Do you believe in ESP?

[CPT Tripss]

I think even those who do not believe there is such as thing as ESP or such a thing as being sensitive to their surroundings and the people and things in those surroundings have to admit that like animals, humans have instinct. For those who say it is not possible to be sensitive...have you never had the experience of feeling someone looking at you and you look up and someone is watching you? How do you explain that? You didn't see them looking at you...you felt it. It's no different but it's about levels. That primary instinctual feeling that someone is following you or watching you is so basic every human being has it. Sensing things before they happen or sensing things about other people are on the same spectrum just further on the scale.

I'm in a public place with other people in it, I look around and someone is looking at me. Hardly surprising.

 

[FlightlessDuck]

I'm not sure if I believe in ESP, but if a person is making money off of it, I think it's hooey.

Sylvia Brown, John Edwards, etc. etc.

Con artists.

 

[Disfan1]

The last time this happened to me was last year. I felt suddenly that I HAD to go visit my grandmother, no excuses. I went to visit her for the weekend and just a month later my mother called to let me know she was very sick and she would keep me updated. About three days later, I just woke up one morning and started packing a suitcase. My husband asked what I was doing and I said, "I don't know - I just need to have some clothes packed." Just then the phone rang - my mom was calling to tell me my grandmother passed about the same time I started packing.

Things like this happen a lot. I explain it to my family and VERY close friends as "Sometimes I just know things I don't know" LOL

 

[Tinker'n'Fun]

I definitely never made any money off it, and to be honest I also never told anyone things I had felt or knew.

I also did have very strong deja vu growing up. So strong that it made me ill at times.

I usually do not talk about it or do I usually even admit to it. Too many people do not believe and that's okay. I never try to make others uncomfortable about things that may or may not happen to them.

 

[skylizard]

Do you know every single time the phone rings? And I mean every single time?

Otherwise, it is just the law of averages that your mind will guess who is calling and it will be that person.

Are you ever wrong? I mean, even once? That you think it is X calling and it turns out Y? Because then again, your percentage of being right is not ESP, it is an educated guess.

As humans, we have a funny little thing where we remember all the right things and then tend to forget when it doesn't happen that way.

So, we remember all the times we are right in guessing who is calling on the phone, but our subconscious conveniently ignores all the time it is wrong.

Sure, some of it can be explained by it just being a coincidence or a lucky guess. Some things can't though.

Here's my own personal recent experience and take from it what you want. I normally don't remember my dreams, let alone much detail about them. Yet, there were two dreams last year, each a few months apart, that were very detailed and both involved two different co workers quitting. I personally worked with each of them and had no idea they were even thinking about leaving so I thought it was weird. Both co workers ended up quitting within a few days of me having my dream about them. Two different dreams, both ended up happening in the way I dreamed it. I've never had any other dreams of people quitting, much less about specific people. Weird? Most definitely. ESP? Who knows. But not just a coincidence or a good guess.

 

[Zooshoveller]

Everyone knows that Deja Vu is a glitch in the Matrix!

 

[NFLDERS]

Incorrect post

 

[Kimberlyann11]

All the women in my family have had a few experiences. My mom is the freakiest. Hers are very very specific, she writes them down and they are never wrong.

I think science will come up with an answer to this someday. There won't be any deity of any kind involved - or ghosts or demons, just plain old science.

I have a theory, if anyone wants to go swimming off the weird end with me. I think time is like a book. Everything that ever happened or will happen is written right there and the only way we know how to move through it is from one page to the next. As we age, we flip faster, but it's still only one page at a time. We don't know how to flip to the end or how to skim back to the beginning. Now - imagine there are some people having the genetic trait of being able to "see" a few pages ahead, maybe when they're relaxed or sleeping (my few happened when I was distracted with the radio on in the background. I heard things on the radio that didn't happen yet. My mom and sister dream. I had one dream that I can claim).

Of course there is no way to prove any of this with the technology we have now. I would love to be a physicist and try to devise ways to determine the nature of time and its relationship to space and our experience in them as humans. If I had a huge brain, I might have done that when I was younger. But I don't It's only a fun thought to play with, write it down on toilet paper and that's about all it's worth. Someday I might share my theory about what happens when you die!! That'll be a hoot for sure! Points for all!!

 

[EMom]

This is one story I have shared before here, so I don't mind sharing again. When we were adopting, we were sent many video referrals of available babies/toddlers. For various reasons...mainly because the agency wasn't listening to us ...we kept having to turn down the referred child. It was agonizing.

During this time, I had a recurrent dream about a baby girl. I could see her face clearly and knew her Russian name. The dream was always about the same child. Finally, we fired that agency and went to Russia on our own to adopt a baby. We had no referral tape, no name, no photo, no nothing. We sat in the office and were told the name of a baby we were being given permission to go meet. When they said her name, I asked them to repeat it because I could not believe my ears. It was the name of the baby I had dreamed about. None of the babies the agency had ever referred to us had ever had that name. But she did.

I felt at ease as we drove to meet her. It seemed like a good sign. When they walked in with the baby, I looked up. I saw the face I had dreamed about so many times! Same face, same name, same baby. There was no doubt we were going to say yes. Easiest decision ever.

 

[Bluestars]

I think people like Sylvia and John Edwards are frauds. I think they scam vulnerable people. I do believe in ESP though. I just don't think can be harnessed like the high profile scammers claim to do.

I believe many people have random experiences that can't be explained away as pure chance. I am a skeptic though, so I think there are a lot of scammers out there.

Anyway, the most concrete experience I had was many years ago when I went to a huge event with several coworkers. There were hundreds of people at the event. They gave everyone a raffle ticket upon entering the event. When the raffle began and they got to a particular prize, my mind (or whatever) told me that a particular coworker of mine was going to have her name called next. I also thought clearly that I needed to put my drink down so that I wouldn't spill it when I heard her name called. Just then, her name was called. It was the most bizarre, random thing that ever happened to me. It was so pointless that I wondered why I even experienced it.

Another event was when my husband went downstairs to the kitchen to heat something up in the microwave. When he got back upstairs, for no reason whatsoever, I looked him straight in the eyes and asked if he turned off the stove. He looked at me and then walked downstairs. He had left the stove on and I had no idea he even used the store. How random is that? So weird.

Another time a family member in his early 20s told me that he would die young and it would be in the water. He told me this several times and I didn't believe it because he was a strong swimmer and he was young and healthy. He ended up drowning a few months later due to having a seizure while in the water.

There are other experiences, but a few are too personal to discuss. I think it's something that really needs to be experienced to be believed. I would probably not believe something just because somebody else told me it's true.

 

[WDWBarb]

I like to think the universe is laden with possibilities.

There are many incidents in my life (many fewer as I get older) that I can't reasonably explain. Coincidence, sure, but after so many you do wonder.

Just a small example - I was driving home from work one day and the thought "So and so died" popped into my head. It was strange because this man was the father of the owners of my previous company. I'd only met him a few times and hadn't worked for his sons for many years. About that time, my phone rings and it's my ex boss from that company asking me if I was coming to this man's funeral that evening. I had not been told that he passed away. That took me aback. Why in the world would I coincidentally be thinking of someone I hardly knew and within moments find out that he had passed away?

On the flip side, I had another friend who passed away, home alone. It was 2 days before anyone realized he had died. Where was that "talent" then? Where was it when he was alone and needed help? Hardly seems fair.

 

[ebtbmom]

Everyone knows that Deja Vu is a glitch in the Matrix!

Exactly!

I do not believe in ESP, but I am a die hard skeptic of pretty much everything in the world, so I don't believe in anything.

I have had some experiences that felt like deja vu, or I felt like a situation was familiar and then "remember" that I'd dreamed it. I attribute it to weird neurological responses.

If ESP is real why doesn't anyone use it for anything useful?

 

[sonnyjane]

Exactly! I do not believe in ESP, but I am a die hard skeptic of pretty much everything in the world, so I don't believe in anything. I have had some experiences that felt like deja vu, or I felt like a situation was familiar and then "remember" that I'd dreamed it. I attribute it to weird neurological responses. If ESP is real why doesn't anyone use it for anything useful?

I can only speak for myself, but you don't really "pick" what you predict. Premonitions is probably a better term for what I experience. After trying to describe to family what was happening (that I was experiencing things I'd previously dreamt about), they didn't believe me so I started keeping a dream journal every night so that when things happened I could go back and find the date. I don't keep a journal anymore, but it was pretty compelling. It's not always having a dream that plays out exactly in real life. Sometimes it is just seeing something in a dream that becomes eerily relevant. For example one night I dreamt of my ex who I hadn't seen in more than 10 years. All of a sudden the next day I was contacted by his dad to tell me he tried to take his life the night before (as I dreamt of him). Just weird things like that.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

If ESP is real why doesn't anyone use it for anything useful?

I guess it depends on how you define useful.

I don't generally have premonitions; mine is in the form of intuition. I just know things. Since I've learned to pay attention to it, it has become very useful - to me. Not trying to convince anyone at all, cause truthfully, I couldn't care less whether someone else "believes" or not. Their call. But I'll give an example of my own intuition. When I had cancer I had chosen an oncologist. But it just didn't feel right to me. I had a gnawing feeling I should get a different one. So even though it was really the last thing I wanted to do at the time, being so ovewhelmed with just the cancer diagnosis and work, two young kids, surgery, etc., I started searching around. There was one that stood out to me. Why, I don't know, she just did - it was all just a very vague but strong feeling. Anyway, I called this one doctor that stood out and was told (rather rudely) she wasn't taking new patients. Well, so much for that idea. But again, that gnawing feeling came back. Must have her. So I called back a second time, got a nice lady on the phone, and explained that I really felt strongly about seeing her, and I asked her to ask the doctor for me if she could see me, I'd come anytime, etc. After being on hold for a few minutes, she came back and told me the doctor said she'd see me. Great, and gnawing feeling was replaced with peace.

Several months later I ran into a cousin of mine. We never knew eachother too well as there was a 20 year age span between us - him being the oldest and me being the youngest on that side of the family. He had also undergone treatment for cancer the previous year, and lo and behold, guess who his doctor was? Yes, the same one I chose. (And no, there were no communications about it that I would have overheard or anything like that. None. I did not know anything about his illness or treatment, let alone who his doctor was.) He told me that doctor had basically saved his life. And here I am, 11 years later too. So I'd say that was pretty useful. As I said before, these types of things happen to me all the time.

People that people here like to call frauds are useful to people they help. One of my closest friends lost her young son in a car accident not too long ago. She has seen mediums who have without a doubt brought her messages from her son. Those messages have brought her more peace than anything else, so I'd say it was very useful - for her. Most of the people who are non-believers going in say they would never believe it unless it happened to them, etc. So I think it's useless to try to convince anyone.

 

[Kimberlyann11]

Exactly!

I do not believe in ESP, but I am a die hard skeptic of pretty much everything in the world, so I don't believe in anything.

I have had some experiences that felt like deja vu, or I felt like a situation was familiar and then "remember" that I'd dreamed it. I attribute it to weird neurological responses.

If ESP is real why doesn't anyone use it for anything useful?

Deja Vu is actually a thing. Some researchers think that its an anomaly between short and long term memory. They are attempting to locate a gene for it and think it might be near the same gene that controls epilepsy.

The term Deja Vu has been used incorrectly quite a bit in this thread. (not by you, PP - you seem to have a grip on it). For the uninitiated, deja vu the feeling that an event or sensation that you're currently experiencing has happened to you in the past, when it actually hasn't. It's a pretty common phenomenon.

 

[NFLDERS]

Exactly!

I do not believe in ESP, but I am a die hard skeptic of pretty much everything in the world, so I don't believe in anything.

I have had some experiences that felt like deja vu, or I felt like a situation was familiar and then "remember" that I'd dreamed it. I attribute it to weird neurological responses.

If ESP is real why doesn't anyone use it for anything useful?

I've heard of a few where someone acted on a premonition that otherwise would have killed them. Changing an Airline travel plan ie. Those whom assist the FBI in missing persons cases ie. Historically, I believe there have been times (reported) when people "tried" to warn of disasters.

This post is interrupting my "Morning Routine" (another thread). I'll try to pull up some factual info. later..

I'm back! Dis anyone predict that I would be?

I found this site an interesting read: http://www.pureinsight.org/node/1185.

 

[ebtbmom]

I guess it depends on how you define useful.

I don't generally have premonitions; mine is in the form of intuition. I just know things. Since I've learned to pay attention to it, it has become very useful - to me. Not trying to convince anyone at all, cause truthfully, I couldn't care less whether someone else "believes" or not. Their call. But I'll give an example of my own intuition. When I had cancer I had chosen an oncologist. But it just didn't feel right to me. I had a gnawing feeling I should get a different one. So even though it was really the last thing I wanted to do at the time, being so ovewhelmed with just the cancer diagnosis and work, two young kids, surgery, etc., I started searching around. There was one that stood out to me. Why, I don't know, she just did - it was all just a very vague but strong feeling. Anyway, I called this one doctor that stood out and was told (rather rudely) she wasn't taking new patients. Well, so much for that idea. But again, that gnawing feeling came back. Must have her. So I called back a second time, got a nice lady on the phone, and explained that I really felt strongly about seeing her, and I asked her to ask the doctor for me if she could see me, I'd come anytime, etc. After being on hold for a few minutes, she came back and told me the doctor said she'd see me. Great, and gnawing feeling was replaced with peace.

Several months later I ran into a cousin of mine. We never knew eachother too well as there was a 20 year age span between us - him being the oldest and me being the youngest on that side of the family. He had also undergone treatment for cancer the previous year, and lo and behold, guess who his doctor was? Yes, the same one I chose. (And no, there were no communications about it that I would have overheard or anything like that. None. I did not know anything about his illness or treatment, let alone who his doctor was.) He told me that doctor had basically saved his life. And here I am, 11 years later too. So I'd say that was pretty useful. As I said before, these types of things happen to me all the time.

People that people here like to call frauds are useful to people they help. One of my closest friends lost her young son in a car accident not too long ago. She has seen mediums who have without a doubt brought her messages from her son. Those messages have brought her more peace than anything else, so I'd say it was very useful - for her. Most of the people who are non-believers going in say they would never believe it unless it happened to them, etc. So I think it's useless to try to convince anyone.

Glad you're doing well! I wouldn't call that experience ESP though, sounds like intuition. I think we all have intuition, probably evolved as a survival instinct.

I agree with you that it's useless to try and convince anyone, even when I've had strange experiences I assume there's a rational scientific explanation, even if I don't know it at time!

Maybe if there's ever a winner of the amazing Randi challenge I'll reconsider my opinion.

 

[ebtbmom]

Deja Vu is actually a thing. Some researchers think that its an anomaly between short and long term memory. They are attempting to locate a gene for it and think it might be near the same gene that controls epilepsy.

The term Deja Vu has been used incorrectly quite a bit in this thread. (not by you, PP - you seem to have a grip on it). For the uninitiated, deja vu the feeling that an event or sensation that you're currently experiencing has happened to you in the past, when it actually hasn't. It's a pretty common phenomenon.

You know "a glitch in the Matrix" is just a reference to the movie, right?

 

[Kimberlyann11]

You know "a glitch in the Matrix" is just a reference to the movie, right?

Of course - I don't think I mentioned it though.

I think the person who did was just having a fun time quoting movies.

 

[Disney Doll]

Do you know every single time the phone rings? And I mean every single time?

Otherwise, it is just the law of averages that your mind will guess who is calling and it will be that person.

Are you ever wrong? I mean, even once? That you think it is X calling and it turns out Y? Because then again, your percentage of being right is not ESP, it is an educated guess.

As humans, we have a funny little thing where we remember all the right things and then tend to forget when it doesn't happen that way.

So, we remember all the times we are right in guessing who is calling on the phone, but our subconscious conveniently ignores all the time it is wrong.

Actually, if it's someone I know personally (as opposed to a telemarketer) I pretty much do know every single time the phone rings. I can say to DH "You answer that because it's going to be your sister and she wants to talk to you". Freaks him out a little.

When my mother was failing over the summer, I used to know when the phone rang when it was going to be her calling to tell me she wasn't feeling well vs. calling to chat.

But no, if it's Jake from State Farm, I don't know that it's specifically him calling because, unlike the guy on the TV commercial, I have no close personal relationship with Jake.

As I have said, I think the human mind is capable of a lot more than we think. I think a lot of things that happen are truly not explainable by science. But that's just me. YMMV.