This chapter describes how digital interaction differs from physical – the feeling of being there with someone, sharing a common space, is lost. To comprehend how and why digital interactions feel so different, the author aims to understand how presence works in the virtual world. There is a specific definition that is applied to presence when it comes to virtual reality (VR): the sense of ‘being there’ in a computer-based environment. The author concludes by describing how ideas, methods and findings are changing fast in this field, as is the level of conversation about this experience. To understand felt presence in psychosis, we are ultimately going to need to explore both of these paths: of the body and the mind. There is not just one presence – there are others.

This chapter tells Luke’s story of skiing to the South Pole, where he experienced a range of hallucinatory phenomena: illusions, visions, voices and presence. They became so familiar to Luke that they formed part of the daily routine: illusions on the snow and hallucinations on the horizon. Luke’s presences were not just saving him; they needed him. He had a responsibility to them. His experiences remind us that relating to others is not a one-way street – duties, hopes and desires go in both directions. It stands to reason that if our minds somehow create others, then our feelings towards them will reflect that complexity. Some presences lead. And some are led.

We can probably find an explanation for anything, and we do not always get the chance to test our explanations. To do that, we would have to somehow create a presence. In this chapter, the author describes how Olaf Blanke and colleagues offered a more detailed model for how this process works for presence with the help of a robot. The author concludes that our brains might create a bodily self – but that body has to exist in space. Some spaces will make our bodies grow or shrink, contract or relax. Where we draw the line, where we distinguish ourselves from others, these things will shift with the space we are in. The presences we encounter might be familiar companions, or unsettling doppelgängers, or just neutral entities, but the conditions around us have to be right for them to appear at all.

Presence can mean lots of things to different people. This chapter describes people’s experiences of other people being present and discusses research of felt presence. The feeling of the presence of another person can be described as an instant and vivid feeling of recognition – not an unknown ‘someone’ being there but a specific person, present right now. The author’s examples encourage us to think past the double, or at least to think more broadly. If felt presence comes from us, why does it feel so distinctly ‘other’? Could the mirror be a starting point, the first step on an uncanny road?

In this chapter, the author explores the nature of loneliness and isolation, and what this might tell us about presence. He discusses the ultrarunner Paul Burgum’s experiences of feeling that a spirit had joined him on his epic run in Italy and suggests that this illustrates an important point: if you go seeking inspiration, actively looking for companions and putting yourself into states that blur the boundaries of self and other, you might not always get to choose what happens next. A presence could be invited in, but who or what they are isn’t always up to you – the process might even require you to give up that kind of control. And it might be shaped by others around you. This chapter expands on the complexity of presence.

This chapter looks at sleep as potentially one of the most powerful sources of presence. The presences that come with sleep paralysis are not like most of the presences we have met so far. These visitors are much more likely to be experienced in a negative fashion. The phenomenon of sleep paralysis acts as an important testing ground for many of the key questions around felt presence.

While most programmes in neuroscience are understandably built around imparting foundational knowledge of cell biology, neurons, networks and physiology, there is less attention paid to critical perspectives on methods. This book addresses this gap by covering a broad array of topics, including the philosophy of science, challenges of terminology and language, reductionism and social aspects of science, to challenge claims to explanation and understanding in neuroscience. Using examples from dominant areas of neuroscience research alongside novel material from systems that are less often presented, it promotes the general need of scientists (and non-scientists) to think critically. Chapters also explore translations between neuroscience and technology, artificial intelligence, education and criminology. Featuring accessible material alongside further resources for deeper study, this work serves as an essential resource for undergraduate and graduate courses in psychology, neuroscience and biological sciences, while also supporting researchers in exploring philosophical and methodological challenges in contemporary research.

This chapter considers neuroscience translations and attempts to apply our knowledge of the nervous system in practical approaches. I start by discussing the traditional areas of translation, neurology and psychiatry, and the extent to which a focus on neurobiological aspects can help in addressing these conditions. I then turn to more recent claims that neuroscience can inform educational practice, including claims of pharmacological cognitive enhancement, and neurocriminology claims that we will be able to predict and prevent criminal behaviour by identifying the neural mechanisms involved. The discussion covers brain imaging and heritability approaches that try to identify biological bases that can be targeted in translations and interventions, highlighting the caveats associated with these approaches and the claims made from them.

This chapter considers new tools introduced in neuroscience over the past thirty years and claims that these tools will overcome traditional limitations. Some claim that tools lead scientific advances; I question this claim, not by negating the utility of new tools, but highlighting that they have to be applied to relevant concepts. Tool development has been and maintains a major aspect of neuroscience, with the US BRAIN initiative investing over a billion dollars by the end of the decade to develop new tools. I cover computer modelling, molecular genetics, connectomics, calcium and voltage imaging, optogentics and neural pixel probes. I highlight the advantages of each approach, but then discuss various caveats that should be highlighted to promote attempts to address them and improve the insight that the techniques can give.

This brief chapter considers what we mean by knowledge, explanation and understanding, aspects that have and remain areas of debate in the philosophy of science. Despite scientists referring to these aspects routinely in ways that suggest their meaning is clear, examples are given that suggest the terms can actually be used in various ways by different people. It is important to consider what is being claimed and why in a claimed explanation or a claim to understanding, because the terms carry different weights and subjectively mean different things. This can lead to confusion and errors of reasoning that can constrain a field.

This chapter looks at claims to understanding. It begins by looking at the system I have worked on, the lamprey spinal cord locomotor circuit, and claims that circuit function and behaviour can be understood in terms of the interactions of spinal cord nerve cells. I highlight that the claims to experimental confirmation actually reflect various assumptions and extrapolations and that the claimed understanding is lacking. I then look at the Nobel Prize winning work on the Aplysia gill withdrawal reflex, making the same conclusion as the lamprey, various assumptions and extrapolations are used to claim causal links, and in doing this commit various logical fallacies, including confusing correlation for causation and begging the question. I finish by looking at hippocampal long-term potentiation and claims it is the cellular basis of memory, again highlighting that the claimed links have not been made.

This introductory chapter starts by considering the distinction between doubt and denial, and why retaining doubt in science is needed to ensure claims are accurate. It then discusses neuroscience aims and claims, and how the insight obtained is directed at translations to practical use in artificial intelligence, neurology, psychiatry and wider translations to society; for example, education and cognitive enhancement. The chapter highlights the relevance of philosophy and history to science, aspects to which science students are seldom exposed. This includes discussion of science denial by popularist politicians and corporations who try and ignore or dismiss evidence that negates their views or products. These aspects are highlighted as being important to defend science and ensure that scientific claims are as accurate as possible, and that in an age of disinformation we all need to think critically, mirroring the workers’ educational movements of the late nineteenth century.