Deja vu

There is already so much information about this phenomenon that my blog on this is undoubtedly redundant. However, I presume that this might be of some use to people who have accidentally tripped over to visit my blogpage AND (as in logical operator) have never ever tried to delve into this not so important topic.

Dictionary.com (Sorry!! I don't own an Oxford's concise any more) states it as "The illusion of having previously experienced something actually being encountered for the first time".

The Thesaurus.com manages to extricate just one alternate term for this, namely - illusion. Since, it already involves the term 'illusion' in it, it rules out the option of this being an actual possibilty. Hence, I formally do not approve of this definition.

Though a staggering 70% of the people in this world have experienced this, it was not until 1876 years after the birth of Christ added to the years before them, that Dr.Emile Boirac coined this term. There are an astounding 40 theories, excluding those of mine (a fraction of which are mentioned in this blog) have been propounded by famous psychologists including the god, Sigmund Freud (of whom I am a big fan).

So what is deja vu exactly? The theories broadly fall into two categories, the scientific ones (rational and meaningful) and the spiritual (no comments) ones. In order to warm up, and also to avoid the reader from veering away from this page, let us begin with the latter. Let me remind, before we begin, that none of these have my support. Nevertheless, I have gone through the painful task of browsing through them, just for the sake of completeness. The first one (not necessarily the most important) is the one regarding reincarnation. All those souls with unfinished business, which otherwise should have been ghosts, are reborn in this torturous world to experience deja vu. For further details, I suggest you watch 'Karan Arjun' and 'Sooryavanshi'.

Another theory, which is slightly more palatable is one involving the mismatch of timing between the spirit and the self. Much like a pirated movie disc where the scenes and voices don't match. According to this theory the spirit visits the space ahead of the self. One more theory goes like this: these are messages in the form of visions from god. By God, the world is really not doing very well even with the so many visionaries around.

Lets, quickly jump over to the rationality. Most of these are adapted from the web and I apologize for not listing references. In most cases the phenomenon was referred to, as a psychological disorder. I bet it is neither fatal, not hereditary and in no way a threat to the society. One of them being the mixup of the brain, over the short term and the long term memories. One another being neuronal malfunction. A very convincing theory is about the recording capabilty of visual stimulus of one eye being superior over the other's. However this miserably fails to explain the case of acoustic and sensual deja vu. Apparently, in one of the experiments, the scientist displayed imges the subjects, for subliminally short durations, but long enough for the brain to capture them. In such cases the concious part of the brain does not completely record the image but is able to recollect from its volatile memory, when the image is shown again. The same logic applies to the perceptions of sound.

I myself, in the days of extreme boredom, like the ones I am going through now, have tried to propound theories about certain mysterical phenomena, one of the topics being this. I confess of having such experiences ever since I don't remember, even before my English (Deja vu, however, is a French term) was good enough that I came to know that such a term existed. One very plain and simple reasoning and often a very powerful one when you are cornered, is the 'coincidence technique'. It is highly possible that of all the zillions of imaginations your brain picturises, a handful of them happen to come true.

It is also possible that in an euphoric state of mind the mind percieves what it wants to. Many might have seen religious events or occasins when a devotee jumps out of joy with great vigour beyond their normal capabilities. This is often interpreted as the embodiment of god inside his body. Deja vu could be one of such phenomena.

One another theory of mine, whcih I would henceforth refer to as 'layering' was inspired by Photoshop. Similar to the making of an image layer by layer, the brain at any point of time could superimpose layers of images stored in the long term memory over a long period of time to obtain a unique combination which coincidentally happens to be one the being percieved now. Take for example, you were driving a car sometime and another situation when you have been travelling along the coast, may be walking or in a bus. The next time you drive along a scenic beach, your brain forms a collage of the past two events which may fit close to the current situation.

Before, we close this topic, one extreme bizarre imagination of mine goes like this. This explanation is again, restricted again only to the visual deja vu. Since all that we see at any moment of time are just rays of light. It may happen, in a one in a zillionth probable case that rays from the same x,y,z coordinate escape afer reflections from smooth reflectors, into space and return back after infinite reflections on smooth reflectors back to the same x,y,z coordinate but much ahead in the time coordinate where you are,at the moment. It might seem to you as a vision or day dream, but this place happens to be the same and you experience the feeling which we now call deja vu. Totally unacceptable, to the extent that the spiritual explanations may seem more true, but, still rational.

Like many other blogs of mine, this one again comes with a disclaimer: The theories which I claim to be mine are originally mine. It is highly possible that alike thinkers have published these independently, but is unfortunately not to my knowledge. Kindly, ignore this 'act of coincidence'.