Is there a spiritual sense?

[Silent3]

Poll question: Is there a spiritual sense?

By "spiritual sense" I mean a sense of "the divine", of supernatural or "other worldly" things, of non-physical essences or "energies", not merely, say, a good but conventionally explainable sense for the emotional states of other people.

[trotsky]

1. The more important question to resolve first:

If there is such a thing as a "spiritual sense," how do we distinguish it from imagination?

[bananas]

4. No, that would be a secondary question. nt

[trotsky]

8. Actually it would fall under defining what is meant by "spiritual sense."

I think that's fairly important to answering the question in the poll.

[dmallind]

2. Probably not. What would it do and how could it be verified?

The human brain is a remarkably plastic thing and I cannot discount the slight possibility of some of them having some other sense than my own and that of most people's. That it must be a minority and a tiny one that have it is obvious. Nobody talks around the cooler at work about having "snurfled" the news for example, and acts surprised when I say I cannot snurfle or even understand what it is. The closest counterpart is the "intuition" or "hunch" but that is easily explicable by the human brain's well-known ability to detect and extrapolate patterns subconsciously. However no such claim has yet been rigorously investigated and supported. People who see "auras" can't do it repeatably. Psychics who have been tested with a group informed about cold-reading techniques and confirmation bias suspiciously find their correct guesses hovering around random levels. So far then we are 6.8billion to zero as far as naturalistic versus metaphysical senses go. Cannot say it's impossible, but it's very very ery improbable.

[edhopper]

3. Most people have a sense of awe and wonder

Some of us feel it in an art museum or looking at photos from the Hubble telescope. Others feel it while meditating or praying in church. I see no evidence that it does not generate from the individual and his reaction to the experience rather than some outside force coming into him/her.

[bananas]

5. Buddhism and other Indian epistemologies identify six "senses" as opposed to the Western five.

"In Buddhism, "mind" denotes an internal sense organ which interacts with sense objects that include sense impressions, feelings, perceptions and volition."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayatana

Āyatana (Pāli; Sanskrit) is a Buddhist term that has been translated as "sense base", "sense-media" or "sense sphere."<1> In Buddhism, there are six internal sense bases (Pali: ajjhattikāni āyatanāni; also known as, "organs", "gates", "doors", "powers" or "roots"<2>) and six external sense bases (bāhirāni āyatanāni or "sense objects"; also known as vishaya or "domains"<3>). Thus, there are six internal-external (organ-object) pairs of sense bases:<4>

• eye and visible objects<5>
  
• ear and sound
  
• nose and odor
  
• tongue and taste
  
• body and touch
  
• mind<6> and mental objects<7>
  

Buddhism and other Indian epistemologies<8><9> identify six "senses" as opposed to the Western identification of five. In Buddhism, "mind" denotes an internal sense organ which interacts with sense objects that include sense impressions, feelings, perceptions and volition.<6><10>

Saḷāyatana (Pāli; Skt. ṣaḍāyatana) refers to all six sense objects and six sense organs and is generally used in the context of the Twelve Causes (nidāna) of the chain of Dependent Origination.<11>

<snip>

[laconicsax]

10. Science recognizes that there are more than five senses.

http://harvardmedicine.hms.harvard.edu/fascinoma/fivesenses/beyond/extra.php

[bananas]

6. Prana is one of the five organs of vitality or sensation.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prana

Prana (प्राण, prāṇa) is the Sanskrit word for "vital life" (from the root prā "to fill", cognate to Latin plenus "full"). It is one of the five organs of vitality or sensation, viz. prana "breath", vac "speech", chakshus "sight", shrotra "hearing", and manas "thought" (nose, mouth, eyes, ears and mind; ChUp. 2.7.1).

[MineralMan]

7. I think some people mistake a sense of wonder for spirituality.

My sense of wonder is very strong. When it hits, I start looking for answers. That's called curiosity. For most things, the answers are available. For a few, they're not...yet. Looking for reasons for the things that stimulate our sense of wonder is the basis of science. Looking for one step, simplistic reasons is the basis for religion. God did it is not a satisfactory explanation of anything.

[bananas]

9. Shen, hun, and po each have a "seat" in the body, a place where they are said to rest and take resid

http://www.itmonline.org/shen/chap1.htm

<snip>

Shen, hun, and po each have a "seat" in the body, a place where they are said to rest and take residence. Thus, even though each of them can influence all aspects of the human person, they rely on certain parts of the person as a base. This situation might be likened to our own experience of working in the community and interacting with our neighbors, then returning home as a place for recuperation, rest, family interactions, and maintaining personal identity. Shen rests in the heart and vessels; hun rests in the liver; and po rests in the lungs. Although these three entities are the dominant concern in the ancient texts, in keeping with the influential system of five elements, two other organ systems are identified as having their own spiritual characteristics which are not the same as, but might be likened to, the other three: yi (intention, planning, thought, wisdom) is associated with the spleen and zhi (will; the strength to carry out yi) is associated with the kidney.

<snip>

[Silent3]

11. You link to material which blandly states these things...

...about "shen", "hun", etc. as if they're undisputed, accepted facts. Why, however, should any of this material be believed?