Paranormal Fake-Tivity

Olaf Blanke is is leading the research at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, Switzerland.. And he made news this week by creating a ghost--with those seeing the ghost becoming so disturbed that they asked for the experiment to end..

Reuters is among the news agencies reporting on this interesting scientific experiment attempting to ascertain what paranormal activity is and what the brain does when it perceives it.. Matthew Stock writes,

Blanke's team began by analyzing the brains of 12 patients with neurological disorders who have reported having such a secondary representation of their body, in other words a ghost sensation. MRI scans revealed abnormalities with three brain regions involved in self-awareness, movement and the sense of position in space. These brain regions together contribute to multi sensory signal processing, important for the perception of one's own body.

The scientists then conducted an experiment to 'trigger' a similar neurological sensation in healthy subjects.

Blindfolded and wearing ear-plugs, test subjects performed movements with their hand attached to a robotic device. Behind them, the robotic device reproduced their movements and touched them on the back. When conducted in real time, the participant's brain could adapt and recognize it as their own movement because of the synchronized movement. However, when the scientists introduced a temporal delay of just a few milliseconds, the distorting of temporal and spatial perception induced the 'ghostly' feeling.

Stock goes on,

Blanke says the main aim of the study is to better understand some of the symptoms of neurological or psychiatric conditions, such as schizophrenia. He hopes the research could lead to a similar robotic system that doesn't induce neurological symptoms, but helps patients overcome such sensations.

But it also gives rise to some interesting questions about ghost activity itself..

Blanke's experiment surmises the events this way: Under 'normal' circumstances, the brain is able to form a unified self-perception, but it's when this malfunctions that the brain contrives a false second representation a body..

One note on the experiment: Two of the 12 were so disturbed by the experience that they asked the scientists to halt the test..

Some scientists say that this can go on to explain why people experience angels and demons and can sense spirits when they die.  However, there may be a skeptical view of this skeptic's experiment. Yes, it showcases that we can recreate the notion of ghostly paranormal activity. But it does not make a judgement on each and every paranormal tale we hear. It proves we can simulate events--but perhaps it does not clearly link the two bits of phenomena together in any scientific way. Causation? Correlation? Big differences..

The paranormal is strange and bizarre to most people. Until they, themselves, experience it..

Last October, VICE used Halloween to write about the scientists who believe in ghosts.. that story introduced me to a video of a banned TEX TALK by Rupert Sheldrake..
It's worth a view, perhaps.
Reason.. Skepticism.. All healthy.
But perhaps as healthy is the allowance that things beyond our intelligence and understanding occur on a regular basis.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKHUaNAxsTg]