Macabre stuff, but indisputably scientific all the same.
Neuroscientists have recorded the activity of a dying human brain
71–80 of 197 posts
Re: Neuroscientists have recorded the activity of a dying human brain
#72This corresponds with what I've read previously about brain activity following clinical death. What appears to be the case is that the brain continues to work for a period after the heart stops and a last breath is taken. So what that might mean is that if one is with a person who has just died, a relative or friend, there is still a moment, just a moment, to say good bye and I love you. And it is comforting to know…
It seems strange to imagine telling someone who isn't going to experience anything ever again anything at all.
Re: Neuroscientists have recorded the activity of a dying human brain
#73There's an assumption that the brain knows that its support structure, aka the body, has stopped functioning in a permanent sense. I can see how brains could evolve to do status checks and respond to survivable events. But, I don't see how it could evolve to have a different response to non-survivable events. What I'm getting at is, do folks who survive report that they had a nice experience? If not, how did brains g…
Or it merely enters a power-saving mode once the oxygen levels drop, survivable or not.
Re: Neuroscientists have recorded the activity of a dying human brain
#74Earlier quoted context omitted.
What if you just don't remember the experiences you've had during this moment? Not impossible, imho
An interesting thought, but in my mind it also raises the question of the meaning behind a sequence of memories that you don't remember remembering, there's simply no reason to assume it happened at all since without memories there is no other evidence of the event.
Re: Neuroscientists have recorded the activity of a dying human brain
#75Earlier quoted context omitted.
> the brain continues to work for a period after the heart stops I had a sudden cardiac arrest (Ventricular Fibrillation). I felt dizzy and oriented for a few seconds (5?) after my heart stopped pumping blood and then I passed out. There was no life-flashing-before-my-eyes, no tunnels of light, just sudden dizziness and disorientation and then nothing. The next thing I remember was coming round in hospital.
What if you just don't remember the experiences you've had during this moment? Not impossible, imho
True, forming memories at that time might simply be unnecessary overhead since you're not likely to turn back without significant medical help. Memories that will never be accessed are just pointless.
But so are hiccups, who knows...
Re: Neuroscientists have recorded the activity of a dying human brain
#76I dread that it might be like my usual (nightly) sleep paralysis, except it will be the one time I don't wake up...
This is a big factor in my insomnia. Not necessarily the fear that I'll die in my sleep (God willing, that's my preference in old age) but the realization that every night, I'm getting a little more and more acquainted with oblivion. Knowing that you and everyone else here is in the same boat helps a lot. Maybe it's trite, and silly, but the phrase "We're all in this together" brings me a little bit of comfort, a tin…
Yes, seriously, most nights I am kept awake by that same existential dread. since I was too young to even know how to speak, actually. it's haunted me my entire life. I am of the fundamental belief that consciousness is nothing more than the functioning of our biological brain. I've never seen even the tiniest shred of evidence to suggest otherwise (in fact I have become more and more certain as I live more years on this earth and observe more humans in varying states of functioning/life/consciousness/etc.) ...
Re: Neuroscientists have recorded the activity of a dying human brain
#77> “Through generating oscillations involved in memory retrieval, the brain may be playing a last recall of important life events just before we die, similar to the ones reported in near-death experiences,” Zemmar speculated. I wonder what the adaptive benefits of near-death flashbacks are. Perhaps as a way to give last-ditch motivation. We have plenty of accounts of what it's like to have a heart stop. Thank defibril…
It doesn't have to have adaptive benefits. The critical path is molded by natural selection but the rest grows wild, mutating as it pleases until it either helps or hinders gene replication.
For example, if humans exploded like a bomb when we died the way some insects do to protect their colony, that might be selected for or against by evolution. Or if somehow eating the deceased's heart or brain actually transferred their strength or memories to the consumer, as some cultures believed. But no, death by old age just doesn't interest evolution.
Re: Neuroscientists have recorded the activity of a dying human brain
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
What if you just don't remember the experiences you've had during this moment? Not impossible, imho
An interesting thought, but in my mind it also raises the question of the meaning behind a sequence of memories that you don't remember remembering, there's simply no reason to assume it happened at all since without memories there is no other evidence of the event.
A dying person will not revisit their final moments if they were saved as memories. Giving comfort in passing is a kindness and a dignity to both the dying and the bereaved.
Re: Neuroscientists have recorded the activity of a dying human brain
#79A good avenue of future study to correlate these with case reports of Near Death Experiences.
Re: Neuroscientists have recorded the activity of a dying human brain
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
I figure that worrying about death is something that can, by definition, only torment the living. There will be no blackness, because that implies perception. How are you going to perceive it when you no longer exist? The closest survivable analog, in my opinion, is the "sleep" you experience when under something like sodium thiopental. When it works, you go from awake to awake again in an instant, from your own pers…
> When it works, you go from awake to awake again in an instant That's my thought as well. Last time I was put under anesthesia I tried hard to think about how I was feeling. I went from awake with my eyes open to opening my eyes. I thought my eyes were already open? There is just literally nothing between that span of time. It's like that except you don't wake? But it lasted an instant. How can something that passes…
> How can something that passes in an instant last for infinity? It makes my brain hurt.
Indeed it does. This is why I try to remind myself that this kind of thinking can only torment me when I'm alive, and I should stop wasting time. Especially at 2am, which of course is when I have these kinds of thoughts to begin with.
My dad and I used to talk about this and decided that we lived forever, as a practical matter. "Before" and "after" just speculation.