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Visual Hallucinations Are a Normal Grief Reaction
Hugh Pickens writes "Vaughn Bell has written an interesting essay at Scientific American about grief hallucinations. This phenomenon is a normal reaction to bereavement that is rarely discussed, although researchers now know that hallucinations are more likely during times of stress. Mourning seems to be a time when hallucinations are particularly common, to the point where feeling the presence of the deceased is the norm rather than the exception. A study by Agneta Grimby at the University of Goteborg found that over 80 percent of elderly people experience hallucinations associated with their dead partner one month after bereavement, as if their perception had yet to catch up with the knowledge of their beloved's passing. It's not unusual for people who have lost a partner to clearly see or hear the person about the house, and sometimes even converse with them at length. 'Despite the fact that hallucinations are one of the most common reactions to loss, they have barely been investigated and we know little more about them. Like sorrow itself, we seem a little uncomfortable with it, unwilling to broach the subject,' writes Bell. 'We often fall back on the cultural catch all of the "ghost" while the reality is, in many ways, more profound.' "
I turned a corner and swear I saw him sitting there. I even said involuntarily "Hi, Prince..."
Stories like this make me wonder whether we actually hallucinate the presence of cats, maybe even people, all the time, and it's only when it happens after the cat has passed away that we think twice about such events and realise that they must have been hallucinations...
Peter
That in 80% of cases some remnant, some energy of that person was left behind? Just because it happens frequently doesn't mean it is *not* supernatural in nature.
Do they have MRIs of people while they are experiencing a hallucination like this? Something to show the brain is dreaming, and not simply observing?
By the same token, I suppose we can't really prove that there is an observation going on. I've had family members relate to me that they remember a sequence of events, in a very specific way. I remember the same events differently. Either we are people from different dimensions who have slipped between worlds to share this one, or we have altered our own memories to suit what we would have liked to happen. One of these is more consistent with current science. It doesn't guarantee that the other option won't be found to be possible at some point.
In the same way a human brain seems wired to see recognizable patterns in random material, I think a part of us is also hard-wired to seek familiarity and anticipate familiar sights by "seeing" them before they actually appear. That's why it's so shocking (or even traumatizing) when you see the same sight your whole life, only to have it disappear or radically change one day. I remember one story from a New Yorker after 9-11 who said he occasionally still spotted the towers out of the corner of his eye because he was so used to them being there.
Most humans find comfort in the familiar. And when it's not there, it can be very hard for us to accept--and take even more time for the brain to adjust to that absence.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
A lot of early morning hallucinations probably also come when a person is still asleep, but doesn't realize it. I saw a documentary on sleep research not long ago where they showed that during certain phases of a sleep cycle, a person could actually be asleep and still think they're awake. People in these phases would often interpret lingering sleep paralysis as some weight on their chest, not realizing it was just the remnants of them dreaming.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
They've barely been investigated because one of the best avenues for investigating them, hallucinogenic drugs, has been actively suppressed. Take the tryptamines for example. Here we have a class of chemicals that are, for the most part, physically harmless, that can be administered in a controlled setting and are all but guaranteed to produce hallucinations. Hell one of them, dimethyltryptamine (DMT), is even produced naturally in the human brain. This is the most powerful hallucinogen known to exist, yet we know almost nothing about it or what it's doing there, because (ironically) it's a Schedule I drug. Technically, we're all guilty of possession of a controlled substance.
Whether these things should be legalized is another topic, but at least make it easier for researchers to do legitimate science with them. Just tell me where to sign up.
Murphey's fighting Occam, and we're in the stands.
I've had one hallucination, without any grief or drugs. I think stress is enough.
I was kayaking nears rocks, surfing very high waves, lost my kayak, and spent 15 minutes in the surf, hitting rocks multiple times. I got out, retrieved my kayak, launched, and paddled to a place where I could relax... then I had a pretty long and elaborate hallucination.
It involved three-four deities (Tangra, Athena, Poseidon and the Lady) and the appropriate sacrifices I should perform for my pretty damn miraculous survival. I'm an atheist, and I cannot help but think that this is how religions get started.
No good deed goes unpunished...