Introduction
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.
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