After Death, You’re Aware That You’ve Died, Say Scientists

It seems that when the body dies, we still have awareness according to this new study.

bigthink.com...

Time of death is considered when a person has gone into cardiac arrest. This is the cessation of the electrical impulse that drive the heartbeat. As a result, the heart locks up. The moment the heart stops is considered time of death. But does death overtake our mind immediately afterward or does it slowly creep in?

Some scientists have studied near death experiences (NDEs) to try to gain insights into how death overcomes the brain. What they’ve found is remarkable, a surge of electricity enters the brain moments before brain death. One 2013 study out of the University of Michigan, which examined electrical signals inside the heads of rats, found they entered a hyper-alert state just before death.

So in this hyper alert state we have abnormal levels of brain activity. The article suggests the 'white light' some people experience may in fact come from neural activity. Near death experiences are a fascinating phenomena, with some people seeming to have an awareness of what is going on around them.

“Many times, those who have had such experiences talk about floating around the room and being aware of the medical team working on their body,” Dr. Parnia told Live Science. “They'll describe watching doctors and nurses working and they'll describe having awareness of full conversations, of visual things that were going on, that would otherwise not be known to them.”

So how is this possible? It seems that 'brain death' may take longer to set in.

According to Parnia during this period, "You lose all your brain stem reflexes — your gag reflex, your pupil reflex, all that is gone." Brain waves from the cerebral cortex soon become undetectable. Even so, it can take hours for our thinking organ to fully shut down.

Very materialistic, with little to nothing to indicate an extension of consciousness beyond the period of brain death, but this is science here, not mysticism, so any proof of life beyond brain death seems unlikely to be proven anytime soon.

There's a new movie on Netflix called "Discovery".

It's about a doctor who proves scientifically that there's life after death.

Then there's a massive wave of suicides around the world because people want to see what happens!!

I guess some things we just shouldn't know, at least for now... But yea, NDEs are waaaay interesting! It's good to see people actually studying it with no mysticism or religions involved.

And do you have a link for the article?

a reply to: bgerbger

Hours? Wow, imagine your brain experiencing relative “hours” in a hyper-alert state. It must seem like .....an eternity. Relatively speaking of course. As we know though time IS relative. Food for thought.

a reply to: bgerbger
Strictly speaking, if the brain has awareness, then it hasn't died yet. So awareness of "having died" would not be possible. (That is why philosophers say "Death is not an experience".)

a reply to: DISRAELI

one can ask himself what is life and death ?, Only pictures show death as a horrible state of being? could life be just a passing between realities?

a reply to: 0bserver1
Even so, what these scientists are analysing is the first reality, the physical one. They are detecting physical signs.

Death may seem at the point of heart stoppage, clinically speaking. This is only the beginning of death. About four minutes later if oxygen doesn't return to the brain, the spirit leaves. This is recorded as a shudder in the body, the passage of the soul. I felt it when they put my dog to sleep as I held her, It took about four minutes.

Doctors practice resuscitation beyond the cessation of life signs because people can be revived. The longer that takes the more deprived of oxygen the brain becomes the more damage done if resuscutation is successful.

TV would have us believe death is quick, you get shot on tv, fall down dead, you get strangled on tv, dead in ten seconds.

When people 'drown', clearing the lungs of water often times returns oxygen flow to the brain and they are resuscitated, brought back to life.

They weren't dead yet, the body is lifeless apparently but still able to be revived or brought back for several minutes.

a reply to: bgerbger

finally, a sane prognosis...a very abbreviated version, but it fits with my two previous NDE's


I imagine that as the brain loses activity, it actively grasps at all stimuli (both real & imagined) to get a notion of their bodies' condition and position in the environment...the brain aggressively seeks to have a real-time sense of 'total situational awareness'

originally posted by: DISRAELI
a reply to: bgerbger
Strictly speaking, if the brain has awareness, then it hasn't died yet. So awareness of "having died" would not be possible. (That is why philosophers say "Death is not an experience".)

Right but I think the brain in that moment certainly knows that death is a certainty being that it even considers the pupal dilation reflex some sort of extra weight that should be thrown overboard the sinking ship. I’m curious to know what thoughts exactly the brain is allowing subconsciously and if it allows any conscious thoughts.

ETA
So in this sense and in light of this new information that the brain remains active for such a period, cutting off vitals, eliminating reflexes and still remaining active, I would definitely consider this an experience even if one experiences it subconsciously. And I assume that there would be no doubt that the person experiencing such would regard the experience as their death.

originally posted by: vinifalou
There's a new movie on Netflix called "Discovery".

It's about a doctor who proves scientifically that there's life after death.

Then there's a massive wave of suicides around the world because people want to see what happens!!

I guess some things we just shouldn't know, at least for now... But yea, NDEs are waaaay interesting! It's good to see people actually studying it with no mysticism or religions involved.

And do you have a link for the article?

Speak for your self..!!

If there is life after death i will kill my self. ( after cleaning the banks and spending it )

a reply to: Alien Abduct
I have a theory that the brain normally spends a lot of energy on maintaining barriers to keep memories OUT of the conscious mind, so that the mind is not overwhelmed by them.
If that energy was re-directed in an absolute emergency, then those barriers would collapse, and that might explain the reported "my life flashed in front of my eyes" phenomenon.

Seems to me this consciousness must not really be tangible or true individual consciousness, but rather just a more general or generic state. In other words, I don't think the person is able to think/reason "I'm Bill and I'm dead" (the key part being, "I'm Bill"). It's more like a dream state where the individual doesn't have any specific identity, and certainly not their own. It's more like a personality agnostic state of awareness.

The reason I say this is because throughout history people have opined about what they would do when they went to the 'afterlife', yet even after the millions, billions even, of people have passed on there still isn't really any conclusive proof that any of these intentions have ever been acted upon in any meaningful way. Lots of conjecture and theories to be sure, but not any real proof.

I’m imaging during this time you might be hyper aware of the ripples that your life has made on friends, family and the rest of your environment. You might get a more “outside” the box experience of your whole life from other points of view. Maybe even be able to tap into all of that information that you store away but can’t really ever hold all together. Like a slow highly detailed flashback of the totality of your lifetime.

Kind of like a much much more detailed experience of the one where you’re drifting off to sleep and suddenly remember where you left those keys last week.

a reply to: bgerbger

I'm willing to bet those electrical signals are just your brain frantically attempting to find a way to keep your body alive and heart to start beating again to keep the brain alive. It must be terrifying when you think about it. Or peaceful, who knows.

I always thought that David Lynch's Mulholland Drive and Lost Highway could be interpreted as a dying brain frantically trying to construct a personal reality that is compatible with being dead while still in denial...

Sorry, not sure how to phrase this any better.

a reply to: bgerbger

The hyper- surge doesn't last hours though, only the residual light brain wave activity?

One issue that the scientists may gloss conveniently over is how NDE experiencers can witness things outside of any potential sensory input - down a hall behind heavy doors or see a relative coming in on an airplane, etc. accurately.

Doesn't that prove a viable alternative sensory consciousness outside of brain function? I think birth and death are very much the same thing. So that is my own bias.

Thanks for posting!

There are cases where people have clinically died and witnessed events happening in other parts of the hospital, only to be brought back to life and recount those events to people who confirmed their happening. Near death experiences aren't simply the brain going into overdrive, they're one's consciousness being freed from the physical constraints of the body. There are other ways to achieve this same effect without dying.

You all have no idea just how deep the life rabbit hole goes..or how powerful God truly is.





Repent.

originally posted by: SR1TX
You all have no idea just how deep the life rabbit hole goes..or how powerful God truly is.

Repent.

Reincarnation is a Hindu/Buddhist belief. Neither religion requires repentance. So what do you mean?

Two points:


When this is done on a rodent ... Does that mean the rodent has a soul? Would it be different for humans since humans are the only ones that are supposed to have a sentient soul?


Second... Has anyone ever passed out due to a lack of oxygen? If so, you'd know that you aren't aware of anything. You get all brain fuzzy and prickly numb almost instantly. It's like your brain going all fuzz channel in only a couple of seconds.

When the heart stops, blood stops flowing. Without blood flowing, there is no Oxygen getting to the brain. Instant fuzz channel.

Now... if there is a spiritual aspect of this, I would only assume it taking place upon real death, as in not just passing out from a lack of O2 but actually dying - full cell death kind of dying.

I guess this is confusing to me as a spiritual person but also someone who's blacked out due to a lack of oxygen.

Anyone ever play that dangerous O2 game as a kid that you didn't know was actually deadly but was just cool and fun to see each other pass out? Yeah, hind sight.. but that also helps makes the above point about going all fuzzies once the oxygen stops.