title: There is nothing paranormal about near-death experiences: how neuroscience can explain seeing bright lights, meeting the dead, or being convinced you are one of them.
abstract: Approximately 3% of Americans declare to have had a near-death experience. These experiences classically involve the feeling that one's soul has left the body, approaches a bright light and goes to another reality, where love and bliss are all encompassing. Contrary to popular belief, research suggests that there is nothing paranormal about these experiences. Instead, near-death experiences are the manifestation of normal brain function gone awry, during a traumatic, and sometimes harmless, event.
authors.affiliation: Medical Research Council, Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, 15 Chaucer Road, Cambridge, CB2 7EF, UK. dean.mobbs@mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk
authors.forename: Dean
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Mobbs
authors.forename: Caroline
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Watt
mesh_terms: D001293:Attitude to Death; D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D003643:Death; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D008027:Light; D009488:Neurosciences; D011639:Public Opinion; D014785:Vision, Ocular