Headline Dec 30, 2015/ ''' GHOSTS ''' : DREAD 0r DEAD

''' GHOSTS ''' : 

DREAD 0r DEAD

IT IS NOW GETTING SOMEWHAT CLEAR,  -that  Believing in Ghosts  can be good for us.

Scientists  -now conclude that the  ''guillible''   may have the evolutionary edge.

THE TALENTS OF people who believe in the paranormal don't end there. It seems that they are also better than non-believers as perceiving meaningful patterns in apparently random noise.

An example of this trait, known as  Pareldolla,  might  be when people claim to see images of, say  the Virgin Mary  on a tortilla or on the wall of a building.

Psychologists have viewed this quality as a shortcoming on the part of sheep. But pattern recognition, argues Peter Brugger, a  neuroscientist at University Hospital Zurich in Switzerland-

*Is an important aspect of   human cognition  , allowing us to recognise familiar faces or camouflaged predators*.

From an evolutionary perspective, it may be safer to err on the side of gullibility:

"If you miss the Tiger hidden in the grass, then you're dead.

If you always see tigers, you're always running away but you're not dead."

What determines our tendency to spot patterns and form associations?  It tuned out that a   key factor   is the  relative dominance of the right and left hemisphere  of the brain.

Most neuroscientists accept that the left side of the brain is primarily responsible for language and logical analysis, while the right side is more  involved in creativity and what might be called:

Lateral Thinking   -making connections between disparate concepts.

In one of Brugger's experiments , people carried out word association tasks, using different sides of their brain..

When using their right brains,  the sheep were better than the goats at finding connections between indirectly related words {For example,  "lion"  and  ''stripe'' ; the connection is Tiger.}     

While an enhanced ability to spot real patterns and form connections is desirable, it could be argued that believers in the paranormal have taken this tendency too far.

*But that depends on whether you are a sheep or a goat.*

The research author,  -as a goat himself, tends to opt for down-to-earth explanations.

''Here is how I account for the fact that Thalbourne  was e-mailing me just as I phoned for that interview. Earlier that day, while it was already night time in Adelaide, I had sent him an e-mail.

Later I guessed he might start work at  about 8:30am in Adelaide,midnight my time. In fact he had arrived earlier and started his day by responding to overnight e-mails, which happened to include one from me.

Thalbourne views it as one of life's intriguing coincidences. But he happily admits to being a sheep.

''My life is full of many small and occasionally large coincidences that suggest some unusual form of cause and effect.'' he says.

With respectful dedication to the Students, Professors and Teachers of the World. See Ya all on !WOW!  -the World Students Society:

''' Fangs For Life '''

Good Night and God Bless

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless