fokket

just curious

Rhaedas

Someone will most likely provide better info and sources, but in short -- a NDE is essentially a misfiring or overload of certain parts of the brain. One rough analogy would be when a computer suffers a brownout, a slight loss of power...things get garbled but don't cut off. When they regain consciousness, they interpret these memories or observations as something paranormal.

There have been studies showing that drugs and other influences on certain parts of the brain cause NDE symptoms, such as the bright tunnel, or seeing shapes and floating above your body.

Also, there's been no tested case of a NDE where the person comes back and can describe in detail things they saw outside their body and the room. I've seen a few claims of such, but like any paranormal claim, it's rather vague.

Do these disprove NDE? No, but they do cast doubt on whether or not it's what NDE proponents believe it is, a separation of the "soul" from its earthly body, to meet its maker.

You would think that there'd be a lot of research into what a soul is by religious groups...if they could come up with one thing to show there's something to the argument, they'd have a stronger case for at least an afterlife or personality persistance after death of some type.

Of course, if there's someone who has such evidence, let's see it. I'd be interested to see something ground breaking...

Walross

Also important to consider is the fact that it's never been established that these experiences actually occur while the person is dead, as opposed to while they are in the process of dying, or the process of recovering (from having been briefly dead). A small, but important and often overlooked point.

Walross

Viti

Here's a couple of good places to start

Skeptic's Dictionary

Susan Blackmore, reseracher

pariah

This months skeptical inquirer deals with out of body experiences, maybe you should pick it up.

Remember, asserting or believing that you are seperated from the body is very different from actually being seperated from the body.

Currently it is believed that they occur b/c of disturbances in the brain. The article mentions a surgeon who would stimulate differant areas of the patients brain before operation. On one patient, while stimulating the right temporal lobe, the patieant who had previously had an OBE exclaimed "i am leaving my body" and was fearful. This happend to another patient on the right angular gyrus, and NOT the temporal lobe. This suggests that "the brain produces the concisiosu perception of an embodied self from the coordinated activity of various brain regions".

The drug ketamine causes NDE.

Basically, the conclusion is that concious experience depends and the brain and nervous system function.

jayh

In non-drugged patients, NDEs from traumatic injuries are relatively common, whereas those from chronic illnesses are quite rare. The explanation appears to be that the traumatic injury induces a flood of endorphins in the brain.

One story told by a medical technician described a dying and heavily drugged cancer patient that they were transporting. While travelling in the elevator, he suddenly smiled and after being wheeled off the elevator described the beautiful feeling of looking down on his dying body.

When the technicians returned to work through the same elevator they looked up for the first time and noticed the mirrored ceiling.

j