Are Supernatural Experiences Shaped by Our Knowledge of Them?

[guguma]

Imagine an experiment, take a person who has never seen a shadow and never heard of the concept of one, and put him into a room illuminated in such a way that no shadows are cast. The room has a TV in it and on the TV there is a guy in a room with a single lightsource and that guy casts a shadow. Now when we ask the experimented person what that is,

Q1:what would he say?

A1: Infinitely many explanations are possible

Q2: Take another guy like that and describe him that a ghost is a black human like figure, which tends to follow your body and shrinks and enlarges according to your mood. Ask this guy the same question. How would he describe the figure on the TV

A2: Ghost.

Although how our brain functions exactly is not figured out in its complete details, it is pretty obvious that the input we get from nature is interpreted there and felt there and somehow the effects are stored (memory) there. These stored effects can even be altered to a certain degree (the weird dream you see yourself as the actor on the movie you saw last night). The brain can even generate a response even if the original input which caused the response is absent (hallucinations, attacks, feeling uneasy around toy dogs because you were attacked by an actual dog etc...)

The Near Death Experiences, Astral Projection, Seeing Ghosts, UFO's, Not seeing through a cleverly concealed magic trick etc.. are all results of this fact.

Examples:

NDE: If a person's mind is filled with religious ideas and while his body is under an extreme stress and signals shooting from his receptors your brain will absolutely go crazy trying to fix everything, your brain's job is to make your body function and its main fear is that it will not function anymore (death), you will be aware of death under such a situation and the first thing that pops into your mind (the one thing dominant about death) is afterlife, god, seeing your deceased family members whatever. So it should be obvious your brain responds to this input by these images

Astral P: I will not talk about it in general, but if you are projecting into the room of a close friend of yours which you have spend a considerable amount of time with and you have been exposed to how his room looks, it is obvious that under a deep state of slumber when your brain is focused at that particular room; you will see your previous experiences in that room which may as well be 80% correlated with the present state of that room and what your friend does. (No scientific 80% there making it up)

Magic Tricks: Imagine a pseudo rectangle with two nonparallel sides, but only slightly non parallel. You will say that it is a rectangle because it looks like the rectangles you have previously seen, you will definitely not say that it is a trapezoid. If you see a metal spoon rotating with erratic movements with the head sloping toward the ground. You will say that it is being bent because bent objects according to your previous experiences act like that, the other interpretation that it is slightly broken and someone is exploiting that fact is not something you see everyday so it is not what you think.

I mean, I always find non-scientific explanations about things that are supernatural pretty stupid, I find supernatural stupid (I am being honest here, do not bash me if you believe in such stuff I would just say I find that pretty stupid, not I find you stupid so let's not take it personal OK) including the last and maybe the most important "religious stuff".

What I cannot seem to understand is that why do people happily cling to the supernatural when there is always a simpler explanation and that simpler explanation is always obvious. Even some physicists (being a student in one I suffer from this fact) are going at great lengths to mystify quantum mechanics (where the most popular method of mystification is trying to find a bridge between consciousness and QM) adding some magic to physics etc... Is it because physics can get boring at the times and they feel this necessity of magic, mystery to spice things up a little bit?

Please Comment.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

What I cannot seem to understand is that why do people happily cling to the supernatural when there is always a simpler explanation and that simpler explanation is always obvious.

That is an assumption on your part. Perhaps other people have had real experiences that you haven't. You are assuming that you have knowledge of all of the facts, when there is no way to know if you do. That is the sort of thing that I find hard to understand.

 

[Architeuthis Dux]

I find this claim to be highly speculative and lacking in evidence. While it is true that our brain interprets and responds to sensory input, there is no scientific evidence to suggest that supernatural experiences are solely caused by one's knowledge of their definition. In fact, there are many factors that can contribute to such experiences, including cultural beliefs, personal experiences, and even physiological and psychological factors.

As for the experiment described, it is important to note that it is not a controlled experiment and there are many variables that could influence the subject's response. For example, the subject's cultural background and personal beliefs could still influence their interpretation of the figure on the TV, even if they have never heard of the concept of a ghost.

Furthermore, the examples provided, such as near-death experiences and astral projection, are highly subjective and cannot be scientifically tested or replicated. While there may be some scientific explanations for these experiences, it is not accurate to say that they are solely caused by one's knowledge of their definition.

In addition, it is important to approach these topics with an open mind and not dismiss them as "stupid" or "nonscientific." While it is important to rely on evidence and critical thinking, it is also important to acknowledge that there are still many mysteries and unexplained phenomena in the world.

As scientists, it is our responsibility to continue to explore and research these topics in a rigorous and objective manner, rather than dismissing them outright. By doing so, we can gain a better understanding of the world around us and potentially uncover new discoveries and insights.