PS381 Lecture Notes - Lecture 9: Ideomotor Phenomenon, Dowsing, Motor System
Document Summary
Ideomotor effect: if you imagine something intensely, your motor system acts as if the imagined situation were true. Chevreul noted correctly other unwilled effects: dowsing, table-turning. Ideomotor effect and dousing: video from scientific american frontiers with alan alda as host called water water. Intuitions and personal experiences seem compelling: need extra training and possibly coursework to understand and fully appreciate scientific method. Ideomotor effect and facilitated communication (fc: video from frontline called prisoners of silence (1999): https://www. youtube. com/watch?v=dqhlv0uzuwy, describe what the experiments look like that investigate whether facilitated communication works. Exploring pendulum now called chevreul"s pendulum: way it works: subconsciously your arm and hand make tiny, imperceptible movements, which pendulum amplifies; they add up and appear as swinging and rotating pendulum movements. Implications: the ideomotor effect: occurs in many circumstances; striking results that seem to have outside cause; very honest, intelligent people who already know about it still have compelling experience.
