Sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch are the tools most of us rely on perceiving the world. However, some people say it also can perceive things beyond the reach of conventional senses, through some other channel for which there is no anatomical or neurological explanation. Scientists who study the skills as we call extrasensory perception (ESP), but lay people often refer to them as the sixth sense.
Any of the terms is actually a generic term for a variety of different skills course vary from person to person. Some people claim that the power of telepathy – that is, the ability to perceive the thoughts of others without having to communicate verbally or in writing. Others say they have the power of clairvoyance, which is the ability to perceive events and objects that are hidden from view because of barriers or distance. Still others claim to be gifted with precognition, which allows them to look ahead and envision what has not happened yet.
The belief in ESP or sixth sense can be traced back thousands of years. The Greek historian Herodotus wrote that Croesus, who ruled a kingdom in what is now Turkey in the sixth century BC, consult oracles – that is, groups of priests claimed to be able to predict the future – before going to war. In ancient India, Hindu holy men are believed to possess the power to see and hear at a distance, and communicate through telepathy.
In late 1700, the Viennese physician Franz Mesmer claimed that he could give people powers ESP hypnotizing them. Just before his assassination in 1865, President Abraham Lincoln told his friends that he had dreamed of his own body lying in state at the White House. In the 20th century, Edgar Cayce and Jean Dixon attracted wide fans, claiming they could predict future events. During the Cold War, U.S. the military and intelligence agencies, driven by reports that the Soviets had at their disposal psychic even tried to use clairvoyants who claimed power to remote viewing for espionage purposes. List of all episodes here: through the hole.
