Smells and Bells

I have never seen the movie "The Sixth Sense", but by watching the trailer it seems like a movie about the paranormal world and I find this really interesting. Even during some of our class discussions it seems like a lot of people's perception of the sixth sense has a paranormal connection. I have never considered this definition of the sixth sense, but I also have never spent much time thinking about what the sixth sense is. I feel like people's definition of the sixth sense is based upon their perception of previous experiences. Perhaps if I had a very powerful experience relating to sensing a ghost, then I would be more likely to form my definition of the sixth sense based upon that experience. Instead of the paranormal, the first thing that comes to mind when trying to place a finger on the sixth sense is that "gut feeling" experience. This gut feeling, intuition, instincts or whatever you choose to call it, is really important to some people, includ

The sixth sense, in my opinion the most interesting sense, and also the most unknown. There are no diagrams that you can find on the web about how the sixth sense works in the body, you cannot find a peer reviewed paper as to why we have the sixth sense, and some people can’t even agree on a definition for what it even is. Most people agree that the sixth sense is a sense of intuition. That gut feeling that you get sometimes that something is going to go wrong or that you forgot something. Or that you are walking into a great opportunity. This is why I believe that the sixth sense is the most religious out of all of the senses. There are no real scientific explanations for why people feel the sixth sense, sometimes you just feel as if something told you what to do, or that something is wrong. This is what makes it almost a religious experience, for some people their sixth sense acts as a way of saving something, or avoiding harm, for others it is a feeling to go out and do something

Growing up, I used to always hear people talking about what their heart says or what their head says and which one they should listen to. I used to try to figure out what that meant and which one I should listen to. When I was little and faced with the difficult choices a six-year-old might face, I tried to think of what my heart would want and what my brain would want. My heart might want that piece of chocolate, but my brain knows that the extra piece might make me feel sick. Later on in life, I figured out I don’t really tend to listen to my heart or to my head. Instead, I trust my instinct. One might call it a “gut feeling” or my “sixth sense.”   I am very passionate about my gut always being right. I always trust my gut feeling even when that “feeling” is mild. Why? Because when my brain is going 5,000 miles per hour and is distracted through the other five senses, my gut is there to guide it. Some people might say that my gut and brain are the same things, but I think

To me, a sixth sense is a sense of knowing without concretely knowing. All of the senses we are equipped with help our perception of the world, but we still know things without perceiving in the same way. The early part of this book brought up the interesting topic of language's ambiguity. David Abram reflected how language is limited as a medium. It has no way to convey one's thoughts completely and the vocabulary used wrongfully describes conveyance in some instances. Oftentimes when my parents speak to me, they use a word that is completely wrong from what they mean to say and it's taught me to not hold a high value to specific words used in favor of what someone means. At the same time, who am I to discern what is being communicated to me? The familiar usage of language shapes "the perceptual style of any community is both reflected in, and profoundly shaped by, the common language of the community," (91). One's demeanor is influenced by their vernacul

Deborah Green's The Aroma of Righteousness elaborates on scents and their biblical origins and significance. In chapter three titled "Election and the Erotic: Biblical portrayals of Perfume and Incense", Green discusses the biblical origins and importance of rituals which inherently require and incorporate spices and incense. Two of which Green uses as examples are frankincense and myrrh. "The two spices that most often appear together in the text are frankincense and myrrh. Widespread use of these spices is well attested in the ancient world and long predates the Israelites. Egyptians used myrrh extensively for perfuming and embalming, while other civilizations, such as Mesopotamia, used myrrh for incense in cultic rituals, as a medicine, and as an ingredient in perfume."  The author explains that frankincense (or levonah) is associated with "white" since it is harvested in autumn when it is white in color. (Green 67). Myrrh derives fr

The sixth sense has always seemed like an unfathomable thing for me. What first comes to mind is relates to communicating with ghosts, demons, or the afterlife. My mind goes to telepathy and understanding what others are thinking, or what their intentions are. I think the sixth sense is an umbrella term that sums up phenomena similar to this that otherwise can't be explained. My current understanding is that the sixth sense isn't a magical ability that one in a thousand people are gifted, but that everyone has an indescribable feeling  about something. This intuition and gut feeling may not have any evidence to back it up, but there is some kind of force in the individual that allows them to pass judgment on whatever situation they're in. Gut feelings tend to be surprisingly accurate, and people are constantly advising to "follow your gut," because you're the only one who can decide what is best for you. In the book "The Righteous Mind: Why Good

                     One of the most fun parts of this class has been entertaining the notion of a “6 th Sense”. A subject which was jokingly breached on the first day for a laugh has now become the subject of some analysis by the class. This semester, we attempted to find an answer to the question, ‘what is the sixth sense?’. The answer to the classical interpretation of that question is ESP, or perhaps some form of supernatural extrasensory-perception. While this is an interesting subject worthy of much Kripalanalysis, what I find more intriguing about pondering the sixth sense is the idea that we may be lumping more than one sense into the five categories we’ve established. For example, the sense of pain is a very separate experience from touch. Although pain is exclusive to touch, it activates a unique part of the brain not engaged in experiencing ordinary touch sensations. For this reason, would it not be appropriate to call pain the sixth human sensory experience?  

What are the limits of human consciousness? How do our sensations compose the reality in which we live?  Throughout the discussion of  'the sixth sense' I began trying to wrap my mind our my own brain and why in my dreams I can predict the future. Is that a sense at all? Or just precognition? I believe that to an extent it is a sense, to sense what will happen. For me, my dreams (not every dream) is characterized by deja vu to the point where if I have a dream that is realistic in design I begin to question if it is a premonition or just a dream. That is how often it occurs. What could be the reasoning of these experiences? One thought I had was that maybe these dreams are collections of past experiences, but that was proved wrong with the following experience: I had a dream where I was somewhere completely different and new. Somewhere I've never been before. I was with my father, whom I am not with too often. I was hearing noises that aren't too common in my

I am not really a believer in paranormal activity, but I like to keep an open-mind about what others think. I don’t like to shoot others beliefs down, especially when it comes to ghosts, because everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I found a video that talks about why people might have thought they had seen or experienced paranormal activity with a more scientific explanation. Some of the reasons they gave were: misperceived self-representation, sleep paralysis, and grief. With misperceived self-representation, your body experiences sensations, and it doesn’t read as ones created by yourself. This is also what causes schizophrenia. The brain of schizophrenics tell the body what actions to do, but it doesn’t tell the body to expect it. So the brain perceives the actions as someone else – someone imaginary. With sleep paralysis, your body is paralyzed but your mind is partly awake. So if you feel a sensation, you are not fully able to place who or what it is or where it’s coming fr

I was intrigued by Diane Ackerman's depictions of artists, and especially writers, in her chapter Courting the Muse , plunging their synaptic buckets deep into their word wells with the help of the outside world. Describing the search for inspiration through our senses  was a terrific way to tie up the book, since this quest pushes us to discover the limits and subtleties of all our senses. I was a little confused why she included a few lines, like the Edith Sitwell bit about how she'd chill in a coffin before writing. While Edith absolutely looks like somebody who would emerge from a coffin to write poetry, was it the touch of the padding inside that she craved? Is there a fresh coffin smell? Or perhaps, she was reaching out into the void- towards the unknown, a sixth sensation? Was there ever a dead body in it? Coffins are more of a mood, to me at least, than sensual experiences. They have too much emotional and cultural baggage.  I haven't been in a coffin though, so

6th Sense The definition is a power of perception like but not one of the five senses A keen intuitive power We see the unseen world through our five subtle-senses We are able to see the subtle-world or subtle-dimension This is known as a spiritual experience The subtle world is all around us Hard to perceive this world Spiritual practice can grow the sixth sense Increases the ability to connect to the subtle-world