Frontiers of Human Possibility

Beyond Reason: Reclaiming Sensitivity, Curiosity, and Human Potential

Reframing Intelligence

We live in a world where intelligence is not confined to minds but is embedded in life itself. Michael Levin, professor of biology at Tufts University, is breaking new ground in bioelectricity research. His work reveals that living tissue is a form of multiscale intelligence, with cells and tissues communicating through electrical signals to solve problems, heal, and construct complex anatomies. As Levin puts it, “The story of life is the story of scaling of intelligence” and, “Bioelectricity is the cognitive glue [...] it’s how the tiny goals of individual cells are scaled up into grandiose goals like building a limb or a face.”¹

Levin’s findings reframes long-standing educational debates. Where Howard Gardner divided intelligence into discrete categories², Levin’s work suggests something more profound: intelligence is not measured in types, it is the organising principle of life itself.

For centuries, we’ve channelled intelligence through the intellect, using reason to shape the world around us. This pursuit has brought us machines, technology, and now artificial intelligence, which extends and increasingly surpasses our cognitive abilities. Just as the telescope expanded our ability to see, AI can expand our capacity to think. But this raises an important question: if machines can outthink us, what remains for human learning? Levin’s work points to an answer. Intelligence is not limited to reasoning; it’s embedded in life itself. It’s a biological, multiscale phenomenon expressed through the electrical conversations of living cells.

Perhaps the time has come to shift our focus in education, moving beyond intellectual skill to develop the many other ways we are intelligent - in our bodies, emotions, relationships, and creativity. While these ideas may be batted down by entrenched systems thinking about what is possible, they are a hopeful provocation to challenge the limitations we have imagined for ourselves.

Exploring at the Frontiers of our Understanding

What if schools approached the intelligence of our other faculties with the same formal rigour we apply to intellectual development? While some of the capacities discussed in this essay remain speculative or emergent, each is being explored with scientific rigour. By treating them as worthy of inquiry perhaps we may reveal untapped human potential. What if we treated emotional, somatic, and creative intelligence not as incidental, but as worthy of structured inquiry and cultivation?

Life is far greater than what fits inside our rational minds. Science helps us to understand what can be measured, but the living cosmos exceeds our instruments and comprehension. I remain in awe of the complexity and mystery of life, undiminished by the small portion of it we have come to understand. I’ve often heard science being used to diminish possibilities, as though what cannot yet be measured cannot be real. This is not science. Science says, “Show me what we do not understand, and I will try to figure it out.”

What if a posture of curiosity became the starting point for education?

Schools Should Back Into Knowledge

In a recent post, I introduced the idea of "backing into knowledge." Rather than rebuilding the entire foundation of knowledge in every student, education should begin at the frontiers, where curiosity and excitement live, and draw upon our deep reservoirs of understanding as needed to pioneer more deeply into the unknown. We’ve reached a bottleneck in education by insisting that every learner reconstruct knowledge from the ground up. The sheer volume of our accumulated knowledge far exceeds what can fit into a single human mind. This is not to argue against the importance of foundational skills, but not all that is taught in school is foundational.

To break new ground, we must release ourselves from this bottom-up orientation. Students should be invited to drill deeply into the quarries of understanding, guided not by rote reconstruction but by the desire to explore what we do not yet know. I think of AI as both the library and the librarian. It not only supplies information and frameworks but also the connective threads between ideas, the patterns and the pathways that help us navigate the landscape of knowledge. The role of education is no longer to memorise the contents of the library but to cultivate the will and the wonder to ask better questions.

Multi-Sensory Meatballs

I’ve often told my students that humans are multi-sensory meatballs. What makes us remarkable is not only the range of our senses but their adaptability. Our sensors adjust to context; they can be crude when needed, or exquisitely fine. Consider the marvel of the hands, which can be used like a hoof to scale a mountain face, can be trained to read a language of miniscule dots (Braille), or can determine the innate quality of a piece of fruit. I am flabbergasted by the potential of our sensitivity, and yet we have created ecosystems that dull our potential. We surround ourselves with soundscapes that numb our hearing, ambient light that flattens our vision, and deodorised spaces that mute our sense of smell. We say “You're so sensitive” as an insult, as though sensitivity were a weakness.

If you were a thermometer, would you be better or worse if your sensitivity increased?

In our ecosystems, we need to recover and enhance human sensitivity. The problem is not with those who feel too much; it is the calloused who are holding us back. Education and society alike should aim to cultivate environments that awaken and refine our capacity to sense and to feel, not ones that require us to blunt ourselves to survive.

The Frontiers of Human Possibility

I spend a lot of time considering the vast expressions of the intelligence of Life; in particular, those embodied in human form. I often wonder how we might live differently if we approached these other domains of intelligence with the same discipline and curiosity we’ve devoted to the intellect.

The following is a curated list of such expressions of intelligence that hint at human possibilities; not exhaustive but enticing:

Sensory Addition

"As we move into the future, we're going to increasingly be able to choose our own peripheral devices. We no longer have to wait for Mother Nature's sensory gifts on her timescales, but instead, like any good parent, she's given us the tools that we need to go out and define our own trajectory." (Eagleman, 2015)³

Across the animal kingdom, many senses exist that are absent or dormant in humans. Research suggests it’s possible to expand the human sensorium by incorporating new sensory inputs. This is known as sensory addition, the deliberate extension of human perception through new modalities.

Neuroscientist David Eagleman (Stanford University) describes the brain as a general-purpose computing device, capable of integrating new sensory data when it provides meaningful information.⁴ Technologies such as haptic vests and neural implants demonstrate that the brain can adapt to new forms of perception, suggesting that human sensory experience is not biologically fixed but limitlessly expandable.

​One of Eagleman’s projects developed the NorthSense device that enables users to perceive magnetic north. A wearable vest equipped with vibratory motors translates directional information into tactile feedback on the skin. Over time, users developed an intuitive sense of orientation, effectively integrating this new sensory input into their perception.⁵

Other investigations into sensory addition include:

Visual-to-auditory devices like The vOICe translate visual input into sound, enabling blind individuals to ‘hear’ their surroundings (Meijer, 1992).⁶

Electrotactile stimulation, explored by Paul Bach-y-Rita, which demonstrated how touch can convey visual information to the brain (Bach-y-Rita et al., 1969)⁷

Virtual taste experiences, such as the e-Taste device, simulate flavours digitally by stimulating the tongue with controlled electrical signals (Cheok et al., 2011).⁸

Synthetic touch technology, which mimics real-world sensations to enhance virtual interactions, with research from Stanford University and other haptics labs advancing artificial skin and tactile feedback (Okamoto et al., 2011).⁹

If humans could seamlessly integrate new sensory modalities, would this expansion of perception redefine our concept of reality, intelligence, and the self?

Human Hibernation

In 1999, Anna Bågenholm, a Swedish radiologist, fell into a frozen stream while skiing. She was trapped under ice for 80 minutes, her body temperature dropping to 13.7°C (56.7°F). By the time she was rescued she was clinically dead. Remarkably, after gradual warming and medical intervention, she fully recovered without significant brain damage.¹⁰

This extreme case of cold adaptation points to a future where humans might learn to slow time within their own bodies. Controlled hibernation could allow us to traverse deep space, resist illness, or stretch the limits of endurance by quieting the demands of metabolism. Both NASA¹¹ and ESA¹² are investigating this possibility, while research into the Wim Hof Method (breathing exercises, cold exposure, and meditation) has shown promise for reducing inflammation and improving metabolic resilience¹³.

If humans could induce metabolic hibernation, would it alter our perception of time, aging, and consciousness? Might it create a new state of existence beyond sleep, wakefulness, and death?

Lucid Dreaming for Skill Mastery

Lucid dreaming offers a frontier where the mind transcends waking limitations. It’s transformative because it unlocks new skills, creative problem-solving, and even real-time communication. In a lucid dream, the brain can rehearse and learn within a consequence-free, immersive environment, extending cognitive and physical training into sleep.

As scientific research continues to explore this hidden cognitive landscape, lucid dreaming may emerge as a tool for learning, innovation, and self-discovery beyond anything previously imagined.

​One study investigated whether practising a motor task, such as finger tapping, within a lucid dream could improve waking performance. The results showed that dream practice produced comparable improvements to physical rehearsal. This suggests that lucid dreaming can serve as a viable method for skills enhancement, leveraging the brain's capacity for learning during sleep.¹⁴

In another study, participants were asked to attempt creative problem-solving within their lucid dreams. They were presented with incomplete puzzles, logic problems, and artistic challenges before sleep, and trained to recognise their dreams and seek solutions within them. Many reported waking with sudden insights, innovative ideas, and fully formed answers that had eluded them while awake. This research points to lucid dreaming as a hidden gateway to creative problem-solving.¹⁵

Most remarkably, neuroscientists have achieved real-time, two-way communication with lucid dreamers. While in REM sleep, participants were asked maths problems, yes-or-no questions, and to identify colours. They responded correctly while still dreaming. This finding suggests that the dreaming mind is not as isolated as once believed and that lucid dreams could one day become a bridge for learning, therapy, and even conscious communication beyond waking experience.¹⁶

Could lucid dreaming eventually evolve into a shared, interactive space where multiple dreamers connect, collaborate, and build a collective dream reality? Would this become a new classroom of the mind?

Telepathy

When Louis Braille introduced his tactile system of reading for the blind, it was met with resistance from the scientific and educational establishment. In the mid-19th century, authorities at the institution Royale des Jeunes Aveugles in Paris actively opposed Braille’s system. They banned its use, destroyed Braille books, and punished students who continued to read or write using it.¹⁷

A similar scepticism is now directed at ‘Spellers' - non-speaking autistic people who use letterboards for spelling-based communication. This phenomenon is explored in The Telepathy Tapes podcast, where filmmaker Ky Dickens investigates reports of telepathic abilities and other ‘psi’ phenomena within the non-speaking autistic community. The series is supported by credible scientists, including Dr. Dianne Hennacy Powell¹⁸ and Dr. Rupert Sheldrake¹⁹, and presents compelling first-hand accounts suggesting that telepathy may not only exist but may also be an overlooked human and animal capability. The Telepathy Tapes is currently collecting funding to reproduce their findings under laboratory conditions.

If the findings can be replicated (which I very much hope they are), they would place telepathy within the realm of reality rather than fiction. This would inevitably raise new questions about how we might learn to access and refine this form of communication.

If telepathy were proven to be a latent human faculty, would we evolve beyond spoken language? Could this ability open new dimensions of understanding, empathy, and connection?

Interoception

Interoception is the hidden language of the body, a silent dialogue between the brain and our internal world that shapes emotions, intuition, resilience, and well-being. It is our ability to perceive the subtle signals of our own physiology.

Guen Bradbury

recently explored ‘Gut Feelings’ in one of her excellent Posts, which made me wonder how many of my students know how to listen to the language of their guts, beyond cravings and beneath constant satiation. And the gut is only one voice in this internal conversation.

Mastery of interoception could revolutionise health, cognition, and human connection. By deepening awareness of the body's signals, we may learn to detect illness early, regulate stress and inflammation, enhance emotional intelligence, and even optimise athletic and creative performance.

One ground-breaking clinical trial explored how mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) could reshape the brains of veterans with PTSD by enhancing interoceptive awareness. Over eight weeks, participants practised meditation and body awareness exercises. The results showed significant reductions in PTSD symptoms, along with increased neural activity associated with relaxation, attention, and self-awareness. Most strikingly, changes in heartbeat-evoked brain responses correlated with symptom relief, highlighting interoception as a key mechanism for emotional healing.²⁰

Could interoceptive training and somatic therapy become part of education itself? Could it foster not only emotional intelligence but also self-regulation, cognitive resilience, and well-being?

Other Frontiers

Taken together, these examples hint at a much broader landscape of human potential. While many of these capacities are supported by early-stage or emerging research and may require further exploration and validation, they are part of a much larger landscape of untapped human capacities. These examples represent only a small selection of what we might yet discover and develop. Beyond them, countless other frontiers remain, waiting to be taken seriously in education.

From altered states of consciousness and flow states, to human echolocation, acquired savantism, and the hidden powers of neuroplasticity, the map of human possibility is far from complete. Emerging research into bioluminescence, electromagnetic sensitivity, hyperscanning, and even brain-to-brain communication invites us to reconsider what it means to be human.

The purpose of this essay is not to catalogue every emerging capacity, but to suggest that education must begin to ask a different kind of question: not only what knowledge should we transmit, but what dormant potentials within the human are waiting to be cultivated?

Education as the Cultivation of Human Possibility

In an age of super-intelligent machines, we must return to an old but urgent question: What does it mean to be human? This article has explored only a few of the many human possibilities that remain largely neglected in our systems of education. At a time when students struggle to find meaning within the walls of school, the moment is ripe to imagine new frontiers of purpose. Perhaps it’s time to move beyond the false promise of certainty that education so often clings to, and instead embrace the uncertain and unexplored.

What if we approached school not as a place for instruction, but as a place for inquiry; where questioning, investigation, and engagement with uncertainty become the central practices of learning? What if we applied the spirit of science not only to the external world but also to the self? Might curiosity, wonder, and self-investigation become fuel for learning?

As we can now leverage the power of our intellects with AI, exploring more deeply and creating more powerfully, we might turn our attention inwards. The time has come to cultivate the neglected domains of our humanity: sensitivity, awareness, embodied intelligence, creativity, empathy, relationship, and love. In doing so, we may begin to reclaim a richer, more balanced vision of what it means to be human; one where the intellect serves, rather than defines, the astonishing capacities of the human sensorium.

1. Levin, M. [@Theories of Everything with Curt Jaimungal]. (2024, March 10). Bioelectricity is the software of life — Dr. Michael Levin | Polymath Medical Conference [Video]. YouTube.

2. Gardner, H. (2011). Frames of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences (3rd ed.). Basic Books.

3. Eagleman, D. (2015, March). Can we create new senses for humans? [Video]. TED Conferences.

4. Eagleman, D. (2015). The brain: The story of you. Pantheon Books.

5. Eagleman, D. M., & Perrotta, M. V. (2023). The future of sensory substitution, addition, and expansion via haptic devices. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 16, Article 1055546. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2022.1055546

6. Meijer, P. B. L. (1992). An experimental system for auditory image representations. IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, 39(2), 112-121. https://doi.org/10.1109/10.121642

7. Bach-y-Rita, P., Collins, C. C., Saunders, F. A., White, B., & Scadden, L. (1969). Vision substitution by tactile image projection. Nature, 221(5184), 963-964. https://doi.org/10.1038/221963a0

8. Cheok, A. D., Karunanayaka, K., & Ranasinghe, N. (2011). Digital taste: Electronic stimulation of taste sensations. Proceedings of the International Conference on Advances in Computer Entertainment Technology, 2011, 1-4. https://doi.org/10.1145/2071423.2071451

9. Okamoto, S., Nagano, H., & Yamada, Y. (2011). Psychophysical dimensions of tactile perception of textures. IEEE Transactions on Haptics, 3(2), 196-207. https://doi.org/10.1109/TOH.2010.19

10. Gilbert, M., Busund, R., Skagseth, A., & Grønseth, G. (2000). Resuscitation from accidental hypothermia of 13.7°C with circulatory arrest. The Lancet, 355(9201), 375-376. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(99)07003-1

11. NASA. (2023). Studying torpor in animals for space-health in humans (STASH). NASA. Retrieved from https://www.nasa.gov/general/studying-torpor-in-animals-for-space-health-in-humans/

12. European Space Agency (ESA). (2023). Research into human hibernation for long-distance spaceflight. SpaceRef. Retrieved from https://spaceref.com/newspace-and-tech/research-into-human-hibernation-for-long-distance-spaceflight/

13. Kox, M., van Eijk, L. T., Zwaag, J., van den Wildenberg, J., Sweep, F. C., van der Hoeven, J. G., & Pickkers, P. (2014). Voluntary activation of the sympathetic nervous system and attenuation of the innate immune response in humans. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 111(20), 7379–7384. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1322174111

14. Stumbrys, T., Erlacher, D., & Schredl, M. (2016). Effectiveness of motor practice in lucid dreams: A comparison with physical and mental practice. Journal of Sports Sciences, 34(1), 27-34. https://doi.org/10.1080/02640414.2015.1030342

15. Stumbrys, T., & Daniels, M. (2010). An exploratory study of creative problem solving in lucid dreams: Preliminary findings and methodological considerations. International Journal of Dream Research, 3(1), 27-36. https://doi.org/10.11588/ijodr.2010.2.6167

16. Konkoly, K. R., Appel, K., Chatelle, C., Scheel, M., Tsakiris, M., Vanhaudenhuyse, A., ... & Paller, K. A. (2021). Real-time dialogue between experimenters and dreamers during REM sleep. Current Biology, 31(11), 2292-2298. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2021.01.026

17. Weygand, Z. (2009). The blind in French society from the Middle Ages to the century of Louis Braille. Stanford University Press.

18. An interesting article by Dr. Powell addressing a critical published article. Dr. Powell outlines a history of scepticism and her evidence-driven defence. https://thetelepathytapes.com/dr-powell-defense

19. I’m particularly fond of Dr. Sheldrakes work with animals and the Nkisi the telepathic parrot, which resulted in The Telepathy Debate at the London RSA. https://www.sheldrake.org/research/animal-powers

20. ​Kang, S. S., Sponheim, S. R., & Lim, K. O. (2022). Interoception underlies therapeutic effects of mindfulness meditation for posttraumatic stress disorder: A randomized clinical trial. Biological Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging, 7(8), 793–804. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bpsc.2021.10.005