10 Important Star Trek Details That Are Almost Never Mentioned

Star Trek is known for its realism, but there is often a fair amount of pseudoscience mixed in to keep things interesting.

In the Original Series episode Where No Man Has Gone Before, we learned that extrasensory perception (ESP) is real, and that Starfleet even had tests to determine someone's level of ESP power.

Extrasensory perception basically describes someone's ability to sense things beyond the standard five Human senses (touch, sight, sound, taste, and smell). These abilities can include telekinesis, telepathy, and precognition. ESP is almost always very weak in Humans, though there were ways to unlock the power. In Where No Man Has Gone Before, when the Enterprise travelled beyond the edge of the galaxy, an energy field activated the mental powers of Gary Mitchell and Elizabeth Dehner, who slowly began turning into godlike beings, using their ESP powers to bend reality to their whims, before eventually being defeated by Kirk.

So, while Human ESP is typically nothing that impressive (much less powerful than a Vulcan or Betazoid), it is interesting to know that these powers are present, and that Starfleet actively screens all officers to determine their ESP levels. Dehner even claimed that some Humans were able to sense future events, accurately guess the backs of playing cards, and even see through walls on occasion.