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From: hadeishi@husc4.harvard.edu (mitsuharu hadeishi)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: Mind Reading
Message-ID: <463@husc6.HARVARD.EDU>
Date: Fri, 17-Oct-86 22:12:55 EDT
Article-I.D.: husc6.463
Posted: Fri Oct 17 22:12:55 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 18-Oct-86 03:10:23 EDT
References: <217@sri-arpa.ARPA> <3598@yale-celray.yale.UUCP>
Sender: news@husc6.HARVARD.EDU
Reply-To: hadeishi@husc4.UUCP (mitsuharu hadeishi)
Organization: Harvard Science Center
Lines: 49
Summary: Perhaps not so useless

In article <447@husc6.HARVARD.EDU> greg@endor.harvard.edu (Greg) writes:
>Although I agree that Mitsu's posting does not belong in net.physics, I think
>the argument in favor of scientific terms can be made stronger:
>
>An idea that cannot be evaluated (such as Mitsu's claims of mind-reading) is
>neither true nor false, neither real nor unreal.  It is a non-statement about
>reality.  It adds nothing to an understanding of nature.

	I believe the original thread of the argument was the
evolutionary advantage/disadvantage of telepathy.  My point was
that the following possibility was being overlooked:  since it is
only human beings who can report telepathic events through language,
we can only say for sure that telepathy is not common in
humans.  We cannot say the same for animals.  My hypothesis was that
because of the large differences between the human and animal mind,
it may well be that telepathic ability in humans is simply supressed;
particuarly because in the current era we have a "common-sense" world
view which excludes telepathy as a possibility.

	However, there is a large amount of evidence that ancient
cultures and primitive cultures believe in various different accounts
of psychic phenomena.  My hypothesis was, further, that we have simply
forgotten how to listen to our "sixth sense"; and that in the past,
when we did not rule out the possibility in our world view, people
were much more inclined to listen to this "sixth sense."  This would
provide an explanation as to why psychic phenomena do not manifest
themselves as often today as they might have in the past.

	The whole point of this argument being: suppose telepathy
were possible and humans were capable of it.  Why don't we see more
telepathy today?  The above is a brief hypothesis (rough, I admit,
but I cannot see how I can present a precise theory when the subject
is still so shrouded in ignorance).  If psychic phenomena do occur,
it is clear that we do not know what kinds of phenomena are possible nor
how or under what conditions they occur.  It is ludicrous to ask for
a "definition" of telepathy; I think what is required at this stage is
simply a series of reports of isolated incidents (data).  After a
large number of events have been recorded carefully, a pattern may well
emerge.  It may be that 50% of the data will be spurious (again, I
am assuming for the sake of argument that the phenomena ARE real,
and presenting a possible scenario), 10% representing "actual"
psychic events, and 40% representing willful fraud or deceit.
Possibly with a concerted effort a pattern might emerge, and at this
time it would be appropriate to classify and define the types of
phenomena that are possible.  Again, it is crazy to ask for a
"definition" when there is still not enough data to begin to discern
a pattern!

				-Mitsu