Are we predisposed to believe the paranormal?

[Admin]

I’ve seen it written many times that as humans we have a tendency to believe in things like the paranormal and we need to be taught how to think logically and correctly.

I have never thought that we have a genetic predisposition to think magically, but does the way we learn about the world as youngsters lead us to accept that there are simply things that happen for reasons we just don’t understand?

As babies and children, we have little worldly experience to go on so we learn to accept that things happen for reasons beyond our understanding and senses. I’m not saying that we were aware of assigning a magical cause to such things merely that we accept that that is the way the world works.

What I’m thinking is that as we construct our model of reality as we develop, we develop the notion that some things, like voices coming out of a radio, cannot be explained and just need to be accepted. i.e. there is an external reality that we cannot comprehend.

Of course as we grow we find answers to many of these things but does the mental model remain?

Things like psychic ability may simply be the same process happening in adults. Experiences may be real but as they don’t understand why, people may be putting things down to an external reality.

What I’m exploring here is how the willingness to accept paranormal explanations for things is formed. It may simply be a consequence of how we have to learn about the world as we grow up!

Any thoughts?

[Muse]

Like you I've read several views concerning the origin of belief in the paranormal - many have a lot in common with the reasons thought to be behind the origin of religious belief too.

Slowly but surely I seem to be coming to the conclusion that given the myriad of ways for our brains to fool and bamboozle us by misinterpreting incoming information, that psychic or paranormal phenomena probably doesn't exist. In essence that all apparent psychic or paranormal experience has a rational explanation involving the effect of natural forces revealed either sooner or later.

Certainly no one has yet identified a gene for religion there are certainly some candidate genes that may influence human personality and confer a tendency to religious feelings. Some of the genes likely to be involved are those which control levels of different chemicals called neurotransmitters in the brain. Dopamine is one neurotransmitter which we know plays a powerful role in our feelings of well-being; it may also be involved in the sense of peace that humans feel during some spiritual experiences.

There's an interesting Swiss study here which suggested that those who believed in paranormal events and had experienced psychic episodes had naturally ocurring higher levels of Dopamine in their brains. Conversely those who were skeptics had relatively lower levels. By giving the skeptics more Dopamine their skeptical ability diminished.

Of course it's possible that strong levels of belief in God, gods, spirits or the supernatural might have given our ancestors considerable comforts and advantages. Many anthropologists and social theorists do indeed take the view that belief emerged out of a sense of uncertainty and bewilderment - explaining misfortune or illness, for example, as the consequences of an angry God, or reassuring us that we live on after death. Rituals would have given us a comforting, albeit illusory, sense that we can control what is in fact ultimately beyond our control - the weather, illness, attacks by predators or other human groups.

From then on its an easy step from ancient comfort into folklore and modern public consciousness.

Its an interesting thought that an individual's inclination to believe or not may be determined at birth by brain chemistry and subsequently reinforced by 'psychic' experiences associated with an excess of Dopamine and supported by society's folklore, myths and legends - very powerful I suppose should that person remain uninformed.

[Jocky]

Thanks for the link to the Swiss study, Muse - really interesting.

I notice it says that participants in the study were asked

to distinguish real faces from scrambled faces as the images were flashed up briefly on a screen [and] real words from made-up ones ... sceptics were more likely to miss real faces and words when they appeared on the screen

So does this mean that while our dopamine levels may make us skeptics less likely to believe in ghosts, they also make us less good at interpreting confused or scrambled information? Perhaps we actually perceive reality in a slightly different way from 'believers' (something which I had always suspected ...)

It's also a little worrying to think that we could be missing out on 'real' information because we sometimes fail to recognise it. Particularly worrying for me, as my job title is "Information Analyst" :o

[doubting thomas]

Are we predisposed to believe the paranormal? No i don't think so, i'll tell you why.
My parents were non church going C of E and paranormal stuff was never talked about because they had no interest in it.
My dad was always watching factual programs and documentaries and encouraged me to watch them with him, this was in the 70's and 80's before the profusion of TV channels we have now therefore i had a strong grounding in reality. The only difference being that unlike my parents i am an atheist but that did not come about by watching lots of TV i like to think i was born to be a skeptic.

[Aardvark]

This is tough question because in 'free child' mode we naturally explore the ' what if' as opposed to the here and now.

I am atheist, I have not had any religious belief since I was 10 years old. My father is an engineer and is a very practical man.

And yet I really enjoy Star Trek, and Hollywood movies such as Blade Runner, I know they are fiction but a part of me marvels at the thought that one day fiction may become reality. I have no such illusion where religion is concerned.

I find that mind remains healthy as long as I occassionaly allow it of the lead and into escapist territory.

[Kat]

In terms of believing in things that have no proof...

My family were church-goers, then Quakers, then nothing. I never thought that my parents believed in any of it (I would still choose Quakerism over other religions, due to the laid-back attitude: Don't hurt others, and do lots of thinking), but I never actually thought they believed. I can't remember a time when I believed in a god, barring my embarassing 'Wiccan' stage when I was 15.

Around the same time, I desperately wanted ghosts, psychics and spontaneous combustion to be real. I read all the books and everything.

Then I started to doubt the stories. I'd wonder why something had happened or, despite nobody being there to observe it, they knew what someone was thinking when they died.

I think that as a teenager I wanted the magical to be true.
I'm now happy to know what actually exists. Jeeez, that's amazing!

[Aardvark]

In terms of believing in things that have no proof...

My family were church-goers, then Quakers, then nothing. I never thought that my parents believed in any of it (I would still choose Quakerism over other religions, due to the laid-back attitude: Don't hurt others, and do lots of thinking), but I never actually thought they believed. I can't remember a time when I believed in a god, barring my embarassing 'Wiccan' stage when I was 15.

Around the same time, I desperately wanted ghosts, psychics and spontaneous combustion to be real. I read all the books and everything.

Then I started to doubt the stories. I'd wonder why something had happened or, despite nobody being there to observe it, they knew what someone was thinking when they died.

I think that as a teenager I wanted the magical to be true.
I'm now happy to know what actually exists. Jeeez, that's amazing!

I know what you mean.
I read all the Von Daniken books, you know, Charriots of the Gods et al.
For me the woo stuff I would like to solidify is space travel and life forms in other start systems.

I still enjoy Star Trek as much now as when I was a lad, and I still put Pink Floyd on my Hi fi and listen in the dark with my Astro Lamp making strange shapes.

If anyone wants to read skeptical posts on Hi Fi, there is some interesting reading on here

http://forum.hifichoice.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=15486

[Zendal Darkman]

Then I started to doubt the stories. I'd wonder why something had happened or, despite nobody being there to observe it, they knew what someone was thinking when they died.

I think that as a teenager I wanted the magical to be true.
I'm now happy to know what actually exists. Jeeez, that's amazing!

I think a lot of people "want the magic to be true", in fact, I would still like to live in a world where magic is true! :D However unlike many people I/we can distinguish between 'wanting something to be true' and it actually 'being true'.

[Dr B]

There are inherent biases that can make all of us see / hear / feel things that are not veridical. All our brains are biased in this way - the question is why does it seem exaggerated in some people?

The brain is biased to make sense of noise - but some people seem to show bigger biases and hyper-emotion towards the interpretations - groups such as schizophrenics and people who report experiencing the paranormal. However, it is not that their senses are more atuned...it is a response bias based in expectation. These people seem to have a predisposition to fit square pegs in round holes...

The data on people who simply believe in the paranormal is more mixed.

This raises an interesting question for future research. Belief in the paranormal could simply be based on wishful thinking and not based on any personal experience from the individual - these people do not necessarily show abnormalities - though again the data are mixed.

Other people may believe in the paranomral based on some deep / meaningful event or recurrent experiences they have - these people are much more likely to show abnormalities in neural activity, chemistry, cognitive biases, irrational thought, associative processing, etc. So although both sets of people 'believe' it is not for the same reasons.

I always try to think of separating 'people who merely believe' and want it to be true from those who 'experience' things and beleive it to be true based on that....it works for me and fits the data better.

Irrational belief is not always representative of some underlying neural anomaly, though, obviously, it can be.

[seren]

I'm quite interested in this research about the dopamine. I'm really interested in what's "real" and not inside one's own head.

Put it this way, if you have what buddhists might call an enlightenment experience, it feels like the whole world has been explained. You understand everything, and it's all just as it should be. And I can't stress this enough, it's a whole-body feeling. Not a thought. A state of being, like an emotion.

And yet, what is it really? It's a bunch of neurotransmitters doing their thang in your brain. Does that mean it all isn't true? Does that mean that a sudden burst of dopamine in the right place is all enlightenment actually is? Or is it also what it purports to be- a brief glimpse at total understanding? I guess what I'm asking is, does being able to objectively,scientifically measure what's happening diminish its veracity, when you can't actually measure the effect of it?

Or, for example, ayahuasca. The people who use ayahuasca claim that it gives them information about what plants to use for healing etc etc. This is generally assumed to be bunkum. OK, so we can measure what the drugs in ayahuasca are physically doing inside the brain, but that doesn't actually explain the individual experience. And it's not as if tripping is fake- it's repeatable, it happens whenever you ingest that substance- it's definitely real, but entirely subjective. Because we can't watch and catalogue the actual thoughts and images as they pass through a tripping person's mind, how can we determine whether what they say is being "imparted" to them is actually being imparted or not? We'd assume it isn't, because if it were it would be a whole new method of communication we've never seen before, but since we can't see it, we don't know.


I don't know that I'm explaining myself very well. I just find it all very interesting.

[Jocky]

it's definitely real, but entirely subjective

You're right about tripping, seren. I too was young once ...

The thing is, if something happens totally within your brain then the associated sensations are totally "real" and valid to you, but they're not reproducible in someone else. That is the sense in which they are not objectively real. That does not deny your subjective sensation, it just puts it in a different category from shared sensation.

Seems to me that woo-thinking does not readily draw a distinction between these things. To some people, if it is perceived, it is "real" - regardless of whether others can see it or not :-\ The person who had the 'revelation' or whatever is hailed as a 'psychic' or somesuch, and before you know where you are there is a huge investment of belief which people are very reluctant to go back on.

[Dr B]

I'm really interested in what's "real" and not inside one's own head.

The problem is, its whats inside your head that defines reality. :D

And yet, what is it really? It's a bunch of neurotransmitters doing their thang in your brain. Does that mean it all isn't true?

No - like any other experience its real at the level of experience, however, it may well betray the veridical senses. Reality is what your brain tells you it is - so if your brain tells you hallucination is real, then for that person, in that brain, at that time - it is. It is neurally equivalent to other real experiences based on external sensation with the exception of really really early brain areas not being involved in hallucination.

Do you really think sound is real? Do you really think objects have colour? Guess what - its not real or true. There is a physical description (vibration and wavelength) and a perceptual one (hearing sounds and seeing colours). To explain the perception of reality we need to concentrate on both - but the perception of reality can exist in the absence of externally driven stimulation

For me, all human experience is a controlled hallucination and I am developing theories that explore this. The experience you are having right now is, to some extent, a pure fiction - but it is a lesser fiction than others - so for now, it represents reality.

Neuroscience is a wonderful thing and these experiences are no less fascinating when they are explained (at least to some arguable degree)

but since we can't see it, we don't know.

Not entirely true as the brain regions involved in hallucination with and without reality distortions are now being located and better understood - so we can, at least start to predict, whether some patients would experience it as real or not.

Hope this helps

[Eileen]

I suppose one question would be is any of it real? Everyone has their own perception of reality and as much as you can never really know my perception of reality, I can never know yours.

[Jocky]

the perception of reality can exist in the absence of externally driven stimulation

Doc - would you agree that it is reasonable to describe such perception as "not real" (without denying its subjective reality to the person who percieved it)?

As I think I've mentioned to you before, we know a certain someone who regards perception of reality as being the only valid source of "empirical evidence". He would argue the exact opposite - that perception is the only reality, and that physical manifestations of reality (such as sound vibration) are merely perceptions and as such are all part of the hallucination, as it were.

[seren]

Do you really think sound is real? Do you really think objects have colour?

This just made me think of the Matrix!

Do I think sound is real? I think that my ears are real, and that they have evolved to experience a particular phenomena in a way that is evolutionarily (I'm sure that's not the right word.....I'm sure it isn't even a word...) useful to me. I could have evolved to "see" sound I suppose, had that been the best option. Dropping a tab might help with that one....

Not entirely true as the brain regions involved in hallucination with and without reality distortions are now being located and better understood - so we can, at least start to predict, whether some patients would experience it as real or not.

Except those people who use entheogens wouldn't refer to it as reality distortion. They'd look at it as a different, but no less real, reality. I think my brain is starting to overheat. I shouldn't post last thing on a Friday.

Thanks for you responses- it's really interesting.