Evidence of the Afterlife: The Science of Near-Death Experiences (8 page)

I have interviewed Vicki myself, and I find her story to be remarkable. For those born blind, sight is an abstract concept. They understand the world only from their senses of hearing, touch, taste, and smell. Occasionally, blind people with certain correctable conditions are able to regain their vision through surgical procedures. When blind people acquire sight, there is often a prolonged period of time in which they have trouble making sense of visual perceptions. This contrasts with Vicki, who was immediately aware of her visual perceptions during her NDE. This further suggests that Vicki’s vision was not of physical origin.

Studies have shown that the dreams of those born blind do not include vision. Vision cannot be effectively explained to those born blind, even by drawing analogies to the four remaining senses they possess. I tried this in conversations with Vicki and was unsuccessful.

Being blind from birth and suddenly being able to see at the point of death must be both beautiful and frustrating at the same time. A number of the subjects in Ring and Cooper’s study tried to explain exactly what they had experienced. Some backed away from saying the experience was visual because they truly didn’t know what a visual experience was. After thinking about it, one man declared that his experience was a form of synthesis, which in this case meant a combination of all of his senses to form a new experience. Here is how the subject described it in Ring and Cooper’s book,
Mindsight:

I think what it was that was happening here was a bunch of synesthesia, where all these perceptions were being blended into some image in my mind, you know, the visual, the tactile, all the input that I had. I can’t literally say I really saw anything, but yet I was aware of what was going on, and perceiving all that in my mind…. But I don’t remember detail. That’s why I say I’m loath to describe it as a visual.
⁵

Another of Ring’s subjects went on to say that his visual NDE went
beyond
the visual:

What I’m saying is I was more aware. I don’t know if it’s through sight that I was aware…. I’m not sure. All I know is … somehow I was aware of information or things that were going on that I wouldn’t normally be able to pick up through seeing…. That’s why I’m being very careful how I’m wording it, ‘cause I’m not sure where it came from. I would say to you I have a feeling it didn’t come from seeing, and yet I’m not sure.
⁶

After considering the stories told to him by these blind subjects, Ring and Cooper came to a conclusion that seemed to take all sides of the argument into consideration:

Even if we cannot assert that the blind see in these experiences in any straightforward way, we still have to reckon with the fact—and it does seem to be a fact—that they nevertheless do have access to a kind of expanded super- sensory awareness that may in itself not be explicable by normal means…. Perhaps, as we have suggested, even if these reports may not in the end represent an analogue of retinal vision as such, they clearly represent something that must be directly addressed….

Indeed, what we appear to have here is a distinctive state of consciousness, which we would like to call transcendental awareness, or mindsight.
⁷

I agree with Ring and Cooper. Visual NDEs that happen to the blind appear to involve an unearthly form of visual experience. There is no medical explanation for anyone born blind to have such a visual NDE. Yet blind people who have near-death experiences may immediately have full and clear vision. This is further evidence that vision in NDEs, including near-death experiences in those who are not blind, is unlike ordinary, physical vision.

NDERF has received several near-death accounts from individuals with significant visual impairment or even legal blindness. An example of a near-death experience occurring in an individual with legal blindness comes from Violet. She was having severe bleeding during childbirth, and the doctor thought they had lost her. Violet had an out-of-body experience, and her vision was remarkably clear:

Everything was very bright and sharp. I am legally blind without my glasses, but the nurse took my glasses before they took me to the delivery room, but I could see clearly what the doctor was doing.

By studying such a huge volume of near-death experiences, we have received a constant stream of answers to questions we have about NDEs and the afterlife. But studying NDEs may be mystifying as well. For every answer we receive, sometimes several other questions present themselves. And one of the big questions for me is: Why—how—can a blind person see during a near-death experience? Add to that another question: What does it mean that a blind person can see during an NDE?

Let me start by considering that first question. Describing vision in the blind as “unearthly” is not a complete answer. There is a transcendental aspect to much in NDE research that remains mysterious. Researching NDEs requires different methodology than is used for most other scientific research. Near-death experiences cannot be reproduced in a laboratory. We cannot wire people with sensitive medical equipment and give them near-death experiences. That would be medically unethical. One thing that we can do is collect and study large numbers of NDE case studies and look for evidence regarding the possibility of an afterlife. That is what we have done with the NDERF study.

But by doing this, we have encountered many questions for which we don’t yet have complete answers. Why the blind can see during an NDE is one of them. Although we don’t have a complete answer, we do have enough data that I can offer some speculation.

It is medically inexplicable for someone born blind to have a detailed and organized visual experience. Another piece of evidence comes from nonblind near-death experiencers who frequently describe unearthly visual ability—360-degree vision, for example. People who have near-death experiences are generally unconscious, and their normal physiologic ability to see is not functioning during their NDEs. All this points to the conclusion that vision described during NDEs is different from earthly vision, which is so familiar to us. Vision in the afterlife may be somewhat analogous to earthly vision but very different in that it is more vivid, comprehensive, and nonphysical.

All five senses associated with earthly life (seeing, hearing, touch, taste, and smell) have been reported in the NDERF case studies. It is without question that NDErs often describe increased function in all of these senses at a time when they should have no sensory function at all. Of all these senses, vision is often described as being very different from ordinary, everyday vision.

The NDERF survey asked NDErs, “Did your vision differ in any way from your normal, everyday vision (in any aspect, such as clarity, field of vision, colors, brightness, depth perception, degree of solidness/transparency of objects, etc.)?” Of the respondents, 66.1 percent answered “Yes,” 15.0 percent answered “Uncertain,” and only 18.9 percent answered “No.” Near-death experiencers were encouraged to provide a narrative response to this question. Here are some of their replies:

My vision was greatly increased. I was able to see things as close or asfar as I needed. There was no strain involved; it was almost like auto-zooming a camera. If I felt I needed to see something I just looked at it, no thought or strain required.

When I was floating above my body, I could see 360 degrees around me at the same time. But I only seemed to focus on a smaller visible area similar to my normal physical vision.

It was like watching high-definition TV, as compared to normal: all people and things were vivid; there was no darkness or shadows.

Clarity, bright lights. Looking back, I had perfect eyesight (I am terribly nearsighted); everything was solid.

Vision was blurry in sedation; when I was having the heart attack vision became clear, as my thoughts also did.

I was short-[near] sighted, but at that moment my vision was 100 percent, and …everything was super clear and crisp and all colors were brilliant.

Having no material body, I was sensing, seeing, feeling, on another plane. It is like trying to explain the colors of the rainbow to a blind person.

Hundreds of such descriptions of vision during NDEs have been collected at NDERF. Descriptions of vision during NDE are often so dramatic that I have to remind myself that the NDErs are generally unconscious and often clinically dead at the time they are experiencing this extraordinary level of vision. Yet over the years, hundreds of NDE accounts have been submitted to NDERF that commonly describe supernormal vision, accelerated consciousness, realistic out-of-body observations, and many other elements that take place while the NDErs are unconscious or clinically dead.

Understanding what happens during near-death experiences, including the vision described, has required me to consider what I would have thought unthinkable early in my medical career: perhaps NDErs are actually describing another real, transcendental realm of existence. Perhaps the rules we all thought we knew about consciousness and sensory perception need to be reconsidered.

This takes us back to the second question that the research has posed to me, namely: What does it mean that a blind person can see during an NDE?

I had never even thought of this as a question until I took my son Phillip to a meeting in Seattle where a blind woman talked about her NDE. Phillip was nine years old at the time, and I thought he would be bored with the presentation. But his response was quite the contrary. Her presentation held his rapt attention. When the lecture was over, we walked quietly to the car. I could tell something was on Phillip’s mind, so I said nothing, inspiring him to fill the dead air.

Finally Phillip spoke. “If blind people can see during a near-death experience, then the experience must not be caused by brain chemistry,” he said. “The experience must be real!”

It’s thinking like this that puts blind sight high on my list of evidence for the afterlife.

Some near-death experiences take place while a patient is undergoing surgery and has been anesthetized. It may seem that a discussion of NDEs occurring while under general anesthesia belongs with the discussion of NDEs and unconsciousness. However, as we will see, there is a great difference between unconsciousness caused by general anesthetic and that caused by trauma or serious illness.

The proper use of general anesthetic leads to a controlled, total unconsciousness. The term
general anesthesia,
according to Merriam-Webster, means “anesthesia affecting the entire body and accompanied by loss of consciousness.” When anesthetic is correctly administered, the anesthesiologist knows that the patient has no conscious awareness of his or her surroundings. Essentially, the patient is dead to the world. The term
anesthesia
may refer to either local or general anesthesia. The term
anesthesia
in this chapter will refer only to general anesthesia.

According to textbooks on the subject, general anesthesia is intended to bring about five states during surgery:

In order to properly care for a patient who is undergoing anesthesia, the anesthesiologist connects the patient to a variety of monitors to observe heart and breathing rate and blood gases. Anesthesia involves intensive efforts to make certain that loss of consciousness and a state of amnesia are achieved and maintained. Yet many near-death experiences are reported by patients who almost died while under this carefully monitored blanket of anesthesia.

What life-threatening events can occur under anesthesia? Sometimes these patients are already near death from a life-threatening illness or injury requiring emergency surgery and they suffer a heart attack, or perhaps they are allergic to the medications given. Or the surgery may have complications and the patient is exposed to a near-death situation.

I have been surprised at the large number of patients who can recount vivid NDEs during anesthesia. The high level of awareness expressed in these case studies is further strong evidence of a nonearthly state of consciousness during NDEs that even anesthesia cannot dampen.

Jaime was undergoing surgery when the tube that was inserted for his breathing became clogged. The doctors later told him that he had been “code blue” and had to have defibrillator paddles applied to be resuscitated. Here is what happened.

Now, all I remember was being anesthetized. The next thing I [knew], I [was] still on my back. At first it seemed like there was nothingness, like I was on my back afloat, and it was pitch-dark, a very scary darkness. I remember I kept putting my hands in front of my face; I could not see them or my body, but I knew that they were there. Then I start hearing this low hummmm, and it was like being underwater, like when you are under and you can hear noise and it’s muffled, that kind of thing. Anyway, I was wondering why it was so dark. Nothing else mattered. I could not remember anything prior to this—not the surgery, anything. It was like this was the only thing I could think of.

I then noticed that while it was pitch-dark, it felt as if I was in a tunnel, and all along the tunnel were doorways, but the whole tunnel I could sense was like … a cave—sort of rocky, not too rocky but kind of smooth—at least that’s my impression of it

So then I am feeling a little more afraid, like, what’s going on here? It felt like I was like that for an hour. Just there, then, I could see a pinpoint of white light in front of me in the distance, the size of a pencil eraser head—that size. So I sense that I start moving in that direction, … like something [is] pulling me there; I don’t feel as if I [am] doing it. At this point I was like floating [in an] upright position, then going slowly toward that pinpoint of light. And then I knew that there [were] little doorways all along this tunnel, and I felt that… if I wanted to, [I could] go into any of those doorways, and I felt at the time that if I did, I would not come back, but my attention was on the light.

In an instant, I thought, “Grandma,” and I was instantly in the light. I kept saying, “You’re not dead. I am not dead, you’re not dead.” She said, “No, I am not, and you are not either.” My grandmother had died three years prior, but at that moment I could not remember that, just that she was not dead and that she was so alive and well. She had died of dementia complications. She invited me to sit and have coffee like we used to all the time at her house. Her table was there, the chairs. She looked like she did when she was in her thirties. She had on a purple dress, like a nice one she had with flowers on it, except that the flowers seemed to glow a fluorescent yellow.

Then I noticed that there was a fluorescent light that emanated from the top of the room, and I started feeling so good like. I can’t describe it—love, or like the first time you kiss. Electricity. Butterflies in your stomach, like the best drug. I don’t know how to describe it, it felt so good.

I then kind of got a little panicky ‘cause I noticed that there was no light source; it was just there. That’s when she touched my hand, [and] I noticed that I looked down and could see my hand also. It was there, but it looked white, almost fluorescent, and she told me that it was all right. (All this conversation was in Spanish, by the way.) And she said, let’s drink the coffee. I did. But I notice[d] that it was not hot and had no taste. It was lukewarm, but yet there was steam coming from it, like it was hot but was not. It’s like when you are sick and there’s no taste.

Anyway, I tell her that we [the family] think of her every day. She stated that she knew. She knew that we loved her very much and she loved us.

And then I noticed that the room was domelike, that in one section, the left side of that domed room, was like a curtain, and I saw my grandfather on my mom’s side peek through, and I [saw] another lady, heavyset, short, with a long black pony- tail. I wanted to say something, and that is when my grandmother told me, “You have to go; you can’t stay here; it’s not your time.”

I then felt terrible; I started to cry. I told her, “But, Grandma, I want to stay here.” It felt so wonderful I did not want to leave. I remember begging in Spanish, “Please, I want to stay with you. I never want to leave here.”

She said, “You will be back here when it’s your time; dont worry.” Then she said, “Tell everyone I love them and think of them all the time.”

At this point I was still saying, “But, but I wanna stay,” and then I heard this loud pop. It felt like I was hit in the chest with a sledgehammer made of fire. I remember coming to and gagging. I was on life support—all the tubes, etc. I felt terrible. I noticed my dad was there and the rest of the family. I don’t remember what happened next, but I do remember telling him that I needed a paper. I had to write something: “I seen Grandma.”

Cyndi was having a second heart valve replacement surgery within six months when she had the experience she described below. She asked her doctor if it was possible to dream during surgery. When he said no, she replied, “Then we have to talk.” Here is a paraphrase of what she experienced.

During my surgery I felt myself lift from my body and go above the operating table. The doctor told me later that they had kept my heart open and stopped for a long time, and they had a great amount of difficulty getting my heart started again. That must have been when I left my body because I could see the doctors nervously trying to get my heart going. It was strange to be so detached from my physical body. I was curious about what they were doing but not concerned. Then, as I drifted farther away, I saw my father at the head of the table. He looked up at me, which did give me a surprise because he had been dead now for almost a year.

Valerie was seventeen years old and undergoing surgery. During the operation her heart stopped. Here is her experience:

Sometime during surgery I went through a tunnel. Parts of my life passed me by. I had closed my eyes tight; I remember someone saying, open your eyes. I was in a pure white space and could see rooms with spirits walking around. I started to cry, but no tears. I remember looking at my hands, and they were translucent. Then an angel appeared; she had such a radiant glow to her beauty to behold. She comforted me, telling me I was safe. I remember telling her I wasn’t ready to die. She said she knew that. Then she pointed down, and I could see the doctors doing CPR on a little girl. Not really understanding that was me, I watched my whole operation, CPR and all. I told her that was so sad, she looks so young. Then she said they are bringing her back, and I felt like I was pushed and thrown back into that painful body.

Patricia was scheduled for a two-hour surgery to remove her gallbladder. The surgery lasted eight hours, and her heart stopped twice:

The next thing I knew, I heard the doctor yelling and the nurses running around. I looked to my right and saw the doctor beating on my chest, but all I could do was stand there until I saw a light on the wall. It looked like a flashlight that grew bigger, and I touched it and was taken into a tunnel with clouds spinning and rolling around. The clouds were gray, white, and smoky somewhat. I was gliding very fast with my arms just dangling. When I got to the end the light turned orange and there [was a] very tall man dressed in [a] tan work outfit (shirt & pants). I look[ed] pas[t] him, and I could see yellow flowers and a large mountain and a blue sky. His face was the color of light sand, and his hair was golden tan. He had the kindest look in his eyes. I could hear the silence and see the trees, and I wanted to run in, but he stopped me. He tilted me backwards and sent me back through the tunnel with a gentle push, at which time I heard the doctor say, we got her. There was no pain when I was back in my body, only a fullness of some sort around my chest and stomach.

Christopher was being treated surgically for a serious heart disease. He was under partial anesthesia, called “conscious sedation.” He was heavily sedated and had a heart attack. Christopher describes how he became
more
conscious after his heart attack, a seemingly impossible occurrence:

I recently found out that I have Wolff-Parkinson-White Syndrome/heart disease, which causes sudden death at any moment because of the extra [electrical] pathway in the heart. The only way to fix this heart disease is by ablation, which is surgery where the surgeon removes the extra [electrical] pathway in the heart. I was under a conscious sedation. I felt sedated to the point where I did not know what was happening to me, but there was a moment when I went into V tach [ventricular tachycardia], where the heart speeds up so fast it causes a heart attack. Even under the sedation I felt a small amount of pain, but when my heart started going into V tach, a peace came over me. I became fully aware of my surroundings. I could feel the shell of my body, and my spirit began to rise; an extreme peace came over me. As my spirit began to rise, the doctor shocked me and then again, and my spirit stopped and went back into my body, and [my] state of mind went back to being sedated. I felt complete peace, no worries about anything, and it was one of the greatest experiences of my life.