Out-of-body experience under fMRI

[pocaracas]

http://www.iflscience.com/brain/brain-sc...experience

To be clear, this was a type of hallucination.[...]

Using an fMRI, which images blood flow to detect brain activity, researchers from the University of Ottawa scanned the brain of a woman who claims that she can produce, at will, extra-corporeal experiences -- during one of her self-reported experiences. They write in their case study:

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She was able to see herself rotating in the air above her body, lying flat, and rolling along with the horizontal plane. She reported sometimes watching herself move from above but remained aware of her unmoving “real” body.

Crazy, yes? But according to the researchers, something was happening in her brain that was consistent with her report. Gizmodo explains:

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The fMRI showed a "strong deactivation of the visual cortex" while "activating the left side of several areas associated with kinesthetic imagery," which includes mental imagery of bodily movement. This is the part of the brain that makes it possible for us to interact with the world. It's what makes you feel where your body is in relation to the world.

In other words, the brain scans show that she feels she’s going through what she’s claiming. But this was no astral trip -- it was a type of hallucination triggered by some neurological mechanism.