Scientific evidence of survival of consciousness after death

sinweiy SG

Scientific evidence for survival of consciousness after death(i.e. brain dead)

NDEs occur while patients are brain dead.

Cardiologist Michael Sabom described a near-death experience that occurred while its experiencer - a woman who was having an unusual surgical procedure for the safe excision and repair of a large basilar artery aneurysm - met all of the accepted criteria for brain death. The unusual medical procedure involved the induction of hypothermic cardiac arrest, in order to insure that the aneurysm at the base of the brain would not rupture during the operation. The patient's body temperature was lowered to 60 degrees Fahrenheit, her heartbeat and breathing ceased, her brain waves flattened, and the blood was completely drained from her head. Her electroencephalogram was totally flat (indicating no cerebral electrical activity) and auditory evoked potentials (normally elicited by clicks presented through molded earplugs that had been inserted into her ears) ceased (indicating cessation of brainstem functioning). Ordinarily - at regular body temperature - the brain cannot function without its oxygen supply for more than a few minutes. Lowering the body and brain temperature to 60 degrees F. - by chilling the blood in a bypass machine before returning it to the body and brain - however, can reduce cellular metabolism so that the brain can tolerate complete cerebral blood flow for the 45 minutes or so required for the brain operation. The patient later reported that, apparently while under these “brain death” conditions, she had a near-death experience (NDE) in which she was able to observe and hear details of objects and happenings in the operating room with accuracy. She also experienced classic components of the NDE, including a tunnel vortex, a bright light, and different figures in the light (many deceased family members, including a distant cousin of whose death she had been unaware).

http://www.near-death.com/evidence.html

sinweiy SG

By Loden Jinpa

http://lodenjinpa.com/death-process-in-buddhism/

DEATH AND DYING IN THE TIBETAN BUDDHIST TRADITION
Compiled by: Ven. Pende Hawter

Upon the inception of the fifth cycle the mind begins to dissolve, in the sense that coarser types cease and subtler minds become manifest. First, conceptuality ceases, dissolving into a mind of white appearance. This subtler mind, to which only a vacuity filled by white light appears, is free from coarse conceptuality. It, in turn, dissolves into a heightened mind of red appearance, which then dissolves into a mind of black appearance. At this point all that appears is a vacuity filled by blackness, during which the person eventually becomes unconscious. In time this is cleared away, leaving a totally clear emptiness (the mind of clear light) free from the white, red and black appearances (see Chart 5). This is the final vision of death.

This description of the various internal visions correlates closely with the literature on the near-death experience. People who have had a near-death experience often describe moving from darkness (for example a black tunnel) towards a brilliant, peaceful, loving light. A comprehensive study comparing death and near-death experiences of Tibetans and Euro-Americans has shown many similarities between the two (Carr, 1993). Care must be taken though in such comparisons because the near-death experience is not actual death, that is, the consciousness permanently leaving the body.

Since the outer breath ceased some time before (in the fourth cycle), from this point of view the point of actual death is related not to the cessation of the outer breath but to the appearance of the mind of clear light. A person can remain in this state of lucid vacuity for up to three days, after which (if the body has not been ravaged by illness) the external sign of drops of red or white liquid emerging from the nose and sexual organ occur, indicating the departure of consciousness.

Other signs of the consciousness leaving the body are 1) when all heat has left the area of the heart centre (in the centre of the chest), 2) the body starts to smell or decompose, 3) a subtle awareness that the consciousness has left and the body has become like 'an empty shell', 4) a slumping of the body in a practitioner who has been sitting in meditation after the stopping of the breath. Buddhists generally prefer that the body not be removed for disposal before one or more of these signs occur, because until then the consciousness is still in the body and any violent handling of it may disturb the end processes of death. A Buddhist monk or nun or friend should ideally be called in before the body is moved in order for the appropriate prayers and procedures to be carried out.

Amitayus48 SG

Reincarnation has been called by some to be the greatest unknown scientific discovery today. In the last chapter of Dr. Ian Stevenson's book entitled Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation (1967), he provides rigorous scientific reasoning to show how reincarnation is the only viable explanation that fits the facts of his study. He considers every possible alternative explanation for his twenty cases of young children who were spontaneously able to describe a previous lifetime as soon as they learned to talk. He was able to rule out each alternative explanation using one or more aspects of these cases. Later research has even bolstered his case in favor of the existence of reincarnation. His study is also completely reproducible which means that anybody who doubts the validity of this study is perfectly welcome to repeat it for themselves. I believe it is only a short matter of time before his discovery of the existence of reincarnation is finally realized by the scientific community and the world to be accepted as one of the greatest scientific discoveries of all time.

NDE and Reincarnation Research

NDE and Reincarnation Examples

Reincarnation Case Studies

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"How can you make denial of Allah, who made you live again when you died, will make you dead again, and then alive again, until you finally return to him (Buddhahood)?" - the Koran [2.28]