A believer’s evidence, a skeptic’s challenge
Jeffrey Long, M.D. has spent years studying near death experiences (NDE). Evidence is a curious thing. Standing alone, any evidence can only vaguely point a finger toward a specific direction of truth. Oftentimes, as in the belief in Christ or God, Himself; by taking only one piece of evidence, you can’t eliminate enough variables to keep a convincing argument. To say, for example, that the pollens on the Shroud of Turin are a dead ringer for the species that grew in Jerusalem at the time of Christ, therefore the cloth is authentic, doesn’t give enough evidence. However, when you consider that the scorch is of an unknown origin, and can only be caused by vacuum ultraviolet radiation with a wavelength of 200-100 nanometers from laser pulses lasting less than 50 nanoseconds, it helps. Also, there is the fact that the cloth holds an image which has been copied on works dating back to the earliest centuries. Consider, as well that it has three dimensional qualities and it is indicative of ancient Jewish burial rituals. Also consider that it matches the face cloth which has been protected and revered the same. The evidence begins to add up. Add to that, the evidence of blood on the Shroud which has been typed, the indications of wounds that give away crucifixion, and then some, well, soon, we begin to believe. As we study, painstakingly sweat in the labs, carry on discussions, and bleed our brains over midnight oil for variables to give us another alternative, at one point, we finally realize that the variables have been nearly explained away, given enough lines of evidence. It is the gift of reason.
Jeffrey Long didn’t just sit down and listen to one testimony on youtube about someone who had a near death experience and call it “good”. That kind of evidence doesn’t dismiss the fact that people who nearly died wanted to tell a sensational story or want the attention. It leaves open the possibility that they were having a lucid dream or that the brain was shooting out endorphins. Could be that the brain was over reacting in the lighting sensors as death approaches. It doesn’t eliminate those who were drugged on chemicals that mess with neurological activity. Dr. Long, instead, pounded the pavement and gathered nine lines of evidence that eliminate these variable. He has read documentations of over a thousand NDEs.
It is the combination of his lines of evidence that, he says, becomes compelling.
Jeffrey Long is a radiation oncologist. For more than ten years he has studied the incidences of NDE. He is the author of Evidence of the Afterlife; the Science of Near Death Experiences. His web site is the largest known account of NDEs. Jeffrey says that the Gallup Poll numbers those who have had NDEs then lived to tell about it are 5% of the population. Blissful state, Heavenly realms, and those recovering wake up unafraid of death. His claim is that consciousness is outside of the body. These people come into infinite love and a feeling of being in touch with divinity. Some feel a universal knowledge. The changes they emotionally go through impacts them for the rest of their lives. They come back to life convinced there is life after death. Relationships become important, materialism slides into the background and its importance often dissipates. Sometimes they change professions and begin to work in areas that are geared more toward nurturing and love for fellow man.
According to Dr. Long, the nine lines of evidence that surpass any medical reasons follow.
1) It is Real.
The claim by 76% of the subjects is that the NDE feels more real than what they experience in every day life. Subjects claim, in the words of Plato, that our lives are the dream and this type of consciousness found in the NDE is real. Our lives we live everyday, after a NDE are then described as the illusion. One man described the experience as changing his impression of life as “paper mache” and “two dimensional fluff”.
Lucid consciously, or alertness when one is clinically dead can not be explained by what we know at this time. The level of consciousness is inexplicable because it is so heightened. It is consistent across the board that the experiencer was not caught up in a dream. Typically in a dream the flow is fragmented. In a NDE, the elements do not skip around, they flow with continuity in perfection. It is especially curious that this often happens when one is under a general anesthesia; when no consciousness should be happening at all.
2) Out of Body Experience:
Dr. Long expresses the out of body experience. He claims that 50% of NDEs have an out of body experience. People will clearly see what is going on around them from another perspective, seemingly consciousless to the observer, the person is really watching what is happening and return to tell the most astounding details such as words said, the way a person was standing, etc.
This experience of a separation of consciousness from their body leaves the NDE above the body, looking down. Sometimes the point of consciousness leaves the room, sees and hear conversations and experiences that goes on far from their body. They can see and hear what their family or workers are talking about in other rooms such as the cafeteria, hallways, and nurses stations. Such phenomena is not possible to explain by the skeptics who fall back on the inner workings of the brain confined to one room and one time. Many a family has been shocked when their loved ones can recount conversations they’ve had a long distance from the site of surgery.
One man described the “post it notes” that were put in place during the surgery when he had a NDE. These messages were put there by a nurse who was notifying the surgeon of calls he was getting during the surgery. Prior to entering the room the post-its were not placed. Says the surgeon, “There’s no way he could have described that before the operation because I didn’t have any calls at that time.”
3) Blind Sight
Heightened vision is another line of evidence that Dr. Long names in NDEs. People are able to break through their limited peripheral vision and see at about 160 degrees. This is beyond our limited capacity in our physical bodies. Furthermore, one of the most astounding lines of evidence are the reports that blind people tell of the ability to see. Even those who were born blind from birth, a NDE has been able to give them the ability to see. These people have clear vision; a sense they’ve never had. One woman was horrified and shocked to see her body during a NDE. She was born blind and never had sight until her NDE. It was frightening to her because she had never experienced that sense before. Some have reported sound being more acute, being able to pick up on details, not capable of picking up in life.
All things illuminate light rather than reflects it. Descriptions of unearthly realms are consistence, as is the harmony and peace of the experience.
4) Impossible Consciousness
While under general anesthesia, it is scientifically difficult to bring out consciousness at all, let alone heightened consciousness. Dr. Long notes that the knowledge NDEs bring back is astounding, though they can not describe it. An analogy is given which compares the knowledge you have during NDE to holding the entire oceans of the world into a teacup.
Neuropsychologist, Dr. Peter Fenwick, gives us a profound thought. He says that if someone’s heart is stopped and their brain is no longer functioning, and you are still having experiences, such as looking down from the ceiling or going through a type of tunnel, this suggests that consciousness is independent of the mind.
5) Perfect playback
With a sense of timelessness, subjects go through a life review, as if everything they ever thought, did, or said is there in front of them. They experience the influences they’ve had on other people, as if it is their own. Even an eternal understanding of adversaries, and ones self is given outside of time’s arrow.
The consciousness is so accelerated, they are able to pick up on empathy for all of those they have met and influenced during their lifetime. Time does not exist in these realms. Space does not exist as we know it either. It’s as if everything happens at once. Time is compressed. Decades become minutes. Some describes everything happening at the same time. There seems to be an absence of time, other physical dimensions going on, and concepts of quantum physics where matter can locate itself in two places, even though the matter is apart. In quantum theory, this is called entanglement.
6) Family Reunion
Testimonies of death include meeting people who have been in our lives, or people who passed on before we knew of them. Oftentimes describes as beings full of love, sometimes unrecognizable, but all were parts of our lives that mattered.
One man, following a fatal heart attack, met a woman and a boy with the realization that he had abandoned them. After he recovered, the reality of his experience caused him to look further into the possibility that he had a son. Eventually he discovered that he had a son he never knew about, with a long past girlfriend. Both had died. Both met him during his NDE.
The motion picture, Heaven is for Real tells the story of the young child who learned of his mother’s miscarriage in a NDE when he met his older sister. This film claims to be based on actual events.
7 and 8) Out of the Mouths of Babes and World Consistency
A basic marker of valid science is consistency. You would expect that experiences would be consistent, no matter what the culture or belief of the observer. In thousands of reports, there is consistencies in NDE. We see the same experiences in small children, around the globe, among all different religions. The similarities are striking worldwide.
In 1975, Raymond Moody published the well-known book, Life after Life. Prior to that publication, the general populace wasn’t aware of the events that defined the experience. The term, “near death experience” had not even been coined yet. Jeffrey Long did a study and compared those who reported NDEs prior to 1975 and after. He found no difference, whatsoever on the details of the experience before or after this well known publication. As a matter of fact, 66% of those surveyed never heard of a near death experience.
Since his research involved children as well, it’s interesting to note that the children had the same experience as those who have lived full lives on into old age.
9) Changed Lives
Whether described as Jesus, God, or just a spiritual being, the introduces the individual to a being of light. This is described as beyond power, dissolving the separation of the self, and dispensing anything negative. It is often described as being connected to a greater whole. All individuals could not find the words to describe this experience. Safety, exaltation, absolute love and peace, joy, infinite, with an all encompassing presence that had no boundaries in dimension or time.
This being is not described as a human being such as the man on the Sistine Chapel. It is beyond description and beyond anything we’ve experienced, even in our imaginations.
When the individual realizes they have to go back into their body, there is a type of mourning because of the profound feelings that have met them beyond this life. They don’t want to go back to the pain, anguish, and sheer nonsense of worldly concerns.
Spirituality, naturally becomes more profound in the experiencer. There is a motivation to give one’s soul over to “God”. There is the feeling that there is really nothing else, but this being and the unity it gives to the visitor. This unconditional love consumes them and they come back far more capable of giving unconditional love to others. Whether atheistic, Christian, Buddhist, or Jewish, concerns that ran before become nonsense. People, relationships, service, and love become the only thing that matters. One NDE left a man with this: ” It’s got a couple of things. One is, it shakes my own sense of self from this egoic physical structure that’s trying to survive as best as it knows how through this dangerous world to seeing this incredible matrix and dance of life that this body is part of. And yet that dance of life is part of me as well.”
The most prominent thing that changes after a NDE is that the most important thing we can do is learn how to love. An awareness of a connection to all and everything is prominent.
Some come back only because of their relationships, some to continue learning lessons that can only be learned here.
The Fear of Death Dissolves:
Once a NDE is visited, the individual no longer fears death. There have even been documented accounts of people who become high risk takers or those who try to take their own life. They would do anything to be back into the reality of what it is like to die; to return home.
In the words of Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee
“We have in us a divine spark that you can see it, it’s a light that shines in a human being. It is our direct access to truth, our direct access to God. And the purpose of all the spiritual practices that exist are to awaken that spark, to give it life, to give it energy so that it can transform you, and one of the energies that transforms that spark is love. This spark is exceedingly beautiful if you see it within a human being; it is like a sun that is shining and every human being has it. It is the divine consciousness that is given to humanity as a gift. Human beings, when you see them as they really are, are unbelievably beautiful. We are made of light. Yes, we have a lot of denseness, a lot of darkness in us, but our real essence is light. Somewhere you see a human being, and what is amazing is when a human being turns toward God, the light in them increases tenfold, increases a hundred fold and they start to radiate in space, and they start to give off light. And that is why a spiritually evolved human being helps the environment and connects also inwardly with other people who are spiritually evolved. It is very, very beautiful.”