Science proves that humans have a sixth sense

Humans have the ability to perceive things in the dark through echolocation like bats.
Human senses are finite. They do not possess a good sense of smell like dogs, cannot perceive as many colors as mantis shrimp, or find their way home with the Earth’s magnetic pole like sea turtles.

However, one sense that humans can soon master, is bat-like echolocation. Sixth sense experiment According to the Popular Mechanics Scientists in Japan have tested this ability in a laboratory, proving that humans can use it echolocation , or the ability to sense echoes for navigation. This ability helps people recognize the shape and rotation of many objects. Thanks to that, people can “see” in the dark. When the volunteer presses the tablet, a synthesized echo is emitted from the amplifier speaker (red line). The sounds obtained with the binaural are 1/8 of the original pitch by reducing the sampling frequency, which is transmitted into the volunteer headphones (green line). Photo: Miwa Sumiya. As bats fly around objects, they emit intense sound waves from different angles and bounce off at isolated intervals. Thanks to that, this tiny mammal can determine the topography, texture or movement of an object. According to Dr. Miwa Sumiya, if humans were able to perceive the patterns of time-changing sounds similar to bats, they could see the world in new ways. Dr. Sumiya, a researcher at the Center for Nerve and Information Networks in Osaka, Japan and was the first author of a paper to appear on Plos One on this topic. “Testing that humans are capable of detecting multiple environments via sound waves could add a new step in understanding the complexity of the human brain,” Sumiya said. According to Sumiya, humans have the ability to further understand the perception of other species (such as bats) by comparing with knowledge gained in echolocation studies of humankind. To test this theory, Mrs. Sumiya’s group made a meticulous arrangement. In one room, the researchers gave volunteers a pair of headphones and two tablets, one that produced a calibrated signal using a synthesized echo, the other to listen to pre-recorded echoes. . In room 2, only the strangely shaped 3D axes stand in one place and rotate around themselves. When prompted, 15 volunteers turned on echolocation signals from their tablets. The sound waves emit each beat, travel to room 2 and hit the 3D axes. Participants need a little bit of imagination to convert sound waves into a certain object. Sumiya explained that the synthesized echo-locating signals used in this experiment were high-frequency signals up to 41 kHz, which cannot be heard by humans. Dolphins are also a mammal that uses echolocation to detect and hunt. Photo: Getty Images. Researchers used a humanoid (1/7 the size of a real skull) to “hear” the sound in room 2 before passing it on to volunteers. The fake head is equipped with 2 microphones attached to the two ears and creating a 3D resonance. The sound output is quite similar to the surround sound experienced in movie theaters. Reducing the frequency of the echoes in both ears enabled volunteers to hear “with the feeling of being heard in real space”. Many people like to listen to podcasts or watch videos with headphones to create surround sound and give a tingling sensation in their ears. This is called the Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response, or ASMR. Result Finally, researchers and volunteers guessed whether echoes were coming from stationary or spinning objects. At the end of the experiment, the volunteers were able to accurately identify two pillars thanks to the time-varying echolocation signals emanating from them. Identifying clue is thanks to the pitch and timbre. However, it was difficult for them to discern the shape of the standing pillars. Sumiya’s group study is not the first to test the ability of human echolocation. Previous studies have shown that blind people can use mouth-clicking sounds to see 2D objects. However, Ms. Sumiya said her experiment was the first to specifically explore the ability of echolocation to change over time. The researchers said their work is evidence that both humans and bats are capable of decoding objects through sound. In the future, engineers could apply this technology to wearable devices such as watches or glasses to improve how visually impaired people can navigate the world, except for headsets.