Paranormal Perception? A Critical Evaluation

The concept of extrasensory perception (ESP) implies that not all perception is dependent upon known physical sensory systems. General ESP is typically sub-divided into three types: (i) telepathy (i.e., alleged direct transference of thoughts), (ii) clairvoyance (i.e., alleged awareness of remote objects or events other than by use of the known sensory channels), and (iii) precognition (i.e., alleged knowledge of events before they occur, other than as a result of inference). This essay will begin by briefly considering the philosophical problems raised by the notion of paranormal perception. Whether or not ESP exists is still an unresolved issue after more than a century of scientific research. What is certain, however, is that the human information-processing system is such that we should expect ostensibly paranormal experiences to be frequently reported even if paranormal forces do not exist. Several types of altered states of consciousness have been linked with the experience of ostensibly paranormal events. These include the near-death experience, the out-of-body experience, and sensations associated with sleep paralysis, such as a sense of presence and apparitional experiences. The role of ‘top-down’ processing (that is, the tendency to see what one expects to see) is often crucial in determining exactly what is experienced in such situations. Topdown processing is also responsible for the human tendency to perceive meaningful patterns in essentially random stimuli. This provides the most likely explanation for a host of ostensibly paranormal and other pseudoscientific phenomena. These include the so-called ‘electronic voice phenomenon’ (in which spirits are said to communicate via tape recorders), subliminal persuasion techniques (such as ‘backward masking’ which supposedly involves the embedding of reversed-speech Satanic messages in rock music), and pareidolia (an illusion in which a vague or obscure stimulus is perceived as a clear and distinct image, e.g., the face of Mother Theresa in a cinnamon bun). However, such biases are not restricted to the world of the (apparently) paranormal, and their effects are also to be found in the history of science. Examples of