“I was in bed and about to fall asleep when I had the distinct impression that I was at the ceiling level looking down at my body in the bed. I was very startled and frightened; immediately (afterwards) I felt that I was consciously back in the (body on the) bed again.”1 Out of body experiences, as described by a person here, are characterised by a location of the self (or one's centre of awareness) outside one's body, an impression of seeing the world from an extracorporeal elevated perspective, and an impression of seeing one's own body from this perspective.1^–3 They are striking phenomena because they challenge the experienced spatial unity of self and body—or the experience of a real me that resides in one's body and is the subject of experience and action.4 5 Recent neurological evidence shows that these experiences are related to an interference with the temporo-parietal junction of the brain.

A better understanding of out of body experiences might further our scientific concepts about self and body and …