Reading Minds/Predicting Future Thread

[Dog--]

I thought it'd be cool to have a discussion about the 'oogie boogie' side of the human mind. It can be the two things the thread title says, or any other 'oogie boogie' human mind thing you can come up with, maybe telekineses, hmm?

So what are your guys' thoughts on either reading minds or predicting the future?

Personally I think we can currently predict the future, we just need to evolve a bit more to be able to fully control the ability. Deja Vu is what I'm talking about here.. You experience a moment, then later, maybe days, maybe months, maybe years, you experience it again.. First question is how do you experience it the first time? Day-dreaming? Sleep-dreaming? Maybe you just blank out for a split-second, and it's immediately imprinted into your subconscious memory? Second question is how do you determine how far back you experienced it the first time? More and more questions emerge...

On the reading minds topic, I have no idea.. We have brain waves that flow out of our minds constantly, but only a few inches outside of our heads.. Keep that in mind if you're going to comment on that..


Looking forward to the (hopefully) intelligent responses...

 

[Pesmerga]

I predict this thread will suck.

Deja Vu is the sudden and inexplicable emotion that you've experienced that moment before, but you really haven't. It's not deja vu if you've already experienced it. It's just memory.

"Evolve" a bit more? lulorz. The universe is a series of collisions with random occurrences that guide time. You're better off looking at trends and predicting results based on those, which we've already become quite good at. What exactly are brain waves, by the way?

 

[MJ12]

As much as I would like to think we have the ability to look into the future and have Telekenisis, we don't and we won't.

The brain is just a very complex computer. It's like if you got a brand new desktop PC and tons of new programs are loaded onto it. You don't know A LOT about of it. Just because you don't know what it does, doesn't mean it can magically fry eggs and make orange juice. Same thing goes with the brain. It's programmed to only do so much.

That whole arguement people give with the "we only use <insert percent> of our brain, so who knows?" is also bull, because in reality we use all of our brain, just not 100% of the time.

Hopefully, at the most we will just progressively get better at using our brains at a faster, more reflexive pace.

 

[Avoidist]

Ah, xkcd. The webcomic with 387 uses.

 

[Pesmerga]

The brain is just a very complex computer.

It's worth noting that brains operate in a completely different way computers do; the brain is better than a computer in some ways, but worse in others.

 

[Jintor]

And in any case, that would be like one of those metaphors which is inaccurate, but helps you kind of grasp the basic idea of what a brain is.

 

[Sulkdodds]

Considering the bizarro things the brain and the body are capable of, and the lexical instability of concepts like 'magic', I do not consider such things entirely implausible; stranger things have happened, and look what Derren Brown can do.

I don't think that's quite a basis on which to claim we'll soon be able to see the future though.

 

[Avoidist]

All things are freely determined (as stated by Pavlov and is required by quantum mechanics). Seeing the future is a stab in the dark based on a fair judgment of where the turkey is due to its gobbling.

I'm not going to rule out the paranormal all together, but for the supernatural to exist it must (by virtue of its existence) be natural by definition.

 

[Atomic_Piggy]

I really don't think the supernatural, or any "Phsyic" part of the brain exist. Since much of it is explainable by science, it logically follows that there is a natural explanation for the remaining ones.

However, I will not rule it out completely. I have watched some weird programmes with freaky gypsies who are able to tell you more about you than you know.

 

[swiss]

The only way i see us being able to 'predict' the future, is based on laws of physics.
For instance .. we all predict the future everyday in some way. eg when I drop something to the floor, im predicting that gravity will pull it down. Just we are so used to it, we dont think about it.

Otherwise the only way we can predict things is based on evidence from the past. Not some specially 'evolved' ability in our brain.
Also darren brown is just clever, he reads peoples reactions and then infers things about them, which are sometimes right.

 

[Eejit]

Nuh-uh, doubt it.

Heroes isn't based on reality fyi