test that proves obes
ted trost
RM>Out of Body EXPERIENCES clearly EXIST, just as dreams EXIST. The question
RM>is how to explain them.
How do we know OBE's *aren't* dreams?
Ted VE3TTD ted....@canrem.com
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Robert McGrath
|>
|> RM>Out of Body EXPERIENCES clearly EXIST, just as dreams EXIST. The question
|> RM>is how to explain them.
|>
|> How do we know OBE's *aren't* dreams?
Phew! A question I can answer!
Everyone that has ever reported an OBE also has had dreams. Most say
the two are completely different experiences. The reports of OBEs
also differ from reports of dreams in many ways.
The *primary* difference is that an OBE "feels real" and is remembered
just like waking experience. Dreams (including, I think, lucid dreams)
do not "feel real", they feel, well, dreamy.
There is a real possibility that some or even many "OBE's" may be
unusually vivid "dreams". And it wouldn't be too surprizing to find
that OBE's are eventually seen to be related to or to be in some sense
a special kind of "dream". Since dreams are pretty interesting in
their own right, this would hardly be a demotion!
EEG studies may be able to distinguish between (one or more types of?)
OBE's and "normal" dreaming.
OBE's seem rare and unpredictable, so I expect it is difficult to get
people to have OBE's while wearing sensors. The unpredictability of
inducing OBE's is a definite problem here!
(If any of you can get out of your body any time you want, get in contact
with me. There are some really interesting experiments we could do.)
--
Robert E. McGrath
Urbana Illinois
mcg...@cs.uiuc.edu
M Holmes
>In article <1992Jul24.885.18006@dosgate>, "ted trost" <ted....@canrem.com> writes in part:
>|>
>|> RM>Out of Body EXPERIENCES clearly EXIST, just as dreams EXIST. The question
>|> RM>is how to explain them.
>|>
>|> How do we know OBE's *aren't* dreams?
>Phew! A question I can answer!
>Everyone that has ever reported an OBE also has had dreams. Most say
>the two are completely different experiences. The reports of OBEs
>also differ from reports of dreams in many ways.
>The *primary* difference is that an OBE "feels real" and is remembered
>just like waking experience. Dreams (including, I think, lucid dreams)
>do not "feel real", they feel, well, dreamy.
I have to disagree with this. There's a type of dream called "false
awakening" which seems to be related to lucid dreaming, or at least
seems mostly to be experienced by those who have frequent lucid dreams.
In false awakening dreams, the dream consists of exactly the normal
waking-up sequence. In mine, I experience getting up, getting dressed,
washing, making up the bed, cycling to work (or to lectures when I was a
student). At some point in the sequence I will wake up extremely
confused to be in bed, and then annoyed that I have to do it all over
again. On a bad day, I then get up, get dressed, wash, make the bed,
cycle to work.....and, you guessed it.... wake up in bed again. I've had
this three deep once and believe me I felt just as tired by then as if I
had done the whole thing three times. I also wasn't entirely sure that I
was awake the fourth time round. How to check?
There's no "dreamy" feel about it at all, believe me.
One thing that might be related to this though. When I get lucid dreams,
about 90% of them are induced by a reality-check in a dream: "hey, this
is too weird, it must be a dream..." For a while, I tried to induce, and
experiment in, lucid dreams by the method of constantly reality-checking
during the day. The idea is that the habit will carry over into a normal
dream and help induce a lucid dream. It worked to some extent for a
while. Later though, my dreams began to get extremely "normal". Nothing
very strange happened, and if it did, it happened in a more normal way.
One example taht I remember was that I was flying. I thought "hmmm, I
can't fly, is this a dream?" Then I answered "nope, I'm flying because
of this hang-glider on my back" (I don't hang-glide, but I did do
gliding around then). I then got a few false awakenings. Finally I had
one dream where I woke up and there was "something" in the room. I hit
the lightswitch and it failed. From that I knew that I was dreaming
(failed light level changes are common in dreams) and forced myself to
struggle to wake up and hit the lightswitch, which failed..... The
fourth try and it worked and I was awake, terrified. Of course, there
was nothing in the room. I quit inducing lucid dreams for a while though
;-) Nothing about that seemed very dreamy, though one detail reminded
me of nightmares that I had as a kid: things were kinda lit up by
darkness if you can get the sense of what I mean.
Anyway, unless false awakenings count as OBE's, there are definitely
dreams that are real enough to fool the observer. It gets really
irritating when you get to the point that you aren't sure you're awake,
even when you are.
>--
> Robert E. McGrath
FoFP
Robert McGrath
[crisp, clear description of "false awakening" deleted]
|>
|> Anyway, unless false awakenings count as OBE's, there are definitely
|> dreams that are real enough to fool the observer. It gets really
|> irritating when you get to the point that you aren't sure you're awake,
|> even when you are.
to fool the observer". I think you will agree that not all dreams are
that way, though.
I'd expect that "false awakenings" and OBEs might well be related to
each other.
I might point out that some OBEs occur while the person is AWAKE,
which is really, really, wierd!
Mcirvin
>mcg...@cs.uiuc.edu (Robert McGrath) writes:
>>The *primary* difference is that an OBE "feels real" and is remembered
>>just like waking experience. Dreams (including, I think, lucid dreams)
>>do not "feel real", they feel, well, dreamy.
[disagreeing with this...]
>One example taht I remember was that I was flying. I thought "hmmm, I
>can't fly, is this a dream?" Then I answered "nope, I'm flying because
>of this hang-glider on my back" (I don't hang-glide, but I did do
>gliding around then).
Let me add another example... For years I had a recurring dream in
which, in various otherwise ordinary situations, I would discover
that I had the ability to levitate about three feet off the ground.
I would invariably think: "Wait. This happens in *dreams* all
the time, but this time it's *real*!" I would then become very
frustrated trying to fit the phenomenon into the rest of my
world-view, since it didn't seem to have any plausible physical
explanation. I was sufficiently fooled to specifically reject
the possibility that I was dreaming once again.
These days, when I dream about levitating, I usually just enjoy it.
Perhaps my brain is getting mushy.
--
Matt McIrvin mci...@husc.harvard.edu
Stanley Friesen
|
|Let me add another example... For years I had a recurring dream in
|which, in various otherwise ordinary situations, I would discover
|that I had the ability to levitate about three feet off the ground.
Hey, I have the same dream! It seems I keep discovering how easy it is
to levitate :-) Unfortunately I always seem to forget how when I wake up.
|These days, when I dream about levitating, I usually just enjoy it.
|Perhaps my brain is getting mushy.
|
Yep, it does feel nice, no tired feet to deal with :-)
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