Mental telepathy has different meanings that can be a broad spectrum. Direct thought transference between people without using the five senses of sight, sound, taste, touch and smell is the most widely accepted meaning. There can be enormous differences in how that thought transfer or communication takes place, whether it is a hunch that proves right or being able to predict a plane crash happening at the moment it happens someplace else. Mental telepathy can encompass large ranges of thought transference from the most basic to more complex. We will attempt to understand the different meanings of mental telepathy.

NON-VERBAL COMMUNICATION

A form of non-verbal communication known as Kinesics can be construed as mental telepathy. Kinesics is the ability to communicate using eyes or body behaviors instead. Entire conversations can be had without saying a word, but the other person knows what you mean or are thinking, like parents communicating without speaking when they don't want their children to hear. Kinesics or non-verbal communication more easily attained between people who have a close relationship, such as?spouses, brothers and sisters, parents and children and at times close friends.

Many people however do not call this kind of communication as mental telepathy since as per them the people in question are using their senses and not just thoughts to communicate. However, mental telepathy does have a part to play in this mode of communication since studies tell us that this type of communication has a great success rate with people who known and are mentally in sync with each other than with mere strangers. However, some people may even turn down this statement and say that people who are familiar with each other are also used to each others body language or may have even developed non verbal cues and signals to communicate over a period of time.

EMPATHY

Empathy can be defined as the capability or the knack to understand the mental and emotional state of the other person by putting yourself in his place. Some people have a lot of empathy while some just don't have it. However, empathy is something that can be increased by persistence and training. You can take actors for instance. With time actors become experts in understanding the state of mind of the character that they play that they can even laugh and cry at the same things that the character does.

Sympathetic pain is another form of emotional mental telepathy, like feeling another person's pain as if it were your own. For example, you may experience a pain in your arm after witnessing someone close to you breaks their arm. Even though you know its fine, it is still an uncomfortable feeling. Overwhelming emotion, such as joy, grief, or depression, may cause you to feel the same emotion inside you, if it is somebody close to you. Long distance empathy or emotional mental telepathy is where a person suddenly knows or feels that someone close to them is in danger or is in pain, even though they are the person may be far away.

Psychologists dismiss such feelings as an overactive imagination instead of empathetic mental telepathy. It is true that they do have a point, as other senses, such as visual and audible stimulants are used here. Could we feel the sympathy pains if we did not see it? Yet, this does not explain the strange experiences of long-distance empathy

CONCRETE SYMBOL THOUGHT TRANSFERENCE

A form of mental telepathy that goes beyond the five senses is thought transference of concrete symbols and objects between two minds. Many times this requires a designated sender and receiver, training, practice and super strong concentration.

The principle behind this meaning of mental telepathy is – simpler the concept, the easier it is to communicate through thought alone. For example, simple things, like a color or shape as used in the example above, may be easier to convey than something more complex like an animal or a person's name.

Experiments in concrete levels telepathy use Zener cards to prove mental telepathy skills. They are simple, concrete black-and-white symbols (a circle, square, star, plus sign, and three wavy lines). Critics of the Zener cards have pointed out that with only five cards to choose from, there is a 20% chance of being right, even with random guesses. On the other hand, it may be easier for two people to send and receive thoughts if those are shared, known, and a limited set of concrete symbols. Although anyone can get a 20% success rate with enough guesses, there are success rates of 50% or higher in some cases.

ABSTRACT THOUGHT LEVELS

Mental telepathy at this level uses abstract thoughts, actions and ideas and goes beyond simple colors and shapes. Rarely do telepaths achieve this level of mental telepathy, and experiments have shown that do not do as well on these types of tests.

There are some animals which seem to have mental telepathy attunement and can communicate simple concepts like hunger, thirst and danger amongst their group. Though the lack of well developed brains inhibits them from transmitting more complicated messages, scientists are still trying to discern how mental telepathy happens with these animals.

There is a theory that humans were once capable of telepathy, but had no need to utilize it after they developed language to communicate. If this is true, then with the right stimulation humans should be able to stir up this dormant ability to communicate, if they choose to.

Other scientists believe that psychic powers and mental telepathy can exist and become part of the human communication options, however, they feel future means of communication could involve use of mental telepathy for mankind rather than something that was used and discarded from the past.