Near-death experiences and consciousness

and the two anecdotal accounts, one within the paper and one referenced, perhaps the referenced one is not merely anecdotal we would need access to that paper to find out

Anecdotal evidence is real evidence, it just isn't strong or compelling evidence as it is so dependent on the subjective experiences of human beings.

and THOSE effects seem to explain nde's.

The most remarkable thing, Van Lommel says, is that his patients have such consciousness-expanding experiences while their brains register no activity. But that’s impossible, according to the current level of medical knowledge. Because most scientists believe that consciousness occurs in the brain, this creates a mystery: How can people experience consciousness while they are unconscious during a cardiac arrest (a clinical death)?
After all those years of intensive study, Van Lommel still speaks with reverence about the miracle of the near-death experience. “At that moment these people are not only conscious; their consciousness is even more expansive than ever. They can think extremely clearly, have memories going back to their earliest childhood and experience an intense connection with everything and everyone around them. And yet the brain shows no activity at all!”
This has raised a number of large questions for Van Lommel: “What is consciousness and where is it located? What is my identity? Who is doing the observing when I see my body down there on the operating table? What is life? What is death?”

In order to convince his colleagues of the validity of these new insights, Van Lommel first had to demonstrate that this expansion of the consciousness occurred, in fact, during the period of brain death. It was not difficult to prove. Patients were often able to describe precisely what had happened during their cardiac arrest. They knew, for example, exactly where the nurse put their dentures or what doctors and family members had said. How would someone whose brain wasn’t active know these things?
Nevertheless, some scientists continue to assert that these experiences must happen at a time when there is still some brain function going on. Van Lommel is crystal clear in his response: “When the heart stops beating, blood flow stops within a second. Then, 6.5 seconds later, EEG activity starts to change due to the shortage of oxygen. After 15 seconds there is a straight, flat line and the electrical activity in the cerebral cortex has disappeared completely.

Van Lommel contends that the brain does not produce consciousness or store memories. He points out that American computer science expert Simon Berkovich and Dutch brain researcher Herms Romijn, working independently of one another, came to the same conclusion: that it is impossible for the brain to store everything you think and experience in your life. This would require a processing speed of 1024 bits per second. Simply watching an hour of television would already be too much for our brains. “If you want to store that amount of information”along with the associative thoughts produced”your brain would be pretty much full,” Van Lommel says. “Anatomically and functionally, it is simply impossible for the brain to have this level of speed.”

Also of interest are NDEs that involved alleged veridical perception. This refers to accurate perception of specific, unique events that the NDEr’s physical body could not have seen or heard, and that the NDEr could not have figured out through reasoning and logic. These cases include NDE vision in persons blind from birth. They also include NDE vision and hearing in a woman undergoing brain surgery whose eyes were taped shut and whose ears were plugged with a small speaker emitting a clicking sound. Meanwhile, her body was chilled down, her heart stopped and did not beat for nearly an hour, and the blood was drained from her brain so surgeons could repair a blood vessel. By all measures, her brain was completely inactive. Nevertheless, she correctly described instruments used by the doctors and conversations held between the doctors and nurses conducting the operation. So NDEs are subjective experiences, but they also may be objective”“real” in terms of physical, earthly reality.

Nevertheless, some scientists continue to assert that these experiences must happen at a time when there is still some brain function going on. Van Lommel is crystal clear in his response: “When the heart stops beating, blood flow stops within a second. Then, 6.5 seconds later, EEG activity starts to change due to the shortage of oxygen. After 15 seconds there is a straight, flat line and the electrical activity in the cerebral cortex has disappeared completely. We cannot measure the brain stem, but testing on animals has demonstrated that activity has ceased there as well. Moreover, you can prove that the brain stem is no longer functioning because it regulates our basic reflexes, such as the pupil response and swallowing reflex, which no longer respond.

From these studies we know that in our prospective study of patients that have been clinically dead (VF on the ECG) no electric activity of the cortex of the brain (flat EEG) must have been possible, but also the abolition of brain stem activity like the loss of the corneareflex, fixed dilated pupils and the loss of the gag reflex is a clinical finding in those patients. However, patients with an NDE can report a clear consciousness, in which cognitive functioning, emotion, sense of identity, and memory from early childhood was possible, as well as perception from a position out and above their “dead” body. Because of the sometimes reported and verifiable out-of -body experiences, like the case of the dentures reported in our study, we know that the NDE must happen during the period of unconsciousness, and not in the first or last second of this period.So we have to conclude that NDE in our study was experienced during a transient functional loss of all functions of the cortex and of the brainstem. It is important to mention that there is a well documented report of a patient with constant registration of the EEG during cerebral surgery for an gigantic cerebral aneurysm at the base of the brain, operated with a body temperature between 10 and 15 degrees, she was put on the heart-lung machine, with VF, with all blood drained from her head, with a flat line EEG, with clicking devices in both ears, with eyes taped shut, and this patient experienced an NDE with an out-of-body experience, and all details she perceived and heard could later be verified. (8)....The study of patients with NDE, however, clearly shows us that consciousness with memories, cognition, with emotion, self-identity, and perception out and above a life-less body is experienced during a period of a non-functioning brain (transient pancerebral anoxia).

My extensive watching of ER suggests that they would have started CPR and ventilation before they intubated him, the explicit purpose of both of which is to maintain oxygenation and circulation in vital organs. So we may assume that there was some oxygenated blood getting to the patients brain prior to the nurse removing his dentures.

It is important to mention that there is a well documented report of a patient with constant registration of the EEG during cerebral surgery for an gigantic cerebral aneurysm at the base of the brain, operated with a body temperature between 10 and 15 degrees, she was put on the heart-lung machine, with VF, with all blood drained from her head, with a flat line EEG, with clicking devices in both ears, with eyes taped shut, and this patient experienced an NDE with an out-of-body experience, and all details she perceived and heard could later be verified. (8