archived as http://www.stealthskater.com/Documents/Conciousness_40.doc [pdf]

more of this topic at http://www.stealthskater.com/Science.htm

note: because important websites are frequently "here today but gone tomorrow", the following was archived from http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20127011.400-deja-vu-where-fact-meets-fantasy.html on March 26, 2009. This is NOT an attempt to divert readers from the aforementioned web-site. Indeed, the reader should only read this back-up copy if the updated original cannot be found at the original author's site.

Déjà vu: where Fact meets Fantasyby Helen Phillips

New Scientist / March 25, 2009

'Mr. P.' -- an 80-year-old Polish émigré and former engineer -- knew he had memory problems. But it was his wife who described it as a permanent sense of déjà vu.

He refused to watch TV or read a newspaper as he claimed to have seen everything before. When he went out walking, he said the same birds sang in the same trees and the same cars drove past at the same time every day. His doctor said he should see a memory specialist. But Mr. P. refused. He was convinced that he had already been.

Déjà vu can happen to anyone. And anyone who has had it will recognize the description immediately. It is more than just a sense that you have seen or done something before. It is a startling, inappropriate, and often disturbing sense that history is repeating. And impossibly so.

You can't place where the earlier encounter happened. And it can feel like a premonition or a dream. Subjective, strange, and fleeting not to mention tainted by paranormal explanations, the phenomenon has been a difficult and unpopular one to study.

The feeling that history is repeating itself is one of the weirdest sensations a healthy human can have (Image: Mark Pennington)

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Now that is changing, spurred in part by Mr P and a handful of people who -- like him -- have dementia and experience continuous déjà vu.

And also by the discovery that there is a group of people with epilepsy who have déjà vu-like auras before a seizure. They are making it possible for researchers to catch the process in action, bringing hope that the secrets of this strange and disturbing phenomenon could finally be unlocked.

Surprisingly, not only is déjà vu proving an interesting window on the peculiar ways that our memory works, but it is also providing a few clues about how we tell the difference between what is real, imagined, dreamed, and remembered -- one of the true mysteries of Consciousness.

Speculations about "past lives" or telepathy aside, the first biological explanations of déjà vu were based on ideas that 2 sensory signals in the brain (perhaps one from each eye or each hemisphere of the brain)- for some reason move out of sync so that people have the experience of reliving the same event. "Mental diplopia" (as it was called) is intuitively appealing. But the evidence is stacked against it. Information from the 2 eyes mixes very early in visual processing -- long before we perceive a scene.

What's more, déjà vu -- rather ironically as the term means "already seen" -- can occur in blind people according to Chris Moulin, a psychologist at the University of Leeds, UK (Brain and Cognition, vol 62, p 264).

Then there are the cases of people who have had their 2 cortical hemispheres surgically separated in an attempt to relieve intractable epilepsy. If the mental diplopia idea were correct, you might expect them to have permanent déjà vu. Yet there are no reports of this happening.

A second intuitive explanation is some sort of "distortion in time" perception. Somehow, incoming signals must get misinterpreted and labeled with an inappropriate time stamp, making the experience seem old as well as current. If the brain's memory system is like a tape recorder, it is as if the recording head has got muddled with the playback head. It is an interesting analogy. But it does not appear to have any anatomical basis in the brain.

Now another theory is gaining credibility. Perhaps déjà vu feels like reliving a past experience because we actually are. At least to some extent. Psychologist Anne Cleary of Colorado State University in Fort Collins came to this idea via an interest in memory problems

Keen to explain instances such as when something seems to be on the "tip of the tongue" or when we recognize a face but can't place it, she started looking for parallels with déjà vu. "One particular theory of déjà vu is that it may be a memory process," she says. " Features of a new situation may be familiar from some prior situation."

Her first experiments seem to support this. In one, she was able to induce familiarity for images of celebrity faces or well-known places -- even if the viewer couldn't place the image -- simply by first presenting subjects with lists of their names. In another study, volunteers reported familiarity with words that sounded similar to ones presented in an earlier list.

Nevertheless, Cleary acknowledges that this can't be the whole story. "Déjà vu is unique in that it is not just another instance of familiarity. It actually feels wrong," she says.

How to account for this? One possibility is that déjà vu is based on a memory fragment that comes from something more subtle such as similarity between the configuration or layout of 2 scenes. Say you

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are in the living room of a friend's new house with the eerie feeling that you have been there before, yet knowing you can't possibly. It could be just that the arrangement of furniture is similar to what you have seen before suggests Cleary, so the sense of familiarity feels misplaced.

To test the idea, her team produced a large range of images showing scenes such as a bar, a bowling alley, landscapes, or rooms from a house. Volunteers saw a subset of these. Then they were tested on a new set -- half of which were entirely novel and the other half resembling scenes from the first set in structure and configuration but not content.

Not only did the similar layouts produce familiarity without recall, but subjects also reported a sense of the inexplicable, having been told that all the scenes were different.

Although the familiarity idea appeals to many, Moulin for one is not convinced. His skepticism stems from a study of a person with epilepsy that he conducted with Akira O'Connor (now at Washington University in St Louis, Missouri). This 39-year-old man's auras of déjà vu were long-lasting enough to conduct experiments during them. The researchers reasoned that if familiarity is at the root of déjà vu, they should be able to stop the experience in its tracks by distracting the man's attention away from whatever scene he was looking at.

However, when he looked away or focused on something different, his déjà vu did not dissipate and would follow his line of vision and his hearing -- suggesting that real familiarity is not the key. The fact that an epilepsy aura can cause déjà vu at all suggests that it is erroneous activity in a particular part of the brain that leads to misplaced feelings of familiarity, suggests Moulin.

Hypnotic dissociation

But how? Moulin and O'Connor think déjà vu is the consequence of a dissociation between familiarity and recall. We know that we can have a sense of familiarity for a face or name without actually remembering where we know it from. Using hypnosis, O'Connor and Moulin have been able to create a more mysterious sense of familiarity that leads people to draw parallels with déjà vu.

One group of people was given a puzzle to solve. Then while under hypnosis, they were told they would be given the puzzle again, but would not recall it. Another group did not do the puzzle but were told under hypnosis that they would be given it later and that they would experience feelings of familiarity but not understand why.

Both situations produced a sense of eerie familiarity which some people likened to déjà vu. Moulin and O'Connor hope that their ability to induce a déjà vu-like state in the lab will help them probe the phenomenon. They also believe these experiments support the idea that familiarity and recall are dissociable. And that you can have a sense of familiarity without actually having any prior experience of something.

Studies of the brain also support the idea that separate circuits mediate recollection and familiarity according to John Aggleton and Malcolm Brown of Cardiff University, UK who recently reviewed brain imaging and animal studies (Trends in Cognitive Sciences , vol 10, p 455 ). They point out that different parts of the medial temporal lobe at the side of the brain are responsible for different aspects of memory recall (see illustration). The curved tube-like hippocampus which runs through the centre of the lobe mediates recollection (particularly of autobiographical memories). Meanwhile, the studies show that the surrounding parahippocampus -- particularly the perirhinal cortex -- may provide the feelings of familiarity.

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This fits well with the evidence from brain scans of 'Mr. P.' and others like him who show huge degeneration of neurons in the medial temporal lobe. And the fact that it is epilepsy originating in the medial temporal lobe that leads to déjà vu auras.

It is possible that both Moulin and Cleary are correct. The perirhinal cortex may store information about spatial relationships rather than time, place, and sequence of events. And so normal familiarity feelings could come largely from layout and configuration, backing Cleary's findings.

Indeed, there may be many ways to produce false familiarity according to psychologist Alan Brown of Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas - author of The Déjà vu Experience (Psychology press, 2004). His own experiments indicate some other possibilities.

For example, he has induced the feeling by distracting volunteers while they saw a glimpse of a scene and then moments later giving them a good look. "If you take a brief glance when distracted and look at the same scene again afterwards, it can feel like you've seen it before but much earlier," says Brown. He has also induced it by showing people images of things they had forgotten. "Just as a stomach ache can hurt the same way but be caused by lots of different processes, it could be the same way with déjà vu," he says.

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The real problem with explaining déjà vu, however, is not how we can get familiarity without recognition but why it feels so disturbing. "We'd get it all the time if it were just familiarity with real experiences," says Ed Wild from the Institute of Neurology in London. He suggests that mood and emotion are also important contributors to the sensation of déjà vu. We need the right combination of signals -- not just the layout of a scene but how we feel at the time -- to believe something is familiar when really it is not.

A Matter of Degree

Moulin agrees it may be matter of degree. The regions thought to mediate recall, familiarity, and emotions are all extremely closely linked. A small amount of stimulation could produce a mild sense of familiarity. While a stronger stimulus could spread into neighboring emotion regions producing a more disturbing feeling or even the striking sense of doom or premonition some people report with déjà vu.

Cognitive neuroscientist Stefan Köhler from the University of Western Ontario in London, Canada believes the role of emotion is even more central in generating the sense of weirdness that accompanies déjà vu. He recently had the chance to image the brain of a person cured of epilepsy with déjà vu auras by removal of a large tumour that was triggering the seizures. The excised areas consisted of parts of the hippocampus and perirhinal cortex but also included the amygdala.

It suggests that this region -- which is known to be heavily tied up with emotion -- was also involved in creating the déjà vu. Köhler speculates that without the appropriate emotional arousal, perhaps the brain cannot recognize a person or place we have encountered before as truly familiar. On the other hand, inappropriate emotional arousal may make us believe something is familiar when actually it is not.

The final element of déjà vu -- a sense that it feels impossible -- probably comes from the reasoning parts of our brain. According to Köhler, when our rational knowledge tells us one thing but our emotional instincts tell us another, it can feel very wrong. This final element is missing in people with dementia (including Mr. P.) who accept their experiences as perfectly normal. Köhler suspects this may be because neurodegeneration in these individuals has caused a disconnection between the temporal lobes (which are generating sensations) and the frontal lobes (which are continuously interpreting them).

Our brains are looking for associations all the time. Déjà vu is interesting, says Kohler, because it points to a brain mechanism that helps you interpret what you are doing. When you are having a memory, you have the sensation of recollection. It feels like having a memory, and doesn't feel like daydreaming or current reality.

"Déjà vu is a fault in a kind of cognitive process that is going on in the background all the time. When it goes wrong, it's very striking," says Moulin. At the extreme, patients with permanent déjà vu -- dubbed déjà vecu for "already experienced" -- actually make up stories to make sense of it (New Scientist, 7 October 2006, p 32).

While déjà vu is starting to divulge some of its secrets, there is still a long way to go before we understand how we actually decide what is real, imagined, dreamed, or experienced and how these various tags lead to such different conscious experiences.

One anecdotal finding that came to light while working on this article is that people who think a lot about déjà vu are more prone to it. I had déjà vu about reading about déjà vu. And researchers have had déjà vu about having déjà vu. It certainly retains mystery enough to justify further study. After all says Wild, "Déjà vu is one of weirdest brain experiences that normal people have".

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Stranger and stranger yet

● About 10 percent of people claim never to have experienced déjà vu while some individuals report having it regularly.

● Children first get it at around age 8 or 9, suggesting that a degree of cognitive maturity is required.

● Déjà vu happens less as you get older and more when you are tired, anxious or stressed.

● It is particularly prevalent in people with certain conditions known to produce problems in time perception such as schizophrenia and epilepsy.

● Although there is no gene for déjà vu, it is possible that certain versions of genes associated with epilepsy make some of us more prone to it.

● Just reading this article could give you déjà vu.

Readers' Comments

1. "Is This Copied From Another Article? I Just Know I Read This Before!"by Ben / Wed, Mar 25, 2009 19:06:46 GMT

I don't think I have experienced striking deja vu since I was about 7 or 8. But one instance at that age was profound enough that I can still remember the feeling 10 years later.

The feeling was akin to singing along to a song you knew well but haven't listened to in a long time. The words come to you as you say them. But you know that you are recalling them.

The difference in this instance was that it felt like I was simply recalling that the same events had happened before. But instead of feeling 'normal', it felt profoundly wrong.

All in all, even though I no longer experience the phenomenon, it still interests me. I think it would be a fantastic boost for our understanding of memory and memory recall as well as a step towards developing new technologies (I hope Virtual Reality) if it were explained.

2. "Deja Vu And Precognition"by jeremy / Wed Mar 25, 2009 19:32:56 GMT

In a handful of distinct episodes in my life, I've met someone who I could swear I've known before. On at least a couple of these occasions that I can recall, the other person said the same thing about me -- that they had the feeling we've known each other before. Yet despite a meticulous comparison of our lives, contacts, jobs, etc., we could find no common thread.

One day when I was 12, I dreamed that a friend and I went somewhere and met her cousin. The next day in real life, we did go there and met her cousin who was exactly as she was in my dream. Furthermore, the place (which I had not been to before) was exactly as it had appeared in my dream.

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Nothing like that happened before or since.

Maybe deja vu is a form of precognition that splits off from real, actual experience. When deja vu happens, we are simultaneously experiencing the actual event as well as precognition of it. Or the precognition precedes the actual event by just a few seconds or less. In that case, the event itself would take our attention. We wouldn't be able to consolidate the precognition into memory, but we'd have a 'feeling' that we've experienced it all before.

Just a theory.

3. "Deja Vu And Precognition"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 11:09:48 GMT

Jeremy --This is exactly what Dr. Art Funkhouser of Bern suggests in his Dream Theory. You have

dreamed the event and the recognition is the dream coming true.

My theory is slightly different in that I suggest that a deja vu is a recognition of an event that you have experienced in your Past. A past that is also your Future.

I propose that the 70% of people who experience deja vu are literally re-living their life again in a virtual reality, "Matrix"-like neurologically based recording of their life. I call this the "Bohmian IMAX".

How this works is explained in my books and on my website. Just "Google" me.

4. re: "Deja Vu And Precognition"by Aijay S James-Laaki / Thu Mar 26, 2009 16:48:48 GMT

I completely agree!

Things like this happen so frequently to me. But when I told my doctor about it, I was politely told to "Stop being ridiculous!"... In fact, the only person who believed me was my best friend. And for a very good reason.

We'd stopped over in London for the night. Wnd we're planning to go sightseeing the next day. That night, I had a really vivid dream that we had been involved in a car accident just outside Clapham. I told my friend about it over breakfast who shrugged it off as a bad dream until an hour later when we got caught in a RTA in exactly the place I had dreamt. Although I can't recall all the details of my dream, I'd have to say it was exactly how I had dreamt it.

I'd say I've had about 15-20 episodes like this in the last 15 years where I have dreamt of something not necessarily related to myself which has then happened or occurred a day-or-so later. Obviously, most people dismiss it. But I guess you can only believe it if you have experienced it yourself.

A colleague of mine is of the opinion that deja vu is the result of a Star Trek 'Borg'-like "collective consciousness" that we all have. We just don't know how to tap in to it. Although it's quite a radical suggestion, I think that she might be on to something. This should give you all something to argue about :) [StealthSkater note: another "take" on Consciousness theory is similar to Star Trek's 'Q'-type collective/universal consciousness (based on the omnipotent

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'Q' character). I have seen this comparison made by such renowned physicists as Matti Pitkanen and Jack Sarfatti.]

5. "Dream Link?"by Jenna Shaw / Wed Mar 25, 2009 19:41:09 GMT

I'm not sure that this article completely covers my experiences of deja vu. Whenever I've had it, it feels almost like recalling a dream. Like I remember remembering what has happened. I get a very clear sense of having full conversations with people as they're happening and can tell them what they are about to say.

I don't get it often and certainly couldn't attribute any paranormal explanations. However, it does scare me! Thinking about it rationally, I would say it perhaps stems from knowing the person involved (it's always conversations with me -- not places, events, or objects) very well and my own personal ability to over-analyze situations. I will often find myself rehearsing conversations with people in my head when mulling over a particularly important issue.

Even thinking about it in this rational way, it still gives me the shivers and a sense that nothing could ever explain it (apart from perhaps the experiences of my parallel self in another universe!!).

6. re: "Dream Link?"by j / Wed Mar 25, 2009 20:16:05 GMT

I think they missed the dream link as well. Most of my deja vu experiences are like recalling a dream. get the sensation that not only am I reliving the moment, but I also know what is about to happen. (Usually something bad.)

I feel like a fairly rational, grounded human being. But those experiences are still quite unnerving.

7. re: "Dream Link?"by miles / Wed Mar 25, 2009 21:07:30 GMT

I myself have experienced both of these possible forms of deja vu on occasion. The dream form was, like it seems to be a pattern, in my early childhood and did foreshadow an actual event that seemed to follow my deja vu dream to a 'T'.

But just the other day in class, a classmate asked a question and I knew the at that moment what the teacher was going to say word-for-word. It is quite an odd experience and almost made me want to stop the class and ask if he was really about to answer that way. Then he did! :)

8. re: "Dream Link?"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 11:20:19 GMT

The "Parallel Universes" idea is not as far-fetched as it sounds. It is possible that within particular structures of the brain (called microtubules), the quantum effect known as the "collapse of the wave function" may facilitate something similar to that described in the famous "Schrodinger's Cat" experiment. As you may be aware, this is used as evidence of the "Many Worlds Interpretation". [StealthSkater note: more on "parallel universes" at doc pdf URL .

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The Everett/Wheeler "MWI" is at doc pdf URL . Theories of Consciousness start at doc pdf URL .]

If quantum effects are in some way related to brain function, then a deja vu experience could bring about a switch between one universe and another. (See the work of Stuart Hameroff and Roger Penrose or even simply check out the New Scientist staffwriter Marcus Chown's wonderful book The Universe Next Door for examples of how this may happen).

9. re: "Dream Link?"by Geoff / Thu Mar 26, 2009 12:57:15 GMT

Schrodinger's Cat was an experiment designed to disprove quantum theory -- not to prove it. The suggestion is that before the human opens the box and observes the state of the cat (and hence the quantum level event), the cat is in both possible states. It's fallacious because 'observation' doesn't require intelligent observers (feline or human). Any interaction with the rest of the Universe counts.

Sadly, it doesn't prove anything (least of all Multiverse theory). There's a similar experiment called the "quantum machine gun" which will prove the Multiverse theory. But only statistically in a tiny subset of universes.

10. re: "Dream Link?"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 13:40:56 GMTHi Geoff --

I am perfectly aware of why Schrodinger put forward his "thought experiment". However, why he did this was to deny the logical implications of Bohr's "Copenhagen Interpretation". We all know that this interpretation is now the new orthodoxy. An orthodoxy that suggests that the act of observation brings about the collapse of the wave function. (Or more accurately, "decoheres" it.)

The "Many Worlds Interpretation" of Hugh Everett was an attempt to show that (1) the observer does not collapse the wave function and that (2) 2 alternative outcomes take place -- both of them with observers in them.

It is fair to say that quite a few top particle physicists go with the MWI line (Max Tegmark and David Deutsch to name but two). Indeed it was Max Tegmark who suggested the "quantum machine gun" thought experiment. This is wonderfully described in Marcus Chown's great book The Universe Next Door.

11. "Deja vu in my first visit to Cartagena, Spain"by Juan Sevilla / Wed Mar 25, 2009 20:19:23 GMT

I visited for the first time Europe, Spain, and the port of Cartagena itself in February 1964 during a Summer Cruse while being still a midshipman in the Peruvian Navy. The first time we got ashore, I was heading downtown with some fellow cadet. Aas we came only a block away from the Plaza Mayor of Cartagena City, I suddenly "felt" that I had been somehow there before (couldn't tell when because I had never been even near Europe before). I told my friends about it.

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Even more, I told them that in that Plaza Mayor, making a right turn at the next corner there was a Spanish restaurant (where we could find some delicious paellas for lunch) more-or-less at mid-half position of that block we were about to stroll. Surprisingly enough, we turned the corner and there was the expected restaurant at the same and exact place I told them it would!

The only thing I can think about it is that my last name is undoubtedly Spanish (as it is Sevilla as the Spanish city) and perhaps some ancestor recorded this situation deeply in his brain God knows when!

No explanation to this day!

12. re: "Deja vu in my first visit to Cartagena, Spain"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 12:33:11 GMT

I will attempt an explanation. But first I would like to respond to your very reasonable (and very popular) opinion that the experience may be to do with an "ancestor" of yours having been there in the Past. If this was the case, then what is the chance of the restaurant being exactly the right place and looking exactly the same? If your "memory" was that of an ancestor, then surely some things would have been different.

Indeed, I use a similar argument against the other popular explanation that a deja experience is proof of reincarnation. If this was the case, then you would have been struck by the differences -- not the similarities. A memory of a past life would involve you and all the people around you being dressed differently as would be the things around you.

For me, a deja experience is clearly a memory of having "lived" this moment before (actually known as deja vecu). This is why everything is so familiar. At some time in your past, you visited Plaza Mayor with the same friends on the same day and went to the same restaurant (the one you so accurately predicted). Your precognition was given to you from a memory.

I suggest that a deja experince is exactly what it feels it is. i.e., A literal reliving of a moment that you have lived before. And that is how you knew what was to happen next.

I lecture around the country on this very subject and I have collected many experiences that you describe. And believe me! they are amazingly common. It is just that people do not feel at ease talking about them.

13. "The Moose Knows"by LoonyMagnet / Wed Mar 25, 2009 20:34:46 GMT

I think deja vu has some correlation to the neurotransmitter serotonin. Psychedelic drugs act on the serotonin system. And deja vu is a very "trippy" feeling'

After all, we are all "high" on serotonin. Don't forget that. Without serotonin, life would be unbearably boring. That's why we humans are a bunch of loonies -- we're all tripping. Do you not think we would have some "side effects" from the drug? Or better yet, drugs? Dopamine serotonin interaction?

14. re: "The Moose Knows"by Anonymous / Wed Mar 25, 2009 23:36:15 GMT

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Actually, you might be onto something there. Coming down from an ecstasy drug high can trigger deja vu.

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15. re: "The Moose Knows"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 12:47:33 GMT

Your suggestion regarding the neurotransmitter link is in my opinion quite correct. But I consider that you have the wrong neurotransmitter. There is strong evidence that the chemical responsible is glutamate. Evidence for this can be found in the pre-seizure auras of those experiencing temporal lobe epilepsy (and to a lesser extent, migraine).

Neurologists have long known that deja sensations are a central part of the aura of TLE. Indeed, this is usually used as one of the symptoms by which a diagnosis is made.

Glutamate is known to be a major factor in both migraine and TLE. Indeed, it is also known to be involved in schizophrenia. And of course, schizophrenics regularly report all kinds of temporal confusions including deja vu and precognition

What is of even greater interest to me, however, is that glutamate is also known to be responsible for some of the psychological and sensual effects of Near-Death Experience. And what is one of the most common reports that experiencers of NDE report? Something called the "Panoramic Life Review". They live their lives again in a super-fast flashback.

If that was to be experienced in real time, would not the experiencer sometimes feel that they have "lived this moment before"? Or even feel that they know what is going to happen next? Is that a clue to the real nature of deja vu? [StealthSkater note: these subjects are touched upon in "Lucid Dreaming" and "Out-of-Body Experiences" sections at doc pdf URL ]

16. "Aa Sense of Something being very Wrong?"by McFinch / Wed Mar 25, 2009 20:37:54 GMT

I have 2 types of déjá vu:(1) Everything is the same in the experiences which triggers it as if I seen this exactly this

way before.(2)Things are very similar in the experience, but there is a slight difference. Here, there is

that eerie familiarity. But I can remember there were a couple things which were slightly different.

However, I can't quite relate to the sense of wrongness. Eerie, yes. But a nice sort of "eerie" as if I am in my own science-fiction movie. I would be quite excited if it were such (as one commentator experienced) that I knew what was going to happen before it happened. I imagine life might become unimaginably boring after a while though.

17. "But What If …"by Clay / Wed Mar 25, 2009 20:44:44 GMT

What if you have deja vu which isn't particularly tied up with the Present moment but rather the present moment triggers a memory of a near Future event?

I have been able to tell several highly-respected people (ANU professor, DSTO research scientist, etc.) what's about to happen to them around 1-hour in advance. I am a post-doc molecular biologist myself and have attributed these experiences to our fundamental lack of understanding of Time. This seems to violate the "rules" of unidirectional time. Anyone else experienced something like this? [StealthSkater note: Dr. Matti Pitkanen's TopologicalGeometroDynamics (TGD) theory unites Consciousness with Quantum

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Mechanics and General Relativity. It allows a differentiation between Geometric-Time (i.e., Relativity) and Experienced-Time (Consciousness). In doing that, an "arrow of time" is postulated. See doc pdf URL ]

18. re: "But What If …"by Edward / Thu Mar 26, 2009 10:09:18 GMT

From what you are telling, I think that being a molecular biologist, you have a strong analytical mind and are also highly experienced to browse fast through data and make fast and reasonable conclusions. It could be that without being aware you are making logical conclusions because you are a sharp observer and interpret correctly what you sense.

19. re: "But What If …"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 12:54:53 GMTClay --

It is absolutely imperative that you contact me with regard to your precognitive deja experiences. This is exactly the kind empirical and verifiable data that I need in support of my theory. I am not sure if this is allowed but please contact me via my website FORUM onhttp://www.anthonypeake.com/forum .

There is a section on this Forum that discusses deja vu and precognition. Involved in this group are some of the World's leading researchers in the deja phenomenon including Professor Vernon Neppe and Dr. Arthur Funkhouser.

We are keen to have clear evidence of deja vu precognitions so that we can present these to serious scientists. This invite goes out to anybody else checking out the responses to this fascinating article

20. "I Remember Déjà vu"by daniel / Wed Mar 25, 2009 20:50:25 GMT

My deja vu (or maybe it is deja vecu) starts with a feeling of seeing things before. But it grows exponentially to feel like everything from thoughts, to hearing, to my movements, to tactile sensations have been experienced before exactly as I am experiencing them at the time.

Invariably the feeling of having deja vu is part of the deja vu as I generally recognize the deja vu during the experience and it is incorporated into it. The feeling of maybe being able to just nearly know what will happen next feels a bit like the "word on the tip of your tongue sensation". If I could only remember quickly enough and not just as I experience it!

21. re: "I Remember Déjà vu"by Jeremy / Wed Mar 25, 2009 22:08:58 GMT

Your experience seems to support the theory that memories (of what you are experiencing at the moment) are not being recorded in real time. Instead, the recording is offset by a couple of seconds.

In that case, deja vu would be an illusion. When you say "hey, I've experienced this before" … you have! Just a few seconds ago. It's only burning into your memory now. But you also have a

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very temporary memory of what happened as it happened a couple of seconds previously which the brain now thinks is the memory being déjà vu-ed.

I've never heard of deja vus of deja vus like you have though. It's as if the memory keeps echoing. You might be a good case study!

I have had a dream where in the dream I woke up from dreaming and thought I was awake. I understand that's very rare. [StealthSkater note: this happens in "Lucid Dreaming" => doc pdf URL ]

22. re: "I Remember Déjà vu"by Liza / Wed Mar 25, 2009 22:50:06 GMT

"I have had a dream where in the dream, I woke up from dreaming and thought I was awake. I understand that's very rare."

This has nothing to do with déjà vu. Once I was having a dream of great emotional significance for me. In my dream, I told myself "you have to wake up now so you can remember this dream". And so I did. It felt very funny. But I guess this is not unusual.

23. re: "I Remember Déjà vu"by Edward / Thu Mar 26, 2009 10:15:34 GMT

Your experience is normal. It is probably a hypnopombic hallucination. If this was the case, you were immobilized when this experience happened.

24. re: "I Remember Déjà vu"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 13:24:57 GMT

The technical term for this is "False Awakenings" and is more common than you would expect. I also agree with the other respondee that there are elements of "hypnopompia" and/or "hypnogogia" in your experience (the former experienced just before you wake up and the latter just before you go to sleep.

As far as I am aware, only one book has been written on this subject. It is called Hypnogogia and written by a guy called Mavromatis.

25. re: "I Remember Déjà vu"by Liza / Thu Mar 26, 2009 15:42:09 GMT

Edward & Anthony --Tthanks both for your reactions. However, I actually truly woke myself up. No hallucination

at all! I have evidence because I turned on the light and wrote down that dream. I did not experience any feeling of being immobilized. It happened in the middle of the night (2 am) -- not when I just was falling asleep.

26. re: "I Remember Déjà vu"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 13:04:03 GMT

The process by which Experience is recorded before it is presented to Consciousness has long been known by neuroscientists (particularly those involved in a new area of enquiry called

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consciousness studies). Various amazing experiments have done on this "time delay" and recording theory. These include the "PHI Phenomenon", "The Cutaneous Rabbit", the "Libet Experiment", and the "Bierman-Radin Experiment".

All these show that either (1) the brain delays presenting sensory information to consciousness or else (as a journalist wrote after hearing about the Bierman-Radin results) (2) that we are all like the "PreCogs" in the movie "Minority Report"

Of course, if the brain does delay the data, this implies that it is recorded. And if everything you perceive is recorded, then a whole record of your life must be hidden within the neuronal networks of your brain!

27. "No News At All!"by Gianfranco / Wed Mar 25, 2009 21:49:48 GMT

My deja vu's started when I was about 10 and seldom happened. I started having migraine auras around 30. Migraine completely disappeared at 43. But at 51 (1991), I had the first epileptic aura and soon after the first epileptic fit. The professor who examined me in Italy immediately asked me about déjà vu. So he considered the connection between epilepsy and deja vu as a matter of course.

Since 1991, being constantly under medication, I only had 8 seizures. But I had deja vu very often. So that it is difficult for me to distinguish between aura and deja vu. All symptoms disappeared after a last gigantic fit three years ago.

28. re: "No News At All!"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 13:29:56 GMT

I agree totally (note: see an earler posting). It is clear that there is a strong link between TLE, migraine, and deja vu.

On my FORUM are at least 12 TLE-ers from around the World who regularly discuss with me their TLE aura sensations.

I would be interested in hearing more about your experiences. I can be contacted via my website: http://www.anthonypeake.com

29. "Temporal-lobe Epilepsy And Déjà vu"by James P. Girard / Wed Mar 25, 2009 22:13:26 GMT

Before my epilepsy was treated, I had pre-seizure experiences that I described as "extended deja vu". At the same time, it seemed to me that the seizure itself often seemed like "dreaming while awake". As a result, I developed a theory of my own based only on my own experience.

My understanding is that sleep is partly used by the brain to organize (especially cross-reference) and store new data. And that dreams are a byproduct of this process -- that there is a part of the mind that continually (while awake) constructs a coherent ongoing narrative out of incoming data. During sleep, this part of the mind continues to operate. But the only data coming to it is from the brain itself (i.e., the new data it's organizing and linking with past data).

My theory is that during a seizure, the night-time part of the brain becomes active while you're conscious and is attempting to organize real-time incoming data. At the same time, the part of the

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brain whose job it is to organize such data into an ongoing coherent narrative is also working, creating a kind of feedback loop in which real-time data is being processed immediately after having been received while the old memories with which the new data is being associated are interpreted by the conscious mind as incoming data which it attempts to fit into the real-time narrative.

30. "Verbal Déjà Vu? Or Déjà Entendu?"by JARI / Wed Mar 25, 2009 22:15:40 GMT

When I was 9 or 10, I experienced my first déjà vu. It involved knowing what my sister was going to be asked and when she would answer. It happened just like that! I have vivid details of it. The Sun shining, me swinging on the arm of a sofa...

It felt odd. But not wrong. Everyone I told said they've experienced déjà vu, too. I think it only happened twice after that. Cheers!

31. "What about Déjà Vu in Dreams?"by Attila Csanyi / Wed Mar 25, 2009 22:32:08 GMT

I have repeated dreams about places that I have never been to but which are completely familiar to me in the dream. I know in my dream that I had been there before. Is this related to déjà vu experiences?

32. "Familiarity?"by John Doe / Wed Mar 25, 2009 22:36:36 GMT

… absolutely not! Do the blind experience any familiarity with what they have '"seen"?

The brain processes information which virtually always continues throughout the process as one "clump". But on those rare occasions when separation occurs, déjà vu results. Indeed, the brain requires much more study,. Bt this line is hogwash.

33. "Just Perception Gone Wrong?"by Luke / Wed Mar 25, 2009 23:19:47 GMT

I have very occasionally had deja vu for no apparent reason. The "spooky" feeling is that not only have I done this before, but that I also know what will happen next.

A few years ago I had a heavy blow to the back of my head. Not enough to render me unconscious, but there was a lot of blood and it hurt. For the next hour-or-so, I experienced deja vu several times, leading me to believe that this is an internal brain problem to do with perception that happens in real time and not a memory or a dream recall, although this is how it feels and is unconnected to one's surroundings. [StealthSkater note: interesting because trauma to the head is often what awakens remote-viewing "powers" in individuals. Read David Morehouse's story when he was struck in his helmet by a bullet => doc pdf URL .]

34. "Following A Thought"by Eliza / Wed Mar 25, 2009 23:37:51 GMT

Could it be that deja vu is triggered by a fleeting moment either of something familiar (of a primal nature) or just a trigger of "familiarity". Which then causes the brain to instantly search that

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thought and then essentially follow it so quickly that it feels like a repeated sense? For me, the "impossibility" comes from the sense that it is an "identical" match to something previously experienced that I know didn't happen.

35. "Dreams and Reality could be similar to the feeling of Déjà vu"by Ramin / Wed Mar 25, 2009 23:47:19 GMT

Dreams were mentioned in the article. I've had many cases of something that has happened in real life and prior to that I had a dream of the same thing happening! In a couple of the cases that really happened, it took a few years. When the event took place, I had a feeling that I had seen this before!

36. "Comments …"by Bruce Dickson / Wed Mar 25, 2009 23:58:26 GMT

I seem to remember seeming to have remembered saying this before...

Like many posters here, I've had isolated -- but vivid -- experiences in the past including those where I knew what people were going to say verbatim or knew esoteric place locations right down to small appearance details in advance.

The bothersome thing about them was that (especially when dream-related), one never knew at the advance-viewing stage to write them down somewhere. There was no warning that -- unlike other visions or experiences -- these were exceptions that would actually recur. Unfortunately, that realization tends not to come until it's too late and the recurrence is underway.

The neurobiologists among us will likely insist that such a "realization" is actually just the brain misreading an input. Synapses triggering a chemical process similar to those related to memory formation and management.

Unfortunately, that would not explain those instances where -- in "mid-vu" as it were -- I could almost literally have paused the action and written down the rest of the scene that would play itself out in exactly that manner immediately upon its resumption. In that respect, I fall in line precisely with some of the other experiences being reported here. So distinct is that experience that a simple chemical "misfire" or "misread" can't explain it away.

There might be other, vaguer instances where neural-chemical activity (and nothing else) mimics a true déjà vu experience, thereby clouding the entire issue for both subjects and researchers, alike. But a previous poster ingeniously raised the whole Space/Time issue and got me thinking about how the brain I have today is the raw material for the brain I'll have tomorrow. Same material and differently arranged thanks to new memories socked away. But still the same organ -- just at different points in Time.

In a sense, one could argue that both exist simultaneously. Assuming I'm still around, what I have Today is basically what I'll have Tomorrow. The only thing separating the two is Time. But the day after Tomorrow, they'll won't be separate any more. Yesterday's experiences will have taken up residence with their predecessors in that very same organ.

All that will have changed is that I won't be relating to them as Present-tense occurrences. In other words, what will change is my perception of them. Those which according to that perception

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had been filed as "memories" would have been considered 'real'. Those yet to be perceived would have been given no filing status and, therefore, would be beyond considering.

Once filed in the former category, however, what had once been beyond consideration becomes as real any memory preceding it. The shift from one point of perception to the other is what we call "Time".

What if for rare and brief moments, our customary perceptual path were to jump the track or reverse itself? What if we accorded "memory" status to something in what would normally have been the unclassified "beyond consideration" category? (Remember, we are talking about the same brain being home to both the perceived and the yet-to-be-perceived events.)

Then for that instant, a profound sense of déjà vu -- even to the point of being able to predict details with certainty in advance -- would surely result. Like a phonograph record being played momentarily in reverse, groove-generated notes usually heard in a certain succession are heard the other way around instead. They have all been laid down in advance. They all exist on the record simultaneously and do not simply appear-and-disappear as the needle happens to arrive at each point along the way. It is just that we are accustomed to them being presented to our needle-like consciousness a certain way. So we get thrown off a bit when the order of presentation gets changed.

If I were on a moving train peering out a very narrow vertical slit as my only window, the ever-changing elevations of the mountains in the distance would appear to me as a ceaseless up-and-down dance of grey (rock) and blue (sky). I would be totally convinced that the countryside was one tireless and dynamic place.

But were the train to stop and I alight, how astounded I would be at the stasis before me and how every rise-and -fall I had been witnessing in dizzying succession had actually existed altogether both motionlessly and simultaneously. All that had changed was my perception of them.

Well, perhaps true déjà vu is simply a momentary directional change in our perception of that storehouse we call "memory". Like record grooves, the memories are already laid down. It is just that the needle of our perception has yet to run over them all. Its progress is what we have named "Time". And our time -- just like that record -- will eventually run out. [StealthSkater note: Einstein himself once said that "Time is an illusion". I have seen that written elsewhere as "Reality is an illusion".]

37. re: "Comments …"by Jeremy / Thu Mar 26, 2009 03:19:42 GMT

That could well be true. Many well-thought analyses here point to a temporary aberration of memory or perception of memory.

But some people report events that were first dreamed about and then coming true exactly as they happened in the dream. This must be something different than a memory aberration because of the time lag between the dream and the event. (Unless it's some extreme aberration where they only think they dreamed it -- which is unlikely).

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Maybe we have dreams that would turn out to be true very frequently but we forget the dreams. Who knows. Maybe these precognition dreams are a different phenomenon from déjà vu. Or maybe they're the same phenomenon but the 2 events are separated more widely in time.

If precognition experiences (i.e., dreaming something then it comes true the next day) are not some hallucination -- that is, if the dream really did happen many hours before the event -- then I don't think it's a memory aberration. But I'm not sure it's true déjà vu, either. Perhaps it is simply precognition with all its spiritual, dimension-traveling connotations and deja vu (with no preceding dream) is something different.

In my case of having strong deja vu of knowing someone previously and them having the same feeling but with no precognition dream associated with it, that would also suggest that deja vu is not a memory aberration. Fascinating!

38. re: "Comments …"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 15:38:07 GMT

Bruce --You have picked up many of the themes contained in my theories. I am specifically interested

in your phonograph analogy. You will recall that in the movie "The Matrix", there is a deja vu scene where Neo sees the cat cross his path and then sees it again. Morpheus then reacts by explaining that this is evidence that the Matrix is being re-programmed. Indeed, this could be an alternative explanation.

If we are existing in a 3-dimensional recreation of our lives (something I term "The Bohmian IMAX -- and an idea that has been discussed by Dr. Nick Bostrom and Professor John Wheeler so I am in good company), then sometimes the recording may "jump" just like a record or a CD/DVD does. This may give you a glimpse of the Future.

In my opinion, there are 2 sorts of deja vu. There is (1) the vague feeling of recognition and there is (2) the full-blown precognition. These may be 2 very separate phenomenon.

Hopefully the research being done by Dr.Funkhouser in Switzerland, Dr. Moulin in Leeds, Dr. Neppe in the USA, and little old me may come up with something that satisfactorily explains all elements of this fascinating neurological state. [StealthSkater note: what about the rumors of the "Yellow Book" allegedly given to us by aliens whose holographic pictures of the Future change depending upon the viewer ( doc pdf URL ) ?]

39. "Dreams Within Dreams and the Same Thing Happening In Real Life Later"by Ramin / Thu Mar 26, 2009 00:22:31 GMT

I have had dreams that within those same dreams I had dreamed about the same thing. And I was recalling it or telling someone that I had dreamed about that same thing/event or person. Later on, the same thing/event happened in real life. And while I was telling the same person about it in real life, only then I had a feeling that I had done the same thing before (which of course it had happened in my dreams!).

40. re: "Dreams Within Dreams and the Same Thing Happening In Real Life Later"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 15:46:52 GMT

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There is a fascinating case that was recorded by Frederick Myers over 100 years ago. I mention it in my first book and acknowledge that I first came across it in an article by Dr Funkhouser.

A woman had a dream that she saw a coach-driver fall from his coach and injure himself. When she awoke, the dream was still lodged in her mind. Later that day, she was walking in Mayfair and turned into Down Street. As she did, so she was confronted with the scene from her dream. She saw the coachman begin to climb out of the coach.

She knew he was going to fall and so she screamed. The scream so startled the coachman that he fell off the coach and injured himself. It was her scream that made the dream come true. Had she not screamed, the man would not have fallen.

Clearly there is something very strange happening here with regard to precognition and dreams. I suspect that the solution may lie in the famed "Many Worlds Interpretation" of Hugh Everett III or -- more accurately -- a subtle change in this theory termed the "Many Minds".

41. "Disturbing"by Mediocrates / Thu Mar 26, 2009 00:49:08 GMT

Deja vu is disturbing because there is a sense of being trapped in Time. i.e., Doomed to repeat the same actions and undergo identical experiences, over and over ad infinitum. I have noticed that LSD (which alters perception and induces abnormal mental states) can produce similar symptoms. Which is interesting.

Perhaps if (as another New Scientsist article states) tachyons do not exist and our Universe is deterministic, deja vu would then be a temporary cognitive awareness of it. At least until our psychic defense mechanisms slam back into place.

Check of proof: people with mental illnesses could be far more prone to extended deja vu because they lack the appropriate psychic mechanisms to "block out awareness" (as it were).

"The Fountain" is a good movie to demonstrate the principle of a deterministic universe producing déjà vu effects. Too bad it's muddled with religious connotations.

Determinism and the mental experience of it (real or not) is downright scary. Because then concepts like "free will", "change", "new" are meaningless. It's an eternal prison sentence.

42. "Familiarity"by Strada202 / Thu Mar 26, 2009 01:38:45 GMT

It may be that we recognize things that we have seen, read, or been told.

For example, when we read a detailed book, we create elaborative scenes in our mind. When we look at pictures of places we may not remember them. People may talk in detail about places sometime in your life. For all these cases that can occur any time in your life, you will likely forget mostly all of this detail.

Also dreams could combine all of this information and create new scenes. After all, our unconscious mind absorbs more data then we think. Maybe deja vu is simply recognizing this detail.

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As another example: when I do multiple choice questions (general knowledge), I just so happen to know a lot of answers despite never reading about it. (Maybe I associate the answer words with the question subject.) When really the likely chance is that sometime in my life I have come across it. Just as when we recognize people we don't know, we probably have passed them sometime in our lives. How many people do we look at every day? How many images and pictures do we see every second? Multiply this by all the seconds we have lived and that's a very large memory store!

Many memories internally stored = increased chance of Familiarity

43. "Yes! I Have Several Times"by Justony / Thu Mar 26, 2009 03:39:24 GMT

It would appear that one can grow out of it since I have not had a deja vu experience for many years.

However, one that I partially remember was a dream where I was looking up a hill into the Sun and talking to someone that I could not see. A few months later, the actual situation occurred and I was able to finish the sentence for him (somewhat startling for us both!).

44. re: "Yes! I Have Several Times"by Dave Baldock / Thu Mar 26, 2009 09:34:53 GMT

That's spooky! But I'm sorry. I can't believe in knowing the Future. It's too "X Files" for me. I don't believe in anything supernatural.

It's strange though, because a fear of the dark when I've just watched a ghost film is still apparent. And I'm not a young man anymore. I think that some fears and beliefs are built into our nature and are very difficult to "rationalize" away sometimes.

[StealthSkater note: My next-door neighbor had an aunt who was regarded as having clairvoyant gifts. She said that her aunt once foresaw her being engulfed in a orange-ish type of fire. Months (or years) later, my neighbor said she had stumbled onto a yellowjacket nest in her back yard. She had trouble getting all of the bees out of her bathrobe.

And I had a personal experience where an acquaintance (who supposedly read tarot cards) told me out of the proverbial blue that I would be taking a trip South in the very near future. As it turned out, I was out of work and looking for my next consulting assignment. Sure enough, in 2 months I was heading South (actually more Southeast). I really wasn't close friends with this guy and tended to avoid him as much as possible (for other reasons).]

45. "My Take On Life"by C / Thu Mar 26, 2009 04:55:29 GMT

This is my theory on Life. Please feel free to criticize it :)

1. I'm an atheist and don't believe there is a God.

2. I believe in Evolution.21

3. I believe in morality because without it, we would all live miserable lives and all 8 Billion people on Earth would not be able to live with one another.

4. I believe that there is Life all over the Universe. Because of this, I feel that it is somewhat silly that we focus all our attention on helping Humanity. Animals are sentient as well. Right?

5. I believe that it is scary that some people live a life that is very sad and yet do not have the courage to commit suicide. I believe if you are truly in dire consequences that you should commit suicide because I do believe that you are reborn. I think Life is just a very complex pattern that occurs in Nature. And this pattern that we call "Life" is built into Nature itself so it is unavoidable. Therefore, since Life is an unavoidable pattern, you have to live morally and try your best to improve your life situation.

6. I know as an American in Los Angeles, I have a life that is better than 95% of the World's and probably 99.99% of sentient life on Earth. Therefore, my fear is that I will be born into very bad circumstances but I will not have the courage to commit suicide or that I will be in a lifeform that cannot kill itself and will therefore suffer all the time.

Replies are very welcome. Criticism as well :)

46. re: "My Take On Life"by Dave Baldock / Thu Mar 26, 2009 08:46:20 GMT

I agree with your atheist, evolution, morality, and animal welfare comments. But I think committing suicide because of a belief in reincarnation is wrong. If you believe in reincarnation, then you are believing in the supernatural which is as bad as believing in God. Why rise above one fairy tale just to believe in another?

And it's illogical to believe there's Life all over the Universe when there's not a shred of evidence to support it. I would prefer there to be Life elsewhere. But I can't say I believe there is. A single alien microbe found on Mars or Europa would persuade me to start believing it was likely, though. Perhaps I'm just splitting hairs.

47. re: "My Take On Life"by Strada202 / Thu Mar 26, 2009 10:04:06 GMT

Sorry, but did I miss the point you made on deja vu? Just because it;s something you can;t explain doesn;t mean that it is supernatural. There are many realistic scientific theories out there.

I'm an atheist but don't believe in reincarnation as this is like believing in a supernatural force. (You may as well believe in God!) Unless you are buried, then your deceased body is the source that maggots and insects thrive on. So yes in that way we are recycled and "re-born".

The fact that memories are imprinted on DNA through methylation suggests that deja vu and deep regression is scientifically possible when passed through generations. This may come across as what you think is "reincarnation". [StealthSkater note: more on "methylation" and Epigenetics is archived at doc pdf URL ]

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48. re: "My Take On Life"by Jeremy / Thu Mar 26 , 15:26:26 GMT

"…. the courage to commit suicide …"How about the courage (and the effort and the valuing of Life) to get therapy? Or look at the

way you feel and do something to change it? Or to move out of your miserable circumstances?

If you value morality and such, you should not think that "suicide takes courage". It takes desperation, confusion, and a lot of pain. It's a big gamble to assume that you'd be reborn.

49. re: "My Take On Life"by R. H / Thu Mar 26, 2009 07:56:18 GMT

I am not criticizing (although you said you do not mind). This is just for sake of discussion.

1. The idea of God is very much misunderstood because God is, shall I say, an "existence" that people vary in defining. And from the way you were writing, your God is clearly Nature. Which is simply just a different naming because in order to believe in God, you do not have to call it "God" and actually be committed to a certain religion or a traditional way of thinking. You just have to believe there is a Power in control (and in your case, it is Nature). I might have actually misunderstood and you meant Nature as an unorganized chaotic existence. If so, then my interpretation would be wrong.

5. So which is it? Should a person in sad (and sad is a relative word) life conditions commit suicide or live morally and try his/her best to improve life situation?

6. If you are reborn -- but not in the same conditions, not in the same way of thinking, not knowing it is you, and not having a clue you have lived before -- then it is not really 'You'! It is just another person with possibly a fragment of your soul that has no memory of you. [StealthSkater note: as a joke, I frequently say that my "Al Bundy"-type life misfortunes are punishment due to a past life/existence. The trouble is that I don't remember what I did!]

50. re: "My Take On Life"by Ivor Clark / Thu Mar 26, 2009 11:47:41 GMT

It is interesting to me that as an atheist, you still have many "beliefs" of things which are not seen or proven (like extraterrestrial life) or the "recycling" of the human soul (for want of a better expression). Let me address each of your points.

On the belief in God:The best way to deal with that is to just wait. Eventually we all die. Then we will know for

definite who was right, won't we?! [StealthSkater note: from the old rock song: "I can say there ain't no Heaven; but I pray there ain't no Hell. But I'll never know by living -- only my dying will tell …" All of this stuff -- however well-intended -- is just words on paper until proven. And believing (no matter strongly) in something doesn't mean it will turn out that way.]

No need to "believe" in Evolution:Mainstream science accepts it as fact as do many religions now. The evidence is accruing all

the time (esp. in DNA studies and fossil records).

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On morality:Unfortunately, the fact is all 8 billion of us don't live in harmony with each other. There are

lots of different moral standards relating to religion, culture, race, social status, income, environment etc.. There are always wars going on over resources, land, assets etc. We see this in all of Nature. It's called the "battle for survival". hat a moral code does is set certain rules or standards which can also be seen in animal groups that rely on a social network. Chimps, wolves, elephants, and dolphins demonstrate these kind of behaviors. Whether they intrinsically know something is right or wrong is probably more to do with "will it help me to survive or not?"

AnimalsI agree that other animals have sentience (albeit different to ours). We place a very high value

on communication. This is reflected in our need to read, write, share experiences and emotions, and form relationships. Our brains are wired for visual input (50% devoted to that) and auditory input. Our senses of smell taste and touch to a certain extent fall way short of our animal cousins. Our need for communication is now reaching out into Space with the hope of somehow contacting another communicative species. I think we should spend more time trying to communicate better with our animal friends. And why not look after our own Humanity? Who else is gonna do it?!

So suicide takes courage?Not in my book. It's the coward's way out. Depends how you define a "sad" life. If you mean

someone terribly mentally-disabled and disfigured, that is very different to someone who is mentally ill or who has committed a serious crime and who seriously contemplates committing suicide. Overcoming our most basic instinct to survive is nigh on impossible unless there is an underlying mental abnormality. Of course, some people can become so conditioned to a certain way of life that they cannot accommodate major changes and become depressed. But that in itself can become chronic and lead to suicidal tendencies.

On the idea of Life and being "recycled":

Yes, at a fundamental chemical level we can be "recycled". But biologically, it is what happens to our DNA that is most important. We can either pass it on to our next generation or it gets destroyed. That's part of the evolutionary process which you said you believed in.

Life never stays the same. It is constantly dealing the pack of DNA cards to create new species and kill-off old ones. The chances of even one human genome being completely recycled to the same genome are almost infinitely large. But some of your atoms and simple molecules will eventually become part of a food chain somewhere or be incorporated into your childrens' childrens' childrens' children ad infinitum.

You refer back to living morally again with this. "Morality" to me is what humans use to organize themselves into social groups and has little to do with "Life being an unavoidable pattern"

You carry on with this idea of being born again into another life but which may be intrinsically worse that what you have at the moment. Very few people in the World's population enjoy your standard-of-living. So make the most of it whether you end up "recycled" or not.

And remember that there are many poor people out there without access to what we have in" civilized" countries like food, medicine, shelter, warmth, transport etc. and yet they remain intrinsically happy people. Maybe -- just maybe -- you will be "reborn" into that kind of community. Would you swap happiness for all your creature comforts?

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51. "Remember To Forget"by Nick M / Thu Mar 26, 2009 05:18:25 GMT

IMHO … If you forget what you were supposed to remember, it is because you have associated forgetting with whatever you were supposed to associate remembering (also "writers' block"). I think this is also the same mechanism for déjà vu.

When we remember something, we first have a feeling of familiarity with that object or sensation. A smell, a sound, a color combination, etc. If we are distracted at just the instance of familiarity, we cold lose what we were associating with that familiarity and carry it over to the whole situation.

52. "For What It's Worth"by Marc / Thu Mar 26, 2009 05:21:19 GMT

We have a murder trial in progress in this country[NZ] where the accused [who is being retried after 15 years on charges of shooting his entire family] was reportedly suffering regular episodes of deja vu up till the time of the murders.

53. "Deja Vu And Predictive Dreams"by anonymous / Thu Mar 26, 2009 07:46:15 GMT

My visual deja vus are focused on unrepeatable details of color, texture, motion parallax, etc. My aural deja "vus" involve the particular vocal timbre and intonation of a single utterance (often for me, visual and aural deja vu is combined although it is only ever those 2 senses). This all seems to rule out the "familiarity" thesis unless the brain is superimposing these details ex post facto on a vaguely familiar situation.

Most of my deja vu experiences occur in tandem with the Present experience. That is, I can't predict what someone is going to say or how the scene is going to change but I feel the memory unfolding as the event does. I sometimes feel I can predict it. But the "premonition" comes so soon before the unfolding events that I don't have time to stop moving (and thus interrupt the remembered motion parallax) or interrupt a speaker. So I've never been able to confirm it.

I have had one single occasion of recalling the moment in the Past when I predicted a present moment. I was at my desk studying when I experienced a momentary disruption of thought as if I'd heard a moment of a radio transmission on a turning dial or a subliminal scene had been cut into a movie. It was so brief that I couldn't parse the interrupting signal and soon forgot it. When the event I had foreseen occurred, I remembered being at my desk and foreseeing it. The foreseen moment was completely ordinary. Nothing important happened. I suppose my brain could have fabricated the entire memory of "foreseeing" the event in the moments after the event itself occurred.

I have had one, inconsequential predictive dream. My key-ring broke the day after I dreamt it would. And in the same place. The morning after the dream (that is, hours before the event occurred), I woke up and thought "I must replace my key-ring because it will break today" and felt disorientated when I realized I had only dreamed it.

A colleague of mine dreamt in accurate detail of the scene of me breaking up with my partner the night I did so. And we hadn't discussed my relationship previously.

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A friend dreamt that I came to her and asked her to call me (which I did, in fact, want her to do). She called me the next day. We met up and I was wearing the same outfit I'd been wearing in the dream. One that she'd never seen before.

54. "Deja Vu - Is It A Memory?"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 10:12:49 GMT

A very interesting article. I am pleased to see that it has now been acknowledged that the Robert Efron explanation of "Mental diplopia" has been disproved.

I have been researching the deja phenomenon for many years and am of the opinion that this particular psychological mystery may hold clues to a much greater understanding of Consciousness and its relationship to external Reality. I have been in regular contact with Dr. Arthur Funkhouser of Bern in Switzerland (whose "Dream Theory" offers fascinating alternative explanation) and Dr. Vernon Neppe of Seattle (whose definition of deja vu is the one used by all researchers and writers on the subject). I strongly advise anybody interested in this phenomenon to check out the work of these two researchers.

Indeed, both are members of my Forum where I have a section on Deja Vu. This is an attempt to collect evidence of the deja experience from around the World. From there, interested parties can take part in Dr Funhouser's "Deja Vu Questionnaire. This can be found at:

http://www.anthonypeake.com/forum

55. re: "Deja Vu - Is It A Memory?"by Ivor Clark / Thu Mar 26 , 2009 11:18:11 GMT

>Dejavous: "a feeling of having experienced the same scenario before but with no material evidence for having done so"....

My view on this is that we take in so much information every day through our subconscious. We are totally unaware of it. Id it gets stored away in deep in our short-term and then long-term memories and then given an appropriate stimulus (e.g., a certain environment or social situation) reappears into our Conscious mind as that experience.

Some may also say the experience is simply a coincidence when it tells of foreboding or precognition. The fact that many link it to a dream-like mental state also indicates the role of the subconscious. It could be a warning message that might impact on our survival in some way (hence the foreboding idea - it's always about something bad happening) that the subconscious recognizes and sends a message to the conscious (often via a dream) to say "Hey! Yu better take a look at this! Ignore at your peril…)".

However, in a linked subject I do think that certain people can be on the same "wavelength" (for want of a better expression). Look at twins or close siblings. When my children were younger, my daughter always could tell me exactly what my son was thinking and feeling far better than me. Maybe that "connection" is something that could be investigated further to see how far apart people can be and yet still be aware of each other, beyond the normal senses and communications we use today.

56. "Déjà Vu Is Not A Unitary Phenomenon"by Dr. Art Funkhouser / Thu Mar 26, 2009 11:19:56 GMT

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Back in 1981, Dr. Vernon Neppe coined the term "déjà experience" -- thereby underlining the fact that there are many forms of such experiences (just read the comments to this article) and that there may well be just as many causes for them.

As Anthony Peake has just written, I have a questionnaire on-line which seeks to see what differences there may be between déjà vécu and déjà visité experiences those terms are explained there). The URL is http://silenroc.com/dejavu.

I have also now created a website in which I have attempted to bring together what is known and thought about these phenomena. The URL for that is http://www.deja-experience-research.org. I welcome comments and suggestions for improving it.

57. Deja Vu And Epilepsyby Alex / Thu Mar 26, 2009 11:26:25 GMT

I suffered from mild epilepsy as a teenager. One symptom of this was profoundly bizarre -- intensely powerful déjà vu experiences lasting for several minutes. They somehow felt like premonitions and were accompanied by a pounding sensation in my head and dizziness. This article is the first time I've heard epilepsy being connected with déjà vu. I must say it is very reassuring to feel a sense that these episodes are closer to being understood now years later.

58. re: "Deja Vu And Epilepsy"by Ivor Clark / Thu Mar 26, 2009 12:08:10 GMT

Deja vu -- a memory aberration or a true indication of a parallel reality? Talk to some physicists and they of the "Many Worlds" theorum would get excited about deja vu being a momentary sharing or exchange between parallel universes. At a quantum level, physicists are now talking about elementary particles existing at the same time in several different places. So why not consider that brain illnesses like epilepsy, schizophrenia, etc. and brain-altering drugs like LSD are just forming the molecular conditions necessary to make these links? [StealthSkater note: actually some physicists like Pitkanen are attributing remote mental actions to "dark matter/energy" photons etc. (not your "ordinary" type of elemental particle such as a quark, photon, boson, meson, etc.) => doc pdf URL .]

We interpret them as "abnormal" because they can be harmful. But we still don't really know why they happen even though we can describe how they happen. Of course, speak to physicists of the one-Universe theory and it then becomes a simple memory aberration. We cannot predict the Future; it has not happened yet. We can only remember the Past; and often not that well. Our brains are designed to make predictions as it pertains to our survival. In the end, I think this is a good explanation for why deja vu happens.

59. re: "Deja Vu And Epilepsy"by Strada202 / Thu Mar 26, 2009 12:12:19 GMT

Funnily enough, I feel strange and dizzy when I get deja vu. Maybe dizziness is a side-effect.

60. "Déjà vu"by Barbara / Thu Mar 26, 2009 12:55:17 GMT

Well, this thought is not "scientific" in the sense that you understand Science. But why wouldn't deja vu have to do with our idea of Time? Isn't Science still trying to figure that out<

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If Time exists in the way we experience it (Past/Present/Future time as we feel it in this 3-dimensional existence), then deja vu is hard to explain. But if Time exists differently (say, vertically), all things can happen be happening at once and we are picking up those energies from a "time" when we did that already. [StealthSkater note: as a specific example, read about "time" theories for the Philadelphia Experiment and Montauk Project at doc pdf URL . For more general theories, see the "Misc." on doc pdf URL as well as "Superstrings" at doc pdf URL

and an "alternative" to the 'Big Bang' doc pdf URL .]

Remember I said this wasn't "scientific" within what is considered scientific thus far. Maybe looking at the brain isn't where you should be looking.

I'm guessing most of this conversation is based on what you know so far. But it is fascinating. Yes, I have had déjà vu. An odd feeling …

61. re: "Déjà vu"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 15:27:28 GMT

Barbara --You have hit the nail on the head with your comment about Time! It is Time that we do not

understand fully.

Indeed, if you take the implications of Particle Physics, then Time as we perceive it is a construct of the brain. Hermann Minkowski and Hermann Weyl suggested a concept known as the "Block Universe". This suggests that the Past, Present, and Future already exist as a "block". The 4th dimension is Time and we perceive the "Present moment" as we travel though the block.

Indeed, I will be on stage at the National Theatre in London on July 24 doing a "Platform Event" on this very subject. Sharing the stage will be partical phsyicist Professor Jeff Forshaw. We will be discussing the time theories of J.W. Dunne. If you can get along, it promises to be an interesting evening. Full details on this can be found at:

http://www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/1355/platforms/platforms.html

[StealthSkater note: I'm not sure that mainstream physicists interpret what are commonly known as Minkowski/Weyl lightcones as "constructs of the brain". They have a more fundamental(mathematical) and less metaphysical explanation to Time.]

62. "Eyes And Brain"by Christopher Pontac / Thu Mar 26, 2009 12:58:13 GMT

A small, slightly nit-picking pit. The article says

"Then there are the cases of people who have had their 2 cortical hemispheres surgically separated in an attempt to relieve intractable epilepsy. If the mental diplopia idea were correct, you might expect them to have permanent déjà vu. Yet there are no reports of this happening."

I think that the inference here is grounded in an error. The output of both eyes goes to both hemispheres (the right portion of the visual field to the left hemisphere and vice-versa). The idea of mental diplopia relies on 2 eyes being out-of-synch. Not 2 visual fields.

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All done. The nit has been picked. Love to all

63. re: "Déjà vu"by jason carter / Thu Mar 26, 2009 13:02:12 GMT

I always thought that deja vu was the brain accidently filing the "Now" into the long-term memory as well as the Current. But it could just be a glitch in the "Matrix", I suppose!

64. "Alternative Theory on ihe Deja Experience"by Anthony Peake / Thu Mar 26, 2009 13:17:17 GMT

Firstly -- my apologies for making so many responses to the comments below. It is not a manifestation of my hyper-graphia but simply because many of the comments are of essential importance in support of my alternative theory of deja vu called "Cheating The Ferryman".

This theory really does explain all of the sensations involved in the deja phenomenon. Aand that includes the precognitive aspects. What I am now looking for is empirical evidence for the theory.

I am really keen to involve any of the respondees to this excellent article to join me and Professor Vernon Neppe and Dr. Arthur Funkhouser on my Forum. On there can be found a section devoted to the deja phenomenon. We are keen to receive personal experiences. And even better if those experiences have supporting witness evidence to the precognitive aspects.

May I stress that this is a serious scientifically-based exercise. The forum can be found at:http://www.anthonypeake.com.forum . I look forward to your contributions.

65. "Skip Protection"by Mike Bell / Thu Mar 26, 2009 14:00:42 GMT

I have a friend that is a neurosurgeon who told me about a theory making the rounds. He called it "Skip Protection". The idea being that we perceive "Reality" a split second after it actually happens.

Within this model, deja vu would be akin to skip protection on a CD or DVD player. Something occurs in the brain that causes a momentary repeat of the information being processed. Thus the feeling of having been in that situation before.

66. re: "Déjà vu"by ed / Thu Mar 26, 2009 15:16:02 GMT Has anyone considered that this sensation may actually refer to a real event in memory?

67. re: "Déjà vu"by patricia / Thu Mar 26, 2009 15:53:14 GMT

I believe that deja vu is inherited memory. We inherit our ancestors' looks and mannerisms. So why not their memories?

68. Correction …29

by Eric Kvaalen / Thu Mar 26, 2009 16:02:55 GMT "Déjà vecu" should be spelled "déjà vécu".

Also as usual, the article gives the impression that we have only one hippocampus, parahippocampus, and amygdale. For instance, the sentence: "The excised areas consisted of parts of the hippocampus and perirhinal cortex but also included the amygdala."

At least this time, your illustration shows two of each.

69. re: "Déjà vu"by esd / Thu Mar 26, 2009 16:34:52 GMT

I too have experienced deja vu. When I experienced them, they don't feel wrong -- just feel weird. Not only that but if it is a particular conversation or scene, I know word-for-word what the other person will say or the action they will take.

One time, I decided not to follow the deja vu scene by changing my response and my action. That truly felt weird. Deja vu played out. But then the feeling of deja vu dissipated when I changed things. I couldn't help but smile. It is almost like being able to change your dream while dreaming. That is the coolest thing to do and yes! it can be done . I have done it several times. [StealthSkater note: Lucid dreaming actually allows one to control their own dreams ( doc pdf URL ). And there are some rumors of "wishing machines" that allow one to choose from one of many possible Quantum predictions. Supposedly these many possible Quantum histories are what make it difficult for multiple remote-viewers to report back the same view/story.]

70. "Deja Vu and Dreaming?"by Brona Thu Mar 26 16:59:37 GMT 2009

Very interesting article. Makes me wonder about how dreaming might be linked to deja vu. Given the tendency of our dreams to take elements of Reality and rehash them into weird and wonderful related manifestations, could deja vu be a recognition of something from a dream? Emotions can be very strongly associated with dreamscapes.

71. "Just Reading This Article Could Give You Déjà Vu"by CarolineK / Thu Mar 26, 2009 17:00:53 GMT

Scary... ;) There was no explanation as to why deja vu is accompanied by a negative feeling (like some impeding doom awaits just around the corner).

Maybe it's a survival mechanism which has less of a purpose in the modern World. Like a vestigial part of the brain...

72. re: "Another Theory"by Andy Lamb / Thu Mar 26 18:35:27 GMT 2009

Is deja vu not something to do with the time delay (filtering system) between the 'Unconscious' registering something and the 'Conscious' being made aware of it malfunctioning in some way?

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If your Conscious self was party to the same data at the same time as the Unconscious, would that not create some sort of feedback loop which would describe the deja vu experience exactly? Or am I reading the wrong books?

73. re: "Alternative Theory"by HOS / Thu Mar 26, 2009 19:18:52 GMT

Deja vu may perhaps be memories of an event you have seen or been shown before. For some reason, when those events happen in your life, something makes you remember when you saw them in the Past. The memory block you are born with seems to break down in some people (but usually only fleetingly).

We are an Eternal Being and this is one of many "lives". This is part of the theory that we choose our own lives before we live them. So you see what your life will be before you accept it and become born into it. Like choosing your school curriculum. Whilst under hypnotic regression, some people can remember their past lives (perhaps while under hypnosis the memory block is bypassed).

We talk about us being part of a "computer program". And if this is a virtual world, maybe it is. Maybe we are living our chosen characters in life until we die and the game is over.

But it isn't a game. It is more of a classroom. If we fail class, then we come back to the same class. And we keep coming back until we pass. Then we can move on to the next more difficult class. To another dimension or reality. [StealthSkater note: indeed, some NDE-ers report that they don't go directly into "Heaven" but to another realm where learning seems to continue.]

None of us are "human". We only inhabit or co-habit a human host. We are many different beings from around the Universe. In this reality, we happen to live in a human biological body. Do you remember? [StealthSkater note: alleged Area-51/S4 microbiologist Dan Burisch claims that a unique quartz-based "Ganesh particle" was found that (by entrapping electromagnetic waves) -- "married" a Consciousness with a biological host => doc pdf URL ]

74. "I Know The Feeling Well"by Jason D / Thu Mar 26, 2009 19:46:09 GMT

I've had deja vu thousands of times. I don't consider it deja vu unless I see something while thinking something and hearing something familiar. It happens at least once-a-week.

My best explanation is that because I have very vivid realistic dreams and an unbelievable memory (I literally remember everything), the two combine to confuse the hell out of me!

75. "Great Discussion"by I Doubt That / Thu Mar 26, 2009 23:51:33 GMT

Unfortunately, it's a typical NewScientist discussion. Lots of people rambling on about their pet (generally unscientific) theories (I'm certainly getting deja vu fom Mr. Peake promoting his website!) and digressions into the paranormal, reincarnation, etc.

I suspect that a number of posters need to visit their doctors and get checked for epilepsy or schizophrenia. Far more likely to be a result of brain malfunction than some bizarre and inexplicable (no matter how much misused pseudo-scientific amateur Quantum mumbo-jumbo it's

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cloaked in) "time-slip or "precognition" or "DNA memory" or "forming the molecular conditions necessary" or whatever other mad theory someone has dreamed up in their bedroom.

76. re: "Great Discussion"by Anthony Peake / Fri Mar 27, 2009 08:52:41 GMT

Genuine apologies if my responses seemed to be "self-promotional". This was not my intention.

It is very, very unusual for a series magazine such as NewScientist to discuss such a subject as deja vu. I am very keen to have this fascinating phenomenon discussed more and am very aware that next week this discussion will disappear into archives or something similar. The article has attracted responses from exactly the kind of people that I wish to attract to my own discussion Forum. This has a specific section on deja vu and will continue for as long as possible.

I agree fully that this has been a great discussion. I am only sorry that my involvement may have spoiled it for some of you.

77. "Visions Of A Past-centered Future"by Anthony / Fri Mar 27, 2009 04:26:27 GMT

This article is very interesting. But I think it's missing the true nature of the experience. I've had times of deja vu as long as I can remember and have done some subjective experiments of my own to find out what it's about. I noticed that during the experience, I can tell what will happen a split-second before it does. But I wasn't sure if this is an illusion created by my brain (as this article suggests); if I am seeing the Future; or what it might be.

On one occasion, I was having a conversation and I had a sense of what I was going to say in reply. I kept the meaning of my statement but changed the wording and timing of my response. I then waited to see what happened. The person I was talking to had a strange look on her face -- perplexed. Maybe I also made a face which affected her response, so I kept experimenting.

I've had deja vu when first meeting a good friend; just before life-threatening situations; and have had mutual deja vu with 2 other people at once. Sometimes I remember the date when I had a dream of the exact situation while it's happening. All this has led me to a different theory as to what this is all about.

I think deja vu is a way that our minds draw attention to an important event or person. During the experience, we are aware of a change in the way we are perceiving the World, thus creating a heightened awareness of our surroundings which -- if understood for what it is -- can help us lead longer fuller lives.

Now just as brain damage can cause a loss or malfunction in one of our other senses, it can also effect deja vu. This doesn't mean that deja vu is itself a "malfunction" any more than your sight is a malfunction when it's filtered to allow you to focus on one object or your hearing when you focus on one sound. [StealthSkater note: a similar argument could be made regarding remote-viewing capabilities. If we allow that all of us have such gifts from birth, then why is it that only a few ever get to develop ("release") them? Something must be suppressing such actions. Something that a blow to the head frequently un-dos.]

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Therefore I've come to believe that deja vu is the sense which reminds us to pay attention to the Present at certain important times in our lives.

78. "Felt It A Few Timesby Kurt / Fri Mar 27, 2009 06:11:14 GMT

When I was about 15-16, I was at Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp in Michigan for 4 weeks. One day, me and a cabin mate were walking to see some of our friends on the 'Girls side' of the facility. Between the 'Boy' and 'Girl' sides is about a half-mile buffer of trees planted in rows/columns evenly spaced. It was very aesthetically pleasing walking through it, specifically around late August.

Anyways, about 100-or-so feet into this area there is a Jazz Band Shell (concert area). As we passed around the corner of the shell, we bumped into the friends we were going to see. At that very moment, my stomach felt weird and I had that sensation of having been in this exact situation before. The perceived memory lasted only seconds. It felt wrong and sickening.

I had never walked by that band shell before and had never met these people anywhere else but in the common areas. I am almost 36 and can remember that event clearly even today.

[StealthSkater note: to muddy the waters even further, there are persistent rumors that advanced intelligence/military-oriented technologies have been developed to exploit certain mental traits so as to cause sensations of déjà vu, medium channelings, NDS/OBEs, etc. Indeed, the famous Barney&Betty Hill UFO abduction was rumored to be a test of an "Orion" methodology to induce so-called screen memory implants ( doc pdf URL . More on such folklore is archived at (a) doc pdf URL ; (b) doc pdf URL ; and (c) doc pdf URL . Even more "far-out" stuff is at doc pdf URL .]

79. "unconvinced by 'Familiarity' approachby Sarah / Fri Mar 27, 2009 15:17:28 GMT

The reason deja vu feels so "wrong" is that the so-called "familiarity" (which I would describe rather as "a sense of exact identity" between the current experience and the felt recollection) is located specifically in the *conjunction* of details so precise that familiarity or analogy seems impossible.

It's emphatically not that someone's face appears familiar or that the layout of a room recalls some other room on a subconscious level. The feeling is that you've heard that rumble of truck wheels, that bird, that snip of conversation from a passerby while witnessing (from the very same angle of one's head) that mailbox, that hat, that cloud, and the way that light is striking the pavement while feeling that breeze on the side of one's nose and that configuration of rumpled paper in one's pocket.

The conjunction of those sensations (and despite my long list, it's not all-inclusive; other sensations may seem irrelevant) is where the sense of "familiarity" resides. And often, the fluid sensations of the next moment and the moment after that.

80. "Strangely"by Fred / Fri Mar 27, 2009 13:03:10 GMT

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Strangely, it does not seem to work for traders and other sophisticated financial products addicts. Neither for lotteries, horse races, casino's games and Madoff's fans, etc. Why is deja vu so "selective"?

81. re: "Strangely"by anonymous / Fri Mar 27, 2009 16:44:26 GMT

WHAT "selection"? If you are a gambler and human, chances are that you are going to have déjà vécu experiences while occupied with your habit. If you are a stock broker and human, chances are you are going to have déjà vécu experiences while occupied with your vocation. I f one is a dullard who spends their time sitting in front of a television all day and is human, chances are they'll occasionally have the feeling that they've been in that spot before. (But it is amazing they'd FEEL anything noticeably different, considering their chosen lifestyle doesn't admit of much difference).

You say "it does not seem to work" for them? What makes you think that (A) they don't have déjà vécu experiences; (B) that déjà vécu experiences actually INFORM anybody; and (C) that gamblers and stockbrokers can't have déjà vécu experiences because they haven't managed to figure out how to capitalize on them?

The feeling itself is what makes it "feel selective". It's in the nature of the sensation. It can pop out of nowhere at any time and will make you feel like the moment must be somehow "special" (i.e., "selected"). What do you suppose is so strange about that? Why do you ASSUME it must be mysteriously selective?

82. "Another Odd Feeling …"by anonymous / Fri Mar 27, 2009 16:20:06 GMT

I have the oddest feeling that I've read this article before ..

Seriously, from studies of how the brain stores memories during REM sleep etc., I've long attributed déjà vécu experiences to an inadvertent triggering of a particular circuit pattern in the brain associated with memory retrieval. This might conceivably happen spontaneously (for whatever neurological reason which is no doubt complex) to a specific sensory input of a real experience. Either way, whatever we are exposed to in terms of real-time sensory information is regarded as a "memory" in a peculiar kind of peculiar "feedback loop" (so to speak) which eventually fades away.

Makes a lot more sense than any gibberish that needs to use the word "aura" as part of an "explanation" or alternate-reality-time/discontinous-quantum-hysteria/parallel-universe nonsense for which no other independent evidence exists to help support the idea we have any access to those over-bloviated ideas.

With billions of neurons and trillions of connections and probably at least thousands of subroutine operations, our brains are stupendously complicated creatures. Why is it so difficult to imagine that such enormous complexity can't run 100% smoothly? Those who disagree will no doubt think that the "stars" that one sees after getting a good knock on the head are due to real "entities" outside the head that show up at the appointed time.

83. a Possible Explanation for deja vu34

by mermaid / Fri Mar 27, 2009 17:27:51 GMT When a person has the experience that "I've been here before, done this before, heard this, seen

this, already know this", it's very possible this is what some have described as 'coincidence'. And this kind of coincidence is a perfect (or apparently perfect) synchronization of inner content meeting its exact match "out there" in the physical world.

Which comes first? The inner -- it's there first. And it seems likely that this can explain many ideas about karma, reincarnation, reoccurrence, etc and the strange fact that somehow individuals seem to act and live with "foreknowledge" of their and others' future.

There are moments of "pre-vision". It's likely everyone has them. One of the oldest ideas in Philosophy is that "thought" creates the life. What you think is what you live. Change your thinking, change your life. etc. Maybe that's not exactly true because everyone thinks different "stuff", don't they?

84. Déjà Voodooby Sharon Burton Fletcher / Fri Mar 27, 2009 17:31:06 GMT

Déjà vu is the emotional recognition of an environment that you may never have been in before and yet you are familiar with it. It is a peculiar sensation but not worrying at all, although this may depend on the "condition" of the person experiencing the event. I would dispute that it "feels wrong".

Every explanation offered in this article has holes a mile wide. And fascinating as the subject is and as intriguing as Mr. P's contribution is, it seems to me no-one is any closer to the truth.

The conclusions and finding at the end of the article are questionable. I doubt many before the age of 8 would have the vocabulary to describe the feeling. And that's only if they understand it to be "odd" and in need of a description in the first place.

Maybe it doesn't happen more when you are tired but when you are relaxed. I would question the idea that it might be more common when you are anxious. I would propose that when the sensation occurs, it is weird and can be confusing. This can make you look perplexed and confused as you regain your equilibrium.

Equally, past a certain age you are less likely to put yourself in an environment unknown to you and would no-doubt attribute such instances to familiar rather than new-but-known time segment and place.

I'm aware that your explanations cannot fit in with my experiences of the occurrence -- which although few were distinct and cannot be explained by the thought's offered in this article and as this is based on research -- I would suggest the gathering of more anecdotal data so that you can dismiss or reassess some avenues of exploration.

Otherwise you might just as well explore the hocus/pocus explanations as they are also based on very limited input or practical application. But if both parties are happy to jump to conclusions, what's the difference?

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else if accessing these files from the CD in a MS-Word session, simply <CLOSE> this file's window-session; the previous window-session should still remain 'active'

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