Tonight I was watching an old episode of Hamish Macbeth with my mum. The one where Alex dies (Season 2 Episode 4; Radio Lochdubh; orig. air date 14 April 1996). Hamish's sidekick TV John , an experienced seer, encounters a woman who has been having premonitions - they connect and he sees Alex's death through her vision.
This second hand second sight made me wonder...such things exist in my family and we've compared notes of premonitions but nothing quite so useful as to see through each others' eyes. It might be rather useful, if disturbing, if we could figure out a way to do such a thing.
According to Wikipedia "There is no scientific evidence that second sight exists. Reports of second sight are known only from anecdotal evidence given after the fact".
Hmmmm.
There are a couple of problems with that statement:
- Seeing the future is never 'scientific' - a chain of events can lead to a certain outcome but any number of interventions to alter the course of things could occur. Just because the prediction did not come to pass does not mean that was not the outcome that was right when it was foretold.
- Reports are NOT only anecdotal nor only 'after the fact; people do tell their predictions or write them down - however, given the nature of these things predictions can be unpleasant or little believed.
Take this example:
Three weeks before my cousin Allister's death from cancer I was so certain of the specific date I tweeted it. However, not wanting to alarm family members I was very vague about it. Indeed there is only my word and that of my daughters (who I told in full) to say what this tweet meant. But honestly, how likely are you to say publicly that X will die on date Y? Not exactly polite, no mater how sure you are. And if I had forseen his brother's fatal accident an intervention may have been possible - I would have tried to tell HIM, not the world. Incidentally, I favourited my own tweet so as I could find it again (I tweet a LOT) if it proved correct.
Then there's the fact Allister had terminal cancer...his death was no surprise although, not being a close relation, I had no idea the end was particularly nigh. The prediction could be put down to chance although I remain unconvinced that could be the case. But it also fits with my ideas of futures being changeable - there was little to interfere with his death occurring at any given moment unlike an accident such as the fictional Alex.
Despite having no news of a particularly ominous nature the weeks leading to Allister's death were especially tense. My parents and I stopped phoning each other as we prepared for The Call. For me that came when my mum rang a little after 7pm on the 21st. I swore at the phone and started crying before I answered it.
A more recent example was Sunday 15th April this year. As my mum left my house I turned to my elder daughter, tears in my eyes, and said something along the lines of "I feel like I won't have my mum much longer"...27 hours later my stepdad called to report a problem - my mum had FINALLY answered her phone but he couldn't understand her. It turned out she'd had a severe stroke.
My mother's still alive but in some ways I lost her that night - she's living with me now, I am her carer. I have already lost the sound of her voice in my memory...they say it's the first memory to go. I still feel like I won't have her for much longer but I don't know how much of that might be 'wishful thinking' - her quality of life is not so good, and she is very unhappy.
Who is to believe I foresaw this catastrophe? If I'd had the idea it would be a stroke I would have been over at her flat, that had actually been the plan until I asked her for Sunday lunch instead... If I had been there to see her collapse perhaps the sodding doctors would've believed that it was a stroke and treated her - instead they insisted it wasn't a stroke and she wasn't diagnosed until the damage was permanent. As creeptastic as I find my meagre psychic 'gift' I wish it was stronger so as to be of more use.
Obviously as I believe I have seen things before they happen you'll never get me to entertain the idea of coincidence or a 'lucky' guess. If my mum or my daughters were to give me a warning I would heed it, no questions asked.
I don't expect any warnings I give to be heeded but I would give them anyway - I'd rather be wrong than right.
NOTE
Just thought of a second hand example. My mum was once told her fortune and that she would die in her mid 50s. As she'll be 74 soon that clearly did not come to pass. However, in her mid 50s she suffered a DVT with pulmonary emboli; a condition that would have been fatal when the prediction was made. I'm not convinced the broken ankle that triggered it all off was a fixed point in time but who knows?!
My mum used the example as one of inaccuracy whereas I see it as a possible future that was averted. The explanation of 'anecdote' only works if the person reporting it believes in the prediction, surely?
