Dying person's brain scan suggests possibility that life really does flash before your eyes before death

Originally published at: Dying person's brain scan suggests possibility that life really does flash before your eyes before death | Boing Boing

4 Likes

Can I request just the sex parts?

7 Likes

Well I guess we’ll all find out!

4 Likes

You can but you’ll sound just as sexist as you did right then. Hope it’s worth it.

7 Likes

Nah, I don’t want a quick recap. Just hit me with the next season, please.

9 Likes

That’s a hell of a conclusion to come up with based on that bit of data.

15 Likes

When I think about death, the idea of an afterlife is less important to me that just knowing what this was all about, like how did the story of Earth and all of us crazy humans eventually turn out? Whimper or a bang. Did humanity and all our works of art just eventually fizzle out and wind down into nothingness or did we eventually colonize the galaxies and discover unimaginable wonders?

3 Likes

Just pull the plug. I don’t need a recap or upcoming attractions.

2 Likes

It sounds like you’re discounting the joy and bonding that many people feel during sex… I’m glad UnBoingBoing has happy times they want to remember.

19 Likes

Hmm, it’s ethical to chop someone’s donor organs out just after death but putting electrodes on the head just before death is verboten?

12 Likes

Not at all, just sick of comments around here going straight to “show me the tits.”

6 Likes

I’ve been in the mental editing bay re-cutting and splicing my memories my whole life to try to put together a cohesive narrative, I hope I’d get to at least watch a rough cut before I go…

3 Likes

I can’t even conceive of how this could be seen as sexist

2 Likes

Point Damon GIF by Pose FX

7 Likes

“I tried to reach Nirvana, but all I ever got were re-runs of The Mickey Mouse Club”
-Jim Ignitowsky on taking psychedelics.

6 Likes

Fair enough.

3 Likes

A friend (he was a first-year resident when he told me this but he’s a thoracic surgeon now) explained to me that most organ donations require that the donor giving the organ(s) be alive during the operation to remove some specific organs (he mentioned the heart). So, unless human biology or medical technology has changed a lot from a few decades ago, sometimes the donor patient must be kept alive until the very last second, or the organ can’t be transplanted.

People volunteer for all kinds of medical studies, including terminal patients, including people who believe their volunteerism will further our understanding even if the study they participate in is… unusual or experimental. Consent is everything.

My thoughts as well.

ETA: grammar :roll_eyes:

6 Likes

I’m just hoping this doesn’t lead to folks attempting scenarios from the plots of Brainstorm or Flatliners

4 Likes

Not the “alive” that most of us would define as such. The part of the body that was “you” - the brain and all its amazing thoughts - is gone - i.e. brain death. Given very careful management, though, the rest of the body may continue to function for awhile. The organs are removed from that sort of “alive” person. Once a heart is removed, it generally is put into another patient in less than 6 hours.

7 Likes