Freethought & Rationalism Archive

cricket · 11-03-2002, 10:13 AM

No such thing as typing "too much", in your case; your posts are always interesting. (I am helping daughter with college essays; she would love to have a mom who writes like you do!)

Somebody mentioned premonitions that are dreams. I'm reminded of my friend June, who was visited by her grandmother the night she died.

(No, June didn't die, it was the granny who died, and visited. According to June, that is. According to me, it was just another dream).

I think we have all these dreams we never remember unless something dramatic happens the next day to remind us. I think we dream about oodles of people and situations every night. Maybe June dreamed of granny several times a week, all her life?! but never remembered. But when she gets the phone call saying Grandmother died, this time she is able to recall the dream from a few hours earlier. The dream gets a bit of embellishment from the imagination, and voila! it was grandmother's goodbye visit.

Aerik Von · 11-03-2002, 05:02 PM

I think it's just a deeper part of the brain affirming what you've already placed together with evidence.

I hardly think it's supernatural...it is cool though!

Marduk · 11-04-2002, 06:33 AM

"I hardly think it's supernatural..."

There is no supernatural! Only undiscovered countries.

"The dread of something after death,
The undiscovered country from whose bourn
No traveller returns"
WS

[ November 04, 2002: Message edited by: marduck ]

Proxima Centauri · 11-04-2002, 07:02 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by chekmate:
How do you guys explain that feeling that you sometimes get. You know they one I'm talking about. The one that causes you to slow down, seconds before you see a police officer on the side of the road.

Hello fellow agnostic. We agnostics can sometimes get quite worried about something that looks paranormal. Different apparent paranormal phenomena have different explanations so dealing with them all can be trouble. This one's fairy easy though. You saw the policeman subliminally but were not consiously aware of it. You slowed down. Then you noticed the cop consciously and asked yourself, "Was it paranormal?"

Quote:

Or that makes you stop, in the middle of sex, and put your cloths back on, minutes before your parents get home a day early from vacation.

You heard your parents car subliminally or perceived something else subliminally that showed you they were coming.

Quote:

Or that makes you take the longer way home that one day, only to find out that there was an accident the way you normally would have gone, and you would have been stuck in traffic for hours had you goen that way.

As far as I can see this one has to be luck, or the paranormal. You remember the times when you take a different route and afterwards find out something has happened. You forget all the times when you took a different route and nothing happened.

Quote:

Maybe it's luck I guess, but all three of these things happened to me this weekend, and I swear that there was a weird feeling that caused me to deviate from what I had originally planned. What is that?

[ November 04, 2002: Message edited by: B.Shack ]

Proxima Centauri · 11-04-2002, 07:21 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Walross:
y'know, chekmate, it's funny you bring this up. The other night I dreamt about (among other things) a very specific neighbourhood that I had never been to. Tonight, on my way to a Halloween party, I drove through a neighbourhood that could have been cut-and-pasted from my dream. The stores were the same ones and in the same places as I had imagined, same with the houses, yet I know for a fact that I've never been there before. Beyond that, there was a feel to the place that was familiar. I suppose it could be a coincidence, or it could be something else. I'm too much of a skeptic to just pass the buck to the "supernatural". I'm sure there's a rational explanation for this event, but in any case, I quite enjoy the mystery. Regards,

Walross

You're sure you've never been there before. You're sure you've never seen photographs of the place. you're sure you've never seen a film of the place on TV, say during a news broadcast.

Unless you can eliminate all these possibilities you cannot assume the paranormal.

Lord Asriel · 11-04-2002, 07:35 AM

Just to return to the OP...

Quote:

Originally posted by chekmate:
How do you guys explain that feeling that you sometimes get. You know they one I'm talking about. The one that causes you to slow down, seconds before you see a police officer on the side of the road. Or that makes you stop, in the middle of sex,nd put your cloths back on, minutes before your parents get home a day early from vacation. Or that makes you take the longer way home that one day, only to find out that there was an accident the way you normally would have gone, and you would have been stuck in traffic for hours had you goen that way. Maybe it's luck I guess, but all three of these things happened to me this weekend, and I swear that there was a weird feeling that caused me to deviate from what I had originally planned. What is that?

I would just like to state for the record that I, for one, have never had this particular feeling.

Walross · 11-04-2002, 11:53 AM

Originally posted by B.Shack:

Quote:

You're sure you've never been there before. You're sure you've never seen photographs of the place. you're sure you've never seen a film of the place on TV, say during a news broadcast.

Unless you can eliminate all these possibilities you cannot assume the paranormal.

Did I say that I was assuming the paranormal? Quite the contrary, I said I was too much of a skeptic to pass the buck off to the supernatural. To answer your questions, yes, I am reasonably certain I've never seen that neighborhood by any of the means you describe. I suspect that what happened was probably what a few other posters have suggested - a case of recording a hit (ie coincidence) after ignoring a whole lot of misses, possibly combined with a little retrofitting of my memory. My point was that things that seem strange happen even to skeptics. Regards,

Walross

echidna · 11-05-2002, 03:01 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Lord Asriel:
I would just like to state for the record that I, for one, have never had this particular feeling.

Neither has George Costanza.

Aerik Von · 11-05-2002, 03:48 PM

I've gotten this feeling before - but I just think it's your subconscious putting 2 + 2 together...

<img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" /> <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" /> <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" />

I must be a gifted supernatural being!!!

Sidian · 11-06-2002, 09:12 AM

i read a fairly decent fiction (yes i'm aware it was a fiction) called "year zero". mostly it's entertainment level science with alot of artistic liscence.

there is one section where they discuss DNA being responsible for our instinctual knowledge (like know to breath at bearth, knowing to swallow, and more examples outside of humans like marsupials knowing where their mother's pouch is) it also tried to tie memories that we create to our DNA.

It said, basically, that when we commit something to memory we imprint it on our dna. they used this idea to explain why antient DNA could be cloned with the clones still remembering their lives.

i don't think it's that extensive, but if we do have insincts imprinted in our DNA what if some memories can be imprinted as well.

maybe someone lives in a neighborhood for 20 years and has a kid, that kid has a vague imprint of the neighborhood.

i myself have gotten the feeling that i've been somewhere before i know i've never been to. it could be me picking up similarities between this new place and places i've been.

all the neighborhoods where i live are cookie cutter so it'd be hard to tell any of them apart.

so what about this dna-imprinter memory crap?

any possibility it could explian the "i was here in another life" feeling?

11-04-2002, 06:33 AM	#33
Marduk Veteran Member Join Date: Aug 2000 Location: the 10th planet Posts: 5,065	"I hardly think it's supernatural..." There is no supernatural! Only undiscovered countries. "The dread of something after death, The undiscovered country from whose bourn No traveller returns" WS [ November 04, 2002: Message edited by: marduck ]</p>

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11-03-2002, 10:13 AM	#31
cricket Veteran Member Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: St Louis MO USA Posts: 1,188	No such thing as typing "too much", in your case; your posts are always interesting. (I am helping daughter with college essays; she would love to have a mom who writes like you do!) Somebody mentioned premonitions that are dreams. I'm reminded of my friend June, who was visited by her grandmother the night she died. (No, June didn't die, it was the granny who died, and visited. According to June, that is. According to me, it was just another dream). I think we have all these dreams we never remember unless something dramatic happens the next day to remind us. I think we dream about oodles of people and situations every night. Maybe June dreamed of granny several times a week, all her life?! but never remembered. But when she gets the phone call saying Grandmother died, this time she is able to recall the dream from a few hours earlier. The dream gets a bit of embellishment from the imagination, and voila! it was grandmother's goodbye visit.

11-03-2002, 05:02 PM	#32
Aerik Von Regular Member Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Hell, New York Posts: 151	I think it's just a deeper part of the brain affirming what you've already placed together with evidence. I hardly think it's supernatural...it is cool though!

11-05-2002, 03:48 PM	#39
Aerik Von Regular Member Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Hell, New York Posts: 151	I've gotten this feeling before - but I just think it's your subconscious putting 2 + 2 together... <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" /> <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" /> <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" /> I must be a gifted supernatural being!!!

11-06-2002, 09:12 AM	#40
Sidian Junior Member Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: Colorado Posts: 39	i read a fairly decent fiction (yes i'm aware it was a fiction) called "year zero". mostly it's entertainment level science with alot of artistic liscence. there is one section where they discuss DNA being responsible for our instinctual knowledge (like know to breath at bearth, knowing to swallow, and more examples outside of humans like marsupials knowing where their mother's pouch is) it also tried to tie memories that we create to our DNA. It said, basically, that when we commit something to memory we imprint it on our dna. they used this idea to explain why antient DNA could be cloned with the clones still remembering their lives. i don't think it's that extensive, but if we do have insincts imprinted in our DNA what if some memories can be imprinted as well. maybe someone lives in a neighborhood for 20 years and has a kid, that kid has a vague imprint of the neighborhood. i myself have gotten the feeling that i've been somewhere before i know i've never been to. it could be me picking up similarities between this new place and places i've been. all the neighborhoods where i live are cookie cutter so it'd be hard to tell any of them apart. so what about this dna-imprinter memory crap? any possibility it could explian the "i was here in another life" feeling?

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