Humanities
March 28, 2016
Michael N. Marsh
33 citations
Near-death and out-of-body experiences do not prove existence without a functioning brain. Despite expectations that cardiac patients would report seeing strategically placed markers during resuscitation, no corroborative empirical evidence for extra-corporeal cognition has emerged. These experiences occur as consciousness returns, not during brain death, and the memory required for recall is set down at that return. Most recollections are geo-physical, anthropomorphic, banal, and dream-like, offering nothing revelatory about life without a brain. With prevalence rates below 1% globally, subjects may have predisposed brains, and the experience itself may be a transient epiphenomenon similar to post-traumatic stress disorder.
Humanities
November 9, 2015
31 citations
Near-death experiences (NDEs) are vivid, often transcendent episodes that occur during life-threatening situations, involving sensations like leaving the body or entering another dimension. Reported across cultures and throughout history, 10% to 20% of people who nearly die experience them. While cultural factors shape some content, the core phenomenology remains consistent worldwide. This invariance could stem from universal psychological defenses, neurophysiological processes, or actual contact with a transcendent realm. Research is limited by NDEs' unpredictability. Regardless of cause, NDEs consistently produce profound, lasting changes in experiencers and may hold significance for others.
Humanities
February 11, 2025
Magdalena Żółkoś
Wartime dream diaries serve as a testimonial practice that makes visible experiences hidden from public discourse and dominant narratives of war. Drawing on post-2022 Ukrainian dream diaries and the theories of Charlotte Beradt, Georges Didi-Huberman, and Wilfred Bion, the article argues that sharing dreams is not merely a constative speech act but a form of thinking about and acting on history. This ethical–political perspective frames dream sharing as a relational act of self-disclosure, not just a relay of content. To read records of war dreams is to be called upon to receive and offer hospitality to a dream.