Erickson mentioned a little-known phenomenon to folks who don’t work in extremely loud industrial settings. For old-timers in these settings, it is not uncommon for two acclimated workers to be able to carry on a “normal” conversation, at normal volume levels, when outsiders can’t hear each other even when shouting in close proximity. How is this even possible? This appears to be a phenomenon almost akin to telepathy. It certainly seems to defy our understanding of hearing biology. What can Creator tell us?

This is an interesting experiment of nature carried out by human beings, and observing the capabilities of consciousness to work with the sensorium in sorting out the meaning of what the senses are detecting and conveying to the brain for processing, in order to make sense out of it under conditions of overload. What is happening here is not the development of psychic ability because the ears are useless with the din of the loud environment seemingly making a normal conversation impossible, rather what is taking place is the brain is, in effect, filtering out the din because of prior familiarity in understanding and registering those frequencies over and over and over again, and simply using its multitasking ability to shunt them aside, to not be considered, but only what is novel in the form of the vocal conversation taking place despite the background noise. Because the brain is filtering out the din, the conversation is perceptible and understandable to the mind, and the person as well can perceive the words of the conversation with clarity and understanding, so this is an illustration of the elegant adaptability of consciousness and the sensory mechanisms. If you think about this, there are many such examples where people can acclimate themselves to many situations to ignore sensory input that would overwhelm a new experiencer but, having acclimated to the environment, the person will simply block it out and not be influenced in a way that could impair their actions by being distracted. This has obvious benefits to ensure safe functioning, and has survival value for the species.