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So many birds and insects seem to be sensitive to the magnetic forces deep within the planet. I've never met a human being who was consciously aware of these fo

So many birds and insects seem to be sensitive to the magnetic forces deep within the planet. I've never met a human being who was consciously aware of these forces, but I've met plenty of spiritualists who called them something else. Ask any old person whose body reacts to pressure changes in the weather, and they'll point out which bones ache when a storm is approaching. They're usually right. As humans, we brush it off. It's just a feeling, or we're having a bad headache, and need to take some medicine. To a small insect whose entire world can change in a flash though, these signals are a monumentally important part of how they sense the world. Especially I think in absence of more complex visual perception that we humans use to bridge the gap. Nature is amazing! The more we study it, the less we realize we actually know.

cyberferret 9y ago
I do recall reading about an experiment many years ago where a group of university students were blindfolded and taken to a remote hill outside of their town. They were then (still blindfolded) asked to point to their homes, and it turns out that most of them managed to point fairly accurately in the direction where they lived. No idea of the validity or scientific basis for that 'experiment', but as you mentioned - that mysterious ability for older people to 'feel' weather changes in parts of their bodies, or that 'gut feeling' that a lot of people get when they are being watched by hostile eyes... There is a lot more going on to our unconscious perception of the world that we realise. There are some facets however, that are easily explainable, such as people "smelling the rain coming" when it is in fact the higher moisture content in the air making our smell receptors work better at smelling the everyday environment around us... But there are some phenomena which aren't as easily explained. I hope that we can begin to be more adept at recognising the unconscious prompts, which I think will make us much better are relating to the world around us.
- pvaldes 9y ago
  > They were asked to point to their homes and most of them managed to point fairly accurately in the direction where they lived. Blind people can still hear, smell and perceive the wind direction and use it to make a mental map of their (well known) surrondings. Zero mystery here and no scooby snack for those scientists.
appleflaxen 9y ago
Note that the supremacy of science is so absolute that mystics need to anchor their theories back to it somehow: "magnetic forces deep within the planet" as an explanation (vs. something obviously mystical / supernatural / pretend such as demons or spirits). Since the scientific process is so powerful in its ability to understand reality, let's follow it all the way through to the end. Meaning: let's ask a zoologist about hermit crabs anticipating a storm, rather than a spiritualist.

cyberferret 9y ago

I do recall reading about an experiment many years ago where a group of university students were blindfolded and taken to a remote hill outside of their town. They were then (still blindfolded) asked to point to their homes, and it turns out that most of them managed to point fairly accurately in the direction where they lived. No idea of the validity or scientific basis for that 'experiment', but as you mentioned - that mysterious ability for older people to 'feel' weather changes in parts of their bodies, or that 'gut feeling' that a lot of people get when they are being watched by hostile eyes... There is a lot more going on to our unconscious perception of the world that we realise. There are some facets however, that are easily explainable, such as people "smelling the rain coming" when it is in fact the higher moisture content in the air making our smell receptors work better at smelling the everyday environment around us... But there are some phenomena which aren't as easily explained. I hope that we can begin to be more adept at recognising the unconscious prompts, which I think will make us much better are relating to the world around us.

pvaldes 9y ago
> They were asked to point to their homes and most of them managed to point fairly accurately in the direction where they lived. Blind people can still hear, smell and perceive the wind direction and use it to make a mental map of their (well known) surrondings. Zero mystery here and no scooby snack for those scientists.

appleflaxen 9y ago

Note that the supremacy of science is so absolute that mystics need to anchor their theories back to it somehow: "magnetic forces deep within the planet" as an explanation (vs. something obviously mystical / supernatural / pretend such as demons or spirits). Since the scientific process is so powerful in its ability to understand reality, let's follow it all the way through to the end. Meaning: let's ask a zoologist about hermit crabs anticipating a storm, rather than a spiritualist.