NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCES

At this point, the reality of survival of consciousness has been established through the strong evidence provided by reincarnation researchers, primarily Stevenson. A comprehensive vision of the afterlife has been put forward in three books, written by Newton and Cannon, describing life after life, based on results obtained from many patients in deep hypnotic regression. These results are not strongly evidential by themselves, but only in the high degree of commonality that each researcher experienced and the fact that both investigations were independent and led essentially to the same conclusions. A strong body of evidence has next been given in Radin's book, The Conscious Universe, that indicates that human beings have psychic capabilities that are not predicted by modern medicine or physics, in the areas of telepathy, remote viewing, pre-cognition and psycho-kinesis.

Over ten million Americans are believed to have had some form of near-death experience. This often involves actual or perceived imminent death, a feeling of separation from the physical body, enhanced cognition, movement towards and encounter with identified deceased persons or non-physical entities, a life review, and return to the body. By their very nature, these phenomena are difficult to distinguish from those which could be experienced solely in one's mind. There are a number of cases where information was gathered, either in the environment of the physical body or in the meeting with previously deceased persons, that could not have been obtained by the experiencer in his physical body. However, these cases are sufficiently small in number so that the entire NDE experience base does not provide by itself a very convincing source of evidence for the existence of the afterlife. The major life transformations that are common to NDE experiencers are suggestive of the NDE reality. But if NDE's are real, this experience base provides an excellent description of (1) the post-death happenings that all will eventually encounter and (2) the guidance and information provided by spiritual entities. These descriptions can be compared with those obtained by other research, in topics such as reincarnation, between-life regression, and medium communications.

The first study source is a recent book, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Near-Death Experiences, by P.M.H. Atwater with David H. Morgan, which is a very comprehensive source about essentially every aspect of Near-Death Experience research. Although there are many, many books dealing with NDE's, this one book will provide the person studying the afterlife all that is needed for this purpose. A transcript of a radio interview with Atwater is also included.

The second and final source is a website created by Mr. Kevin Williams on the Near-Death Experience. It contains over 50 NDE summaries and various analyses of their contents. The views of leading experts on the NDE phenomenon are contained on the site. Particularly important is the summary of the guidance provided all these experiencers by spiritual advisors, which Williams has created.

These two sources provide a good summary of the entire scope of NDE research and cover the many debates which are underway, pitting the many who believe that the NDE is a real experience against a considerable number of skeptics who believe that the NDE is solely a phenomenon of the dying brain. The digest of spiritual guidance received by the experiencers is an important result in the study of the afterlife.