
The Science of Near-Death Experiences - Hooke
http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2015/03/the-science-of-near-death-experiences/386231/?single_page=true
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jacel
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe DMT can be produced in the
pineal gland? I can't read this paper from 1976 but that's what the title says
[http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1471-4159.1976....](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1471-4159.1976.tb04456.x/full)

DMT is hallucinogenic, similar to LSD and psilocybin (magic mushrooms), and
these NDEs sound quite similar to the results of medical psilocybin trials
[http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/02/09/trip-
treatment](http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/02/09/trip-treatment). I'm
surprised the author didn't mention this aspect (or if they did, it was very
brief).

As the author alluded to, the disappointment for me is with this false
dichotomy - mystical and wonderful or scientific and mundane. Isn’t the idea
that a bunch of neurons can produce these incredible experiences wonderful
enough? How great is it that we can produce a drug to make the last moments of
our life beautiful? Aren’t we lucky that sometimes we get a second chance, and
our brain can rewire so dramatically we change the way we live our life? And
just think how it will change our understanding of consciousness when we
figure out how all of this happens! I think that’s a much more fulfilling
explanation than the intangible mind/soul argument. But maybe that’s just me.

------
DanielBMarkham
Read the first bit, then scanned some, then read the closing, so fair warning:
I may have missed some important parts. (I like The Atlantic, but I do not
always have time to consume it)

I think the problem in digesting all of this that the author describes is due
to the fact that this is not a science -- it's philosophy. That doesn't make
it any less real, it just makes the issues and questions more difficult to
grasp.

I would find it odd if people traveled half-way around the world to go to a
conference on NDEs and all thought the idea was hokum, so the author may be a
little unfair in his observations. If you're looking for falsifiability and
reproducibility in something that so far has been intermittant and subjective,
then you are using the wrong tool.

What's probably going to happen -- especially with some of the suspended
animation stuff going on -- is that we'll start seeing an emerging "science of
death". Assuming the suspended animation stuff keeps chugging along, the AI
guys start augmenting/transferring small bits of consciousness, and we gain
better and better instrumentation to look at what happens at death? We're
going to start seeing a really cool field of study open up in another 20-40
years. But we ain't there yet, sadly. Right now it's just a lot of fumbling
around in the dark.

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up_and_up
Anecdotally speaking, I have had 2 out of body experiences which were
extremely vivid. Think about if your consciousness could be ejected outside
and above your body somehow and you were looking down at your physical self.
One experience was while awake meditating and the other was while sleeping. No
drugs involved etc.

While these were not technically NDE's, it definitely opened up for me the
possibility that an NDE is potentially possible and that more research should
go into this.

~~~
Cybernetic
About 10 years ago, I had an experience that felt like I was out of my body.
It occurred during the night while asleep. I woke up to find myself floating
over the bed, just below the ceiling and against the wall opposite the bed.

I remember looking around the room and I could see myself and my wife asleep.
It didn't register to me at that time, that I was looking at myself from
outside my body. It felt like a dream and I didn't have any desire to try to
fly around or through anything, I was content to float there and observe.

About a minute or two into the experience, I noticed something crawling across
my pillow, towards my head. As I focused on it, it appeared to be a spider.
This made me panic. I think the panic wasn't because of the spider, but that I
suddenly realized I was floating in the air and looking at myself. I was
overwhelmed with fear and felt myself suddenly fall into my body, at which
point I woke up immediately. There was a physical sensation of light pressure
when that happened. That experience felt like it lasted only a few minutes.

I jumped out of bed, turned on the some lights and looked all over. I pulled
the blankets off the bed, turning over my pillow, etc. I woke up my wife and
told her there was a spider on the bed. We spent a few minutes trying to find
it, but to no avail. I never had anything like that happen before or since.

I don't know what actually happened, but the experience felt very real. There
wasn't any alcohol or drugs involved, but I was in the Air Force at the time,
so it could have been aliens. ;-)

~~~
kijin
> _at which point I woke up immediately._

Could the whole thing have been a dream?

Even if you remember waking up before it happened, that doesn't mean that it
was not a dream. You can have a dream within a dream, or have two consecutive
dreams that make you feel like you dreamed within a dream.

~~~
Cybernetic
It definitely could have been a dream. It was a strange combination of the
physical sensation of floating and falling, but also observing myself in the
third person that was very unusual.

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vinceguidry
Reading this gave me a lot more respect for the god of the gaps, or, at least,
the gaps themselves.

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dghf
It would be interesting to find someone who had had an NDE _and_ taken LSD (on
a separate occasion), and ask them to compare the two experiences in terms of
vividness, beauty, feelings of peace or being loved, etc.

~~~
reitoei
> vividness, beauty, feelings of peace or being loved, etc.

Or, you know, the complete opposite.

------
2015weird
i was in an acoma at 16. I was floating around the room way above my bed in
the hospital. my mom walked in looked up at me straight in my eyes. behind her
was a priest with a purplecloth around his neck. I yelled out, that i was not
going to die,by the time the words, not going to die got out of my mouth ,i
was back in my body.mom laughed commented how she knew this would work. the
priest had an odd look on his face as he looked at me and mom.it was a shooked
look. this was normal crap for my family. i know know most people are not like
this.

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2015weird
i was in an acoma at 16. I was floating around the room way above my bed in
the hospital. my mom walked in looked up at me straight in my eyes. behind her
was a preast with a purple around his neck. I yelled out that i was not going
to die,my the time not going to die ,i was back in my body.momlaughed
commented how she knew this would work. the priest had an odd look on his face
as he looked at me and mom.it was a shooked look. this was normal crap for my
family.

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caniscrator
What we can perceive collectively tells us little about our collective
consciousness. Humans are more than just meat.

~~~
louwrentius
Why do you think that we are more than 'thinking meat'? Seems like there is no
evidence for that at all.

[Let’s say experiments are done, and there is finally a comprehensive,
scientifically rigorous, and materialist account of what causes an NDE. What
then? Does it mean that all the stories people tell of seeing angels and
meeting their deceased relatives are just fairy tales to be ignored?]

Yes, but that's even unrelated to NDE's.

~~~
collyw
Self awareness differentiates us from "thinking meat".

~~~
charliefg
Why is self-awareness an indication of something other than "thinking meat"?
Why can't it be a more abstract form of thought?

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kleer001
Nothing new here, move along.

But it's a good primer if you've never read up on this stuff before.

