Nancy Sherer

Extra Sensory Perception
the remarkable ability to gather information
that is beyond our physical limitations.


Do we have it?
If so, what would we ever use it for?

Human curiosity is insatiable. When a toddler asks “Why?” over and over, rarely waiting for the answer before asking ‘Why?’ again, she is expressing a basic characteristic of our species. It is our instinct to know and understand. Our five senses of taste, touch, sight, sound, and smell are so limited, will we ever be satisfied with what we know?

It seems uncanny to us that a dog can sense danger that we can’t see or hear. Dogs have a sense of smell that is so acute that they can smell their masters before they see them. Birds migrate thousands of miles every year across oceans and continents. Something in their genes tells them when to go, and where. That other senses are possible, senses beyond our physical ability is clear. We can’t possibly understand the world with only hearing, vision, touch, taste and smell.

But humans also have an instinct to ask ‘Why not?’ We have always longed to be free of physical limitations. We figured out how to use fire to keep safe and warm. We developed methods of building boats so we could travel over water, then eventually vessels that made it possible to fly to the moon. We devised weapons that made us the most formidable species on the planet. So why isn’t it possible that we have other hidden capabilities?

Why settle for five senses anyway? If the secret to ‘extra’ senses lies in our brain then we can easily come up with ways to make use of them. Think of what we could accomplish. We could understand the world-even the universe-if we could only overcome the handicaps of our physical limitation.

Although we learn as children about the five senses of touch, taste, sight, hearing, and smell, the other abilities of our species have been marginalized as fantasy. “Extra” sensory perception is defined as magic, religion or existing outside the natural world. But we aren’t really biologically limited to five senses at all. Extra Sensory Perception is part of our everyday lives. It isn’t a mystery. Why this fact is so often ignored, I can’t guess. But I can prove to you - beyond all question - that Homo sapiens' use of ESP is so commonplace that we discount it rather than embrace it.

Bats dart through the night plucking insects out of the air. Owls swoop down in the dark forest and fly away with their dinner of mouse or hare. Eagles see fish underwater from thousands of feet above. Whales can locate objects through the murky ocean. Bees see light that Homo sapiens can only describe in theoretical terms. Isn’t it obvious that our five senses are not enough to experience the world around us?

Are these senses beyond our ability? Of course not. Although it took bats’ radar to inspire us, Homo sapiens developed radar in the last century. With it, we can locate objects with great accuracy at enormous distances. We even use it to predict the weather. Owls’ night vision is primitive compared to night-vision tools that we created. What is an eagle’s telescopic vision compared to our ability to see other parts of the galaxy, even across the universe? Bees are able to see colors that we can’t see, but we are able to manipulate those colors and use them as tools. All these senses and more are available to Homo sapiens. Not through magic, but through science and logic.

Homo Sapiens have a genetic desire to know and to understand our environment. We have developed, and will continue to develop paranormal abilities as long as we embrace logic and practice science.

God is the name we give things we don’t understand. Once, fire was thought of as a god-thing. Forty thousand years ago, the earliest humans learned how to control fire. Only a few thousand years ago, people believed that flight was the dominion of gods. Today, we rarely even look down as we fly from Seattle to Los Angeles. Predicting weather, locating objects miles away, enhanced abilities to hear and see, were all magical powers belonging to gods. How small those gods look through modern eyes. How much more useful is Homo sapiens’ ability to extend our ‘normal’ abilities through science and reason.

 
God is never a substitute for science.

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