M.M. So today you defend NDEs as real experiences, more real than the reality in which we live. Can you affirm that consciousness exists?
E.A. Consciousness might be defined as awareness of things outside oneself. So while philosophers have been debating more precise definitions for millennia, and the finer points are quite complicated, the core of the thing is easy; if you’re reading this, if you’re aware of this newspaper, you’re conscious.
The tougher question, and one that I have learned a lot about since my experience, is whether consciousness is essentially mechanical—that is, arising solely from physical processes in the brain—or holistic, in that it transcends the brain. As a neurosurgeon, I was used to a one-to-one correlation between the
physical brain and how the mind appeared to work. For example, if I had a patient with a tumor that affected a part of the brain associated with language, he would have trouble communicating. But I’ve since learned that it’s a lot more complicated than that.
M.M. Do you affirm it from the personal point of view or from a scientific point of view?
?.A. While the science has been emerging throughout the last few decades, I refused to seriously consider it until my own personal experience. Since
then, I have learned a lot, and based on my experience, a wealth of anecdotal evidence, and emerging research in medicine and physics, I have come 5
to accept the hypothesis that consciousness exists beyond the physical brain.