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What happens after we die? Near-death experiences may shed light on mystery

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What happens after we die? Near-death experiences may shed light on mystery

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This video is about a research professional looking into near death experiences, he believes it could help us learn about what happens after we die. In this video they are using confusion of correlation with causation as they are mentioning how many people describe the same thing and that. I also found there was an appeal to authority by having a professional in a white lab coat be interviewed about it. For these reasons I personally feel a draw to believing in their research.

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What happens after we die? It's a question humans have grappled with since the beginning of time. Some people say they've gotten a glimpse into the afterlife during near-death experiences, when their heart stopped during a surgery, accident or emergency.

Skeptics believe these accounts are imaginary, but some doctors are now studying near-death experiences with tools to measure the phenomenon.

Dr. Sam Parnia of the State University of New York at Stony Brook, and author of "Erasing Death," is one of the experts conducting research.

"People who come close to death for any reason typically describe a sensation of being profoundly peaceful and comfortable. Some of them describe a tunnel and a bright, warm, welcoming light," Parnia told TODAY'S Jenna Bush Hager as part of our two-day "Do You Believe?" series.
Related: Near-death experience survivor recalls 'amazing' encounter
"Probably the most interesting aspect of this is that a small group of them describes a sensation of actually separating from themselves and watching doctors and nurses trying to save their lives. Except that they're clinically dead."
RELATED: 'I crossed over': Survivors of near-death experiences share 'afterlife' stories
In the AWARE study involving more than 2,000 cardiac arrest patients, Parnia and his colleagues used auditory tests to time consciousness after the brain had shut down.

"What we found is that 40 percent of people had a perception of having had awareness, which was phenomenally high. Ten percent of them had a classical near-death experience and about 3 percent of them actually had full consciousness and awareness and could describe things," Parnia said.

One man was able to recall details that occurred for up to five minutes after he was declared clinically dead. The brain shuts down within two to 20 seconds in those cases and would not have been functioning, he noted.

Dr. Jeffrey Long, a radiation oncologist and author of "God And The Afterlife," has studied more than 4,000 patients who reported near-death experiences and found a very consistent pattern of elements in the accounts.

"There may be a life review, where they see part or all of their prior life. They may encounter deceased relatives. These are joyous reunions. The two most common words used to describe a near-death experience are peace and love," Long said.

After people survive, he sees them undergo dramatic change, including an increased belief in the afterlife and a decreased fear of death. Some people even leave jobs where they're forced to act out in materialistic ways. There's a vast amount doctors and others can learn from near-death experiences, Long noted.
RELATED: After a freak accident and near-death experience, 10-year-old girl smiles again
But not everybody believes the accounts, dismissing them as hallucinations.

To deepen his understanding, Parnia is now conducting a new study, giving specific sounds through an earpiece to patients in cardiac arrest. Unusual images will also be placed high and facing the ceiling in hospital rooms, so they're only visible to somebody looking down from above - in theory, to a soul separated from a physical body.

"The machines we use will also give visual stimuli, maybe a picture of a cute baby, to see if they can recall them," Parnia said. "If you come back and say you saw Dr. Smith or Dr. Jones, what they were doing, the question is: will you also see the image that's in the room that is independent? That you would not to have been able to guess because it's not something you'd expect to see on TV."
RELATED: Boy recants claims in his best-selling book: 'I did not die. I did not go to heaven'
Parnia hopes to enroll other hospitals and inspire other doctors to start thinking about how they should be measuring what's happening in the brain.

Some doctors and those involved in the near-death community say that, in general, scientific and medical professionals are increasingly accepting of the concept. No matter what you believe, the research will continue.

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What happens after we die? Near-death experiences may provide clues

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What happens after we die? It's a question humans have grappled with since the beginning of time. Some people say they've gotten a glimpse into the afterlife during near-death experiences, when their heart stopped during a surgery, accident or emergency. Skeptics believe these accounts are imaginary, but some doctors are now studying near-death experiences with tools to measure the phenomenon.

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This video is about 10 different people and their near death experiences. This video is completely information bias it doesn't give any facts or even talk about the doubts in near death experiences. It like most others confuses correlation and causation, it only talks about the different experiences and clearly is trying to link them together. Perception/observation is used as this video is entirely based on the perception of others. It also uses ancient wisdom by connecting Plato with his description on a near death experience, trying to point out that these events have been happening for a long period of time so they must be true.

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Douglas Todd: Health professionals need to understand near-death research

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Douglas Todd: Health professionals need to understand near-death research

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This article expresses a different way of using near death experiences to help people with different mental health problems or who are very sick (ex cancer). It links how near death experiences can give people hope no matter there beliefs or religion. This article associates apeal or authority as they have a "veteran Vancouver psychiatrist and professor at the University of B.C" as a spokesperson. They also use the fact that many people have had near death experiences, (confusion of correlation with causation). In fact, "A Gallup poll recently found five per cent of the population of the U.S. and Canada, or almost 20 million people, believe they have had a near-death experience.

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Douglas Todd: Health professionals need to understand near-death research

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Patients have felt relief when a doctor does not dismiss their near-death experience as a sign of either delirium, psychoses.

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This video is contradictory to our other videos especially the first one, it mentions the experiment that was being tested and that it didn't have an effect. This video mentions more of a science based view on the idea of a near death experience. In the beginning of this video just as the others I could see an immediate confusion of correlation and causation. After it started to explain a science veiw on near death. I really liked that this video was not completely bias it gave both views on belief and non belief.

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What makes a person believe that he visited heaven? Is there a way for science to get at what's really going on? In the April 2015 issue of the Atlantic, Gideon Lichfield mounts an empirical investigation of near-death experiences, concluding that more rigorous research must be pursued to understand what happens in the minds of "experiencers," as they call themselves.

One thing is abundantly clear, though. Near-death experiences are pivotal events in people's lives. "It's a catalyst for growth on many different levels-psychologically, emotionally, maybe even physiologically," says Mitch Liester, a psychiatrist.

We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to letters@theatlantic.com.

About This Series

Short, animated videos from The Atlantic

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What makes a person believe that he visited heaven? Is there a way for science to get at what's really going on? In the April 2015 issue of the Atlantic, Gideon Lichfield mounts an empirical investigation of near-death experiences, concluding that more rigorous research must be pursued to understand what happens in the minds of "experiencers," as they call themselves.

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Near-death experiences: could consciousness continue after death?

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Near-death experiences: could consciousness continue after death?

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This article is about a person who has found a correlation of education on near death experiences can be linked to a persons compassion, as well as it giving them a sense of hope. This article like everything else I've found links confusion of correlation with causation, but it links it in a different way. It links the results after the experience, link the healing of a sickness and it links the fact that after learning about near death experiences people can become more compassionate.

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A fear of death is one of humankind's deepest anxieties.

But new research suggests a less orthodox way of facing this free-floating dread - by learning about what might happen when you die.

Over six years, Massey University senior lecturer in psychology Dr Natasha Tassell-Matamua has spoken to hundreds of New Zealanders about their near-death experiences.

"It is a psychological phenomenon that is not easily measured," she says. "I'm quite commonly asked: 'How do you know it is real?'
READ MORE
* Life after a near-death experience
* Shining light on near-death experiences
* High-flying women lose money in secret spiritual movement
"Well, I don't know if it is, but it appears to be real for the people who have them - and the after-effects are real."

People who have near-death experiences commonly report a sense of leaving their physical body, an overwhelming feeling of love and peace, an exposure to a bright otherworldly light, and seeing loved ones.

"They will often report travelling down a tunnel towards a bright light, usually at high speeds," Dr Tassell-Matamua said.

"They can describe meeting deceased people who are significant to them, and who usually provide comfort to them during the experience, or who tell them it's not their time."

Afterwards, they report feeling better, losing their fear of death, having more self-esteem, more compassion and less concern for material goods, Dr Tassell-Matamua says.

"If you've had that experience and you feel as though you've died, and it went well, it makes sense that after that you would lose your fear of death."

Her study, published in the Journal of Spirituality in Mental Health, also shows learning about near-death experiences can bring about similar benefits to having one.

In it, 143 undergraduate students were randomly assigned to an education or non-education group, and then the "psycho-spiritual benefits" were assessed.

The group of 81 students who learned about near death experiences scored higher on tests measuring compassion, appreciation for life and death and sense of spirituality.

"It does promote positive change in people - they tended to have a greater sense of spirituality, and appreciation for life.

"I'm not talking about religious belief; it was more that people had a sense they were part of something greater than them, part of a greater whole," Dr Tassell-Matamua said.

"I think maybe learning about these experiences, which contravene our socially acceptable norms of reality, make people feel good. Maybe it provides a bit of hope for them."

Dr Tassell-Matamua's inclination is together, these experiences suggest some kind of consciousness after death.

"I'm not saying they're pointing to some sort of afterlife, but based on my research it would seem to suggest that maybe, even for just a limited amount of time once we lose our heartbeat, there is some kind of conscious mental activity going on.

"It's an outlandish sort of claim to make, but after doing my research I can't just dismiss these experiences."

- Stuff.co.nz

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Near-death experiences: could consciousness continue after death?

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A fear of death is one of humankind's deepest anxieties. But new research suggests a less orthodox way of facing this free-floating dread - by learning about what might happen when you die. Over six years, Massey University senior lecturer in psychology Dr Natasha Tassell-Matamua has spoken to hundreds of New Zealanders about their near-death experiences.

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Physician-author finds God in studies of near-death experiences

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Physician-author finds God in studies of near-death experiences

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This article is based on a book with religious beliefs on near death experiences.  The base of this book is the relation of religion with near death experiences. In so it's using agenticity as it's proof and relating back to religion as to get more to faithfully believe in the subject.

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"God and the Afterlife: The Groundbreaking New Evidence for God and Near-Death Experience"
by Jeffrey Long, M.D., with Paul Perry.
HarperOne (San Francisco, 2016).
213 pp., $25.99.

Since the beginning of time, death has posed the ultimate enigma. Where exactly do we go after our physical demise? Catholic tradition points to heaven or hell (and sometimes, purgatory). While earlier generations seemed to accept these beliefs on faith, in our age medical advances have made near-death experiences comparatively common.

Everyone has heard of near-death survivors, often called NDEers - those whom modern medicine has brought back from the very brink of death. In fact, a 1992 poll by Gallup - cited by the Near Death Experience Research Foundation - found that 13 million Americans, or 5 percent, had a near-death experience.

These survivors of horrendous car accidents, heart attacks and the like have actually flatlined, meeting the clinical definition of death. And when doctors revive them, these patients often tell similar stories of out-of-body experiences that include meeting deceased loved ones, crossing through a tunnel into a brilliant light and feeling cocooned by an overwhelming love, often from a distinct, supernatural personage who many of them conclude is God.

Not surprisingly, the sizable cohort of survivors of a near-death experience has inspired a popular literature that ranges from collections of anecdotes to more "scientific" explorations of the subject.

In 1975, when Raymond Moody, a physician and philosopher, published his book "Life After Life," a collection of interviews with and anecdotes about NDEers, it became a best-seller and sparked much popular interest in the subject. However, some critics dismissed Moody's lack of scientific rigor; for example, he provided no statistical analysis of the data he collected about the experiences of those who seemingly died and then were revived.

Dr. Jeffrey Long's new exploration of NDEers seems to try to address some of the limitations of earlier studies such as Moody's. "God and the Afterlife" reports on more than 4,000 near-death experiences cataloged by the nonprofit Near Death Experience Research Foundation that Long, a radiation oncologist in Houma, Louisiana, founded in 1998. He also established a website - nderf.org - to collect near-death accounts for scientific study.

In this book, Long reveals some of the experiences that near-death survivors "of diverse backgrounds and religious traditions" consistently report, such as feeling out-of-body and encountering a loving, mystical, divine being. Commonly, survivors also note their passage through a tunnel, the presence of a brilliant light and encounters with deceased relatives and friends.

Long presents numerous first-person accounts of near-death experiences, such as this one from a nurse who experienced severe blood loss during a cesarean section: "I looked down at my son's incubator and wondered, 'Am I dead?' But I was also thinking that it was OK if I were dead, because my son was all right. I was later given a photograph of him post-birth that looked exactly the same as what I saw, even though he was on the other side of the curtain."

Long found that many who survive these close calls with death report feelings of extraordinary peace and calm, as did a survivor of two cardiac arrests, who described how, "On the other side, the arms of my loved ones welcomed me home. The intense love just can't be described in words ... I felt content and safe, like I was in the care and love of God. And that love of God felt like the first time you see your baby or the first time you fall in love - multiplied by 10,000."

The book is a follow-up to Long's earlier New York Times best-seller, "Evidence of the Afterlife: The Science of Near-Death Experiences" (2010). Intriguingly, it addresses less common aspects of near-death experiences, such as "hellish encounters" (reported by fewer than 4 percent of Long's sample), which may seem "unworldly, frightening and suggestive of classical concepts of hell."

Long concludes that there is no correlation between one's relative "goodness" and the chance of encountering what he calls "a walk through the Valley of Death." All kinds of people have reported such experiences. Long prefers not to characterize them as "negative," because they seem to spur survivors to live transformed, more meaningful lives as much as the more common, pleasant near-death experiences do.

He observes that "there is historical literary evidence that past saints and holy men and women have experienced descent into hell. And, although this brush with evil may be hard on them it also often provides the grist for a deeper spirituality, one that moves them to greater spiritual wholeness."

With many engaging first-person accounts culled from this large near-death study, "God and the Afterlife" is easy to read and will likely interest many. Long's conclusion is unequivocal, that this data set of more than 4,000 near-death experiences offers "overwhelming evidence of God."

Some skeptics might question whether the reported tunnel, the light and the encounters with dead relatives and with a divine being actually occur during the period when the NDEer is judged to be clinically dead. Or could these experiences possibly occur in the seconds as consciousness (and life) is being regained? The latter explanation might cast doubt on the claims of Long (and other researchers).

Ultimately, despite this and other attempts to study what happens after we die, we may just have to take it on faith. At the very least, "God and the Afterlife" leads us to ponder the reality of God, if not to find a definitive answer.

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Roberts is the author of two books about Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker and teaches journalism at the State University of New York at Albany.

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god and the afterlife: the groundbreaking new evidence for god and near-death experience

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Physician-author finds God in studies of near-death experiences

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"God and the Afterlife: The Groundbreaking New Evidence for God and Near-Death Experience" by Jeffrey Long, M.D., with Paul Perry. HarperOne (San Francisco, 2016). 213 pp., $25.99. Since the beginning of time, death has posed the ultimate enigma. Where exactly do we go after our physical demise?

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This picture represents the common idea that one you die you will see a light at the end of a tunnel and you will want to walk toward it as it will lead you into your afterlife. I think people are often influenced by stories that have this sort of graphic but into them because they relate this with other people's experiences of near death (confusion of correlation with causation). This idea is common and maybe the reason why so many report seeing it. As in a delusional state they wish to believe they are going to be brought somewhere safe and they are able to relate to the idea of it all.

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This picture is created with a quote from a famous philosopher, psychologist, physician and author, who's known widely. This photo is an example of  appeal to authority as this person is a professional and is also known by many, this leads people to look up to him. It also beings into question perception/ observation as he has expressed himself has has a first count experience.

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This image represents the idea that when you have these near death experiences people often see this such as future event, deceased loved ones, an out of body experience, and an overview of past decisions. This is an example of an emotional connection, people wish to relate to the experience with an emotional bond. Like seeing a deceased loved one, they want to feel a connection as they pass or while they are unconscious.