Mysticism, religiosity, spirituality, and brain science.
Imagine having visions of Satan and monsters making you wake up from sleep and scream every 20 minutes. That would be terrifying. Are these hellish apparitions evidence for the existence of of the evil devils as real, supernatural external demonic entities or mere products of the workings of our brains? The experience of one of the patients who underwent brain surgery provides the answer to that question.
Imagine, while undergoing surgery under general anesthesia, you wake up but can't move or talk to let the anesthesiologist or the surgeon know that you are awake. That would be a nightmare and similar to experiences that many reported throughout human history as Incubi and Succubi. This episode explains what exactly happens during such scary experience during surgery. It also explains how the nightmarish Incubus and Succubus might have come into human imagination.
Imagine being in a scary situation like serious heart attack where the heart stops for a few minutes, or drowning, or suffocating and not having enough oxygen! Many in such situations almost enter the doorstep of death but come back. Their near-death experiences transform them profoundly and also affect their beliefs in the existence of supernatural realms of heaven and afterlife as well as divine entities of angels and gods. This episode is about one such near-death experience.
No matter what part of the globe, what culture or religion, many who had out-of-body and, especially, near-death experiences claim visions of angels, gods and heaven. Some say they had vivid glimpses of otherworldly realms. These experiences make them believers in those supernatural realms and afterlife. How do those supernatural realms look? This episode is about the glimpses of heaven experienced by one of such believers who had a near-death experience.
Stories of near-death experience and the people coming back to life again after being dead for a while have been reported by many around the world. Their stories have garnered much curiosity and interest. Is this a recent phenomenon or has been part of human history since ancient times. Plato, one of the earliest Greek philosophers might have shed some light on the dead rising back to life.
The faithful of many of different religions believe all humans have souls which may leave the physical body at the time of death and travel to supernatural realms of heaven or hell or reincarnate as another human or animal depending on their karma. The big question is what exactly is soul and is it the same as spirit? How did the concept of soul even came into human existence?
Gautama Buddha said, “Mind is everything. What you think you become.”
Since the mind is what the brain does, the brain is the measure of everything.
Plato is said to be one of the, if not the most influential people responsible for the concepts of heaven and salvation in Christianity. What exactly were the experiences of Plato that made him believe in the existence of soul and another supernatural world of perfect form and function? Were the Eleusinian mysteries popular in Greece from 1600 BCE to around 350 CE responsible for his beliefs?
It is not unusual for many who had cardiac arrest, but revived, to believe or be told by some doctors that they actually died and came back to life. If a patient with cardiac arrest was resuscitated did they actually die and had glimpses of afterlife? Is cardiac arrest the same as true cardiac death?
If heart or breathing stops and a person is unconscious, is that person brain dead? What is the difference between coma and brain death and how does one confirm a person is truly brain dead? Respiratory failure and respiratory death, coma and irreversible brain death are explained.
