If time really does exist in a spatial sense – and if it’s true that time is a construct of the human mind – then perhaps in some way future events may already be present, just as past events are still present.Īdmittedly, this is very difficult to make sense of. But I don’t think it’s impossible that Tony did glimpse future events. Perhaps, for instance, he became a saxophone player simply because he saw himself playing it in his vision. There are obviously some mundane interpretations of Tony’s experience. And none of these theories explain how it’s possible for such a vast amount of information – in many cases, all the events of a person’s life – to manifest themselves in a period of a few seconds, and often far less. This could be related to “ cortical disinhibition” – a breaking down of the normal regulatory processes of the brain – in highly stressful or dangerous situations, causing a “cascade” of mental impressions.īut the life review is usually reported as a serene and ordered experience, completely unlike the kind of chaotic cascade of experiences associated with cortical disinhibition. Article contentįor example, a group of Israeli researchers suggested in 2017 that our life events may exist as a continuum in our minds, and may come to the forefront in extreme conditions of psychological and physiological stress.Īnother theory is that, when we’re close to death, our memories suddenly “unload” themselves, like the contents of a skip being dumped. “The life review can actually occur when people are not physiologically close to death – there are many cases of life reviews during falls, for instance,” he said.This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. “I don’t think we can assume this is a representative example of how the human brain behaves at the point of death,” he said, adding it was also a stretch to link an increase in gamma brain waves with flashbacks before death. “This study, showing similar findings in a dying human, is both moving and fascinating, but whether the recorded activity underlies any particular kind of subjective experience – whether so-called ‘near death experiences’, or impressions of life flashing before ones eyes – is impossible to say, and will likely remain so.”ĭr Steve Taylor, a psychologist at Leeds Beckett University, agreed. “The study extends work from about 10 years ago showing characteristic ‘bursts’ of brain activity in rodents prior to death, with some brain activity persisting even after cardiac arrest – especially in the so-called ‘gamma’ frequency range,” he said Prof Anil Seth, a neuroscientist at the University of Sussex who was not involved in the research, said the data was “pretty unique”, noting ethically it was not possible to plan the collection of such recordings. “These findings challenge our understanding of when exactly life ends and generate important subsequent questions, such as those related to the timing of organ donation,” said Dr Ajmal Zemmar, a neurosurgeon at the University of Louisville, US, and a co-author of the study. Nonetheless, the researchers say the results could have important implications. However, the findings are based on the recordings from just one person, and the researchers urge caution, noting among other factors that traumatic brain injuries and white matter damage can affect brain waves, while activity of networks in the brain can be affected by anticonvulsant medication such as that given to the patient. “Given that cross-coupling between alpha and gamma activity is involved in cognitive processes and memory recall in healthy subjects, it is intriguing to speculate that such activity could support a last ‘recall of life’ that may take place in the near-death state,” the team writes in the journal Frontiers in Ageing Neuroscience. The study suggests that interactions between different types of brain wave continue after the blood stops flowing in the brain.īut, the researchers add, it also raises an intriguing possibility. The team says analysis of recordings of the 30 seconds before and after the man’s heart stopped beating suggest that in his final moments he experienced changes in different types of brain waves, including alpha and gamma brain waves. However, during the EEG recordings he had experienced a heart attack and died. When doctors carried out an electroencephalography (EEG), they had discovered the patient had developed epilepsy. The man had been admitted to a hospital emergency department after a fall that resulted in a bleed in the brain, and subsequently deteriorated.
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