9. Psychic powers and ESP 靈力與超感知覺

Psychic powers and extra-sensory perception (ESP) rank among the top ten unexplained phenomena if for no other reason than that belief in them is so widespread. Many people believe that intuition is a form of psychic power, a way of accessing arcane or special knowledge about the world or the future. Researchers have tested people who claim to have psychic powers, though the results under controlled scientific conditions have so far been negative or ambiguous. Some have argued that psychic powers cannot be tested, or for some reason diminish in the presence of skeptics or scientists. If this is true, science will never be able to prove or disprove the existence of psychic powers.

對靈力和超感知覺（簡稱ESP）的信仰流布甚廣，就憑這一點，這兩樣東西也應該進入十大未解之謎的行列。許多人相信，直覺就是靈力的一種表現形式、一種獲取有關世界或未來的特異知識的方法。研究人員已經對一些自稱擁有靈力的人進行了測試，但是迄今為止，他們在受控實驗室條件下得到的都還是否定或含糊的結果。有些人辯稱靈力不可測試，因為它會因懷疑論者或科學家的在場而莫名其妙地減弱。如果這是真的，科學就永遠無法證明或駁斥靈力的存在。