Near-Death Experiences (Part One)

Consciousness is immaterial and metaphysically distinct from the body regardless of which causally creates or sustains the other and regardless of whether the former outlives the latter.  The entire issue of an afterlife changes nothing about these truths, for they are true by necessity whether there is a heaven and hell (and no matter what they are like), whether there is some other kind of afterlife entirely, and whether all human consciousness fades into nonexistence once the body dies.  However, there is the logical possibility--for everything that does not contradict logical axioms is possible--that the mind does survive past the body even if only in a dreamless soul sleep.  With my limitations, I cannot know which possibility is correct, as I am living in what might actually already be an afterlife with no way of knowing the future of events in this life, much less what will come next.

Before addressing near-death experiences (NDEs) specifically, I will emphasize again that because there is extensive evidence for Christianity being true, there is accessible evidence for the Christian afterlife: eternal life with rest and nonsinful pleasure for the redeemed in New Jerusalem and permanent death/nonexistence of the soul and body, potentially preceded by temporary torment, in hell (John 3:16, Matthew 10:28).  The Biblical heaven is not a dull place of intellectual and physical inactivity, nor is the Biblical hell a place of eternal torture for all unsaved humans where demons delight in sadism over people.  Aside from the evidence for Christian philosophy and the clarifications about the afterlife in the Bible, there are the many reported stories of people who died or almost died and were revived to recount seeming experiences with an afterlife.

There are so many knowable philosophical truths that pertain to near-death experiences despite how one cannot know if they are accurate that they could not all be sufficiently addressed in one article alone.  For example, even if none or only some of them corresponded to an afterlife, it is still possible to experience all sorts of things within the mind in the final moments before death.  While nothing can be proven that is not knowable from pure reason, and thus matters like scientific laws or an afterlife cannot be known beyond possibilities, probabilities, and perceptions, there is strong evidence in favor of at least some NDEs being real experiences of an afterlife--some hospital patients have claimed to see very specific objects inaccessible to their bodily senses when their hearts and brains stopped, with doctors having affirmed that the items they saw while dead or close to physical death were present after all.

Also, certain NDEs truly do seem to occur when people are near death, as opposed to dead, while others seem to happen in the interim between genuine death of the body and its resuscitation.  While there are sometimes enormous differences in some of the NDE stories I have encountered, there are also often great similarities despite those claiming to have glimpsed an afterlife coming from people with very different cultures, religious backgrounds, and general philosophical beliefs.  It is even possible that the more abnormal experiences are only experiences taking place strictly within consciousness, like dreams, and that the similar ones provided real glimpses into an afterlife.  With the logical possibility of an afterlife and the veracity of NDEs recognized, some of the most significant of the other issues related to NDEs have to do with what it is that many people claim to experience, as well as whether the experiences are specifically consistent with the tenets of any particular religion beyond beyond consistent with logical axioms (nothing can be experienced at all if it is a logically contradictory experience, since contradictions are impossibilities).

Common things people might speak of when recounting their alleged NDEs are passing through tunnels of light, seeing a radiant, benevolent being, and watching most or all of their lives as if they were an outside observer rather than the person whose life is being witnessed.  Ultimately, many things people speak of are consistent with the Christian afterlife.  Though they will be addressed in subsequent posts, many details do not conflict with anything the Bible says awaits humans after death, and even the fact that some people from non-Christian backgrounds claim experiences that some Christians do might only mean that there is a "second" chance post-mortem to submit to reason and God, which the Bible never actually teaches or denies.  The extreme philosophical significance of an afterlife would either way only be ignored by fools.  Whether or not consciousness or a mind-body unity of some kind continues after biological death and what the nature of that afterlife would be are of immense importance.