Mind Tricks Explained

Out-of-Body Experience

What it is: The disorienting sensation of looking in on one's own body-no near-death experience necessary.


New Research Shows:A do-it-yourself recipe for transcendence comes from neuroscientist Eric Altschuler of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, who noticed the phenomenon in a McDonald's (he later published it in the journal Perception): Set up two mirrors so that they face each other to form an infinite set of images. Now step between them and tilt your head so that in every other image you can't see your eyes. Stroke your cheek. You'll feel as though there's a stranger in front of you who's stroking his or her cheek, because, Altschuler explains, in every other image you can't recognize your own face.


What It Means: The exercise demonstrates how important it is for the brain to receive coordinated feedback from the senses. When a sense is reporting one sensation, and another sense is reporting a different sensation, the brain can't process the incongruity.