Hypnosis and Suggestion
February 27, 2026 Kevin Sheldrake, Zoltan Dienes preprint
Hypnosis is one manifestation of a broader human capacity called phenomenological control: an evolved ability to deceive oneself to support socially useful beliefs. This capacity allows people to strategically construct subjective experiences that misrepresent reality despite contradictory evidence, in order to meet goals. It is so effective that researchers studying it have often been deceived, mistaking participants' constructed experiences—such as feeling energies or special states—for the mechanism itself. Phenomenological control is used in spirit possession, spiritual experiences, esoteric martial arts, everyday life, and psychology experiments.