Researchers cause out-of-body experiences

An enduring mystery for each human being is the question "What is consciousness?" Or in other words, "How is it that I perceive whatever it is that is me?

To make the question more personal, consider that as you read this, you are aware that you are reading it, and for most of us that person - that self-aware you - is looking out at the world from somewhere behind your eyes.

Who or what is that looking out from behind your eyes?

A little over 20 years ago Marvin L. Minsky published a fascinating book entitled The Society of the Mind. In it he points out that the mind actually consists of a lot of relatively simple functions. In order to get the body to do anything, there has to be a function that links together the necessary simply basic functions and activates them while suppressing those functions not needed.

Interestingly, those things we do most efficiently are things in which we are not aware that we are doing all this linking and activating of lesser functions. When we get good at doing something, it becomes unconscious, like driving a car. But when we have a problem or things cease to be routine, then we become conscious of the process and attempt to modify it. Whoever it is that becomes aware of the process is that thing we call our "self".

So what is this "self?"

No one knows, but presumably it is another function of the mind. [As an aside, remember that we are talking about the functions of the mind. How the physical brain creates the mind is another issue entirely. Let's not confuse the two things. Now, forget about the mind-brain connection for the moment and let's get back to the present issue.]

One characteristic of this "self" is that we normally identify it with our body. So how do we deal with reports of "Out of body experiences?"

Out of body experiences are subjective - that is, only the person who is having it can actually know he or she is having it. Since it can't be measured, a behaviorist psychologist would simply ignore such reports of events. Unmeasurable psychological events cannot be scientifically studied according to Behaviorism. But what if a researcher could induce such events, and the reports of the resulting "out of body experiences" could be correlated to the efforts to induce them?

Talking Points Memo provides the following Associated Press report, sourced from the Journal Science. (The journal is subscription only.)

Researchers in England and Switzerland have figured out ways to confuse the sensory signals received by the brain, allowing people to seem to be standing aside and watching themselves. [Snip]

Dr. Henrik Ehrsson of University College London's Institute of Neurology and the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, explained that he was interested in a person's perception of the "self."

"I'm interested in the question of why I feel that my self is located inside my physical body. How does my brain know that I am standing right here," he said.
And what would happen to the self if a person could effectively move their eyes to another part of the room and observe themselves from an outside perspective? Would the self move with the eyes, or stay in the body, he wondered.

So seated volunteers were fitted with head-mounted video displays that allowed them to view themselves from behind, using a pair of video cameras, one for each eye.
A researcher would stand behind them and extend a plastic rod which they could see toward the area just below the cameras. At the same time another plastic rod, which they could not see, touched their chest.

The volunteers said they experienced the feeling of being behind their own body watching. Many found it "weird" and seemingly real, though not scary.
They felt "that their center of awareness 'self' is located outside their physical bodies and that they look at their bodies from the perspective of another person," he reported.

"The idea is to change the visual input and its relationship to the tactile information," he said. "The brain is always trying to interpret sensory information. The brain can trick itself."

In a second test, Ehrsson connected sensors to the skin to measure electrical conductance, which indicates emotional response.

He then allowed them to watch a hammer swing down to a point below the camera, as though it were going to hurt an unseen portion of the virtual body.
Their skin conductance registered emotional responses including fear, indicating they sensed their selves had left their physical bodies and moved to the virtual bodies where the hammer was swung.

The research has applications in neuroscience and also potentially in industrial applications involving virtual reality, he said.

So who is looking out from behind your eyes if whoever it is can be fooled into thinking it is looking at the back of your head?