I can do that, it's just having a mental image of the room and building I'm in, as well as the surrounding landscape, sky, and where the sun rises and sets. Even if I have to pass through a bunch of twisting corridors, there's just a mental arrow in my head that's always being updated in the background when I turn.

No, that's just orientation, I can do that too. Playing first-person games like Descent improves the orientation.

The true compass would be if you could be blinded, walked through some turns, and you could still pick up north, having no idea about how you got into the surroundings.

Yeah but you can always pick up based on observational cues.

Real test would be spin around in a dark room without any cues can you pick out true north.

I think you just said the exact same thing.

Is that something that you learned how to do? Any suggestions for picking up this skill?

Try playing First person shooter games that don't have a map. But as I said in a sibling comment, it's just orientation using memory, not a compass.

When I was a kid at some point I just realized I could close my eyes and try to visualize my room that I knew really well. And then I'd imagine what it would look like if I looked at it making a 90 degree right turn. Then visualizing what happens if I walked out of the room, then up the stairs, etc. And then trying to make sure that as I'm doing these turns around corners in my house, connecting it with if I'm facing north/east/south/west until it became second nature to know that. And then as I got older I connected it implicitly with other senses of my surroundings (e.g. time of day + location of sun = you know which direction).

I'd just sit for like 5-10 minutes at a time every day doing that until I got "bored" by the skill. Not necessarily sure if it's something you can practice as I know there's actual brain structural differences that can determine whether you have this skill and how advanced it is, and I'd imagine it's potentially harder to rewire your brain for this as an adult.

I found "Natural Navigator" by Tristan Gooley to be a fascinating read with a lot of good ways to train your navigation skills without instruments.

I think its different - you're keeping track of something, whereas some creatures can evidently just feel the earths magnetic field.

Hah, I thought you meant a literal cat.

Our dogs do that. There's a building we used to go up with six elevators. Three on each side of the hallway facing each other. Without hesitation the dogs will pick the correct direction to go coming out of the elevator. Whereas I always had to check because it all looks the same and depending on which side the elevator is on you have to turn left or right.

It's like they have an innate sense of where they are.

Could there be a different smell or air-flow coming from one side versus the others?

My apartment building has identical elevator lobbies. I thought my dog was smart by not leaving the elevator on seemingly identical incorrect floors. But actually I think she just knows what home smells like.

Not sure, but I wouldn't think so. They'd basically spring out of the elevator with no hesitation.

Lots of people have a good "sense of direction" in terms of an awareness of their surroundings that keeps track of cardinal directions. It also correlates with an ability to use other indicators to reinforce or reacquire this awareness.

Put me on some winding singletrack in the woods, or driving around an unfamiliar part of town, and I'll remember an imaginary map of where I've been and which directions I've turned, and be able to tell you where north is all day. If I forget, there are context clues everywhere - it's late afternoon here in Michigan so the sun is setting in the southern sky, pointing south-southwest. I'm currently in a windowless manufacturing facility, but I know where the front door is and I remember that's on the west side of the building, so I'm facing east. It helps a lot that many roads and buildings are indexed to be precisely aligned with the compass. It also helps that my Garmin GPS watch has a built-in compass, so if I ever need to shoot a bearing precisely, I train and recalibrate this sense of direction.

But if you put a blindfold on me, sit me down on an office chair, spin it around for a couple minutes as you wheel me down the hall and into an unfamiliar room...after I have finished retching, I hypothesize that I'd have no sensation to tell me where north is.

I appreciate the author's study design here - the source PDF [1] and linked website [2] describe feeding the turtles in the same pool, but exposing them to varied magnetic fields by surrounding the pool in a giant Helmholtz coil. It's not as if they flew the turtles alternately to New Hampshire and to the Gulf of Mexico, which might leave lots of context clues in light or smell or taste, but as if they effectively teleported them to an identical pool of water with slightly different magnetic fields.

[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-08554-y.epdf?shar...

[2] https://oceanweb.sites.oasis.unc.edu/www.unc.edu/depts/ocean...

You maybe meant "magnetic north", not "true north"?

Or if you meant what you wrote, then fairly safe to rule out magnetism from being involved! (I suspect it's not involved either way, but I don't know anything)

(Explanation of the difference between true and magnetic norths: https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/true-north-magnetic-nor... )

I can sense magnetic fields of some strength through my nasal bone. Its like a metallic taste except its not where your taste buds are.

I don't know if its rare? I think most people just never held a magnet against their face.

You should probably approach some of the people investigating this.

People get exposed to extremely strong magic fields when getting an MRI. So that’s probably not it.

On the surface this looks like a non-sequitur. I'm not sure what people getting exposed to strong magnetic fields while getting an MRI has to do with detecting a magnetic field. Are you saying something like "we should have been able to detect this"? This doesn't seem correct to me, because the magnetic field is through the aperture of the MRI -- ie head to toe in most MRI applications. If the MRI field is orthogonal to earth's typical magnetic pole, you wouldn't expect the same signal. I'm skeptical of a claim from a person that they can "detect" the earth's magnetic field, but I don't think "we have MRIs" implies anything about that ability.

They're responding to this part

> I don't know if its rare? I think most people just never held a magnet against their face.

If it were not rare, and simply because most people haven't held a magnet against their nose, people would definitely feel it during an MRI scan, since those are much much much stronger than any regular magnet. An MRI will rip a nose piercing right out of you, a regular magnet you'd have around the home couldn't do that.

“I think most people just never held a magnet against their face.”

I don’t think they comprehend just how strong an MRI is. You don’t need to be inside the machine for it to be the strongest magnetic field you’ve experienced, that’s likely true if you’re in the room nearby. Sure it falls as the square of the distance, but those suckers are big. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLjxhuybFWo

For comparison earths magnetic field is ~50 microtesla vs an MRI at 200,000 to 7,000,000, with 1.5 million microtesla (aka 1.5 T or 15,000 gauss) being common.

Most people haven't been in an MRI, either. I only know about their existence from TV.

That doesn’t really matter here. ~300k people in the US get an MRI per year (significantly more are near the things) and they have been around since the 1970’s.

If simply waving weak magnetic fields in people’s faces were enough for anything close to 1% of people to notice then it would be common knowledge at this point.

When the signal is strong enough you don’t need careful experiments to pick out the difference. IE the rest of the universe outside of earth isn’t made of antimatter because our telescope’s aren’t on fire. https://what-if.xkcd.com/114/

Let me break it down for you.

In electromagnetic fields both an electric field and a magnetic field are produced. They are orthogonal to one another (in 2D with 2 vectors this is perpendicular, orthogonal is when the vector is in a different dimension with respect to multiple reference dimensions). So, detection of a magnetic field could be based on the detection of this orthogonal electric field in the presence of a magnetic field. Highly sensitive electrical detection cells triggered by a magnetic field would be orientation specific, because the more "out of orientation" the less strong the signal.

Also, we could easily have chalked this effect up to a "weird side effect" of metallic taste during MRI[0] which would be more pronounced when the head is moved during the MRI[1].

Hopefully it is clear now why "I think lots of people would have noticed it" is not a great argument against the possibility of humans evolving the detection of magnetic fields. Please let me know if I can clarify anything.

[0] https://mriquestions.com/metallic-taste.html

[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17969179/

Sure, you can clarify why you think someone walking up to and then getting inside an MRI would only experience a specific orientation?

It’s obviously false, but I’m curious why you assume it would be the case.

As to your example, that’s well known even with only 1 in 20 people experiencing it, thus demonstrating my point.

Apparently you have not had an MRI or studied MRI.

1) The people operating the MRI are outside the magnetic field.

2) The patient in the MRI is oriented such that the magnetic field is directed from head to toe (where the effect on sensing apparatus in place which might detect earth's magnetic field while standing or sitting would be approximately zero, no matter the magnetic strength).

3) Instructions for the patient in the MRI are to remain as still as possible to reduce imaging noise. So, most patients do not move their head much at all.

I'm sorry you seem to be unwilling to even consider the physics, and apparently didn't bother to look at the second reference. I am also sorry that I am having trouble explaining concepts that most biomedical engineers readily understand as the reasons why "but MRI!" is not a valid argument. Regardless, I hope you have a wonderful weekend.

> The people operating the MRI are outside the magnetic field.

That’s not how magnetic fields work. It’s not some sci-fi force field that cuts off instantly, the field drops off quickly but it doesn’t disappear. Which is why as mentioned in your second link workers noticed the effect.

> unwilling to even consider the physics

Again, you’re seemingly unaware of the actual physics involved.

MRI’s operate via two different electromagnets which create magnetic fields. A really strong one which is on 24/7, and a separate field which is turned off and on in operation and thus doesn’t correlate with earths magnetic field.

So when you walk up to the machine you’re “in” the same giant field just as when you’re inside the machine (or even sitting in some other room in the hospital if we want to be pedantic). This is why it’s relatively common for chairs etc to be yanked across the room and smack into the machines.

And thus, if people could directly sense the orientation of earths magnetic field, being anywhere near an MRI would be a really obvious and novel experience.

Oh good, they noticed the effect too. It's almost as if many people experience the effect, but somehow to you it's impossible for any humans to be able to take advantage of the effect at lower field strengths.

When you walk up to the machine it's not turned on. Then non-participants go to the small enclosed control room and then the magnet is activated. Every time you respond you reveal how little you know about MRI and weaken your case. You should stop while you are behind.

Also, you should lookup faraday cage. They're like magic to someone who has never heard of them, and they're used in MRI control rooms.

I feel sorry for your apparent inability to accept you might be ignorant about anything. I hope you grow out of it one day. Enjoy your weekend, I won't be responding again.

> When you walk up to the machine it's not turned on.

False. MRI: https://mriquestions.com/is-field-ever-turned-off.html

Permanent magnet scanners are permanently "on" by definition.

Resistive electromagnet scanners, in theory, can be turned on and off. However, it may take 30-60 minutes for their magnetic fields to stabilize after being off and hence they are generally left continuously on during daily operations. To save electricity, they are usually turned off or have their power levels reduced after hours.

Superconducting scanners remain on at all times as long as superconducting temperatures are maintained. The main field may be ramped down for servicing in a controlled manner with minimal loss of cryogens in about 30 minutes and restored in a few hours, but this is performed only occasionally. In the event of an emergency, all superconducting scanners have a "quench" button that releases liquid helium into the atmosphere and turns their fields off within a few seconds. Dumping that helium is inherently expensive and only done in a serious emergency.

“Faraday cages cannot block stable or slowly varying magnetic fields, such as the Earth's magnetic field (a compass will still work inside one).” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faraday_cage

> then the magnet is activated

A magnet not THE primary one. Here’s a reasonable though simplified explanation of why there’s multiple magnets involved: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NlYXqRG7lus

Anyway, it’s clear you have many fundamental misunderstandings so I can see how you’d come to such wildly inaccurate conclusions.

> it's impossible for any humans to be able to take advantage of the effect at lower field strengths.

The actual literature investigating the effect describes why it doesn’t work on earths magnetic field.

Someone who does not know that MRI has variable field strength is someone who truly does not know the basics of MRI.

Maybe this source will clue you in as to why your understanding of MRI is fundamentally flawed:

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4632105/

Good luck buddy.

I’m aware, which is why I’ve said repeatedly there’s multiple magnets involved one vastly weaker than the other which is kept on…

But wallow in your ignorance, it brings a little dark joy knowing I am simply better than you in a real tangible way.

You’re unable to erase signs of your failure, and as long as HN lasts anyone can know my dominance.

Hahaha. Thank you for the laugh. It must be great walking around with such an unwavering sense of superiority. Enjoy the dark joy of your perceived vast superiority and try not to have a breakdown when you come crashing back to reality. May you never crash and forever be certain in your vast delusions of superiority all the rest of your days. Very rarely have I seen a more foolish certainty. Congratulations.

You could join on the dark side.

All it takes is learning how the fundamental forces of the universe work.

Ok, in this context having a friend who works in medical imaging was useful, but that’s just a trivial matter.

Sounds more like you can taste static electricity.

Can he notice when it shifts? What happens when the magnetic field flips?

That's just spatial awareness. Put a giant magnet by his head. He'll still be able to do it.

Have you ever done any of these controlled experiments with giant helmets or blindfolds and elaborate movements to defeat orientation though?

I can just imagine the experimental set-up…”son, what the f** are you doing”. “Chill out dad, I’m just going to blind fold you and run some electricity through this coil, and you have to tell me where New Bedford is, got it”. “I told you you ain’t getting no inheritance”. Etc

Atleast when I was younger I always felt like I could point towards north within 20-30 degrees at any time. I tried testing it out many times, and was right the vast majority of the time, even when trying to eliminate possible subconscious factors like sound reflections and what surface I was standing on. We do technically have the right associated nerves and structure for it, but obviously underdeveloped compared to animals who use it to live and survive, so I would totally believe it is possible to some extent, atleast among some people.

I would attribute part of it to practice, because when I was younger I spent a lot of times in the woods where you can easily get turned around following animal trails and skirting around obstacles, and finding your way back out accurately was extremely helpful.

Same with my old man. He is a farmer in southern India. All the farms nearby are super identical with tall beetlenut trees. Im often confused where we are and which direction is the house, he is not. He has set over a 100 water gates across the farms and the instructions he gives is always east face or turn the gate north facing as an example.

The aboriginal language Guugu Yimithirr, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guugu_Yimithirr_language, uses cardinal directions instead of relative, e.g. "That man is to the west of her" instead of "That man is to the left of her", which of course means that speakers need to be aware of the direction they are facing at all times, and thus these people have a remarkable sense of direction.

Can't remember where I first heard about this, I think it may have been a Malcolm Gladwell book, but in any case if you search you can find lots of articles on the topic.

Foxes can, and a brief search suggests cats may also?