Sam Harris

Heya,

I was watching one of my favorite shows, ‘Through The Wormhole’ the other day, where they in this episode looked at whether or not humans have sixth sense. Much of it kinda bothered me. They had a bunch of scientists presenting the theories/hypothesies they worked on along with the collected data. Some of them involved precognition, brains being connected through the earth’s magnetic field…I’ll have to watch it again to clarify my critique, but has other readers here seen the show? What did you think?

Best regards,

Daqar

OK, I’ve watched it again and looked at some the researchers that are presented, and debated the contents with a friend. First question: Is there a difference between a ‘scientist’ and a ‘researcher’? In the episode they seem to interview ‘researchers’ is there a notable difference here?

The first theory/hypothesis is that humans that I blind can sense emotion through the eyes, using alternative pathways in the brain. These pathways only stand a chance when the visual-cortex is out of buisness. It seemed legit to me.

Another theory was presented by Michael Persinger, that human thought can cross spaces using Earth’s magnetic field. I’m not an expert, but nothing in my education goes against this theory, but a few problems remain: A scale problem, and a computational problem. If I stand near a roadsign, I’ll exert a gravitational pull on it. This is logic. However this force has no real world impact, due to scale. The force between me and the road sign is being overpowered by Earth itself. Add to that the host of other physical factors I forgot about. If we humans are connected via Earth’s magnetic field, we’re talking 6 billion people. Now there is a computational problem. How does the brain wade through all that noise, to find the relevant information ?!?

A Third theory was that humans can somewhat predict the future. How is this possible? I can’t help think of Laplace’s Demon and quantum theory. They solve this by introducing Michio Kaku, that explains that antimatter is in fact ordinary matter, travelling back in time. Now we’re faced with the problem of explaining how matter and antimatter interacts without annihilating. The Tevatron particle-collider has been using protons and antiprotons for years. Everytime they collide, they annihilate. Why would the human brain be an exception to this part of physics ?!?

This show is usually quite provocative and offers a good chance to think about things, but this time I around I had trouble weeding out the bullshit. I’m quite sure it is there….

Daqar

The few episodes I’ve seen had me scratching my head.  This series really walks the fine line between science and pseudo science.  The constant mention of god and some questionable ‘experts’ have me watching with extreme caution.  Too many scientists and researchers are trying to be rock stars and there is not enough evidence or proof to be presenting some of these not-ready-for-prime-time theories as facts that radically conflict with the sum of all known knowledge.

I’d say it is clear that they deal with fringe science. Meaning science at the edge of our understanding of the world/universe/human. But usually it doesn’t not go against what I presume to know about the universe/world/human. They did have an episode on ‘Life after death’ which seemed to me to be a load of hooey. Only one theory stood a chance against physics, and that didn’t involve life after death as such, just a non-destruction of our experiences.

It is the first time the series has tickled my bullshit detector in a bad way…I can’t quite understand why.

Daqar

I think the show is just trying to sensationalize science. A good thing or a bad thing?

I don’t think sensationalizing science is necessarily a bad think. As long as the science involved is properly represented and balanced.

Daqar

It’s a fun show.  They’re trying to be provocative and why not?  If it gets the kiddies watching something besides ‘Jersey Shore’ and ‘Real Housewives of Where-the-hell-ever’ then it’s worth the fringy bs.

Think of it as a ‘gateway drug’, lol.

Hi

I can understand some of us begin to look at this particular episode as bullshit. But there is nothing in physics that disprove it, -actually it is the other way round. Here is one link to information about blindsight:

http://thedallasgeek.com/2012/08/04/what-is-blind-sight/

And when it comes to the quantum physics, - dont condemn what you see, as the double-slit experiment shows us:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-slit_experiment
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=new-double-slit-experiment-skirts-uncertainty-principle

http://youtu.be/DfPeprQ7oGc

I am just happy that physics finally can come to terms with the facts, -yes light can be both wave and particles at the same time…as the oceans have been all the time ( molecule ). Dont understand why it should be so difficult to understand, -that we can have two states at the same time: meditative and observing ( no condemnation or prejudice ).