https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2024/09/240909113039.htm

"Out-of-body experiences, such as near-death experiences, can have a "transformative" effect on people's ability to experience empathy and connect with others, a scientific paper from University of Virginia School of Medicine researchers explains.

"The fascinating work from UVA's Marina Weiler, PhD, and colleagues not only explores the complex relationship between altered states of consciousness and empathy but could lead to new ways to foster empathy during a particularly fractured time for American society -- and the world.

"Empathy is a fundamental aspect of human interaction that allows individuals to connect deeply with others, fostering trust and understanding," said Weiler, a neuroscientist with UVA's Division of Perceptual Studies. "The exploration, refinement and application of methods to enhance empathy in individuals whether through OBE [out-of-body experience]-related ego dissolution or other approaches is an exciting avenue with potentially profound implications for individuals and society at large."

***

"In these instances, people feel they have been severed from their physical form and have connected with the universe at a deeper level. Sometimes known as "ego death" or "ego loss," this state can be brought on by near-death experiences, hallucinogenic drugs and other causes. But people who undergo it often report that their viewpoint on the world, and their place in it, is radically changed.

"'The detachment from the physical body often leads to a sense of interconnectedness with all life and a deepened emotional connection with others," the researchers write. "These sensations of interconnectedness can persist beyond the experience itself, reshaping the individual's perception and fostering increased empathy, thereby influencing personal relationships and societal harmony."

***

"Experiencers often become more compassionate, more patient, more understanding. More than half in one study described their relationships with others as more peaceful and harmonious. Many become more spiritual and more convinced of the possibility of life after death.

"In their paper, Weiler and her co-authors explore potential explanations for what is happening within the brain to cause these changes. But while that remains unclear, the lasting effects of OBEs are not. And by understanding how these life-changing experiences can enhance empathy, researchers may be able to develop ways to help foster it for society's benefit during a conflicted age."

Comment: all of the research in this phenomenon shows dramatic transformations in individual's emotional state toward themselves and everyone else.

https://evolutionnews.org/2023/10/after-death-a-riveting-glimpse-of-the-hereafter/

"The message of the film, by directors Stephen Gray and Chris Radtke, is extremely well conveyed. It’s beautifully photographed, produced, and enacted, making use of actors and ordinary people who describe what they say happened to them while briefly dead, before being revived in a medical setting. No small number have died, only to be brought back thanks to advances in healing unknown to past generations. Of these, some number offer reports of an otherworldly realm, beyond yet somehow connected to our own. For those who go and come back, there is both joy and grief. Make of it what you will.

***

"The “dead” person may see the room or other locale where he lies and observe actions by others going on around him. This is “autoscopy” — seeing yourself from outside, and reports of it have in some cases been objectively verified. More subjective (perhaps) are accounts of travel to a heavenly realm to meet loved ones who have passed on, and to meet God. Disturbingly, according to the film, 23 percent of near-death experiences (NDEs) are not of heaven but of hell. “One of the scariest moments in my life,” says one man. (Only “one of”?) “A pit of despair and hopelessness,” says another.

"The interviews are fascinating. The subjects describe being, while dead, “more alive than I’ve ever felt,” ““conscious and then more conscious,” immersed in “an ocean of love.” Some are anguished to realize they’ve been returned to our earthly existence, from their true home, against their will. Nor is everyone who comes back necessarily improved by the experience, at least not at first. A man who died with his life disordered felt he went down to hell, then was rescued by Jesus. He wished to share what he learned with others but became, in his own words, a “zealot” who alienated everyone around him. A neurosurgeon recalls talking with a patient who, after being medically dead, recounted details of her autoscopic experience. “As she spoke,” says the surgeon, “I became spooked.” That makes two of us.

"The filmmakers plainly wish to give hope for the hereafter, and no doubt with many viewers, they will succeed. But After Death is not a simple vehicle for that. Parts of it are scary and disturbing. While generally appearing to reflect a Christian perspective, the theology here, insofar as it’s articulated, doesn’t clearly match any one recognizable religion. The heavenly imperative seems to be, above all, that humans in their lifetime on Earth should love each other. That makes sense to me, but I’m not sure that it’s an orthodox view, or more of a modern one. Being modern doesn’t mean it’s not true. It’s suggested, also, that these experiences are cross-cultural. It would be interesting to know what people outside the American context report.

"One could ask other questions, like why is the information imparted here, while pertaining to ultimate matters, conditioned on something wholly worldly like advances in life-saving medical techniques? And if God is love, indeed an “ocean of love,” and if that figure of 23 percent is meaningful, how can it be that he sends approximately one quarter of humans to hell?"

Comment: the issue of hell makes this film strongly from a Christian perspective. But worldwide studies have shown the NDE is always colored by one's religious background. NDE's are not exclusive to a Christian bias.

https://evolutionnews.org/2023/10/are-near-death-experiences-science-now/

"Sometimes the experiencer recounts apparent trivia:

"A nurse, on her first day back at work after vacation, was a member of the medical team that successfully resuscitated a female patient whom she did not know:
The very next day she saw the patient, who responded, “Oh, you’re the one with the plaid shoelaces!” and explained that she observed them while watching the resuscitation from overhead. Intriguingly, Harmon had just purchased the plaid shoelaces while on her vacation and had worn them to the hospital that day for the very first time. Though casual or mundane conversations by staff often occur in hospital settings, even during stressful times, the color of shoelaces does not appear to be a topic that would be likely be discussed or even noticed during a frantic resuscitation attempt.

"PP. 326–27 REF: KENNETH RING AND MADELAINE LAWRENCE, “FURTHER EVIDENCE FOR VERIDICAL PERCEPTION DURING NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCES,” JOURNAL OF NEAR-DEATH STUDIES, 11 (1993): 223–229

"Psychiatrist Bruce Greyson first became interested in NDEs (near-death experiences) in a similar situation. An NDE experiencer noticed, in an out-of-body experience, a spaghetti stain on his tie, which he had successfully concealed from colleagues.

"Yet sometimes, the message the NDE experiencer offers is not trivial at all:
A young nine-year-old boy named Eddie was seriously ill in a hospital. Recovering from a thirty-six-hour fever, Eddie immediately told those in the hospital room that he had been to heaven, recounting seeing his grandfather, an aunt, and an uncle there. But then his startled and agitated father heard Eddie report that his nineteen-year-old sister Teresa, away at college, was in heaven too, and she told Eddie that he had to return. But the father had just spoken to Teresa two days prior. Checking with the college, the father found out that his daughter had been killed in a car accident the previous day.

"P. 331 BRUCE GREYSON, “SEEING DEAD PEOPLE NOT KNOWN TO HAVE DIED: ‘PEAK IN DARIEN’ EXPERIENCES,” ANTHROPOLOGY AND HUMANISM, 35 (2010): 159–171. P. 167 THE PAPER IS OPEN ACCESS

"The college had been unable to reach Teresa’s parents, probably because they were with Eddie. While near-death experiencers sometimes meet persons who were not known to have died, they rarely meet anyone who is alive in this world.

"These sorts of cases are not as rare as we might suppose, Habermas notes. There are many other solid ones.

"What to make of it all? Two things to start with: First, from time immemorial, there were stories, now and then, of a person who apparently died, saw the unseen world, and came back to tell about it. Carol Zaleski wrote a valuable book, Otherworld Journeys (Oxford University Press, 1987), collecting such stories from many genres. But how should we understand them? Are they divine truth? Pious fiction? Narcissistic fantasy?

"Who knows? Each interpretation comes with problems. If it’s divine truth, what about the cultural differences? If it is pious fiction, what about the knowledge (veridical experiences) gained while apparently dead? If it is fantasy, why all the life-changing experiences?"

Comment: facts like been have been n=reported here before: What is most special is the second one of the dead sister: No way of knowing this except through the NDE, which validates the episode as real and substantive. There are thousands of these validations. Read Greyson's book and be convinced. Dead brain, active consciousness episode!!! The first episode is out-of-the-body: common and not as convincing but lots more common. A patient of mine told me of hers during surgery.

https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/970272

"One in five people who survive cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) after cardiac arrest may describe lucid experiences of death that occurred while they were seemingly unconscious and on the brink of death, a new study shows.

"Led by researchers at NYU Grossman School of Medicine and elsewhere, the study involved 567 men and women whose hearts stopped beating while hospitalized and who received CPR between May 2017 and March 2020 in the United States and United Kingdom. Despite immediate treatment, fewer than 10% recovered sufficiently to be discharged from hospital.

"Survivors reported having unique lucid experiences, including a perception of separation from the body, observing events without pain or distress, and a meaningful evaluation of life, including of their actions, intentions and thoughts toward others. The researchers found these experiences of death to be different from hallucinations, delusions, illusions, dreams or CPR-induced consciousness.

"The work also included tests for hidden brain activity. A key finding was the discovery of spikes of brain activity, including so-called gamma, delta, theta, alpha and beta waves up to an hour into CPR. Some of these brain waves normally occur when people are conscious and performing higher mental functions, including thinking, memory retrieval, and conscious perception.

“'These recalled experiences and brain wave changes may be the first signs of the so-called near-death experience, and we have captured them for the first time in a large study,” says Sam Parnia, MD, PhD, the lead study investigator and an intensive care physician, who is also an associate professor in the Department of Medicine at NYU Langone Health, as well as the organization’s director of critical care and resuscitation research.“Our results offer evidence that while on the brink of death and in a coma, people undergo a unique inner conscious experience, including awareness without distress.”

"Identifying measureable electrical signs of lucid and heightened brain activity, together with similar stories of recalled death experiences, suggests that the human sense of self and consciousness, much like other biological body functions, may not stop completely around the time of death, adds Parnia.

“'These lucid experiences cannot be considered a trick of a disordered or dying brain, but rather a unique human experience that emerges on the brink death,” says Parnia. As the brain is shutting down, many of its natural braking systems are released. Known as disinhibition, this provides access to the depths of a person’s consciousness, including stored memories, thoughts from early childhood to death, and other aspects of reality. While no one knows the evolutionary purpose of this phenomenon, it clearly reveals “intriguing questions about human consciousness, even at death," says Parnia.

"The study authors conclude that although studies to date have not been able to absolutely prove the reality or meaning of patients’ experiences and claims of awareness in relation to death, it has been impossible to disclaim them either. They say recalled experience surrounding death now merits further genuine empirical investigation without prejudice."

Comment: this study shows the brain's near-death activity that can then explain the experiences recounted by the resuscitated survivors. It does not explain how some of the patients learned of new information they had had no access to before the NDE, as described in many papers. Does the NDE state allow the brain to attach itself to some immaterial consciousness state where information is available? Is consciousness, itself, a separate form of a real immaterial level of reality?

DAVID: How it relates to NDE's is not known, but there does seem to be another layer of mental activity that can cross many years or distance before surfacing:
https://notendur.hi.is/erlendur/english/mediums/Perfect%20case.pdf

DAVID: I have described some of my wife's similar abilities here. She has, in the past, identified by name dead ancestors, she had never met in life, from old photos. Her explanation is that she had met them in dreams! I have also noted she has 'seen ' current events at the exact time they occurred, then confirmed on television. The point is there is a level of mental activity that only some of us are privy to.

dhw: Thank you once more for sharing this. I remember too some of the experiences BBella told us about, and within my own family and circle of friends, there have been plenty more. They play a very important part in my own balancing act as I sit on my fence!

I know you wont leave. I don't think its can't.

DAVID: I have described some of my wife's similar abilities here. She has, in the past, identified by name dead ancestors, she had never met in life, from old photos. Her explanation is that she had met them in dreams! I have also noted she has 'seen ' current events at the exact time they occurred, then confirmed on television. The point is there is a level of mental activity that only some of us are privy to.

Thank you once more for sharing this. I remember too some of the experiences BBella told us about, and within my own family and circle of friends, there have been plenty more. They play a very important part in my own balancing act as I sit on my fence!

https://notendur.hi.is/erlendur/english/mediums/Perfect%20case.pdf

Abstract

"At a séance with Indridi Indridason in Reykjavik on November 24th 1905 a Danish communicator appeared who gave his name as ‘Jensen’ and his profession as a ‘manufacturer’. He described a fire that had broken out in a factory in Copenhagen. About an hour later he said that the fire had been brought under control. A written account was deposited with the Bishop of Iceland. There was no telephone or telegraph communication with Iceland in 1905 and news arrived by ship near Christmas that a fire had indeed broken out on November 24th in a factory at Store Kongensgade 63, and was brought under control in an hour as had been stated at the séance. Minute books were kept of Indridason’s séances which took place from 1904 to 1909. They had been lost for over half a century when two of them turned up a few years ago. According to them on December 11th 1905 the communicator revealed his name to be Emil Jensen, claimed that he was unmarried and had no children, had died when ‘not so young’, and had brothers and sisters who were all still living. No attempt was made to trace manufacturer Jensen until the author did so in 2009. A search by the author in archives in Denmark revealed the existence of a person named Emil Jensen who had been a manufacturer and had lived most of his life on Store Kongensgade where the fire broke out. Everything that the communicator had stated about himself in 1905 was thus verified over a century after the sittings took place. This case has a striking similarity to the famous case of Emanuel Swedenborg, who described while in Gothenburg in 1759 a fire that raged near his home in Stockholm."

Comment: I have described some of my wife's similar abilities here. She has, in the past, identified by name dead ancestors, she had never met in life, from old photos. Her explanation is that she had met them in dreams! I have also noted she has 'seen ' current events at the exact time they occurred, then confirmed on television. The point is there is a level of mental activity that only some of us are privy to,

On this subject, you and I are in complete agreement. The latter episodes are crucial, and it is these plus other “psychic” experiences that join design as my basic arguments against atheism. I don’t need to repeat my arguments against theism.

Thank you all the other posts, mainly devoted to the complexities that support design. Fair enough!

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-near-death-experiences-reveal-about-the...

"Near-death experiences, or NDEs, are triggered during singular life-threatening episodes when the body is injured by blunt trauma, a heart attack, asphyxia, shock, and so on. About one in 10 patients with cardiac arrest in a hospital setting undergoes such an episode. Thousands of survivors of these harrowing touch-and-go situations tell of leaving their damaged bodies behind and encountering a realm beyond everyday existence, unconstrained by the usual boundaries of space and time. These powerful, mystical experiences can lead to permanent transformation of their lives.

"NDEs are not fancy flights of the imagination. They share broad commonalities—becoming pain-free, seeing a bright light at the end of a tunnel and other visual phenomena, detaching from one’s body and floating above it, or even flying off into space (out-of-body experiences). They might include meeting loved ones, living or dead, or spiritual beings such as angels; a Proustian recollection or even review of lifetime memories, both good and bad (“my life flashed in front of my eyes”); or a distorted sense of time and space. There are some underlying physiological explanations for these perceptions, such as progressively narrowing tunnel vision. Reduced blood flow to the visual periphery of the retina means vision loss occurs there first.

"NDEs can be either positive or negative experiences. The former receive all the press and relate to the feeling of an overwhelming presence, something numinous, divine. A jarring disconnect separates the massive trauma to the body and the peacefulness and feeling of oneness with the universe. Yet not all NDEs are blissful—some can be frightening, marked by intense terror, anguish, loneliness and despair.

***

"A 2017 study by two researchers at the University of Virginia raised the question of whether the paradox of enhanced cognition occurring alongside compromised brain function during an NDE could be written off as a flight of imagination. The researchers administered a questionnaire to 122 people who reported NDEs. They asked them to compare memories of their experiences with those of both real and imagined events from about the same time. The results suggest that the NDEs were recalled with greater vividness and detail than either real or imagined situations were. In short, the NDEs were remembered as being “realer than real.”

***

"I accept the reality of these intensely felt experiences. They are as authentic as any other subjective feeling or perception. As a scientist, however, I operate under the hypothesis that all our thoughts, memories, percepts and experiences are an ineluctable consequence of the natural causal powers of our brain rather than of any supernatural ones. That premise has served science and its handmaiden, technology, extremely well over the past few centuries. Unless there is extraordinary, compelling, objective evidence to the contrary, I see no reason to abandon this assumption.

***

"Why the mind should experience the struggle to sustain its operations in the face of loss of blood flow and oxygen as positive and blissful rather than as panic-inducing remains mysterious. It is intriguing, though, that the outer limit of the spectrum of human experience encompasses other occasions in which reduced oxygen causes pleasurable feelings of jauntiness, light-headedness and heightened arousal—deepwater diving, high-altitude climbing, flying, the choking or fainting game, and sexual asphyxiation.

"Perhaps such ecstatic experiences are common to many forms of death as long as the mind remains lucid and is not dulled by opiates or other drugs given to alleviate pain. The mind, chained to a dying body, visits its own private version of heaven or hell before entering Hamlet’s “undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveler returns.”

Comment: Wedded to pure science, he sees no known cause. He ignores events that confirm these episodes when patients find out facts they cannot have know in advance of the episode.

QUOTE: Up to 25 per cent of people who almost die report a near-death experience. These usually involve sensations of zooming through a tunnel towards a light. Many also feature replays of the person’s life and reunions with dead loved ones.

dhw: Nothing new here. One can’t help wondering why up to 75% of such people do not have this experience, but I agree with David that the whole subject is fascinating. The quotes do not mention what for me is the most crucial factor of all, which is those occasions when the patient returns with information he or she could not possibly have had prior to the experience. These are the examples that appear to provide evidence that goes beyond the realms of subjectivity.

Agreed.

Nothing new here. One can’t help wondering why up to 75% of such people do not have this experience, but I agree with David that the whole subject is fascinating. The quotes do not mention what for me is the most crucial factor of all, which is those occasions when the patient returns with information he or she could not possibly have had prior to the experience. These are the examples that appear to provide evidence that goes beyond the realms of subjectivity.

https://mindmatters.ai/2019/12/what-if-a-near-death-experience-is-a-vision-of-hell/

"Thanks to modern medical interventions, the experiences are not even rare:
Up to 25 per cent of people who almost die report a near-death experience. These usually involve sensations of zooming through a tunnel towards a light. Many also feature replays of the person’s life and reunions with dead loved ones.

***

"We are told by the International Association for Near Death Studies, Inc. that most near-death experiences (NDEs) recorded in the literature are “dominated by pleasurable feelings such as peace, joy, and bliss.” The distressing ones, by contrast, have been described as “dominated by distressing, emotionally painful feelings such as fear, terror, horror, anger, loneliness, isolation, and/or guilt”. One researcher classifies as many as 15 percent of NDEs as hellish.

***

"Bruce Greyson and Bush studied fifty reports of distressing NDEs, including “an acute awareness of nonexistence or of being completely alone forever in an absolute void. Sometimes the person received a totally convincing message that the real world including themselves never really existed.” A few such reported experiences have included hellish imagery. Some also included a sense of personal torment or negative judgment.

"These experiences can be mapped onto specific psychological or religious templates but here are some general observations from the literature:
Distressing NDEs are comparatively rare and individual examples may not necessarily form a pattern:
As a result, what we know about frightening NDEs must be considered less certain than virtually any other aspect of NDEs.

***

"People who had a distressing experience may be proportionately less likely to report it than people who had a pleasurable experience.

"It is often difficult for NDErs who had a pleasant experience to share their NDEs. It is understandable how hesitant an NDEr might be to share an experience that was frightening, or even terrifying. NDErs experiencing hellish NDEs are likely aware that they risk inviting negative judgments from others due to the content of their NDEs.

***

"Prior studies of frightening and hellish NDEs have established that it is wrong to assume that ‘good people’ have pleasant NDEs and ‘bad people’ have hellish NDEs. In spite of the findings of these prior studies, this erroneous stereotype persists. This stereotype could greatly limit the desire of those experiencing hellish NDEs to share them.

***

"It’s remarkable that one single experience can have such a profound, long-lasting, transformational effect. This is illustrated by research showing that people who have near-death experiences following suicide attempts very rarely attempt suicide again. This is in stark contrast to the normal pattern—in fact, a previous suicide attempt is usually the strongest predictor of actual suicide.

"Survivors often believe they have been to another realm. They lose all fear of death and become convinced that some aspect of their consciousness will survive it – although they struggle to say what, falling back on vague notions such as spirit and soul. Even people who were convinced that death is final often come back from a brush with it as believers in an afterlife."

Comment: Still fascinating. Afterlife may be real and many of these episodes, like Eben Alexander's amazing book.

dhw: I am not, however, arguing for dualism or for materialism. I am merely pointing out that Parnia’s articles do not provide evidence that we have a “soul” which survives death, since BOTH suggested unproven hypotheses would solve the mystery he has set us. But I stand by my argument that the materialist solution does NOT solve the mystery of information acquired about events that take place outside the operating theatre. Parnia’s articles make no mention of these.

DAVID: Parnia has concentrated on operating room events. I think he was more surprised at the brief burst of energy, since it was previously unknown. But brief doesn't cover up to 45 minutes of resuscitation which is protecting cortical life with the cells alive but non-functional. Your overall analysis is correct, especially including information learned by the patient while in an NDE that they had not known before the NDE.

dhw: Thank you.

You are welcome.

Thank you.

DAVID: Function is also represented by the flat EEG, for which you have no answer. Medical science at this time states a flat line means no function. Your suggestion is a possibility for which there is no current evidence.

dhw: All my comments concern the "evidence" being presented by Parnia and by you, and I can only comment on the logic of your conclusions as based on that evidence. We have a mystery: despite the “flat EEG”, some patients are conscious of events going on around them. Medical science “at this time” offers NO solution. Here are two possibilities:

1) that the cortex, which has not died, may still be conscious though outwardly non-functional. Of course this suggestion is “a possibility for which there is no current evidence”. You say Parnia’s “burst of energy” is irrelevant, so I don’t know why he makes such a big thing of it. But you also say: “Some strange deeper EEG spikes have been seen sporadically, but are poorly understood.” Now you tell me these spikes may come from areas that are not considered a part of awareness. “May” is the operative word. Maybe they don’t come from there, or maybe those areas ARE part of awareness. “At this time” we don’t know.

2) that consciousness exists independently of the cortex in the form of a “soul” which survives the death of the body. This suggestion is a possibility for which Parnia’s articles and medical science “at this time” provide no evidence. According to you: “We have full knowledge of cortical function in a reversed way: cortically damaged patients lose part of their mental/conscious capacities.” Hardly full if "at this time" there are questions concerning the cortex which we can't answer. But in any case the materialist can say this knowledge provides evidence that the cortex is the source of mental/conscious capacities.

I am not, however, arguing for dualism or for materialism. I am merely pointing out that Parnia’s articles do not provide evidence that we have a “soul” which survives death, since BOTH suggested unproven hypotheses would solve the mystery he has set us. But I stand by my argument that the materialist solution does NOT solve the mystery of information acquired about events that take place outside the operating theatre. Parnia’s articles make no mention of these.

Parnia has concentrated on operating room events. I think he was more surprised at the brief burst of energy, since it was previously unknown. But brief doesn't cover up to 45 minutes of resuscitation which is protecting cortical life with the cells alive but non-unctional. Your overall analysis is correct, especially including information learned by the patient while in an NDE that they had not known before the NDE.

All my comments concern the "evidence" being presented by Parnia and by you, and I can only comment on the logic of your conclusions as based on that evidence. We have a mystery: despite the “flat EEG”, some patients are conscious of events going on around them. Medical science “at this time” offers NO solution. Here are two possibilities:

1) that the cortex, which has not died, may still be conscious though outwardly non-functional. Of course this suggestion is “a possibility for which there is no current evidence”. You say Parnia’s “burst of energy” is irrelevant, so I don’t know why he makes such a big thing of it. But you also say: “Some strange deeper EEG spikes have been seen sporadically, but are poorly understood.” Now you tell me these spikes may come from areas that are not considered a part of awareness. “May” is the operative word. Maybe they don’t come from there, or maybe those areas ARE part of awareness. “At this time” we don’t know.

2) that consciousness exists independently of the cortex in the form of a “soul” which survives the death of the body. This suggestion is a possibility for which Parnia’s articles and medical science “at this time” provide no evidence. According to you: “We have full knowledge of cortical function in a reversed way: cortically damaged patients lose part of their mental/conscious capacities.” Hardly full if "at this time" there are questions concerning the cortex which we can't answer. But in any case the materialist can say this knowledge provides evidence that the cortex is the source of mental/conscious capacities.

I am not, however, arguing for dualism or for materialism. I am merely pointing out that Parnia’s articles do not provide evidence that we have a “soul” which survives death, since BOTH suggested unproven hypotheses would solve the mystery he has set us. But I stand by my argument that the materialist solution does NOT solve the mystery of information acquired about events that take place outside the operating theatre. Parnia’s articles make no mention of these.

DAVID: The 'soon become undetectable' is 4-20 seconds. Please accept that short time. The cortex is NO LONGER functional. The nonfunctioning cells die in 4-6 minutes if no resuscitation.

dhw: “No longer functional” is not the same as “dead”. You keep emphasizing function and the short time before the cells die. I keep emphasizing that the cortex of these patients does NOT die, and function is not necessarily confined to the outward signs (reflexes etc.).

Function is also represented by the flat EEG, for which you have no answer. Medical science at this time states a flat line means no function. You suggestion is a possibility for which there is no current evidence.

dhw:I used coma patients as an example of no outward signs and no communication and yet the patient is aware. If the cortex cells are NOT dead (and all these NDE patients have been resuscitated before the cells could die), and if patients are aware of events happening around them, this can just as easily be considered evidence that the cells are the source of consciousness as that there is a “soul” which exists independently of the cortex.

These are locked-in patients. They have an active EEG. These are not patients during a resuscitation with a flat EEG. Doctors have a problem trying to determine the patients' degree of awareness. They do not fit your theorizing.

dhw: The evidence for the separate “soul” would only be there (a) if the cortex had actually died, and (b) if the patients could describe events outside the operating theatre.

Unfortunately if the cortex is dead, the patient is by definition brain-dead. All one can do to benefit the situation is turn off life support to stop a living dead situation. Unfortunately, life support can continue keeping the body alive for years, not a good outcome from an emotional and monetary viewpoint.

dhw:I note you have ignored the following:

dhw: In your earlier post you wrote: “Could there be deeper levels of brain activity to support consciousness? Some strange deeper EEG spikes have been seen sporadically, but are poorly understood.” And I commented: Perhaps when we understand them better, we shall find that the cortex, our “thinking organ”, is still absorbing information.

I presented that information to be complete. Neurons make EEG activity. Most of the mass of the brain beneath the cortex is fat insulating a mass of fiber connections. Neurons are present in the cerebellum which coordinates various activities, the olfactory bulb for odors, the hippocampus which it is thought coordinates memory, etc. None of these are considered a part of awareness. The spikes may come from one of those areas. Your comment above does not fit any of the facts we have about the brain. If the EEG is flat the cortex is not working. You keep trying to find some exception to that. My training in the subject is 40-50 years older than Parnia and his current research, and he is writing the same facts I know. Nothing has changed. While you struggle to poke holes.

Resuscitation research started in 1955 at the hospital where I was training. I've had courses in it and experience. Nothing has changed in all that time regarding medial teaching about the cortex and EEG's. This is why books have appeared by MD's (many reviewed in my first book) wondering why consciousness appears to survive a nonfunctional cortex. We have full knowledge of cortical function in a reversed way: cortically damaged patients lose part of their mental/conscious capacities. They can not conceptualized normally. Yes, they have consciousness, but their IQ is reduced.

DAVID: The 'soon become undetectable' is 4-20 seconds. Please accept that short time. The cortex is NO LONGER functional. The nonfunctioning cells die in 4-6 minutes if no resuscitation.

“No longer functional” is not the same as “dead”. You keep emphasizing function and the short time before the cells die. I keep emphasizing that the cortex of these patients does NOT die, and function is not necessarily confined to the outward signs (reflexes etc.). I used coma patients as an example of no outward signs and no communication and yet the patient is aware. If the cortex cells are NOT dead (and all these NDE patients have been resuscitated before the cells could die), and if patients are aware of events happening around them, this can just as easily be considered evidence that the cells are the source of consciousness as that there is a “soul” which exists independently of the cortex. The evidence for the separate “soul” would only be there (a) if the cortex had actually died, and (b) if the patients could describe events outside the operating theatre. I note you have ignored the following:

dhw: In your earlier post you wrote: “Could there be deeper levels of brain activity to support consciousness? Some strange deeper EEG spikes have been seen sporadically, but are poorly understood.” And I commented: Perhaps when we understand them better, we shall find that the cortex, our “thinking organ”, is still absorbing information.

dhw: My complaint was that the original article contained no evidence for dualism. However, even the new article confines itself to events happening around the patient, and the fact that patients cannot communicate or control their bodies does not mean they are unconscious. The new article states: “Brain waves from the cerebral cortex soon become undetectable. Even so, it can take hours for our thinking organ to fully shut down.”

The 'soon become undetectable' is 4-20 seconds. Please accept that short time. The cortex is NO LONGER functional. The nonfunctioning cells die in 4-6 minutes if no resuscitation.

DAVID’S comment: For me case closed. Until you get full cardiac function there is coma. Yet patients report experiences. All resuscitation does is limit cell death. Your comment about learning of unknown facts is a stronger example I admit.

dhw: As you have said, some coma patients who have recovered even years later report that they were fully aware of events going on around them. Once again: There is no reason to assume that the inability to communicate and to control the body after cardiac arrest or reduced function means that the still living cortex is unable to perceive and think.

This is locked-in syndrome with a damaged but living and functional cortex. Not an example you can use!

dhw: Awareness of events within the patient’s area of perception will therefore only provide evidence for dualism if it can be proved that the cortex is incapable of awareness and thought under the conditions described.

In clinical death the cortex is not functional. Again Parnia, first article:

"Dr Sam Parnia said: “Technically, that's how you get the time of death – it's all based on the moment when the heart stops.
“Once that happens, blood no longer circulates to the brain, which means brain function halts almost instantaneously.
“You lose all your brain stem reflexes – your gag reflex, your pupil reflex, all that is gone.”
However, there’s evidence to suggest that there’s a burst of brain energy as someone dies."

Comment: Which is brief!

This is not the article you posted on 23 October, and the new one contains information that was not in the first one, which was: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/mind-works-after-death-consciousness-sam-parn...

You asked me to reread it, and on 25 October I wrote: "I can’t get the whole article, so I am relying on what you posted. The only experiences recounted in the article are of events taking place in the presence of the patient, and the article is absolutely explicit that during these few minutes the brain is ACTIVE." You told me: “I gave you the entire article”.
My complaint was that the original article contained no evidence for dualism. However, even the new article confines itself to events happening around the patient, and the fact that patients cannot communicate or control their bodies does not mean they are unconscious. The new article states: “Brain waves from the cerebral cortex soon become undetectable. Even so, it can take hours for our thinking organ to fully shut down.” In your earlier post you wrote: “Could there be deeper levels of brain activity to support consciousness? Some strange deeper EEG spikes have been seen sporadically, but are poorly understood.” Perhaps when we understand them better, we shall find that the cortex, our “thinking organ”, is still absorbing information.

DAVID’S comment: For me case closed. Until you get full cardiac function there is coma. Yet patients report experiences. All resuscitation does is limit cell death. Your comment about learning of unknown facts is a stronger example I admit.

As you have said, some coma patients who have recovered even years later report that they were fully aware of events going on around them. Once again: There is no reason to assume that the inability to communicate and to control the body after cardiac arrest or reduced function means that the still living cortex is unable to perceive and think. Awareness of events within the patient’s area of perception will therefore only provide evidence for dualism if it can be proved that the cortex is incapable of awareness and thought under the conditions described.