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Merged New Insights into Hallucinations and Paranormal Phenomenon

I have had several 'Sleep Paralysis' episodes in my life complete with tactile, auditory and visual hallucinations. SP is a stress and fatigue related sleep disorder and nothing more. I've actually seen 'The Old Hag' twice so I know how terrifying and realistic these hallucinations can be. I will still sometimes get an auditory hallucination when waking up but they now rare and quite benign.

I can understand why people think that they've actually seen a 'demon' but it's really just all in the head. There's a perfectly rational medical explanation for these types of hallucinations and it has nothing to do with the paranormal or ESP...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jthU9G5PSho

https://www.quora.com/What-causes-sleep-paralysis

https://www.amazon.ca/Wrestling-Gho...8076360&sr=1-1&keywords=wrestling+with+ghosts
 
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Donn said:
I skimmed it. In my recollection, it's much the same as the last time you posted.

Essentially I have no problem with what you say. It's said in a somewhat verbose manner and could do with a diet.

I read it as: Senses may be triggered within the brain, sans a sense organ's involvement. When mixed with the regular operation of the senses, this causes conflicting interpretations in the mind; delusions of varying kinds result.
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Sorry, English is not my native language. I have tried to make it clearer this time. You get the point, and actually I should make it pithier. However, besides your comments, what is your point, or original idea about Paranormal Phenomenon? Sorry.
 
wengehuang said:
Sorry, English is not my native language. But it also depends on one's intelligence to grasp the logic of a new theory.
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Are you calling it a "theory" in a formal sense? (Because I don't think it's up to that level; however, I am not an expert; nor did I look beyond the abstract you posted.)

wengehuang said:
.. I should make it pithier.
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Pithier implies humour. It probably doesn't need that. It can do with simplification — removing repeats, preferring shorter words and so on.

However, besides your comments, what is your point, or original idea about Paranormal Phenomenon? Sorry.
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I am not sure I follow that question.
 
Sherman Bay said:
Might as well have a discussion of what the temperature of a fire-breathing dragon is on Mars.

And what the heck is "ASC"?
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Tell me more about this dragon. Is it more full of hot air on Earth than it is on Mars? How hard does it blow? TIA.

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk
 
Autolite said:
I have had several 'Sleep Paralysis' episodes in my life complete with tactile, auditory and visual hallucinations. SP is a stress and fatigue related sleep disorder and nothing more. I've actually seen 'The Old Hag' twice so I know how terrifying and realistic these hallucinations can be. I will still sometimes get an auditory hallucination when waking up but they now rare and quite benign.

I can understand why people think that they've actually seen a 'demon' but it's really just all in the head. There's a perfectly rational medical explanation for these types of hallucinations and it has nothing to do with the paranormal or ESP...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jthU9G5PSho

https://www.quora.com/What-causes-sleep-paralysis

https://www.amazon.ca/Wrestling-Gho...8076360&sr=1-1&keywords=wrestling+with+ghosts
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Very interesting. Are you familiar with Susan Clancy's work?

https://www.amazon.com/Abducted-Peo...liens-ebook/dp/B002WYJICS/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8
 
In June I had a stroke. Since then I have had 3 or 4 hallucinations. One of them was of my father, another of a favorite pet, both of them died many years ago. In researching strokes, I know that this is not uncommon. It makes me wonder if people who have a brain dysfunction mistake these incidents as paranormal?
 
I came to this conclusion about a decade ago when I hung up my ghost hunting spurs. People's brains misinterpret a variety of subtle external stimuli that causes hallucinations that are profoundly real. I believe this happens to almost everyone, but they never know it because the hallucination is subtle or unremarkable.

The next step on the research level is learning how to induce specific hallucinations for fun and profit.
 
wasapi said:
In June I had a stroke. Since then I have had 3 or 4 hallucinations. One of them was of my father, another of a favorite pet, both of them died many years ago. In researching strokes, I know that this is not uncommon. It makes me wonder if people who have a brain dysfunction mistake these incidents as paranormal?
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I was dating this woman who had had a traumatic brain injury about fifteen or so years ago (when we had first met) and she developed a large fantasy world regarding the TBI and the role she attributed to it in her life. She had also apparently had a near-death experience and had a detailed description of what occurred during that event; all invented, of course. She discovered that she was "the savior of all mankind" and was here on Earth to bring everyone into the awareness that we are all one — and we are all God at that. I've mentioned her before here on ISF and I do think that at least some people will develop a fantasy to help explain either what happened (like a catastrophic injury) or what their place is in this life.

Regarding the last bit, I think that's what every person has to develop for themselves; some can manage to do it without fantasy, but some seem to rely upon it.
 
Axxman300 said:
I came to this conclusion about a decade ago when I hung up my ghost hunting spurs. People's brains misinterpret a variety of subtle external stimuli that causes hallucinations that are profoundly real. I believe this happens to almost everyone, but they never know it because the hallucination is subtle or unremarkable.

The next step on the research level is learning how to induce specific hallucinations for fun and profit.
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I love to explore abandoned places, I get in usually with the pretense of telling security I'm filming a ghost hunting show.

Given the right mood, It's a fun self spook
 
I think you could extrapolate from that that were are all suffering, for all we know, from false internal perceptions perhaps held together with some form of ESP. What do you think? Or, perhaps were are living in a globe walled off from the rest of the universe for the pleasure of others.
 
New update:

This paper attempts to make a whole new interpretation of Altered States of Consciousness (ASC) induced by meditation, mind-altering drugs, hypnosis, or physiological lesion. On the basis of empirical materials, we summarizes four essential phenomena (hallucinations, paranormal phenomena, the more sensitive awareness and mystical experiences) in ASC after an initial clarification. However, the existence of paranormal phenomena, especially extrasensory perception (ESP), has been disputed for more than one century. Therefore, we firstly propose a novel hypothesis that ESP happens because there are two pathways to affect perception and the essence of ESP is that internal false stimulations are mistaken as external objective stimulations which enter through various senses and external objective stimulations as perceptions which do not result from various senses. To support this hypothesis, we develop an original model of hallucinations: When internal false stimulations and external objective stimulations affect perception together, the changes in the relation of their strength will result in the consistence, breakdown and re-consistence of the five senses, leading to three states of hallucinations (one can distinguish reality from fantasy, one cannot distinguish reality from fantasy, and reality and fantasy are totally reversed). This model can also explain the generation mechanism of out-of-body experiences, synesthesia and many other marvelous psychedelic phenomena in ASC. After that, we probe into the more sensitive awareness, and define jhāna samādhi in an explicit way. On such basis, a unified analytical framework will be made to reveal the essence of ASC: The reduction of self-awareness results in three mechanisms (the more sensitive awareness, hallucinations and jhāna samādhi) and the relation of them is figured out. Finally, this paper also reveals the essence of the Buddhist deep insight and the mystery of cessation and insight.
 
Donn said:
This is a tad unfair. It may still all go south, but the content in the recent post is not irrational.
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Donn, thank you for taking one for the team and ploughing through it. I've had a couple of attempts at wading through it but tbh I'm finding it turgid and frankly terribly written (it is also as New Years Day which I admit isn't helpful!).

So far as I can see the posts say little more in substance than "hallucinations occur in the brain and don't reflect external stimulus, when they are sufficiently convincing people mistake them for real and believe they have had paranormal experiences". Is this a fair summary?

If so then other than "Well, yes." Is there really anything else to say? It doesn't seem either novel or controversial. Is there something new hidden in the word salad that you could find?
 
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