Before I try to explain, let give a brief background on my methods and how I can talk about quantifying anything of this nature. It all lies in inductive reasoning, that is, reasoning from the specific to general. A lot of the time induction is looked down on a bit in comparison to deduction--to the point where Sherlock Holmes claims to reason by deduction, but actually uses induction.
Still, induction is the kind of reasoning one does every day. Things like looking out at the sky, seeing it filled with black clouds, and thinking 'It's probably going to rain' are likely induction--most of the time, very dark clouds do mean rain. After years of seeing that, one reacts automatically to the condition and expects it to happen. Induction also crops up a lot of the time in dealing with people. For instance, if one gets in a heated discussion with a friend whenever one mentions, say, the recent US election, and one hears someone bringing up it around this person, one would probably expect an argument.
There are risks involved with induction. One of the major ones is a false cause, that is making erroneous linkages between things, particularly between two things that happen close together. This is something I watch for by checking repeatability. That is to say, if something happens once, I'm going to try to avoid deciding that event B was caused by event A, even if it seems likely. If it happens again, I might flag it as something to collect data on and watch. If it seemingly happens every time, after awhile, I'll look at the pattern and see if I can get any sort of general rule or cause-effect relationship from it. I'll also start trying to check with other people and see if the same sort of thing happens to them, apparently for the same reasons.
So essentially, it works like this: I start with UPP, unsubstantiated personal perceptions, things that happen to me, but that I don't understand the reasons for or feel enough confidence about to declare as 'real.' For instance, say I drink ginger tea and that night, dream about Loki. If the next time I drink ginger tea, I dream about Loki that night, I might start to think, 'Hey, that's odd. I drink ginger tea, and get these dreams about Loki.'
From repeated UPPs, I move to a UPG, unsubstantiated personal gnosis--an idea that seems to work for me and explain what's going on. To continue with the ginger tea, example, if I continued drinking ginger tea at night and having dreams involving Loki the same night, after awhile, I'd probably come up with some sort of causal connection, like 'Ginger tea gives you dreams involving Loki.'
Then, I'd start trying to check with other people, seeing if they'd shared any similar experiences, if they'd noticed a similar pattern. If say, Mary, Mark, and Mordred (these are random names--I'm trying to avoid picking on any list members), admitted that yes, they also had this kind of experience, and knew that drinking ginger tea at night would lead to dreams about Loki, then I might start calling it an SPG, a substantiated personal gnosis. With other people also having the same experience and noticing the same pattern, the chances of falling into false cause are probably reduced, so it's more serious.
If, after awhile, I and the other people who heard about this SPG kept testing it, bringing it before others, and keep finding confirmation, finding that it looks like about everybody who drinks ginger tea dreams of Loki that night, it could become a SCG, substantiated community gnosis. That would carry more weight than a UPG or SPG because it would have been examined and tested by more people, who probably different tests too, making the chance of error less.
I do think, by the way, that most people do go through these kind of stages in evaluating ideas and trying to quantify them. Unfortunately, however, it seems that a lot of times, when people talk about UPGs, they leave the background out, just saying something like 'Ginger tea makes you dream about Loki,' presenting it nearly as if it were a fact, but without giving the background. This can make the UPG look very odd--in fact, it can lead to it being rejected out of hand, particularly if it sounds at all odd.
That's why I thought I'd better take the time to explain where I was coming from first, how I can talk about repeated patterns and quantifying. And before I go on, let me assure everyone that the ginger tea example isn't real, just something I was using to explain methods before going on to the real stuff. Ginger tea is great for a cold or a sore throat, but so far as I know, it doesn't really bring dreams of Loki.
First of all, let's take the computer connection. It seems like Loki does have some connection somehow with computers and/or the net. I'm not just saying that because it's entertaining to picture him as a hacker, though I enjoy doing so. It's that I do notice him hanging out more often when I'm around a computer. Other people I've talked to have noticed similar things. It wouldn't surprise me at all if most people here had a few stories about Loki and computers and/or the net. This connection is something that's repeated...again, and again, in all kinds of ways.
Curiously, the strongest and perhaps easiest to explain computer-based pattern that I've investigated so far involves ICQ. Repeatedly, messages involving Loki's reactions to things have crossed, messages that essentially say the same thing, making it clear that he's responding about the same way to different people who are geographically separated. The first time it happened, it was pretty spooky...the second time, more so. But after awhile, as it happened again and again, it started to seem like something Loki just does. So it appears that Loki pays attention to ICQ conversations about himself and somehow manages to respond to the conversation a bit on both sides.
Second, there's Loki's usual manner of appearing (which probably does vary a bit by individual). I do have a good imagination, and my first reaction was to completely dismiss him as nothing more than imagination. But Loki wouldn't go away: he kept coming back, in about the same manner, in the same place, on the left (I'm not going to go into my mental geography because it would take a long time to explain and this post will be quite long enough without that). And unlike imagination, I couldn't manipulated what I saw of him--I tried, but his appearences simply don't handle in the way that my imagination does: I can't replay, I can't rewrite bits. Furthermore, I'd have to add that it seems like Loki may be rather visual. That I usually see him could be a hallmark of my own highly visual orientation. That a number of other people also see him, even when they're not necessarily that visual, makes a stronger case for it.
Then, there's the method in which Loki seems to operate: through coincidences. Coincidences are one of the easiest things to misjudge, by the way, so I resisted this one for a long time, but when things happen repeatedly, apparently in response to the same circumstances, it does seem like there's something going on. Other gods may also work through coincidences. I only really deal with Loki at this point, so I have no idea how any other such entity might manage.
What started to get me noticing this was blotting, actually. If Loki is apparently paying attention when I blot, in the next day or two, I'll find some unexpected and helpful things happening, like former staff members whom I'd thought had completely vanished coming to help out with Arythia, finding or book orders arriving. Or after asking for some help on an issue, finding the next morning that I wouldn't need to commit any more time to something that was taking up time which I needed for coding. On occasion, this kind of coincidence has kept up for the better part of a week.
If this kind of thing just happened once or twice, I could disregard it easily. But it does seem to happen virtually every time after a blot where it seems like Loki's hanging out and listening.