Why Study Them?

Understanding the neurobehavioral correlates of the sense of self is one of the last challenges for neuroscience. In general the sense of self is involved with language processes traditionally associated with the left hemisphere of the human brain. However we were interested in the source of discovery: the neurocognitive processes of creativity. We had been impressed by the many historical and cross-cultural examples of ordinary people who accessed sophisticated knowledge well beyond their level of education or intellect when the right hemisphere was likely to have been stimulated. To test this association we experimentally simulated the condition. We applied specific complex magnetic fields of less than 1 microTesla over the right hemisphere. The most frequent result was the experience of the sense of a presence or of another Sentient Being.

We have hypothesised that this sense of a presence is the transient awareness of the right hemispheric equivalent to the left hemispheric sense of self. We suspect that the general properties of this "other" reflect right hemispheric functions that include a feeling of extended space (beyond the self, infinity), widened time (eternity) and marked emotion. Our data suggest that the sensed presence is the prototype for experiences of gods, incubi, succubae, demons, and other "supernatural" beings. Most cultures have words to describe a process that is everywhere and forever. They usually call it God or some equivalent. Whether or not the idea is valid or not (if God exists or does not exit) is not the issue. What is important is that we have a technology that may allow the identification of those portions of the brain and those activities of the brain that generate the experience. Consequently the experimental study of these phenomena may allow us a more precise understanding of their origins within the brain and the stimuli, man-made and natural, that produce them.

The primary experimental method to study the "presence" is to place the person in a simulated "cave", an acoustic chamber, where they are blindfolded and sit in the dark for about 30 min. The person wears a helmet or a collection of solenoids arranged around the head (like a crown) through which complex magnetic fields are generated. By applying specific patterns of weak magnetic fields that imitate the brains own activities, about 80% of the normal population report the experience of "another". Only specific patterns produce the experience; a reversed presentation of the pattern does not. People exposed to sham-field conditions rarely report the experience.

What we have found

We have found that: 1) the verbal label (usually supplied by the culture) the person places upon the experience strongly affects how it is recalled even within a few seconds after the end of the experiment, 2) experiences along the left side are usually aversive while those associated with the right side are more positive and may have "thoughts" associated with them, 3) increased geomagnetic activity in association with right hemispheric stimulation encourages the incidence of a sensed presence, 4) when a person attempts to "focus" upon the sensed presence it appears to become dynamic (to "move") since the act of focusing alters brain activity and hence how the applied complex fields interact with the brain, 5) an inordinate number of people who experience a sensed presence attribute them to gods or deceased individuals, 6) about 7% of the population, particularly males with enhanced temporal lobe lability and who attend a religious place frequently), report that if god told them to kill they would in his name, and 7) certain patterns of applied magnetic fields produce subjective experiences that are sometimes considered "parapsychological" or "paranormal". By applying a specific sequence of magnetic fields through the brain of a person who had experienced a "haunt", we generated the experience as well as paroxysmal electrical activity that suggested a source deep within the right temporal lobe.