Scientific Reason for Instinctive Reads (Long)

[Johnny Hughes]

[LilOleMe?]

You know Johnny that's actually interesting. I personally have gone in on hands that have been nothing more than instinct, or a gut feeling. Sometimes you just know. Ty for Post

-Me

[tetsuo]

Hmmm.. I find that very hard to give credibility to.

After all, they were pictures on a computer screen.

These are made up of (depending on the type of screen, obviously) thousands of phosphorous dots, illuminated by three electrons guns fired through a directional magnetic force.

If he can't see the face, and there is no real person involved (as the 'normal' definition of ESP/empathic communication would require a human 'transmitter'), then I find it doubtful that this is anything other than coincidence.

Have you got the URL?

[Sunbob]

Here is the link to the article on WebMD,


I didn't read this as an example of ESP but rather that a different part of the brain was processing the data in a "sub-cognitive" way (was that a word?). I am by no means an expert in this and my biology degree is 32 years old but what I got out of it was this. The man's eyes still received the light (data) input but the part of the brain that performs the normal processing of that data was damaged. So he could not process that data into a cognitive image. He could not "see". What the researchers were suggesting was that a different part of the brain peforms a co-processing function that we are not conscienciously aware of but it does effect our interpretation on a subconscience level.

A very very rough computer analogy might be if my Internet Explorer program was corrupted I would not be able to go on line, but if I used another browser, say Opera, I would still be able to process the incoming internet data signal but with a different part of the computer "brain".

The man's data receptors, his eyes, still functioned, but the part of his brain that normally would process that data into what we would recognize as an image was damaged and malfunctioning. But another "program" (part of the brain) was able to process that incoming data and was experienced by the man as a "feeling". Since this process goes on in the "background" it is not experienced by the man as "seeing".

Wow, that turned into a way too heavy explanation when all I was setting out to do was say thank you to Johnny for passing on this info. Now that you are all bored to tears you may go back to your poker game.

[k3nt]

[tetsuo]

Hey,

Thanks for providing the link!

As far as I can make out from this article and others, he was given at least three different tests, each of which consisted of 200 images.

* shapes e.g. circles vs squares
* animals in threatening and non-threatening stances
* human faces in sad/happy/fearful states

He was given a low (swept under the carpet) score for shapes and animals but 59% in the human faces test.

Which is "considerably higher than would be indicated by chance".

A set of 200 seems a bit on the low low side for an article in a scientific journal... And how many OTHER subjects have they tested with similar disabilities but did not get a statistically high score? Give the dude another couple of thousand and let's see what happens.

Flip a coin 200 times. I wouldn't be surprised to get 59% right in all honesty. Just because the roulette wheel's come up black 24 times in a row doesn't necessarily mean red'll come up next time...

I'm never one to say anything's impossible, but I am severly skeptical. Some people just want to get published - there's a lot of politics involved in science AFAIK.

Society needs us cynics, you know

[Johnny Hughes]

This article applies to poker in relation to our own use of intuition in decision making. Sometimes we make a call based on instinct based on reading an opponent.

You seen the scenario where a man bets the nuts on fifth street and another man begins to study the board and decide what to do. Sometimes all the other playes just "know" correctly the bettor will win it. Often we make decisions with imperfect information and depend on gut feel or instinct.

In my opinion, people develop their guessing ability or decision ability over time.

In Contract Bridge, a recurring situation is to guess which of your two opponents holds an outstanding Queen when there is no other information available. The top long term bridge team, called the Aces, had this very high, 80% of so success rate at this. It should be a fifty fifty prop. The Aces did this for many years.

The thing is one of the opponents has the Queen and knows you are going to guess. Maybe you read them. Sometimes you just "know" your opponent is on a semi-bluff.

This type of intuition or reading people is not to be confused with thinking that a card is coming. Reading people is based in science.