Talk:Prescience

Merge discussion

It shouldn't be merged....it's quite different than precognition in the fact that all, or at least most, paths of the future are seen. Different definition, period. 20:55, 4 November 2005 Deadxendxmoon

It shouldn't be merged. In actual usage, 'precognition' describes a paranormal quality/skill, whereas 'prescience' indicates something more akin to fortuitous intuition or intuitive planning. To bring one's umbrella to work on a sunny day that turns unexpectedly rainy might be prescient, but it's not necessarily an indication of one's psychic ability. See the definition HERE.--Anchoress 08:56, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

It shouldn't be merged. As precognition is a hint of what is to come in the immediate future, and precient awareness is a vision of all possible futures, immediate or not. In Dune, Muad'Dib can see a bloody jihad raging through the universe unchecked, and all possible paths lead to it. Eventually he finds a path in which he can avert that terrible outcome.

Shouldn't be merged. Precognition refers to a different meaning however related. Moreover, Prescience is more Dune-oriented and combining them might take away the dune-oriented part.

Fictional psychic characters...

I feel that there are so many precognitive/precient characters in fiction, it demands its own category, and I'm surprised to find it doesn't have one. What should the categroy be called, for example, the telekinetic characters have the category Category:Fictional psychokineticists. The category could hold a lot of characters like Buffy Summers, Phoebe Halliwell, Cordelia Chase, Cassie Newton, Sam Winchester etc... there are literally hundreds... would anyone like to be a part of this? Feel free to discuss on my talk page too. Zythe 23:27, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Dune

This article is 80% presience in Dune. Isn't there more to cover than just that one universe? Afterall, this isn't a fictional concept Frank Herbert created.

True. And the comment about a list of prescient characters in fiction may be misleading. Prescience is different from foresight in that is acts exactly as it is described in the Dune section of the article, where the prescient character gains power through understanding that all action is predictable when enough variables are known. This is why the presence of another oracle interferes with prescience-- the greater oracle must predict as well what "decision" the lesser oracle will make in order to know how they will influence the future. The same applies in reverse, where the original oracle's decision must be predicted by the greater one. I personally think the best examples of prescience therefore are Dune and Asimov's Harri Seldon. One the other hand, most classical prophets, who see the future but have no power to influence it, effectively only have foresight (this could be debated-- a condition of Cassandra's vision prevent her from being believed, so if she were prescient she could not see possible futures where she is believed. The prophecies of Oedipus are fulfilled after being spoken-- would they have been fulfilled some other way had they never been said?) --199.94.78.180 20:27, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

some anonymous person's rambling

A book I read had somewhat of a different nature: someone fully presient out to a very short time ahead of present (for most of the book, three hours) leading to incredible manipulation of the timestream but retained free will.

Well thanks for your comment anonymous person, about a book you didn't cite. Whatever. -- Sy / ^(talk) 22:19, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Neutrality tag

I noticed someone slapped the tag on it but nev er commented here, it looks okay to me. It really needs sources though. Aaron Bowen 03:42, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

I'd remove it, since there was no discussion initiated. But the history of the article and these comments ought to be checked out first, to see if comments were made and then removed. -- Sy / ^(talk) 22:19, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

POV

[1]: User:Martinphi added this tag. Since it was added without discussion I suppose it could be removed without discussion. =/ -- Sy / ^(talk) 22:27, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Ambiguous term

@TAnthony: in this edit you changed the target from the Foreknowledge disambiguation page to precognition without giving a meaningful reason. This overwrote user:Steelpillow's previous [2] that did give a valid reason why precognition is the wrong target. This page at one time used to be a disambiguation page itself. Furthermore, it used to be an article and a merge discussion above in 2005/2006 decided that precognition was an unsuitable merge target. In light of this page history, I really think you need a better rationale than "update" for this change. SpinningSpark 23:01, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Just three mainspace articles link here. I notice similar usage of "prescience" as specifically psychic at Outline of parapsychology and Palo (religion). Whether the usage at Theology proper refers to "psychic" precognition is more a matter of the nature of Deity. Looking more widely the use of prescience to mean precognition in the Dune mythology is clearly muddying the waters, however there are plenty of articles using it in the mundane sense of foreseeing consequences through rational thought. We should not presume pseudoscience here. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 10:28, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

I am very confused by your rationale. You say that "we should not presume pseudoscience" yet your chosen target is explicitly a "purported psychic phenomenon". It is redirecting to a specific page that makes an assumption. Redirecting to a disambiguation page is what not making an assumption looks like. SpinningSpark 10:54, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Eh? My chosen target was foreknowledge, the neutral term. Mine was the reverted edit; have you got me the right way round? — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 12:19, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Oh right. Sorry, I didn't look carfully enough. I thought that was a response from TAnthony. So we agree, that should be reverted? SpinningSpark 13:10, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Yes indeed. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 13:27, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Done. I also changed the redirect template they had added. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 13:31, 16 November 2022 (UTC)