Thursday 16 May 2024

Telepathy

I find there are too many occasions when "coincidences" occur for me to believe that they are merely "co-incidences". We only really believe this because we imagine ourselves to be independent from one another - little self-contained robots pursuing our own algorithms, and only "understanding" each other through the perturbations that each of us produces in others. A "co-incidence" in this model of the world is merely a particular pattern that emerges at random in the processing of these perturbations that makes one of the robots go "ah-ha!"

But it may not be like that at all. In fact, we are very unlikely to be "independent" of each other: independence is an illusion. Every cell unites us. Every cell contains a shared history which maps each "individual" back to a shared origin. If that is the case, then it is not a surprise to think that our shared history isn't causal in our coordination with each other. What then is a "co-incidence"? It is not necessarily a random encounter, but the result of a deep coordination produced the internal selection processes of mechanisms whose components belong with each other, whilst being physically separate. It is further possible that such coordinations are related in some way to basic physical processes - entanglement particularly being a mechanism that would explain this kind of "strange relationship at a distance".

We are rarely aware that we breathe together - we only become aware of it when in a large silent room with many others. When we do become aware of it, we sense something "bigger" which unites us all. Is this an illusion? If it isn't an illusion, then what must be happening is some kind of "coordination of constraint": that what constrains my free will in choosing actions becomes coupled with what constrains another person's free will. 

The simple point here is that we don't know what constrains free will. We don't know what shapes the mechanism that chooses action x or action y. But just because we don't know it, doesn't mean that there might be something that constrains action x and y and that these constraints might become aligned. 

When people fall in love, there is a very strong sense of connection - even when there is an absence. People will report picking up the phone at the very moment their loved one calls. How many times have I opened WhatsApp (for example) to see at the same moment the person I want to call show up suddenly as "online"?  So the question is, How might those constraints become aligned? 

Rupert Sheldrake speculated that its a "morphic field" which unites the various constraints that affect us and steer us to action. He conducted experiments staring at the back of peoples' heads and timing how long it took them to turn round. I think there might be a simpler explanation based on the fact that we are basically made of the same stuff, and that stuff has a common history. We don't need to invent a field, because there is already a kind of "vector" in-built into each one of our cells. 

Now the question about telepathy arises because it might be possible to "tune-in" to the vector in each of our cells and coordinate its processes with the cells in someone else. Actually, this is pretty much what happens in sex, isn't it? Also in deep conversation. So why shouldn't the same process not be possible at a distance? 

We could probably explore this experimentally if there was a way to account for the constraints bearing on cellular behaviour. John Torday, for example, has subjected cells to micro-gravity and observed common changes in this way. There may be a mistake in thinking of telephathy as "exchange of thought". Rather it seems to be "coordination of constraints on physiological process at a distance". 

I've written something on a piece of paper, and I want to conduct an experiment. Here's another form with a few questions about thought and telepathy



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