New research about consciousness in the dying brain

You can find the new research here:
medicalxpress.com - Electrical signatures of consciousness in the dying brain...

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Whether and how the dying brain is capable of generating conscious activity has been vigorously debated.

But in this week's PNAS Early Edition, a U-M study showed shortly after clinical death, in which the heart stops beating and blood stops flowing to the brain, rats display brain activity patterns characteristic of conscious perception.

"This study, performed in animals, is the first dealing with what happens to the neurophysiological state of the dying brain," says lead study author Jimo Borjigin, Ph.D., associate professor of molecular and integrative physiology and associate professor of neurology at the University of Michigan Medical School.
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Here're a few other related links I found from searching ATS...

www.dailymail.co .uk - Near-death experiences 'explained': Scientists believe it's the last gasp of a dying brain...

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A study of the brains of critically ill men and women revealed a brief burst of activity moments before death.

Researcher Lakhmir Chawla, an intensive care doctor, said: 'We think that near-death experiences could be caused by a surge of electrical energy as the brain runs out of oxygen.
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news.discovery.com - Brain Waves Surge Moments Before Death...

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Doctors at George Washington University Medical Faculty Associates recorded brain activity of people dying from critical illnesses, such as cancer or heart attacks.

Moments before death, the patients experienced a burst in brain wave activity, with the spikes occurring at the same time before death and at comparable intensity and duration.

Writing in the October issue of the Journal of Palliative Medicine, the doctors theorize that the brain surges may be tied to widely reported near-death experiences which typically involve spiritual or religious attributes.
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What do you think it all means?

One thing that came to my mind was if they had previously been monitoring the patient's brain on a regular basis in different hospitals up until hte moment of death then why have they not noticed activity AFTER? Is this because the equipment they were using was not sensitive enough?

This is a sensitive topic, so I wnated to post in the Science and Technology forum, rather than in the Paranormal Studies forum, where I think the interest of people is counter.

For me, this is a painful and at once vivid issue. I hate the prospect that after a person dies they're gone forever. i wish very much that this wasn't true, but I need plentiful evidence.

When my grandpa died I never looked at him in his casket. Somehow, the thought of looking at a corpse did not appeal. I'd rather remember him when he was alive. Is this a sign that I am in denial about death? Will I at some point in my future have to confront a skeleton in my closet? I hope not, but I feel like I've already found the skeleton and it's in the guise of me posting this thread.

reply to post by jonnywhite

One thing that came to my mind was if they had previously been monitoring the patient's brain on a regular basis just before death than why have they not noticed activity AFTER? Is this because the equipment they were using was not sensitive enough?

From what I read, it's because in experiments with rats electrodes were attached directly to brain tissue, where in humans experiments they were attached to their scalps.
This could be the first evidence of brain activity after clinical death (heart not beating, blood not flowing).
Very interesting... I'm looking forward to more research on the matter

I was always under the impression it was caused by a sudden release of naturally occurring '___' just before the brain dies.

Edit: wow ATS has edited out the chemical i just posted about even though it is naturally present in our blood streams

*** occurs in trace amounts in mammals, including humans, where it putatively functions as a trace amine neurotransmitter/neuromodulator.

Dr. Rick Strassman, while conducting *** research in the 1990s at the University of New Mexico, advanced the controversial hypothesis that a massive release of *** from the pineal gland prior to death or near death was the cause of the near death experience (NDE) phenomenon. Several of his test subjects reported NDE-like audio or visual hallucinations. His explanation for this was the possible lack of panic involved in the clinical setting and possible dosage differences between those administered and those encountered in actual NDE cases. Several subjects also reported contact with 'other beings', alien like, insectoid or reptilian in nature, in highly advanced technological environments where the subjects were 'carried,' 'probed,' 'tested,' 'manipulated,' 'dismembered,' 'taught,' 'loved,' and even 'raped' by these 'beings.'

Sourced from wiki

reply to post by PhoenixOD

Enough information to google it. (remember: got to keep it 'safe' enough for the kids)

Here's someone that was on the verge of dying or losing parts of her brain:
www.ted.com - Jill Bolte Taylor: My stroke of insight...

Here's her book:
en.wikipedia.org - My Stroke of Insight...

I saved it in my favorites because it was always an interesting talk. I'm not spiritual about these things, you know. I don't believe in a God or an after-life, but I still listen to people.

reply to post by jonnywhite


Interesting.
But in Out of Body Research, where people go through the various phases before leaving the body (Beta, Alpha, Theta, Delta) with each phase corresponding to a lower brainwave frequency, people tend to leave at the Theta / Delta stage. The slowest Brain Activity Stage of them all.

From an esoteric point of view, it could be that there is a buildup of energy followed by a transference to the astral / spirit / etheric body since it is leaving for good.

reply to post by jonnywhite


what i think it all means..

the soul gathers up all it's assets and departs from the body. scientific instruments may only detect electromagnetic waves or interference etc. basically just the byproducts of this process which have representations in this reality.

Any definitive study on whether or not consciousness survives death is going to have to take into account scientifically studied cases of near-death experiences such as the ones Dr. Sam Parnia discusses in this radio interview:



Dr. Sam Parnia

And thousands of academically studied cases of reincarnation by the University of Virginia School of Medicine:

University of Virginia School of Medicine

Primarily the work of Dr. Ian Stevenson:

Originally posted by zilebeliveunknown
reply to post by jonnywhite

 

One thing that came to my mind was if they had previously been monitoring the patient's brain on a regular basis just before death than why have they not noticed activity AFTER? Is this because the equipment they were using was not sensitive enough?

From what I read, it's because in experiments with rats electrodes were attached directly to brain tissue, where in humans experiments they were attached to their scalps.
This could be the first evidence of brain activity after clinical death (heart not beating, blood not flowing).
Very interesting... I'm looking forward to more research on the matter

Please post anything else you may find.

Very interesting topic.

reply to post by jonnywhite


I'm gonna go out on a limb here. .. .

With the impulse building up for a sudden burst at the exact time of death might indicate that. .. . ..

It is Lunching the Soul from the body.

Maybe there are also other waves that we not able to detect that are at work as well.

Have you ever dozed off for a couple of minutes, but had a dream that seemed to last far longer?

Time inside your own subconscious brain is very plastic. What looks like a "burst" of electrical energy to a scientist could be entire lifetimes to that person that is dying. That person may find themselves in infinite lives in the fraction of "our time".

Just a thought. Our brains seem to top out at about 100hz ... compare that to your quad-core 1.5 GIGAHERTZ smart phone. Our brains seem to do more with less. Just imagine if we put our minds into a computer running at 3.2 ghz -- we'd essentially feel immortal. 100's of years would pass in seconds to everyone outside the computer. . .

reply to post by PhoenixOD


I'm glad you brought that up so I didn't have to. It's a good book, it is amazing the hoops that doctor had to go through to do legitimate medical research.

3-15 minutes of "that" can also feel like a much longer period of time.

Its one of the great mysteries of life aint it? What messes my mind up is if you are open to all possibilities the spectrum goes from absolute nothing to something so vast and awesome we cannot even comprehend what could be out there.
maybe one we will find out, maybe not but it looks like we are making progress and heading in the right direction.

I don't know if this applies or not, but frequently stroke victims will experience an extreme return of mental awareness prior to death. I have observed this in people as well as animals, in their last stages of life. It's always fascinated me. I've also had a close relative in a coma for more than a week, and termed "brain dead" by EEG, but yet, before being detached from the life support system, displayed awareness and consciousness, right before death.

What does all that mean? I don't know. Reincarnation, or the soul through consciousness saying its goodbye before it moves on to the next stage.....who knows. Fascinating topic, OP.
Tetra50

Perhaps self awareness is another higher function which doesn't entirely originate within the body.....
The swamis say we are all connected....perhaps this is that underlying connection between us all....spiritual beings having a human experience......
Is death perhaps a re integrating with the spiritual self?
Maybe a much more knowledgeable entity than we happen to realize in this conscious plane....
Life here is the pool into which our naked souls plunge themselves.... the purpose may be of great or little consequence in the scheme of things....it doesn't matter...our essences are drawn to life like moths to a flame....we cannot stop incarnating.....

reply to post by jacobe001


The answer seems simple enough.
When you die your 'spirit' enters into a dream world of your own fabrication. Your hopes and fears, your virtues and your sins, all the memories and dreams that make up who you are and color what you have experienced will ultimately shape the reality into which you enter.

Heaven or Hell, its up to you.

Originally posted by ShadellacZumbrum
reply to post by jonnywhite

 

I'm gonna go out on a limb here. .. .

With the impulse building up for a sudden burst at the exact time of death might indicate that. .. . ..

It is Lunching the Soul from the body.

Maybe there are also other waves that we not able to detect that are at work as well.

edit on 12-8-2013 by ShadellacZumbrum because: (no reason given)

maybe is an understatement. lol

A candle burns brightest right before its flame burns out.

reply to post by jonnywhite


This somewhat relates to the original thought of this forum. Maybe the final surge of electrical impulses given by the brain is the trigger for the ultimate release of endorphins to flood the into system. Giving people that have near death experiences their psychedelic hallucinations, leading to the release of the soul.

Dr. Duncan "Om" MacDougall (c. 1866 – October 15, 1920) was an early 20th-century physician in Haverhill, Massachusetts who sought to measure the mass lost by a human body when the soul departed the body upon death.In 1901, MacDougall weighed six patients while they were in the process of dying from tuberculosis in an old age home. It was relatively easy to determine when death was only a few hours away, and at this point the entire bed was placed on an industrial sized scale which was apparently sensitive to the gram. He took his results (a varying amount of perceived mass loss in most of the six cases) to support his hypothesis that the soul had mass, and when the soul departed the body, so did this mass. The determination of the soul weighing 21 grams was based on the average loss of mass in the six patients within moments after death. Experiments on mice and other animals took place. Most notably the weighing upon death of sheep seemed to create mass for a few minutes which later disappeared. The hypothesis was made that a soul portal formed upon death which then whisked the soul away.