Unfortunately I can't post them here in their entirety, but here's the abstracts:
Ganzfeld-induced hallucinatory experience, its phenomenology and cerebral electrophysiology
Abstract
Ganzfeld, i.e., exposure to an unstructured, uniform stimulation field, elicits in most observers pseudo-hallucinatory percepts, and may even induce global functional state changes (‘altered states of consciousness’). The present paper gives a comprehensive overview of the phenomenology of subjective experience in the ganzfeld and its electrophysiological correlates. Laboratory techniques for visual or multi-modal ganzfeld induction are explained. The spectrum of ganzfeld-induced phenomena, ranging from elementary percepts to complex, vivid, dream-like imagery is described, and the latter illustrated by transcripts of subjects' reports. Similarities and differences to related sensory/perceptual phenomena are also discussed. Earlier findings on electrophysiological correlates of the ganzfeld are reviewed. Our own studies of electroencephalographic (EEG) activity in the ganzfeld are presented in some detail, and a re-analysis of data on EEG correlates of hallucinatory percepts in statu nascendi is reported. The results do not support the hypothesis of the hypnagogic origin of the percepts; the ganzfeld-induced steady-state is an activated state, and the spectral EEG dynamics in the alpha frequency range reveals processes of attention shifts and percept formation. The final section is devoted to the controversial topic of allegedly anomalous communication between human subjects (‘ganzfeld telepathy’). It is shown that the use of ganzfeld in this research field relies partly on unsupported hypotheses concerning ganzfeld-induced states, partly on a weak conceptual background of the experimental procedure. The rôle of a particular belief system shared by the participants and experimenters is critically discussed.
Jiří Wackermann, Peter Pütz, Carsten Allefeld
Department of Empirical and Analytical Psychophysics, Institute for Frontier Areas of Psychology and Mental Health, Freiburg i. Br., Germany.
EEG correlates of multimodal ganzfeld induced hallucinatory imagery.
Abstract Multimodal ganzfeld (MMGF) frequently induces dreamlike, pseudo-hallucinatory imagery. The aim of the study was to explore EEG correlates of MMGF-induced imagery. In a screening phase, seven 'high-responders' were selected by frequency and quality of their reported hallucinatory experience in MMGF. Each of these subjects then participated in three MMGF sessions (45 min) with simultaneous 19 channel EEG recordings and indicated occurrences of imagery by pressing a button. Relative spectral power changes during percept formation (30 s preceding subjects' reports) with respect to intra-individual baselines (no-imagery EEG) were analysed. At the beginning of the 30-s 'image formation' period alpha was slightly reduced than in the 'no-imagery' periods. This was followed by increased power in the higher alpha frequency band (10-12 Hz) which then declined in a monotonic fashion. This decline in higher alpha power was accompanied by increased power in the beta frequency bands. Throughout the image formation period there was a steady decline in power of low frequency alpha (8-10 Hz). Correlations between descriptors of subjective experience and EEG power changes were evaluated in terms of their global average magnitude and variability in time. Results indicate that the acceleration of alpha activity is a nonspecific effect of MMGF. In contrast, the tri-phasic profile of faster alpha activity seems to be a specific correlate of the retrieval and transformation of memory content in ganzfeld imagery.
Peter Pütz, MatthiasBraeunig, Jiří Wackermann
Department of Empirical and Analytical Psychophysics, Institute for Frontier Areas of Psychology, Wilhemstrasse 3a, D-79098 Freiburg i. Br., Germany.
There was nothing very interesting in Katherine P. Rankin’s study of sarcasm — at least, nothing worth your important time. All she did was use an M.R.I. to find the place in the brain where the ability to detect sarcasm resides. But then, you probably already knew it was in the right parahippocampal gyrus.
What you may not have realized is that perceiving sarcasm, the smirking put-down that buries its barb by stating the opposite, requires a nifty mental trick that lies at the heart of social relations: figuring out what others are thinking. Those who lose the ability, whether through a head injury or the frontotemporal dementias afflicting the patients in Dr. Rankin’s study, just do not get it when someone says during a hurricane, “Nice weather we’re having.”
Michael Persinger is a neuropsychologist at Canada's Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ontario. His theory is
that the sensation described as "having a religious experience" is merely a side effect of our bicameral brain's
feverish activities. He has attempted to create experiments to show that when the right hemisphere of the brain
is stimulated in the cerebral region presumed to control notions of self, and then the left hemisphere is called
upon to make sense of this nonexistent entity, the mind generates what is felt as a 'sensed presence.'
Many of Persinger's studies detail the reactions that people have when their temporal lobes are stimulated with complex magnetic fields. Some of the subjects experience a 'sensed presence' in the form of the deity from the culture that they were raised in. They see the God (or spirits associated with their God - the Virgin Mary, Mohammed, etc) that they believe in. Others have had experiences that mimic the feeling that one would have during alien/UFO visitation - these people tend to be more agnostic.
In 2003 the BBC arranged for Prof. Richard Dawkins to be a subject in one of Persinger's experiments.
There are sites on the net that claim to teach the ability, there's an International Remote Viewing Association that even has conferences (there's one starting on October 19th, apparently), the US government has funded research in it (in the 1970's), we've even had customers buy our mind machines to help them with remote viewing and claim great success. I've never had any type of experiences that are anything like remote viewing - and I'm not sure that I believe that it is even possible - but I'm open to the idea.
What is it? I think a simple explanation for it is just the ability for an individual to descibe locations not yet visited. The CIA and the US Army spent millions of dollars on researching remote viewing and other parapsychological activities and dubbed it 'Star Gate'. They began the program in 1970 (then called SCANATE - good thing they changed the name to something that sounded cooler) at the Stanford Research Institute in Menlo Park, Ca. This program continued in different forms using both soldiers and civilians who were believed to posess natural psychic abilities for over 24 years.
The remote viewing program was shut down by the CIA in 1994 because they were convinced that remote viewing was of no practical value to the intelligence community.
What is a sketpic supposed to believe? (That's a trick question) There is so much controversy surrounding the people in these programs, the programs themselves, the data from the programs, etc etc etc - that there really isn't anything to go off of. Unfortunately there have been no peer reviewed studies that prove that remote viewing is a reality. darn. Research the links below and see what you think.
Tor Wagner from Columbia University (and colleagues) used an fMRI study to what parts of the brain are activated when patients experience the placebo effect.
Click here to listen to an audio recording of Wagner discussion the team's findings.
Prof. Olaf Blanke and his colleagues from the Laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience at EPFL in Switzerland have been doing research on the neural-correlates of out-of-body-experiences since at least 2002. This new study is very unusual, as they claim to be able to produce an out-of-body-experience when the user of special goggles is shown a projected image of themselves while being poked with a stick.
Out-of-body experiences are most common in people who endure intense meditation practices, experience sleep paralysis, and following certain types of head injuries. Research such as this strives to discover exactly how the brain creates the out-of-body-experience sensation.
It is arguable whether these experiencies re-produce bona-fide NBE's, but it is an interesting effect nonetheless.
NewScientist just posted a video to YouTube featuring Olaf's group inducing out-of-body-experiences:
The New York Times just published an
article in their science section about 'priming effects'.
Psychological priming happens when subconscious stimuli can affect
our conscious choices. They discuss a few experiments, related
neuroscience research and more.
Neuropsychology 
