Comment by nprateem

I'm personally comfortable accepting that people have experiences that aren't explained by mainstream science, and I know at least one person who says they can see auras, a person who is very dear to me. But I also know it's best not to sneer at people who aren't familiar with those experiences, as it serves only to anger and alienate people.

> Anyway cue the downvotes from the overly analytical people here

This breaks these guidelines:

Please don't fulminate. Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community.

Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents. Omit internet tropes.

Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading.

I know it can be upsetting to face hostility when sharing experiences and concepts that are deeply meaningful to you, but let's try and avoid taunting people like this. When it's predictable that a comment will attract downvotes, it's an indication that there might be a better way to express things.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

I can see colors on the periphery of my vision when black contrast with white too, and it is just... chromatic aberration from my glasses. Does not happen in a detectable level with my contacts.

What you experience as perception happens inside the brain, it's inherently deceptive. With suggestive practice you can teach your brain to 'perceive' all sorts of things that to you appear as real as any other perception.

One way to study this is to shut off the neural channels for external stimuli with NMDA-antagonists or isolating the entire body, you'll experience immersive perceptions, including visions. Falling for various degrees of decoration your brain provides spontaneously or has been trained to provide is foundational to many religious and mystical currents throughout history. Some of them consider not falling for at least some of these things to be the basic exercise of their regimes, e.g. non-reaction to mental phenomena in Goenka's vipassana or time-locked prayer as in canonical hours and islamic prayer.

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