davet@oakhill.UUCP (Dave Trissel) (06/22/85)
In article <217@unccvax.UUCP> dsi@unccvax.UUCP (Dataspan Inc) writes: > > ... 2) a reasonably decent model that will >weather academic criticism well already exists. > > ... but all the other stuff (precognition, >deja vu, etc) can be effectively explained. Since it's about time to complete my precognition experience from last week I'll post the main brunt of it now. I would be interested in hearing any reasonable interpretations of how by non-paranormal means I could have happened upon the things I "picked up." To summarize: I became friends with a graduate student at U. of Fla. who took a job offer at Dow in Baton Rouge. Just for fun we agreed that I would try to tune-in on his future house as an experiment. He had never been to the city itself and I had only been through it on the Interstate. The following items I told him, but he did not tell his wife. He let her pick out whatever house she wanted: 1) The house number which came to me in a dream. Specifically, upon awaking I wrote down the numbers "99178" with the last two digits underlined and the following note underneath: "not sure about the end but something like that" 2) Looking at a map of Baton Rouge I pointed to two different subdivisions and told him that I felt he would be moving into or very near one of the two. My driving through Baton Rouge occured long before I knew he would be moving there. 3)That his house would not be on or near a corner but something like 3 or 4 away from the corner. This was given to me in the same dream with the house number. We futher agreed that I would write down some things which I wouldn't tell him just to make sure he couldn't inadvertantly or sub-consciously give out any clues. These were: 4) An odd U shape turn which would have to be taken to get to his house. 5) The specific position of the kitchen, living room and dining room in the new house and the general area of where the bedrooms would be. 6) A garage on the right side of the house. 7) Where the TV would be and which direction it would face. 8) That the street name would have the letter "Z" or "X" in it. After his wife chose the house he called me from Baton Rouge to see if I could guess anything on the phone AFTER the fact. All that came to me was that I "felt" there were lots of trees in back of his house. (9) This was all documented at length. For example, when I awoke from the dream before writing anything down about the house number and such I wrote the date and time at the top of the page. Now to describe the actual house that his wife chose. They went through a real-estate agency. The agent had chosen a house she thought his wife would love and on the way to view it my friend told her the house number I had predicted which made her freak out. 1) The house number is 9918. 2) The house is in one of the two subdivisions I had indicated. 3) The house is not near a corner and is fourth from the nearest one (If I remember correctly.) 4) Several acres directly in front of his home were reserved for a future school. Thus, no roads cut through there and one does need to make a U shaped route to travel around to the house. 5) The kitchen, dining room, living room and bedrooms were all situated in the respective quadrants of the house I specified. 6) The garage was a complete miss. The driveway was on the correct side but continues on around the back edge of the house into a carport. 7) The TV ended up being in the living room on the wall and facing the direction I had indicated. 8) The street the house is on is "Azrok" with the letter Z. 9) My friend said on the phone that my remark about the trees was on target since there was a thick 20 acre forest butting his small backyard. The first question to ask is what things could I have guessed just by knowing their personalities. Conciously, none of the items were obvious to me. But, I can see where 3, 5, and 7 could be put in that catagory. The next question is trying to ascertain just how improbable the guesses were from random chance guessing. Not easy to do but here is my conservative estimate: 1) I'd say at least 20 to 1. 2) 4 to 1. 3) 2 to 1. 4) 1 to 1. (a lot of houses could be interpreted to require a U turn access.) 5) 3 to 1. 6) 4 to 1. (This was a miss.) 7) 4 to 1. 8) 20 to 1. (Anyone with a map of Baton Rouge? This is likely quite larger.) 9) 1 to 1. (A lot of houses have trees in the backyard.) I think I have been quite conservative with these odds. Take the trees for example (9). Neither my current nor future house has a single tree behind it yet I'm assuming that all houses have lots of trees behind them. And for (8) I doubt that one out of every 20 streets has an X or Z in the name. The primitive odds for guessing this comes out to 20 X 4 X 2 X 3 X 4 X 20 divided by 4 (for the miss) = 9,600 to 1. Throwing out 3, 5, and 7 changes the odds calculation to 400 to 1. In any case I think its obvious that random guessing is no explanation. Yet another thing to be explained is why did I have the feeling that I "knew" the things, instead of feeling like I was just making random guesses. I can guess a random number between 1 and 10,000. My guess is 2791. Trouble is, when I guessed it I didn't feel like I knew anything. But most of the items I "picked up" were as though I was pulling them out of my memory - as though I had known them all along. To me, studying what's behind whatever is going on here is just as important as anything in science today. I refuse to put my head in the ground and just ignore what happened to me as though it didn't exist. That's copping out. >each one can be explained by an "attenuated behaviour" model, where >person A, based on some reinforcers in common (or, for that matter, >disjoint) with person B, have the same behaviour. The first one goes >out and wraps his Corvette 'round a pine tree. The second, behaving >in an attenuated fashion, has a 'precognition' while in an elevator >2000 miles away that A has done so. > This may be true for certain situations, but it doesn't explain how information about a housenumber or a streetname having the letter "X" or "Z" in it could be due to behaviour of my friends. They certainly didn't go out looking for a house with a certain number, nor did they try to find a house on such a street. > But what about the cases where a 'psychic' is hired to find the >dead body of some pour soul that has the cops baffled? Again, these >psychics have the (albeit very limited) knack of finding some relevant >reinforcer in the situation and extrapolating behaviourally to the >behavioural end. This is certainly more reasonable an explaination >than 'tapping in' to some undiscovered pheonomena in the Ether. > This may be true but it seems like the cops would certainly know to look for behaviour patterns themselves. In any case, there are enough failures on record of attempts to utilize psychics that it doesn't seem fruitful to look in this direction. I agree with much of the rest of the posting I'm replying to in that subtle behavioural mechanisms can be used to explain away a lot of so-called paranormal experiences. If I had not had the few spectacular (in my view) occasions where paranormal events had seemingly occured I would be much more skeptical of the whole subject. -- Dave Trissel {ihnp4,seismo}!ut-sally!oakhill!davet
js2j@mhuxt.UUCP (sonntag) (06/26/85)
> I agree with much of the rest of the posting I'm replying to in that subtle > behavioural mechanisms can be used to explain away a lot of so-called > paranormal experiences. If I had not had the few spectacular (in my view) > occasions where paranormal events had seemingly occured I would be much more > skeptical of the whole subject. > --Dave Trissel Then perhaps you understand why most of the rest of us, who have never witnessed *any* paranormal events, spectacular or not, are so skeptical of the whole subject. Until I witness just one, I think I'll just continue to assume that people like you, Dave, are either: 1.) very easily amazed by the occasional low probability event which occurs. 2.) unconsciously coloring your memory of such events to make them seem more amazing than they really were. 3.) lying 4.) one brick shy of a load But what do you expect when you claim that these amazing phenomena, which break the laws of physics, happen now and then (at apparently random intervals), BUT NEVER WHEN I'M AROUND? Or NEVER TO ME. Or NEVER WHEN ALL POSSIBILITIES OF FAKERY OR RANDOM CHANCE ARE REMOVED. -- Jeff Sonntag ihnp4!mhuxt!js2j "Well I've been burned before, and I know the score, so you won't hear me complain. Are you willing to risk it all, or is your love in vain?"-Dylan
rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen) (06/27/85)
>> I agree with much of the rest of the posting I'm replying to in that subtle >> behavioural mechanisms can be used to explain away a lot of so-called >> paranormal experiences. If I had not had the few spectacular (in my view) >> occasions where paranormal events had seemingly occured I would be much more >> skeptical of the whole subject. --Dave Trissel > Then perhaps you understand why most of the rest of us, who have never > witnessed *any* paranormal events, spectacular or not, are so skeptical of > the whole subject. Until I witness just one, I think I'll just continue > to assume that people like you, Dave, are either: > 1.) very easily amazed by the occasional low probability event which > occurs. > 2.) unconsciously coloring your memory of such events to make them > seem more amazing than they really were. > 3.) lying > 4.) one brick shy of a load [SONNTAG] You forgot the most important one: 5.) wishful thinking: wishing and hoping for the existence of paranormal phenomena and tainting your perceptions so as to make the events fit the particular patterns ("This respresents teleparakinetocognition!") you wish for. -- Like a bourbon? (HIC!) Drunk for the very first time... Rich Rosen ihnp4!pyuxd!rlr