A FEW months ago I wrote about the sixth sense and said that it exists. Readers have sent me a number of replies. Some accept the idea while others reject it. In fact, the subject had slipped my mind until I got a report on some scientific research which seems to confirm the sixth sense or intuition. Even without scientific evidence, human experience indicates that the sixth sense exists. Most of us know the sudden feeling of danger when we are perfectly safe; and then not long after, something happens and the reason for our feeling is suddenly clear. A researcher conducted experiments using 4,000 people from 57 countries trying to prove the existence of the sixth sense. This particular researcher calls the sixth sense “pre-conceiving.”
In conducting trials, researchers subjected the volunteers to a combination of pictures designed to elicit specific reactions. Some volunteers responded to the pictures before they could be seen. In other words, they anticipated what was going to be seen.
In one trial, volunteers sat in a room with a computer wired to their bodies to record the most minute changes in body temperature and blood pressure. The computer randomly selects a picture meant to produce a specific reaction — such as a traffic accident or a view of a quiet pastoral scene. The majority of the volunteers reacted to the picture before it appeared. Researchers have thus confirmed the existence of the sixth sense but are unable to interpret its origins or how it functions. What is clear is that it does exist though not in all people; it is more common in females than in males. If you are one of those with a sixth sense, perhaps you should pay attention to it. It might save you from danger or equally likely, it might direct you to fame and fortune.
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DON’T be surprised if you visit a restaurant in London, Paris or Tokyo and are offered a new dish you have never heard of. Owners of famous restaurants have discovered that the best dishes can be made not by traditional chefs but by chemists and physicists. It is claimed that scientists are capable of preparing dishes that contain important nutrients and are also easily digestible and energy-generating.
So we may soon reach a point where behind every good chef is a chemist or a physicist. As in many other innovations, London has taken the lead in this one. The owner of a famous London restaurant sought the assistance of Dr. Nicholas Curty in the preparation of a dish named “Curty.” (Dr. Curty is among the scientists who worked on the atomic bomb.)
Along these lines, scientists have helped in creating recipes that have been difficult for chefs. So don’t be surprised if one day you are offered a dish created by Ahmad Zwail, the Egyptian Nobel Prize winner.
