Near-death experiences often include feelings of detachment from the body, traveling through strange spaces, encounters with supernatural beings, and visions of a bright light at the end of the tunnel. These experiences are described both by those who have survived clinical death and by those who have ingested psychedelic drugs such as the DMT contained in ayahuasca. London-based neuroscientists are now investigating why the two conditions produce similar experiences.
“Both conditions share the same neurobiological skeleton, but individual psychology builds different stories on top of it,” said Dr. Pascal Michael of the University of Greenwich. In a recent study, thirty-six volunteers inhaled a high dose of DMT. Their experiences were compared with a database of people who have survived clinical death after cardiac arrests. The results show that both experiences have the same main motifs: bright light, tunnel, feelings of peace or meeting with beings.
According to Dr. David Luke of the University of Greenwich it is possible that DMT is naturally formed in the human brain at death or clinical death, which could explain the similarity of experiences. However, there is no direct evidence that DMT concentrations reach psychedelic levels during cardiac arrest.
Nevertheless, there are differences between the two states. In the near-death state, people often see deceased loved ones, while after DMT they report encounters with bizarre beings. Near-death tunnels tend to be dark with a bright light at the end, while after DMT they have a complex colored geometric structure. “Why both experiences involve tunnels, even though they are completely different, is an open question,” added Dr. Luke. Researchers believe that cultural expectations, memories, beliefs, and context influence the content of experiences, but the exact mechanism remains unclear.
