A Temporary Brain Disturbance is All You Need

by gail kavanagh

According to Canadian scientist Michael Persinger, believing you have been abducted by aliens or found God is the result of a "temporary brain disturbance".

Persinger has been tinkering with the heads of volunteers, disturbing the electrical activity in the grey matter with magnetic fields.

The volunteers feel as if they have been poked and prodded by alien probes, or they report intense emotional reactions similar to religious ecstacy. Since this phenomena can obviously occur without magnetic interference from mad Canadian scientists, this could explain reports of such abductions. Of course, the brain is mysterious territory. It fills a cavity in our skulls and for the most part makes sure that we know left from right, up from down, and fully comprehend gravity so we don't fall off really tall buildings.

We rely on our brains for a lot of stuff—for being able to see and hear and move and talk and even for being alive. Once the brain shuts down, even a fully functioning heart and other offal is not regarded as evidence of life as we know it.

Our brains formed the word as well as the concept of paranoia. Just because it isn't there, doesn't mean it isn't out to get you. If a tree falls in the forest and there is no one there to see it, can it still flatten your house? But Persinger has taken paranoia to a whole new level. Forget the CIA, the FBI and all those other initials, it's our damn brains we can't trust. Our brains are stuffing us around all over the place. They lie to us, convince us we have been probed by grey guys with radar dish eyes, have spoken to God, met Elvis in the frozen food aisle of the local supermarket, or fallen in love.

That's the dirtiest brain trick of all. If intense feelings are the result of a temporary brain disturbance, then falling in love is quite simply a psychotic disorder.

We are already at the mercy of our hormones and our biological clocks in the mating game as we are prodded into perpetuating the species. But when the object of desire is not chosen for breeding purposes, what then are our sneaky brains up to?

The line between being a "star crossed lover" and a psychotic stalker is already pretty thin. Persinger's experiments have placed the ardent pursuit of love into the category of a short circuit.

Persinger's experiments could undermine thousands of years of silly love songs. How typical of a man to prove emotions are nothing more than TBDs just as we are getting men to wake up to their feminine sides.

It is all very bad news for us sensitive, emotional, feeling souls.

Yesterday I cried, today I hugged someone and said "I love you" and it is all the result of a TBD. I am a crazy mess with a brain sparking like a live wire in a mud puddle.

I haven't been abducted by aliens yet, but it's only a matter of time before my brain convinces me I have.

Bring it on, Brain, I'm ready for you.

Copyright © 2001 Gail Kavanagh. All Rights Reserved.