• Question: Is a sixth sense real?

    Asked by anon-181143 on 20 Jun 2018. This question was also asked by anon-182675.
    • Photo: Nathan Clarke

      Nathan Clarke answered on 20 Jun 2018:

      Good question! If you mean in a Bruce Willis “I see dead people” kind of way, then I don’t think that there’s anything supernatural to sense 🙂 But as humans, we actually have more than the five senses that generally grab the headlines. For instance, we can sense changes in temperature (called thermoception), where parts of our body are in relation to others (proprioception) and balance/movement (equilibrioception). Some animals have other impressive senses: some sharks can sense changes in electrical activity and certain birds have an ability to sense magnetic fields, giving them a kind of ‘internal compass’ to navigate!

    • Photo: Laura Hemming

      Laura Hemming answered on 24 Jun 2018:

      There is a whole branch of Psychology named parapsychology which aims to objectively, scientifically assess what is happening when people report paranormal experiences. However, this field is generally criticised quite heavily – and many believe it to be a ‘pseudoscience’ or ‘fake’ science. This video below gives some more details of how people have tried to use science to ‘prove’ the existence of paranormal activity.

    • Photo: Daniel Rhodes

      Daniel Rhodes answered on 26 Jun 2018:

      So the idea of five senses came from Aristotle – so it’s super old. Nowadays people think there could be as many as 20 different senses. So if they were to remake the 6th sense now, they might have to call it the 21st sense.

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