Saturday, February 27, 2016

Déjà Vu


Image courtesy of messagetoeagle.com
We’ve all been there, that random sudden spur of the moment when we think to ourselves … I’ve been here before. Or that oh so eerie feeling of familiarity that you can’t quite grasp. Yup, Déjà vu has happened to all of us at least once in our lives. I can remember my first time like it was yesterday. I was going to my friends 8th birthday party. The party was held at a park in a city that I have never been to. Once I arrived to the park, that was my first time … boom … I had a sudden realization that I had seen this scene from somewhere … was it in a dream? from the TV? Nope, years later I realized that it was just Déjà vu.

So we’ve all felt it, but no one really knows what it is? Is it clairvoyance, some kind of religious or voodoo magic? Well, no one is sure yet. Psychoanalysts state that, "déjà vu occurs and is firmly associated with “temporal lobe epilepsy”. Individuals have a strong sense of déjà vu during, before, or in between seizures or episodes" (Science). This can be translated as, for those of us who do not have epilepsy, it may just be a neural misfiring in which the neurons in the hippocampus transmit signals at random (Lallanilla). The hippocampus is part of the brain that manages our short- and long-term memories. This would make sense that a misfire would cause even the healthiest of individuals to have a confusion of memory and create a false sense of familiarity.
Image courtesy of epilepsyu.com

Although there are many other theories and hypotheses, no one is clear on why this phenomenon occurs. Just like sleep paralysis and other weird phenomena, déjà vu might just be better left as a mystery. Next time when you have déjà vu remember, it could just be misfiring of neurons, some mystical premonition, or just a seizure, let’s just hope it isn’t the last of the three.







Works Cited

Lallanilla, Marc. What Is Déjà Vu? . 18 July 2013. 27 Febraury 2016. <http://www.livescience.com/38280-what-is-deja-vu.html>.
Science. What is déjà vu. n.d. 27 Febraury 2016. <http://science.howstuffworks.com/science-vs-myth/extrasensory-perceptions/question657.htm>.

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6 comments:

  1. Sulekha RamayyaFebruary 27, 2016 at 7:22 PM

    Very interesting! When I was a child, I use to think of Deja vu as one of the scariest yet amazing things...it was kinda like a super power. Although I love finding out why things happen the way they do, I think that some things are better left a mystery.

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  2. UnknownFebruary 27, 2016 at 10:03 PM

    I just hope you don't get a Deja Vu about your ex, Tim.

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  3. UnknownFebruary 28, 2016 at 12:38 PM

    Never knew that these were the reasons fro déja vu...super interesting post!

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  4. UnknownFebruary 28, 2016 at 10:03 PM

    I've always found Deja Vu to be an interesting topic, and I never fully understood the reasons for it. I really liked your post!

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  5. UnknownFebruary 29, 2016 at 12:20 AM

    I remember how I used to be troubled by Deja vu when I was younger. Your post makes me throwback to this childhood mystery. This is super interesting, Tim!

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  6. Tiffany LeeFebruary 29, 2016 at 1:00 AM

    This was an interesting read! The spontaneous firing of neurons theory does make some sense. I definitely will keep that in mind the next time I have a deja vu!

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