The topic of the afterlife and what happens when we die has been going on for centuries and still continues to be a hot topic present day. And while there are some people who have had near-death experiences that claim to have seen something, can we really trust their stories?
A recent study conducted at the University of Michigan may shed some light on this subject.
A near-death experience (NDE) occurs when an individual comes close to death, often due to medical emergencies such as cardiac arrest or other physical trauma. In these cases, the person may appear to be clinically dead for several minutes before being revived by medical personnel.
During this time, some people report having vivid out-of-body experiences in which they see or hear things that cannot be explained medically.
One example is Tina Hines, who died from cardiac arrest in February 2018 and was revived six times by medics during her trip to the hospital. She awoke asking for paper and pen so she could write down a cryptic message – “It’s real” – while nodding upwards as if indicating something spiritual.
Although NDEs remain somewhat mysterious and unproven scientifically, researchers at the University of Michigan conducted a study in 2013 using nine rats as test subjects in order to measure brain activity just before death.
The results showed that there was actually an increase in high-frequency brain waves during the 30 seconds after the rat’s heart stopped beating compared with its waking conscious state.
This suggests that although clinical death appears inactive or hypoactive from our perspective, it may actually be much more active than our waking state – which could explain why some individuals report seeing strange visions or hearing voices during their NDEs.
At this point it looks like science might be able to help us understand what happens when we die, though it will likely take another couple of decades until scientists can definitively prove whether near-death experiences are real or not.
