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From: Schauble@MIT-MULTICS.ARPA
Newsgroups: net.physics
Subject: Re: My thoughts on NOVA's ESP show
Message-ID: <16198@sri-arpa.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 31-Jan-84 03:48:00 EST
Article-I.D.: sri-arpa.16198
Posted: Tue Jan 31 03:48:00 1984
Date-Received: Sun, 5-Feb-84 04:06:07 EST
Lines: 29

bly work because the radio waves can't "know" that they are
supposed to couple with matter at the antenna to be produced, turn off
the coupling to pass through the walls of the building, and turn it back
on again to react with the radio. The same way that X-rays can't
possibly know that they should couple to matter at the X-ray tube, cease
coupling as they pass through the subject, and once again magically
couple to the film to produce an image. And what could electronics in a
vacuum tube possibly have to do with light sensitive film, indeed.

Seriously. The human mind is an extremely good signal processor. Through
hearing and sight it is possible of extracting useful information at a
signal/noise ratio <<1, i.e. signal far below the noise. Considering
telepathy only, I have seen and experienced enough to convince me that
something is going on. I don't know what, and whatever it is, it doesn't
work very well or very consistantly. But it is there.

I don't know how you test for it, either. If you made controlled studies
of randomly chosen people off the street, you could easily prove that
the ability to compose music, write poetry, or dance ballet are very
unreliable talents that don't exist to any noticable degree.

My own theory on the topic is this: There seems to be an age at which a
child developes language skills. If, by some change, a child goes
through this age without learning to speak, the effects will be
permanant. Perhaps there is a similar age in children at which they
develop ESP skills and should be taught how to use them. Consider how we
treat kids who see and hear things that the adults don't.

                              Paul