terms of its sticking to reality. It advises that the explanation that sticks to known phenomena should be preferred. It's a way of determining that the theory containing the unnecessary multiplications is really not as good as the one that goes by known quantities. Occam's Razor absolutely applies here.

I heard Occam's Razor paraphrased on CSI:NY: "When you hear hoofbeats in Central Park, don't think 'Zebra!'" Central Park is sometimes patrolled by cops on horseback, so that is really the first thing you should think of if you hear hoofbeats there. And for the very same reason you shouldn't think "Zebra!" you also shouldn't think "The ghost of George Washington's horse!"

The fact remarkable coincidences are statistically common is a very good reason to prefer that explanation over telepathy, on which we have no data whatever.

That fact, though, does not constitute proof that it wasn't telepathy. Because, strictly speaking, there's been no proof it was a coincidence, just proof of the high probability it was coincidence.

 

[FlexGunship]

No. Occam's razor:

"a scientific and philosophic rule that entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily which is interpreted as requiring that the simplest of competing theories be preferred to the more complex or that explanations of unknown phenomena be sought first in terms of known quantities"

-Merriam-Webster's

There is no proviso about "all other aspects of the theories being equal".

Not to speak for Dave, but I think he's saying that when the "explanatory abilities" of two theories are equal (i.e. all things other than the explanation's complexity itself), then Occam's Razor indicates there should be a preference for the simpler theory.

In effect, you're both saying the same thing.

A zebra and a horse both adequately explain the sound of hoof-beats. So, all other things being equal (except for the complexity of the explanation) favor the simpler of two theories.

 

[Evo]

i was married to a woman for 24 years. during that time there were several occasions where we had several long, wordless conversations. it was utterly impossible to lie to her. we would "catch each other thoughts" the way some people finish each other's sentences.

Were you in the same room?

 

[zoobyshoe]

Not to speak for Dave, but I think he's saying that when the "explanatory abilities" of two theories are equal (i.e. all things other than the explanation's complexity itself), then Occam's Razor indicates there should be a preference for the simpler theory.

In effect, you're both saying the same thing.

A zebra and a horse both adequately explain the sound of hoof-beats. So, all other things being equal (except for the complexity of the explanation) favor the simpler of two theories.

I understand your statement perfectly well, but Dave seems to have meant something else because he came to the conclusion Occam's Razor doesn't apply in the coincidence vs telepathy choice:

Well, as I think you're pointing out, Occam's razor is a test for picking the likelihood between two theories, all other aspects of the theories being equal. In this case, they are not equal, not by a long shot. One has a preponderance of evidence, the other has (what is generally considered) an extreme paucity of evidence. So yeah, Occam's razor does not apply.

I think it applies more than ever, that it was designed for just such choices.

 

[FlexGunship]

I understand your statement perfectly well, but Dave seems to have meant something else because he came to the conclusion Occam's Razor doesn't apply in the coincidence vs telepathy choice:

I think it applies more than ever, that it was designed for just such choices.

I stand corrected.

 

[Deveno]

Were you in the same room?

quite frequently. not always. and, yes (it sounds like such a cliche) there were times when i'd be at work, the phone would ring, and i'd know (by a feeling in my guts) it was her (note: i received many calls at work, at these calls came in at various times during the day).

now,i freely admit, i might have subconsciously noticed some pattern to her calls, and such anecdotal accounts do not constitute "proof" of anything. but i am led to believe that we might (in some sense) be aware of more than we think we are. it would be interesting to see how pairs of identical twins did on "guessing cards" tests, and whether or not they performed within expected statistical norms.

as far as Occam's Razor goes: it is my understanding that some very well-thought-of physical theories depend on "fine-tuned" parameters, and that this is seen as a potential flaw (that is, the very existence of our universe is, in some well-defined sense, improbable).

i think the objections raised by other posters in this thread, namely: "if telepathy is a real ocurence, why isn't it more common?" is a valid one. i agree it's possible that all such occurences could just be coincidence, certainly some unlikely things are bound to happen every now and then. but perhaps not all of them are, for reasons as-yet unknown.

i don't see telepathy as a "useful" explanation, because we can't reproduce it with any regularity (people have tried, even the remote viewing studies released by the CIA, were ambiguous at best, and their methodology has been (justly) criticized). but i also feel (in a vague sense i will not define) that there "is more going on than meets the eye".

looking at the world in an analytic and dispassionate way is fine, as far as it goes. but it's somewhat reductionist, and not (in my opinion) wholly accurate. there's mysteries we haven't solved, and may not ever.

 

[dacruick]

quite frequently. not always. and, yes (it sounds like such a cliche) there were times when i'd be at work, the phone would ring, and i'd know (by a feeling in my guts) it was her (note: i received many calls at work, at these calls came in at various times during the day).

Think of how many times you'd "know" it was her and it actually wasn't, and then forget that you "knew". To state that you knew it was her means that you would have taken any odds on a bet in that second. If I bet 100:1 on a dollar that it wasn't her would you have taken the bet, right?

My point is that you would only commit it to memory when you successfully guessed that it was her.

 

[Deveno]

Think of how many times you'd "know" it was her and it actually wasn't, and then forget that you "knew". To state that you knew it was her means that you would have taken any odds on a bet in that second. If I bet 100:1 on a dollar that it wasn't her would you have taken the bet, right?

My point is that you would only commit it to memory when you successfully guessed that it was her.

quite possibly this is true (i mean, certainly, the "times i was wrong" i might have forgotten). it just happened enough that i was right, to be noticeable (whereas i had no such luck with anticipating a call from an engineering firm, or one of our firm's regular customers).

i only mention it, to say that this bond with my wife, wasn't entirely a function of proximity. I'm sure there are several plausible explanations, i never made any attempt to notify the local press (or even my circle of friends) of some "amazing ability".

perhaps it is just (in some way) that human patterns of behavior are predictable. i'll admit that's one answer. i remain unconvinced it's the only answer.

i would hesitate to say that i was "guessing". the feeling was more akin to fear, than anything else (or perhaps apprehension is a better word). i don't recall a sizeable number of times i felt the relief i would have felt, had i been wrong (of course, there's the whole bit of how reliable memory is, in the first place).

these are just some of my personal experiences. I'm not so silly as to think these can be extrapolated meaningfully to "how things are, for everyone". these personal experiences have led me to believe that some kind of indirect information transfer could be involved. coincidence is a "non-explanation", it basically asserts "strange things happen" they aren't significant. this might be true, it might not be. i don't have a broad enough view of the totality of human experiences to make that kind of assessment. I'm not sure anyone does (or to turn it around, i would be suspicious of anyone who claimed such).

 

[Evo]

LOL, it reminds me of calls from my ex husband. The phone would ring and I'd ask the girls to get it because it was their dad. I was never wrong. They asked how I knew and I told them that his ring sounded different. Of course it could have been an unusually long lucky streak, but I had the girls convinced that I was Psychic.

 

[Deveno]

i can bend spoons with my fingers. i just say "bend" as I'm bending them. it really works!

oh...and...you're thinking of making a reply to this post right now! (how did i know that?)

 

[Ryan_m_b]

Telepathy and other spooky bonds that people recall are brilliant examples of confirmation bias. Just the other day I was walking with a friend and from out of the blue both of us started at the same time talking about the same topic that had nothing to do with what we were doing nor what we were previously talking about. Some sort of mystical energy pattern or unexplained phenomenon? Whilst I, nor anyone else, cannot rule it out it is far more likely that this is just a product of chance. Throughout our friendship we have spent thousands of hours together, considering the huge abundance of times that we haven't immediately started saying the exact same random thing it diminishes the credibility of this event being special.

It's an inherent faculty of humans to notice the out of the ordinary and the seemingly ordered. Thus we naturally forget the 99.99% of events that are perfectly normal and focus on the 0.01% of weird ones. I had a statistics lecturer who once addressed the "I was thinking of them and then they rang!" phenomenon. He encouraged us that the next time it happened we should make a note of it. The time after that when it happens we should look through our call history and see just how many calls we received where we didn't have some sort of premonition. And that's before we get into the confounding factors of how often you think about certain people, the unconscious/automatic knowledge you have of the most likely time they will call, attaching extra significance to when two coincidences coincide (e.g. a premonition about a bad phone call from Alice before getting a phone call from Alice saying that Bob is in the hospital) etc.

 

[Deveno]

Telepathy and other spooky bonds that people recall are brilliant examples of confirmation bias. Just the other day I was walking with a friend and from out of the blue both of us started at the same time talking about the same topic that had nothing to do with what we were doing nor what we were previously talking about. Some sort of mystical energy pattern or unexplained phenomenon? Whilst I, nor anyone else, cannot rule it out it is far more likely that this is just a product of chance. Throughout our friendship we have spent thousands of hours together, considering the huge abundance of times that we haven't immediately started saying the exact same random thing it diminishes the credibility of this event being special.

It's an inherent faculty of humans to notice the out of the ordinary and the seemingly ordered. Thus we naturally forget the 99.99% of events that are perfectly normal and focus on the 0.01% of weird ones. I had a statistics lecturer who once addressed the "I was thinking of them and then they rang!" phenomenon. He encouraged us that the next time it happened we should make a note of it. The time after that when it happens we should look through our call history and see just how many calls we received where we didn't have some sort of premonition. And that's before we get into the confounding factors of how often you think about certain people, the unconscious/automatic knowledge you have of the most likely time they will call, attaching extra significance to when two coincidences coincide (e.g. a premonition about a bad phone call from Alice before getting a phone call from Alice saying that Bob is in the hospital) etc.

one wonders how much confirmation bias lies underneath our scientific inquiries. i suspect we have a preference for data that confirms our existing theories as being "better" than data that contradicts it (so much so, that when such data is reported, often the first task is to see if the data can be discredited, somehow).

to phrase it loosely: skepticism is fine, but we should, in all fairness, be somewhat skeptical of our own skepticism.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

one wonders how much confirmation bias lies underneath our scientific inquiries. i suspect we have a preference for data that confirms our existing theories as being "better" than data that contradicts it (so much so, that when such data is reported, often the first task is to see if the data can be discredited, somehow).

to phrase it loosely: skepticism is fine, but we should, in all fairness, be somewhat skeptical of our own skepticism.

Well a big part of the scientific method is eliminating things like confirmation bias and other fallacies. We do that with rigorous methodology and a good understanding of statistics.

As for the data that doesn't fit with theory, the reason that this often is treated as probably wrong is because a well established theory has already been shown to make multiple, correct, testable predictions. Occam's razor would suggest that the single piece of data is wrong rather than the already tested theory. However if further review shows that the methodology that produced the data is sound then much more work has to be done to elucidate the meaning of this anomaly.

 

[phinds]

one wonders how much confirmation bias lies underneath our scientific inquiries. i suspect we have a preference for data that confirms our existing theories as being "better" than data that contradicts it (so much so, that when such data is reported, often the first task is to see if the data can be discredited, somehow).
.

Yes, possibly, BUT ... the crucial factor here is that reputable scientists DO try to discredit the data whereas the nut cases and overly credulous do not.

 

[DaveC426913]

There is no proviso about "all other aspects of the theories being equal".

It is not in Occam's razor; it is about invoking it.
One does not resort to Occam's razor until one has two theories that are similar competitors. If they are not similar in plausibility, it's because they have better merits to weight them on - such as one theory falls well within statistical likelihood, while the other has precious little evidence or mechanism to support it.

In fact, I don't think telepathy even qualifies as a theory. It does not have a proposed mechanism by which is could occur. It is merely an hypothesis.

Theory versus hypothesis? No need for Occam's Razor.

The fact remarkable coincidences are statistically common is a very good reason to prefer that explanation over telepathy, on which we have no data whatever.

That fact, though, does not constitute proof that it wasn't telepathy. Because, strictly speaking, there's been no proof it was a coincidence,
just proof of the high probability it was coincidence.

No one is talking proof here.

 

[imiyakawa]

Hi Dwalaine. Welcome to the Physics Forum and thank you for your post.

Unfortunately, even though your experience is interesting, may have really happened just as you described, and similar experiences have been reported by many others, it cannot be accepted as evidence of telepathy, certainly not according to the rules of this forum as I understand them. It must remain a charming anecdote.

The "scientific" literature on Psi is very thin. If you are motivated to explore what little of it I am aware of, you might take a look at some of the books written by Dean Radin.

Respectfully submitted,
Steve

I wouldn't recommend Radin's popular publications for those that are serious about learning the field. His scientific publications are fine, but the meta-analyses that he provides in his popular books are not.

There are those that have a much wider search criteria (hence a larger N, perhaps because they've accounted for foreign publication) but also a stricter inclusion criteria (w.r.t. experimental methodology) that have shown significantly lower effect size that what Radin has reported.

Also, if you look at Dick Bierman's 2000 or 2001 paper, I forget the name, there are many experiments that have had perpetually decreasing ES, perhaps due to improving experimental rigor and decreased file drawer effect/publication bias, which means there's something that's really biasing results from this era but he's included them in his sample.

After reading the field for a long period of time, I've come to the conclusion that the results are disinteresting until there is a central body where the researchers report their intentions to experiment prior to the commencement of the experiment. Without this, there is no way of determining the extent of the file drawer effect. I came to this conclusion after seeing the N to ES plot of Ersby's meta-analysis, massive gap in bottom left (low N low ES). Conclusion: large file drawer problem that has not been accounted for and will not unless they form a central reporting body to eliminate it.

I'm sorry but I'm too lazy to properly reference these claims.