In 1975, Dr. Raymond Moody first mentioned the term “near-death experiences” in publishing reports of 150 patients emerging from comas. In an article published in March 2020, a team of Belgian scientists, led by Charlotte Martial, examined the different states of consciousness that can arise during a near-death experience.
It is generally accepted that when we are in a coma, we lose our consciousness as the brain shuts down. However, this is a very simplistic way of looking at the subject, scientists say. Understanding near-death experiences requires a new approach that separates awareness, wakefulness, and connectedness.
Martial et al. divide awareness into two kinds: internal and external. In the case of near-death experiences, people have inner awareness when they see a bright light at the end of the tunnel, their lives flashing before their eyes, and other images. Meanwhile, their connection to the outside world is severed. Out-of-body experiences, on the other hand, occur during wakefulness, when our consciousness can react to the environment (for example during deep meditation).
Both of these phenomena are therefore associated with awareness. According to scientists from the Phase Research Center, near-death experiences can be artificially reproduced using the techniques of out-of-body travel during lucid dreaming. Do you think we enter a phase state or the afterworld during near-death experiences?
The study was published in the Trends in Cognitive Sciences journal.
