Deeper into the neuroscience of hypnosis
Trends in Cognitive Sciences explores how cognitive neuroscientists are becoming increasingly interested in understanding hypnosis and are using it to simulate unusual states of consciousness in the lab.
Hypnosis was typically treated with suspicion by mainstream cognitive science, although an important turning point came when a 2000 study demonstrated that people hypnotised to see colour on grey panels showed activity in the colour perception areas of the brain.
Myths about hypnosis are still common, but it is nothing more than a participant’s willing engagement in a process of suggestion. The hypnotic induction, sterotypically the counting backwards and the ‘you are feeling sleepy’ patter, helps but is not necessary.
The Amaz!ng Meeting: London, and The Skeptic Magazine relaunch
Over at the Skeptic they have warned me that tickets for TAM (The Amazing Meeting) go on sale today. Also the magazine has re-launched - they say:
To mark the last 21 years of Britain’s foremost sceptical magazine, we are relaunching in an expanded format with a series of new columnists, interviews with notable individuals, and a very highly respected editorial board.
The New Mozart
A blind five-year-old pianist from South Korea has stunned the music world after a video of her performance received more than 27million hits.
Yoo Ye-eun, who was born blind and adopted in 2002, has never had a formal piano lesson but can play any song after just one listen.
And now her remarkable talent is set to propel her to stardom as clips of her amazing performance have attracted millions of viewers to Korean website Pandora TV. A similar clip on YouTube has so far received two million hits.
Her display on ‘Star King’, a Korean talent show, earned the youngster £500 in prize money and moved the studio audience to tears.
Jun Labo – Psychic Surgeon
“Jun was born on 23 December 1934 in Dagupan City in Pangasinan, Philippines. His parents belonged to the “Union Espiritista Christiana de Filipinas” (a spiritualist church that has taught numerous healers in the Philippines). Jun’s mother was a psychic dentist and she forced Jun to go to church on Sundays. Jun was not keen on spending part of his Sunday in church and used to sneak out to play with his friends.
One Sunday, he became paralysed during a church ceremony. In a state of shock and with fear, he witnessed his first apparition of Jesus. This was Jun’s first encounter with Jesus who was to become one of his spirit guides for all healing.
His first healing experience came when he was accompanying his mother on a religious walk. One woman collapsed and Jun instinctively began rubbing her chest. Blood spurted out and Jun ran away in fear. The crowd brought him back and asked him to finish the healing. Jun carried on rubbing the woman’s chest and she fully recovered.
In order to find out the condition of a patient, Jun holds a sheet in front of the patient and uses it as a form of psychic x-ray. Through it, he is able to see spots inside the patient’s body. If the spots are dark, then the disease is serious (location and number of tumours are shown to him). If the spots are bright, it is not so serious.”
Is Free Will an Illusion?
You may think you decided to read this story — but in fact, your brain made the decision long before you knew about it.
In a study published Sunday in Nature Neuroscience, researchers using brain scanners could predict people’s decisions seven seconds before the test subjects were even aware of making them.
The decision studied — whether to hit a button with one’s left or right hand — may not be representative of complicated choices that are more integrally tied to our sense of self-direction. Regardless, the findings raise profound questions about the nature of self and autonomy: How free is our will? Is conscious choice just an illusion?
Teller’s House
Drive up to Teller’s compound on the outskirts of town, and you’re immediately greeted by the sound of his voice over the gate intercom. Catch Teller at his homestead, and behold a chatty, erudite prankster who lives in his own personal romper room.
Did we mention the house has multiple mirrors, hidden doors, screaming tables and one talking bear sculpture who plays card tricks on visitors?
Hybrid Images
Look at the picture above and you see Albert Einstein. Now walk across the room. Suddenly, he morphs into Marilyn Monroe. Trippy, right? Aude Oliva, an associate professor of cognitive science at MIT, uses images like this one to study how our brains make sense of sight.
Our eyes pick up resolutions with both high spatial frequencies (sharp lines) and low ones (blurred shapes). By blending the high frequencies from one picture with the lows from another, Oliva creates images that change as a function of distance and time—allowing her to parse how humans absorb visual information. Turns out that we perceive coarse features quickly, within the first 30 milliseconds, and then home in on details at around 100 milliseconds. We also focus on the higher frequencies close up and register softer shapes from afar.
You can find further Hybrid Images here
Blackpool
At last, useable wi-fi has returned. I’m ashamed at how lost I am without it. My Macbook Air, crushed in a Coopie skateboarding-accident after a Nottingham show, has been gasping for action.
First night in Blackpool was great – after Harrogate’s tricky venue it was nice to be in a theatre – the Opera House of the faded, extraordinary Winter Gardens. That first night felt like the best show yet on tour, and afterwards some lovely people at stage door. Thank you Rich, Rob, Mark and Russ.
Wolverhampton’s first audience was hysterical: anyone there will have delighted in the first couple of people who were used in the front row, while I tried to get the first routine underway. One of them sat and grumpily stared at me for most of the show. Brilliant. The second night everyone was a bit more on the ball, and the show was rather good. The second night in Blackpool was lovely – I forgot a few little moments in the first half but the second was great.
We now have – can I hear angels? – a few days off. When I am home with my better connection I shall post some videos of us tired and silly in the Novotel bar.
Ta-ta for now. Phone’s off the hook and I’m switching all the lights off. I’m not in, go away.
x
