Why do we feel that we own our body?

If we ponder what the the Metaverse will look like in 10 years we might think of a world in which you can enter a virtual environment totally and with all your senses, not just the eye. This is the vision of numerous science fiction novels like "Snow Crash" or "Otherland".

If you have read "Otherland" or similar novels you will remember that one of the issues discussed is the danger of losing the connection to your own body if you dive too deeply into the virtual world. You fail to be able to "come back" and fall into some kind of a coma.

All fiction?

The German Magazine "Gehirn & Geist" has an article titled: "Why do we feel that we own our body?"

The Swedish researcher Henrik Ehrsson from the Karolinska Institute approached this question experimentally and I must say I was very surprised that this was still an open issue and that research was going on in this area.

The findings her replicate my own experiences, though (from a very "scientific" point of view, of course):

It certainly IS possible, to identify with your virtual body (avatar)! You can easily further this identification through emphasizing the connection between physical and virtual body by  making them go through the same "experiences".