Recreating Out-of-Body Experiences

By hooking test subjects up to virtual-reality goggles which are honed in on their own bodies, scientists have performed two separate experiments in which they have been able to recreate at least part of the psychological phenomenon which may be responsible for reported "out-of-body" experiences (OBEs). In one, volunteers were "prodded in the chest at precisely the same moment that an object approached the camera." In the other, "patients viewed a camera image of their own back being stroked, while their own back was stroked too." In both instances, the subject identified highly with the position of the camera (Video). Attempts to replace the subject with a mannequin were also successful, while those using a tall metal plate were not.

While researchers do not claim this process mimics "classic" OBEs - or that the finding rules out the existence of a spirit - it is one step towards being able to use "appropriate visual and tactile information to convey a feeling of operating in the body of a robot or virtual character and could help with applications ranging from NASA's Robonaut project, which aims to control robots on the Moon, to surgeons performing operations over the Internet."

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