Thought this news item was quite interesting but sadly haven't been able to read the book as it is prohibitively expensive (£85 :o ), as it is meant for academic use. Might see if I can get hold of it as a library loan some time.

The book recounts a five year 'clinical' study by a nurse working in intensive care. She apparently took into account things such as oxygen and endorphine levels and didn't find anything unusual. Although she doesn't seem happy to accept that people may survive death, she does suggest that consciousness might exist around us (like a magnetic field?) and that our brains act like some kind of antenna.

Interesting idea!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/7463606.stm

Thank you, batfink!

At first I thought this Penny Satori didn't have anything new to reporton the content of the NDEs themselves, but her conclusions and continuing research are very much on the leading edge.  The reviewer said:

''She now intends to continue her research into the phenomenon
and is developing a private theory, not included in her book,
about what could be happening to these patients.
"I don't think it's quite as simple as life after death," she said.
"It's what consciousness is and how we define it. We are entering
an exciting time researching consciousness.
"Current science says it is a by-product of the brain. But it may
be that consciousness is around us and the brain might be a
mediator, an antenna, instead of controlling consciousness."

Maybe the book will show up in some public libraries near medical centers. I sure hope so! And with a name like Penny satori, she's got a great start !

bets

For what its worth, the radio/antenna theory was put forth on this board many months ago - by me.  I used the specific analogy.  Some say that when a person has a stroke, and loses the ability to move one side of their body, or their ability to speak, it is proof that consciousness is formed from the brain.  However, as I mentioned before, if the brain was like a radio receiver of consciousness, you could imagine that damaging the radio would cause a permanent problem.   Consciousness could then be permanently unable to translate into the physical world, and you could have the same outcome.  

I do applaud any efforts to scientifically study NDEs or OOBEs.  Not enough objective work has been donein these areas.


Matthew

Hi Matthew,

I remember you did, but I didn't feel qualified to discuss it.

I hope you will have some medical peers now with Dr Piero
and this Penny Santori 'on the scene'. (Perhaps you can track Santori down
for email communication through google etc.) This whole field seems to be moving into a new level, one to which you will be able to contribute meaningfully !  
Congratulations!

Bets

batfink wrote on Jun 20^th, 2008 at 4:22am:

Although she doesn't seem happy to accept that people may survive death, she does suggest that consciousness might exist around us (like a magnetic field?) and that our brains act like some kind of antenna. Interesting idea! http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/7463606.stm

Hi Fiona,  

This is exactly how I have pictured Consciousness (or GOD if you will) for myself.  [smiley=shocked.gif] In a few words - the Consciousness exists in a form of well..., let's say a "cloud". A human's body in this case acts simply as an interface device to interact with phisical reality.

If you think of our cell/mobile phones technology - this is simpyfied model of the World Consciousness - peers (humans) scheme.
This is my personal understanding, vision, theory - whatever you call it. I came to this conclusion absolutely independantly just trying to find rational explanation... to some of my questions. [smiley=rolleyes.gif]
Apparently I'm not the only one who came up with this concept wich makes me feel very positive about it. [smiley=2vrolijk_08.gif]

I've thought of it as rather like being inside a box (or, say, one of the bathyspheres, where your only communication is through radio and closed circuit).

When everything is working well, both those inside and those outside communicate just fine.  If one side (say the transmitter from outside) goes wonky, there can still be reasonable communication after a period of time for both sides to figure out what went wrong.  But if part or all of both transmitters and/or receivers goes bad, especially if it's intermittently, those inside the box/bathysphere/whatever could be perfectly coherent and mentally "there", but nothing they wanted to communicate would make any sense outside, and therefore they would get to where they couldn't tell if information from the outside was coming through accurately or not, nor whether what they had sent was coming through ungarbled to the outside.

Very freaky situation...now imagine it inside your own head...serious unpleasantness...