Researchers Found Out About That There Actually is a 'Life After Death'

What really happens when we pass away?

Alexandra

• Published in Interesting
• January 9, 2018

Do you ever think about life after death and the possibilities that lie beneath? In 2014, the movie Heaven is For Real portrayed a young child who has a near-death experience while having a life-saving operation. 

After the procedure, he was able to fill his father in about future events, such as his late great-grandmother and his unborn baby sister who died in the womb. 

The movie proved to be a huge success and one thing can be taken away from that undoubtedly- people are feeling anxious, constantly thinking about what will happen to them after they are no longer on this Earth.  

The question of what happens to us after our death is a highly sought out question. Do we go to heaven? Is there a heaven? Is there an afterlife? We know this to be, perhaps, life's biggest mystery. 

From scientists to philosophers, there are a great number of people who have tried to calculate some sort of answer to this question. 

Recently, that question may have come a little closer to being answered. 

Dr. Sam Parnia, who serves as the director of critical care and resuscitation research at NYU, and her team of researchers were able to access patients who were declared dead but were later revived. What they found was astounding. 

This Is a Huge Shock

Out of all the patients observed, a large amount remembered their surroundings during the time they were "dead". 39% of them could remember their specific surroundings and around half of those people could describe what was done and said during that time period. 

If there was any doubt about the authenticity of these interviews, the hospital staff was able to back up every single piece of information described by the patients. 

This Astounding Information Alone Could Kill You

When asked about what makes death official, Dr. Parnia answered, "Technically, that’s how you get the time of death – it’s all based on the moment when the heart stops. Once that happens, blood no longer circulates to the brain, which means brain function halts almost instantaneously. You lose all your brain stem reflexes – your gag reflex, your pupil reflex, all that is gone." 

However, as evidence suggests, the brain seems to supply a sudden burst of energy and activity as your body dies. Researchers from the Univerisity of Michigan observed clinical rats go through a "hyper-alerted state" prior to their ultimate demise. 

The Brain is an Amazing Thing

That burst of energy pretty much explains near-death experiences. 

In an interview with BBC, a professor at the University of Birmingham named Jason Braithwaithe, explained this phenomenon in greater detail. He stated, "Under certain unfamiliar and confusing circumstances — like near-death — the brain becomes overstimulated and hyperexcited. Like ‘fire raging through the brain’, the activity can surge through brain areas involved in conscious experience, furnishing all resultant perceptions with realer-than-real feelings and emotions.

Another professor, Dr. Jimo Borjin from Michigan State, backed up the previous claim by explaining, "This can give us a framework to begin to explain these [near death experiences]. The fact [that people] see light perhaps indicates the visual cortex in the brain is highly activated – and we have evidence to suggest this might be the case, because we have seen increased gamma in area of the brain that is right on top of the visual cortex."

In the simplest of terms, near-death experiences and the visions that people experience along with them may be the real deal. 

Sure, this may be the most mind-blowing thing you've heard in quite some time. However, researchers are well aware that humans have body cells that tend to die off at various rates. Your muscles can spend up to 12 hours dying, constantly twitching as they go. 

Skin cells can literally take entire days to completely die. Hair and nail cells though? Bring on the complications.

Contrary to popular belief, your hair and nails do not continue to grow after you pass on to the next life. In reality, your skin is just losing a great amount of moisture at a rapid rate and more of the hair and nail follicles come into visibility, making it seem like they are growing.

Isn't science just amazing?

Alexandra