5 different ways to trick your brain

Bear_thrylls · 2012-09-04T12:04:22+00:00

I tried the Ganzfeld Procedure a few days ago. I used a red light in the room though because i remembered reading about doing that with it once before. I was also wearing very high quality studio headphones playing pure white noise.

It worked.

At first it was just the colourful stuff you see when you rub your eyes, but then it began pulsating and movng rhythmically with my heartbeat. Not long after, I'd completely zone out and see different things that i was thinking about. Like how you can space out into your imagination and suddenly snap back to the real world with your eyes open the whole time only it was more vivid. I'd also have a full body twitch with each snap back.

dishiee · 2012-09-04T12:00:44+00:00

Rubber Hand Illusion

temptingtime · 2012-09-04T14:48:41+00:00

An interesting trick that I've seen but never tried:

When I was in 6th grade our teacher was having a bit of fun with the class. There were a few kids who tried to act alpha and disrupt all the time, so the teacher asked them to come to the front. He took the hand of one of the kids and had a few of his friends hold it in place on the desk. He then held up a lighter and a paperclip and showed them to the class, explaining that he was going to heat the paperclip up using the lighter and burn the kid. He then told the kid with his hand out that he couldn't look because it would hurt more if he did. We all watched him hold the paperclip in the flame for a good 45 secs to a min. (Meanwhile, Alpha kid is still trying to act alpha).

He builds the final moment up a lot, by this point the whole class is crowded around the desk wondering what will happen, if he will actually burn him, etc. Now the Alpha kid starts freaking out with all the added attention and him seeing the faces of the kids around him, he still can't look. His friends hold his hand in place even though he is desperately trying to jerk it away...

Then comes the countdown...3...2...1...

He screams and jumps back "OOOWWWWWW!!!"

The teacher touched the kid's hand with a pencil instead, but there appeared a red coil in the shape of a paperclip where the pencil had touched him. His brain manufactured a burn. He then laughed and tried to play it off when everybody started laughing.

CleanBill · 2012-09-04T15:54:44+00:00

I sure laughed my sides off with this one. Thanks for sharing :-)

HereToHumilateAFrand · 2012-09-04T17:22:58+00:00

I don't have any ping pong balls... Can I cover my eyes with a regular blindfold?

H4L9000 · 2012-09-04T13:33:09+00:00

The Purkinje one sounds a lot like Brian Gyson's dream machine.

mishugana · 2012-09-04T17:11:48+00:00

I'm surprised "general drugs" didnt make the list.

Painkiller3666 · 2012-09-04T14:28:15+00:00

Thanks, I lost this about a year ago.

Jack_Latham · 2012-09-04T14:45:55+00:00

The shrinking pain illusion was something I thought was limited to individuals with phantom limbs watching ANOTHER person's limb being pricked with a needle. I may be wrong, but I strongly suspect this is a mistake in reporting.

Edit: Sorry if you don't like it, but I'm remembering this from V.S. Ramachandran's book The Tell Tale Brain. It's not like I'm just disagreeing to be disagreeable. Really, downvoted for skepticism? What the hell is wrong with you people?

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