2. What is the near death
experience?
• It occurs when a person enters “clinical
death” and usually has a profound personal
experience which can include:
• A sensation of leaving the body
• Following a bright light
• Encounter with a higher being (God, Buddha,
Aliens, etc.)
• What is “clinical death” then?
• Clinical death: no cardiac output, no
respiration, fixed dilated pupils
3. TYPES OF NEAR-DEATH
EXPERIENCES
• INEFFABILITY
• HEARING THE NEWS OF THEIR DEATH
• FEELING PEACE AND QUITE
• THE DARK TUNNEL
• OUT OF BODY EXPERIENCES
• THE BEING OF LIGHT
• THE LIFE REVIEW
• THE BORDER OR LIMIT
• EFFECT ON LIVES
• CORROBORATION
4. NDE TRAITS
BY RAYMOND MOODY IN
“LIFE AFTER DEATH”
• TIME AND SPACE
• PAINLESSNESS AND PEACE
• OUT OF BODY EXPERIENCES
• RISING INTO HEAVENS
• RELUCTANCE TO RETURN
• MEETING OF THE SUPREME BEING
5. RESEARCH
• Research by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, George
Ritchie, and Raymond Moody Jr. Moody's book
"Life after Life", released in 1975, brought a lot
of attention to the topic of NDEs
• This was soon followed by the establishment of
the International Association for Near-death
Studies, IANDS, in 1981.
6. PREVALENCE OF NDEs
• According to the Gallup and Proctor survey in 1980-1981, of a
representative sample of the American population, data showed that 15%
had an NDE.
• Knoblauch in 2001 performed a more selective study in Germany and found
that 4% of the sample population had experienced an NDE
• Perera et al., in 2005, conducted a telephone survey of a representative
sample of the Australian population, as part of the Roy Morgan Catibus
Survey, and concluded that 8.9% of the population had experienced an
NDE.
• van Lommel et al. (2001), a cardiologist from Netherlands, studied a group
of patients who had suffered cardiac arrests and who were successfully
revived. They found that 62 patients (18%) had an NDE, of whom 41 (12%)
described a core experience.
7. BIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS AND
THEORIES
• Dr. Karl Jansen, a New Zealand-born psychiatrist, claims to have
reproduced the effects of NDEs through the use of ketamine, thus
giving potential evidence of a biological cause of the experience
• In the 1990s, Dr. Rick Strassman conducted research on the
psychedelic drug Dimethyltryptamine (DMT) at the University of New
Mexico. Strassman advanced the theory that a massive release of
DMT from the pineal gland prior to death or near-death was the
cause of the near-death experience phenomenon
• According to Engmann, near-death experiences of people who are
clinically dead are psychopathological symptoms caused by a
severe malfunction of the brain resulting from the cessation of
cerebral blood circulation.
8. EFFECTS
• Changes in personality and outlook on life
• A greater appreciation for life.
• Higher self-esteem, greater compassion for others.
• A heightened sense of purpose and self-understanding.
• Desire to learn.
• Elevated spirituality.
• Greater ecological sensitivity and planetary concern.
• A feeling of being more intuitive.
• Changes may also include increased physical sensitivity;
diminished tolerance to light, alcohol, and drugs; a
feeling that the brain has been "altered" to encompass
more; and a feeling that one is now using the "whole
brain" rather than just a small part
10. “This body, that you are in has been
alive forever. It comes from an
unending stream of life, going back
to the big bang and beyond.”
-MELLEN THOMAS BENEDICT
