Extra Sensory Perception Essay Research Paper 10Extra

Extra Sensory Perception Essay, Research Paper

10Extra Sensory Perception In the world of everyday existence, the five senses reign,but their powers are sharply limited. We perceive the universe inglimpses through narrow portals, acquiring our knowledge by sight,hearing, smell, taste, and touch. But what if knowledge has widergateways and thresholds? What if, beyond vision, humans haveanother way of seeing? (Brill, Dr. A.A. p 3+) From all over the world, from the beginning of time, somepeople have been called gifted with what is known as a secondsight, the third eye, the sixth sense–powers of the mind that seemto bypass the usual sensory channels and transcend normal reality. Many powerful figures in ancient past history had beenclaimed to obtain some sort of ESP. In fact, witch doctors,shamas, prophets, and assorted soothsayers were all said to havethese qualities. Also, many powerful figures in just past history have claimedof ESP. One such person was Abraham Lincoln. He claimed that in adream of his own death, he stood at the foot of a coffin in theWhite House and saw a shrouded corpse. When he asked who had died,a solider among the shadowy mourners answered The President. Hewas killed by an assassin. Another episode of ESP happening to an important figure inour past was when Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) had a dream aboutwalking into the waiting room of the steamboat he was currentlyworking on, and finding his brother laid out in a metal coffin withwhite flowers and a single rose laid on his chest. He awoke 10believing this dream was true, and began to cry. After finding outthis didn t happen, he was afraid to say anything to anyone abouthis dream. Days later his brother has an accident on the boat hewas working on and was said to be dying. Samuel went to him andstayed with him until he died. At the layout, his brother was in a metal coffin, but therewere no flowers or roses on his chest. Minutes after observingthis an old lady walked in and laid white flowers on his chest witha single rose in it. Needless to say Samuel Clemens was stunned. People of all ages and cultures have always been fascinatedby the unknown and the mysterious, that is why this topic caught myeye. Extrasensory perception, or ESP, is the term that is used todescribe the four topics I will discuss with you. These fourtopics include: clairvoyance, telepathy, precognition, andretrocognition. (Day, Laura p 80+) My first topic is clairvoyance. This is when someone is ableto see events from the past, present, and future that are not invisible sight. Here is an example of an episode of clairvoyance. On the evening of July 19, 1759, a pleasant party was justbeginning at the home of a prominent citizen of Gotaborg, Sweden. Suddenly, unaccountably, the most eminent of the sixteen guests-thefamed scientist and mystic Emanuel Swedenborg-left and walkedoutside without explanation. When he returned a short time later,he was pale and shaken. A fire was raging, he said, It had alreadydestroyed a friends house and now threatened his own. 10 The guests exchanged startled glances. As they all knew,Swedenborg did not live in Goteborg, but in Stockholm. AndStockholm was almost three hundred miles away. The party proceeded, but Swedenborg left the house severalmore times and returned to report the blaze was still spreading. Finally, at 8:00 P.M., he accounted that is had beenextinguished-only three houses from his own.(Brill, Dr. A.A.p 115+) By the next morning, a Sunday, Swedeborg s vision was thetalk of Gotenborg. Had there really been a fire? Or was theseventy-one-year-old s imagination running away with him? Anapparent answer came the following night when an express messengerarrived form Stocholm with news of a great fire. Three days afterthe vision, a second messenger brought more details. They matchedSwedenborg s account of the blaze and confirmed that is had haltedonly three doors from his own and had ended, just as he said, at8:00 P.M. Swedenborg was a respected engineer, inventor, and authorwhose intellect encompassed sciences ranging from psychology tozoology. When he was in his late fifties, however, he receivedwhat he regarded as a visitation from God. There after, he turnedhis full attention to theology, metaphysics, and the exploration ofhis psychic powers, which seemed abundant. To many parapsychologists, Swedenborg s reported vision ofthe Stockholm fire is an example of clairvoyance: the ability tosee psychically what the eye cannot perceive. 10 People who claim to be clairvoyant, often help police infinding bodies, finding crime scenes, or even just finding a murderweapon. These people aid in the investigation to help close casesthat are otherwise discontinued. (Matsuda, Kenya Internet) My personnel opinion on this is that they claim to beclairvoyant, and can help investigations, then why not let them. Ibelieve that clairvoyance is very possible because of a hypothesisI found out of a book. It stated that when a proton and anelectron collide in space, they shot miles apart and becomeprotons. One proton starts to spin a direction directly after thecollision, the other however, doesn t begin spinning until hourslater. Sure this may not sound like a big deal, but the thing toit is that the second proton has to find out which way the firstproton is spinning (from miles away), so that is can begin spinningthe opposite. This scientists say is the connection between theevent and the person. A similar event is supposedly to take place. This hypothesis is the only hypothesis that could logicallyexplain clairvoyance. Scientists have no real evidence of findingany link to clairvoyance from anything.(Morse M.D., Melvin p 49+) The next topic I will discuss is telepathy. Websters sdictionary defines telepathy as that of: communication form onemind to another without the use of speech or writing or gesturesetc. We know telepathy as simply being able to read ones mind. A

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example of telepathy is. One day in 1955, five-year-old Joicey Hurth of Cedarburg,Wisconsin, came home from a birthday party to find that her father 10and two brothers had gone to a movie without her. The theater wasonly a block and a half away from their home, so the little girldashed out to join them. Shortly after the child left, her mother, also named, Joicey,was washing dishes at the kitchen sink when suddenly,unexplainably, she knew her daughter had been in an accident. Without hesitation, Mrs. Joicey Hurth ran to the telephone anddialed the theather. (Wozniak, Robert Internet) My little girl was on the way to the theater, she told thewoman who answered. She has had an accident, is she badly hurt? How did you know? stammered the confused theater employee. it- the accident- just happened. Indeed, it turned out that the child, in rushing to join herfather and brothers, had run into the path of a moving car justoutside the moviehouse. After being hit, she had bounced off afender and landed on the pavement, but she was not badly hurt. I did not see or have a mental image of a car hittingJoicey, the mother recalled, but I did have the impression sostrongly that I did not question it or hesitate to call thetheater. (Wozniak, Robert Internet) Recounting the episode some years later, the daughter saidthat just after she was hit by the car she ran to the side of thestreet, crying and calling out in her mind, Mama, mama,mama. Shewas, she believed, screaming inaudibly. Since Mrs. Hurth neither heard nor saw anything that couldhave alerted her to her daughters mishap, parapsychologists 10studying the case attributed her knowledge of it totelepathy–direct mind-to-mind communication occurring without thefive senses.(Day, Laura p 13) Another great example of telepathy is by a woman by the nameof Mary Craig. She was the wife of Upton Sinclair, a novelist. Mary believed she had telepathic powers, and in the 1920 s, she andher husband set out to test them. He would draw pictures, and tryto transmit them to her mentally; and she would draw the image shereceived. She believed that psychic talent can be cultivated by anyone. She recommended a method that combines relaxation with intenseconcentration. Doing this right, she said, would produce an almostsleeplike stage that was critical in the conductivity of telepathicreception. She also said that by doing this you created a third type ofmind. not conscious, and not unconscious. She called this thedeep mind. (Wilson, Cloin p 21+) Her experiments with her husband however, were verysuccessful. She redrew every object as it appeared. However, shedid not interpret every object for what is actually was. Many intellectual people have had something to say about thistopic. Sigmunc Freud believed that psychic research is alegitimate scientific pursuit, but was wary of linking himself withwhat he had once called the Black tide of mud of occultism. Although he kept an open mind, Albert Einstein consideredtelepathy unlikely because it seemed to defy physics. 10Parapsychologists claimed distance between subjects did not affecttheir telepathic success. For Einstein, this contradicted theobservation that forces decline over distance. I believe that this could also be in existence. I have noexperiences of my own, but I like to keep an open mind about theunknown. The final two topics shall be combined because of how closein nature they are. Precognition is seeing into the future orbefore and event happens, while retrocognition is seeing into thepast.(Moody Jr. M.D., Raymond p 39) There is a story that appears to encounter both. A man isfixing a bush in his yard and turns to look at the landscaping ofthe house. When he turns back around, the bushes that he hadpreviously been working on had vanished. All he saw was a longdirt road with a man in old western-style clothing walking down it. When the man walking got close enough to make out the other, hestopped. They stared at each other for minutes until one finallyturned around to see what was going on, and then the originallandscape came back again. Some parapsychologists interpret theman doing yard works vision as an instance of simultaneousretrocognition and precognition. Through a tear in the fabric oftime, her was peering into the past-retrocognition. The oldwestern-type, if indeed he saw the doctor, experiencedprecognition-seeing into the future. (Matsuda, Kenya Internet) 10 All of these topics seem to have one thing in common, no hardcore evidence. This leaves most skeptical about believing. I onthe other hand can find believing this as easily as I believe in flying saucers, or even the lochness monster. Anything that hasunknown origins make me interested. I do not think I wouldbelieve everything off of hearing this from word of mouth I wouldeither have to experience it myself first hand, having it eitherhappen to me or have me watching it. After researching this topicI find myself thinking that all of this is very possible. I am notbeing gullible about this either, I just like to keep my eyes openand have an open mind about everything.

I. Moody Jr. M.D., Raymond. The Light Beyond. New York: Bantam Books, 1988 II. Wilson, Cloin. Afterlife. New York: Harrap Limited, 1985 III. Morse M.D., Melvin, Parting Visions. New York: Villard Books, 1994. IV. Day, Laura. Practical Intuition. New York: Villard Books, 1996 V. Brill, Dr. A.A. The Basic Writings of Sigmund Freud. New York: The Modern Library. 1938 VI. Morse M.D., Melvin. Closer to the Light. New York: Villard Books, 1990 VII. Matsuda, Kenya. ESP Super Willpower (online) Avaiable http://www.cna.ne.jp/ esper/300.htm, May 9, 1999. VIII. Wozniak, Robert. Mind and Body. (online) Avaiable http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/Mind/Table.html May 9, 1999 IX. Carroll, Robert. Skepdics Dictionary (online) Available http://www.skepdic.com May 8, 1999 X. A.R.E . E.S.P Extra Sensory Perception (online) Avaiable http://www.are-cayce.com/esp.htm