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An energy skeptic was asked the following question.
"If we took two hundred identical plastic water bottles and filled them with identical water, and then on one hundred of these, we put a picture of the skulls and crossbones, an old age symbol for a deadly poison, and on the other hundred we put a picture of Jesus, likewise a symbol in the Judeo-Christian world, of healing instead, and we gave these bottles to 200 people who suffer from the same illness to drink from for one month, do you believe there would be a statistical difference between the two groups, in their various symptoms getting worse or better respectively, at the end of the month?"
The skeptic said immediately, "Of course there would be! No doubt about it! But of course, it has NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with any kind of energy, it's all in their minds."
Ok, fair enough.
How about we put these water bottles inside brown paper bags, where just the lid peeks out, and repeated the experiment?
Would at the end of the month there be a significant statistical difference between the two groups?
The skeptic thought about it and said, "There might be ..."
Now this difference, the difference between there being no change, and whatever changes there were to make people's symptoms better or worse, in the absence of them knowing what was in the water, has to do with energy.
One way or the other.
Telepathy to know and see behind the casing of the brown bag, or the water actually having been CHANGED in some way by the affixing of these different symbols on their labels.
The skeptic said soon enough, "But that doesn't prove anything ..."
Well, it proves there is something going on.
But here is the skeptic test.
This is where the theoretical idea of energy, and whether there really are levels and layers to reality that have yet to be scientifically proven, bridges into becoming personal.
Energy work tends to be personal - very personal, in fact.
Here is where we ask the skeptic:
"Are you personally willing to take part in the test, and have a fifty percent chance that YOUR water, the one that YOU will be drinking for one month every day, is the skull and crossbones water?"
And here, this particular skeptic grew nervous, uncomfortable, and decided to decline the invitation.
Other energy skeptics and energy debunkers might take a different cause of action.
Some might think that the "mind over matter" effect or placebo effect of their powerful beliefs in there NOT being any levels to reality that may be influenced by intention will protect them sufficiently from the negative energetic effects of the "poison water".
One should hope that they might start to think about HOW placebo works, and what the mysterious and unexplored "mind over matter" might eventually turn out to be in the end.
Other skeptics might say that even though they themselves get a bad gut feeling about drinking poison energy water for a month, it would be safe for others who feel nothing.
They may put forth the argument that having grown up in a society that does have churches and religious festivals, no-one can come away entirely un-brainwashed and it is the belief that is the problem, not the energy.
I would like to put forth the idea that people's reactions to the presence of various energy forms are universal, culture independent, and very much like a sense of smell that every human being is born with.
The vast majority of people can feel the atmosphere in a room, in a building, about a person, about an object, even if they have never been trained to pay attention to what it is they are feeling, and how they are doing that.
A very small minority of people are really entirely unable to "feel energy" and these people fall without exception in the autistic spectrum, even if it is at the low end of Asperger's syndrome.
These people however make up the vast majority of skeptics - they are skeptical BECAUSE they cannot feel energy, and for them, there simply isn't anything there.
We must also make a strong delineation between the simple existence of energy in the sense of it being simply a different dimension to existence, to reality absolute, that is really there on the one hand, and the many illusionary and delusionary, and sometimes downright fraudulent dealings and outcomes PEOPLE have made from this fact.
That human beings are so extremely "susceptible" to energy prophets such as shamans, all the religions, magic and witchcraft for example is in my opinion not a sign of human beings being stupid; but of the fact that human beings have a real sense of the energy worlds, can indeed feel them, a few can also see and hear them. They already know there is an energy world and that is why they flock to churches and metaphysics and esoterics, and have done so in every human civilisation that ever existed, and still continue to do so today.
I would strongly recommend that instead of spending time debunking energy, or being negatively skeptical about energy work, the energy skeptics should start to ask relevant questions, and to start to investigate, rather than to nay-say which isn't a scientific approach in any world, or any dimension.
The theoretical experiment outlined above with the water - and I would add that I would not give anyone water from the poison bottle, because I do know that energy is real, and would never want to harm people using it - is an example of experiments that are easy to conduct, very simple, should have been conducted decades ago, refined, studied, discussed, and most of all, USED sensibly and logically.
People in hospitals consume gallons of drinking water. If it was blessed on a regular basis, and patients would need just 10% less time in the bed, medication, staff care, after care, this would represent a significant saving to the health care systems of the world which are creaking under the strain.
Enough trials with placebos have been done by now to have established that "mind over matter" really does work to alleviate symptoms and in some cases, cure patients entirely.
We should be by now 60 years into the refinement of placebos, blessed water, energy healers in hospitals, meditations to advise to ill people and so much more besides.
We are not because the scientific community is full of skeptics who calls everyone who works with energy, or who had energy work for them to help them, fools.
I am no fool; I am very practical person who has spent decades on the practical uses behind the simple acceptance "Yes, there is such a thing as energy - and now, how are we going to use this to make life better?"
If we want to wean people off of illusionary nonsense, and truly free them from the pied pipers of the spirituality world, then science has to come on board, investigate the experiences that people have with energy, and offer an alternative - a viable alternative to explaining that what human beings have felt, experienced, known, for over a hundred thousand years.
Skepticism about energy will never achieve that.
Research could and it is my hope, eventually it will.
Dr Silvia Hartmann
Author, Oceans Of Energy
* First posted to http://energy-magic.com
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