An out-of-body experience (OBE or sometimes OOBE) is an experience that typically involves a sensation of floating outside one's body and, in some cases, perceiving one's physical body from a place outside one's body (autoscopy).
The term out-of-body experience was introduced in 1943 by George N. M. Tyrrell in his book Apparitions, and was adopted by researchers such as Celia Green and Robert Monroe as an alternative to belief-centric labels such as "astral projection", "soul travel", or "spirit walking". OBEs can be induced by brain traumas, sensory deprivation, near-death experiences, dissociative and psychedelic drugs, dehydration, sleep, and electrical stimulation of certain parts the brain, among others.
Mainstream science considers the OBE a type of hallucination that can be caused by various psychological and neurological factors. Some parapsychologists and occult writers treat OBEs as evidence that a soul, spirit or subtle body can detach itself from the body and visit distant locations.
One in ten people has an out-of-body experience once, or more commonly, several times in his or her life. but scientists still know little about the phenomenon.
Read more about Out-of-body Experience: Studies of OBEs, Astral Projection
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“The novelist ... must live in paranoia and seek to be one with the world; he must be terrified of experience and hungry for it; he must think himself nothing and believe he is superior to all.”
—Norman Mailer (b. 1923)