Outside Influences

As is mentioned in the history section, déjà experiences were known and thought about already in antiquity. Ovid, 43 B.C. - 17 A.D., in Book XV of his Metamorphoses, has Pythagoras make a long speech in favor of vegetarianism and against the slaughter of animals. In it are found the following words: 

"Our souls are deathless, and ever, when they have left their former seat, do they live in new abodes and dwell in the bodies that have received them. I myself (for I well remember it) at the time of the Trojan War was Euphorbus, son of Panthous, in whose breast once hung the heavy spear of Menelaus. Recently, in Juno's temple in Argos, Abas' city, I recognized the shield which I once wore on my left arm!" (lines 158 - 164) 

Here is found one of the earliest references to a déjà vu-like episode. It more properly belongs within the section on reincarnation (see below), but I mention it here to show that in ancient times, this was the favored explanation for such experiences. I should mention that Plato also believed in the transmigration of souls. 

Such a doctrine, though, was anathema to the early Christian theologians and thus St. Augustine (354 - 430 AD) felt himself called upon to offer an alternative theory. In chapter XV of book XII of On the Trinity is found the following argument: 

"For we must not acquiesce in their story, who assert the Samian Pythagoras recollected some things … which he experienced when he was previously here in another body; and others tell yet of others, that they experienced something of the same sort in their minds: but it may be conjectured that these were untrue recollections, such as we commonly experience in sleep, when we fancy we remember, as though we had done it or seen it, what we never did or saw at all; and that the minds of these persons, even though awake; were affected in this way at the suggestion of malignant and deceitful spirits, whose care it is to confirm or to sow some false belief concerning the changes of souls, in order to deceive men." 

As far as I know, this explanation of St. Augustine's, in his insistence on the demonic intent of exterior forces, is unique. A worthy successor, though, might be seen in some of the ideas that came out of the spiritualistic movement. Probably beginning with Swedenborg, in the 1700's, interest grew with the revelations of the Fox sisters (1848) from their contacts with spirits, and from the writings of A. J. Davis at about the same time. Certainly encouraged by the Theosophists under the leadership of Madame Blavatsky and Annie Besant, the wave of excitement and interest in mediums, spirits, and séances swept America and Europe during the nineteenth century. 

As a result, a group of scientifically interested men and women in England, most notably from Cambridge University, banded together to form the Society for Psychical Research in 1882. Their intent was to subject such manifestations to scientific scrutiny. Among the members of the governing council were Prof. Oliver J. Lodge, Lord Rayleigh, Prof. B. Stewart, and Prof. J. J. Thomson, all four outstanding and respected physicists. Corresponding members included Prof. William James and Prof. E. C. Pickering of Harvard, and Prof. Pierre Janet in France. Already in 1886, it had over 600 members. Similar societies were soon formed in the USA and in other European countries. 

In 1895, F. W. H. Myers published two chapters of an intended book entitled The Subliminal Self in the society's Proceedings. The chapters were concerned with "The Relation of Supernormal Phenomena with Time", the first being concerned with retrocognition (supernormal knowledge of the past) and the second with precognition. He supplied many examples of both and also some remarks about deja vu (see the section on precognitive dreams). What concerns us here, though, is his belief in the activities of invisible spirits, more benign, however, than those of St. Augustine's. To quote Myers, 

"... in some cases I think that there is actual evidence that the precognition comes from a disembodied intelligence ... " 

And further, 

" ... I ascribe some precognitions to the reasoned foresight of disembodied spirits, just as I ascribe some retrocognitions to their surviving memory. I have tried in an earlier paper to show ground for believing that some spirits have a continued knowledge of some earthly affairs; and if they have such knowledge, and can show us that they have it, they may presumably reveal to us also their not infallible inferences from what they know." (p. 340) 

As we shall see in the section on precognitive dreams (below), Myers himself believed that déjà vu resulted from such dreams. It is not clear how agencies such as he mentioned could reveal the future with such photographic accuracy as that experienced in déjà vu. Thus I personally find it difficult to believe that the corresponding dreams could be "given" by outside entities, especially if they are supposed to be derived from "not infallible inferences". There are others, though, who are not so troubled (e.g., Thomas, 1946-9).