When We Die Could We Ever Become Conscious Again
The first time I reached past the sheer horror of the concept of death and wondered what the experience of dying may be similar, I was nearly 15. I had but discovered gruesome aspects of the French revolution and how heads were neatly cut off the body by a Guillotine.
Words I think to this day were the last of Georges Danton on April v, 1794, who allegedly said to his executioner: "Show my head to the people, information technology is worth seeing." Years later, having get a cognitive neuroscientist, I started wondering to what extent a encephalon suddenly separated from the body could still perceive its environment and possibly remember.
Danton wanted his head to be shown, but could he see or hear the people? Was he conscious, even for a cursory moment? How did his brain shut down?
On June xiv, 2021, I was violently reminded of these questions. I set up off to Marseille, French republic, having been summoned to Avignon by my female parent because my brother was in a disquisitional state, a few days after existence of a sudden diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. Simply when I landed, I was told my blood brother had passed away 4 hours ago. An hour afterward, I constitute him perfectly nevertheless and beautiful, his caput slightly turned to the side every bit if he was in a deep country of slumber. Only he was not breathing anymore and he was cold to the bear on.
No thing how much I refused to believe it on that day, and during the several months that followed, my brother'southward extraordinarily bright and creative listen had gone, vaporised, just to remain palpable in the artworks he left behind. Even so, in the last moment I was given to spend with his lifeless body in a infirmary room, I felt the urge to speak to him.
And I did, despite 25 years of studying the human brain and knowing perfectly well that about vi minutes after the centre stops, and the blood supply to the brain is interrupted, the encephalon essentially dies. Then, deterioration reaches a point of no render and core consciousness – our ability to feel that we are here and now, and to recognise that thoughts we have are own ain – is lost. Could in that location be annihilation of my dear brother'southward mind left to hear my voice and generate thoughts, five hours after he had passed away?
Some scientific experiments
Experiments have been conducted in an attempt to meliorate sympathise reports from people who have had a well-nigh death experience. Such an consequence has been associated with out-of-body experiences, a sense profound elation, a calling, a seeing of a calorie-free shining above, but likewise profound bursts of anxiety or complete emptiness and silence. One central limitation of studies looking into such experiences is that they focus too much of the nature of the experiences themselves and frequently overlook the context preceding them.
Some people, having undergone anaesthesia while in good shape or having been involved in a sudden accident leading to instant loss of consciousness have little ground to feel deep feet equally their brain commences to close downwardly. On the contrary, someone who has a protracted history of a serious illness might be more probable to get a crude ride.
Information technology isn't easy to go permissions to study what really goes on in the brain during our final moments of life. But a recent paper examined electric brain activity in an 87-year-old human who had suffered a caput injury in a fall, equally he passed away following a series of epileptic seizures and cardiac arrest. While this was the first publication of such data nerveless during the transition from life to decease, the newspaper is highly speculative when information technology comes to possible "experiences of the mind" that accompany the transition to death.
The researchers discovered that some brain waves, called alpha and gamma, inverse pattern fifty-fifty subsequently blood had stopped flowing to the encephalon. "Given that cross-coupling between alpha and gamma activity is involved in cognitive processes and retention recall in healthy subjects, it is intriguing to speculate that such activeness could support a last 'recollect of life' that may accept place in the near-decease state," they write.
Yet, such coupling is not uncommon in the healthy brain – and does not necessarily mean that life is flashing before our eyes. What's more, the study did not reply my basic question: how long does it take after the cessation of oxygen supply to the brain for the essential neural activeness to disappear? The study only reported on brain action recorded over a menses of about 15 minutes, including a few minutes later expiry.
In rats, experiments have established that after a few seconds, consciousness is lost. And after 40 seconds, the great majority of neural activity has disappeared. Some studies accept also shown that this brain shutdown is accompanied past a release of serotonin, a chemical associated with arousal and feelings of happiness.
But what about us? If humans tin exist resuscitated after six, 7, 8 or even x minutes in extreme cases, it could theoretically be hours before their brain shuts down completely.
I have come across a number of theories trying to explicate why life would be flashing earlier someone'southward eyes as the brain prepares to die. Maybe information technology is a completely artificial effect associated with the sudden surge of neural action equally the brain begins to shut down. Maybe information technology is a last resort, defence mechanism of the body trying to overcome imminent death. Or mayhap it is a deeply rooted, genetically programmed reflex, keeping our mind "busy" as clearly the most distressing event of our entire life unfolds.
My hypothesis is somewhat different. Maybe our most essential existential drive is to sympathise the meaning of our own existence. If and so, and then, seeing one'due south life flashing earlier 1's eye might be our ultimate attempt – however desperate – to detect an respond, necessarily fast-tracked because we are running out of time.
Baca juga: Death: can our final moment be euphoric?
And whether or non we succeed or get the illusion that we did, this must effect in accented mental bliss. I promise that future research in the field, with longer measurements of neural action afterwards death, possibly fifty-fifty encephalon imaging, volition provide support for this idea – whether information technology lasts minutes or hours, for the sake of my brother, and that of all of us.
Source: https://theconversation.com/death-how-long-are-we-conscious-for-and-does-life-really-flash-before-our-eyes-177897
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