Physics met psychics yesterday when two researchers presented findings they said could prove humans have psychic abilities—at least three seconds’ worth.

The research—which focused on the autonomic nervous system’s response to stimulus—shows that the human body might be hard-wired with a sixth sense to predict threatening events about three seconds in advance, according to the researchers, Edwin C. May and Joseph W. McMoneagle.

May, a parapsychologist who holds his doctorate in physics, told an audience in William James Hall that he thinks the findings are promising.

“Looking into the future is totally impossible, but if what we’re proposing is true, then that’s exactly what we’re capable of,” said May, who serves as executive director of the Cognitive Sciences Laboratory in Palo Alto, Calif.

In the experiment, isolated subjects wore headphones and listened as a random generator triggered a second of white noise or a second of silence between intervals of 40 to 80 seconds.

The research showed that skin conductance—an indictor of nervous system activity—increased during a three-second period of time before the subjects heard the white noise.

“If this research is true, which is still a big ‘if,’ it suggests that human beings are capable of sensing a few seconds in advance a future surprise or threat even though there’s no conscious way of detecting it,” May said. “It’s terribly controversial.”

McMoneagle, who runs his own firm called Intuitive Intelligence Applications, offered the example of soldiers who stop just short of land mines—for no apparent reason—on battlefields as possible manifestations of this ability.

May said he hypothesizes there is a “pro-survival mechanism” that helps humans and animals avoid hazards every day. He attributes this ability to an “additional sensory system.”

A skeptical audience questioned everything from the soundproof quality of the headphones to the “notoriously awful” Windows operating system that was used to record the timing during experiments, but May remained unfazed.

“We love scepticism,” May said.

He said he hopes that after the research is published, other groups will do independent studies to corroborate his findings.