To think children may see things we can’t?

[Opal93]

My son is autistic and his language is disordered so it’s very hard to ask him what he actually means when he tells us something, but lately there have been a few instances where he has said things that have spooked us out a bit! Tonight he was at my mums, and he said “goodnight nana Marlene” (my mums mum who died when he was one) and started singing her favourite Doris Day song, word for word which he has never heard before and I didn’t know of the song until my mum told me today he started singing it and she has no idea how he knew it. My dad died when I was 16 and my son knows his photo. We were in a park the other week and my son pointed behind me and said “it’s grandad Stephen!” And I looked behind me thinking he probably saw a man that looked like the photo but there was nobody there. Another time, he started talking to my husbands dad about “nanny Margaret.” I didn’t realise he even had a nanny Margaret but apparently it was my husbands dads mums name. Then he said nanny Margaret has a big belly, and my FIL looked freaked out then and said she had a massive hernia that ruptured and killed her. I wouldn’t say I’m a believer in ghosts or life after death but it does make me wonder. Any other experiences of kids sensing things?

Roll not role!

I just remembered as well, DGM once rang DM up in the middle of the night asking if I was OK. I was sound asleep in bed.

@SmallChairs Fair enough. I’m very interested in all these stories too. I guess I’m coming at it from the point of view of someone very open to the idea of the spiritual and the unknown, and I am slow to call someone a liar/mistaken/stupid. Some posters are very quick with the put-downs, and it seems very arrogant. We all live by our own senses, and when something stands out as strange/unexplained, I’m prepared to listen - because, as I’ve said, there are some pretty big questions about the universe that remain unanswered.

Sorry, whilst I want to believe in this, I honestly think once you're gone, you're gone.

My kid is also autistic and says many random things. Often totally out of context because of delayed echolalia etc. He has an exceptional memory and can remember very minor details years after the incident has passed. He also understands a lot more than people realise. For me, a more likely explanation is that your son has similar abilities and saw an image or heard people talking about your passed relatives months back and is just verbally recycling it in some form.

I think it doesnt take much actually for our brains to process things a bit differently. Even a UTI can make us see or sense things in a really strange way.
If youve ever taken acid youll know that it doesnt take much for your entire reality to change. We know other animals sense things that humans cant. It makes sense to me that the world of young children that havent been taught over years to ignore and block out information in the world in favour of other information could be quite different to that of adults.

I wonder why a lot of non believers are so aggressive about it?

@TableFlowerss
The idea that it’s purely fantasy really irks those that believe, but you’ve got to understand, it’s not a personal attack on individuals, it’s critically evaluating the likelihood of whether something is possible or fantasy

I would say that the opposite is true too. That the idea that it is not fantasy really irks those who seek to prove everything.

If you look at this thread there are some really unpleasant ways of expressing the disbelief of what the op has written about. Comments like baby shit themselves. It's all nonsense and much worse. Why are none of these people who uses this way of communicating their view not capable of stating their view and express their non-agreement with what others believe in without making an attack? Personal or not?

To me it simply makes their argument look bad.

I will also say I have not actually expressed a view for or against the OP's post as I don't feel I know enough about what occurred to have an opinion. IF Op was a friend of mine and told me about this I would ask further questions before making up my mind. If that was opposing the OPs I would then make a judgment call as to if OP needed me to say so or if I should keep silent.

For me, we simply do not always need to force our views on others. Providing everyone is safe and not endangering others.

@Beeinalily

I wonder why a lot of non believers are so aggressive about it?

Because this kind of privileged navel gazing is part of a narrative that leaves the vulnerable vulnerable to exploitation and scapegoating.

"Children Are Being Accused Of Causing Coronavirus Using Witchcraft | HuffPost" m.huffingtonpost.co.uk/amp/entry/children-accused-witchcraft-coronavirus-abuse-demonic-possession_uk_5fdc817fc5b6102009896d13/

Children are not some other species that operates in a closer proximity to woo bullshit and if you pretend that they are so you can have your woo-fix you legitimise the slippery slope of batshit evilness.

@Beeinalily

I wonder why a lot of non believers are so aggressive about it?

I wonder why a lot of believers think that no one should openly disagree with them?

@DeleteSystem32
I don’t think anyone has said that? There’s a difference between openly disagreeing and aggressively or rudely disagreeing, I think.

[quote Enko]@TableFlowerss
The idea that it’s purely fantasy really irks those that believe, but you’ve got to understand, it’s not a personal attack on individuals, it’s critically evaluating the likelihood of whether something is possible or fantasy

I would say that the opposite is true too. That the idea that it is not fantasy really irks those who seek to prove everything.

If you look at this thread there are some really unpleasant ways of expressing the disbelief of what the op has written about. Comments like baby shit themselves. It's all nonsense and much worse. Why are none of these people who uses this way of communicating their view not capable of stating their view and express their non-agreement with what others believe in without making an attack? Personal or not?

To me it simply makes their argument look bad.

I will also say I have not actually expressed a view for or against the OP's post as I don't feel I know enough about what occurred to have an opinion. IF Op was a friend of mine and told me about this I would ask further questions before making up my mind. If that was opposing the OPs I would then make a judgment call as to if OP needed me to say so or if I should keep silent.

For me, we simply do not always need to force our views on others. Providing everyone is safe and not endangering others.[/quote]
I think people get fed up with the posts such as ‘I seen my dead granddads ghost at the end of my bed’, as if it’s factually correct.

People then just roll their eyes and think that’s utter bullocks. Their intention isn’t to offend in their reply, I’m sure, though it may come across like that.

I wouldn't like to argue either way. I'm happy to sit on the fence. I'm happier with the idea of no ghosts :)

Here's what happened with DD4 though (who is now 6). We never encouraged ANY of it or asked or prompted her because honestly that sort of stuff freaks me and DH out and we didn't want to know.

• From birth she'd always strain to look up into the corners of our bedroom. We noticed it pretty early on. You know when newborns crane their little necks for the first time, raising and dropping back on your shoulder again, all wobbly.
• As she got stronger she'd always look up into one particular corner of that room.
• On her changing mat she began to lean around me to look up into the corner. I should add here - there was nothing to see. Pale walls pale ceiling.
• Once she was old enough to smile she'd smile up there, sometimes reach/point towards there.
• Then she'd babble toward there. Leaving the room with her in my arms she'd crane round to keep looking up there. It was really obvious.

Talking arrived.

• ''Man''
• ''Man up there''
• ''Man in wall mummy''.
• ''Man in blue. He's up there''.

at 3 ish

''who is the man in the blue shirt mummy? He goes that way ...'' .

Just before we moved one evening she said
''He's here''
and i said oh right, and got on with what ever i was doing.
She said
''He's going like this ...''
and she did this god awful grin/snarl face with all her teeth bared

I hid it, but that properly freaked me out, and i've no idea why she wasn't scared! But i'm so glad we moved! Thankfully she's never shown any interest in the ceiling in this house.

I really don't understand all of the posters who say "but science" like it proves anything on this topic. I am a scientist btw.

Science has paradigms. Anybody who thinks that our current science - which is the set of theories we have that currently explain reality as best we can based on what we can observe - is "finished" is very much mistaken. There are huge issues around incompatibility e.g. between quantum mechanics and general relativity. There is dark matter etc that we cannot explain. New types of particles are still being discovered. We by no means have a consistent set of theories that explain our observed reality.

What people also neglect is that humans have only 5 senses. These are what happened to evolve in our species as they were most beneficial in the survival/ energy trade off, for us. That does not imply that they allow us to observe/ sense everything that exists. For example, some snakes can sense infrared so can track an animal across hot desert sand that has been there hours earlier. A few hundred years ago we did not have the equipment to measure infrared so people might have said this was impossible and it can't exist. Similarly we can't "see" xrays, and even for the senses we do have they have a limit (the range of light perception and sound perception, which again differs between species).

It is rather arrogant to claim that there cannot possibly be yet more things that the human senses cannot observe directly and that we also haven't developed equipment to measure artificially yet.

And finally, we do not perceive the world directly through our senses. Your brain interprets the data it receives. The world you "see" or "hear" is created by your brain. This is why babies have to learn depth perception, why optical illusions can be deceiving etc, why people often do not notice spelling errors as their brain "autocorrects" it in their mind. Most objects are over 90% empty space but appear solid to us. We are not directly perceiving reality.

And as people mature their brain gets better at "filtering". So we become better at focus but less aware of background stimuli than a small child. This is one thing that people with ASD often struggle with so the comments saying it's outrageous that they might have more awareness of certain things other people do not notice are misguided. Also heightened sensory perception is one of the features of autism. Before anybody jumps on me I am autistic myself.

@PolkadotClouds

I really don't understand all of the posters who say "but science" like it proves anything on this topic. I am a scientist btw.

Science has paradigms. Anybody who thinks that our current science - which is the set of theories we have that currently explain reality as best we can based on what we can observe - is "finished" is very much mistaken. There are huge issues around incompatibility e.g. between quantum mechanics and general relativity. There is dark matter etc that we cannot explain. New types of particles are still being discovered. We by no means have a consistent set of theories that explain our observed reality.

What people also neglect is that humans have only 5 senses. These are what happened to evolve in our species as they were most beneficial in the survival/ energy trade off, for us. That does not imply that they allow us to observe/ sense everything that exists. For example, some snakes can sense infrared so can track an animal across hot desert sand that has been there hours earlier. A few hundred years ago we did not have the equipment to measure infrared so people might have said this was impossible and it can't exist. Similarly we can't "see" xrays, and even for the senses we do have they have a limit (the range of light perception and sound perception, which again differs between species).

It is rather arrogant to claim that there cannot possibly be yet more things that the human senses cannot observe directly and that we also haven't developed equipment to measure artificially yet.

And finally, we do not perceive the world directly through our senses. Your brain interprets the data it receives. The world you "see" or "hear" is created by your brain. This is why babies have to learn depth perception, why optical illusions can be deceiving etc, why people often do not notice spelling errors as their brain "autocorrects" it in their mind. Most objects are over 90% empty space but appear solid to us. We are not directly perceiving reality.

And as people mature their brain gets better at "filtering". So we become better at focus but less aware of background stimuli than a small child. This is one thing that people with ASD often struggle with so the comments saying it's outrageous that they might have more awareness of certain things other people do not notice are misguided. Also heightened sensory perception is one of the features of autism. Before anybody jumps on me I am autistic myself.

It’s one thing saying that there are things we can’t understand and you’re right that our senses are limited compared to other animals and we still have more to learn.

But it’s quite another to say that when we die, our ‘souls’ leave out body and live in a parallel universe and sometimes make themselves seen……..

@PolkadotClouds

I really don't understand all of the posters who say "but science" like it proves anything on this topic. I am a scientist btw.

Science has paradigms. Anybody who thinks that our current science - which is the set of theories we have that currently explain reality as best we can based on what we can observe - is "finished" is very much mistaken. There are huge issues around incompatibility e.g. between quantum mechanics and general relativity. There is dark matter etc that we cannot explain. New types of particles are still being discovered. We by no means have a consistent set of theories that explain our observed reality.

What people also neglect is that humans have only 5 senses. These are what happened to evolve in our species as they were most beneficial in the survival/ energy trade off, for us. That does not imply that they allow us to observe/ sense everything that exists. For example, some snakes can sense infrared so can track an animal across hot desert sand that has been there hours earlier. A few hundred years ago we did not have the equipment to measure infrared so people might have said this was impossible and it can't exist. Similarly we can't "see" xrays, and even for the senses we do have they have a limit (the range of light perception and sound perception, which again differs between species).

It is rather arrogant to claim that there cannot possibly be yet more things that the human senses cannot observe directly and that we also haven't developed equipment to measure artificially yet.

And finally, we do not perceive the world directly through our senses. Your brain interprets the data it receives. The world you "see" or "hear" is created by your brain. This is why babies have to learn depth perception, why optical illusions can be deceiving etc, why people often do not notice spelling errors as their brain "autocorrects" it in their mind. Most objects are over 90% empty space but appear solid to us. We are not directly perceiving reality.

And as people mature their brain gets better at "filtering". So we become better at focus but less aware of background stimuli than a small child. This is one thing that people with ASD often struggle with so the comments saying it's outrageous that they might have more awareness of certain things other people do not notice are misguided. Also heightened sensory perception is one of the features of autism. Before anybody jumps on me I am autistic myself.

Thank you, @PolkadotClouds. But I don’t think anyone has claimed that scientific paradigms are in any way ‘finished’. I am certainly only pointing out that many of the posters on these threads who point to science as providing evidence for life after death, for instance, are recommending as credible people whose work has been completely discredited, as a quick Google would tell them, or visibly have no understanding of the difference between peer-reviewed research and something on someone’s UFO blog.

That we don’t fully understand our universe often becomes on these threads — like the generally misquoted snd almost always misunderstood Hamlet quotation — an excuse for sloppy thinking, superstition, and credulity.

I’m an academic, and the first thing we teach new undergraduates is how to identify and evaluate credible sources. There’s absolutely nothing ‘arrogant’ or ‘closed-minded’ about noting a total lack of evidence for the existence of the realm of the ‘supernatural’ according to current scientific paradigms.

Well before X-rays were identified and understood, they were known about as an unknown form of radiation because of their effects. And when Röntgen identified them, around the same time Marconi was experimenting with radio, there were all kinds of wildly sensational responses, linking them to the occult and paranormal — some people believed it would prove the existence of telepathy.

PolkadotClouds I am in agreement with much of what you have written. See my earlier post upthread if you are interested. I find that debunkers can often adopt an overly simplistic and paradoxically unscientific way of looking at reality.

Thank you, @PolkadotClouds. But I don’t think anyone has claimed that scientific paradigms are in any way ‘finished’. I am certainly only pointing out that many of the posters on these threads who point to science as providing evidence for life after death, for instance, are recommending as credible people whose work has been completely discredited, as a quick Google would tell them, or visibly have no understanding of the difference between peer-reviewed research and something on someone’s UFO blog.

That we don’t fully understand our universe often becomes on these threads — like the generally misquoted snd almost always misunderstood Hamlet quotation — an excuse for sloppy thinking, superstition, and credulity.

I’m an academic, and the first thing we teach new undergraduates is how to identify and evaluate credible sources. There’s absolutely nothing ‘arrogant’ or ‘closed-minded’ about noting a total lack of evidence for the existence of the realm of the ‘supernatural’ according to current scientific paradigms.

Well before X-rays were identified and understood, they were known about as an unknown form of radiation because of their effects. And when Röntgen identified them, around the same time Marconi was experimenting with radio, there were all kinds of wildly sensational responses, linking them to the occult and paranormal — some people believed it would prove the existence of telepathy**

@SmallChairs

👏👏👏

@OutwiththeOutCrowd

PolkadotClouds I am in agreement with much of what you have written. See my earlier post upthread if you are interested. I find that debunkers can often adopt an overly simplistic and paradoxically unscientific way of looking at reality.

It’s more that they critically evaluate the evidence. They don’t just accept she feels, sees, hears stuff therefore it must be true.

They use rational critical reasoning and evidence is a huge part of that.

My eldest had a secret friend called Sharon who had a sister called Tracey. I just wondered if someone had shown her Birds of a Feather when I wasn't around.

And PS, I will be as fascinated as anyone should science come up with paradigms that account for elements of what we now term the supernatural — I find the intertwined histories of science, psychology and psychical research really interesting. But based on what we now know, I think ghosts are far more likely to remain a cultural phenomenon than be scientifically accounted for.

@SmallChairs

And PS, I will be as fascinated as anyone should science come up with paradigms that account for elements of what we now term the supernatural — I find the intertwined histories of science, psychology and psychical research really interesting. But based on what we now know, I think ghosts are far more likely to remain a cultural phenomenon than be scientifically accounted for.

I couldn’t agree more with you. It’s as if ‘sceptics’ are jut closed minded and just being awkward for fun.

The whole ‘just because there is no evidence, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist’, is so boring 🙄

@ToomuchHeat

My eldest had a secret friend called Sharon who had a sister called Tracey. I just wondered if someone had shown her Birds of a Feather when I wasn't around.

My son had loads of imaginary friends, who had the most complex interrelations he would get cross about if you got mixed up. One of them spoke in what appeared to be a strong WC Glaswegian accent (despite us being Irish people living in England and DS not knowing a single Scot), and another appeared to be a medical knight who clanked around duelling imaginary enemies and insisted on being addressed as ‘Sir Son’s Name’.

Yes, @TableFlowerss, I agree.

I think some of you have misunderstood my post. I didn't say or imply that ghosts or "souls" are real. I'm saying that some of the "scientific" arguments on this thread seem to misunderstand the scientific method.

I find it funny how people complain they can't talk about woo stuff without being 'shouted down' or 'sneered at' and at the same time make insulting generalisations about non-believers.