Can a thought be classified as a sense?

Ah, but it IS the brain that sees and hears!

To simplify with example, you could say that the senses pass through a type of "governor" in the brain, and that limiting function makes the decision on what to perceive.

The images that your eyes receive are projected upside down, and the brain turns them around, and also fills in the "blind spot" with whatever continuation of image it deems necessary to complete the picture.

Your brain also filters out perception of light that is beyond the spectrum detected by the average human eye.

Your brain will only allow your ears to register the range of hearing appropriate to a human being; we don't hear what a rat hears, or what a dog hears. Yet these noises are in the environment.

The brain is constantly filtering out what is not necessary for human life.

Your dog will be able to detect every separate, distinct taste in a jumble of table scraps, whereas the human brain is a bit more lazy about it, and will allow one flavor to overwhelm the others. it's not that the taste buds are less accurate, it's that brain again.

People don't much understand how the brain limits us, and they imagine it is a thing so powerful that nothing can escape its notice.

I'm inclined to think that thought is far more than a sense. I think thought is what determines how we receive and respond to our senses. In other words, like why we develop a preference for certain things while others develop a preference for something different. We each have different likes and dislikes, and this I believe comes from thought rather than sense. The human body is an amazing filter, but it is the mind that ultimately filters everything, not the senses. Existence consists of two types of information, the body and brain deal with objective information, while the mind deals with both the subjective and objective information. In other words, the mind merges both the subjective and objective information into one, thus creating thought. This merging of the two types of information is how we ultimately come to KNOW, and this is why when we truly know something, thought, body and brain are no longer necessarry relative to what we know. That is, when you know something you don't need to think about knowing it, you know you know.

I suppose you could say that everything exists so the mind has something to do. I know I think, but I also know that I am more than just my thoughts. We are all ultimately that which KNOWS existence, but there is simply so much more to know. I guess what comes next is knowing how to use our knowledge in a way that benefits everyone and everything. A new way of thinking will achieve this, but our current way of thinking can only come to know so much. In other words, our minds will be evolved, but not by ourselves.

A most excellent question!

Since we can stand back and observe our thoughts at a distance, obviously we are not our thoughts.

The brain is a noise generator. Most people are stuck in the thought stream, only half awake = a state of light hypnosis. Some have climbed up on the bank and observe the thought stream going by.

I answer no: thought is not a sense.

The brain is very good at fooling us by filling in the gaps. For example, you never notice when you blink your eyes. But the brain is always living in the past; it can only fill the gaps with what's already in its inventory. For example, UFOs. Since forever people have seen unidentifiable things in the sky. In the past it was chariots of fire or whatever. It was not until 1948 that we started seeing "flying saucers" because prior to that the concept of rockets and humans going into space did not exist. Something's there but the brain interprets it, fills in the 'gaps' with only what it already knows, its inventory of symbols.

A thought can not be classified as a sense.

But! Humans do have a 6th sense. Intuition. We are not alone but are connected to (for lack of better terms) spiritual or mystical / metaphysical forces. Some scientists are beginning to believe that a lot of our memory is stored in the ether, that the brain is a transceiver to something greater than ourselves. Some call this God.

"You must learn the ways of The Force if you are to accompany me to Alderon."

-ObiWan-

Humans have a lot more than five senses. It turns out, there are at least nine senses and most researchers think there are more like twenty-one or so.

Just for reference, the commonly held definition of a “sense” is “any system that consists of a group of sensory cell types that respond to a specific physical phenomenon and that corresponds to a particular group of regions within the brain where the signals are received and interpreted."

Actually, yes. But not "sense" in the way we mean "sense" now. Aristotle coined the term "common sense":

"Apart from using our eyes to see and our ears to hear, we regularly and effortlessly perform a number of complex perceptual operations that cannot be explained in terms of the five senses taken individually. Such operations include, for example, perceiving that the same object is white and sweet, noticing the difference between white and sweet, or knowing that one's own senses are active. Observing that other animals must be able to perform such operations, and being unprepared to ascribe any share in rationality to them, Aristotle explained such operations with reference to a higher-order perceptual capacity which unites and monitors the five senses. This capacity is known as the ‘common sense’ (koine aisthesis, sensus communis)."

http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acpr...

It may be why we now refer to a "sixth" sense outside of the 5 material ones.

http://ndpr.nd.edu/news/24129-aristotle-on-the-com...

beyond the 5 senses, there are "extrasensory perceptions" like, thought, intuition, instinct.. when we "pick up on a vibe", we are using "extrasensory" perceptions

It is a great source of error to believe that there is no perception in the soul besides those of which it is conscious - Gotffried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716)

Maybe our strongest 'sense', Architect.

I personally would have to say NO!!