1 00:00:03,040 --> 00:00:05,360 Speaker 1: Welcome to stot to Blow Your Mind production of My 2 00:00:05,480 --> 00:00:14,640 Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. 3 00:00:14,720 --> 00:00:17,400 Speaker 1: My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and 4 00:00:17,400 --> 00:00:20,800 Speaker 1: we're back with another closet edition. Uh So this week 5 00:00:21,280 --> 00:00:24,079 Speaker 1: we got kind of hijacked off on the side trail 6 00:00:24,120 --> 00:00:26,000 Speaker 1: that we didn't quite expect at the beginning of this 7 00:00:26,079 --> 00:00:29,480 Speaker 1: week because of a personal experience you had, right, Robert, Yeah, 8 00:00:29,520 --> 00:00:33,279 Speaker 1: this this would have happened Wednesday, and it's got me 9 00:00:33,600 --> 00:00:36,360 Speaker 1: researching some other topics and looking into it, and I 10 00:00:36,400 --> 00:00:38,479 Speaker 1: mentioned it to you and the next thing we know, 11 00:00:38,520 --> 00:00:40,640 Speaker 1: we were putting notes together for a couple of episodes. 12 00:00:40,680 --> 00:00:43,320 Speaker 1: But it's great because this is also a topic. It 13 00:00:43,360 --> 00:00:46,000 Speaker 1: gets into some topics that have been requested by listeners 14 00:00:46,200 --> 00:00:49,440 Speaker 1: as well. So Lenny said, a little background for for 15 00:00:49,479 --> 00:00:52,920 Speaker 1: what I'm about to describe. So give us your origin story. Yeah, 16 00:00:53,000 --> 00:00:55,920 Speaker 1: my origin story, such as it as it is. When 17 00:00:55,960 --> 00:00:58,440 Speaker 1: I was a kid, maybe seven or eight years old, 18 00:00:58,560 --> 00:01:00,760 Speaker 1: which is which is uh the age of my own 19 00:01:00,800 --> 00:01:05,520 Speaker 1: son today, I had a very vivid and unsettling mental experience. 20 00:01:06,360 --> 00:01:09,520 Speaker 1: It wasn't really a nightmare, but much like a nightmare, 21 00:01:09,760 --> 00:01:12,399 Speaker 1: there was this ineffable quality to it. You know, like 22 00:01:12,520 --> 00:01:15,240 Speaker 1: even as I try to explain it, uh, my words 23 00:01:15,400 --> 00:01:18,200 Speaker 1: can't really relate how it made me feel and how 24 00:01:18,240 --> 00:01:20,280 Speaker 1: it still makes me feel. Like when I when I 25 00:01:20,319 --> 00:01:22,440 Speaker 1: remember it, when I think back on it, I can 26 00:01:22,480 --> 00:01:27,240 Speaker 1: still feel a bit of the terror that I felt then. Uh, 27 00:01:27,400 --> 00:01:30,600 Speaker 1: even though just a flat description of it sounds kind 28 00:01:30,640 --> 00:01:33,120 Speaker 1: of dumb. Yeah, that's often how nightmares are. It's like 29 00:01:33,319 --> 00:01:35,400 Speaker 1: the thing that was really scary in your dream wouldn't 30 00:01:35,440 --> 00:01:37,720 Speaker 1: necessarily make a good horror movie because it's hard to 31 00:01:37,760 --> 00:01:41,160 Speaker 1: communicate why it was scary. Yeah, exactly, Like I once 32 00:01:41,200 --> 00:01:44,080 Speaker 1: had a nightmare about a polar bear that was peeking 33 00:01:44,080 --> 00:01:46,080 Speaker 1: into a house with a periscope, and somehow that was 34 00:01:46,160 --> 00:01:48,880 Speaker 1: terrifying in the dream, but outside of the dream, it's 35 00:01:48,920 --> 00:01:53,480 Speaker 1: just ridiculous and comical. So uh, but this particular situation, 36 00:01:53,520 --> 00:01:56,480 Speaker 1: it was, it was not a nightmare. Um, I was 37 00:01:56,520 --> 00:01:59,960 Speaker 1: in my bed and I have always slept with white noise, 38 00:02:00,560 --> 00:02:03,280 Speaker 1: so even then I had this like oversized box fan 39 00:02:03,400 --> 00:02:06,920 Speaker 1: in my my childhood room. And I should also explain 40 00:02:07,040 --> 00:02:09,440 Speaker 1: that I watched a lot of TV in those days, 41 00:02:09,480 --> 00:02:11,680 Speaker 1: and the you know, my family would watch TV together 42 00:02:11,880 --> 00:02:14,360 Speaker 1: and there were various shows on TBS that we would 43 00:02:14,400 --> 00:02:17,120 Speaker 1: regularly check out, and one of them was the sitcom 44 00:02:17,240 --> 00:02:19,960 Speaker 1: Sanford and Son. You remember Sanford and Son, right, Oh yeah, 45 00:02:20,000 --> 00:02:24,000 Speaker 1: totally yeah, Red Fox uh uh so uh. You know, 46 00:02:24,040 --> 00:02:26,799 Speaker 1: I don't want to use the verb here or heard here, 47 00:02:26,840 --> 00:02:30,000 Speaker 1: because it's it's not like I actually heard sound. It's 48 00:02:30,000 --> 00:02:33,639 Speaker 1: not like I experienced an auditory hallucination. It's more that 49 00:02:33,760 --> 00:02:36,480 Speaker 1: I suddenly remembered it as I lay there in bed. 50 00:02:36,560 --> 00:02:40,280 Speaker 1: It was like a jagged memory that was suddenly embedded 51 00:02:40,360 --> 00:02:43,680 Speaker 1: in my my psyche. And it was the sound of 52 00:02:43,720 --> 00:02:47,760 Speaker 1: the Sanford and Son character Fred Sanford speaking in slow 53 00:02:47,840 --> 00:02:50,840 Speaker 1: motion through the back of a box fan, addressing the 54 00:02:50,960 --> 00:02:57,600 Speaker 1: character Grady in this drawn out, oscillating voice. So that's 55 00:02:57,639 --> 00:03:00,480 Speaker 1: great because that that has that perfect quality of something 56 00:03:00,520 --> 00:03:04,239 Speaker 1: that would be terrifying in like a dream like memory, 57 00:03:04,360 --> 00:03:07,200 Speaker 1: but you just can't see it from the outside. It's 58 00:03:07,200 --> 00:03:09,760 Speaker 1: like I had a horrifying dream about Bob Sagett from 59 00:03:09,919 --> 00:03:13,640 Speaker 1: Full House. Yeah, it's I mean, it's just so ridiculously dumb, 60 00:03:13,680 --> 00:03:16,000 Speaker 1: Like if I were to to fictionalize it even a 61 00:03:16,040 --> 00:03:18,560 Speaker 1: little bit, I feel like I'd want to change it completely, 62 00:03:18,600 --> 00:03:22,720 Speaker 1: you know. Um, but but but the thing is like, 63 00:03:22,760 --> 00:03:25,320 Speaker 1: it definitely filled me with terror, and I can I 64 00:03:25,320 --> 00:03:28,080 Speaker 1: can remember that terror, and I can. I can really 65 00:03:28,120 --> 00:03:30,520 Speaker 1: compare it only to the stark sort of terror that 66 00:03:30,600 --> 00:03:33,320 Speaker 1: one feels in a nightmare, you know, especially with the 67 00:03:33,360 --> 00:03:37,240 Speaker 1: nonsensical elements to it. And uh and indeed it also 68 00:03:37,280 --> 00:03:40,320 Speaker 1: it did not feel like I was remembering something specifically 69 00:03:40,360 --> 00:03:44,040 Speaker 1: from watching TV. And it didn't feel like I was dreaming. 70 00:03:44,360 --> 00:03:47,200 Speaker 1: I it was, I guess, in some ways, like I 71 00:03:47,240 --> 00:03:50,280 Speaker 1: was remembering a dream that I had never had. But 72 00:03:50,360 --> 00:03:53,480 Speaker 1: in the sensation passed, the anxiety of it passed, although 73 00:03:53,480 --> 00:03:55,320 Speaker 1: I I've always been able to feel like a tinge 74 00:03:55,360 --> 00:03:58,560 Speaker 1: of it when I think back on the experience. So 75 00:03:58,680 --> 00:04:01,280 Speaker 1: I've never I was never really sure what it was exactly. 76 00:04:01,600 --> 00:04:04,360 Speaker 1: I kind of always just sort of thought, well, okay, 77 00:04:04,360 --> 00:04:06,680 Speaker 1: it was, you know, something like a dream or a nightmare. 78 00:04:06,720 --> 00:04:09,920 Speaker 1: I don't know. Um. And and looking back, I think 79 00:04:10,280 --> 00:04:12,080 Speaker 1: there perhaps times in my life where I had like 80 00:04:12,120 --> 00:04:15,960 Speaker 1: similar experiences in the years after that, but but pretty 81 00:04:16,040 --> 00:04:18,760 Speaker 1: you know, far flung from each other, far less intense. 82 00:04:19,279 --> 00:04:23,119 Speaker 1: And because of these factors, I've never really connected those 83 00:04:23,160 --> 00:04:26,160 Speaker 1: experiences with this childhood experience. You know, when I think 84 00:04:26,200 --> 00:04:29,400 Speaker 1: about experiences like that, especially involving lying in bed as 85 00:04:29,440 --> 00:04:31,720 Speaker 1: a child. I think one thing that's often going on 86 00:04:31,800 --> 00:04:34,120 Speaker 1: there is that in our memories we are having a 87 00:04:34,120 --> 00:04:39,480 Speaker 1: hard time sorting the demarcation line between wakefulness and sleep. Um. 88 00:04:39,520 --> 00:04:43,000 Speaker 1: And this is definitely characteristic of memories I have as 89 00:04:43,040 --> 00:04:45,800 Speaker 1: a child, Like there are things that I feel like 90 00:04:45,839 --> 00:04:49,080 Speaker 1: I remember as happening while I was lying in bed 91 00:04:49,200 --> 00:04:52,560 Speaker 1: awake as a kid, But in fact I think they 92 00:04:52,600 --> 00:04:55,839 Speaker 1: probably were some sort of like you know, edge of 93 00:04:55,880 --> 00:05:01,400 Speaker 1: sleep hallucination, hypnogogic or hypnopompic hallucination, uh, dreams bleeding over 94 00:05:01,440 --> 00:05:04,760 Speaker 1: into wakefulness. But that it's it's hard to sort out 95 00:05:04,800 --> 00:05:07,720 Speaker 1: what's what at that age. Yeah, And I would say, 96 00:05:07,760 --> 00:05:10,080 Speaker 1: prior to this week, if you really put me to 97 00:05:10,160 --> 00:05:12,800 Speaker 1: task on on what that experience was I had as 98 00:05:12,839 --> 00:05:15,080 Speaker 1: a kid, I would have probably leaned on on the 99 00:05:15,279 --> 00:05:18,880 Speaker 1: you know, hypnogogic explanation of for what was happening. You know, 100 00:05:18,920 --> 00:05:21,840 Speaker 1: like I was somewhere between wakefulness and sleep, and therefore 101 00:05:22,040 --> 00:05:27,120 Speaker 1: my mind was susceptible to this kind of semi paranormal experience. 102 00:05:27,960 --> 00:05:30,599 Speaker 1: And these kind of experiences are super common, by the way. 103 00:05:30,640 --> 00:05:34,720 Speaker 1: That's nothing especially like pathological about them, right, Yeah, So 104 00:05:34,760 --> 00:05:36,160 Speaker 1: you know, I also don't want to make it sound 105 00:05:36,160 --> 00:05:38,560 Speaker 1: like this like shaped me as an experience, you know. 106 00:05:39,960 --> 00:05:43,920 Speaker 1: S Yeah, like I continue to watch Sanford the Sun 107 00:05:44,000 --> 00:05:46,800 Speaker 1: after it. Clearly it didn't. It didn't affect me in 108 00:05:46,839 --> 00:05:50,720 Speaker 1: that capacity. No night terror can make Red Fox unfunny. 109 00:05:52,080 --> 00:05:54,640 Speaker 1: Uh So so that was that was, you know, my 110 00:05:54,720 --> 00:06:00,440 Speaker 1: life up until this week, uh, Wednesday, March. I then 111 00:06:00,520 --> 00:06:04,240 Speaker 1: experienced what we're basically four of these in a single day. 112 00:06:04,800 --> 00:06:07,920 Speaker 1: So I can I can kind of explain two of them, 113 00:06:07,920 --> 00:06:11,159 Speaker 1: I guess. Um. So I've been I've been obsessed with 114 00:06:11,200 --> 00:06:15,400 Speaker 1: Peter Lori this week, you know, the famed actor. Um. 115 00:06:15,440 --> 00:06:17,440 Speaker 1: And I've been feeding that obsession, you know, to try 116 00:06:17,480 --> 00:06:19,919 Speaker 1: and get my mind off of more stressful matters. And 117 00:06:19,960 --> 00:06:22,440 Speaker 1: I was in the in the process of actually responding 118 00:06:22,480 --> 00:06:25,760 Speaker 1: to an email to you, Joe about we had a 119 00:06:25,920 --> 00:06:28,840 Speaker 1: slight sort back and forth about the ninety six movie 120 00:06:28,920 --> 00:06:31,560 Speaker 1: Mad Love, which I have not seen, but I've been 121 00:06:31,560 --> 00:06:33,680 Speaker 1: meaning to see for years because it has one of 122 00:06:33,680 --> 00:06:36,400 Speaker 1: the best trailers of all time, Like the the two 123 00:06:36,400 --> 00:06:39,560 Speaker 1: minute long trailer for this movie is more entertaining than 124 00:06:39,640 --> 00:06:43,880 Speaker 1: most entire movies. It's got Peter Lorie sitting on the 125 00:06:43,920 --> 00:06:47,000 Speaker 1: couch at his house and he's got this giant dog 126 00:06:47,120 --> 00:06:49,520 Speaker 1: next to him, this bigger than he is. And then 127 00:06:49,520 --> 00:06:52,279 Speaker 1: he gets a phone call from beautiful actress to like 128 00:06:52,320 --> 00:06:54,800 Speaker 1: tell him what a wonderful actor he is. And then 129 00:06:54,800 --> 00:06:57,960 Speaker 1: he starts explaining the new movie he's in, and it's 130 00:06:58,040 --> 00:07:00,159 Speaker 1: Mad Love the movie that this is a trailer or 131 00:07:00,160 --> 00:07:03,800 Speaker 1: fo yeah, and it's it's a wild movie. Um, I 132 00:07:03,800 --> 00:07:05,960 Speaker 1: feel like it doesn't. It doesn't. It's not remembered as 133 00:07:06,000 --> 00:07:07,960 Speaker 1: well as it should be. It has so many bizarre 134 00:07:08,040 --> 00:07:12,960 Speaker 1: elements in it. There's there's knife throwing, there's their hand transplants, 135 00:07:12,960 --> 00:07:16,520 Speaker 1: there's tragic mad scientists love stories. We gotta come back 136 00:07:16,520 --> 00:07:19,160 Speaker 1: and do this as a as a full movie episode sometime. 137 00:07:19,440 --> 00:07:22,200 Speaker 1: It's got the line in the trailer, a poor peasant 138 00:07:22,280 --> 00:07:26,800 Speaker 1: have conquered science. Why can't I conquer love? Yes, it's 139 00:07:26,840 --> 00:07:29,880 Speaker 1: such a great moment. But but in our email, you 140 00:07:30,000 --> 00:07:35,160 Speaker 1: specifically mentioned a face that Peter Lare makes when uh, 141 00:07:35,200 --> 00:07:39,000 Speaker 1: when when a previous film is mentioned to him, And 142 00:07:39,000 --> 00:07:41,040 Speaker 1: and it was weird. When I was about to respond 143 00:07:41,080 --> 00:07:43,440 Speaker 1: to that, I was like gonna type, and then suddenly 144 00:07:43,480 --> 00:07:45,320 Speaker 1: I had like this kind of like mash up in 145 00:07:45,360 --> 00:07:49,880 Speaker 1: my head, like a memory of his face in that trailer, 146 00:07:50,160 --> 00:07:53,120 Speaker 1: and then kind of this this the fact that Laura 147 00:07:53,400 --> 00:07:55,360 Speaker 1: is deceased, I don't know, just kind of like as 148 00:07:55,360 --> 00:07:57,320 Speaker 1: if they were kind of floating in my head. And 149 00:07:57,360 --> 00:08:02,080 Speaker 1: I suddenly had this just this czar deja vou like 150 00:08:02,200 --> 00:08:04,880 Speaker 1: experience that was like really overwhelming, and I had to 151 00:08:04,960 --> 00:08:06,520 Speaker 1: I had to get up, and I had to go 152 00:08:06,520 --> 00:08:10,560 Speaker 1: go lay down. And then uh, there was a just 153 00:08:10,640 --> 00:08:13,200 Speaker 1: a little later in the day, I I had another 154 00:08:13,240 --> 00:08:15,480 Speaker 1: experience like that. Again. I was at a computer. I 155 00:08:15,520 --> 00:08:18,120 Speaker 1: was looking over some of the telescool activities that my 156 00:08:18,160 --> 00:08:20,480 Speaker 1: son had done in Google classroom, and I was making 157 00:08:20,520 --> 00:08:23,080 Speaker 1: sure that everything was checked off, and it was like 158 00:08:23,160 --> 00:08:25,960 Speaker 1: checked off in two different places, and you know, this 159 00:08:26,080 --> 00:08:29,360 Speaker 1: juggling act of like eight different learning apps. And then 160 00:08:29,400 --> 00:08:32,680 Speaker 1: suddenly I have this jagged chunk of deja vu like 161 00:08:32,800 --> 00:08:37,240 Speaker 1: mental energy that, um, though quite vague this time, felt 162 00:08:37,320 --> 00:08:40,679 Speaker 1: like a fragment from some old TV show, maybe Carol 163 00:08:40,679 --> 00:08:42,600 Speaker 1: Burnett or something. If I had to guess, but I 164 00:08:42,640 --> 00:08:45,400 Speaker 1: but I really that would be just guessing and like 165 00:08:45,480 --> 00:08:48,760 Speaker 1: reshaping the memory. But again it hit me so hard 166 00:08:48,800 --> 00:08:49,960 Speaker 1: that I had to get up. I had to go 167 00:08:50,000 --> 00:08:52,480 Speaker 1: into another room. I like, I could feel my um, 168 00:08:53,480 --> 00:08:56,000 Speaker 1: it felt like a like an anxiety attack, and I 169 00:08:56,040 --> 00:08:58,040 Speaker 1: had to I had to, I had to lay down 170 00:08:58,120 --> 00:08:59,560 Speaker 1: for a little bit. And then in both of those 171 00:08:59,600 --> 00:09:01,600 Speaker 1: cases when I when I laid down, there was kind 172 00:09:01,600 --> 00:09:04,640 Speaker 1: of an echo of the initial experience where I had 173 00:09:04,640 --> 00:09:07,720 Speaker 1: like kind of another one and um and and then 174 00:09:07,760 --> 00:09:11,280 Speaker 1: I was fine. But it was really weird to to 175 00:09:11,280 --> 00:09:14,880 Speaker 1: to experience that, especially having not really experienced anything like 176 00:09:15,040 --> 00:09:17,400 Speaker 1: that since I was a kid. All right, So I'm 177 00:09:17,400 --> 00:09:19,720 Speaker 1: trying to sort out the elements of what it is 178 00:09:19,760 --> 00:09:23,199 Speaker 1: you're describing here. So you're saying that there was there 179 00:09:23,240 --> 00:09:27,360 Speaker 1: was an element of like sudden onset overwhelming anxiety, but 180 00:09:27,480 --> 00:09:31,559 Speaker 1: also uh, sort of some mental imagery and a feeling 181 00:09:31,640 --> 00:09:35,520 Speaker 1: of deja vu, like familiarity with whatever thoughts were currently 182 00:09:35,679 --> 00:09:38,680 Speaker 1: entering your mind. Is that it right? Yeah? And And 183 00:09:39,720 --> 00:09:41,880 Speaker 1: while the first one, the one with Peter LORI did 184 00:09:41,880 --> 00:09:43,959 Speaker 1: have I guess there was some sort of contemplation of 185 00:09:44,320 --> 00:09:45,920 Speaker 1: death in there, I guess, And and so that one 186 00:09:45,960 --> 00:09:48,120 Speaker 1: was a little loaded, but but the other one had 187 00:09:48,200 --> 00:09:51,079 Speaker 1: no like nightmare imagery. It was just kind of like 188 00:09:51,120 --> 00:09:54,480 Speaker 1: a bit of TV shrapnel. And actually I had I 189 00:09:54,520 --> 00:09:57,280 Speaker 1: had one more last night where I was just making 190 00:09:57,280 --> 00:09:59,679 Speaker 1: I was making a drink. I was like, like making 191 00:09:59,800 --> 00:10:02,320 Speaker 1: us some sort of tiki cocktail, uh, standing in the 192 00:10:02,360 --> 00:10:04,200 Speaker 1: same place they normally do, and then there was just 193 00:10:04,240 --> 00:10:08,360 Speaker 1: some sort of nondescript image, uh that that that gave 194 00:10:08,400 --> 00:10:11,360 Speaker 1: me a similar sensation, and that passed. So you've had 195 00:10:11,800 --> 00:10:15,800 Speaker 1: So these are like multiple instances of deja vu like 196 00:10:15,960 --> 00:10:19,200 Speaker 1: experience in the course of a couple of days. How 197 00:10:19,280 --> 00:10:21,800 Speaker 1: common is that for you? Normally? Would you say that 198 00:10:22,400 --> 00:10:24,520 Speaker 1: you have a feeling of deja vu? Maybe once a 199 00:10:24,640 --> 00:10:28,880 Speaker 1: year more or less. It's an interesting question because it's 200 00:10:28,880 --> 00:10:30,600 Speaker 1: a question that definitely comes up in some of the 201 00:10:30,600 --> 00:10:32,920 Speaker 1: studies that we're gonna look at where they ask people 202 00:10:32,960 --> 00:10:35,760 Speaker 1: how how many deja experiences do you have? Is it, 203 00:10:36,160 --> 00:10:38,000 Speaker 1: you know, once a week, a couple of times a month. 204 00:10:38,520 --> 00:10:42,480 Speaker 1: I'd be really hard pressed to say, because normally when 205 00:10:42,520 --> 00:10:46,960 Speaker 1: I have deja vu, it is so mild and uninteresting. 206 00:10:47,040 --> 00:10:48,760 Speaker 1: It's just kind of like, huh, that's a bit of 207 00:10:48,840 --> 00:10:51,440 Speaker 1: deja vu, and then I move on, you know, like 208 00:10:51,520 --> 00:10:55,480 Speaker 1: it's never like this. So I would if I would 209 00:10:55,480 --> 00:10:58,280 Speaker 1: to to to take just a wild guess, I'd say 210 00:10:58,440 --> 00:11:03,480 Speaker 1: maybe maybe, like once every couple of months. That that 211 00:11:03,520 --> 00:11:05,880 Speaker 1: sounds about right for me. Maybe a little bit less 212 00:11:05,880 --> 00:11:08,520 Speaker 1: frequently now for me. I one thing I've noticed, and 213 00:11:08,559 --> 00:11:10,760 Speaker 1: this is going to line up absolutely with some of 214 00:11:10,800 --> 00:11:14,240 Speaker 1: the research we look at later. I definitely feel like 215 00:11:14,280 --> 00:11:18,480 Speaker 1: I got deja vu like experiences much more often when 216 00:11:18,520 --> 00:11:21,880 Speaker 1: I was a young child. UM, when I was younger. 217 00:11:22,040 --> 00:11:24,280 Speaker 1: I I think I may have actually mentioned this on 218 00:11:24,320 --> 00:11:28,440 Speaker 1: the show before. I have one very specific instance of 219 00:11:28,640 --> 00:11:31,760 Speaker 1: deja vu like feelings that stand out in my memory, UM, 220 00:11:31,800 --> 00:11:34,800 Speaker 1: and it was when I was a kid. I don't 221 00:11:34,840 --> 00:11:37,400 Speaker 1: remember what age, but you know, I was young enough 222 00:11:37,400 --> 00:11:39,240 Speaker 1: to be playing out in the front yard with friends. 223 00:11:39,320 --> 00:11:41,360 Speaker 1: I think we were like running around, chasing each other 224 00:11:41,400 --> 00:11:44,000 Speaker 1: with sticks and stuff. And there was a low hanging 225 00:11:44,040 --> 00:11:46,880 Speaker 1: branch that was coming off of a tree hanging over 226 00:11:46,920 --> 00:11:49,560 Speaker 1: our front yard, and I guess I was distracted. I 227 00:11:49,640 --> 00:11:51,520 Speaker 1: was looking back at a friend of mine or something, 228 00:11:51,520 --> 00:11:53,720 Speaker 1: and I turned around and I ran into this low 229 00:11:53,760 --> 00:11:56,679 Speaker 1: hanging branch and hit my face. I think I ended 230 00:11:56,760 --> 00:11:59,640 Speaker 1: up getting a black eye from running into the branch. 231 00:12:00,320 --> 00:12:05,040 Speaker 1: And right then I had this powerful sensation like this 232 00:12:05,160 --> 00:12:08,040 Speaker 1: is all happened before. He was standing right there where 233 00:12:08,040 --> 00:12:10,160 Speaker 1: he was and I was here and I ran into 234 00:12:10,200 --> 00:12:12,320 Speaker 1: the branch, and it was this time of day, this 235 00:12:12,400 --> 00:12:15,400 Speaker 1: time of year. And I never knew how to make 236 00:12:15,400 --> 00:12:16,960 Speaker 1: sense of that when I was a kid, because like, 237 00:12:17,400 --> 00:12:20,520 Speaker 1: I think I pretty quickly understood that, like, no, this 238 00:12:20,559 --> 00:12:24,440 Speaker 1: has not actually happened before. I even as a child, 239 00:12:24,520 --> 00:12:27,080 Speaker 1: I don't think I attached any kind of magical significance 240 00:12:27,120 --> 00:12:29,680 Speaker 1: to it, Like I didn't think that I was clairvoyant 241 00:12:29,840 --> 00:12:32,280 Speaker 1: or something. It was just very odd. I was like, 242 00:12:32,360 --> 00:12:34,640 Speaker 1: why do I feel like this exact thing happened before 243 00:12:34,679 --> 00:12:37,480 Speaker 1: when I know it didn't. Yeah, the the stat about 244 00:12:37,760 --> 00:12:40,520 Speaker 1: it occurring more when you're younger definitely comes up, which, 245 00:12:40,880 --> 00:12:44,079 Speaker 1: of course it doesn't really help me out explaining this 246 00:12:44,520 --> 00:12:48,200 Speaker 1: because I'm what forty one now, and it seems like 247 00:12:48,240 --> 00:12:51,360 Speaker 1: I should have had the bulk of this earlier on um. 248 00:12:51,600 --> 00:12:53,520 Speaker 1: But but I mean that's just on average. I mean, 249 00:12:53,559 --> 00:12:55,960 Speaker 1: everybody's different. Some people have it much more frequently than 250 00:12:56,000 --> 00:12:58,920 Speaker 1: other people do. I'd say it's pretty rare for me now. 251 00:12:58,960 --> 00:13:01,559 Speaker 1: I think I probably it at least a few times 252 00:13:01,600 --> 00:13:04,959 Speaker 1: a year. Well after after I had these experiences, I 253 00:13:05,120 --> 00:13:07,280 Speaker 1: I you know, I initially asked, well, what's a different right, 254 00:13:07,280 --> 00:13:11,040 Speaker 1: That's what you you can always uh, you know, use 255 00:13:11,120 --> 00:13:15,040 Speaker 1: trying to deduct right things that are that are different 256 00:13:15,080 --> 00:13:18,360 Speaker 1: this week. Yeah, yeah, I mean, first of all, it's 257 00:13:18,400 --> 00:13:20,960 Speaker 1: I thought, well, maybe there's this panicky aspect to it. 258 00:13:20,960 --> 00:13:23,000 Speaker 1: Maybe I had two innch of coffee, but no, it's 259 00:13:23,040 --> 00:13:26,120 Speaker 1: a usual amount of coffee for the day. I thought, maybe, 260 00:13:26,240 --> 00:13:29,360 Speaker 1: you know, had something to do with steering at screens 261 00:13:29,400 --> 00:13:31,720 Speaker 1: too much because I was working, you know, at my 262 00:13:31,760 --> 00:13:33,959 Speaker 1: own laptop and then having to go in and help 263 00:13:34,000 --> 00:13:37,559 Speaker 1: my son with his laptop. But I dismissed that pretty 264 00:13:37,600 --> 00:13:39,400 Speaker 1: quickly as well, because it seems like the connection to 265 00:13:39,800 --> 00:13:42,840 Speaker 1: some sort of anxiety was unavoidable. Because, you know, while 266 00:13:42,920 --> 00:13:45,320 Speaker 1: while my family and I are objectively you know, lucky 267 00:13:45,360 --> 00:13:47,680 Speaker 1: and fortunate compared to plenty of other people going through 268 00:13:47,720 --> 00:13:52,200 Speaker 1: COVID nineteen, social distancing, shelter and place mandates or actual 269 00:13:52,320 --> 00:13:54,600 Speaker 1: you know illness, there there are a lot of things 270 00:13:54,679 --> 00:13:56,679 Speaker 1: to be anxious about right now. I mean, there's the 271 00:13:56,720 --> 00:14:01,240 Speaker 1: pandemic itself, local individual, national response is to it, household 272 00:14:01,240 --> 00:14:05,520 Speaker 1: protocols to stay safe, my son's tell us schooling, my 273 00:14:05,559 --> 00:14:09,079 Speaker 1: own attempts to make my work function remotely, trying to 274 00:14:09,120 --> 00:14:12,520 Speaker 1: follow the World Health Organization recommendations to only check the 275 00:14:12,559 --> 00:14:15,120 Speaker 1: news once or twice a day, that sort of thing. Yeah, 276 00:14:15,160 --> 00:14:17,840 Speaker 1: how's that going? I think I'm I'm still exceeding the 277 00:14:17,880 --> 00:14:21,240 Speaker 1: recommended dosage of news per day, but it is helping 278 00:14:21,280 --> 00:14:24,240 Speaker 1: me cut down a bit. Uh. And and like some 279 00:14:24,280 --> 00:14:26,240 Speaker 1: of the times when I'll reach for my phone to 280 00:14:26,680 --> 00:14:29,000 Speaker 1: look at the news, I will put it down instead. 281 00:14:29,120 --> 00:14:33,040 Speaker 1: So I think that's it's some advice to take to heart. Yeah, 282 00:14:33,240 --> 00:14:35,440 Speaker 1: I feel like looking up that stats, it's like looking 283 00:14:35,520 --> 00:14:37,560 Speaker 1: up you know, like how many alcoholic drinks are you 284 00:14:37,600 --> 00:14:40,880 Speaker 1: supposed to have a day. It's like yeah, uh, it's 285 00:14:40,920 --> 00:14:43,760 Speaker 1: like maybe if you find yourself googling that, it's it's 286 00:14:43,800 --> 00:14:48,720 Speaker 1: worth considering that you should consume less. Yeah, exactly. Um. 287 00:14:49,000 --> 00:14:52,920 Speaker 1: Another another bit of of infoll throw out on the anxiety. 288 00:14:53,080 --> 00:14:55,360 Speaker 1: Uh part of it is that I know on Wednesday 289 00:14:56,040 --> 00:14:59,080 Speaker 1: I did go on a walk, but otherwise I didn't 290 00:14:59,080 --> 00:15:01,960 Speaker 1: really leave my front porch or my house, and I 291 00:15:02,040 --> 00:15:04,160 Speaker 1: ended up not doing yoga or any other kind of 292 00:15:04,200 --> 00:15:08,240 Speaker 1: mindfulness exercise that day. Um, so that could have also 293 00:15:08,320 --> 00:15:10,600 Speaker 1: been a factor. It's like, well, I did less to 294 00:15:11,120 --> 00:15:13,400 Speaker 1: sort of get out of the default mode network and 295 00:15:13,440 --> 00:15:16,600 Speaker 1: to escape panic that day. Uh. So maybe I was 296 00:15:16,640 --> 00:15:20,000 Speaker 1: more susceptible to it. Yesterday I did do yoga um 297 00:15:20,400 --> 00:15:25,440 Speaker 1: and only had one of these episodes. So uh, you know, again, 298 00:15:25,480 --> 00:15:27,360 Speaker 1: I think that supports the idea that, well, there's something 299 00:15:27,400 --> 00:15:30,480 Speaker 1: going on here with anxiety, right, And and to be sure, 300 00:15:30,520 --> 00:15:33,680 Speaker 1: I can be an anxious person in the best of circumstances, 301 00:15:33,760 --> 00:15:36,160 Speaker 1: and I've gone through, you know, some stressful times in 302 00:15:36,200 --> 00:15:39,560 Speaker 1: my life without having any episodes like this before. But 303 00:15:39,600 --> 00:15:41,920 Speaker 1: I thought, well, maybe this is kind of the accumulation 304 00:15:41,920 --> 00:15:44,520 Speaker 1: of things, right, death by a thousand cuts. Right, There's 305 00:15:44,560 --> 00:15:47,440 Speaker 1: just all these little things and some extra things to 306 00:15:47,480 --> 00:15:49,880 Speaker 1: be anxious about, and it kind of builds up. Yeah, 307 00:15:50,080 --> 00:15:53,560 Speaker 1: that kind of doesn't make sense for having anomalous I 308 00:15:53,600 --> 00:15:56,800 Speaker 1: don't know types of mental phenomena. But then again, one 309 00:15:56,840 --> 00:15:59,120 Speaker 1: thing that strikes me is interesting about this is that 310 00:15:59,360 --> 00:16:06,560 Speaker 1: I don't formally associate deja vu like sensations with anxiety. Yeah. 311 00:16:06,960 --> 00:16:08,960 Speaker 1: I had not really either, because again I didn't I 312 00:16:08,960 --> 00:16:11,320 Speaker 1: had never really thought of of that experience for my 313 00:16:11,400 --> 00:16:14,520 Speaker 1: childhood as being really connected to deja vu. But but 314 00:16:14,600 --> 00:16:17,240 Speaker 1: after these, uh, these experiences on Wednesday, I started doing 315 00:16:17,280 --> 00:16:20,480 Speaker 1: a few searches looking around, and indeed a quick glance 316 00:16:20,520 --> 00:16:24,360 Speaker 1: around the internet for deja vu panic attacks indeed turned 317 00:16:24,440 --> 00:16:27,000 Speaker 1: up some hits like there was someone on an epilepsy 318 00:16:27,040 --> 00:16:31,120 Speaker 1: website with a post titled deja Vu slash panic attacks 319 00:16:31,240 --> 00:16:35,320 Speaker 1: very tired of being undiagnosed. Another health board nightmarish deja 320 00:16:35,400 --> 00:16:38,960 Speaker 1: vu and anxiety attacks. What's going on? Um? And in 321 00:16:39,000 --> 00:16:41,040 Speaker 1: both of these posts people responding with like, yeah, I 322 00:16:41,040 --> 00:16:43,120 Speaker 1: get this too. Uh, I hate it when this happens, 323 00:16:43,160 --> 00:16:45,880 Speaker 1: that sort of thing. And granted, we're talking about message 324 00:16:45,880 --> 00:16:49,000 Speaker 1: boards where people are, you know, engaging in varying degrees 325 00:16:49,040 --> 00:16:52,800 Speaker 1: of self self diagnosis, et cetera. But it was enough 326 00:16:52,800 --> 00:16:54,720 Speaker 1: to make me think, well, maybe there is more to this. 327 00:16:55,000 --> 00:16:58,000 Speaker 1: And and uh, you know, I I've never really researched 328 00:16:58,120 --> 00:17:01,160 Speaker 1: deja vu itself all that much, so I should look 329 00:17:01,160 --> 00:17:04,359 Speaker 1: a little deeper. So in these episodes, that's what we 330 00:17:04,400 --> 00:17:06,480 Speaker 1: thought we'd do. We take a little time to explore 331 00:17:06,880 --> 00:17:10,720 Speaker 1: deja vu and to explore the connection between deja vu 332 00:17:10,880 --> 00:17:14,880 Speaker 1: and anxiety and deja vu and dreams. All right, well, 333 00:17:14,920 --> 00:17:16,920 Speaker 1: then maybe we should take a quick break and then 334 00:17:16,920 --> 00:17:19,359 Speaker 1: when we come back, we can dive into the memory fog. 335 00:17:21,000 --> 00:17:26,720 Speaker 1: Thank thank alright, we're back deja vu. Uh, a term 336 00:17:26,720 --> 00:17:29,440 Speaker 1: that I guess most people are familiar with, but you 337 00:17:29,520 --> 00:17:32,359 Speaker 1: might not. You might not necessarily be able to define 338 00:17:32,400 --> 00:17:34,960 Speaker 1: it off the top of your head. Um, you should 339 00:17:34,960 --> 00:17:37,600 Speaker 1: probably just talk about what it means, right, So deja 340 00:17:37,680 --> 00:17:41,760 Speaker 1: vu comes from the French. It literally means already seen. Uh. Now, 341 00:17:41,800 --> 00:17:45,879 Speaker 1: there are actually a number of different terms for similar, 342 00:17:46,080 --> 00:17:49,919 Speaker 1: overlapping experiences that often kind of get blended together and 343 00:17:49,960 --> 00:17:53,639 Speaker 1: blurred together. For example, there's another term that's sometimes used. 344 00:17:53,840 --> 00:17:57,720 Speaker 1: It's deja vit coup, which means already lived. And so 345 00:17:58,200 --> 00:18:00,200 Speaker 1: there's like a lot of things that we call old 346 00:18:00,240 --> 00:18:04,200 Speaker 1: deja vu meaning already seen or probably you know, probably 347 00:18:04,240 --> 00:18:07,359 Speaker 1: could be categorized as deja viku, meaning like I've already 348 00:18:07,359 --> 00:18:10,600 Speaker 1: been through this situation or I've already lived at this moment. Yeah, 349 00:18:10,600 --> 00:18:13,800 Speaker 1: they're they're about like twenty different variations of this and 350 00:18:13,960 --> 00:18:16,000 Speaker 1: uh and I'll get to some more of them in 351 00:18:16,040 --> 00:18:20,120 Speaker 1: the second episode of this series. Yes, But basically, whatever 352 00:18:20,200 --> 00:18:24,520 Speaker 1: it is, deja vu, deja viku, uh, it means that 353 00:18:24,560 --> 00:18:28,240 Speaker 1: you are having some kind of experience of a stimulus. 354 00:18:28,240 --> 00:18:31,240 Speaker 1: You're looking at something, you're hearing something, you're feeling something, 355 00:18:31,280 --> 00:18:34,399 Speaker 1: you're going through a situation, and you suddenly get the 356 00:18:34,480 --> 00:18:37,879 Speaker 1: feeling that this has already happened. I've already seen that, 357 00:18:38,000 --> 00:18:40,919 Speaker 1: or I've already been here, this has happened sometime in 358 00:18:40,920 --> 00:18:44,760 Speaker 1: my past, despite evidence to the contrary that like, you're 359 00:18:44,800 --> 00:18:47,920 Speaker 1: not seeing something you've already seen, you're not living through 360 00:18:47,960 --> 00:18:51,960 Speaker 1: a moment that has already happened. I feel very confident that, 361 00:18:52,000 --> 00:18:54,000 Speaker 1: you know, in my in my experience as a child, 362 00:18:54,040 --> 00:18:56,600 Speaker 1: that I had not already been playing with those same 363 00:18:56,600 --> 00:18:58,960 Speaker 1: friends and run into a branch and gotten a black 364 00:18:58,960 --> 00:19:01,439 Speaker 1: eye and all that. For some reason I felt like 365 00:19:01,520 --> 00:19:07,000 Speaker 1: I had. Yeah. Likewise, my childhood experience was it was 366 00:19:07,040 --> 00:19:09,520 Speaker 1: again not that the feeling that there was an actual 367 00:19:09,640 --> 00:19:12,200 Speaker 1: voice in the room with me. It wasn't It wasn't 368 00:19:12,320 --> 00:19:15,600 Speaker 1: like that. It was just this feeling that, you know, 369 00:19:15,680 --> 00:19:18,720 Speaker 1: the terror was associated with the fact that I didn't 370 00:19:18,760 --> 00:19:21,679 Speaker 1: understand like what the sensation came from, not that it 371 00:19:21,760 --> 00:19:25,200 Speaker 1: was real. I guess with your original sensation as a child. 372 00:19:25,280 --> 00:19:28,640 Speaker 1: There's another level of complexity though, and that'll get into 373 00:19:28,640 --> 00:19:31,080 Speaker 1: stuff we'll talk about more in the second episode, with 374 00:19:31,160 --> 00:19:34,479 Speaker 1: ideas like de jaureev which do you like that? How 375 00:19:34,520 --> 00:19:36,679 Speaker 1: I said that French word? Oh yeah, you hit the 376 00:19:36,680 --> 00:19:42,280 Speaker 1: fresh nicely on that, which means already dreamed. So like 377 00:19:42,320 --> 00:19:45,120 Speaker 1: there are some cases where you're not even experiencing real 378 00:19:45,320 --> 00:19:48,400 Speaker 1: external stimuli. You know, it would be like I already 379 00:19:48,440 --> 00:19:51,040 Speaker 1: had this experience as a dream. But then maybe the 380 00:19:51,080 --> 00:19:55,480 Speaker 1: current experience isn't is just an imaginative moment. So it 381 00:19:55,520 --> 00:19:58,199 Speaker 1: can get very complicated in meta um. But I mean, 382 00:19:58,359 --> 00:20:02,960 Speaker 1: especially since just the the vast differences that are possible 383 00:20:03,080 --> 00:20:06,360 Speaker 1: from from brain to brain, from mind to mind. Um, 384 00:20:06,560 --> 00:20:07,879 Speaker 1: That's kind of the sense I get from a lot 385 00:20:07,920 --> 00:20:10,280 Speaker 1: of this research is that when you're dealing with the 386 00:20:10,640 --> 00:20:14,800 Speaker 1: basic broad deja vu experience, uh, you know, one size 387 00:20:14,840 --> 00:20:16,760 Speaker 1: is not gonna fit all. Like, it seems like it's 388 00:20:16,760 --> 00:20:20,320 Speaker 1: going to be a slightly different experience, slightly different frequency, 389 00:20:20,400 --> 00:20:24,880 Speaker 1: depending on the individual and the current state of the individual. Right, 390 00:20:24,920 --> 00:20:28,119 Speaker 1: I would maybe categorize all of this stuff under an 391 00:20:28,200 --> 00:20:32,040 Speaker 1: umbrella that we could just call anomalous familiarity, a sense 392 00:20:32,080 --> 00:20:35,199 Speaker 1: of familiarity with something that you have no reason to 393 00:20:35,240 --> 00:20:38,600 Speaker 1: be familiar with. So credit for the term deja vu 394 00:20:38,720 --> 00:20:42,400 Speaker 1: is usually given to a French philosopher, writer, and parapsychologist 395 00:20:42,560 --> 00:20:46,240 Speaker 1: named Amil warrock Uh. He used the term in a 396 00:20:46,320 --> 00:20:48,760 Speaker 1: letter to the editor of an academic journal in eighteen 397 00:20:48,800 --> 00:20:51,480 Speaker 1: seventy six. Though I do not think Barak made a 398 00:20:51,520 --> 00:20:54,840 Speaker 1: distinction from what I can tell, between deja vu is 399 00:20:54,880 --> 00:20:59,720 Speaker 1: like a normal psychological phenomenon versus the supposed psychic power 400 00:20:59,800 --> 00:21:03,119 Speaker 1: of clairvoyants. And this is something that comes up a 401 00:21:03,119 --> 00:21:06,520 Speaker 1: bit throughout the history of research on deja vu. Um. 402 00:21:06,760 --> 00:21:11,000 Speaker 1: I think it's more recently that deja vu has been 403 00:21:11,880 --> 00:21:14,560 Speaker 1: has gotten a lot of attention as a like just 404 00:21:14,920 --> 00:21:19,280 Speaker 1: serious subjective phenomenon, as opposed to people looking at it 405 00:21:19,320 --> 00:21:23,280 Speaker 1: trying to find evidence that it's like literal precognition. It's weird, 406 00:21:23,400 --> 00:21:26,720 Speaker 1: isn't that. This this kind of idea about deja vu 407 00:21:26,840 --> 00:21:30,240 Speaker 1: is really reflected in the Matrix movies, remember where uh, 408 00:21:30,560 --> 00:21:32,720 Speaker 1: if you see a black cat twice or whatever, it's 409 00:21:32,760 --> 00:21:35,000 Speaker 1: just a glitch in the matrix and it's not really treated. 410 00:21:35,080 --> 00:21:37,040 Speaker 1: It's not really a major plot point. It's just kind 411 00:21:37,040 --> 00:21:41,640 Speaker 1: of like, huh, isn't that interesting? Uh? Nothing, you should 412 00:21:41,840 --> 00:21:45,640 Speaker 1: waste your time with neo just to keep keep on course. Well, 413 00:21:45,680 --> 00:21:47,280 Speaker 1: you could look at that two different ways. You could 414 00:21:47,320 --> 00:21:49,560 Speaker 1: look at that as like, oh, it's just a little thing, 415 00:21:49,920 --> 00:21:52,600 Speaker 1: or you could also look at it as at least 416 00:21:52,600 --> 00:21:55,920 Speaker 1: in the Matrix movies, it is giving you real information 417 00:21:55,960 --> 00:21:59,280 Speaker 1: about the external world. And oh, and one thing that 418 00:21:59,359 --> 00:22:01,800 Speaker 1: we will come back too is there are some theories 419 00:22:01,800 --> 00:22:04,520 Speaker 1: of deja vu in which the experience of deja vu 420 00:22:04,800 --> 00:22:07,959 Speaker 1: is giving you some real information about the external world. 421 00:22:08,240 --> 00:22:11,199 Speaker 1: But it's not clairvoyant or precognitive. You're not having the 422 00:22:11,200 --> 00:22:14,159 Speaker 1: sensation because you actually saw the future from the past. 423 00:22:14,760 --> 00:22:17,200 Speaker 1: It's more likely having to do with the brains straining 424 00:22:17,240 --> 00:22:20,560 Speaker 1: to connect memories that that may not be exactly how 425 00:22:20,600 --> 00:22:23,919 Speaker 1: they feel. Yeah, but one thing that I found was 426 00:22:23,960 --> 00:22:26,359 Speaker 1: interesting is that before it was fully described and named 427 00:22:26,359 --> 00:22:30,080 Speaker 1: in the clinical or scientific context, deja vu was observed 428 00:22:30,080 --> 00:22:33,399 Speaker 1: by a number of authors and poets throughout history. Yeah. 429 00:22:33,480 --> 00:22:35,520 Speaker 1: I was reading a little bit about this from the 430 00:22:35,600 --> 00:22:39,199 Speaker 1: deja vu researcher Art Funk. Howser will come back to 431 00:22:39,240 --> 00:22:41,320 Speaker 1: some of his some of some work that he was 432 00:22:41,359 --> 00:22:44,320 Speaker 1: involved with the paper that he was a co author on. Yeah, 433 00:22:44,600 --> 00:22:47,040 Speaker 1: a little bit later. Uh, but but he pointed out 434 00:22:47,040 --> 00:22:50,440 Speaker 1: a few different early examples. Uh. One of the earliest, 435 00:22:50,480 --> 00:22:53,840 Speaker 1: I think the earliest that he identified, Well, he's pointing 436 00:22:53,920 --> 00:22:57,000 Speaker 1: to the writings of St. Augustine, but to understand what 437 00:22:57,080 --> 00:22:59,720 Speaker 1: Augustine's critiquing. You have to go back to the Roman 438 00:22:59,720 --> 00:23:03,840 Speaker 1: poem uh Avid, who lived forty three b C. Through 439 00:23:03,880 --> 00:23:08,040 Speaker 1: seventeen C. So Avid had written about the human soul 440 00:23:08,280 --> 00:23:12,120 Speaker 1: is a thing quote deathless and ever quote when they 441 00:23:12,160 --> 00:23:15,080 Speaker 1: have left their former seat, do they live in new 442 00:23:15,119 --> 00:23:18,640 Speaker 1: abodes and dwell in the bodies that have received them? 443 00:23:19,040 --> 00:23:22,119 Speaker 1: So all of it is getting into ideas of precognition 444 00:23:22,280 --> 00:23:25,600 Speaker 1: and more specifically the survival of the human soul. So a. 445 00:23:25,720 --> 00:23:29,280 Speaker 1: It is not talking about deja vu here, but what 446 00:23:29,560 --> 00:23:32,879 Speaker 1: he's talking about like basically the idea of reincarnation, about 447 00:23:32,880 --> 00:23:36,199 Speaker 1: the soul passing from one life to the next. Uh So, 448 00:23:36,320 --> 00:23:40,480 Speaker 1: three hundred years later, St. Augustine is critiquing of its 449 00:23:40,480 --> 00:23:44,560 Speaker 1: words and he writes the following quote for we must 450 00:23:44,640 --> 00:23:49,520 Speaker 1: not acquiesce in their story. Who assert that as Samian 451 00:23:49,640 --> 00:23:53,840 Speaker 1: Pythagoras recollected some things which he experienced when he was 452 00:23:53,880 --> 00:23:57,399 Speaker 1: previously here in another body, and others that they experienced 453 00:23:57,400 --> 00:24:00,199 Speaker 1: something of the same sort in their minds. But it 454 00:24:00,240 --> 00:24:04,760 Speaker 1: may be conjectured that these were untrue recollections, such as 455 00:24:04,760 --> 00:24:08,640 Speaker 1: we commonly experience in sleep when we fancy we remember, 456 00:24:08,920 --> 00:24:11,280 Speaker 1: as though we had done it or seen it what 457 00:24:11,400 --> 00:24:14,720 Speaker 1: we never did or saw at all, And that the 458 00:24:14,800 --> 00:24:18,040 Speaker 1: minds of these persons, even though awake, were affected in 459 00:24:18,080 --> 00:24:21,480 Speaker 1: this way at the suggestion of malignant and deep deceitful 460 00:24:21,520 --> 00:24:25,080 Speaker 1: spirits whose care it is to confirm or to sow 461 00:24:25,160 --> 00:24:29,600 Speaker 1: some false belief concerning the changes of souls in order 462 00:24:29,640 --> 00:24:34,160 Speaker 1: to deceive men. And that is from Augustine's on the Trinity. 463 00:24:34,280 --> 00:24:38,879 Speaker 1: Uh so, so basically he's he's saying, okay, of it is, uh, 464 00:24:39,000 --> 00:24:40,600 Speaker 1: you know, don't listen of it because he might just 465 00:24:40,640 --> 00:24:43,080 Speaker 1: be talking about this thing that we have all have 466 00:24:43,160 --> 00:24:47,760 Speaker 1: some experience with. And funk howser saying that that Augustine 467 00:24:47,880 --> 00:24:51,560 Speaker 1: is is probably talking about deja vu. Here. Yeah, I 468 00:24:51,600 --> 00:24:55,000 Speaker 1: found another great example by the British poet Alfred Lord Tennyson, 469 00:24:55,119 --> 00:24:58,199 Speaker 1: who wrote a poem around eighteen thirty three or eighteen 470 00:24:58,280 --> 00:25:02,679 Speaker 1: thirty four called The Two Voices. Uh. This poem was 471 00:25:02,720 --> 00:25:06,200 Speaker 1: written during a period of just deep misery and despair 472 00:25:06,280 --> 00:25:09,560 Speaker 1: for Tennyson. The basic form it takes is of an 473 00:25:09,600 --> 00:25:14,119 Speaker 1: internal argument between two parts of himself about whether or 474 00:25:14,160 --> 00:25:18,080 Speaker 1: not to commit suicide, which he describes saying, quote, pain 475 00:25:18,240 --> 00:25:22,119 Speaker 1: rises up old pleasures Paul, there is one remedy for 476 00:25:22,200 --> 00:25:25,080 Speaker 1: it all. It's actually very similar in many ways to 477 00:25:25,160 --> 00:25:27,439 Speaker 1: the famous to be or Not to be soliloquy from 478 00:25:27,480 --> 00:25:31,720 Speaker 1: hamlet Um. It's certainly one of Tennyson's darkest works, but 479 00:25:31,920 --> 00:25:35,200 Speaker 1: there's a lot of strange beauty and insight in this 480 00:25:35,280 --> 00:25:38,800 Speaker 1: passage where he discusses the sensation of false memory, which 481 00:25:38,840 --> 00:25:41,760 Speaker 1: did not yet have the name deja vu h. So 482 00:25:41,880 --> 00:25:46,000 Speaker 1: Tennyson writes much more, if first I floated free as 483 00:25:46,119 --> 00:25:50,600 Speaker 1: naked essence, must I be incompetent of memory for memory 484 00:25:50,720 --> 00:25:54,240 Speaker 1: dealing but with time and he with matter? Could she 485 00:25:54,400 --> 00:25:59,359 Speaker 1: climb beyond her own material prime? Moreover, something is or 486 00:25:59,440 --> 00:26:03,760 Speaker 1: seems that touches me with mystic gleams, like glimpses of 487 00:26:03,800 --> 00:26:08,800 Speaker 1: forgotten dreams, of something felt like something here, of something 488 00:26:08,880 --> 00:26:12,400 Speaker 1: done I know not where such has no language. May 489 00:26:12,400 --> 00:26:15,600 Speaker 1: declare that's nice. I also I am. I don't know 490 00:26:15,640 --> 00:26:17,160 Speaker 1: if I'm alone here, but I feel like you could 491 00:26:17,200 --> 00:26:20,399 Speaker 1: probably drop a beat behind Tennyson and it would have 492 00:26:20,520 --> 00:26:23,720 Speaker 1: some serious flow to it. There's another one from British 493 00:26:23,720 --> 00:26:26,560 Speaker 1: poetry that I found. It's kind of on a happier occasion, 494 00:26:26,640 --> 00:26:29,520 Speaker 1: though it's by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and he manages to 495 00:26:29,560 --> 00:26:32,400 Speaker 1: take the happy occasion of a poem and and go 496 00:26:32,480 --> 00:26:35,240 Speaker 1: in very dark places with it. But anyway, this is 497 00:26:35,520 --> 00:26:39,000 Speaker 1: from a sonnet by Cole Ridge called composed on a 498 00:26:39,080 --> 00:26:42,359 Speaker 1: journey homeward, the author having received intelligence of the birth 499 00:26:42,400 --> 00:26:47,840 Speaker 1: of a son. He begins by about it exactly, I 500 00:26:47,880 --> 00:26:51,399 Speaker 1: love it, But he writes, um off to or my 501 00:26:51,520 --> 00:26:55,159 Speaker 1: brain does that strange fancy roll which makes the present 502 00:26:55,320 --> 00:26:58,639 Speaker 1: while the flash doth last seem a mere semblance of 503 00:26:58,680 --> 00:27:03,480 Speaker 1: some unknown past. And then one more. Charles Dickens writes 504 00:27:03,480 --> 00:27:07,520 Speaker 1: about it in pretty straightforwardly in in his novel David Copperfield, 505 00:27:07,760 --> 00:27:10,600 Speaker 1: he writes, we have all some experience of a feeling 506 00:27:10,600 --> 00:27:13,800 Speaker 1: which comes over us occasionally, of what we are saying 507 00:27:13,840 --> 00:27:16,600 Speaker 1: and doing having been said or done before in a 508 00:27:16,680 --> 00:27:21,320 Speaker 1: remote time, of our having been surrounded dim ages ago 509 00:27:21,760 --> 00:27:25,879 Speaker 1: by the same faces, objects and circumstances, of our knowing 510 00:27:26,000 --> 00:27:28,960 Speaker 1: perfectly what will be said next, as if we suddenly 511 00:27:29,000 --> 00:27:32,600 Speaker 1: remembered it. I like the part about dim ages ago 512 00:27:32,640 --> 00:27:35,320 Speaker 1: because I think that is also a very consistent and 513 00:27:35,480 --> 00:27:39,640 Speaker 1: interesting feature of deja vu experiences, at least in my life, 514 00:27:39,680 --> 00:27:41,800 Speaker 1: and as I've often read about them is so you 515 00:27:41,920 --> 00:27:46,800 Speaker 1: have the incorrect sensation of remembering present events or present 516 00:27:46,880 --> 00:27:50,520 Speaker 1: stimuli from the past, but you can't place it. So 517 00:27:50,600 --> 00:27:53,800 Speaker 1: you don't think like I had an experience like this 518 00:27:54,000 --> 00:27:57,080 Speaker 1: four months ago, or you know, I had an experience 519 00:27:57,119 --> 00:27:59,919 Speaker 1: like this two years ago. It's more like it had 520 00:28:00,040 --> 00:28:04,240 Speaker 1: been in this inaccessible, kind of vague other time, which 521 00:28:04,280 --> 00:28:06,120 Speaker 1: I think maybe the reason that a lot of people 522 00:28:06,200 --> 00:28:10,199 Speaker 1: chalk this up to memory of past lives. Yeah, you 523 00:28:10,240 --> 00:28:12,960 Speaker 1: can definitely see where if you wanted to believe in 524 00:28:13,040 --> 00:28:15,960 Speaker 1: past lives, this is the sort of the sort of 525 00:28:16,000 --> 00:28:18,240 Speaker 1: stuff you could turn to and sort of you know, 526 00:28:18,320 --> 00:28:22,920 Speaker 1: warp into evidence. Um now, Yeah, And indeed, most examples 527 00:28:22,960 --> 00:28:25,600 Speaker 1: that that I mean I've experienced. I think all the 528 00:28:25,600 --> 00:28:27,960 Speaker 1: examples I've experienced have that vagueness to them, and you 529 00:28:27,960 --> 00:28:30,920 Speaker 1: do see that in most of the reporting. However, when 530 00:28:30,960 --> 00:28:34,960 Speaker 1: we eventually turned to the link between deja vu and dreams, 531 00:28:35,200 --> 00:28:38,400 Speaker 1: there are some specific cases where people have a strong 532 00:28:38,480 --> 00:28:41,840 Speaker 1: connection between like the deja vu experience they're having now 533 00:28:42,200 --> 00:28:46,200 Speaker 1: in a specific dream that they remember. Um. So, I 534 00:28:46,240 --> 00:28:49,600 Speaker 1: guess just a reminder that, yeah, with with deja vu experiences, 535 00:28:49,600 --> 00:28:53,600 Speaker 1: with this broad category of DejaVu experiences. There's there's a 536 00:28:53,640 --> 00:28:56,400 Speaker 1: lot of variety and so there even though that the 537 00:28:56,440 --> 00:29:02,040 Speaker 1: trend seems to be towards just you know, the things, 538 00:29:02,200 --> 00:29:06,280 Speaker 1: the damn ages, there are occasions where it doesn't seem 539 00:29:06,320 --> 00:29:09,360 Speaker 1: so dim to the person experiencing it, which is very interesting. 540 00:29:09,360 --> 00:29:12,160 Speaker 1: It makes you wonder what's different about those cases. And 541 00:29:12,160 --> 00:29:15,000 Speaker 1: we'll get into some of that probably in the second episode. Well, 542 00:29:15,040 --> 00:29:17,320 Speaker 1: are you ready to jump into some basic facts and 543 00:29:17,360 --> 00:29:20,760 Speaker 1: findings about deja vu from scientific research? Yeah, let's do it. 544 00:29:20,880 --> 00:29:23,920 Speaker 1: Let's let's just start talking about what we know and 545 00:29:23,960 --> 00:29:26,680 Speaker 1: what some of the theories are regarding the true nature 546 00:29:26,720 --> 00:29:29,000 Speaker 1: of deja vu. All right, let us jump on this 547 00:29:29,080 --> 00:29:33,240 Speaker 1: ghost train. Uh So, first thing is, occasional cases of 548 00:29:33,280 --> 00:29:37,280 Speaker 1: deja vu are very common for neurologically typical people. Deja 549 00:29:37,360 --> 00:29:39,920 Speaker 1: vu as I think we alluded to this earlier, but 550 00:29:40,040 --> 00:29:42,719 Speaker 1: it does not typically a sign of any kind of 551 00:29:42,760 --> 00:29:47,160 Speaker 1: known pathology. It's just pretty common for people to experience it. 552 00:29:47,200 --> 00:29:52,080 Speaker 1: Approximately sixty percent of people report having experience to deja 553 00:29:52,160 --> 00:29:55,080 Speaker 1: vu at some point. Yeah, we're we're of course going 554 00:29:55,120 --> 00:29:58,400 Speaker 1: to hear a lot from listeners about their particular experience 555 00:29:58,400 --> 00:30:00,400 Speaker 1: with deja vu. And I just want to mind you 556 00:30:00,680 --> 00:30:03,240 Speaker 1: if you have not if you were one of these, uh, 557 00:30:03,280 --> 00:30:05,680 Speaker 1: these people that have not experienced deja vu at some 558 00:30:05,720 --> 00:30:07,800 Speaker 1: point in your life, I want to know about that. 559 00:30:07,960 --> 00:30:10,280 Speaker 1: I want to hear what that's like, and then how 560 00:30:10,320 --> 00:30:15,600 Speaker 1: and how you process other people's reportings of of deja Yeah, 561 00:30:15,640 --> 00:30:19,200 Speaker 1: that's interesting. I wonder if I guess it's fairly straightforward 562 00:30:19,200 --> 00:30:21,320 Speaker 1: to explain, so you could know what it was, but 563 00:30:22,040 --> 00:30:24,520 Speaker 1: you might not be able to understand how it feels 564 00:30:24,640 --> 00:30:27,120 Speaker 1: if you've never felt it, even though you could. I mean, 565 00:30:27,160 --> 00:30:32,120 Speaker 1: somebody can explain to you, like what the frequency of 566 00:30:32,280 --> 00:30:34,200 Speaker 1: light of the color red is, but you might not 567 00:30:34,320 --> 00:30:36,360 Speaker 1: really be able to understand it if you've never been 568 00:30:36,400 --> 00:30:40,959 Speaker 1: able to see red. Yeah, because uh, deja vu in particular, 569 00:30:42,440 --> 00:30:44,760 Speaker 1: My take on it is that it it feels at 570 00:30:44,840 --> 00:30:48,880 Speaker 1: least casually weird. You know, every time it happens, it 571 00:30:48,960 --> 00:30:51,560 Speaker 1: is at least notable for a second where like huh, 572 00:30:51,600 --> 00:30:54,760 Speaker 1: well that's that's odd, and then then you move on. Well, No, 573 00:30:54,920 --> 00:30:57,560 Speaker 1: I do think that's interesting because to me, deja vu 574 00:30:57,680 --> 00:31:03,080 Speaker 1: feels inherently weird. It's just weird because you realize that 575 00:31:03,160 --> 00:31:06,160 Speaker 1: it couldn't be correct, Like, it's not just weird because 576 00:31:06,400 --> 00:31:11,400 Speaker 1: you logically recognize the misperception. For me, deja vu feels 577 00:31:11,520 --> 00:31:15,000 Speaker 1: weird the moment you experience it, before you even realize 578 00:31:15,000 --> 00:31:19,520 Speaker 1: anything's wrong. It is accompanied by a strange sensation. See 579 00:31:19,520 --> 00:31:22,080 Speaker 1: that that's interesting because it makes me think of But 580 00:31:22,200 --> 00:31:26,000 Speaker 1: between the two of us, like your, your typical deja 581 00:31:26,080 --> 00:31:31,440 Speaker 1: vu experience might be maybe more intense or at least, uh, 582 00:31:31,880 --> 00:31:34,280 Speaker 1: you end up contemplating it more I don't know than 583 00:31:34,360 --> 00:31:38,040 Speaker 1: than I do. Uh. And then of course the episodes 584 00:31:38,080 --> 00:31:40,520 Speaker 1: like I've had this week are certainly more pronounced than 585 00:31:40,840 --> 00:31:43,560 Speaker 1: than either of these cases. So I don't know. But 586 00:31:43,680 --> 00:31:46,719 Speaker 1: when when I experience like just typical deja vu, it is, 587 00:31:46,960 --> 00:31:50,440 Speaker 1: it is generally just so casual that I might mention 588 00:31:50,480 --> 00:31:53,120 Speaker 1: it if I am, you know, if i'm you know, 589 00:31:53,120 --> 00:31:55,880 Speaker 1: around somebody that I'm close to, But otherwise it's just 590 00:31:56,080 --> 00:32:00,479 Speaker 1: it's like seeing a bird flyover that's fun, like, oh, well, 591 00:32:00,520 --> 00:32:02,000 Speaker 1: there's another bird. I'm not going to point it out 592 00:32:02,000 --> 00:32:05,320 Speaker 1: because it's not a special bird, it's just another bird. Well, 593 00:32:05,360 --> 00:32:07,680 Speaker 1: maybe this is another thing for listeners to tell us about. 594 00:32:07,920 --> 00:32:10,120 Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I would love to hear from them, so 595 00:32:10,280 --> 00:32:12,800 Speaker 1: we know it happens every now and then at least 596 00:32:12,840 --> 00:32:17,000 Speaker 1: pretty frequently to even typical otherwise healthy people. But is 597 00:32:17,000 --> 00:32:22,520 Speaker 1: there any psychological or neurological condition consistently associated with deja vu? 598 00:32:22,720 --> 00:32:25,520 Speaker 1: I would say the answer to this is um. The 599 00:32:25,600 --> 00:32:28,480 Speaker 1: actual evidence for the link might be a little more 600 00:32:28,560 --> 00:32:32,720 Speaker 1: tenuous than has sometimes been suggested, But in the history 601 00:32:32,760 --> 00:32:35,240 Speaker 1: of research on deja vu, there appears to be one 602 00:32:35,440 --> 00:32:39,560 Speaker 1: major answer here, and that is temporal lobe epilepsy or 603 00:32:39,720 --> 00:32:43,360 Speaker 1: t l E. So, temporal lobe epilepsy is characterized by 604 00:32:43,400 --> 00:32:47,480 Speaker 1: focal seizures that begin in the temporal lobe of the brain. 605 00:32:48,120 --> 00:32:51,440 Speaker 1: And the temporal lobe is very important. It's a crucial 606 00:32:51,480 --> 00:32:53,880 Speaker 1: part of the brain that's been associated with major brain 607 00:32:53,920 --> 00:32:59,040 Speaker 1: functions like emotional association, visual and short term memory. Does 608 00:32:59,040 --> 00:33:03,480 Speaker 1: a lot of stuff with memory, like understanding and processing language. 609 00:33:03,920 --> 00:33:06,640 Speaker 1: There's a lot that goes on there. So where does 610 00:33:06,680 --> 00:33:09,520 Speaker 1: the deja Vu come in? Are people with temporal lobe 611 00:33:09,560 --> 00:33:13,960 Speaker 1: epilepsy just more likely to have deja vu experiences? The 612 00:33:13,960 --> 00:33:17,320 Speaker 1: answer there is no. Instead, there is a specific case 613 00:33:17,560 --> 00:33:21,840 Speaker 1: where people with temporal lobe epilepsy tend to report deja vu, 614 00:33:22,400 --> 00:33:25,520 Speaker 1: and that is in what's known as the aura before 615 00:33:25,560 --> 00:33:28,640 Speaker 1: the onset of a seizure, so people with recurrent seizures 616 00:33:28,680 --> 00:33:33,560 Speaker 1: often get this weird combination of feelings right before seizure happens. 617 00:33:33,600 --> 00:33:36,200 Speaker 1: It's it's sometimes described as a kind of like series 618 00:33:36,240 --> 00:33:41,880 Speaker 1: of warning signs. So these might include sudden, unexpected emotions 619 00:33:41,920 --> 00:33:45,840 Speaker 1: like you have elation or fear with no cause. Another 620 00:33:45,840 --> 00:33:49,320 Speaker 1: one might be numbness in parts of the body, weird 621 00:33:49,480 --> 00:33:53,280 Speaker 1: smells or tastes from out of nowhere, like I smell oranges. 622 00:33:54,040 --> 00:33:57,320 Speaker 1: Another one is known as epigastric phenomena. This refers to 623 00:33:57,400 --> 00:33:59,920 Speaker 1: a weird feeling in the abdomen. I've read it some 624 00:34:00,000 --> 00:34:03,080 Speaker 1: times described as a rising feeling, like when you're plummeting 625 00:34:03,080 --> 00:34:07,560 Speaker 1: on a roller coaster. Um epigastric specifically, I think, refers 626 00:34:07,600 --> 00:34:11,279 Speaker 1: to higher up on the abdomen, so very often it's 627 00:34:11,320 --> 00:34:14,160 Speaker 1: like right below the chest, above the stomach, you know, 628 00:34:14,280 --> 00:34:17,200 Speaker 1: right sort of where your solo plexus is. But then finally, 629 00:34:17,200 --> 00:34:22,000 Speaker 1: another recognized symptom of of the aura for temporal lobe 630 00:34:22,000 --> 00:34:26,920 Speaker 1: epilepsy is deja vu, which is interesting, right, yeah, because 631 00:34:26,920 --> 00:34:30,160 Speaker 1: this this makes us look to causes in the brain, 632 00:34:30,400 --> 00:34:33,239 Speaker 1: like like more specifically, it's it's it seems like there 633 00:34:33,280 --> 00:34:38,319 Speaker 1: must be some sort of uh in neurophysical origin for 634 00:34:38,400 --> 00:34:41,520 Speaker 1: what is occurring. Yes, But on the other hand, I 635 00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:45,000 Speaker 1: think we should also acknowledge that deja vu is, as 636 00:34:45,000 --> 00:34:48,279 Speaker 1: we've said, pretty common in people with no otherwise identified 637 00:34:48,320 --> 00:34:52,280 Speaker 1: medical or neurological conditions. Um. And I want to quote 638 00:34:52,280 --> 00:34:53,920 Speaker 1: now from somebody I'm going to be referring to a 639 00:34:53,960 --> 00:34:57,840 Speaker 1: lot throughout this couple of episodes. This is Alan S. Brown, 640 00:34:58,440 --> 00:35:02,920 Speaker 1: who published a big review of of deja vous research 641 00:35:02,960 --> 00:35:06,560 Speaker 1: in two thousand three in the journal Psychological Bulletin. And 642 00:35:06,600 --> 00:35:08,440 Speaker 1: this is an older paper and we will have to 643 00:35:08,480 --> 00:35:11,440 Speaker 1: refer to some more recent ones to supplement it, but 644 00:35:11,760 --> 00:35:14,680 Speaker 1: up to that point, it's a really fantastic review of 645 00:35:14,719 --> 00:35:18,520 Speaker 1: all the research leading up to the early two thousands. Uh. 646 00:35:18,560 --> 00:35:22,080 Speaker 1: And So Brown writes about the association between temporal lobe 647 00:35:22,120 --> 00:35:26,880 Speaker 1: epilepsy and deja vu that despite the fact that it 648 00:35:27,120 --> 00:35:30,440 Speaker 1: is a recognized symptom of a t L a seizure 649 00:35:30,520 --> 00:35:34,040 Speaker 1: on set, deja vu doesn't appear to be more common 650 00:35:34,200 --> 00:35:37,560 Speaker 1: in general in people with epilepsy. Quote. The weight of 651 00:35:37,600 --> 00:35:40,680 Speaker 1: evidence argues against deja vu being more common in people 652 00:35:40,719 --> 00:35:45,040 Speaker 1: with epilepsy or being diagnostic of seizure pathology. So there's 653 00:35:45,040 --> 00:35:46,719 Speaker 1: a couple of things to weigh. They're on one hand, 654 00:35:46,760 --> 00:35:50,320 Speaker 1: it is a recognized feature that a lot of people 655 00:35:50,400 --> 00:35:54,840 Speaker 1: report when they're about to have a temporal lobe epileptic seizure. 656 00:35:55,000 --> 00:35:57,680 Speaker 1: But on the other hand, it doesn't appear that people 657 00:35:57,680 --> 00:36:02,239 Speaker 1: with temporal lobe epilepsy have deja vu more often than 658 00:36:02,280 --> 00:36:04,960 Speaker 1: people in general. And uh yeah, And for for that 659 00:36:05,000 --> 00:36:06,319 Speaker 1: to make sense, I have to do is just think 660 00:36:06,360 --> 00:36:09,400 Speaker 1: back to some of these other symptoms uh we were listing, 661 00:36:09,680 --> 00:36:12,360 Speaker 1: uh that are part of the TLA. Like, none of 662 00:36:12,360 --> 00:36:16,520 Speaker 1: these other symptoms are things that are exclusive to people 663 00:36:16,680 --> 00:36:20,960 Speaker 1: that are experiencing uh, epileptic seizures or anything. Uh So 664 00:36:21,239 --> 00:36:24,400 Speaker 1: it's just deja vu is thrown in the mix, but 665 00:36:24,520 --> 00:36:28,319 Speaker 1: it's not exclusive to people with this condition, right uh now, 666 00:36:28,400 --> 00:36:30,919 Speaker 1: deja vu appears to be that this is one that 667 00:36:30,920 --> 00:36:33,719 Speaker 1: that does look pretty solid in in the research. It 668 00:36:33,800 --> 00:36:38,560 Speaker 1: is associated with stress and fatigue. You are more likely 669 00:36:38,600 --> 00:36:41,399 Speaker 1: to have an episode of deja vu when you are 670 00:36:41,520 --> 00:36:44,719 Speaker 1: tired and when you are agitated and you've got your 671 00:36:44,719 --> 00:36:48,960 Speaker 1: stress hormones you're pumping your no adrenaline and cortisol. And 672 00:36:49,000 --> 00:36:51,719 Speaker 1: this is interesting because I wonder how I mean it's 673 00:36:51,719 --> 00:36:54,160 Speaker 1: not exactly the same thing as Robert. You're talking about 674 00:36:54,200 --> 00:36:59,399 Speaker 1: your experience with UH sudden anxiety producing episodes of deja vu. 675 00:36:59,520 --> 00:37:02,000 Speaker 1: But it makes me wonder if there's some kind of 676 00:37:02,040 --> 00:37:04,840 Speaker 1: connection here. Yeah, I mean, when I ran across the 677 00:37:04,880 --> 00:37:08,040 Speaker 1: same information, I I lined it up with what I 678 00:37:08,160 --> 00:37:11,839 Speaker 1: had experienced, and Okay, you know, obviously there's the stress level, 679 00:37:11,880 --> 00:37:15,120 Speaker 1: which I've already touched on, but also, um, all the 680 00:37:15,160 --> 00:37:19,320 Speaker 1: experiences I had were in the afternoon or the early evening. 681 00:37:19,640 --> 00:37:21,879 Speaker 1: They were not in the morning. You know, I did 682 00:37:21,880 --> 00:37:24,520 Speaker 1: not experience them like when I in the first few 683 00:37:24,560 --> 00:37:27,120 Speaker 1: hours after waking up or anything like that. So it's 684 00:37:27,120 --> 00:37:30,000 Speaker 1: possible that, yeah, I'm throughout the day, I'm getting getting 685 00:37:30,000 --> 00:37:32,720 Speaker 1: more tired, I'm having you know, I have less energy 686 00:37:32,760 --> 00:37:35,640 Speaker 1: to handle sort of the ambient stress that is around 687 00:37:35,680 --> 00:37:39,480 Speaker 1: me and UH, and that could potentially have some connection 688 00:37:39,520 --> 00:37:44,560 Speaker 1: to the deja vu H like experiences that I had. Yeah, totally. Now, 689 00:37:44,600 --> 00:37:46,879 Speaker 1: the next thing that I thought was interesting is that 690 00:37:47,440 --> 00:37:51,759 Speaker 1: Brown reports that some studies have found that people who 691 00:37:51,920 --> 00:37:57,680 Speaker 1: travel experience deja vu more than people who don't. For example, 692 00:37:57,760 --> 00:38:00,560 Speaker 1: I was looking at the paper by Richardson and Winnaker 693 00:38:00,800 --> 00:38:04,840 Speaker 1: from nineteen sixty seven. It was summarizing an earlier study 694 00:38:04,840 --> 00:38:08,279 Speaker 1: by Chapman and Mench from nineteen fifty two. But this 695 00:38:08,360 --> 00:38:11,920 Speaker 1: study had defined travel as going more than fifty miles 696 00:38:11,960 --> 00:38:15,759 Speaker 1: away from home, and it reported findings that quote, non 697 00:38:15,880 --> 00:38:20,040 Speaker 1: travelers experienced deja vu in only eleven per cent of 698 00:38:20,080 --> 00:38:24,520 Speaker 1: their number, and in those who traveled twenty five percent 699 00:38:24,640 --> 00:38:28,040 Speaker 1: of their number. There was no relationship with the frequency 700 00:38:28,080 --> 00:38:31,320 Speaker 1: of travel. And so that part about no relationship with 701 00:38:31,360 --> 00:38:34,400 Speaker 1: the frequency of travel makes me wonder, like, why would 702 00:38:34,400 --> 00:38:38,319 Speaker 1: it be that people who like if this effect is real, 703 00:38:38,320 --> 00:38:41,319 Speaker 1: why would it be that people who travel some have 704 00:38:41,480 --> 00:38:43,920 Speaker 1: more deja vu than people who don't travel at all. 705 00:38:44,400 --> 00:38:47,160 Speaker 1: But if you travel a lot, you don't appear to 706 00:38:47,200 --> 00:38:50,920 Speaker 1: have it much more than people who travel a little. Well, well, 707 00:38:50,960 --> 00:38:53,719 Speaker 1: the I guess the main potential answer that comes to 708 00:38:53,800 --> 00:38:58,200 Speaker 1: my mind is that if we're thinking about deja vu 709 00:38:58,440 --> 00:39:03,320 Speaker 1: as this experience by the novel seems familiar, if something 710 00:39:03,400 --> 00:39:08,719 Speaker 1: new seems like something old, then perhaps there would be 711 00:39:09,040 --> 00:39:11,960 Speaker 1: more potential to experience it if you live the sort 712 00:39:12,000 --> 00:39:16,640 Speaker 1: of life in general, uh, either via travel or you know, 713 00:39:16,719 --> 00:39:19,839 Speaker 1: via other acts that line up with this personality type. Uh. 714 00:39:20,120 --> 00:39:22,399 Speaker 1: You know, the more novelty in your life, the more 715 00:39:22,440 --> 00:39:25,560 Speaker 1: potential there is to then have that turn around and 716 00:39:25,640 --> 00:39:29,439 Speaker 1: be made a seemingly mundane through deja vu. Oh yeah, 717 00:39:30,160 --> 00:39:33,640 Speaker 1: well no, I've actually seen that hypothesized by a researcher 718 00:39:33,640 --> 00:39:35,399 Speaker 1: who who I think we're going to talk about more 719 00:39:35,480 --> 00:39:39,919 Speaker 1: later and Cleary who's done work on on deja vu. 720 00:39:40,040 --> 00:39:42,319 Speaker 1: But I think I also saw her mention at some 721 00:39:42,400 --> 00:39:46,120 Speaker 1: point that there's some research indicating that people who watch 722 00:39:46,200 --> 00:39:49,880 Speaker 1: more movies are also more likely to experience higher deja 723 00:39:49,920 --> 00:39:54,640 Speaker 1: vu frequency. Interesting now, now one I have to catch 724 00:39:54,680 --> 00:39:56,680 Speaker 1: myself though at the same time, because when I think 725 00:39:56,719 --> 00:39:59,840 Speaker 1: back about deja vu experiences I've had in the past, 726 00:40:00,520 --> 00:40:02,600 Speaker 1: a lot of them have not They have not occurred 727 00:40:02,600 --> 00:40:06,120 Speaker 1: while I'm traveling. They occurred like if I'm if they're 728 00:40:06,160 --> 00:40:11,360 Speaker 1: occurring during novel experiences, they're only mildly novel, you know, like, oh, 729 00:40:11,400 --> 00:40:14,320 Speaker 1: like I've never maybe I've never stood in my backyard 730 00:40:14,360 --> 00:40:17,640 Speaker 1: with a coffee mug, you know, at this particular spot before. 731 00:40:17,960 --> 00:40:20,120 Speaker 1: But that's hardly on par with say, traveling you know, 732 00:40:20,320 --> 00:40:23,520 Speaker 1: around the world to to Bangkok or something. I was 733 00:40:23,560 --> 00:40:27,400 Speaker 1: sailing to Byzantium. Yeah, um it was. So there's an 734 00:40:27,400 --> 00:40:31,080 Speaker 1: interesting thing that Alan Brown notes in his review, combining 735 00:40:31,160 --> 00:40:33,600 Speaker 1: the last couple of facts, the idea that deja vu 736 00:40:33,719 --> 00:40:37,319 Speaker 1: appears to be strongly associated with stress and fatigue and 737 00:40:37,480 --> 00:40:41,719 Speaker 1: the association with with travel um He he notes that 738 00:40:41,760 --> 00:40:44,200 Speaker 1: there it was at least one clinician in the nineteen 739 00:40:44,239 --> 00:40:48,120 Speaker 1: fifties who observed that reports of deja vu were especially 740 00:40:48,160 --> 00:40:53,879 Speaker 1: common among soldiers heading into battle. Weird, but it would 741 00:40:53,880 --> 00:40:57,680 Speaker 1: combine those things, right, Heading into battle tends to combine stress, fatigue, 742 00:40:57,760 --> 00:41:02,480 Speaker 1: and travel into new locations. Yeah, yeah, you're really piling 743 00:41:02,520 --> 00:41:05,000 Speaker 1: those up. Yeah. Now there's another one, which is that 744 00:41:05,120 --> 00:41:09,239 Speaker 1: frequency of deja vu experience also shows a positive relationship 745 00:41:09,640 --> 00:41:14,840 Speaker 1: with socioeconomic status and level of education. On average, people 746 00:41:14,880 --> 00:41:18,080 Speaker 1: who are wealthier and people who have attained higher levels 747 00:41:18,120 --> 00:41:21,880 Speaker 1: of education experience more frequency of deja vu, or at 748 00:41:21,920 --> 00:41:26,600 Speaker 1: least report more frequency of deja vu on average, And 749 00:41:26,600 --> 00:41:28,960 Speaker 1: that does complicate some other findings by the way, Like 750 00:41:29,080 --> 00:41:32,960 Speaker 1: for I think Brown actually mentions, I wonder if like 751 00:41:33,120 --> 00:41:36,719 Speaker 1: this is acting on the travel variable, right, that, like, 752 00:41:36,800 --> 00:41:39,600 Speaker 1: people who have more money or probably more likely to 753 00:41:39,760 --> 00:41:43,680 Speaker 1: travel more frequently, So something could be going on there. Yeah, 754 00:41:43,760 --> 00:41:46,840 Speaker 1: And of course it also makes me wonder about the 755 00:41:46,920 --> 00:41:50,759 Speaker 1: populations that are polled for these kind of studies. You know, um, 756 00:41:51,360 --> 00:41:52,960 Speaker 1: I know that there's going to be at least one 757 00:41:53,000 --> 00:41:57,440 Speaker 1: study later on that that the researchers point out that, well, 758 00:41:57,480 --> 00:42:00,440 Speaker 1: we we looked at like four people, but they were 759 00:42:00,440 --> 00:42:06,720 Speaker 1: mostly psychology students, you know, so common with psychology research. 760 00:42:08,000 --> 00:42:10,880 Speaker 1: So yeah, not to because I don't know the particulars 761 00:42:10,880 --> 00:42:13,279 Speaker 1: of the data that they're referring to here. You know, 762 00:42:13,320 --> 00:42:16,879 Speaker 1: perhaps the polling data is uh is the survey data 763 00:42:16,920 --> 00:42:19,000 Speaker 1: is more robust than I'm giving it credit to. But 764 00:42:19,040 --> 00:42:21,960 Speaker 1: I mean, obviously that's always a potential problem when you're 765 00:42:22,000 --> 00:42:26,799 Speaker 1: when you're considering information like this. Absolutely another thing I 766 00:42:26,800 --> 00:42:29,360 Speaker 1: thought this was interesting. Men and women seem to experience 767 00:42:29,400 --> 00:42:31,480 Speaker 1: deja vu at about the same rate. There have been 768 00:42:31,480 --> 00:42:34,600 Speaker 1: a few studies here and there that found gender differences, 769 00:42:34,640 --> 00:42:38,000 Speaker 1: but they were not directionally consistent, and combining all the 770 00:42:38,040 --> 00:42:41,719 Speaker 1: results together did not find any differences for gender. Now, 771 00:42:41,760 --> 00:42:44,919 Speaker 1: we've talked about overlap with neurological conditions, but here's one 772 00:42:45,000 --> 00:42:48,080 Speaker 1: that should be very interesting. What about drugs. Do do 773 00:42:48,160 --> 00:42:52,080 Speaker 1: any drugs cause increased uh chances of deja vou? Well, 774 00:42:52,160 --> 00:42:55,920 Speaker 1: there are some isolated reports of certain drugs yes and 775 00:42:56,280 --> 00:43:01,000 Speaker 1: causing very frequent episodes of dejav For example, I was 776 00:43:01,000 --> 00:43:04,640 Speaker 1: looking at a paper from the Journal of Clinical Neuroscience 777 00:43:04,640 --> 00:43:08,320 Speaker 1: in two thousand one where authors A. Tarot timon In 778 00:43:08,560 --> 00:43:16,000 Speaker 1: and Satu K. Jones Yaskalainen. I think UH report the 779 00:43:16,040 --> 00:43:19,760 Speaker 1: case of quote a thirty nine year old Caucasian, healthy 780 00:43:19,880 --> 00:43:25,600 Speaker 1: male physician who developed intense recurrent deja vu experiences within 781 00:43:25,680 --> 00:43:29,600 Speaker 1: twenty four hours of initiating concommitant UH. And this is 782 00:43:29,640 --> 00:43:32,760 Speaker 1: a couple of drugs. I'll try the names here, amantadine 783 00:43:33,480 --> 00:43:38,800 Speaker 1: and UH phenal propanelamine UH. Those are treatments against influenza. 784 00:43:38,960 --> 00:43:41,440 Speaker 1: So the day he was started taking these two drugs 785 00:43:41,480 --> 00:43:46,919 Speaker 1: at the same time, amantadine and phenal propanelamine and UH, 786 00:43:46,960 --> 00:43:49,839 Speaker 1: and then the deja vu experiences stopped as soon as 787 00:43:49,880 --> 00:43:53,600 Speaker 1: he stopped taking the medication. Now, amantadine is a drug 788 00:43:53,640 --> 00:43:57,000 Speaker 1: that has multiple effects. It's used to promote dopamine in 789 00:43:57,040 --> 00:44:00,520 Speaker 1: patients with some neurological conditions I think, like Parkinson's disease, 790 00:44:01,000 --> 00:44:04,040 Speaker 1: but it's also used as an anti viral against influenza 791 00:44:04,080 --> 00:44:08,480 Speaker 1: type A. Meanwhile, phenal propanelamine is a decongestion that is 792 00:44:08,520 --> 00:44:11,880 Speaker 1: sometimes used as a cough and cold medicine. Um and 793 00:44:12,000 --> 00:44:14,040 Speaker 1: I should note I also found at least one other 794 00:44:14,080 --> 00:44:17,719 Speaker 1: case report from the nineties of psychosis in an otherwise 795 00:44:17,719 --> 00:44:20,920 Speaker 1: healthy patient brought on by this exact same drug combination. 796 00:44:21,520 --> 00:44:24,520 Speaker 1: So this appears to be related to the ability of 797 00:44:24,560 --> 00:44:28,360 Speaker 1: these drugs to mess around with your dopamine levels. But 798 00:44:28,440 --> 00:44:30,719 Speaker 1: we don't know for sure. And I must say that 799 00:44:30,719 --> 00:44:34,239 Speaker 1: that would be such a strange symptom to report to 800 00:44:34,239 --> 00:44:36,080 Speaker 1: your doctor. You know, they say take two and call 801 00:44:36,120 --> 00:44:38,759 Speaker 1: me in the morning, and you call her back and say, Doc, 802 00:44:38,800 --> 00:44:42,399 Speaker 1: I am I am experiencing deja vu every five minutes. Yeah, 803 00:44:42,440 --> 00:44:44,840 Speaker 1: I mean, that would that would be something. But again, 804 00:44:44,960 --> 00:44:47,920 Speaker 1: I mean there are other medications that have, you know, 805 00:44:48,000 --> 00:44:51,080 Speaker 1: weird side effects like this. There's a there's a particular 806 00:44:51,320 --> 00:44:55,560 Speaker 1: malaria treatment. I remember. I remember being on vacation and 807 00:44:55,880 --> 00:44:57,719 Speaker 1: chatting with another couple that was on vacation, but I 808 00:44:57,719 --> 00:44:59,919 Speaker 1: believe this was in Costa Rica years and years ago, 809 00:45:00,440 --> 00:45:03,600 Speaker 1: and the older couple we were talking to they were 810 00:45:03,640 --> 00:45:08,319 Speaker 1: both on this, uh, this anti malarial medication. Uh, you know, 811 00:45:08,360 --> 00:45:10,840 Speaker 1: it's just just in case. But they were talking about 812 00:45:10,840 --> 00:45:14,439 Speaker 1: the vivid dreams they would have every night because of it. Yeah, 813 00:45:14,480 --> 00:45:16,000 Speaker 1: it was. It was quite interesting. It makes me want 814 00:45:16,000 --> 00:45:18,800 Speaker 1: to come back and do an episode on malaria drugs 815 00:45:18,880 --> 00:45:22,319 Speaker 1: because there are some there's some interesting stories about UH 816 00:45:22,400 --> 00:45:25,759 Speaker 1: side effects and complications that have occurred with some of them. Well, 817 00:45:25,760 --> 00:45:27,399 Speaker 1: maybe we should take another quick break and the when 818 00:45:27,440 --> 00:45:29,520 Speaker 1: we come back, we can discuss maybe the single most 819 00:45:29,560 --> 00:45:36,080 Speaker 1: consistent finding in the literature on deja vu. Thank alright, 820 00:45:36,120 --> 00:45:39,360 Speaker 1: we're back all right now. I think Brown actually notes 821 00:45:39,440 --> 00:45:42,759 Speaker 1: this in his review that that probably the single most 822 00:45:42,800 --> 00:45:46,200 Speaker 1: consistent finding in the literature on deja vu is that 823 00:45:46,360 --> 00:45:51,719 Speaker 1: frequency of deja vu decreases with age. Isn't that strange? 824 00:45:52,080 --> 00:45:54,799 Speaker 1: Like there there's a graph that's included in UH in 825 00:45:54,920 --> 00:45:58,480 Speaker 1: Brown's paper here that shows UH like it takes average 826 00:45:58,560 --> 00:46:01,840 Speaker 1: yearly experiences like the san of number number of yearly 827 00:46:01,880 --> 00:46:06,040 Speaker 1: experiences people report. And I imagine that there must be 828 00:46:06,080 --> 00:46:07,920 Speaker 1: a lot of guessing because if you're like us, we 829 00:46:07,960 --> 00:46:11,120 Speaker 1: don't exactly remember, but you know people people are estimating, 830 00:46:11,800 --> 00:46:14,040 Speaker 1: and you know, you look at it and people in there, 831 00:46:14,080 --> 00:46:17,360 Speaker 1: like early twenties, there's this spike and that they're reporting 832 00:46:17,440 --> 00:46:21,000 Speaker 1: somewhere between like two and a half and three UH 833 00:46:21,040 --> 00:46:25,120 Speaker 1: experiences on average every year of deja vu. But it's 834 00:46:25,200 --> 00:46:28,319 Speaker 1: it's sharply curves down. You're down to like one or 835 00:46:28,360 --> 00:46:30,719 Speaker 1: a half by the time you're in your late thirties, 836 00:46:30,760 --> 00:46:34,680 Speaker 1: and then people in their like sixties are reporting extremely 837 00:46:34,760 --> 00:46:36,560 Speaker 1: little with the internet. You know, it's a good thing 838 00:46:36,560 --> 00:46:38,680 Speaker 1: we did the episode. If we if we kept going, 839 00:46:38,760 --> 00:46:40,160 Speaker 1: you and I are just going to get older and 840 00:46:40,239 --> 00:46:42,960 Speaker 1: older and we'll have fewer fresh memories of deja vu 841 00:46:43,040 --> 00:46:44,480 Speaker 1: to talk about. Oh, we just got to keep our 842 00:46:44,520 --> 00:46:46,840 Speaker 1: stress and fatigue up and then we can buck the trend. 843 00:46:46,960 --> 00:46:51,080 Speaker 1: You know. Now here's another big trend about deja vu 844 00:46:51,200 --> 00:46:54,680 Speaker 1: experiences that we see reflected in you know all a 845 00:46:54,680 --> 00:46:57,319 Speaker 1: lot of these different variations of it, including it's what 846 00:46:57,440 --> 00:47:00,759 Speaker 1: is often held up is its opposite Jimmy's oh yeah, 847 00:47:00,760 --> 00:47:03,719 Speaker 1: and that means uh, something like never seen. It's the 848 00:47:03,760 --> 00:47:06,719 Speaker 1: inverse it would be, uh, you know, deja vu is 849 00:47:06,760 --> 00:47:09,520 Speaker 1: you see something new and you think I've seen this before. 850 00:47:10,040 --> 00:47:13,680 Speaker 1: Jama vu is you see something you should be familiar 851 00:47:13,680 --> 00:47:15,640 Speaker 1: with and you think it's brand new, You've never seen 852 00:47:15,640 --> 00:47:19,000 Speaker 1: it before. Well, well, one of the an attribute that 853 00:47:19,040 --> 00:47:21,960 Speaker 1: one tends to encounter in all of these experiences is 854 00:47:21,960 --> 00:47:26,000 Speaker 1: that people with intact reality testing do not have a 855 00:47:26,040 --> 00:47:30,319 Speaker 1: problem identifying the deja vu as inherently unreal. And this 856 00:47:30,400 --> 00:47:32,200 Speaker 1: comes back to something we were talking about with our 857 00:47:32,239 --> 00:47:36,040 Speaker 1: own experiences, you know, like even these really pronounced experiences 858 00:47:36,040 --> 00:47:37,759 Speaker 1: I had yesterday, even the experience I had as a 859 00:47:37,760 --> 00:47:40,479 Speaker 1: as a kid, like my my brain kind of fact 860 00:47:40,520 --> 00:47:43,000 Speaker 1: checked them and said, is this real? Is there really? 861 00:47:43,360 --> 00:47:46,040 Speaker 1: Is Fred Stanford really in my bedroom speaking through a fan? 862 00:47:46,480 --> 00:47:49,839 Speaker 1: Uh No, he's not. This is something else, you know, yes, 863 00:47:49,920 --> 00:47:53,000 Speaker 1: and that it's not. That's not a function of you 864 00:47:53,080 --> 00:47:57,000 Speaker 1: being like a hyper skeptical person or something that that's like, 865 00:47:57,120 --> 00:48:01,080 Speaker 1: that's normal for human brains. Yeah. So I was looking 866 00:48:01,040 --> 00:48:03,560 Speaker 1: at reading around a little bit about reality testing, and 867 00:48:04,080 --> 00:48:09,480 Speaker 1: according to the University of Adelaide philosophy professor Philip Grands, 868 00:48:10,120 --> 00:48:13,840 Speaker 1: it's basically the system by which the brain monitors the 869 00:48:13,920 --> 00:48:18,400 Speaker 1: brain's own storytelling system, the very narrative of our lives. 870 00:48:18,800 --> 00:48:23,719 Speaker 1: So it ends up testing and rejecting ideas about reality. Now, 871 00:48:24,120 --> 00:48:27,120 Speaker 1: I was running across uh, um, this is actually a 872 00:48:27,200 --> 00:48:30,480 Speaker 1: two thousand and fourteen press release and or an interview 873 00:48:30,520 --> 00:48:34,560 Speaker 1: that was published on Eureka Alerts and uh. In this, 874 00:48:34,800 --> 00:48:39,040 Speaker 1: Grands used the example of wondering if a common headache 875 00:48:39,200 --> 00:48:41,160 Speaker 1: is a brain tumor. Like you get a headache and 876 00:48:41,160 --> 00:48:43,200 Speaker 1: you're like, oh boy, I've got a headache right now. 877 00:48:43,280 --> 00:48:45,480 Speaker 1: I wonder if this is a brain tumor. Well, in 878 00:48:45,560 --> 00:48:49,680 Speaker 1: a typical mind, this sort of thought is probably quickly rejected. 879 00:48:49,880 --> 00:48:51,880 Speaker 1: You're like, no, this is just a normal headache. I 880 00:48:51,920 --> 00:48:53,560 Speaker 1: had one of these last week and it wasn't you know, 881 00:48:53,640 --> 00:48:55,800 Speaker 1: when't a brain tumor, then it's not a brain tumor. Today. 882 00:48:56,080 --> 00:48:59,000 Speaker 1: It's nothing to get upset about. Okay. But but if 883 00:48:59,040 --> 00:49:03,160 Speaker 1: one's reality testing is faulty, the notion that this might 884 00:49:03,200 --> 00:49:06,160 Speaker 1: be a brain tumor, it might persist, It might even 885 00:49:06,239 --> 00:49:09,560 Speaker 1: become more dominant, It might you know, become the thought 886 00:49:09,560 --> 00:49:14,400 Speaker 1: itself becomes a malignancy. Uh So this, you know, faulty 887 00:49:14,440 --> 00:49:20,160 Speaker 1: reality testing plays into various delusions, especially delusions that are 888 00:49:20,200 --> 00:49:23,759 Speaker 1: tied to the way our brains process the familiar and 889 00:49:23,800 --> 00:49:27,440 Speaker 1: the novel. And one of the examples that Grand's points 890 00:49:27,480 --> 00:49:30,200 Speaker 1: to is cop cross delusion, which we've discussed in the 891 00:49:30,200 --> 00:49:34,120 Speaker 1: show before. Yeah, Cap craws, where you believe that um 892 00:49:34,600 --> 00:49:38,080 Speaker 1: that people you know have been replaced by doubles. So 893 00:49:38,120 --> 00:49:40,480 Speaker 1: like you might see you know, it often results from 894 00:49:40,520 --> 00:49:44,560 Speaker 1: a particular brain injury or neurodegenerative disease or something that 895 00:49:44,760 --> 00:49:48,800 Speaker 1: um causes a dysfunction of the part of the brain 896 00:49:48,880 --> 00:49:52,720 Speaker 1: that accused the feeling of familiarity when you recognize familiar faces. 897 00:49:53,160 --> 00:49:56,319 Speaker 1: So you might see members of your family and you 898 00:49:56,480 --> 00:50:00,040 Speaker 1: recognize them, you say, that looks just like dad. What 899 00:50:00,280 --> 00:50:03,600 Speaker 1: you don't feel familiar and thus you think that's not 900 00:50:03,760 --> 00:50:06,160 Speaker 1: him though, so you think that he's been replaced by 901 00:50:06,200 --> 00:50:09,319 Speaker 1: a doppelganger or look alike. Yeah. So, so we can 902 00:50:09,320 --> 00:50:11,920 Speaker 1: see that as kind of an extreme example of an 903 00:50:11,920 --> 00:50:17,040 Speaker 1: illusion that's tied to malfunctioning reality testing. Uh and uh 904 00:50:17,080 --> 00:50:19,760 Speaker 1: and deja vou is also an example of a mental 905 00:50:19,800 --> 00:50:23,880 Speaker 1: experience that is subjected to reality testing in a typical brain, 906 00:50:24,080 --> 00:50:27,879 Speaker 1: and indeed, it will generally fail a reality test even 907 00:50:27,880 --> 00:50:31,279 Speaker 1: if it's distracting. Part of the distraction for us is 908 00:50:31,320 --> 00:50:34,879 Speaker 1: generally realizing that it's not real. Like just this week, 909 00:50:34,920 --> 00:50:37,719 Speaker 1: those experiences I had, like one of the super distracting 910 00:50:37,760 --> 00:50:40,839 Speaker 1: things was that I realized that this wasn't you know, 911 00:50:41,080 --> 00:50:43,600 Speaker 1: that this something was weird here that you know, it 912 00:50:43,640 --> 00:50:47,280 Speaker 1: made me question the software, the hardware involved a little 913 00:50:47,280 --> 00:50:49,160 Speaker 1: bit but it didn't make me think you know that, 914 00:50:49,840 --> 00:50:52,799 Speaker 1: you know, mind flavors are sending thought beams into my 915 00:50:52,840 --> 00:50:55,359 Speaker 1: brain or anything. Yeah, I mean this is generally an 916 00:50:55,360 --> 00:50:59,480 Speaker 1: interesting question. How how the brain tells what's real? I mean, 917 00:50:59,640 --> 00:51:02,200 Speaker 1: I feel like we we could do episode after episode 918 00:51:02,200 --> 00:51:05,359 Speaker 1: on this subject. Actually, but like, like this came up 919 00:51:05,360 --> 00:51:08,080 Speaker 1: not too long ago when we were talking about visual imagination. 920 00:51:08,160 --> 00:51:11,160 Speaker 1: I think this was an episode from last summer. Um 921 00:51:11,320 --> 00:51:16,080 Speaker 1: how there is evidence indicating that the brain uses some 922 00:51:16,200 --> 00:51:21,160 Speaker 1: of the same infrastructure for imagining visual images that it 923 00:51:21,280 --> 00:51:24,239 Speaker 1: uses for seeing with the eyes. And so if it 924 00:51:24,280 --> 00:51:26,120 Speaker 1: does that, if there's stuff going on in the visual 925 00:51:26,160 --> 00:51:29,160 Speaker 1: processing centers of the brain, just like when you actually 926 00:51:29,200 --> 00:51:32,560 Speaker 1: look at a basketball, uh as when you imagine a basketball, 927 00:51:32,600 --> 00:51:36,080 Speaker 1: how does your brain know that when you are imagining 928 00:51:36,080 --> 00:51:39,120 Speaker 1: a basketball, you're not really seeing one. Clearly, there can 929 00:51:39,120 --> 00:51:42,920 Speaker 1: be cases where that that reality testing fails. And this 930 00:51:42,920 --> 00:51:45,319 Speaker 1: would be like you imagine seeing something and then you 931 00:51:45,360 --> 00:51:48,919 Speaker 1: think it's really there. This is you know, I think 932 00:51:48,920 --> 00:51:51,759 Speaker 1: what's generally accepted to happen in psychosis is like your 933 00:51:52,040 --> 00:51:55,680 Speaker 1: your reality testing fails in the line between what is 934 00:51:55,719 --> 00:52:00,360 Speaker 1: imagined and what is perceived as reality breaks and this 935 00:52:00,400 --> 00:52:03,720 Speaker 1: of course, applies yet to dreams as well. Grant's pointed 936 00:52:03,760 --> 00:52:08,359 Speaker 1: out that during dreams are reality testing is effectively switched off, 937 00:52:08,719 --> 00:52:13,720 Speaker 1: so we simply have experiences. We don't have beliefs about experiences, 938 00:52:13,800 --> 00:52:17,360 Speaker 1: which was interesting. I I don't think i'd ever you know, 939 00:52:17,400 --> 00:52:19,719 Speaker 1: certainly we've covered dreams in the nature of dreams and 940 00:52:19,760 --> 00:52:22,160 Speaker 1: thoughts about dreams in the show before, but I don't 941 00:52:22,160 --> 00:52:25,520 Speaker 1: think I've ever heard it put so succinctly before. Yeah. Well, 942 00:52:25,560 --> 00:52:28,120 Speaker 1: I think we have talked about the idea that in dreams, 943 00:52:28,160 --> 00:52:32,799 Speaker 1: clearly critical thinking is reduced. Yes, yes, definitely that that 944 00:52:32,880 --> 00:52:36,040 Speaker 1: seems to be an extremely common feature of dream cognition, 945 00:52:36,360 --> 00:52:39,560 Speaker 1: and not just the kind of deliberate, effortful critical thinking 946 00:52:39,600 --> 00:52:41,560 Speaker 1: that you do when you're like, okay, and I'm trying 947 00:52:41,560 --> 00:52:44,040 Speaker 1: to understand is there a problem with this scientific claim 948 00:52:44,120 --> 00:52:47,960 Speaker 1: or something. I mean, the normal automatic critical thinking that 949 00:52:48,000 --> 00:52:51,320 Speaker 1: we do that forms the basis of our intuitive reality testing, 950 00:52:51,360 --> 00:52:54,240 Speaker 1: even that is sort of turned off sometimes in dreams, 951 00:52:54,440 --> 00:52:58,000 Speaker 1: or at least greatly diminished. Yeah, it's the kind of 952 00:52:58,000 --> 00:52:59,840 Speaker 1: statement that makes me feel better about being such a 953 00:53:00,040 --> 00:53:02,279 Speaker 1: horrible lucid dreamer. Not that I put in a lot 954 00:53:02,280 --> 00:53:05,239 Speaker 1: of work on it. But I have frequently noticed that 955 00:53:05,800 --> 00:53:08,080 Speaker 1: at times, the rare times where I feel like I 956 00:53:08,120 --> 00:53:11,560 Speaker 1: could have lucid dreamed, I clearly didn't have it in me. 957 00:53:11,800 --> 00:53:15,320 Speaker 1: Like I just fell right back into into just experiencing 958 00:53:15,560 --> 00:53:18,719 Speaker 1: and certainly not having any beliefs or thoughts about the experience. 959 00:53:18,800 --> 00:53:22,040 Speaker 1: This is so embarrassing. I'm such a dream loser. I've 960 00:53:22,080 --> 00:53:25,759 Speaker 1: probably told you this before, but a very common experience 961 00:53:25,800 --> 00:53:28,840 Speaker 1: I have in dreams is stopping in the middle of 962 00:53:28,880 --> 00:53:33,560 Speaker 1: a dream and thinking, hold on a second, I'm dreaming 963 00:53:33,680 --> 00:53:37,000 Speaker 1: right now, right is this a dream? And then in 964 00:53:37,040 --> 00:53:41,000 Speaker 1: the dream I try to pursue that question and interrogate it, 965 00:53:41,320 --> 00:53:45,080 Speaker 1: and then I, invariably every single time, end up concluding no, 966 00:53:45,400 --> 00:53:52,000 Speaker 1: this is definitely real. Uh See, I've had I've probably 967 00:53:52,000 --> 00:53:55,040 Speaker 1: shared this before too. I'll have experiences where I'm dreaming, 968 00:53:55,160 --> 00:53:57,400 Speaker 1: I realized I'm dreaming, and then I just click it 969 00:53:57,520 --> 00:53:59,319 Speaker 1: right back off again, and then I just fall right 970 00:53:59,320 --> 00:54:01,319 Speaker 1: back into the dream. I had that moment where I 971 00:54:01,400 --> 00:54:05,000 Speaker 1: was like raising my my head above the waters, and 972 00:54:05,120 --> 00:54:07,640 Speaker 1: I could concede like that seems the time to take 973 00:54:07,680 --> 00:54:10,520 Speaker 1: the reins of of the dream and and then engage 974 00:54:10,520 --> 00:54:12,600 Speaker 1: in lucid dreaming. But I don't. I just fall right 975 00:54:12,640 --> 00:54:15,080 Speaker 1: back underwater. This is funny. So we've got similar things 976 00:54:15,160 --> 00:54:17,759 Speaker 1: going on, actually, except I just like I address it 977 00:54:17,800 --> 00:54:22,800 Speaker 1: more head on and still fail. By the way, Grande 978 00:54:22,920 --> 00:54:25,719 Speaker 1: is the author of the Measure of Madness, Philosophy and 979 00:54:25,760 --> 00:54:28,960 Speaker 1: Cognitive Neuropsychiatry, which was published by m T Press if 980 00:54:29,000 --> 00:54:31,960 Speaker 1: anybody wants to to look up more of their work. 981 00:54:32,120 --> 00:54:36,080 Speaker 1: But uh, in general, though, just about the connection between 982 00:54:36,120 --> 00:54:38,719 Speaker 1: deja vu and dreams, I guess it's gonna be the 983 00:54:38,760 --> 00:54:41,319 Speaker 1: next episode of Stuff to Blow your mind where we'll 984 00:54:41,360 --> 00:54:45,040 Speaker 1: definitely touch on on some studies related to that, but 985 00:54:45,080 --> 00:54:47,760 Speaker 1: then we'll also get into really some of the core 986 00:54:48,239 --> 00:54:52,719 Speaker 1: theories regarding that the true nature of deja vu itself. Yeah, 987 00:54:52,800 --> 00:54:55,960 Speaker 1: next time we're gonna explore scientific theories that have tried 988 00:54:56,000 --> 00:54:59,600 Speaker 1: to explain why the brain creates the feeling of deja vu, 989 00:54:59,680 --> 00:55:02,839 Speaker 1: what comes from, and we'll look into dreams, we'll look 990 00:55:02,880 --> 00:55:06,520 Speaker 1: into anxiety and more. I think it's gonna be very fun. Yeah, 991 00:55:06,560 --> 00:55:09,080 Speaker 1: and certainly feel free to reach out to us in 992 00:55:09,120 --> 00:55:11,400 Speaker 1: the meantime, knowing, of course that there's about to be 993 00:55:11,440 --> 00:55:14,440 Speaker 1: another episode where we'll we'll probably answer some of your 994 00:55:14,520 --> 00:55:16,960 Speaker 1: questions but hey, maybe not. Uh So it's always good 995 00:55:17,000 --> 00:55:19,359 Speaker 1: to hear from you either way. In the meantime, if 996 00:55:19,400 --> 00:55:21,320 Speaker 1: you want to check out other episodes to Stuff to 997 00:55:21,320 --> 00:55:23,919 Speaker 1: Blow your Mind, you can find us wherever you find 998 00:55:23,920 --> 00:55:27,320 Speaker 1: your podcasts, wherever that happens to be. Just support the 999 00:55:27,360 --> 00:55:31,160 Speaker 1: show by rating, reviewing, and subscribing, uh though. That's the 1000 00:55:31,440 --> 00:55:34,200 Speaker 1: trinity of actions that help our show out. And if 1001 00:55:34,200 --> 00:55:36,160 Speaker 1: you just go to stuff to Blow your Mind dot com, 1002 00:55:36,160 --> 00:55:38,640 Speaker 1: that will shoot you to the I heart listing for 1003 00:55:38,800 --> 00:55:41,440 Speaker 1: our show where you can basically do all three of 1004 00:55:41,480 --> 00:55:44,319 Speaker 1: those things as well. Hughes. Thanks as always to our 1005 00:55:44,400 --> 00:55:47,839 Speaker 1: excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson, who, again I just 1006 00:55:47,840 --> 00:55:51,040 Speaker 1: want to emphasize, has been doing really heroic work while 1007 00:55:51,280 --> 00:55:53,200 Speaker 1: Robert and I and all of us are trying to 1008 00:55:53,200 --> 00:55:56,239 Speaker 1: work from home and do social distancing. Uh. Seth has 1009 00:55:56,239 --> 00:56:00,840 Speaker 1: helped us figure out all manner of gear stuff, closet stuff, 1010 00:56:00,880 --> 00:56:03,440 Speaker 1: and then today I couldn't even understand why my microphone 1011 00:56:03,560 --> 00:56:05,920 Speaker 1: wasn't working for the first half hour we tried this, 1012 00:56:05,960 --> 00:56:09,040 Speaker 1: So thank you, Seth. Thank you Seth. Uh. If you 1013 00:56:09,040 --> 00:56:11,000 Speaker 1: would like to get in touch with us with feedback 1014 00:56:11,040 --> 00:56:13,799 Speaker 1: on this episode or any other to suggest something for 1015 00:56:13,840 --> 00:56:16,400 Speaker 1: the future, or just to say Hi, let's know how 1016 00:56:16,440 --> 00:56:19,319 Speaker 1: you found out about the show, what's going on with you, 1017 00:56:19,400 --> 00:56:22,120 Speaker 1: whatever it is, you can email us at contact at 1018 00:56:22,160 --> 00:56:32,319 Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow your Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow 1019 00:56:32,360 --> 00:56:34,920 Speaker 1: Your Mind is production of I Heart Radio. For more 1020 00:56:34,920 --> 00:56:37,520 Speaker 1: podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app, 1021 00:56:37,719 --> 00:56:49,239 Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you're listening to your favorite shows.