What exactly is deja vu?

Question

Whats your opinion?

Answer 1

The term déjà vu is French and means, literally, "already seen." Those who have experienced the feeling describe it as an overwhelming sense of familiarity with something that shouldn't be familiar at all. Say, for example, you are traveling to England for the first time. You are touring a cathedral, and suddenly it seems as if you have been in that very spot before. Or maybe you are having dinner with a group of friends, discussing some current political topic, and you have the feeling that you've already experienced this very thing -- same friends, same dinner, same topic.

The phenomenon is rather complex, and there are many different theories as to why déjà vu happens. Swiss scholar Arthur Funkhouser suggests that there are several "déjà experiences" and asserts that in order to better study the phenomenon, the nuances between the experiences need to be noted. In the examples mentioned above, Funkhouser would describe the first incidence as déjà visité ("already visited") and the second as déjà vecu ("already experienced or lived through").

As much as 70 percent of the population reports having experienced some form of déjà vu. A higher number of incidents occurs in people 15 to 25 years old than in any other age group.

Déjà vu has been firmly associated with temporal-lobe epilepsy. Reportedly, déjà vu can occur just prior to a temporal-lobe epileptic attack. People suffering an epileptic seizure of this kind can experience déjà vu during the actual seizure activity or in the moments between convulsions.

Since déjà vu occurs in individuals with and without a medical condition, there is much speculation as to how and why this phenomenon happens. Several psychoanalysts attribute déjà vu to simple fantasy or wish fulfillment, while some psychiatrists ascribe it to a mismatching in the brain that causes the brain to mistake the present for the past. Many parapsychologists believe it is related to a past-life experience. Obviously, there is more investigation to be done.

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As for my opinion, I am with the parapsychologists in that I think it is related to a past-life experience.

Answer 2

Those who have experienced the feeling describe it as an overwhelming sense of familiarity with something that shouldn't be familiar at all.
Here is a hypothetical example of Deja Vu, assuming that you are not an Eskimo! On your first trip EVER to some desolate village in northern Alaska, you are invited into an igloo. The moment you are inside, and see everything, you suddenly feel that you "already knew" where everything was. You obviously could not have known, but you have an instantaneous sensation that you "must have already been there" even though you know that was impossible.
In order for it to be a credible Deja vu experience, it needs to be some experience that is clearly different from any forgotten memory you might have had, which generally means something truly surprising. Also, since, by definition, there can be no external confirmation of a Deja vu experience, no one else could possible know and there are no actual evidence, it turns out that "credible" Deja vu experiences have only been believed when the witness had a character that was beyond any question.

Answer 3

"Deja Vu" is french for "already seen". What most people call deja vu is actually deja vecu - meaning "already done".

Scientific studies into phenomena like this are starting to show that it is an anomoly of the memory system. Perhaps an event of an experience is filed into the long-term memory and short-term memory at the same time (overlapping), which makes the subject feel as though he's experienced the events beforehand.

Answer 4

personally, I believe that when we have a deja-vu, we are just catching up to - physically - what we thought of mentally.
Say you have a dream of meeting a teacher you haven't seen in ten years, and then a week later, it actually happens. This is how I think it happens. I've had episodes like this and since I'm not a scientist, this the only possible explanation I have.
Now, the question is: Why did I have that dream in the first place? My friends and I were talking about this: One day I said I knew I was going to have a bad day. Well, it happened, and it was a REALLY bad day! Now, did I have a premonition? Or did I curse myself? Did I foresee, or did I somehow tap into a hidden power of universal persuasion, meaning I somehow created a bad myself, bending the forces surrounding me?

Answer 5

Though the above answers explain it well I'd like to add a bit.

It is when you have a feeling you've lived through the experience before... that is deja vu.

Meanwhile, scientists feel that sometimes one eye is seeing something before the other eye. So the message to the brain is there from one eye first - and then from the other - giving that sensation of -- you guessed it - deja vu.

Answer 6

Deja vu is when an event repeats itself, or at least it seems that way. It could be caused by a number of things but the most common is that you had a similar experience.

Answer 7

De ja vu is the experience of being someplace and feeling like you've been there before even though you know you've never been there, or of experiencing a conversation or sequence of events that you know have never happened before as if they have.

Answer 8

DEJA VU is when you go somewhere ,and you haven't been there. but the place seems so familiar to you. it's happened to me before,it's kind of creepy!!

Answer 9

Main Entry: dé·jà vu
Function: noun
Pronunciation: "dA-"zhä-'vü, dA-zh[a'] -vu
Etymology: French, adjective, literally, already seen
1 a : the illusion of remembering scenes and events when experienced for the first time b : a feeling that one has seen or heard something before
2 : something overly or unpleasantly familiar

Answer 10

it's like a dream or or vision of something or somewhere. and then you find yourself doing the exact same thing or you find yourself in the exact same place, that's deja vu.