Journal of Near-Death Studies
March 1, 1997
P. Fenwick
Karl Jansen's interesting hypothesis that near-death experiences (NDEs) result from blockade of the N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor has several weaknesses. Some NDEs occur to individuals who are neither near death nor experiencing any event likely to upset cerebral physiology as Jansen proposed; thus his hypothesis applies only to a subset of NDEs that occur in catastrophic circumstances. For...
Journal of Near-Death Studies
March 1, 1997
R. Strassman
This commentary on Karl Jansen's ketamine model for the near-death experience expands upon and raises additional questions about several issues and hypotheses: self-experimentation as a source of data; ketamine's similarities to and differences from classical hallucinogens; the need for quantification of unusual subjective states; clinical research and toxicological implications of this model;...
Journal of Near-Death Studies
March 1, 1997
K. Jansen
Near-death experiences (NDEs) can be reproduced by ketamine via blockade of receptors in the brain for the neurotransmitter glutamate, the N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors. Conditions that precipitate NDEs, such as hypoxia, ischemia, hypoglycemia, and temporal lobe epilepsy, have been shown to release a flood of glutamate, overactivating NMDA receptors and resulting in neurotoxicity....
Journal of Near-Death Studies
1997
Karl Jansen
3 citations
The commentators on my paper raised several interesting is sues. Set and setting do influence drug effects, but they also influence near death experiences (NDEs). Some NDEs are very anxiety-generating, just like some ketamine experiences, though frightening NDEs have been ignored by most researchers. High frequency, compulsive ketamine use is rare. While dimethyltryptamine (DMT) may induce...
Journal of Near-Death Studies
1997
Antonio Bianchi
1 citation
Although ketamine can induce a state similar to a near-death experience (NDE), there is a striking difference between experiences induced by ketamine used in a recreational context and in an operating room. Ketamine is a noncompetitive antagonist of the N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor, as is ibogaine, the main alkaloid of a shrub used in Central Africa to induce NDEs in a religious context....
University of North Texas Digital Library (University of North Texas)
1997
Gibbs
25 citations
Article exploring expressions of surprise and puzzlement that lend a ring of authenticity to self-reports of near-death experiences (NDEs). Surprise typically indicates the discovery of novel features of reality during the cognition-reality interplay that makes learning possible. If at least some NDE surprises are discoveries in a nonsubjective sense, then that cognition-reality interplay can...
Mortality
1997
Paul Badham
38 citations
Christian belief in a future life was historically based on theistic religious experience. Today Near Death Experiences are more often cited. Exceptional reports of NDEs go back to the dawn of history but modern medicine has democratised them. Accounts from St. Paul, St. John of the Cross, and from Tibetan and Japanese Buddhism are described and compared with a large survey of contemporary...
Journal of Near-Death Studies
1997
Cassandra Musgrave
36 citations
Fifty-one near-death experiencers (NDErs) were surveyed in person and through the mail to discover if and how their lives were changed as a result of their NDEs. Results showed major changes in participants' lives, especially in the areas of religious belief and practice, lifestyle, career, and relationships.
Journal of Near-Death Studies
1997
James E. Whinnery
60 citations
Although loss and recovery of consciousness are integral parts of the near-death experience (NDE), the role of altered states of conscious ness in the NDE has not been thoroughly investigated. Sixteen years of ob servations, including nearly 1000 acceleration (+Gz)-induced loss of consciousness (G-LOC) episodes, have revealed a pattern of psychophysiologic symptoms that collectively constitute...
Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought
October 1, 1996
M. Introvigne
IN 1975 PSYCHIATRIST RAYMOND A. MOODY introduced the expression "near-death experience" (NDE) in his bestselling book Life After Life. By 1988 more than 3 million copies of the book had been sold (not including foreign translations). Following the early pioneer work by Swiss-born psychiatrist Elisabeth Kiibler-Ross (who wrote the foreword to Life After Life) on terminally ill patients, Moody...