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Near-Death Experiences: Understanding Visions of the Afterlife

Travis Timmerman

The Philosophical Quarterly January 30, 2017 DOI: 10.1093/pq/pqx003 (opens in new tab)

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AI-extracted from the abstract
Characteristics Philosophical analysis Peer reviewed
Topics Near-death experience
Keywords Afterlife Appeal Conversation Dualism Vision Epistemology Aesthetics Law Communication Jungian analytical psychology
Citations 29
Key points Argues that near-death experiences can be explained in purely physical terms and do not warrant belief in dualism or an afterlife.

Abstract

John Martin Fischer and Benjamin Mitchell-Yellin's book is the gold standard for philosophical work aimed at a popular audience. Fischer and Mitchell-Yellin make nuanced, philosophically interesting arguments about a topic largely unexplored by academic philosophers and manage to do so in a way that is accessible to any intellectually curious reader. The central aim of the book is to consider charitable interpretations of arguments for dualism and the afterlife that appeal to near-death experiences (NDEs) and to make the case that such arguments do not actually warrant belief in either. In the first few chapters, Fischer and Mitchell-Yellin review representative and particularly intriguing instances of NDEs, ones that have convinced many that there must be an afterlife. One such example concerns Pam Reynolds, who had the experience of leaving her body and watching her own brain surgery. She accurately reported numerous details about the surgery (e.g., medical staff had a conversation about the difficulty posed by her small arteries) that supposedly occurred at a time the electroencephalograph was not detecting any brain activity. The details of other cases are similar. Taking the people who had NDEs at their word, Fischer and Mitchell-Yellin proceed to methodically review how such experiences can be explained in purely physical terms. In the case of Pam Reynolds, they illustrate how Reynolds may have, after coming out of surgery, become consciously aware of auditory impressions her brain received at an earlier time.

Comparable studies

Other theoretical and historical papers on near-death experience, most cited first.

Study Year Design Participants
Otherworld Journeys: Accounts of Near-Death Experience in Medieval and Modern Times 1987 Historical analysis
Neuroscience and the Near-Death Experience: Roles for the NMSA-PCP receptor, the sigma receptor and the endopsychosins 1990 Theoretical or philosophical paper
Implications of near-death experiences for a postmaterialist psychology. 2010 Theoretical or philosophical paper
Near-Death Experience as a Probe to Explore (Disconnected) Consciousness 2020 Theoretical or philosophical paper
Near-death experiences between science and prejudice 2012 Theoretical or philosophical paper

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