More on altered states of consciousness

Thanks to Erica Tobolski for sending this one in: scientists have discovered that shed light on the "dissociative" experience many have on drugs including ketamine and PCP, the experience in which a person "feels separated from their own thoughts, feelings and body." The research team was not only able to associate this dissociation in 1–3-Hz rhythm in layer 5 neurons of the retrosplenial cortex, but were able to stimulate dissociation in both mice and humans! Here's the NPR article:

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/09/16/913565163/scientists-discover-way-to-induce-altered-state-of-mind-without-drugs

and here's the Nature publication:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2731-9

How the brain stores auditory memories (see chapter 10) may involve the same areas of the brain explored in this study. See https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnana.2010.00129/full for an overview.