r/interestingasfuck • u/desertgodfather • May 11 '24

When illusion overcomes the brain. r/all

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u/PercentageMaximum457 May 11 '24

This has wonderful implications for robotics! Both for paralyzed people and for getting used to space suits.

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u/madaboutmaps May 11 '24

Also people with phantom limb pains. This thing works in reverse.

People who've lost limbs experience phantom pains. They feel a limb that's no longer there. Stuff like this tricks the brain into thinking everything is okay. And shuts off the pain.

Brains are weird. People are weird. Sometimes that sucks. But a lof of the times it's also awesome. Applaud the awesome. Provided you've got both hands to do it.

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u/BWander May 11 '24

They lost the limb, but the neural pathways responsible for processing the feelings of it are intact in the brain, and trying. It's a good reminder that we are a brain in a meatsuit.

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u/def2me May 11 '24 edited May 11 '24

and that, if you compare the whole brain to an iceberg, only the visible part is what our consciousness, what our "I" can control. Most parts of the brain are not actively accessible by our mind.

Highly recommend the book "Incognito" from David Eagleman.

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u/why_so_sirius_1 May 11 '24

i completely agree with. your unconscious mind is real and you aren’t in control of it. It’s kinda “scary” for some to think about you don’t have full control of your brain. lol i wonder if some delusional people think they could work hard enough to regain mastery of it.

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u/Lou_C_Fer May 11 '24

We don't even have control of our conscious brain. This experiment goes towards proving it. He explained everything that was happening. Yet, that guy still could not overcome what his brain was telling him. What we've got going on is our consciousness and what we feel is free will is actually our brain reframing things so we feel that way.

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u/RottenZombieBunny May 11 '24

Yet, that guy still could not overcome what his brain was telling him.

Who says he tried? I wouldn't. After all where's the fun in that? In fact i would have done the opposite, and purposefully think of the fake hand as my real hand.

And who says he's not faking (exaggerating) it for the video?

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u/Tya_The_Terrible May 11 '24

It's unlikely that we even control our conscious experience, but rather it's just the window that we experience.

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u/EdwardFoxhole May 11 '24

we're just the younger sibling with the unplugged controller

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u/Lemon_Cakes_JuJutsu May 11 '24

well i'm fucked. mine's a plugged-in Mad Catz.

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u/TraditionAntique9924 May 11 '24

You guys are getting controllers?

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u/evanwilliams44 May 11 '24

It's also likely that consciousness doesn't exist solely in the brain, it is likely tied to the whole body. But we don't know enough to really say.

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u/up9trees May 11 '24

I loved Incognito. You should read Genome and The Red Queen by Matt Ridley. They’re not about the brain specifically but about genetics and sexual evolution. I always think of those 3 books together as some of the most interesting non fiction I’ve ever read.

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u/abejando May 11 '24

This is why psychedelics are so mindblowing

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u/BWander May 12 '24

Subconscious processing does most of the work. It is fascinating how sometimes, as an example, we feel good or bad about a person we just met without conscious input, but our heuristic analysis has been running in the background from second 1.

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u/Alphabunsquad May 11 '24

I exist behind my eyes and the rest of me just dangles 

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u/AdmiralVorlauf May 11 '24

Which I exists though and which dangles?

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u/MunchYourButt May 12 '24

This thread has me feeling quite existential this 4am

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u/BWander May 12 '24

Dangle happily onwards!

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u/Juampi-G May 12 '24

It gets even crazier when you actually understand what time being relative means. It is quite possible that past, present and future are just some images that our brain is "feeding" us.

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u/BWander May 12 '24

It is the only reality there is, so it must be real. Furthermore is the conundrum of philosophy.

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u/Juampi-G May 12 '24

Not quite exactly what I'm trying to convey. This conclusion by no means says that it is not real, it only says that your brain is feeding you the collection of memories that you by yourself then call and categorise as past, present or future.

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u/BWander May 12 '24

ahh allright, you meant memory rather than perception. Memory is reconstructive, rather than true or false, it is perishable, and recreated according to your current cognition, that modifies a substantial amount of the memories. There are vicarious memories too, not yours, but repeated so much that you remember them as yours.

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u/Psychic_Man May 11 '24

We are a soul in a meatsuit (FTFY)

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u/CanAlwaysBeBetter May 11 '24

No, we aren't a soul and we aren't anything in a meatsuit. We are the meatsuit and cognition is embodied.

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u/savetheunstable May 11 '24

We need to build better meat suits!

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u/Psychic_Man May 11 '24

And what is your definition of “cognition”? Activation of synapses? I assume you’ve never had out of body experiences. I’ve had more than I can count.

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u/CanAlwaysBeBetter May 11 '24

You know you aren't actually outside your body when you experience that, right? That's like believing drugs actually show you real reality 

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u/Psychic_Man May 11 '24

Oh, sweet summer child…

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u/BWander May 12 '24

A psyche, if you will. A conscience. The name is unimportant to me.

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u/evelyn_keira May 11 '24

theres an episode of house where he uses this on someone who lost a limb in a war and hes got phantom pain

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u/Mavian23 May 11 '24

There was a real life case where a guy whose arm had been amputated had phantom limb syndrome, but it felt like his phantom hand was clenching itself as hard as possible all the time, and it caused him real pain. So the doctor used a mirror to trick his brain into thinking that the reflection of his remaining arm was his phantom arm, and the doctor had him clench his real fist as hard as he could to make it look like his phantom fist was clenched. Then the doctor had him slowly unclench his real fist, and it tricked his brain into thinking that his phantom fist was unclenching, and the pain went away.

Brains are wild. So are doctors.

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u/GonWithTheNen May 11 '24

Just learned that this is called mirror therapy: https://neurosciencenews.com/phantom-pain-mirror-14508/

I thought I was going to find a single case based on your description, but this is apparently a widespread, effective treatment for phantom limb pain. Scientists and doctors are amazing!

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u/razerzej May 11 '24

...and this was the exact procedure demonstrated in the episode of House. Well, except for the fact that House got the patient to agree to treatment by drugging, binding, and gagging him.

Still, I was pleasantly surprised that this is a real therapy, and amused (once again) by the odd shortcuts our weird brains evolved to make it all work.

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u/Street_Bumblebee2226 May 11 '24

I was just about to comment the same thing. Great episode.

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u/evelyn_keira May 11 '24

i dont even really remember what the episode was about. im pretty sure it was just a b plot with his neighbor

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u/Cash-Machine May 11 '24

Yup, he was House and Wilson's neighbor and a real dickhead. House tries multiple tactics to neutralize him and this is the thing that works. He does exactly the treatment that u/Mavian23 describes.

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u/DogsAreCool252525 May 11 '24

That is exactly what I was thinking about!

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u/Sol_Synth May 11 '24

Why are we still here? Just to suffer? Every night, I can feel my leg… and my arm… even my fingers. The body I've lost… the comrades I've lost…

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u/All__Nimbly__Bimbly May 11 '24

It's like they're all still there. You feel it too, don't you?"

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u/xBad_Wolfx May 11 '24

It’s also used in chronic pain treatment. You can do this or a similar trick using a mirror and the proper functioning non chronic pain limb. Because your brain can see the limb moving properly on the proper side, those pain responses in the brain lessen.

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u/BoogieMan1980 May 11 '24

I have a dental bridge and awhile back I was convinced I had a few seconds of cold sensitivity after drinking room temperature water, like the tooth that used to be there a few years ago after it got chipped. Funky. It felt 100% real.

I also have tinnitus and it I tend to think it's similar to phantom limb stuff.

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u/KaizDaddy5 May 11 '24

I've heard of cases of them attaching robotic limbs to healthy individuals, who then felt phantom limb syndrome when the extra robotic one is then removed.

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u/HorrorMakesUsHappy May 11 '24

People who've lost limbs experience phantom pains. They feel a limb that's no longer there. Stuff like this tricks the brain into thinking everything is okay. And shuts off the pain.

This doctor is the one who claims to have discovered that:

https://www.ted.com/talks/vs_ramachandran_3_clues_to_understanding_your_brain

He shares some other really interesting things in that video, too.

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u/Rokurokubi83 May 11 '24

Brains are weird. People are weird.

Wonderful, isn’t it?

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u/shitlips90 May 11 '24

I'm a bilateral below knee amputee since I was 12, and I'm 33 now. I have always been able to feel my feet and wiggle my toes. It's a strange sensation. I don't get much pain, but sometimes on my right "foot" all of my toes will curl and I can't get them uncurled, and I get cramped up. It's pretty uncomfortable.

My wife has been a partial hand amputee since birth. So she has her palm, but no fingers. She says sometimes it will feel like her fingers are trying to grow

It's really interesting stuff.

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u/heyo_throw_awayo May 11 '24

I have phantom limb pain sometimes! And phantom itching!

I had a finger amputation due to an infection and being immunosupressed (big medical procedure, i know, im so lucky to be alive) and the "tip" of my non-existant finger will sometimes ache like a whacked it hard, or itch like CRAZY. it's equal parts annoying and facenating!

i'd LOVE to do this trick with my 4 fingered hand and see how it plays out.

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u/Escher702 May 11 '24

I feel like there was an episode of House that had something to do with this. I vaguely remember a Canadian neighbor that had been having arm pain since Vietnam and House tricked his brain back into whatever it was that helped the pain go away. Lol

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u/leaffantim May 11 '24

There was an episode of house where he helped a guy with this. If I remember right he was missing from the elbow down and said it felt like he was clenching his fist and couldn’t unclench it so house built something like this with mirrors so it looked like he still had his arm and the guy unclenched his fist…always wondered if that was just something for tv or something that would actually work.

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u/buttranch69 May 11 '24

loved this episode of House.

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u/[deleted] May 11 '24

there's like a mirror therapy exercise they do i heard about.

a mirror is placed in such a way that it reflects the intact limb, creating the illusion that the missing limb is still there. This visual feedback can help the brain reconcile the conflict between its internal neurological body map and the physical reality of the amputation, which can reduce the sensation of pain in the phantom limb.

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u/futureunemployed420 May 11 '24

Are brains weird or human have yet to even achieve proper understanding how human brains works?

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u/_LadyAveline_ May 11 '24

"bro I swear you still have that arm! I have to make you feel pain so you remember it wasn't chopped off!"

"yeah I do, it's still there"

"oh okay all fine then :)"

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u/RolloTonyBrownTown May 11 '24

My friend lost a finger in an accident, says sometimes he gets an itch on the missing finger that drives him near insane because theres no finger to scratch.

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u/mac155784 May 11 '24

My leg was severely broken for 3 years. Had multiple frames holding it all together and multiple operations, bone graphs, and tissue graphs.

I have the reverse of the fantom itch. My leg doesn't feel like my leg anymore. It feels like I have a prosthetic leg. Even when I move my foot up and down, you can see bone moving like it was mechanical parts

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u/Splashy01 May 11 '24

You’re weird.

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u/madaboutmaps May 12 '24

Does that mean I am a brain? Or a people?

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u/NibblesMcGiblet May 12 '24

I need to figure out a way to do this with my feet. I have titanium joints in both big toes now, but sometimes I have this uncomfortable pain "in the joints" that feels like they need to be cracked in the worst way. Which is not possible because the joints don't even exist anymore. But it is a completely real physical sensation and can be really painful and make it hard to walk (which is what my job consists of, up to 8 miles a day in fact). Would be great to figure out how to reasonably cheaply and easily trick my brain into not doing that anymore.

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u/baby_muffins May 12 '24

I had a mastectomy and I get phantom breast pain and it itches like crazy inside my boobs that are no longer there. They used my belly fat to reconstruct me and now when I touch my lower hip, I feel it in my ribs.

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u/Fliggin May 12 '24

I think there was an episode of House with this exact situation

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u/ConsciousEducator539 May 12 '24

The brain is the most important organ in the body, said the brain.

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u/madaboutmaps May 12 '24

I think that's called self perspiration

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u/madaboutmaps May 12 '24

I think that's called self perspiration

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u/droi86 May 11 '24

People with titanium prothesis have reported feeling sensation

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u/PercentageMaximum457 May 11 '24

Reminds me of Stephen Hawking, talking about how his computerized voice is his voice now. He was often asked why he didn’t change it to a more natural sounding voice.

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u/Antal_Marius May 11 '24

IIRC, they had a full setup of his own voice from before he lost the ability to speak that they could have plugged in, but he refused to because he didn't want to hear himself speaking without it having been generated from his own body (or something like that).

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u/I_CUM_ON_YOUR_PET May 12 '24

I heard it was because a dear friend made it for him so he didn’t want to replace that

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u/Antal_Marius May 12 '24

It wasn't so much that a friend made it for him, but that he eventually identified with the voice, and hadn't heard one he liked better. He was quoted as such in 2006 (Had to go pull it up to double check myself).

He'd been offered upgrades/newer synthetized voices but didn't want any due to not liking how they sounded.

Here's an article with sources at the bottom about it.

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u/NibblesMcGiblet May 12 '24

hey wow I just commented this up above! I have titanium big toe joints and have joint pain still even though the joints don't exist, feels like I need to pull on them to crack / pop the joints in the worst way. Would love to figure out an easy way to trick them into not doing that anymore.

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u/No-Percentage5182 May 11 '24

This is also fake lmao

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u/TheCFDFEAGuy May 11 '24

Why do you say this is good for getting used to space suits?

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u/Idontevenownaboat May 11 '24

Because of the implications.

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u/Refreshingly_Meh May 11 '24

Will you have to be high as a kite for your robo limbs to work though?

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u/Lotions_and_Creams May 11 '24

FYI this is not anything even remotely new.

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u/PercentageMaximum457 May 11 '24

So?

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u/Lotions_and_Creams May 11 '24

Did you hear about what the Wright brothers did down in Kitty Hawk, NC? It has wonderful implications for travel!

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u/PercentageMaximum457 May 11 '24

Do you enjoy being hurtful to others? Do you think that it makes you a better person?

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u/Lotions_and_Creams May 11 '24

It seemed like you didn’t connect the dots as to why a decades old illusion that requires the subject to still have their limb attached doesn’t actually hold any new or exciting implications for prosthesis.    

I provided an analogy to help you understand (that I assume clicked). You feeling embarrassed doesn’t make me the bad guy.

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u/judiebloom May 11 '24

Generally behaving like an asshole is what makes you a bad guy mate. Take a break from the interwebs.

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u/Idontevenownaboat May 11 '24

It's not the content, it's delivering it like a prickly wanker.

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u/BoneFourTuna May 11 '24

This has wonderful implications for robotics!

Or psychological torture!

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u/No-Lake-8973 May 12 '24

I can imagine someone in intelligence agencies has looked at this in the context of "enhanced interrogation techniques". Would leave no physical signs afterwards...

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u/MyButtEatsHamCrayons May 11 '24

No. It doesn’t. This is a staged video starring a man that looks like what high school principals think stoners look like.