Fiach

Near Death Experiences

In my experience, treating epilepsy and also seeing post-cardiac resuscitation patients in my daily job, as a Neurologist, I have interviewed and studied NDEs. The background is three possible precipitants, blunt or penetrating head trauma, decreased blood flow and O2 in the brain (Hypoxemia), and temporal lobe epilepsy (partial complex seizures.)

NDE experiences are stereotyped no matter with of the above was the cause. The person is observationally unconscious. The remembered experience often perceives an out of body experience (OBE) which has two forms. One is standing next to one’s own body or more often floating above their body, seeming to see people around the bedside such as nurses and doctors. The other is a feeling of limitlessness, expanding and merging with the universe. The OBE is followed by going through a bright tunnel in a dark background. In this phase there are the seeing images of dead relatives, angels, Jesus, or Brahma, or saints, then a smaller but brighter light. Usually at that point they either come out of it or come out of it in reverse. During the tunnel phase they may hear the voice of a dead parent or God/Jesus/Virgin Mary/Muhammad/Brahma.

On recovery, the patients often feel disappointed, cheated out of Heaven or bliss. They do have other neurobehavioural changes mainly in short term memory, attention span, and emotional regulation with loss of some inhibition, loss of rational skills, loss of some problem solving efficiency, and changes in efficiency of task specific shifts. I know of a neurologist whom I may not mention. He was a skilled, rational expert in electroencephalography and neurophysiology, author of some excellent protocols. He recovered from a cardiopulmonary arrest but his career disintegrated. His papers were incoherent, his protocols badly designed, and his papers elicited ridicule and pity. Incidentally he was also transformed from a sceptic to religious believer. The frontal religious bollocks filter obviously ceased to work or was disconnected. I was personally saddened by his deterioration and end of career.

The mechanisms of NDE’s are only near death in that they sometimes are cardiac arrests which indeed are life threatening. In such cased there is a marked drop or stop in blood flow to the brain temporarily. This reduced perfusion affects the border zone between the territories of two arteries. Arteries branch into more and smaller arteries and arterioles. At the peripheral end of an arterial “tree” the capillaries merge with those of the neighbouring artery in what is called the Watershed Area. When blood flow decreases, the area getting the worst of it is this watershed area. It is the area also suffering any neuronal loss (there is likely always some neuronal loss, varying with the severity of hypoxemia). Watershed areas are in the inferior medial temporal lobe (arteries are posterior cerebral and middle cerebral), sudden hypoxemia can precipitate temporal lobe like seizures. Other watershed areas are in the upper parasagittal areas of frontal lobe (rational, inhibitory, analytical), calcarine occipital lobe (visual), and cerebellar (balance, coordination (arteries are Superior Cerebellar, Anterior Inferior Cerebellar, and Posterior Inferior Cerebellar.)

Temporal lobe seizures are epileptic discharges that begin in the mesial inferior temporal lobe to amygdala in known epileptics. They can also occur in brain hypoxia, as described above. In Epileptics they are due to temporal sclerosis (scarring), head trauma, brain tumours, arterio-venous malformations, small haemorrhages, small infarcts/strokes, and possibly by drugs such as cocaine. The electrical discharge begins in the neurons in the region of Ammon’s Horn. The discharge is transmitted to memory association areas of the nearby temporal lobe for visual and auditory memories and odd smell memories. Some go to the superior parietal lobe (body orientation/localization areas) to give the primary OBE phase. In this situation they have an inhibitory effect. Some go to cingulated gyrus as well for the affective component. In some cases frontal lobe discharges are recorded. This causes the symptoms I described in the second paragraph.

The third major cause is head trauma. Sudden trauma precipitates seizures. Americans usually remember the televised generalised seizure of Roger Staubach of the Dallas Cowboys in the end zone of a Saturday televised game seen by millions of fans. His career soon ended. But he didn’t have epilepsy. It was just a post-traumatic seizure. Many who have these have partial seizures instead of generalised. These often manifest as Temporal Lobe seizures or focal motor seizures. The Temporal Lobe Seizure may be simple hallucinations auditory or visual or go into the full NDE described in the second paragraph.

The most important thing is that these people are not clinically DEAD. They are unconscious, and in some cases at risk of death. Those who actually die may experience NDEs before they die but cannot tell us about them. The DEAD brain cannot seize. We have no evidence of sentience in a dead brain. That is for you to speculate as you wish.

Fiach

Corso

Fiach,

Have you had any cases where patients had so-called “negative NDE’s.” Usually these involve visions of hell, darkness etc. I saw a special on TV once about an atheist who had a bad NDE and later became a preacher! This really disturbed me to no end.

Fiach

I only recall a few (maybe three or four) who had any experience of Hell or Heaven. Some had fears without a specific reason. I suppose an Atheist could have a vision of Hell, particularly if he/she is an ex-fundamentalist. He could still have subconscious fears of being sent to hell for thinking and non-belief. Or he may not seriously have any Hell beliefs but as a former Chrsitian it is still in his memory storage which is activated by the Temporal lobe seizure. I have never believed in Hell, but I have heard of it. I have read about it, and seen it in movies. So it is possible that I could experience that.

The content of the mystical part of NDE's is entirely coloured by whatever religion in which you were indoctrinate or dominates your culture. Muslims don't see Jesus or Mary. Christians don't see Brahma or Vishnu. Hindus don't see Joe Hovah or the Trinity God or Jesus.

Fiach

Amos

You have a pretty good grasp on that Fiach and you'll never have to deal with hell or be concerned about it (not to flatter you). Hell is for those who fear it . . . for good reason, because they have been torn up about it and when the NDE removes their guard all hell brakes loose.

Catholics are made aware of it because it must be juxtaposed with heaven. But since heaven and hell are not part of the Catholic religion, Catholics can't go to either because heaven is for Christians only and hell is for wannabe Christians only.

In this sense Catholics "go to" . . . and when they "get there" they are no longer Catholics in the same sense as that Jesus was a Jew who "went to" and when he "got there" he was no longer a Jew. The reason behind this is that Christians are Free agents and in charge of their own destiny and never to be bound by religion or religious laws etc. or there would be temples in the New Jerusalem (heaven).

Having said this the Catholic church knows the Church Triumphant which is the equivalent of the Elysian Fields for [ex-]Catholics.

Interesting to read from your post is that religious experiences take place in our mind, which makes them for keeps (if done right) and therefore OSAS is true. We tie the virgin birth into this and also the sin against the HS as the opposite to the virgin birth. In other words, a virgin rebirth leads to a divine comedy (happy ending) and a sin against the HS (non virgin rebirth) a Senecan tragedy (failed divine comedy=tragic ending). This also explains why so many 'born agains' end up in mental institutions.

Fiach

I don't think I can add to that. I am rarely at a loss for words. You made a humourous yet darkly serious set of comments. I appreciate that input.

Fiach