A recent article in BBC Science Focus provides a revealing glimpse into the way that the study of near-death experiences has been changing.

When neuroscientist Mario Beauregard and I wrote The Spiritual Brain in 2007, treating NDEs as scientifically researchable generally meant debunking them. 

For example, in 1999, British psychologist Susan Blackmore discounted the idea that they were life-changing: “The limited evidence available suggests that this change is a function of simply facing up to death, not of having a near-death experience, but when NDErs behave altruistically, this helps spread their NDE memes.”

Canadian science journalist Jay Ingram noted in 2005 that the idea that NDEs might be genuine experiences is “repellent to many.” Yale University psychologist Paul Bloom, author of a number of books, probably spoke for the majority when he said in 2006, “If what you mean by ‘soul’ is something immaterial and immortal, something that exists independently of the brain, then souls do not exist. This is old hat for most psychologists and philosophers, the stuff of introductory lectures.”

It Didn’t Age Well…

Our book was one of a growing number of exceptions — not in the sense that we were boosters — but in the sense that we were writing for those who are prepared to consider the possibility that there might be authentic evidence of the survival of the human mind at death. Since then, a steady stream of corroborative research means that the facile explainaways that worked so well thirty years ago no longer suffice.

Thus we come to cognitive neuroscientist Christian Jarrett’s recent article, which offers a more neutral approach than in the past:

They leave their bodies, witness a bright light and return forever changed. But do survivors of near-death experiences truly glimpse into the great beyond? New research into the brain’s final moments could decode these visions at life’s edge. 

“What is it like to die? The reassuring science of near-death experiences,” June 7, 2025

The hope of fully naturalizing NDEs remains; that is a given. But, in this and many articles like it, the dismissive, just-you-wait tone that we used to see so much of is gone.

… there are plenty of documented NDE cases. And many continue to baffle scientists and raise perplexing questions about the nature of consciousness and life itself.

Should we believe them all? My reaction has always been scepticism tinged with wonder. It’s hard to listen to accounts of people who’ve had these experiences and not be moved.

“The reassuring science”

“Should we believe them all?” Of course, we needn’t believe anything that we find unbelievable. A better question might be “At what point could an agenda get in the way of our understanding?”

If our grounds for disbelief amount to nothing more than “Science means that the mind is merely what the brain does,” we should check out the history of efforts to defend current science in the face of challenging new information, beginning with Thomas Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962).

Jarrett offers the suggestion that the NDE is simply the behavior of the dying brain:

In fact, some neuroscientists argue that many of these powerful subjective experiences can be attributed to intense neurobiological changes occurring as the brain approaches death — and they have the research to support this claim.

In 2024, researchers at the University of Michigan published groundbreaking findings from their analysis of brain recordings from four dying patients.

The patients were on life support and their brain activity was recorded by electroencephalogram (EEG), which tracks electrical activity in the brain via electrodes placed on the scalp.

Led by Dr Jimo Borjigin, the team made the remarkable observation that two of the patients exhibited a surge of brain activity shortly after their relatives had agreed to the removal of life support. Previously, this kind of end-of-life surge in brain activity had only been witnessed in studies with rats, but here was the first evidence that it might occur in humans too.

 “The reassuring science”

So does that final surge of brain activation explain everything we need to know about NDEs? 

Hold the AHA!s for a Moment

As Jarrett reports, the surge the researchers noted was consistent with patterns and regions associated with consciousness. For example, the prefrontal cortex, which is thought to be involved in consciousness, showed heightened connectivity, But the big consciousness study comparison that wrapped up recently did not find that the prefrontal cortex plays as much of a role as is usually assumed.

A bigger problem is that, as Dr. Charlotte Martial noted, none of the patients in this study survived. So we don’t know if they had NDEs. Just what the surge signifies is still to be determined.

Image source: Discovery Institute.

Then, of course, there is the question of veridical near-death experiences: Experiencers may see things they should not be able to, things that can be corroborated later. For example, Michael Egnor and I note in our just-published book, The Immortal Mind, how psychiatrist Bruce Greyson first became interested in the study of NDEs:

Bruce Greyson, author of After (2021), was an agnostic psychiatrist decades ago, skeptical that the mind could be detached from the brain. But then a young woman, rescued from suicide, told him that she had seen a spaghetti stain on his tie during an out-of-body experience. There was indeed such a stain — and he had gone to some trouble to conceal it from colleagues.

Brain surges don’t account for people knowing information they should not have access to under natural circumstances.

It’s early days yet in the study of near-death experiences. But we are seeing a growth in genuine curiosity, which is a welcome change, and likely to be a fruitful one.

Cross-posted at Mind Matters News.