Much of the discussion of out-of-body experiences has
centered around
the recounting of experiences and speculation on the nature
of those
experiences. Some articles have questioned whether the
experiences are
of an hallucinatory nature or purely a function of biochemical
processes that occur in the brain, and, at the other extreme,
some
have linked them with notions of the existence of an immortal
soul and
other ideas generally associated with religious interpretations
of
human existence. Most readers are intrigued by the thought
of being
able to have and control OBEs, and see them as a potentially
interesting experience, though some smaller number of
people taking
part in discussions are interested in trying to figure
out their
nature and function and their possible implications for
the
understanding of what it means to be fully human.
What is an out-of-the-body experience?
Out-of-body-experiences (OBEs) are those curious, and
usually brief
experiences in which a person's consciousness seems to
depart from his
or her body, enabling observation of the world from a
point of view
other than that of the physical body and by means other
than those of
the physical senses. Thus, an out-of-the-body experience
can initially
be defined as 'an experience in which a person seems to
perceive the
world from a location outside his physical body' [Bla82].
In some
cases experients claim that they 'saw' and 'heard' things
(objects
which were really there, events and conversations which
really took
place) which could not have seen or heard from the actual
positions of
their bodies.
OBEs are surprisingly common; different surveys have yielded
somewhat
different results, but some estimates indicate that somewhere
between
one person in ten and one person in twenty is likely to
have had such
an experience at least once. Furthermore it seems that
OBEs can occur
to anyone in almost any circumstances. Researchers have
approached the
question of the timing of OBEs by asking people who claim
to have had
OBEs to describe when they happened. In one of these,
over 85 percent
of those surveyed said they had had OBEs while they were
resting,
sleeping or dreaming [Bla84]. Other surveys also show
that the
majority of OBEs occur when people are in bed, ill, or
resting, with a
smaller percentage coming while the person is drugged
or medicated
[Gre68a, Poy75]. But they can occur during almost any
kind of
activity. Green cites a couple of cases in which motor-cyclists,
riding at speed, suddenly found themselves floating above
their
machines looking down on their own bodies still driving
along.
Accidents did not ensue. Pilots of high-flying airplanes
(perhaps
affected by absence of vibration, and uniformity of sensory
stimulation) have similarly found themselves apparently
outside their
aircraft struggling to get in. One might well struggle
frantically
under such circumstances.
More curious still are reciprocal cases of OBE and apparition:
the OBE
subject, aware that he is operating in some kind of duplicate
body,
travels to a distant location where he sees a person and
is aware of
being seen by that person; this person confirms that he
saw an
apparition of the OBEer at the time that the OBEer claimed
to be in
his presence. Thus the two experiences corroborate each
other.
Not all OBEs occur spontaneously. Using various techniques,
some
people have apparently cultivated the faculty of inducing
them more or
less as desired, and a number have written detailed accounts
of their
experiences. These accounts do not always in all respects
square with
accounts given by persons who have undergone spontaneous
OBEs. For
instance the great majority of those who experience OBEs
voluntarily
state that they find themselves still embodied, but in
a body whose
shape, external characteristics, and spatial location
are easily
altered at will, and an appreciable number refer to an
elastic 'silver
cord' joining their new body to their old one. A much
smaller
percentage of those who undergo spontaneous OBEs mention
being
embodied, and some specifically state that they found
themselves
disembodied. The 'silver cord' is quite rarely mentioned.
It is hard
to avoid suspecting that many features of self- induced
OBEs are
determined by the subject's reading and his antecedent
expectations.
Common aspects of the experience include being in an 'out-of-body'
body much like the physical one, feeling a sense of energy,
feeling
vibrations, and hearing strange loud noises [GT84]. Sometimes
a
sensation of bodily paralysis precedes the OBE [Sal82,
Irw88, MC29,
Fox62]. OBEs, especially spontaneous ones, are often very
vivid, and
resemble everyday waking experiences rather than dreams,
and they may
make a considerable impression on those who undergo them.
Such persons
may find it hard to believe that they did not in fact
leave their
bodies, and they may draw the conclusion that we possess
a separable
soul, perhaps linked to a second body, which will survive
in a state
of full consciousness, perhaps even of enhanced consciousness,
after
death. Death would be, as it were, an OBE in which one
did not succeed
in getting back into one's body.
Such conclusions present themselves even more forcefully
to the minds
of those who have undergone a 'near-death experience'
(NDE). It is not
uncommon for persons who have been to the brink of death
and returned
-- following, say, a heart stoppage or serious injuries
from an
accident -- to report an experience (commonly of a great
vividness and
impressiveness) as of leaving their bodies, and traveling
(often in a
duplicate body) to the border of a new and wonderful realm.
Reports
suggest that the conscious self's awareness outside the
body is not
only unimpaired but enhanced: events which occurred during
the period
of unconsciousness are described in accurate detail and
confirmed by
those present. The subject sometimes 'hears' the doctor
pronouncing
him dead when he feels intensely alive and free from physical
pain,
and finds himself returning unwillingly to the constrictions
of the
physical body. If OBEs show the capacity of the conscious
self to have
experiences and perceptions outside the physical body,
near-death
experiences seem to suggest that this capacity still obtains
when the
physical body is totally unconscious.
The idea that we all have a double seems to spring naturally
out of
that of the OBE. If you seem to be leaving your physical
body and
observing things from outside it then it seems natural
to assume that,
at least temporarily, you had a double. It also seems
obvious that
this double could see, hear, think and move. This interpretation
is
not necessarily valid. As Palmer has so carefully pointed
out [Pal78a]
the experience of being out of the body is not equivalent
to the fact
of being out.
According to the English psychologist Susan Blackmore
the definition
of the OBE as an experience may not be a perfect definition
but one of
its major advantages is that it does not imply any particular
interpretation of the OBE. The consequences of this definition
are
important. First, since the OBE is an experience, then
if someone says
he has had an OBE we have to believe him. Conceivably
in the future we
might find ways of measuring, or establishing external
criteria for,
the OBE, but at the moment we can only take a person's
word for it.
Another related consequence is that the OBE is not some
kind of
psychic phenomenon. As Palmer has explained, 'the OBE
is neither
potentially nor actually a psychic phenomenon.' This view
is a natural
consequence of any experiential definition. A private
experience can
take any form you like. This experience may turn out to
be one
associated with ESP and paranormal events, but it may
not.
What are ESP, PK and psi?
'Extrasensory perception' (ESP) is a term coined by Dr.
J. B. Rhine of
Duke University. It covers any instance of the apparent
acquisition of
non- inferential knowledge of matters of fact without
the use of the
known sense organs. ESP is usually said to have three
varieties:
'telepathy,' in which the knowledge is of events in another
person's
mind, 'clairvoyance,' in which the knowledge is of physical
objects or
states of affairs; and 'precognition' (telepathic or clairvoyant),
where the knowledge relates to happenings still in the
future. The
word 'knowledge' is, however, not entirely appropriate,
for there may
be telepathic or clairvoyant 'interaction,' in which a
person's mental
state or actions may be influenced by an external state
of affairs,
though he does not 'know' or 'cognize' it.
Another American term is 'psychokinesis' (PK), the direct
influence of
mental events on physical events external to the agent's
body. 'Psi'
(from the Greek letter) is 'a general term to identify
personal
factors or processes in nature which transcend accepted
laws' [Gay74].
It is sometimes used to cover both ESP and PK.
What theories have been put forward to account for the OBE?
The notion of the human double has a long and colorful
history. Plato
gave us an early idea. He believed that what we see in
this life is
only a dim reflection of what the spirit could see if
it were released
from the physical. Imprisoned in a gross physical body,
the spirit is
restricted; separated from that body, it would be able
to converse
freely with the spirits of the departed, and see things
more clearly.
Another idea which can be traced to the Greeks is that
we have second
body. The spirit or some subtle body would be able to
see better
without its body. Aristotle taught that the spirit could
leave the
body and that it is capable of communicating with the
spirits, while
Plotinus held that all souls must be separable from their
physical
bodies. This 'doctrine of the subtle body' runs through
Western
tradition.
Homer regarded man as a composite being comprising three
distinct
entities, namely the body (soma), the 'psyche,' and the
thumos; this
last term is untranslatable, but is always closely associated
with the
diaphragm/midriff (phrenes), which was considered to be
the seat of
the will and feeling, perhaps even of the intellect. At
this stage
(800 - 750 BC) the term psyche had not come to mean personal
soul, but
rather it represented the impersonal life-principle which
dwells in
the body but which is unrelated to the intellect and the
emotions. A
fourth component, the 'image' ('eidolon'), might also
be included in
human make-up; it was this aspect of self which acted
and appeared in
dreams, where it was considered as a real figure.
Dionysus' early followers in Thrace reenacted his death
and
resurrection in a gruesome ceremony, where they tore a
live bull to
pieces with their teeth, and then roamed about the woods
shouting
frantically. Later rituals were hardly less barbaric and
frenzied; all
were calculated to induce a stage of religious madness
or mania. They
took place at night to the accompaniment of loud music
and cymbals,
thus exciting the chorus of worshippers who soon joined
in with shouts
of their own. Dancing was so violent that no breath was
left for
singing, and eventually the worshippers induced through
their excesses
a state of such exaltation and rapture that it seemed
to them that the
ordinary limits of life had been transcended, that they
were
'possessed,' their soul having temporarily left the body.
The soul was
in a condition of enthousiasmos (inside the god) and ekstasis
(outside
the body); liberated from the confines of the body it
enjoyed
communion with the god.
Perhaps the most pervasive idea relating to other bodies
is that on
death we leave our physical body and take on some subtler
or higher
form. This notion has roots not only in Greek thought
and in much of
later philosophy, but also in many religious teachings.
Some Eastern
religions include specific doctrines on the forms and
abilities of
other bodies and the nature of other worlds; and in Christianity
there
are references to a spiritual body. Some religious works
can be seen
as preparing the soul for its transition at death.
The Tibetan Book of the Dead, or Bardo Thodol (meaning
Liberation by
Hearing on the After-Death Plane) was first committed
to writing in
the eighth century AD, although the editor, Dr W. Y. Evans-Wentz,
has
no doubt that it represents 'the record of belief of innumerable
generations in a state of existence after death.' It is
thought that
its teachings were initially handed down orally, then
finally compiled
and recorded by a number of authors. The book is used
as a funeral
ritual, and is read out as a guide to the recently deceased.
It
contains an elaborate description of the moment of death,
the stages
of mind experienced by the deceased at various stages
of post-mortem
existence, and the path to liberation or rebirth, as the
case may be.
The Bardo body, also referred to as the desire- or propensity-body,
is
formed of matter in an invisible and etheral-like state
and is, in
this tradition, believed to be an exact duplicate of the
human body,
from which it is separated in the process of death. Retained
in the
Bardo body are the consciousness-principle and the psychic
nervous
system (the counterpart, for the psychic or Bardo body,
of the
physical nervous system of the human body) [Eva60]. Due
to its nature,
the Bardo body is able to pass through matter, which is
only solid and
impenetrable to the senses, but not to the instruments
of modern
physics; and the fact that the conscious self is not embedded
in
matter enables it to travel instantly where it desires.
Flights of the
imagination become objectively real, the wish comes true.
In his introductions to The Egyptian Book of the Dead
-- called in the
language of that people 'Pert Em Hru' ('Emerging by Day')
-- Wallis
Budge points out that its chapters 'are a mirror in which
are
reflected most of the beliefs of the various races which
went to build
up the Egyptians of history.' As all commentators have
hastened to
indicate, the Book of the Dead is not a unity but a collection
of
chapters of varying lengths and dating from different
ages. A
selection of these would be made for the deceased, and
would be copied
on the walls of the tomb or inscribed on the sides of
the sarcophagi;
or they might even be written on scrolls of papyri which
were then
laid within the folds of the bodycloths. The extracts
meant to benefit
the deceased in a variety of ways.
In the Egyptian Book of the Dead the perishable physical
body,
preservable only by mummification, is called the khat.
Next comes the
ka, which is generally translated as 'double,' and is
defined by
Wallis Budge as 'an abstract individuality or personality
which
possessed the form and attributes of the man to whom it
belonged, and,
though its normal dwelling place was in the tomb with
the body, it
could wander about at will; it was independent of the
man and could go
and dwell in any statue of him.'
The ba, or heart-soul, is depicted as a bird and is often
translated
as 'soul.' It is sometimes conceived of as an animating
principle
within the body, but elsewhere it is hinted that one only
becomes a ba
after death, when it either dwells with the ka in the
tomb or with Ra
or Osiris in heaven. The ba is often referred to in connection
with
the spiritual soul (khu), which was regarded as imperishable
and
existed in the spiritual body (sahu). The sahu was originally
considered to be a more material body, and may have formed
a part of
an early and literal view of the resurrection, whereby
the sahu, ba,
ka, khaibit (shadow) and ikhu (vital force) all came together
again
after 3,000 years, and the man was reanimated. Gradually
the sahu came
to be regarded as more spiritual in its compositions,
and the idea of
physical resurrection lost its prominence. It was believed
that this
sahu was germinated from the physical body, provided that
it was not
corrupt, and that the appropriate ceremonies had been
performed by the
priests.
The Egyptians agree with the Primitives and the Tibetans
in asserting
a form of continued existence after physical death. Their
notions are
less psychologically consistent and subtle than those
of the Tibetans,
but much more complex and symbolically developed than
those of the
Primitives, whom they resemble only in the earliest stages
of their
civilisation. Their unique features center round the overwhelming
dread of physical corruption and corresponding longing
for the
germination of the indestructible sahu in which the khu
will exist
'for millions and millions of years.'
One of the directly relevant ideas derives from the teachings
of
Theosophy. Within a scheme involving several planes and
several
bodies, the OBE is interpreted as a projection of the
'astral body'
from the physical body. Theosophical ideas have influenced
the
thinking and terminology of many OBE researchers since
many people
reporting OBEs have found terms like 'astral projection'
which derive
from Theosophy to be useful in describing their experiences.
Other
researchers, however, find such terminology and the model
it has been
devised to describe to be unnecessarily biased in favor
of a certain
'esoteric' interpretation of the actual experiences.
The idea that we have a double also appears in popular
mythology.
Often these doubles have sinister overtones, or are associated
with
the darker side of the psyche, but usually they are supposed
to be
quite harmless. These phenomena seem to be related to
the OBE in that
they involve a double, but there the resemblance ends.
Dean Sheils [She78] compared the beliefs of over 60 different
cultures
by referring to special files kept for anthropological
research. Of 54
cultures for which some information was reported, 25 (or
46%) claimed
that most or all people could travel outside the physical
body under
certain conditions. A further 23 (or 43%) claimed that
a few of their
number were able to do so, and only three cultures expressed
no belief
in anything of this nature. In a further three cultures
the
possibility of OBEs was admitted but the proportion of
people who
could experience it was not given. From this evidence,
we can conclude
that some form of a belief in out-of-body experiences
is very common
in various cultures.
Apparently, as many cultures interpret dreams as OBEs
as those which
do not. The notion that one may induce an OBE deliberately
is not
entirely absent from the cultures included by Sheils,
though it is
usually confined to certain types of people. Often only
shamans can
achieve OBEs, sometimes by using special drugs or methods
for inducing
a trance. Of those cultures described by Sheils, there
were several in
which there was a common belief that the soul could travel
in earthly
places, while in others the general belief was that the
soul could
only move in the world of the dead or spirits, and in
others both
kinds of soul travel were accepted.
There are stories of bilocation in which the physical
body exists and
acts in two separate places at once. But physical effects
in OBE are
rare. Also related to OBEs are the phenomena of traveling
clairvoyance, ESP projection and remote viewing. 'Traveling
clairvoyance' was used to describe a form of clairvoyance
in which a
medium or sensitive seemed to observe a distant place,
therefore it
included both OBEs and experiences in which the clairvoyant
'perceived' the distant scene but without any experience
of leaving
the body. In both 'traveling clairvoyance' and 'ESP projection'
the
occurrence of ESP is presupposed, but the experience of
leaving the
body is not. Remote viewing is a recent and better-defined
term.
Typically a subject describes or draws his impressions
while an
'outbound experimenter' visits randomly selected remote
locations.
Later the descriptions and the locations are matched up.
Remote
viewing has often been compared with OBEs, and sometimes
subjects who
can have OBEs are used in remote viewing experiments.
Many people have argued that the OBE itself is some kind
of dream and
involves no double other than an imaginary one. However,
an ordinary
dream does not have those important features of the experient
seeming
to leave the body and being conscious of perceiving things
as they
occur. In this sense OBEs are better compared with lucid
dreams, which
are dreams in which the sleeper realizes, at the time,
that he or she
is dreaming. In such an experience, the sleeper may become
perfectly
conscious in the dream, which makes the experience very
much like an
OBE.
The experience of seeing one's own double has been called
'autoscopy'
or 'autoscopic hallucinations.' Here again the double
is not the
'real' or conscious person. It is seen as another self,
but the
original self still appears the most real. In the OBE
it is the
'other' which seems most alive.
It has been argued that the OBE is an hallucination, and
any other
body or double is likewise hallucinatory. There are in
fact many
similarities between some kinds of hallucinations and
OBEs.
Among other experiences difficult to disentangle from
OBEs are a
variety of religious and transcendental experiences. People
may feel
that they have grown very large or very small, becoming
one with the
Universe or God. Everything is seen in a new perspective,
and may seem
'real' for the very first time. It is difficult to draw
a line between
a religious experience and an OBE and any line one does
draw may seem
artificial or arbitrary.
What is an astral projection?
Superficially, the idea of having a double may seem to
explain the
OBE. However, as soon as this idea is pursued, problems
become obvious
and the system has to get more complicated to deal with
those
problems. One of the most complex, and certainly the most
influential,
of such systems is the theory of astral projection, based
on the
teachings of theosophy. In 1875 Madame Blavatsky founded
the
Theosophical Society in New York, to study Eastern religions
and
science. From her teachings, brought back from her travels
in India
and elsewhere, a complex scheme evolved. According to
the
Theosophists, man is not just the product of his physical
body, but is
instead thought to be a complex creature consisting of
many bodies,
each finer and more subtle than the one 'below' it. These
bodies
should be thought of as an outer garment which can be
thrown off to
reveal the true man within.
Although there are variations in the details, it is commonly
claimed
that there are seven great planes and seven corresponding
bodies or
vehicles. The grossest of all is the physical body, of
flesh, with
which we are all familiar. There is supposed to be another
body also
described as physical known as the 'etheric double,' or
'vehicle of
vitality.' Etheric double is the manifestation of physical
vitality.
It is constant and does not change throughout the cycles
of life and
death, but it is not eternal, for it is eventually re-absorbed
into
the elements of which it is composed. This 'double' acts
as a kind of
transmitter of energy, keeping the lower physical body
in contact with
the higher bodies. Etheric substance is seen as an extension
of the
physical.
Next up the scale is supposed to be the 'astral world'
and its
associated 'astral body', or the 'vehicle of consciousness'.
These
entities are thought to be finer than their etheric counterparts
and
correspondingly harder to see. Astral body is thought
to be 'a replica
of the physical body (the gross body), but of a more subtle
and tenous
substance, penetrating every nerve, fibre and cell of
the physical
organism, and constantly in a supersensitive state of
vibration and
pulsation' [Gay74].
The astral world consists of astral matter, and all physical
objects
have a replica in the astral. There is therefore a complete
physical
copy of everything in the astral world, but in addition
there are
things in the astral which have no counterpart in the
physical. There
are thought forms created by human thought, elementals
and the lowest
of the dead, who have gone no further since they left
the physical
world. All these entities and many others are used in
ritual magic,
and thought forms can be specially created to carry out
tasks such as
healing, carrying messages, or gaining information.
In the scheme just described, those who have the ability
are supposed
to be able to see the nature of a person's thoughts by
changes in the
color and form of the astral body. All around the physical
can be seen
the bright and shining colors of the larger astral body,
making up the
astral aura. The aura is multi-colored and brilliant,
or dull,
according to the character or quality of the person and
therefore 'to
the seer, the aura of a person is an index to his hidden
propensities'
[Gay74].
All these conceptions are of special relevance because
of the fact
that the astral body is supposed to be able to separate
from the
physical and travel without it. Since the astral is the
vehicle of
consciousness, it is this body which is aware, not the
physical. It is
said that in sleep the astral body leaves the sleeping
body. In the
undeveloped person, little memory is retained and the
astral body is
vague and its travels are limited and directionless, but
in the
trained person the astral can be controlled, can travel
great
distances in sleep, and can even be projected from the
physical body
at will. It is this which is called astral projection.
In astral projection the consciousness can travel almost
without
limitation, but it travels in the astral world. It therefore
sees not
the physical objects, but their astral counterparts, and
in addition
the beings that live in the astral realms. The astral
world has been
known as the 'world of illusion' or world of thoughts.
The unwary
traveler can become confused by the power of his own imaginings.
In
this state one can appear, as an apparition to anyone
who has 'astral
sight.' Indeed one can appear to other too, but to do
so requires some
involvement of lower matter, for example of etheric matter,
as in
ectoplasm. Ectoplasm is considered to be the materialization
of the
astral body and is described as 'matter which is invisible
and
impalpable in its primary state, but assuming the state
of a vapour,
liquid or solid, according to its stage of condensation'
[Gay74].
An aspect of astral traveling which has become important
in later
writings, though it appears little in early theosophy,
is the silver
cord. It is held that in life the astral body is connected
to its
physical body by an infinitely elastic but strong cord,
of a flowing
and delicate silver color. Traditionally the cord must
remain
connected or death will ensue. As one approaches death,
the astral
gradually loosens itself, lifts up above the physical,
and then the
cord breaks to allow the higher bodies to leave. Death
is thus seen as
a form of permanent astral projection.
Beyond the astral Theosophy distinguishes a further five
levels. These
include the mental or devachnic world, the buddhic, the
nirvanic, and
two others so far beyond our understanding that they are
rarely
described. The task of every person is to progress through
all of
these.
Is astral projection an adequate explanation?
Many investigators are convinced of the reality of astral
projection.
Among the best known are Muldoon and Carrington, and Crookall.
Sylvan
Muldoon claimed to be able to project at will and described
his
experiences in The Projection of the Astral Body [MC29]
written in
collaboration with the psychical researcher Hereward Carrington.
Together these two collected many cases of spontaneous
OBEs which they
amassed as support for the reality of astral projection.
Many years
later Robert Crookall [Cro61-78], in more systematic fashion,
did much
the same thing. Many of the people who report OBEs have
found the
notion of astral projection helpful, and describe their
experiences in
these terms.
There are several serious problems with the theory of
astral
projection, as pointed out by Susan Blackmore [Bla82].
The first is
that many OBEs simply do not fit well into the astral
projection
framework. Celia Green [Gre68a] has collected many cases
in which the
person describes no astral body, indeed no other body
at all. Also
very few people actually report any cord, let alone the
traditional
silver cord.
Of course this type of experience can be fitted in by
saying that the
experient's astral vision was clouded, or the astral body
or cord too
fine to be seen, but these methods of attempting to account
for actual
experience begin to weaken the theory. Blackmore criticizes
the
complexity of the theory of astral projection as it tries
to account
for new facts. And this relates to the second problem,
its
'stretchability.' In her opinion the theory is so complicated
and
flexible that almost anything can be stretched to fit
it and it makes
hard to draw definite predictions from the theory. If
you don't see
the features you should, your astral vision is not clear
enough, or
memory was not passed on from higher levels. If you fail
to make
yourself visible to someone else then not enough etheric
matter was
involved and so on. In this way the 'theory' is in danger
of
explaining everything and nothing. Furthermore, any theory
which is
untestable is useless in scientific terms.
What is animism?
A school of thought has grown up within parapsychology,
and around its
fringes, which takes very seriously the idea of death
being an OBE in
which one did not succeed in getting back into one's body.
Gauld
[Gau82] refers to this school of thought as the 'animistic'
school
(anima = soul), 'animism' being the view that every human
mind,
whether in its before death or after death state 'is essentially
and
inseparably bound up with some kind of extended quasi-physical
vehicle, which is not normally perceptible to the senses
of human
beings in their present life' [Bro62]. An argument which
one commonly
hears from members of the animistic school runs as follows:
OBEs and
near-death experiences are, so far as we can tell, universal.
They
have been reported from many different parts of the world
and in many
different historical eras. The experiences of the persons
concerned
therefore must reflect genuine features of the human constitution;
for
we cannot possibly suppose that they derive from a common
stream of
religious tradition or folk-belief -- the societies from
which they
have been reported are too widely separated in space and
time for the
common-origin idea to be a serious possibility.
The most powerful shot in the the animist's locker remains,
however,
still to be mentioned. There are some cases -- by no means
a
negligible number -- in which a person who is undergoing
an OBE, and
finds himself at or 'projects' himself to a particular
spot distant
from his physical body, has been seen at that very spot
by some person
present there. Such cases are generally known as 'reciprocal'
cases.
Thus the animist, starting from his study of OBEs and
NDEs, claims to
have direct evidence that after death we remain the conscious
individuals that we always have been and that the 'vehicle'
of our
surviving memories and other psychological dispositions
is a surrogate
body whose properties (other perhaps than that of being
malleable by
thought) are, he would admit, largely unknown.
In addition to taking OBEs and NDEs as themselves evidence
for
survival, the animist might well feel able to offer the
following
argument in support of regarding a further class of phenomena
as
evidence for survival of consciousness following physical
death. There
is in the literature on apparitions a substantial sprinkling
of cases
of apparitions of deceased persons, some of which have
been seen by
witnesses who did not know the deceased in life. An extensive
statistical investigation by the late professor Hornell
Hart [Har56]
strongly suggests that apparitions of the dead and the
phantasms of
living 'projectors' in reciprocal cases are, as classes,
indistinguishable from each other in what may be called
their
'external characteristics' -- such as whether the figure
was solid,
dressed in ordinary clothes, seen by more than one person,
whether it
spoke, adjusted itself to its physical surroundings, etc.
Now we know
that in reciprocal cases the phantasms of the projector
is in some
sense a center of or a vehicle of consciousness, namely
the
consciousness of the projector. Since apparitions of the
dead and of
living projectors manifestly belong to the same class
of objects or
events, we may properly infer that since the apparitions
of living
projectors are vehicles for the consciousness of the person
in
question, this must be true of apparitions of the dead
also. Hence the
consciousness of deceased persons survives and may either
have, or
make use of, a kind of body.
Can the OBEer be seen as an apparition?
The study of apparitions formed an important part of early
physical
research, and many different types of apparition have
been recorded,
but the ones which primarily interest us here are those
in which a
person having an OBE simultaneously appeared to someone
else as an
apparition. There are many cases of this kind in the early
literature
and they have been quoted again and again but a relatively
small
number of them really form the mainstay of the anecdotal
evidence on
OBE apparitions. Crookall [Cro61] and Smith [Smi65] give
some recent
cases but they too concentrate on the older ones. Green
[Gre68a]
discusses the similarities between apparitions in general
and the
asomatic body perceived by OBEers, but she does not give
any examples
from her own case collection in which another person saw
the
exteriorized double. By contrast, about 10% of Palmer's
OBEers claimed
to have been seen as an apparition [Pal79b] and Osis claims
that from
his survey OBEers 'frequently' said they were noticed
by others and in
16 cases (6% of the total) he was able to obtain some
verification
through witnesses, although he does not expand on this
remark.
Obviously it would be very helpful if much more evidence
of this sort
could be collected, and recent cases thoroughly checked.
How can one find out what an OBE is like?
One of the easiest ways to find out what OBE is like is
to collect a
large number of accounts of cases and compare them. In
this way any
common features can be extricated and variations noted.
A great deal
can be learned about the conditions under which the experiences
occurred, how long they lasted, and what they were like.
Accounts by
people who have had OBEs fall, roughly speaking, into
two categories.
There are the many ordinary people to whom an OBE occurs
just once, or
a few times; and there is a small number of people who
claim to be
able to project at will.
The limitations of this method are that there are many
important
questions which cannot be answered by collecting cases.
Since the
people voluntarily report their experiences, the sample
necessarily
ends up with a bias. Many accounts are given many years
or even
decades after the event and it is then impossible to determine
how
much of the story has altered in memory with the passage
of time. For
such reasons it is not possible to determine, for example,
how common
the the experience actually is. Second, many OBEers claim
that they
were able to see rooms into which they had never been,
describe
accurately people they had never met, or move physical
objects during
their experience. Such reports are of great interest to
parapsychology
but they cannot be tested by collecting cases.
What is an average astral projection like?
Accounts of OBEs have been collected since the beginning
of psychical
research. The first collection of cases of spontaneous
apparitions,
telepathy, and clairvoyance published in 1886 as 'Phantasms
of the
Living' [GMF86]. Frederic Myers also collected similar
cases for his
'Human Personality and its Survival of Bodily Death' [Mye03].
The first major collection was made by Muldoon and Carrington
and
published in 1951 [MC51]. Nearly a hundred accounts were
categorized
according to whether they were produced by drugs or anaesthetics,
occurred at the time of accident, death or illness, or
were set off by
suppressed desire. Finally they gave cases in which spirits
seemed to
be involved. By categorizing the cases in this way, Muldoon
and
Carrington were able to compare and interpret them in
the light of
their theories of astral projection, but they did not
go beyond this
rather simple analysis. These researchers implied that
we do have a
double, and that it is capable of perceiving at a distance
and even of
surviving without the physical body.
The largest collections of accounts of astral projection
have been
amassed by Robert Crookall. In his many books [Cro61,
64a] he has
presented hundreds of cases which show the kinds of consistencies
as
Muldoon and Carrington found. He also divided the cases
according to
how they were brought about. First there were the 'natural'
ones which
included those people who nearly died or were very ill
or exhausted,
as well as those who were quite well. Contrasted with
these were the
'enforced' cases, being induced by anaesthetics, suffocation
and
falling, or deliberately by hypnosis.
Typical features of Crookall's accounts were the mysterious
light
illuminating the darkness, the white double, the ability
to travel at
will and inability to affect material objects. Crookall
cited typical
elements of the natural projection being the cord joining
the two
bodies, feelings of peace and happiness and the clarity
of mind and
'realness' of everything seen. By contrast with what Crookall
calls
'the enforced' OBE, by which he means one which is entered
into
deliberately by the experient, he argued the person typically
finds
himself not in happy and bright surroundings but in a
dream or
conditions reminiscent of popular conceptions of 'Hades.'
In projection two aspects can be exteriorized: in natural
OBEs the
soul body or the astral body is ejected free of the vehicle
of
vitality and the vision of the experient is clear, but
when the OBE is
the result of a conscious effort to have an OBE some of
the lower
vehicle is shed at the same time and clouds the vision.
The same
principles apply in death: natural deaths according to
NDE accounts
usually lead to an experience of paradisaical conditions,
but the
victim of an 'enforced' death is likely to find himself
in Hades with
clouded vision and consciousness.
The implication of Crookall's argument is that there is
an astral
body, a vehicle of vitality and a silver cord, and that
we survive
death to live on a higher plane. He believed that insofar
as such a
thing could be proved, the many cases he had collected
proved the
existence of out other bodies.
What is an average OBE like?
The previous case collections were made by researchers
who believed
implicitly in the astral projection interpretation of
the OBE. A
properly analyzed case collection can provide a rich source
of
information about what the OBE is like. The collections
used here
include those by Hart, Green, Poynton and Blackmore and
the analysis
is made by Blackmore [Bla82].
Hornell Hart, a professor of sociology at Duke University
in North
Carolina, collected together cases of what he called 'ESP
projection'
[Har54]. He required that the person not only have an
OBE, but also
acquire veridical information, as though from the OB location.
This
excludes many OBEs in which the information gained was
wrong or could
not be checked. He also rated the cases. The best possible
case would
gain a score of 1.0, but in fact the highest score given
was .90. No
higher scores were gained because the cases show a curious
mixture of
correct and incorrect vision which seems to be common
in the OBE.
Through this research, one assumption is crucial, that
ESP projection
is a single phenomenon which might have any or all of
Hart's eight
features. Rogo [Rog78b] and Tart [Tar74a] have both suggested
that
several different types of experience may have been lumped
together
under the label 'OBE.' It could be that astral projection,
traveling
clairvoyance, and apparitions are quite different and
need different
interpretations, or other distinctions might be more relevant.
The
reason Hart gave why the non- evidential cases should
be excluded is
far from satisfactory: if there was no evidence of ESP
they did not
count in his analysis. Hart was ruling out the majority
of cases on
the basis of a very shaky criterion.
Perhaps the most thorough, and certainly the best-known
case
collection was carried out by Celia Green of the Institute
of
Psychophysical Research [Gre68a]. Her definition of an
OBE was an
experience, defined as follows, '... one in which the
objects of
perception are apparently organized in such a way that
the observer
seems to himself to be observing them from a point of
view which is
not coincident with his physical body.' J. C. Poynton
[Poy75], like
Green, advertised in the press, and circulated a questionnaire
privately, and on the whole Poynton's results, although
less detailed,
are similar to Green's. Susan Blackmore [Bla82] has analyzed
the cases
collected by the SPR and by herself.
Table: Some Results of Case Collections [Bla82]
Green Poynton SPR
cases Blackmore
Proportion of
61% 56%
69% 47%
'single' cases
Some features of 'single' cases:
Saw own body
81% 80%
72% 71%
Had second body 20% 75% -- 57%
Definite sensation 'majority' 25%
36% --
on separation
none
Had connecting
4% 9%
8% --
cord
Apparently most people have had only one OBE, but the
frequency of
subjects claiming many OBEs is high enough to conclude
that if a
person has had one OBE he or she is more likely to have
another. Also
many people learn to control their OBEs to some extent,
even if they
never learn to induce them reliably at will.
OBEs are occurring in a variety of situations. Green found
that 12% of
single cases occurred during sleep, 32% when unconscious,
and 25% were
associated with some kind of psychological stress, such
as fear,
worry, or overwork. Some cases show that it is possible
to have an OBE
while the body continues with complex and co-ordinated
activity.
However, OBEs are far more common when the physical body
is relaxed
and inactive.
Most of Green's cases occurred to people whose physical
body was lying
down at the time (75%). A further 18% were sitting and
the rest were
walking, standing or were 'indeterminate.' In fact it
seemed that
muscular relaxation was an essential part of many people's
experience.
Just a few found that their body was paralyzed. A feeling
of paralysis
was found to be only rarely a prelude to an OBE.
A difference is found between the 'single' cases and the
multiple
cases. The latter tended to have had experiences in childhood,
and
learned to repeat them. The single cases tended to occur
mostly
between the ages of 15 and 35. Poynton found that many
more of his
cases came from females, but among the SPR cases there
are more males
than females. This sort of difference is most likely to
be due to
sample differences.
Floating and soaring sensations are certainly common.
Poynton also
found that most of his OBEers saw or felt their physical
body. On the
contrary, catalepsy rarely occurred. Some subjects mentioned
noises or
a momentary blacking out, but this did not seem to be
the rule. The
majority just 'found themselves' in the ecsomatic state.
As for the
return, for most it was as sudden as the departure. An
interesting
finding by Green was that more of the subjects who had
had many OBEs
went through complex processes on separation and return.
Green separated her cases into those she called 'parasomatic,'
involving another body, and those she termed 'asomatic'
in which there
was no other body. Her surprising finding was that 80%
of cases were
asomatic -- they had no other body. She asked her subjects
whether
they had felt any connection between themselves and their
physical
bodies. Under a third said they had, and only 3.5% reported
a visible
or substantial connection such as a cord. Poynton's results
tell a
similar story. There seems to be little evidence from
the case
collections to support the usual details of astral projection.
Green found that on the whole perceptual realism was preserved.
Subjects saw their own bodies and the rooms they traveled
in as
realistic and solid. Even when the scene appears to be
perfectly
normal there may be slight differences. Some her subjects
said that
everything looked and felt exaggerated. The experience
is typically in
only one or two modalities: vision and hearing. Green
found that 93%
of single cases included vision, a third also had hearing,
but the
other senses were rarely noted. Another interesting feature
of the OBE
world is its lighting. In some mysterious way the surroundings
become
lit up with no obvious source of light visible, or else
objects seem
to glow with a light of their own.
Perhaps the most important question about the OBE is whether
people
can see things they did not know about -- in other words
whether they
can use ESP in the course of an OBE. Among Green's subjects,
some felt
as though they could have seen anything, but lacked the
motivation to
test out such an ability. Another related question is
whether subjects
in an OBE can affect objects, or have the power of psychokinesis.
On
the whole the evidence is against that possibility.
The last feature which Celia Green found to be common
in OBEs is that
a spontaneous OBE can have a profound effect on the person
who
experiences it. Sometimes OBEs can be very frightening,
sometimes
exciting and sometimes they provide a sense of adventure.
Interestingly, Green found that fear was more common in
later, not
initial experiences. Pleasant emotions are also common.
How common are OBEs?
Two surveys have used properly balanced samples drawn
from specified
populations. The first was conducted by Palmer and Dennis
[PD75,
Pal79b]. They chose the inhabitants of Charlottesville,
Virginia, a
town of some 35,000 people and selected 1,000 of these
as their
sample. The question on OBEs was worded as follows: 'Have
you ever had
an experience in which you felt that "you" were located
"outside of"
or "away from" your physical body; that is the feeling
that your
consciousness, mind, or center of awareness was at a different
place
than your physical body? (If in doubt, please answer "no".)'
To this
25% of students and 14% of the townspeople said 'yes.'
Further data from this survey reveals that no relationship
between age
and reported OBEs was found. Palmer found a significant
positive
relationship between drug use and OBEs and concluded that
this could
account for the higher prevalence of OBEs in students.
This
relationship receives confirmation from work by Tart [Tar71].
In a
survey of 150 marijuana users he found that 44% claimed
to have OBEs.
It seems possible that the use of this drug facilitate
OBEs.
The second survey using a properly constructed sample
was carried out
by Erlendur Haraldsson, an Icelandic researcher, and his
colleagues
[HGRLJ76]. For the survey a questionnaire was sent to
a random sample
of 1157 persons between ages of 30 and 70 years. There
were 53
questions on various psychic and psi-related experiences
including a
translation of Palmer's question. To this, only 8% of
the Icelanders
replied yes.
Table: Surveys of the OBE [Bla82]
Author Year Respondents
size of N
%
sample 'YES' 'YES'
Hart 1954 Sociology
students 113
28 25
Sociology students 42
14 33
Green 1966 Southampton University
students
115 22
19
1967
Oxford University
students
380 131
34
Palmer 1975 Charlottesville
Townspeople
- -
14
Students
- -
25
Tart 1971 Marijuana users 150 66 44
Haraldsson 1977 Icelanders - - 8
Blackmore 1980 Surrey University
students
216 28
13
Bristol University
students
115 16
14
Irwin 1980 Australian students 177 36 20
Bierman &
Blackmore 1980 Amsterdam students
191 34
18
Kohr 1980 Members of
Association
for Research and
Enlightenment
- -
50
Those vague statements about OBEs being 'common' are now
backed up by
a variety of figures. Blackmore gives a personal estimate
of the
incidence of OBEs, based on all the available evidence,
putting it at
around 10%. She thinks we can say with more conviction
that the OBE is
a fairly common experience.
The surveys show that if a person has had one OBE he or
she is more
likely to have another. All these figures are far higher
than you
would expect if OBEs were distributed at random in the
population.
Green went on to compare different groups to see whether
they had had
different numbers of OBEs. Her only finding was that OBEers
were more
likely to report experiences which they thought could
only be
attributed to ESP. Palmer and Kohr found that subjects
who reported
one type of 'psychic' or 'psi-related' experience also
tended to
report others.
Palmer also, like Green, found that many simple variables
were
irrelevant. Sex, age, race, birth order, political views,
religion,
religiosity, education, occupation and income were all
unrelated to
OBEs.
Palmer found significant relationships between OBEs and
practising
meditation, mystical experiences and, as we have already
seen, drug
experiences. Palmer had over 100 people reporting one
or more OBEs,
and asked them various questions about the experience.
They were asked
whether they had seen their physical body from 'outside'
and this was
reported for 44% of the experiences and by nearly 60%
of the OBEers.
Fewer than 20% of experiences involved 'traveling' and
fewer than 30%
of OBEers reported it. Still fewer reported that they
had acquired
information by ESP while 'out- of-the-body,' about 14%
of people and
5% of experiences, or had appeared as an apparition to
someone else
(less than 10% or OBEers). These results confirm the findings
of the
case collections: that few OBEs include all the features
of a
classical astral projection.
Overall the OBE seemed to have had a highly beneficial
effect on its
experiencers. Many claimed their fear of death was reduced,
and their
mental health and social relationships improved. Ninety-five
per cent
said they would like to have another OBE.
What are the prerequisites for inducing an OBE?
Many of the inducing methods use as a starting point techniques
designed to improve the novice's powers of relaxation,
imagery, and
concentration. The ideal state appears to be one of physical
relaxation, or even catalepsy, combined with mental alertness.
One of the easiest ways to relax is to use progressive
muscular
relaxation. In outline this technique consists of starting
with the
muscles of the feet and ankles and alternately tensing
and relaxing
them, then going on up the muscles of the calves and thighs,
the
torso, arms, neck and face, until all the muscles have
been contracted
and relaxed. Done carefully this procedure leads to fairly
deep
relaxation within a few minutes, and with practice it
becomes easier.
Relaxation usually leads to state of paralysis or catalepsy.
When you
go to sleep, your brain deactivates the mechanism by which
you are
able to use your limbs, so that you become incapable of
physical
activity corresponding to your dream images when you dream.
Quite a
few people have found themselves in this paralysis state
as soon as
they have gotten up after sleeping.
The first type of paralysis, known as 'type A,' is a condition
encountered when approaching a deeper layer of consciousness
from a
light trance state. The second, type B paralysis, is the
reverse of
type A, in that it happens during the return home to physical
reality.
The first type A 'paralysis' goes something like this:
"Mmmmmm.... I know I am awake; I can think ..... Mmmmmmm
but my body
is asleep ..." (Robert Monroe labelled it Focus 10 consciousness)
"Wait a minute here, there is something going on here,
I just can't
seem to...."
"Yes, I can't seem to move my limbs; they seemed to be
laden with
lead, why can't I move at all? Hey, what's happening here!
(Panic!)"
A typical type B 'paralysis' goes something like this:
"Mmmmm... I am feeling groggy, absolutely. What was that
just now, oh,
it must be some dream..."
"Mmmm...... hang on a minute, was that a noise I heard?
It must have
come from the door... I need to check it out, could be
a burglar.....
but I am so tired... and sleepy..."
"I need to wake up, it could be important.... Hey, I can't
seem to
wake up, why are my legs not waking up, why can't my hands
respond?"
"PANIC!!! I need to wake up!!! I don't want to die...
I need to exert
more will on this... Hey, body, wake up, eyes open, ...
WAKE UP!"
"Gosh, NOW, I can move my limbs, I am awake now, body
covered with
perspiration, sitting at the edge of the bed, wondering
why just now I
simply couldn't wake up..."
"Phew -- Thank goodness, it is finally over. Am I glad
to be back to
the familiar physical environment."
However, type A paralysis is the type that should not
be resisted; if
the person can allow himself to 'go with the flow,' then
some kind of
altered state of consciousness is bound to happen, which
is what the
person is hoping to achieve anyway.
Many astral travelers have stressed the importance of
clear imagery or
visualization for inducing OBEs and of course imagery
training forms
an important part of magical development. Progressive
methods of
imagery training are often described in magical and occult
books, and
helpful guidance can be found in Conway's occult primer
[Con72], and
in Brennan's 'Astral doorways' [Bre71]. Most involve starting
with
regular practice at visualizing simple geometrical shapes
and then
progressing to harder tasks such as imagining complex
three-dimensional forms, whole rooms and open scenery.
Practice 1: Read the description slowly and then try to
imagine each
stage as you go along: Imagine an orange. It is resting
on a blue
plate and you want to eat it. You dig your nail into the
peel and tear
some of it away. You keep pulling on the peel until all
of it, and
most of the pith, is lying in a heap on the plate. Now
separate the
orange into segments, lay them on the plate as well, and
then eat one.
If this task doesn't make your mouth water, and if you
cannot feel the
juice which squirts from the orange, and smell its tang
then you do
not have vivid or trained imagery. Try it again, the colors
should be
bright and vivid and the shapes and forms clear and stable.
With
practice at this and similar tasks your imagery will improve
until you
may wonder how it could ever have been so poor.
Practice 2: This is a rather harder one: Visualize a disc,
half white
and half black. Next imagine it spinning about its center,
speeding up
and then slowing down, and stopping. Next imagine the
same disc in
red, but as it spins it changes through orange, yellow,
green, blue
and violet. Finally you may care to try two discs side
by side
spinning in opposite directions and changing color in
opposition too.
Other useful skills are concentration and control. Not
only do you
need to be able to produce vivid imagery, but also to
abolish all
imagery from your mind, to hold images as long as you
want and to
change them as you want, both quickly and slowly.
Practice 3: Brennan suggests trying to count, and only
to count. The
instant another thought comes to mind you must stop and
go back to the
beginning. If you get to about four or five you are doing
well, but
you are almost certain to be stopped by such thoughts
as 'this is
easy, I've got to three already,' or 'I wonder how long
I have to go
on.'
All these skills, relaxation, imagery and concentration,
are suggested
again and again as necessary for inducing an OBE at will.
Other aids
include posture. If you lie down you might fall asleep,
although
Muldoon [MC29] advocates this position. On the other hand
discomfort
will undoubtedly interfere with the attempt. Therefore
an alert, but
comfortable posture is best. Some have suggested that
it is best not
to eat for some hours before and to avoid any stress,
irritation or
negative emotions.
How to induce an OBE?
IMAGERY TECHNIQUES
It is possible to use imagery alone but it
requires considerable
skill.
a) Lie on your back in a comfortable position
and relax. Imagine
that you are floating up off the bed. Hold
that position, slightly
lifted, for some time until you lose all sensation
of touching the
bed or floor. Once this state is achieved
move slowly into an
upright position and begin to travel away
from your body and around
the room. Pay attention to the objects and
details of the room. Only
when you have gained some proficiency should
you try to turn round
and look at your own body. Note that each
stage may take months of
practice and it can be too difficult for any
but a practiced OBEer.
b) In any comfortable position close your
eyes and imagine that
there is a duplicate of yourself standing
in front of you. You will
find that it is very hard to imagine your
own face, so it is easier
to imagine this double with its back to you.
You should try to
observe all the details of its posture, dress
(if any) and so on. As
this imaginary double becomes more and more
solid and realistic you
may experience some uncertainty about your
physical position. You
can encourage this feeling by comtemplating
the question 'Where am
I?', or even other similar questions 'Who
am I?' and so on. Once the
double is clear and stable and you are relaxed,
transfer your
consciousness into it. You should then be
able to 'project' in this
phantom created by your own imagination. Again,
each stage may take
long practice.
INDUCING A SPECIAL MOTIVATION TO LEAVE THE BODY
You can trick yourself into leaving your body
according to Muldoon
and Carrington [MC29]. They suggested that
if the subconscious
desires something strongly enough it will
try to provoke the body
into moving to get it, but if the physical
body is immobilized, for
example in sleep, then the astral body may
move instead. Many
motivations might be used but Muldoon advised
against using the
desire for sexual activity which is distracting,
or the harmful wish
for revenge or hurt to anyone. Instead he
advocated using the simple
and natural desire for water -- thirst. This
has the advantages this
it is quick to induce, and it must be appeased.
In order to employ this technique, you must
refrain from drinking
for some hours before going to bed. During
the day increase your
thirst by every means you can. Have a glass
of water by you and
stare into it, imagining drinking, but not
allowing yourself to do
so. Then before you retire to bed eat 'about
an eighth of a
teaspoonful' of salt. Place the glass of water
at some convenient
place away from your bed and rehearse in your
all the actions
necessary to getting it, getting up, crossing
the room, reaching out
for it, and so on. You must then go to bed,
still thinking about
your thirst and the means of satisfying it.
The body must become
incapacitated and so you should relax, with
slow breathing and heart
rate and then try to sleep. With any luck
the suggestions you have
made to yourself will bring about the desired
OBE. This is not one
of the most pleasant or effective methods.
OPHIEL'S 'LITTLE SYSTEM'
Ophiel [Oph61] suggests that you pick a familiar
route, perhaps
between two rooms in your house, and memorize
every detail of it.
Choose at least six points along it and spend
several minutes each
day looking at each one and memorizing it.
Symbols, scents and
sounds associated with the points can reinforce
the image. Once you
have committed the route and all the points
to memory you should lie
down and relax while you attempt to 'project'
to the first point. If
the preliminary work has been done well you
should be able to move
from point to point and back again. Later
you can start the
imaginary journey from the chair or bed where
your body is, and you
can then either observe yourself doing the
movements, or transfer
your consciousness to the one that is doing
the moving. Ophiel
describes further possibilities, but essentially
if you have
mastered the route fully in your imagination
you will be able to
project along it and with practice to extend
the projection.
Ophiel states that starting to move into OBE
will produce strange
sounds. He says that this is because the sense
of hearing is not
carried over onto the higher planes, and that
means that your mind
tries to recreate some input, and just gets
subconscious static. He
asserts that the noises can take any form,
including voices,
malevolent, eerie, and get worse and worse,
more and more
disturbing, until eventually they peak and
then just fade to a
constant background hiss while one has OBE.
Apparently, his 'final
noise' sounded like his water heater blowing
up. He says, anyway, to
ignore the noises, voice or otherwise, as
they are only static or
subconscious rambling, and do not represent
any being in any way,
not even the self really.
THE CHRISTOS TECHNIQUE
G. M. Glasking, an Australian journalist,
popularized this technique
in several books, starting with Windows of
the Mind [Gla74]. Three
people are needed: one as subject, and two
to prepare him. The
subject lies down comfortably on his back
in a warm and darkened
room. One helper massages the subject's feet
and ankles, quite
firmly, even roughly, while the other take
his head. Placing the
soft part of his clenched fist on the subject's
forehead he rubs it
vigorously for several minutes. This should
make the subject's head
buzz and hum, and soon he should begin to
feel slightly
disorientated. His feet tingle and his body
may feel light or
floaty, or changing shape.
When this stage is reached, the imagery exercises
begin. The subject
is asked to imagine his feet stretching out
and becoming longer by
just an inch or so. When he says he can do
this he has to let them
go back to normal and do the same with his
head, stretching it out
beyond its normal position. Then, alternating
all the time between
head and feet, the distance is gradually increased
until he can
stretch both out to two feet or more. At this
stage it should be
possible for him to imagine stretching out
both at once, making him
very long indeed, and then to swell up, filling
the room like a huge
balloon. All this will, of course, be easier
for some people than
others. It should be taken at whatever pace
is needed until each
stage is successful. Some people complete
this part in five minutes,
some people take more than fifteen minutes.
Next he is asked to imagine he is outside
his own front door. He
should describe everything he can see in detail,
with the colors,
materials of the door and walls, the ground,
and the surrounding
scenery. He has then to rise above the house
until he can see across
the surrounding countryside or city. To show
him that the scene is
all under his control he should be asked to
change it from day to
night and back again, watching the sun set
and rise, and the lights
go on or off. Finally he is asked to fly off,
and land wherever he
wishes. For most subjects their imagery has
become so vivid by this
stage that they land somewhere totally convincing
and are easily
able to describe all that they see.
You may wonder how the experience comes to
an end, but usually no
prompting is required; the subject will suddenly
announce 'I'm
here,' or 'Oh, I'm back,' and he will usually
retain quite a clear
recollection of all he said and experienced.
But it is a good idea
to take a few minutes relaxing and getting
back to normal. It is
interesting that this technique seems to be
very effective in
disrupting the subject's normal image of his
body. It then guides
and strengthens his own imagery while keeping
his body calm and
relaxed.
ROBERT MONROE'S METHOD
In his book Journeys out of the Body [Mon71]
Monroe describes a
complicated-sounding technique for inducing
OBEs. In part it is
similar to other imagination methods, but
it starts with induction
of the 'vibrational state.' Many spontaneous
OBEs start with a
feeling of shaking or vibrating, and Monroe
deliberately induces
this state first. He suggests you do the following.
First lie down
in a darkened room in any comfortable position,
but with your head
pointing to magnetic north. Loosen clothing
and remove any jewellery
or metal objects, but be sure to stay warm.
Ensure that you will not
be disturbed and are not under any limitation
of time. Begin by
relaxing and then repeat to yourself five
times, 'I will consciously
perceive and remember all that I encounter
during this relaxation
procedure. I will recall in detail when I
am completely awake only
those matters which will be beneficial to
my physical and mental
being.' Then begin breathing through your
half-open mouth.
The next step involves entering the state
bordering sleep (the
hypnagogic state). Monroe does not recommend
any particular method
of achieving this state. One method you might
try is to hold your
forearm up, while keeping your upper arm on
the bed, or ground. As
you start to fall asleep, your arm will fall,
and you will awaken
again. With practice you can learn to control
the hypnagogic state
without using your arm. Another method is
to concentrate on an
object. When other images start to enter your
thoughts, you have
entered the hypnagogic state. Passively watch
these images. This
will also help you maintain this state of
near-sleep. Monroe calls
this Condition A.
After first achieving this state Monroe recommends
to deepen it.
Begin to clear your mind and observe your
field of vision through
your closed eyes. Do nothing more for a while.
Simply look through
your closed eyelids at the blackness in front
of you. After a while,
you may notice light patterns. These are simply
neural discharges
and they have no specific effect. Ignore them.
When they cease, one
has entered what Monroe calls Condition B.
From here, one must enter
an even deeper state of relaxation which Monroe
calls Condition C --
a state of such relaxation that you lose all
awareness of the body
and sensory stimulation. You are almost in
a void in which your only
source of stimulation will be your own thoughts.
The ideal state for
leaving your body is Condition D. This is
Condition C when it is
voluntarily induced from a rested and refreshed
condition and is not
the effect of normal fatigue. To achieve Condition
D, Monroe
suggests that you practice entering it in
the morning or after a
short nap.
With eyes closed look into the blackness at
a spot about a foot from
your forehead, concentrating your consciousness
on that point. Move
it gradually to three feet away, then six,
and then turn it 90
degrees upward, reaching above your head.
Monroe orders you to reach
for the vibrations at that spot and then mentally
pull them into
your head. He explains how to recognize them
when they occur. 'It is
as if a surging, hissing, rhythmically pulsating
wave of fiery
sparks comes roaring into your head. From
there it seems to sweep
throughout your body, making it rigid and
immobile.' This method is
easier than it sounds.
Once you have achieved the vibrational state
you have to learn to
control it, to smooth out the vibrations by
'pulsing' them. At this
point, Monroe warns it is impossible to turn
back. He suggests
reaching out an arm to grasp some object which
you know is out of
normal reach. Feel the object and then let
your hand pass through
it, before bringing it back, stopping the
vibrations and checking
the details and location of the object. This
exercise will prepare
you for full separation.
To leave the body Monroe advocates the 'lift-out'
method. To employ
this method think of getting lighter and of
how nice it would be to
float upwards. An alternative is the 'rotation'
technique in which
you turn over in bed, twisting first the top
of the body, head and
shoulders until you turn right over and float
upwards. Later you can
explore further. With sufficient practice
Monroe claims that a wide
variety of experiences are yours for the taking.
RITUAL MAGIC METHODS
Most magical methods are also based on imagery
or visualization and
use concentration and relaxation. All these
methods require good
mental control and a sound knowledge of the
system being used, with
its tools and symbols. Charles Tart, in introducing
the concept of
'state specific sciences' [Tar72b] also considered
state specific
technologies, that is, means of achieving,
controlling and using
altered states of consciousness. Many magical
rituals are really
just such technologies. In a typical exercise
the magician will
perform an opening ritual, a cleansing or
purifying ritual and then
one to pass from one state to another. Once
in the state required he
operates using the rules of that state and
then returns, closes the
door that was opened and ends the ritual.
This technology varies almost as much as the
theory, for there are a
multitude of ways of reaching the astral.
One can use elemental
doorways, treat the cards of the tarot as
stepping stones, perform
cabbalistic path- workings or use mantras.
The techniques are very
similar to all others we have been considering,
so we can see the
complexities of ritual magic as just another
related way achieving
the same ends.
MEDITATION AND CHAKRA MEDITATION
Meditation has two basic functions -- achieving
relaxation and
improving concentration. Therefore the ideal
state for OBE is
familiar to meditators and indeed OBEs have
occasionally been
reported during meditation and yoga. The two
main types of
meditation are concentration meditation (focusing)
and insight
meditation (mindfullness). Most kinds of meditation
are the
concentrative type. One simply focuses his
attention upon a single
physical object, such as a candle flame; upon
a sensation, such as
that felt while walking or breathing; upon
an emotion, such as
reverence or love; upon a mantra spoken aloud
or even silently; or
upon a visualization as in chakra meditation.
Concentration
meditation is, simply put, a form of self-hypnosis.
The other main type of meditation, insight
meditation, is the
analysis of thoughts and feelings in such
a way as to cause
realization of the subjectivity and illusion
of experience. Such
meditation is done in an effort to attain
transcendental awareness.
Chakra meditation is a special type of concentrative
meditation
which is basically kundalini yoga -- the practice
of causing psychic
energy (kundalini) to flow up sushumna, energizing
the various
chakras along the way. A chakra is 'a sense
organ of the ethereal
body, visible only to a clairvoyant' [Gay74].
As each chakra is
energized by this practice, it is believed
to add occult powers
(sidhis), until at last the crown chakra is
reached, and with it,
full enlightenment is attained.
According to East Indian philosophy, man possesses
seven major
chakras or psychic centers on his body. In
theosophical scheme there
are ten chakras, which permit those trained
in their use to gain
knowledge of the astral world (three of the
ten are used in black
magic only). Each of the chakras forms a bridge,
link, or energy
transformer; changing pure (higher) energy
into various forms, and
connecting different bodies together. The
chakras are located along
the nadies (a network of psychic nerves or
channels) and follow the
autonomic nervous system along the spinal
cord.
The first chakra, located at the base of the
spine at the perineum
is the root chakra, muladhara. The second
chakra, known as the
sacral center, svadhisthana, is located above
and behind the
genitals. Third of the chakras is the solar
plexus, manipura,
located at the navel and it is said to correspond
with the emotions
and also with psychic sight (clairvoyance).
The heart chakra,
anahata, is the fourth chakra, located over
the heart and
corresponding with the psychic touch. The
fifth chakra is the throat
chakra, vishuddha, located at the base of
the throat (thyroid) and
corresponding with psychic hearing (clairaudience).
The remaining two chakras are believed to
relate mostly to elevated
states of consciousness. The frontal chakra,
(or 'third eye') ajna,
the sixth chakra, is located between, and
slightly above, the
eyebrows. Ajna is the center of psychic powers
and it is believed to
be able to produce many psychic effects. Finally,
the crown chakra,
sahasrara, located atop the head, (pineal
gland) is the seventh
chakra. It is referred to as the thousand-petaled
lotus and
corresponds with astral projection and enlightenment.
To practice this chakra meditation, you simply
concentrate on the
chakras, beginning with the root chakra, and
moving progressively
up, as you visualize psychic energy from the
root chakra traveling
up shushumna and vivifying each higher chakra.
As mentioned above
the chakras have certain properties associated
with them, so that
this type of visualization may 'raise consciousness,'
promote astral
projection, and other things -- once you have
reached ajna and
eventually the crown chakra.
HYPNOSIS
In the early days of psychical research hypnosis
was used a great
deal more than now to bring about 'traveling
clairvoyance,' but it
can still be used. All that is required is
skilled hypnotist with
some understanding of the state into which
he wants to put the
subject, and a willing subject. The subject
must be put into a
fairly deep hypnotic state and then the hypnotist
can suggest to him
that he leaves his body. The subject can be
asked to lift up out of
his body, to create a double and step into
it, to roll off his bed
or chair, or leave through the top of his
head. He can then be asked
to travel to any place desired, but hypnotist
must be sure to
specify very clearly where he is to go, and
to bring him safely back
to his body when expedition is over. If this
is not done the subject
may have difficulty reorientating himself
afterwards.
DRUGS
There are some drugs which can undoubtedly
help initiate an OBE.
Hallucinogens have long been used in various
cultures to induce
states like OBEs, and in our own culture OBEs
are sometimes an
accidental product of a drug experience. In
absence of any further
information we might already be able to guess
which are the sorts of
drugs likely to have this effect. They might
be those which
physically relax the subject while leaving
his consciousness clear
and alert. Drugs which distort sensory input
and disrupt the
subject's sense of where and what shape his
body is ought to help,
and so may anything which induces a sense
of shaking or vibration.
Imagery must be intensified without control
being lost and finally
there must be some reason, or wish, for leaving
the body.
Considering these points hallucinogens might
be expected to be more
effective than stimulants, tranquillizers
or sedatives. The latter
may aid relaxation but help with none of the
other features just
mentioned. Few other types of drug have any
relevant effect. This
fact fits with what is known about the effectiveness
of drugs for
inducing OBEs. Monroe states that barbiturates
and alcohol are
harmful to the ability, and this makes sense
since they would tend
to reduce control over imagery even though
they are relaxing.
Eastman [Eas62] states that barbiturates do
not lead OBEs whereas
morphine, ether, chloroform, major hallucinogens
and hashish can.
Relatively little research has carried out
in this area, partly
because most of the relevant drugs are illegal
in the countries
where that research might be carried out.
It seems that certain
drugs can facilitate an OBE but what is not
clear is why drug
experience should take that form rather than
any other. Part of the
answer is that usually it does not. There
is no specific
OBE-creating drug, and OBEs are relatively
rarely a part of a
psychedelic drug experience. Drugs may help
in inducing the OBE but
they are not recommended as a route to the
instant projection, they
are no alternative to learning the skills
of relaxation,
concentration, and imagery control.
DREAM DEVELOPMENT
Many OBEs start from dreams and since, by
definition, one has to be
conscious to have an OBE, they tend to start
from lucid dreams. The
dreamer may become aware that he is dreaming
and then find himself
in some place other than his bed and able
to move about at will. He
may have another body and may even attempt
to see his physical body
lying asleep. This topic is covered separately
in the later section
on lucid dreams.
PALMER'S EXPERIMENTAL METHOD
In the search for a simple and effective method
of inducing an OBE
Palmer and his colleagues [PL75a, 75b, 76,
PV74a, 74b] use
relaxation and audio- visual stimulation.
Subjects went through a
progressive muscular relaxation session and
the heard oscillating
tones and watched a rotating spiral. One of
the interesting findings
was that many of the subjects claimed that
they had been 'literally
out of' their bodies, and there were indications
that their
experiences were very different in some ways
from other those
encountered in OBEs.
What are lucid dreams?
The term lucid dreaming refers to dreaming while knowing
that you are
dreaming. It was coined by the Dutch psychiatrist Frederik
van Eeden
in 1913. It is something of a misnomer since it means
something quite
different from just clear or vivid dreaming. Nevertheless
we are
certainly stuck with it. That lucid dreams are different
from ordinary
dreams is obvious as soon as you have one. The experience
is something
like waking up in your dreams. It is as though you 'come
to' and find
you are dreaming. This experience generally happens when
you realize
during the course of a dream that you are dreaming, perhaps
because
something weird occurs. Most people who remember their
dreams have had
such an experience at some time, often waking up immediately
after the
realization. However, it is possible to continue in the
dream while
remaining fully aware that you are dreaming.
One distinct and confusing form of lucid dreams are false
awakenings.
You dream of waking up but in fact, of course, are still
asleep. Van
Eeden [Van13] called these 'wrong waking up' and described
them as
'demoniacal, uncanny, and very vivid and bright, with
... a strong
diabolical light.' The one positive benefit of false awakenings
is
that they can sometimes be used to induce OBEs. Indeed,
Oliver Fox
[Fox62] recommends using false awakenings as a method
for achieving
the OBE. For many people OBEs and lucid dreams are practically
indistinguishable. If you dream of leaving your body,
the experience
is much the same.
LaBerge's studies of physiology of the initiation of lucidity
in the
dream state have revealed that lucid dreams have two ways
of starting.
In the much more common variety, the 'dream-initiated
lucid dream'
(DILD), the dreamer acquires awareness of being in a dream
while fully
involved in it. DILDs occur when dreamers are right in
the middle of
REM sleep, showing lots of the characteristic rapid eye
movements.
DILDs account for about four out of every five lucid dreams
that the
dreamers have had in the laboratory. In the other 20 percent,
the
dreamers report awakening from a dream and then returning
to the dream
state with unbroken awareness -- one moment they are aware
that they
are awake in bed in the sleep laboratory, and the next
moment, they
are aware that they have entered a dream and are no longer
perceiving
the room around them. These are called 'wake initiated
lucid dreams'
(WILDs).
For many people, having lucid dreams is fun, and they
want to learn
how to have more or to how to induce them at will. One
finding from
early experimental work was that high levels of physical
(and
emotional) activity during the day tend to precede lucidity
at night.
Waking during the night and carrying out some kind of
activity before
falling asleep again can also encourage a lucid dream
during the next
REM period and is the basis of some induction techniques.
Many methods
have been developed and they roughly fall into three categories.
One of the best known techniques for stimulating lucid
dreams is
LaBerge's MILD (Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreaming).
This technique
is practiced on waking in the early morning from a dream.
You should
wake up fully, engage in some activity like reading or
walking about,
and then lie down to go to sleep again. Then you must
imagine yourself
asleep and dreaming, rehearse the dream from which you
woke, and
remind yourself, 'Next time I have this dream, I want
to remember I'm
dreaming.'
A second approach involves constantly reminding yourself
to become
lucid throughout the day rather than the night. This is
based on the
idea that we spend most of our time in a kind of waking
daze. If we
could be more lucid in waking life, perhaps we could be
more lucid
while dreaming. German psychologist Paul Tholey [Tho83]
suggests
asking yourself many times every day, 'Am I dreaming or
not?' This
exercise might sound easy, but is not. It takes a lot
of determination
and persistence not to forget all about it. For those
who do forget,
French researcher Clerc suggests writing a large 'C' on
your hand (for
'conscious') to remind you [GB89]. This kind of method
is similar to
the age-old technique for increasing awareness by meditation
and
mindfulness.
The third and final approach requires a variety of gadgets.
The idea
is to use some sort of external signal to remind people,
while they
are actually in REM sleep, that they are dreaming. Hearne
first tried
spraying water onto sleepers' faces or hands but found
it too
unreliable. This sometimes caused them to incorporate
water imagery
into their dreams, but they rarely became lucid. He eventually
decided
to use a mild electrical shock to the wrist. His 'dream
machine'
detects changes in breathing rate (which accompany the
onset of REM)
and then automatically delivers a shock to the wrist [Hea90].
Meanwhile, in California, LaBerge [LaB85] was rejecting
taped voices
and vibrations and working instead with flashing lights.
The original
version of a lucid dream-inducing device which he developed
was
laboratory based and used a personal computer to detect
the eye
movements of REM sleep and to turn on flashing lights
whenever the
REMs reached a certain level. Eventually, however, all
the circuitry
was incorporated into a pair of goggles. The idea is to
put the
goggles on at night, and the lights will flash only when
you are
asleep and dreaming. The user can even control the level
of eye
movements at which the lights begin to flash. The newest
version has a
chip incorporated into the goggles, which will not only
control the
lights but will store data on eye-movement density during
the night as
well as information about when and for how long the lights
were
flashing, making fine tuning possible.
There are two reasons for associating lucid dreams with
OBEs. First,
recent research suggests that the same people tend to
have both lucid
dreams and OBEs [Bla88, Irw88]. Second, as Green pointed
out [Gre68b]
it is hard to know where to draw the line between an OBE
and a lucid
dream. In both, the person seems to be perceiving a consistent
world.
Also the subject, unlike in an ordinary dream, is well
aware that he
is in some altered state and is able to comment on and
even control
the experience. Green refers to all such states as 'metachoric
experiences.' It is possible to draw a line between these
two
experiences, but the important point to realize is that
that line is
not clear, and the two have much in common.
But there is an important difference between lucid dreams
and the
other states. In the lucid dream one has insight into
the state (in
fact that fact defines the state). In false awakening,
one does not
have such insight (again by definition). In typical OBEs,
people feel
that they have really left their bodies. Those experiencing
NDEs may
have a sense of rushing down a long tunnel, which some
perceive as
being an entryway into a world beyond death. It is only
in the lucid
dream that one realizes it is a dream.
Just as in the case of OBEs, surveys can tell us how common
lucid
dreams are and who has them. Blackmore estimates that
about 50 percent
of people have had at least one lucid dream in their lives
[Bla91].
Green [Gre66] found that 73% of student sample answered
'yes' to the
question, 'Have you ever had a dream in which you were
aware that you
were dreaming?.' Palmer found that 56% of the townspeople
and 71% of
the students in his sample reported that they had had
lucid dreams and
many of these claimed to have them regularly [Pal79b].
Blackmore found
that 79% of the Surrey students she interviewed had them
[Bla82].
Beyond producing these kinds of results, it does not seem
that surveys
can find out much. There are no very consistent differences
between
lucid dreamers and others in terms of age, sex, education,
and so on
[GL88]. All these surveys seem to agree quite closely,
showing that
the lucid dream is a rather common experience -- far more
common than
the OBE.
What is the physiology of dreams and lucid dreams?
The electrical activity of the brain has been observed
and classified
with EEG (electroencephalograph) equipment; signals are
picked up from
the scalp by electrodes, then filtered and amplified to
drive a graph
recorder. Brain activity has been found to produce specific
ranges for
certain basic states of consciousness, as indicated in
'Hz' (Hertz, or
cycles/vibrations per second):
delta -- 0.2 to 3.5 Hz (deep sleep, trance state) theta
-- 3.5 to 7.5
Hz (day dreaming, memory) alpha -- 7.5 to 13 Hz (tranquility,
heightened awareness, meditation) beta -- 13 to 28 Hz
(tension,
'normal' consciousness)
In the drowsy state before falling asleep, the EEG is
characterized by
many alpha waves while the muscles start to relax. Gradually
this
state gives way to Stage 1 sleep. Three more stages follow,
each
having different EEG patterns and marked by successively
deeper states
of relaxation. By Stage 4 the sleeper is very relaxed,
his breathing
is slower, and skin resistance high. He is very hard to
wake up. If
the dreamer is awakened, he may say that he was thinking
about
something or he may describe some vague imagery, but he
will rarely
recount anything which sounds like a typical dream.
But this is not all there is to sleep -- increasing oblivion.
In a
normal night's sleep, a distinct change takes place an
hour or two
after the onset of sleep. Although the muscles are still
relaxed, the
sleeper may move, and from the EEG it appears that he
is going to wake
up and he returns to something resembling Stage 1 sleep.
Yet he will
still be very hard to wake up, and in this sense is fast
asleep. The
most distinctive feature, however, is the rapid eye movements,
or REMs
and the stage is also called REM-sleep. In earlier stages
the eyes may
roll about slowly, now, however, they dart about as though
watching
something. If woken up now the sleeper will usually report
that he was
dreaming.
Lucid dreams implied that there could be consciousness
during sleep, a
claim many psychologists denied for more than 50 years.
Orthodox sleep
researchers argued that lucid dreams could not possibly
be real
dreams. If the accounts were valid, then the experiences
must have
occurred during brief moments of wakefulness or in the
transition
between waking and sleeping, not in the kind of deep sleep
in which
REMs and ordinary dreams usually occur. In other words,
they could not
really be dreams at all.
This contention presented a challenge to lucid dreamers
who wanted to
convince people that they really were awake in their dreams.
But of
course when you are deep asleep and dreaming you cannot
shout, 'Hey!
Listen to me. I'm dreaming right now.' During REM sleep,
the muscles
of the body, excluding the eye muscles and those responsible
for
circulation and respiration, are immobilized by orders
from a nerve
center in the lower brain. This fact prevents us from
acting out our
dreams. Occasionally, this paralysis turns on or remains
active while
the person's mind is fully awake and aware of the world.
It was Keith Hearne [Hea78], of the University of Hull,
who first
exploited the fact that not all the muscles are paralyzed.
In REM
sleep the eyes move. So perhaps a lucid dreamer could
signal by moving
the eyes in a predetermined pattern. Lucid dreamer Alan
Worsley first
managed to do this in Hearne's laboratory. He decided
to move his eyes
left and right eight times in succession whenever he became
lucid.
Using a polygraph, Hearne could watch the eye movements
for sign of
the special signal. The answer was unambiguous. All the
lucid dreams
occurred in definite REM sleep. In other words they were,
in this
sense, true dreams.
A typical lucid dream lasted between two and five minutes,
occurred at
about 6.30 a.m., about 24 minutes into a REM period and
towards the
end of a 22-second REM burst. The nights on which lucid
dreams
occurred did not show a different sleep pattern from other
nights,
although they did tend to follow days of above average
stimulation.
It is sometimes said that discoveries in science happen
when the time
is right for them. It was one of those odd things that
at just the
same time, but unbeknownst to Hearne, Stephen LaBerge,
at Stanford
University in California, was trying the same experiment.
He too
succeeded, but resistance to the idea was very strong.
In 1980, both
Science and Nature rejected his first paper on the discovery
[LaB85].
It was only later that it became clear just how important
this
discovery had been.
Some conclusions can be drawn from this information. In
both OBEs and
lucid dreams, the person seems to have his waking consciousness,
or
something close to it. He is able to see clearly, but
what he sees is
not quite like the physical and it appears to have many
of the
properties of a dream world or imaginary world. But there
are
differences as well: the lucid dream starts more often
when the
subject is asleep, and the dream world is less distinct
and real than
the OB 'world,' allowing less control and freedom of movement;
in
addition, the person who has an OBE starting from the
waking state
never actually thinks he is dreaming. Most lucid dreams
involve only
the subject, but there are cases on record of 'meetings'
in lucid
dreams. The important question is whether the OBEer is
observing the
same world as the lucid dreamer. Are the two experiences
essentially
aspects of the same phenomenon?
According to Stephen LaBerge it seems possible that at
least some OBEs
arise from the same conditions as sleep paralysis, and
that these two
terms may actually be naming two aspects of the same phenomenon
[LL91]. In his opinion the survey evidence favors this
theory. There
is also considerable evidence that people who tend to
have OBEs also
tend to have lucid dreams, flying and falling dreams,
and the ability
to control their dreams [Bla84, Gli89, Irw88]. Because
of the strong
connection between OBEs and lucid dreaming, some researchers
in the
area have suggested that OBEs are a type of lucid dream
[Far76, Hon79,
Sal82].
One problem with this argument is that although people
who have OBEs
are also likely to have lucid dreams, OBEs are far less
frequent, and
can happen to people who have never had lucid dreams.
Furthermore,
OBEs are quite plainly different from lucid dreams in
that during a
typical OBE the experient is convinced that the OBE is
a real event
happening in the physical world and not a dream, unlike
a lucid dream,
in which by definition the dreamer is certain that the
event is a
dream. There is an exception that connects the two experiences
-- when
we feel ourselves leaving the body, but also know that
we are
dreaming.
LaBerge organized a study which consisted of analysis
of the data of
107 lucid dreams from a total of 14 different people.
The
physiological information that was collected included
brain waves,
eye-movements and chin muscle activity. In all cases,
the dreamer
signaled the beginning of the lucid dream by making a
distinct pattern
of eye movements. After verifying that all the lucid dreams
had eye
signals showing that they had happened in REM sleep, they
were
classified into DILDs and WILDs, based on how long the
dreamers had
been in REM sleep without awakening before becoming lucid,
and on
their report of either having realized they were dreaming
while
involved in a dream (DILD) or having entered the dream
directly from
waking while retaining lucidity (WILD). Alongside the
physiological
analysis each dream report was scored for the presence
of various
events that are typical of OBEs, such as feelings of body
distortion
(including paralysis and vibrations), floating or flying,
references
to being aware of being in bed, being asleep or lying
down, and the
sensation of leaving the body.
Ten of the 107 lucid dreams qualified as OBEs, because
the dreamers
reported feeling as if they had left their bodies in the
dream. Twenty
of the lucid dreams were WILDs, and 87 were DILDs. Five
of the OBEs
were WILDs (28%) and five were DILDs (6%). Thus, OBEs
were more than
four times more likely in WILDs than in DILDs. The three
OBE-related
events which were looked for also all occurred more often
in WILDs
than in DILDs. Almost one third of WILDs contained body
distortions,
and over a half of them included floating or flying or
awareness of
being in bed. This is in comparison to DILDs, of which
less than one
fifth involved body distortions, only one third included
floating or
flying, and one fifth contained awareness of bed.
The reports from the five DILDs that were classified as
OBEs were
actually much like those from the WILD-OBEs. In both the
dreamers felt
themselves lying in bed and experiencing strange sensations
including
paralysis and floating out-of-body. Although these lucid
dreams sound
like WILDs, they were classified as DILDs because the
physiological
records showed no awakenings preceding lucidity. However,
it is
possible that these people could have momentarily become
aware of
their environments (and hence been 'awake') while continuing
to show
the brainwaves normally associated with REM sleep.
The laboratory studies show that when OBEs happen in lucid
dreams they
happen either when a person re-enters REM sleep right
after an
awakening, or right after having become aware of being
in bed. Could
this relationship apply to OBEs and lucid dreams that
people
experience at home, in the 'real world'?
Not being able to take the sleep lab to the homes of hundreds
of
people LaBerge conducted a survey about OBEs and other
dream-related
experiences. The difference between his survey and previous
ones is
that in addition to asking if people had had OBEs, he
asked
specifically about certain events that are known to be
associated with
WILDs, namely, lucid dreaming, returning directly to a
dream after
awakening from it, and sleep paralysis.
A total of 572 people filled out the questionnaire. About
a third of
the group reported having had at least one OBE. Just over
80 percent
had had lucid dreams. Sleep paralysis was reported by
37 percent and
85 percent had been able to return to a dream after awakening.
People
who reported more dream-related experiences also reported
more OBEs.
For example, of the 452 people claiming to have had lucid
dreams, 39
percent also reported OBEs, whereas only 15 percent of
those who did
not claim lucid dreams said they had had OBEs. The group
with the most
people reporting OBEs (51%) were those who said they had
experienced
lucid dreams, dream return, and sleep paralysis.
In this survey, people reporting frequent dream return
also tended to
report frequent lucid dreams. Thus, LaBerge believes that
the fact
that dream return frequency is linked with OBE frequency
in this study
gives further support to the laboratory research finding
that WILDs
were associated with OBEs. On the other hand he stresses
that the
proof that some or even most OBEs are dreams is not enough
to allow us
to say that a genuine OBE is impossible. However, he suggests
that if
you have an OBE, why not test to see if the OBE-world
passes the
reality test. Is the room you are in the one you are actually
sleeping
in? If you have left your body, where is it? Do things
change when you
are not looking at them (or when you are)? Can you read
something
twice and have it remain the same on both readings? LaBerge
asks 'If
any of your questions and investigations leave you doubting
that you
are in the physical world, is it not logical to believe
you are
dreaming?' [LL91].
What is the physiology of OBEs?
Clearly there are similarities between OBEs and dreams.
In both we
experience a world in which imagination plays a great
part and we can
perform feats not possible in everyday life. But the OBE
differs in
many important and obvious ways from what we have called
an ordinary
dream. For a start, it usually occurs when the subject
is awake, or at
least if drowsy or drugged, not sleeping. Second, the
imagery and
activities of an OBE are usually much less bizarre and
more coherent
than those of an ordinary dream, and most often the scenery
is
something from the normal environment rather than the
peculiar setting
of dreams. Third, OBEers are often adamant that their
experience was
nothing like a dream. Finally, there is the great difference
in the
state of consciousness. Ordinary dreams are characterized
by very
cloudly consciousness at best, and are only recognized
as dreams on
waking up.
But these differences are not enough. You may argue that
in a lucid
dream both the imagery and the state of consciousness
are much more
like those in an OBE. So perhaps the OBE is a kind of
lucid dream
occurring in the midst of waking life. One way to find
out might be to
determine the physiological state in which the OBE takes
place. Such a
finding can only be made by means of laboratory experiment;
but first
we need to catch an OBE in the laboratory.
Observing an OBE in the laboratory setting is not easy.
Most people
who have an OBE have only one, or at most few, in a lifetime.
Capturing an OBE requires a special kind of subject, one
who is both
able to induce an OBE at will, and willing to be subjected
to the
stress of being tested. Fortunately there are such subjects.
One of the first to be tested was a young girl called
Miss Z., by
Charles Tart who studied her OBEs [Tar68]. Her OBEs all
occurred at
night. She used to wake up in the night and find herself
floating near
the ceiling. With Miss Z. as subject Tart initially wanted
to test two
aspects of the OBE: first, whether ESP could occur during
an OBE, and
second what physiological state was associated with the
experience.
Altogether, Miss Z. spent four non-consecutive nights
sleeping at the
lab.
During her first night Miss Z. had no OBEs. During the
second night
she woke twice and reported that she had been floating
above her body.
During the first experience Miss Z. had not yet fallen
asleep when the
OBE occurred, and the EEG showed a drowsy waking pattern
followed by
waking when she told Tart about the experience. All the
time the heart
rate had been steady and there were no REMs. Then at 3.15
a.m. Miss Z.
woke up and called out 'write down 3.13.' Apparently she
had left her
body and lifted up high enough to see the clock on the
wall. At that
time the EEG showed various patterns but predominantly
theta and
alphoid activity. There were few sleep spindles (a feature
of the EEG
pattern in certain stages of sleep), no REMs, no GSRs
(galvanic skin
response) and a steady heartbeat.
On the third night Miss Z. had a dramatic OBE. She seemed
to be
flying, and found herself at her home in Southern California,
with her
sister. Her sister got up from the rocking chair where
she had been
sitting and the two of them communicated without speaking.
After a
while they both walked into the bedroom and saw the sister's
body
lying in bed asleep. Almost as soon as she realized that
it was time
to go, the OBE was over and Miss Z. found herself back
in the
laboratory. Tart was not able to contact the sister to
check whether
she had been aware of the visit, but the physiological
record showed
that there was mostly alphoid activity with no REMs and
only a couple
of minutes of Stage 1, dreaming sleep, with REMs.
The last night was in some ways the most exciting, for
on that
occasion the subject was able to see an ESP target provided;
but the
EEG record was obscured by a lot of interference. Tart
described it as
somewhat like Stage 1 with REMs, but he added that he
could not be
sure whether it was a Stage1 or a waking pattern.
Amongst all these confusing and changeable patterns, some
certainty
does emerge. In general the EEG showed a pattern most
like poorly
developed Stage 1 mixed with brief periods of wakefulness.
For this
subject at least OBEs do not occur in the same state as
dreaming. Tart
would have liked to have continued working with Miss Z.
but this
proved impossible as she had to return to Southern California.
However, Tart [Tar67] was able to work with another subject,
Robert
Monroe, well known from his books. Monroe was monitored
for nine
sessions with EEG and other devices. In this environment
Monroe had
difficulty inducing an OBE. Electrodes were clipped to
his ear, and he
found them very uncomfortable. During all the time that
he was trying
to have an OBE his EEG showed a strange mixture of patterns.
There was
unusually varied alpha rhythm, variable sleep spindles,
and high
voltage theta waves. On the whole Tart concluded that
Monroe was in
Stages 1 and 2 and was relaxed and drowsy, falling in
and out of
sleep. His sleep pattern was quite normal and he had normal
dream
periods and sleep cycle.
During the penultimate session Monroe managed to have
an OBE. Tart
concluded that Monroe's OBEs occurred in the dreaming
state; but this
idea presented him with a problem. Monroe claims that
for him,
dreaming and OBEs are entirely different. Tart finally
concluded that
perhaps the OBEs were a mixture of dreams and 'something
else.' This
'something else' might, he thought, be ESP.
One of the next subjects to be tested in this way was
Ingo Swann. In
several experiments at the ASPR [OM77] Swann was attached
to the EEG
equipment while he sat in a darkened room and tried to
exteriorise, in
his own time, and to travel to a distant room where ESP
targets were
set up. He did not fall asleep and was thus able to make
comments
about how he was getting on. After some months of this
type of
experiment Swann suggested that he might be able to leave
his body on
command and so he was arranged to receive an audible signal
to tell
him when to go, and when to return. Apparently he succeeded
in this
effort, which meant that OBE and other times could easily
be
determined and compared.
During the OBE periods, the EEG was markedly flattened
and there were
frequency changes, with a decrease in alpha and increase
in beta
activity. While these changes took place, the heart rate
stayed
normal. These findings are rather different from those
with previous
subjects in that Swann seemed to be more alert during
his OBEs.
Perhaps this just confirms what was learned from case
studies, that
the OBE can occur in a variety of states. But perhaps
most important
is that in no case so far did there seem to be a discrete
state in
which the OBE took place. There were no sudden changes
in either EEG
or autonomic functions to mark the beginning or end of
the OBE. Any
changes were gradual; unlike dreaming, the OBE does not
seem to be
associated with a discrete physiological state.
The one other subject who has taken part in a large number
of OBE
experiments is Keith ('Blue') Harary. The experiments
in which his
physiological state was measured were carried out at the
Physical
Research Foundation [Mor73, HJH74, JHHLM74, MHJHR78].
The findings
were different again from those of previous studies. Here
there were
no changes in EEG. The amount and frequency of alpha were
the same in
OBE and 'cool down' periods and there were only slightly
fewer eye
movements in the OBE phases. These measurements alone
show that Harary
was awake and that his OBEs did not occur in a sleeping,
dreaming or
borderline state.
Other measures did show a change. Skin potential fell,
indicating
greater relaxation, and it was this measure which provided
the best
indicator that an OBE had begun. Both heart rate and respiration
increased. These changes are surprising because they imply
a greater
degree of arousal; the opposite of the finding from skin
potential. So
in some ways Harary was more relaxed, but he was also
more alert.
Great differences between subjects tend to obscure any
clear pattern
in the states, but in all this confusion it is clear that
the start of
an OBE does not coincide with any abrupt physiological
change. There
is no discrete OBE state. The OBE does not, at least for
these
subjects, and under these conditions, occur in a state
resembling
dreaming. The subjects were relaxed, and even drowsy or
lightly
asleep, but they were not dreaming when they had their
OBEs.
What are near-death experiences and are they some kind of OBEs?
Much publicity has recently been given to research on
near-death
experiences (NDEs), experiences of those who survive a
close encounter
with death. More people now survive close brushes with
death. The
near-death experience has been defined as the 'experiential
counterpart of the physiological transition to biological
death'
[Sab82]: it is the record of conscious experience from
the inside
rather than the outside, from the point of view of the
subject rather
the spectator.
Raymond Moody [Moo75, 77] interviewed many people who
had been
resuscitated after having had accidents and he then put
together an
idealized version of a typical near-death experience.
He emphasized
that no one person described the whole of this experience,
but each
feature was found in many of the stories. Here is his
description:
A man is dying and, as he reaches the point
of greatest physical
distress, he hears himself pronounced dead
by his doctor. He begins
to hear an uncomfortable noise, a loud ringing
or buzzing, and at
the same time feels himself moving very rapidly
through a long dark
tunnel. After this, he suddenly finds himself
outside of his own
physical body, but still in the immediate
physical environment, and
he sees his own body from a distance, as though
he is a spectator.
He watches the resuscitation attempt from
this unusual vantage point
and is in a state of emotional upheaval.
After a while, he collects himself and becomes
more accustomed to
his odd condition. He notices that he still
has a 'body,' but one of
a very different nature and with very different
powers from the
physical body he has left behind. Soon other
things begin to happen.
Others come to meet and to help him. He glimpses
the spirits of
relatives and friends who have already died,
and a loving, warm
spirit of a kind he has never encountered
before -- a being of light
-- appears before him. This being asks him
a question, non-verbally,
to make him evaluate his life and helps him
along by showing him a
panoramic, instantaneous playback of the major
events of his life.
At some point he finds himself approaching
some sort of barrier or
border, apparently representing the limit
between earthly life and
the next life. Yet, he finds that he must
go back to the earth, that
the time for his death has not yet come. At
this point he resists,
for by now he is taken up with his experiences
in the afterlife and
does not want to return. He is overwhelmed
by intense feelings of
joy, love, and peace. Despite his attitude,
though, he somehow
reunites with his physical body and lives.
Later he tries to tell others, but he has
trouble doing so. In the
first place, he can find no human words adequate
to describe these
unearthly episodes. He also finds that others
scoff, so he stops
telling other people. Still, the experience
affects his life
profoundly especially his views about death
and its relationship to
life.
The parallel between this kind of account and many OBEs
is clear.
There is the tunnel traveled through as well as the experiences
of
seeing one's own body from outside and seeming to have
some other kind
of body, and the ineffability is familiar. One is tempted
to conclude
that in death a typical OBE, or astral projection, occurs,
and is
followed by a transition to another world, with the aid
of people who
have already made the crossing, and that of higher beings
in whose
plane one is going to lead the next phase of existence.
Although
Moody's work gave a good idea of what dying could be like
for some
people, it did not begin to answer questions such as how
common this
type of experience is.
After Moody there have been studies by cardiologists Rawlings
and
Sabom. The most detailed research has been carried out
by Kenneth
Ring, a psychologist from Connecticut [Rin79, 80]. From
hospitals
there he obtained the names of people who had come close
to death, or
who had been resuscitated from clinical death. Almost
half of his
sample (48%) reported experiences which were, at least
in part,
similar to Moody's description. Of Ring's subjects, 95
per cent of
those asked stated that the experience was not like a
dream (the same
result appears in Sabom): they stressed that it was too
real, being
more vivid and more realistic; however some aspects were
hard to
express, as the experience did not resemble anything that
had happened
to them before.
One of Ring's most interesting findings concerned the
stages of the
experience. He showed that the earlier stages also tended
to be
reported more frequently. The first stage, peace, was
experienced by
60% of his sample, some of whom did not reach any further
stages. The
next stage, of most interest to us here, was that of 'body
separation,' in other words, the OBE. Thirty-seven per
cent of Ring's
sample reached this stage and what they reported sounds
very similar
to descriptions of OBEs. Not all the 'body separations'
were distinct.
Many of Ring's respondents simply described a feeling
of being
separate or detached from everything that was happening.
Ring tried to find out about two specific aspects of these
OBEs. First
he asked whether they had another body. The answer seemed
to be 'no':
most were unaware of any other body and answered that
they were
something like 'mind only.' There was a similar lack of
descriptions
of the 'silver cord.' We can see that an OBE of sorts
forms an
important stage in the near-death experience.
After the OBE stage comes 'entering the darkness' experienced
by
nearly a quarter of Ring's subjects. It was described
as 'a journey
into a black vastness without shape or dimension,' as
'a void, a
nothing' and as 'very peaceful blackness.'
For fifteen per cent the next stage was reached, 'seeing
the light.'
The light was sometimes at the end of the tunnel, sometimes
glimpsed
in the distance but usually it was golden and bright without
hurting
the eyes. Sometimes the light was associated with a presence
of some
kind, or a voice telling the person to go back.
Finally there were ten per cent experiencers who seemed
to 'enter the
light' and pass into or just glimpse another world. This
was described
as a world of great beauty, with glorious colors, with
meadows of
golden grass, birds singing, or beautiful music. It was
at this stage
that people were greeted by deceased relatives, and it
was from this
world that they did not want to come back.
A completely different kind of analysis was applied by
Noyes and
Kletti [Noy72, NK76] to accounts collected from victims
of falls,
drownings, accidents, serious illnesses, and other life-threatening
situations. They emphasized such features as altered time
perception
and attention, feelings of unreality and loss of emotions,
and the
sense of detachment. They found that these features occurred
more
often in people who thought they were about to die than
in those who
did not. This fitted their interpretation of the experiences
as a form
of depersonalization (i.e., the loss of the sense of personal
identity
or the sensation of being without material existence)
in the face of a
threat to life; that is as a way of escaping or becoming
dissociated
from the imminent death of the physical body.
Two other aspects have yet to be dealt with. First, there
is the
absence of any trips to 'hell.' Neither Moody nor Ring
obtained any
accounts of hellish experiences. However, cardiologist
Maurice
Rawlings [Raw78] has suggested that the reason for there
being no such
reports is that although patients may recall such hellish
experiences
immediately afterwards, they tend to forget them with
time. In other
words, their memories protect them from recalling the
unpleasant
aspects. According to Rawlings it is only because they
have been
interviewed too long after the brush with death that all
the
experiences are reported as pleasant. It does seem to
be the 'good'
side of experiences which makes the greater impact.
Another feature which needs mention is the 'life review.'
It has often
been found that a person close to death may seem to see
scenes of his
past life pass before him as though on a screen, or in
pictures. Ring
found that about a quarter of his core-experiencers reported
a life
review, and that it was more common in accident victims
than others.
The general effects of undergoing an NDE are of two kinds:
philosophical and ethical. The main philosophical changes
are in
attitudes towards death and afterlife. Sabom's figures
are extremely
interesting in this respect: he asked those who had and
those had not
had an NDE when unconscious whether there was any change
in their
views of death and the afterlife. Of the 45 who had not
had any
conscious experience, 39 were just as afraid of death
as before, 5
more afraid and 1 less afraid; while of the 61 with an
NDE none were
more afraid, 11 just as afraid and 50 less afraid. The
patterns were
similar concerning belief in an afterlife: of the non-
experiencers,
none had any change of attitude; while of the experiencers,
14 found
their attitude unchanged and 47 stated that their belief
in the
afterlife had increased [Sab82]. Ring found a correlation
between loss
of fear of death and what he called the core experience,
broadly that
with a positive transcendental element in it. Moody comments
that
there is remarkable agreement about the 'lessons' brought
back from
NDEs: 'Almost everyone has stressed the importance in
this life of
trying to cultivate love for others, a love of a unique
and profound
kind' [Moo75]. And he adds that a second characteristic
is a
realization of the importance of seeking knowledge, of
not confining
one's horizon to the material.
A number of reductionist physiological explanations have
been advanced
to account for NDEs: the two most common are 'cerebral
anoxia' and
'depersonalization'. Cerebral anoxia accounts for the
experience by
saying that it is a hallucination due to an oxygen shortage
in the
brain. We have seen that such 'hallucinations' frequently
turn out to
correspond to the physical events actually occurring --
can the NDE
therefore be labelled a hallucination? Perhaps it can,
but certainly
not as a delusion. Ring and Moody both point out that
patterns of
experiences are no different when there is clearly no
shortage of
oxygen. Noyes starts by pointing out that none of the
subjects can
really have been dead if they were resuscitated, so that
their
reported experiences cannot be taken as 'proof' of survival
of
consciousness. Moody never actually states such a position,
but rather
confines himself to asserting that the experiences have
a suggestive
value; even if for the subjects themselves the experience
is proof.
The common factor underlying all the physiological explanations
of the
NDE is the attempt to avoid the prima facie interpretation
of the
experience as an OBE. Sabom concludes that this hypothesis
is the best
fit with the data, while Ring concludes that 'there is
abundant
empirical evidence pointing to the reality of out-of-body
experiences;
that such experiences conform to the descriptions given
by our
near-death experiencers; and that there is highly suggestive
evidence
that death involves the separation of a second body --
a double --
from the physical body' [Rin80].
Just as many different interpretations have been presented
for all
aspects of the near-death experience. The most important
of them have
been usefully summarised by Grosso [Gro81]. Most people
seem to agree
that the near-death experience presents remarkable consistency
varying
little across differences in culture, religion, and cause
of the
crisis; what is in dispute is why there should be such
a consistency.
Rawlings steeps all his findings in the language of Christianity,
involving heaven and hell and the possibility of being
saved. Noyes
interprets NDEs in terms of depersonalization; Siegel
in terms of
hallucinations, and Ring, within a parapsychological-holographic
model. But broadly speaking there are two camps. On the
other side are
those who see the near-death experience as a sure signpost
towards
another world and a life after death; on the other, those
who have, in
various different ways, interpreted the experience as
part of life,
not death, and as telling us nothing whatsoever about
a 'life after
life.'
Is the OBE some kind of mental illness?
If the OBE is to be seen as involving psychological processes,
rather
than paranormal ones, we need to look at what those processes
could
be. Let us begin with a psychiatric approach and ask whether
the OBE,
or anything like it, is found in any mental illness.
Noyes and Kletti likened near-death experiences to the
phenomenon of
depersonalization. Related to depersonalization is derealization,
in
which the surroundings and environment begin to seem unreal
and the
sufferer seems to be cut off from reality. Depersonalization
is the
more common of the two, and involves feelings that the
person's own
body is foreign or does not belong. He may complain that
he does not
feel emotions even though he appears to express them,
and he may
suffer anxiety, distortions of time and place, and changes
in his body
image, and the subject may seem to observe things from
a few feet
ahead of his body. His conscious 'I- ness' is said to
be outside his
body. The patients characterize their imagery as pale
and colorless,
and some complain that they have altogether lost the power
of
imagination.
This description does not sound like that of someone who
has had an
OBE or a NDE. There are distortions of the environment
and alterations
in imagery in OBE and NDE experiences, but it seems that
imagery
typically becomes more bright and vivid, colorful and
detailed, rather
than pale and colorless. There are changes in the emotions
-- but
rather than a perishing of love and hate, many OBEers
report deep love
and joy and positive emotions. The phenomena of derealization
and
depersonalization do not in the least help us to understand.
Any small
similarities are outweighed by overwhelming differences.
One syndrome specifically involving doubles is the unusual
'Capgras
syndrome.' A person suffering from this illusion may believe
that a
friend or relative has been replaced by an exact double.
Since this
double is like the real person in every discernible way,
nothing that
the 'real person' says or does will convince the patient
otherwise. In
this way the patient can avoid the guilt he feels at any
malicious or
negative feelings towards a loved one. From even this
very brief
description it is obvious that this illusion bears no
resemblance to
the OBE.
More relevant may be the kinds of double seen in autoscopy,
literally
'seeing oneself.' Although the OBE is rarely distinguished
from
autoscopy in the psychiatric literature, other distinctions
are made
instead. The main distinction is that OBE involves feeling
of being
outside the body while autoscopy usually consist of seeing
a double.
Some people see the whole of their body as a double; some
see only
parts, perhaps only the face. There is an internal form
in which the
subject can see his internal organs; and a cenesthetic
form in which
he does not see, but only feels the presence of his double.
There is
even a negative form in which the subject cannot see himself
even when
he tries to look into a mirror.
An entirely different way of looking at autoscopy is through
the
physical problems with which it is sometimes associated.
One of these
is migraine, the most obvious symptom of which is the
debilitating
headache. During, before or after the pain some migraine
suffers
apparently experience autoscopy. In any case, a number
of examples of
people who have suffered both migraine and a simultaneous
experience
of either autoscopy or an OBE, does not prove any particular
kind of
connection between the two.
Are people who have greater imagery skills more likely to have OBEs?
OBEs might be expected to be more frequently experienced
by people
with the most highly developed skills of conceiving mental
images if
the experience is one constructed entirely from the imagination.
Irwin
[Irw80, 81b] was interested in whether OBEers differ from
other people
in terms of certain cognitive skills or ways of thinking,
including
imagery. He found 21 OBEers and to these he gave the 'Ways
of thinking
questionnaire' (WOT), the 'Differential personality questionnaire'
(DPQ) and the 'Vividness of visual imagery questionnaire'
(VVIQ). For
each he compared the scores of the OBEers with those expected
from
studies of larger groups of the population.
The imagery questionnaire a self-rated measure of vividness
of just
visual imagery. The scores of these few OBEers were unexpectedly
found
to be lower than normal, and significantly so. It seems
that they had
less, not more, vivid imagery than the average. The next
test, the
WOT, aims to test the verbalizer-visualizer dimension
of cognitive
style. Irwin's OBEers obtained scores no different from
the average.
So there was no evidence that OBEers are either specially
likely to
use visualization or verbalization.
Although not directly relevant to the subject of imagery,
the results
of the DPQ were interesting. One of the various dimensions
of
cognitive style which it measures is 'Absorption.' This
relates to a
person's capacity to become absorbed in his experience.
For example,
someone who easily becomes immersed in nature, art or
a good book or
film or a computer game, to the exclusion of the outside
world, would
be one who scored highly on the scale of 'Absorption.'
Irwin expected
OBEers to be higher on this measure and that is what he
found. His
OBEers seemed to be better than average at becoming involved
in their
experiences.
Are OBEs some kind of hallucination?
There is no single accepted definition of hallucinations
and it is not
clear just how they relate to sensory perception, illusion,
dreams and
imagination. However, let us define an hallucination as
an apparent
perception of something not physically present, and add
that it is not
necessary for the hallucination to be thought 'real' to
count. Into
this category come a wide range of experiences occurring
in people,
not suffering from any mental or psychiatric disturbance.
Visual
imagery may occur just before going to sleep (hypnagogic),
on first
waking up (hypnopompic) or they may be induced by drugs,
sensory
deprivation, sleeplessness, or severe stress. They may
take many
forms, from simple shapes to complex scenes.
Although it is possible to have an hallucination involving
almost any
kind of imagery, it has long been known that there are
remarkable
similarities between the hallucinations of different people,
under
different circumstances. Hallucinations were first classified
during
the last century during a period when many artists and
writers
experimented with hashish and opium as an aid to experiencing
them. In
1926 Kluver began a series of investigations into the
effects of
mescaline and described four constant types. These were
first the
grating, lattice or chessboard, second the cobweb type,
third the
tunnel, cone or vessel, and fourth the spiral. As well
as being
constant features of mescaline intoxication in different
people,
Kluver found that these forms appeared in hallucinations
induced by a
wide variety of conditions.
In the 1960s, when many psychedelic drugs began to be
extensively used
for recreational purposes, research into their effects
proliferated.
Leary and others tried to develop methods by which intoxicated
subjects could describe what was happening to them. Eventually
Leary
and Lindsley developed the 'experiental typewriter' with
twenty keys
representing different subjective states. Subjects were
trained to use
it but the relatively high doses of drugs used interfered
with their
ability to press the keys and so a better method was needed.
A decade later Siegel gave subjects marijuana, or THC,
and asked them
simply to report on what they saw. Even with untrained
subjects he
found remarkable consistencies in the hallucinations.
In the early
stages simple geometric forms predominated. There was
often a bright
light in the center of the field of vision which obscured
central
details but allowed images at the edges to be seen more
clearly, and
the location of this light created a tunnel-like perspective.
Often
the images seemed to pulsate and moved towards or away
from the light
in the center of the tunnel. At a later stage, the geometric
forms
were replaced by complex imagery including recognizable
scenes with
people and objects, sometimes with small animals or caricatures
of
people. Even in this stage there was much consistency,
with images
from memory playing a large part.
On the basis of this work Siegel constructed a list of
eight forms,
eight colors, and eight patterns of movement, and trained
subjects to
use them when given a variety of drugs (or a placebo)
in controlled
environment. With amphetamines and barbiturates the forms
reported
were mostly black and white forms moving aimlessly about,
but with
THC, psilocybin, LSD and mescaline the forms became more
organized as
the experience progressed. After 30 minutes there were
more lattice
and tunnel forms, and the colors shifted from blue to
red, orange to
yellow. Movement became more organized with explosive
and rotational
patterns. After 90 - 120 minutes most forms were lattice-tunnels;
after that complex imagery began to appear with childhood
memories and
scenes, emotional memories and some fantastic scenes.
But even these
scenes often appeared in a lattice-tunnel framework. At
the peak of
the hallucinatory experience, subjects sometimes said
that they had
become part of the imagery. They stopped using similes
and spoke of
the images as real. Highly creative images were reported
and the
changes were very rapid. According to Siegel [Sie77] at
this stage
'The subjects reported feeling dissociated from their
bodies.'
The parallels between the drug-induced hallucinations
and the typical
spontaneous OBE should be obvious. Not only did some of
the subjects
in Siegel's experiments actually report OBEs, but there
were the
familiar tunnels and the bright lights so often associated
with
near-death experiences. There was also the 'realness'
of everything
seen; and the same drugs which elicited the hallucinations
are those
which are supposed to be conducive to OBEs.
There have been many suggestions as to why the tunnel
form should be
so common. It has sometimes been compared to the phenomenon
of 'tunnel
vision' in which the visual field is greatly narrowed,
but usually in
OBEs and hallucinations the apparent visual field is very
wide; it is
just formed like a tunnel. A more plausible alternative
depends on the
way in which retinal space is mapped on cortical space.
If a straight
line in the visual cortex of the brain represents a circular
pattern
on the retina then stimulation in a straight line occurring
in states
of cortical excitation could produce a sensation of concentric
rings,
or a tunnel form. This type of argument is important in
understanding
the visual illusions of migraine, in which excitations
spread across
parts of the cortex.
Another reasonable speculation is that the tunnel has
something to do
with constancy mechanisms. As objects move about, or we
move relative
to them, their projection on the retina changes shape
and size. We
have constancy mechanisms which compensate for this effect.
For very
large objects, distortions are necessarily a result of
perspective,
and yet we see buildings as having straight wall and roofs.
If this
mechanism acted inappropriately on internally generated
spontaneous
signals, it might produce a tunnel-like perspective, and
any
hallucinatory forms would also be seen against this distorted
background.
In drug-induced hallucinations there may come a point
at which the
subject becomes part of the imagery and it seems quite
real to him,
even though it comes from his memory. The comparison with
OBEs is
interesting because one of the most consistent features
of spontaneous
OBEs is that the experiencers claim 'it all seemed so
real.' If it
were a kind of hallucination similar to these drug-induced
ones then
it would seem real. Put together the information from
the subject's
cognitive map in memory, and an hallucinatory state in
which
information from memory is experienced as though it were
perceived,
and you have a good many of the ingredients for a classical
OBE.
But what of the differences between hallucinations and
OBEs? You may
point to the state of consciousness associated with the
two and argue
that OBEs often occur when the person claims to be wide
awake, and
thinking perfectly normally. But so can hallucinations.
With certain
drugs consciousness and thinking seem to be clearer than
ever before,
just as they often do in an OBE. An important difference
is that in
the OBE, the objects of perception are organized consistently
as
though they do constitute a stable, physical world. But
such is not
always the case; there are many cases which involve experiences
beyond
anything to be seen in the physical world.
Consideration of imagery and hallucinations might provide
some sort of
framework for understanding the OBE. It would be seen
as just one form
of a range of hallucinatory experiences. But (and this
is a big but)
if the OBE is basically an hallucination and nothing actually
leaves
the body, then paranormal events ought not necessarily
to be
associated with it. People ought not to be able to see
distant unknown
places or influence objects while 'out of the body'; yet
there are
many claims to such an effect.
What are the features of OB vision?
In the late 1960s Charles Tart began the first laboratory
tests with
subjects who could have OBEs voluntarily [Tar67, 68].
In addition to
his physiological research he also tested subjects' ability
to see a
target hidden from their normal sight. His first subject,
Miss Z., was
tested in a laboratory where a target was placed on a
shelf about five
and a half feet above the bed where she lay. The target
was a
five-digit number prepared in advance by Tart and placed
on the shelf.
Miss Z. slept in the laboratory on four occasions. On
the first she
had no OBE; on the second, she managed to get high enough
to see the
clock, and on third night she had an OBE but traveled
elsewhere.
However, on her fourth and last night she awoke and reported
that she
had seen the number and it was 25132. She was right on
all five digits
which has a probability of only one in 100,000 of being
right by
chance.
Tart himself seemed reluctant to conclude that it was
paranormal.
Tart's second subject was Robert Monroe, who came to the
laboratory
for nine sessions, but he was only able to induce an OBE
in the
penultimate session, and then he had two. During the first
of these
OBEs he seemed to see a man and a woman but not to know
who or where
they were. In the second he made a great effort to stay
'local' and
managed to see a technician, who was supposed to be monitoring
the
apparatus. With her he saw a man whom he did not know
was there and
whom he later described. It turned out that this was the
husband of
the technician, who had come to keep her company. Since
Monroe did not
manage to see the target number, no real test of ESP was
possible.
In 1971 Karlis Osis began to plan OBE research at the
American SPR.
One of the first subjects to be tested there was Ingo
Swann, who went
to the laboratory two or three times a week where Janet
Mitchell
tested him to see whether he could identify a target placed
out of
sight. A platform was suspended from the ceiling about
10 feet above
the ground and divided into two. On either side of a partition
various
objects were placed and Swann was asked to try to travel
up to see
them. The reason for the partition was to see whether
Swann would
identify the correct target for the position in which
he claimed it to
be. Bright colors and clear familiar shapes seemed most
successful and
glossy pictures or glass did not work well for the experimental
purposes.
After his OBE, Swann usually made drawings of what he
had 'seen.'
Although these drawings were far from perfect renderings
of the
original objects, they were similar enough that when eight
sets of
targets and respondes were given to an independent judge
she correctly
matched every pair; a result which is likely to happen
by chance only
once in about 40,000 times [Mit73].
The results of all these experiment were most encouraging.
From Tart's
results especially it seemed that although it was very
hard for the
subject to get to see the number, and that if the number
was seen, it
was seen correctly. Further research showed that OB vision
could be
just as confused and erratic as ESP has always seemed
to be. For
example Osis [Osi73] advertised for people who could have
OBEs to come
to the ASPR for testing. About one hundred came forward
and were asked
to try to travel to a distant room and to report on what
objects they
could see there. Osis found that most of them thought
they could see
the target but most were wrong. He concluded that the
vast majority of
the experiences had nothing to do with bone fide OBEs.
This conclusion
means that Osis was using the ability to see correctly
as a criterion
for the occurrence of a genuine OBE.
Much of the recent research on OBEs has been directed
towards that
important question; does anything leave the body in an
OBE? On the one
hand are the 'ecsomatic' or 'extrasomatic' theories which
claim that
something does leave. This something might be the astral
body of
traditional theory or some other kind of entity. Morris
[Mor73] has
referred to the 'theta aspect' of man which may leave
the body
temporarily in an OBE, and permanently at death. On the
other hand
there are theories which claim that nothing leaves. Some
of these
predict that no paranormal events should occur during
OBEs, but the
major alternative to consider here is that nothing leaves,
but the
subject uses ESP to detect the target. This concept has
been referred
to as the 'imagination plus ESP' theory.
This last theory is problematic. The term ESP is a catch-all,
is
negatively defined, and is capable of subsuming almost
any result one
cares to mention. How then can it be ruled out? And given
these two
theories, how can we find out which, if either, is correct?
In spite
of the difficulties several parapsychologists have set
about this
task. Osis, for example, suggested that if the subject
in an OBE has
another body and is located at the distant position, then
he should
see things as though looking from that position. If he
were using ESP
he should see things as though with ESP.
This general ideal led Osis to suggest placing a letter
'd' in such
way that if seen directly (or presumably by ESP) a 'd'
would be seen,
but if looked from a designated position a 'p' would appear,
reflected
in a mirror. Following this idea further he developed
his 'optical
image device' which displays various pictures in several
colors as in
four quadrants. The final picture is put together using
black and
white outlines, a color wheel, and a series of mirrors.
By, as it
were, looking into the box by ESP one would not find the
complete
picture. To do so can only be achieved by looking in through
the
viewing window [Osi75].
Experiments with this device were carried out with Alex
Tanous, a
psychic from Maine. Tanous lay down in a soundproofed
room and was
asked to leave his body and go to the room containing
the device, look
in through the observation window and return to relate
what he had
seen. Osis recounts that at first Tanous did not succeed,
but
eventually he seemed to improve.
On each trial Tanous was told whether he was right or
wrong and was
thus able to look for criteria which might help to identify
when he
was succeeding. On those trials which he indicated he
was most
confident about, his results 'approached significance'
on the color
aspect of the target. Osis claimed that this aspect was
most important
for testing his theory because some of the colors were
modified by the
apparatus and would be very hard to get right by ESP.
The next tests
therefore used only a color wheel with three pictures
and six colors.
This time overall scores were not significant but high-confidence
scores for the whole target were significant and in the
second half of
the experiment Tanous scored significantly on several
target aspects,
especially the one which Osis claimed required 'localized
sensing.'
Blue Harary, who has provided so much interesting information
about
the physiology of the OBE, was tested for perception during
his OBEs,
but according to Rogo [Rog78c] he was only 'sporadically
successful'
on target studies and so research with him concentrated
on other
aspects of his experience.
Apart from all these experiments there is really only
one more
approach which is relevant to the question of ESP in OBEs
and that is
work done by Palmer and his associates at the University
of Virginia
in Charlottesville. They tried to develop methods for
inducing an OBE
in volunteer subjects in the laboratory and then to test
their ESP.
One can understand the potential advantages of such a
program. If it
were possible to take a volunteer and give him an OBE
under controlled
conditions, when and where you wanted it, half the problems
of OBE
research would be solved. It would be possible to test
hypotheses
about the OBE so much more quickly and easily, but alas,
this approach
turned to be fraught with various problems.
First Palmer and Vassar [PV74a, b] developed an induction
technique
based on traditional ideas of what conditions are conducive
to the
OBE. Using four different groups of subjects in three
stages, the
method was modified to incorporate different techniques
for muscular
relaxation and disorientation. Each subject was brought
into the
laboratory and the experiment was explained to him. He
was then taken
into an inner room to lie on a comfortable reclining chair
and told
that a target picture would be placed on a table in the
outer room.
The stage of the induction consisted of nearly fifteen
minutes of
progressive muscular relaxation with the subject being
asked to heard
a pulsating tone both through headphones and speakers
which served to
eliminate extraneous noises and produce a disorientating
effect. At
the same time he looked into a rotating red and green
spiral lit by a
flashing light; this stage lasted a little under ten minutes.
In the
final stage he was asked to imagine leaving the chair
and floating
into the outer room to look at the target, but here several
variations
were introduced. Some subjects were guided through the
whole process
by taped instructions while other were simply allowed
to keep watching
the spiral while they imagined it for themselves. For
some the spiral
was also only imagined and for some there was an extra
stage of
imagining the target.
When the procedure was over the subject filled in a questionnaire
about his experiences in the experiment and completed
an imaginary
test (a shortened form of the Betts QMI). Then five pictures
were
placed before him. One was the target, but neither he
nor the
experimenter with him knew which it was. When he had rated
each of the
pictures on a 1 to 30 scale, the other experimenter was
called in to
say which was the target.
One of the questions asked was, 'Did you at any time during
the
experiment have the feeling that you were literally outside
of your
physical body?' Of 50 subject asked this question 21,
or 42%, answered
'yes.' As for the scores on the targets, overall scores
were not
significally different from chance expectation. When the
scores were
compared for the 21 OBEers and the others there was no
significant
difference between them. The OBEers did get significantly
fewer hits
than expected by chance, but this result difficult to
interpret.
Palmer and Lieberman [PL75a, b] took the techniques a
stage further.
Forty subjects were tested, but this time they had a visual
ganzfeld:
that is, half ping-pong balls were fixed over their eyes
and a light
was shone on them so as to produce a homogenous visual
field. Half the
subjects were given an 'active set' by being asked to
leave their
bodies and travel to the other room to see the target,
while the other
half were given a 'passive set' being asked only to allow
imagery to
flow freely in their mind.
As expected more of the 'active' subjects reported having
felt out of
their bodies: 13 out of 20 as opposed to only 4 in the
passive
condition. The active subjects also reported more vivid
imagery and
more effort expended in trying to see the target, but
when it came to
the ESP scores both groups were found to have scores close
to chance
expectation and there were no significant differences
between them.
However, those subjects who reported OBEs did do better
than the
others and significantly so. This result is quite different
from the
previous ones and is the opposite of what Palmer and Lieberman
predicted, but it is what one would expect on the hypothesis
that
having an OBE facilitates ESP.
Palmer and Lieverman put forward an interesting suggestion
as to why
more subjects in the active condition should report OBEs.
Their idea
is related to Schachter's theory of emotions, which has
been very
influential in psychology. This theory suggests that a
person
experiencing any emotion first feels the physiological
effects of
arousal, including such things as slight sweating, increased
heart
rate, tingling feelings, and so on, and then labels this
feeling
according to the situation as either 'anger,' 'passionate
love,'
'fear' or whatever. In the case of these experiments the
subject feels
unusual sensations arising from the induction and then
labels them
according to his instructions. If he were told to imagine
leaving his
body and traveling another room he might interpret his
feelings as
those of leaving the body. Of course this suggestion has
far wider
implications for understanding the OBE than those relating
to the
evaluation of the results of these experiments.
In the next experiment Palmer and Lieberman tested 40
more subjects,
incorporating suggestions from Robert Monroe's methods
for inducing
OBEs. The was no ganzfeld and instead of sitting in a
chair the
subjects lay on beds, sometimes with a vibrator attached
to the
springs. This time time 21 subjects reported OBEs; and,
interestingly,
these score higher on the Barber suggestibility scale,
but they did
not have better ESP scores.
In the final experiment in this series 40 more subjects
were tested,
20 with ganzfeld and 20 were just told to close their
eyes [Pal79a].
This time 13 in each group claimed to have had on OBE,
but whether
they did or not was not related to their ESP scores. This
time EEG
recording was also used, but it showed no differences
related to the
reported OBEs. All in all it seems that these experiments
were
successful in helping subjects to have an experience which
they
labelled as out of the body, but not in getting improved
ESP scores or
in finding an OBE state identifiable by EEG.
In an experiment designed to look at the effect of religious
belief on
susceptibility to OBEs, Smith and Irwin [SI81] tried to
induce OBEs in
two groups of students differing in their concern with
religious
affairs and human immortality. The induction was similar
to that
already described, but in addition the subjects were given
an
'OBE-ness' questionnaire and were asked to try to 'see'
two targets in
an adjacent room. Later their impressions were given a
veridicality
score for resemblance to the targets. No differences between
the
groups were found for either OBE-ness or veridicality,
but there was a
highly significant correlation between OBE- ness and veridicality.
This result implies that the more OBE-like the experience,
the better
the ESP.
All these experiments were aimed at finding out whether
subjects could
see a distant target during an OBE. Although the experimental
OBE may
differ from the spontaneous kind, a simple conclusion
is possible from
the experimental studies. That is, OBE vision, if it occurs,
is
extremely poor.
How can the OBE be explained?
Most theories of the OBE either claim that something leaves
the
physical body, or that it does not. Then within these
two major
categories there are several different types of explanation,
and there
is perhaps a last possibility; that any such distinction
is
meaningless and artificial. The theories can be divided
up as follows
[Bla82]:
A. Something leaves the body.
1. Physical theories
2. Physical astral world theory
3. Mental astral world theory
B. Nothing leaves the body
1. Parapsychological theory
2. Psychological theories
C. Other
SOMETHING LEAVES THE BODY
Physical Theories
(a physical double travels in the physical
world)"
First there is the kind of explanation which
suggests that we each
have a second physical body which can separate
from the usual one.
There are two aspects to consider, one being
the status and nature
of the double which travels, and the other
being the status and
nature of the world in which it travels. In
this theory both are
material and interact with the normal physical
world. You may
immediately dismiss this notion, saying that
the double is
non-physical.
To make this theory even worth considering
it is necessary to assume
that this double is composed of some 'finer'
or more subtle material
that is invisible to the untrained eye. This
kind of idea is
sometimes expressed in occult writings. The
idea appears, for
example, as the 'etheric body' of the Theosophists.
Objections to
this type of theory are numerous, and are
made on both logical and
empirical grounds. First, what could the double
be made of? The
possibilities seem to range between a complete
solid duplicate and a
kind of misty and insubstantial version. Another
problem with this
kind of double is its appearance. If all have
a second body why does
it appear to some as a blob or globe, to other
as a flare, or light,
and to yet others as a duplicate of the physical
body? Muldoon and
Carrington [MC29] wrestled with this problem
and so has Tart
[Tar74b].
If the notion of a physical double is problematic,
the notion that
it travels in the physical world is just as
much so. First there are
the types of errors made in OB perception.
These tend not to be the
sort of errors which might arise from a poor
perceptual system, but
seem often to be fabricated error, or additions,
as well as
omissions. Then sometimes the OB world is
responsive to thought,
just as in a dream the scenery can change
if the person imagines it
changing; and lastly, there is the fact that
many OBEs merge into
other kinds of experience. The OBEer may find
himself seeing places
such as never were on earth, or he may meet
strange monsters,
religious figures or caricature animals. All
these features of the
OBE make it harder to see the OB world as
the physical world at all,
and lead one to the conclusion that the OB
world is more like a
world of thoughts.
Physical Astral World Theory
(a non-physical double travels in the physical
world)"
Many theories have suggested that the double
is not physical but
non- physical, even though it travels in the
physical world. Many
occultists believe there to be a whole range
of non-physical worlds
of differing qualities. Let us look at some
examples of this sort of
theory to try to find out what is meant by
it. Tart [Tar74b, 78]
refers to it as the 'natural' explanation.
He describes this theory
of the OBE as follows '... in effect there
is no need to explain it;
it is just what it seems to be. Man has a
non-physical soul of some
sort that is capable, under certain conditions,
of leaving the
physical seat of consciousness. While it is
like an ordinary
physical body in some ways, it is not subject
to most of the
physical laws of space and time and so is
able to travel at will.'
The 'theta aspect' has been mentioned in connection
with detection
experiments. Morris et. al. [MHJHR78] explain
that '... the OBE may
be more than a special psi-conductive state;
they hold that it may
in fact be evidence of an aspect of the self
which is capable of
surviving bodily death. For convenience, such
a hypothetical aspect
of the self will hereafter be referred to
as a Theta Aspect (T.A.).'
According to Osis and Mitchell [OM77] it is
possible that '... some
part of the personality is temporarily out
of the body,' and many
occult theories involve a non- physical astral
double rather than a
physical one.
Blackmore criticizes this view [Bla82]. She
claims if the 'soul' is
to interact with the objects of the physical
world so as to perceive
them then it should not only be detectable,
but all the other
problems of previous theories arise. On the
other hand, if this
'soul' does not interact with the physical,
then it cannot possibly
do what is expected of it in this theory,
namely travel in the
physical world. She sees no escape from the
dilemma. Moreover, she
claims there is already evidence that what
is seen in an OBE is not,
in any case, the physical world.
Mental Astral World Theory
(a non-physical double travels in a non-physical,
but 'objective,'
astral world)
Each of the theories presented thus far support
a conclusion that
OBEs do not take place in the physical world
at all, but in a
thought-created or mental world. Each of the
next three types of
theory start from this premise, but they are
very different and lead
to totally different conceptions of the experience.
The term 'mental world' could mean several
different things. It
could mean the purely private world created
by each of us in our
thinking. One possibility is that there is
another world (or worlds)
which is mental but is in some sense shared,
or objective and in
which we can all travel if we attain certain
states of
consciousness. The important question now
becomes whether the OB
world is peculiar to each individual, or shared
and accessible to
all.
Occultists have suggested that there is a
shared thought world.
There are many other versions of this kind
of theory. The pertinent
features of this idea are that there is a
non-physical OB world
which is accessible by thought, that it is
manipulable by thought,
and that it is the product of the mind of
more than just one person.
Tart [74b, 78], as one of his five theories
of the OBE, suggests
what he calls the 'mentally-manipulatable-state
explanation.' He
raises here the familiar problem of, as he
puts it 'where the
pajamas come from.' That is, if the OBE involves
the separation of a
'spirit' or 'soul' we have to include the
possibility of spiritual
dinner jackets and tie pins. Of course any
theory which postulates
'thought created' world solves this problem.
Tart therefore
suggested that a non-physical second body
travels in a non-physical
world which is capable of being manipulated
or changed by 'the
conscious and non-conscious thoughts and desires
of the person whose
second body is in that space.'
In 1951 Muldoon and Carrington had come to
a similar conclusion
[MC51]. Muldoon states '... one thing is clear
to me -- the clothing
of the phantom is created, and is not a counterpart
of the physical
clothing.' Through his observations he came
to the conclusion that
'Thought creates in the astral, ... In fact
the whole astral world
is governed by thought.' But he did not mean
it was a private world
of thoughts.
Also relevant here is the occult notion of
thought forms.
Theosophists Besant and Leadbeater describe
the creation of thought
forms by the mental and desire bodies, and
their manifestations as
floating forms in the mental and astral planes.
All physical objects
are supposed to have their astral counterparts
and so when traveling
in the astral one sees a mixture of the astral
forms of physical
things and thought created, or purely astral,
entities.
There are other versions of a similar idea.
For example Whiteman
questions the 'one-space theory' of OBEs [Whi75],
and Poynton follow
him suggesting '... what is described is not
the physical world as
actualized by the senses of the physical body,
but a copy, more or
less exact, of the physical world' [Poy75].
Rogo [Rog78b] suggests
that the OBE takes place in a non-physical
duplicate world which is
just as 'real' to the OBEer as our world is
to us.
The idea of shared thought world, attractive
as it is, has some
serious problems. The first problem relates
to how the thoughts of
different people could be combined together
to create an astral
world and the second problem concerns the
storage of ideas. The idea
that thoughts can persist independently of
the brain has been a
cornerstone of many occult theories, but also
parapsychologists have
used a similar idea to try to explain ESP.
According to Blackmore [Bla82] the problem
is essentially one of
coding. We know that when a person remembers
something he has first
processed the incoming information, thought
about it, structured it,
and turned it into a manageable form using
some sort of code. We
presume that the information persists in this
form until needed when
the person can use the same coding system
to retrieve it and use it.
Even if we don't understand the details of
how this system works,
there is in principle no problem for one person
because he uses the
same system both in storing the material and
retrieving it. But if
thoughts are stored in the astral world, then
we have to say that
one person can store them there and another
can get them out again.
And that other person may have entirely different
ways of coding
information. So how can these thoughts in
the astral possibly make
sense to him?
NOTHING LEAVES THE BODY
Parapsychological Theory
(imagination plus ESP)
The OBE might involve only imaginary traveling
in a private
imaginary world. According to this type of
theory, nothing leaves
the body in an OBE. The advantage of such
a theory is that it avoids
all the problems of the previous ones since
it involves no astral
worlds and other bodies. Certain parapsychologists
have tried to
incorporate the evidence that ESP occurs during
OBEs by suggesting
that the OBE is 'imagination plus ESP' or
PK. For example, one of
Tarts's five theories is the 'hallucination-plus-
psi explanation.'
According to this theory, 'For those cases
of OBEs in which
veridical information about distant events
is obtained, it is
postulated that ESP, which is well proved,
works on a nonconscious
level, and this information is used by the
subconscious mind to
arrange the hallucinatory or dream scene so
that it corresponds to
the reality scene' [Tar78].
Osis [Osi75] contrasts his 'ecsomatic hypothesis'
with 'traveling
fantasy plus ESP' and Morris [MHJHR78] compares
the theory that
'some tangible aspect of self can expand beyond
the body' with what
he call the 'psi- favorable state' theory.
In parapsychology many
states have been thought to be conducive to
ESP. They include
relaxation, the use of ganzfeld or unpatterned
stimulation, and
dreaming. There are many reasons why an OBE
might be thought of as a
psi-conductive state. Palmer suggested that
it might induce
attitudes and expectations consistent with
psi, thereby facilitating
its occurrence [Pal74].
This sort of theory is not satisfying. It
appears to avoid all the
previous problems and yet to be able to cope
with the paranormal
aspects of the experience. According to Blackmore
'Calling the OBE
imagination or hallucination tells us very
little, and adding the
words 'plus ESP' adds nothing. We know little
enough about ESP. It
is defined negatively, and we cannot stop
and start it or control it
in any way.'
Psychological Theories
This theory amounts to the statement that
all the details of the OBE
are to be accounted for in psychological terms.
Nothing leaves the
body in an OBE, the astral body and astral
world are products of the
imagination and the OBE itself provides no
hope for survival. Osis
has called the followers of such theories
'nothing but-ers,'
reducing the OBE to 'nothing but a psychopathological
oddity'
[Osi81].
Among psychological approaches there have
been psychoanalytic
interpretations, analogies between the 'tunnel'
and the birth
experience; the creation of the double has
been seen as an act of
narcissism or as a way of denying the inevitable
mortality of the
human body. Then there have been theories
which treat the near-death
experience as a form of depersonalization
or regression to primitive
modes of thinking, and those which treat it
as involving an
archetype.
John Palmer used a mixture of psychological
and psychoanalytical
concepts in his account [Pal78a]. He made
the crucial point that the
OBE is neither potentially nor actually a
psychic phenomenon. An OBE
may be associated with psychic events but
the experience itself,
just like any other experience, is not the
kind of thing which can
be either psychic or not. He went on to suggest
that the OBE almost
always occurs in a hypnagogic state. Within
this state it is
triggered by a change in the person's body
concept which results
from a reduction or other change in proprioceptive
stimulation. This
change then threatens the self concept and
the threat activates deep
unconscious processes. These processes try
to re-establish the
person's sense of individual identity as quickly
and economically as
possible in a way that follows the laws of
the Freudian primary
process. According to Palmer it is this attempt
to regain identity
which constitutes the OBE.
Since the whole purpose of the OBE is to avoid
a threat, the person
will usually remain unaware of that threat
and of the change in body
image which precipitated it. However, Palmer
adds that it is
possible, with practice, to gain ego-control
over the primary
process activity. Of course the OBE is, at
best, only a partial
solution to the threat and both ego and primary
process strive to
regain the normal body concept. As soon as
they succeed the OBE
ends. For Palmer any psychic abilities which
manifest themselves
during an OBE do so more because of the hypnagogic
state than
because anything leaves the body.
This theory has much in its favor. It has
no need of astral bodies
or other worlds and so avoids all the problems
of the earlier
theories. It makes sense of the situations
in which the OBE occurs,
and the way it varies with the situation,
and it relates the OBE to
other experiences. However, the theory is
not without its own
problems. It depends heavily on the idea that
the OBE is a means of
avoiding a threat to the integrity of the
individual and the anxiety
which such a threat would arouse. But it is
not clear that the OBE
would not provide an even greater threat than
the original change in
body concepts. Sometimes OBEers are terrified
that they will not be
able to 'get back in' which is surely also
a threat.
Susan Blackmore [Bla82] bases her theory on
the claim that the
evidence of paranormal events during the OBE
is limited and
unconvincing. She therefore asserts that the
claims for ESP and PK
in OBEs are not impossible but there is actually
not very much
evidence which has to be 'explained away'
in this fashion. Blackmore
suggests that the OBE is best seen as an altered
state of
consciousness (ASC) and is best understood
in relation to other
ASCs. Everything perceived in an OBE is a
product of memory and
imagination, and during the OBE one's own
imagination is more
vividly experienced than it is in everyday
life. In other words the
experience is a kind of privileged peek into
the contents of one's
own mind.
Blackmore suggests that in the case of the
OBE the following are
necessary: vivid and detailed imagery; low
reality testing so that
memories and images may seems 'real'; sensory
input from the body
reduced or not attended to; awareness and
logical thinking
maintained. She shows how these prerequisites
can lead to an altered
state of which one form is the semi- stable
OBE and indicates
related states, such as lucid dreaming, and
shows how experience can
change into others when conditions, or ways
or thinking, change.
This theory accounts adequately for cases
of so-called traveling
clairvoyance, where the subject does not necessarily
see his body,
but is aware of a distant scene. It accounts
less well for cases of
conscious projection, where the subjects feels
himself to be at a
distant location and is actually perceived
by a person at that
location. It also underestimates the veridical
aspect of perception
in cases where there is no apparent distortion
by the imagination,
in other words when the scene viewed from
another point of space
corresponds exactly with what one might expect
to observe from that
point; for instance a room seen from the vantage
point of the
ceiling. The question of perceptual distortion
is related to the
degree of interference by the imagination:
the greater the
imaginative element, the less veridical the
perception of the place.
Stephen LaBerge describes a theory in which
OBEs occur when people
lose input from their sense organs, as happens
at the onset of
sleep, while retaining consciousness [LL91].
This combination of
events is especially likely when a person
passes directly from
waking into REM sleep. In both states the
mind is alert and active,
but in waking it is processing sensory input
from the outside world,
while in dreaming it is creating a mental
model independent of
sensory input. This model includes a body.
When dreaming, we
generally experience ourselves in a body much
like the 'real' one,
because that is what we are used to. However,
our internal senses
reside in the physical body, which when we
are awake inform us about
our position in space and about the movement
of our limbs. This
information is cut off in REM sleep. Therefore,
we can dream of
doing all kinds of things with our dream bodies
-- flying, dancing,
running from monsters, being dismembered --
all while our physical
bodies lie safely in bed.
During a WILD, or sleep paralysis, the awake
and alert mind keeps up
its good work of showing us the world it expects
is out there --
although it can no longer sense it. So, then
we are in a mental
dream world. Possibly we feel the cessation
of the sensation of
gravity as that part of sensory input shuts
down, and then feel that
we are suddenly lighter and float up, rising
from the place where we
know our real body to be lying still. The
room around us looks about
the same as it would if we were awake, because
such in image
represents our brain's best guess about where
we are. If we did not
know that we had just fallen asleep, we might
well think that we
were awake, still in touch with the physical
world, and that
something mighty strange was happening --
a departure of the mind
from the physical body.
The unusual feeling of leaving the body is
exciting and alarming.
This, combined with the realistic imagery
of the bedroom is enough
to account for the conviction of many OBE
experients' that 'it was
too real to be a dream.' Dreams, too, can
be astonishingly real,
especially if you are attending to their realness.
Usually, we pass
through our dreams without thinking much about
them, and upon
awakening remember little of them. Hence,
they seem 'unreal.' But
waking life is also like that -- our memory
for a typical, mundane
day is flat and lacking in detail. It is only
the novel, exciting,
or frightening events that leave vivid impressions.
If we stop what
we are doing, we can look around and say,
'Yes, this world looks
solid and real.' But, if you look back and
try to recall, for
instance, brushing your teeth this morning,
your memory is likely to
be vague and not very life-like. Contrast
this kind of event to a
past event that excited or alarmed you, which
is likely to seem much
more 'real' in retrospect.
OTHER APPROACHES
Perhaps all the distinctions and problems
are artificial, perhaps
the mind is neither 'in' nor 'out' of the
body. Grosso argues the
possibility [Gro81] that one is always 'out'
and in an OBE just
becomes conscious of that fact. Should the
distinction between
normal and paranormal then be dropped?
Let us consider the state of affair that is
considered normal: the
'in-the- body' experience. What does it mean
to be in a body?
LaBerge [LL91] argues that saying that one
is in a body implies that
the self is an object with definite borders
capable of being
contained by the boundaries of another object
-- the physical body.
However, we do not have any evidence that
the self is such a
concrete thing. What we think of as 'out-of-body'
in an OBE is the
experience of the self. This experience of
being 'in' a body is
normally based on perceptual input from the
senses of both the world
external to the body and the processes within
the body. These things
give us a sense of localization of the self
in space. However, it is
the body, and its sense organs, that occupy
a specific locus, not
the self. The self is not the body or the
brain. If we think that
the self is a product of brain function, even
this does not make it
reasonable to state that the self is in the
brain -- is the meaning
contained in these words in this page? It
may not make any sense on
an objective level to say that the self is
anywhere. Rather, the
self is where it feels itself to be. Its location
is purely
subjective and derived from input from the
sensory organs.
Putting aside the question of the essential
nature of the self,
perception is undeniably a phenomenon tied
to brain function. So,
when we find ourselves experiencing a world
that seems much like the
one we are used to perceiving with our usual
equipment -- eyes,
ears, etc., all things linked to our brains,
it would be logical to
assume that it is our usual brain creating
the experience. And, if
we were to really leave our bodies -- severing
all connection with
them -- it would be illogical to assume that
we would see the world
in the same way. Therefore, LaBerge points
out, although no amount
of contradictory evidence can rule out the
possibility of a real
'out of body experience,' in which an individual
exists in some form
entirely independent of the body, it is highly
unlikely that such a
form would utilize perceptual systems identical
to those of the
physical human form.
Spiritual teachings tell us that we have a
reality beyond that of
this world. LaBerge concludes that the OBE
may not be, as it is
easily interpreted, a literal separation of
the soul from the crude
physical body, but it is an indication of
the vastness of the
potential that lies wholly within our minds.
'The worlds we create
in dreams and OBEs are as real as this one,
and yet hold infinitely
more variety. How much more exhilarating to
be "out-of-body" in a
world where the only limit is the imagination
than to be in the
physical world in a powerless body of ether!
Freed of the
constraints imposed by physical life, expanded
by awareness that
limits can be transcended, who knows what
we could be, or become?'
[LL91].
Out-of-Body Tools
Most people taking part in discussions of OBEs seem primarily
interested in developing and ability to do so themselves
and to learn
to control the experience. Aids to people wanting to develop
such
abilities, which include books, audio tapes which are
claimed to
assist in the process, and training programs are available
from:
Monroe Institute
Route 1, Box 175
Faber, Virginia 22938-9749
U.S.A.
Phone:
804-361-1252
Product Orders: 800-541-2488
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[45][IMAGE] kiwi@iis.ee.ethz.ch