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Near-Death News

If you have had a near-death experience or other unexplained experience, you are invited to be in communication with Dr. Bruce Greyson and his team of researchers. Dr. Greyson would like to correspond with as many NDErs as possible. The other researchers and their specialties are listed below. When you respond, please send your name and postal address and/or e-mail address. Accounts can be sent as well. If not, they will ask for them later. You can read about the research Dr. Greyson's team is doing on their website (click on the link provided above). This research includes not only NDEs, but deathbed visions, and other phenomena that suggest we may survive bodily death. Visit the website and click on "Types of Experiences We Study" for an interesting read. Then you can respond by contacting Dr. Greyson at (cbg4d@virginia.edu) to report near-death experiences, or Dr. Jim Tucker (jbt8n@virginia.edu) to report children with memories of previous lives, or Dr. Emily Kelly (ewc2r@virginia.edu) to report any other experiences, such as apparitions, deathbed visions, and communications from deceased loves ones. [Read more]

Arjun died at age 5. The gist of his story: At six o'clock on an April evening in 2001, Arjun was accidentally electrocuted by 220-volt wires touching his head. His parents took him to a medical clinic where they worked on his body for two hours without success. They tried CPR, electroshock paddles, adrenaline shots – all the usual. But they couldn't get him off flatline. So the doctor charged them 5,000 rupees (about $110) and told them to call an undertaker. But they didn't. Instead they called Rod at the nearby Deliverance Church. He then called upon Savitri, one of his staff members. Savitri brought two other Christians to Arjun's home, and the five of them began praying over the dead body about 10:00 p.m. They prayed their hearts out for six hours with pleading and tears. Then, at 4:00 a.m. the next morning, Arjun snapped back to life with no brain damage, no physical problems.  [Read more]

Death could become a thing of the past by the mid-21st century as computer technology becomes sophisticated enough for the contents of a brain to be "downloaded" on to a supercomputer, according to a leading British futurologist ,,, Among other eyebrow-raising predictions by Ian Pearson, head of the futurology unit at British telecommunications giant BT, is the prospect of computer systems being able to feel emotions ... While the predictions might sound outlandish, they were merely the product of extrapolations drawn from the existing rate at which computers are evolving, Mr. Pearson said in an interview. [Read more]

Lisa Randall, one of the world's most influential physicists, explains why we need more than three dimensions to understand the cosmos ... Perhaps the best way to understand what these extra dimensions would be is the way Edwin Abbott described them in his book Flatland, written in the late 19th century. Suppose there was a society that, unlike ours, could detect and experience a world with only two dimensions: the Flatland of the title. Its inhabitants wouldn't perceive a third dimension, even though the dimension really did exist. If an object like a sphere were to pass through their universe, Flatlanders would never perceive it in its entirety; instead, they would see a succession of disks that grew in size and then became smaller. Because they register only two dimensions, Flatlanders could only mathematically piece together the fact that the object they had seen was the analogue of their disk, but in one higher dimension. Similarly, the fact that we see only three dimensions doesn't mean there might not be more.  [Read more]

Michael Nolte sometimes made jurors cry when he testified for three hours Wednesday about despair, loss and pain he suffered from a fiery interstate crash involving a trooper's car. He recounted a near-death experience floating above his body and told of guilt felt because he lived two years ago, while Missouri Highway Patrol Trooper Michael Newton died ... During the helicopter ride to a Columbia hospital, he said he ascended into what he described as a kind of warm tunnel and watched from above as medics worked on him. “It was a soft, pleasant and really good place you want to go — I could hear laughter around the corners.” But then he was back in his body. Someone on the helicopter asked him the level of his pain, on a scale of 1 to 10. “It was higher than a 10, but a 10 was all they gave me.” [Read more]

In the underworld of assisted suicide and euthanasia, Russel Ogden examines the means and methods -- even as he is shunned by academia and chased by the law ... In 1994 Ogden published his master's thesis, which documented the inner workings of this illicit network ...He wants to know who asks for assisted death, who provides it and how it is done. Such grisly details were revealed in Ogden's first study, in which 17 individuals, including doctors, nurses, counselors, social workers and two priests, told him precisely how they had helped AIDS patients kill themselves ... These people were first- or second-timers, "not serial death providers," Ogden remarks. "They weren't sure what they were doing." He concluded that the lack of medical knowledge, as well as the unavailability of suitable drugs and ignorance of lethal doses, contributed to the additional suffering. "This study showed that without medical supervision and formal regulations, euthanasia is happening in horrific circumstances, similar to back-alley abortions," he declares. [Read more]

Procedure appears to limit damage. For 24 hours, Hamilton Loeb lay unconscious inside a cold blue suit that put his brain on ice. Four times, his heart had stopped beating and he was shocked back to life. Then doctors essentially refrigerated him, in a bid to avert the brain damage that too often cripples survivors of cardiac arrest. Today, the 53-year-old Washington lawyer is back to normal, and he credits the cold with protecting his brain. Chilling the sick may sound counterintuitive, but research shows mild hypothermia cooling the body just a few degrees can significantly improve the odds of a full recovery after cardiac arrest. Now scientists are trying to prove whether a cool-down can protect against some of the damage from other disorders, too: [Read more]

After a New York fireman who barely said a word for a decade began talking profusely, what are the experiences of people who wake up from comas and vegetative states after long periods? "I want to talk to my wife," was Donald Herbert's first sentence in a decade. The 43-year-old then began speaking at length to loved ones, who feared he would never recover after a roof collapsed on him in 1995. He was initially in a coma, then he regained consciousness, but his speech was slurred and his vision unclear, with no memory of relatives. Another American, Terry Wallis, who came round in 2003 after a 19-year coma, still thinks it is 1984 and has severe memory problems. There is a fascination with this deep state of unconscious, a "twilight zone" between life and death and a place few of us ever explore. [Read more]

A scientist investigating one of the UK's "most haunted" locations has said "something quite odd" was going on. Professor Richard Wiseman used 200 volunteers to carry out a study of Mary King's Close in Edinburgh. It yielded reports of apparitions, phantom footsteps, unexplained cold spots and unseen hands ... Prof. Wisemen sent groups of volunteers to four locations, without telling them that only two sites had a strong reputation for being haunted. The aim was to compare reports from the different sites. About 70% of those visiting the "haunted" locations reported unusual phenomena. In contrast, only 48% of people exploring the locations not reputed to be haunted had spooky experiences.  [Read more]

While visiting the grave site of his son, a 70-year-old Tucson man was struck by lightning Saturday night. His body was found early Sunday at East Lawn Palms Cemetery. Joseph Cooper's body was found under a tree at the cemetery, 5801 E. Grant Road. His son, Oscar, died on Sept. 15, 1996, at the age of 30. A family representative said relatives were in shock Sunday and declined comment until later. Maintenance employees at East Lawn found Cooper's body and called Tucson police at 6:28 a.m., said Sgt. Kerry Fuller, a police spokeswoman. Homicide detectives and a doctor from the Medical Examiner's Office confirmed significant evidence that lightning was the cause of death, Fuller said. Entry and exit wounds, bruises and other injuries were found on the body, Fuller said, but an autopsy will be performed to confirm the cause. Fuller said deaths caused by lightning strikes are unusual in Tucson, even during severe storms. Local statistics weren't available Sunday, but the National Lightning Safety Institute reported 17 deaths in Arizona from 1990 to 2003, according to its Web site. [Read more]

A recently developed method for treating complicated grief, which includes discussing certain aspects of the death of a loved one, was found more effective than a standard therapy for depression, according to a study in the June 1 issue of JAMA ... Bereavement-related major depressive disorder (MDD) is a well-recognized consequence of loss. Complicated grief also occurs in the aftermath of loss but is different from depression. Key features of complicated grief, persisting more than 6 months after the death of a loved one, include (1) a sense of disbelief regarding the death; (2) anger and bitterness over the death; (3) recurrent pangs of painful emotions, with intense yearning and longing for the deceased; and (4) preoccupation with thoughts of the loved one, often including distressing intrusive thoughts related to the death. [Read more]

Patients approaching the end of life can significantly reduce their depression symptoms and improve their sense of spiritual well-being according to a study published in the current issue of the Journal of Palliative Medicine ... Some were randomly assigned to support groups, which met monthly progressively discussing more difficult and challenging issues. They addressed topics such as recognizing and asserting needs, feelings and emotions, symptom control, living well while sick, intimate relationships, spiritual needs, end-of-life planning and decision making, hope and gratitude, and legacy. Other patients received what is called “usual care,” and received mailings of standard support materials related to their disease, many of which could be found in their doctors' offices. “We were able to improve depression symptoms and lessen death anxiety, which led to better spiritual well-being,” says Dr. Miller. “We consider this pilot work as a promising approach, but a lot of work needs to be done to fully meet patients' needs at this most difficult time in their lives.” [Read more]

Researchers analyzed love-crazed brains. New love can look for all the world like mental illness, a blend of mania, dementia and obsession that cuts people off from friends and family and prompts out-of-character behavior - compulsive phone calling, serenades, yelling from rooftops - that could almost be mistaken for psychosis. Now for the first time, neuroscientists have produced brain scan images of this fevered activity, before it settles into the wine and roses phase of romance or the joint holiday card routines of long-term commitment. In an analysis of the images appearing in The Journal of Neurophysiology, researchers in New York and New Jersey argue that romantic love is a biological urge distinct from sexual arousal ... "When you're in the throes of this romantic love it's overwhelming, you're out of control, you're irrational, you're going to the gym at 6 a.m. every day - why? Because she's there," said Dr. Helen Fisher, an anthropologist at Rutgers University and the co-author of the analysis. "And when rejected, some people contemplate stalking, homicide, suicide. This drive for romantic love can be stronger than the will to live." [Read more]

Daniel Tammet is an autistic savant. He can perform mind-boggling mathematical calculations at breakneck speeds. But unlike other savants, who can perform similar feats, Tammet can describe how he does it ... Ever since the age of three, when he suffered an epileptic fit, Tammet has been obsessed with counting. Now he is 26, and a mathematical genius who can figure out cube roots quicker than a calculator and recall pi to 22,514 decimal places. He also happens to be autistic, which is why he can't drive a car, wire a plug, or tell right from left. He lives with extraordinary ability and disability. Tammet is calculating 377 multiplied by 795. Actually, he isn't "calculating": there is nothing conscious about what he is doing. He arrives at the answer instantly. Since his epileptic fit, he has been able to see numbers as shapes, colours and textures. The number two, for instance, is a motion, and five is a clap of thunder. "When I multiply numbers together, I see two shapes. The image starts to change and evolve, and a third shape emerges. That's the answer. It's mental imagery. It's like math without having to think."  [Read more]

The sixth man to walk on the moon spoke about his experience with unexplainable phenomena Thursday to a skeptical audience of about 100 scientists. Edgar Mitchell, an astronaut on Apollo 14, talked of the experiences that led him to research the unexplainable at the 24th annual meeting of the Society for Scientific Exploration at the Best Western Gateway Grand Hotel in Gainesville. "It isn't science, but personal experience, that stimulates you to do good science," he said. Mitchell, who holds a doctorate in aeronautics and astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, worked on the first extended research trip to the moon in 1971. He founded the Institute of Noetic Sciences to sponsor the study of unconventional scientific models, such as intuition and feeling, and he was inducted into the Space Hall of Fame in 1979 and the Astronaut Hall of Fame in 1998. His interest in the unexplainable began on his way back to Earth aboard Apollo 14. He gazed out the window and realized he was connected to the stars, his colleagues and the planet through his own molecules, he said. "You could see the Earth, the moon and the stars with each rotation of the spacecraft," Mitchell said. "The stars were literally brighter for me. It was an awesome, awe-inspiring view of the heavens." [Read more]

Physicists have problems with their belief systems and the field of physics is in crisis because of it, said Nobel Prize-winner Robert Laughlin at a recent Boston University lecture ... Laughlin, co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in physics in 1998, compared physicists to monotheists who hold one belief and defend it even when presented with contradictory evidence. Instead of questioning their original belief, he said, they would question the validity of the evidence challenging it ... “Physics is now in the midst of a crisis, an ideological battle,” he said. “The most fundamental things you know may not be fundamental" ... Laughlin also argued that, for mysteries like why atoms are so uniform throughout the galaxy, physicists form creation myths to explain away these quandaries. Inflationary cosmology, he said, is the “myth” created to solve this problem by saying that during the expansion after the big bang, matter became uniform ... The best chance at solving some of these mysteries of the universe, Laughlin suggests in "A Different Universe," is to avoid the reductionist approach of studying particles too minute to measure, and to look at the basic realities of the natural world. The exact characteristics of substances like ice or salt is not fully understood, he said, but may reveal more about the universe than the far reaches of space or the first nanofraction of a second after the big bang.  [Read more]

Astronomers have used supercomputers to re-create how the Universe evolved into the shape it is today. The simulation by an international team is the biggest ever attempted and shows how structures in the Universe changed and grew over billions of years. The Millennium Run, as it is dubbed, could help explain observations made by astronomers and shed more light on the Universe's elusive dark energy field. Details of the study appear in the latest issue of Nature magazine. "We have learned more about the Universe in the last 10 or 20 years than in the whole of human civilisation," said Professor Carlos Frenk, Ogden professor of fundamental physics at the University of Durham and co-author on the Nature report. "We are now able, using the biggest, fastest supercomputers in the world, to recreate the whole of cosmic history," he told the BBC. The researchers looked at how the Universe evolved under the influence of the mysterious material called dark matter. [Read more]

The asteroid, named 2004 MN4, was found last year. It orbits the Sun but crosses the path of Earth. In December, preliminary observations showed it might strike in 2029, according to NASA scientists. It briefly had the highest odds ever assigned to a possible collision. Further investigation ruled out the 2029 impact scenario, but scientists cannot yet rule out an impact in 2036. The odds of a collision in 2036 are about 1-in-10,000, Schweickart says. In fact, there are several scenarios between 2034 and 2065 in which 2004 MN4 has even smaller odds of striking. Schweickart and other scientists stress, however, that future observations are likely to reduce all these odds to zero. [Read more]

There are an estimated 6,000 intensive care units in the United States caring for approximately 55,000 patients daily. Between 60 percent to 80 percent of these patients develop a brain dysfunction known as delirium, which according to a group of physicians at Vanderbilt Medical Center is an independent predictor of mortality ... "The dilemma in critical care is that people often develop brain dysfunction or delirium in the ICU setting which is thought to be of no real importance to survival or long-term quality of life," Ely said. "Frankly, it's been overlooked by medical teams for years and is simply called 'ICU psychosis ... Five years ago, we began studying delirium in the ICU at Vanderbilt, after realizing that older people are more frequently going to ICUs and the added risk of developing brain dysfunction was present" ... Ely said the first problem with delirium is the mortality rate. The second is cost. The estimated cost of treating delirium in the ICU ranges from $4 billion to more than $20 billion nationwide. Third, Ely and his team assert, is the impact the duration and severity of delirium will likely have on the neuropsychological deficits of these patients. [Read more]

A bill to make California the second state in the nation to allow physician-assisted suicide cleared a key committee Wednesday, setting up a first-ever state Assembly vote on the issue ... If signed into law, certain terminally ill Californians would be able to obtain a lethal dose of medication from physicians after a waiting period and multiple medical evaluations ... Despite physician-assisted suicide consistently polling well, California voters turned down a ballot measure on the issue in 1992. Also Wednesday, the committee passed legislation that would legalize same-sex marriage in California on a 13-5 party line vote, ensuring that measure, too, will face a full Assembly floor vote.  [Read more]

OPINION:  If the new Spanish film "The Sea Inside" teaches us anything, it is that no amount of law and legislation can prevent a person who wants to die from devising the ways and means to take their own life ... The life and death of lead character and real-life person, Ramon Sampedro, has long been a cause celebre in Spain. Paralysed from the neck down from a diving accident at 26, Sampedro spent his next 28 years as, in his words, a head attached to a corpse. Deeply resentful of being forced to live a life that he defined as having little quality, Sampedro repeatedly petitioned the Spanish and European courts. Repeatedly, Sampedro was denied permission to ask for assistance to die, a request he believed he had the right to make. The law disagreed. Most people believe in death with dignity. In this, Sampedro was not exceptional. At the end of the day it is of little importance that he was not terminally ill. Rather, what mattered to him was that his life had so little dignity, that death was a preferable option. [Read more]

OPINION:  The notion that an embryo, or a fertilised egg, should be considered human is certainly open for debate. As reported in Science magazine, "zygotic personhood" - the idea that a fertilised egg is a person - is a recent concept. Before 1869, for example, the Catholic church believed that the embryo was not a person until it was 40 days old, at which time the soul entered. Aristotle also presumed this 40-day threshold. If the early embryo was soulless, then perhaps early abortion was not murder. Pope Innocent III determined, in 1211, that the time of ensoulment was anywhere from three to four months. In Jewish law, the fetus becomes a full-fledged human being when its head exits the womb. According to the Talmud, before the embryo is 40 days old, it is 'maya b'alma' or 'mere water'. [Read more]

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