“I whirled, floated, toward it.”

A couple more items drawn from Pim van Lommel, Consciousness Beyond Life: The Science of the Near-Death Experience (New York: HarperCollins, 2010):

I felt that I was sliding deep down into another state of consciousness.  That’s to say, my consciousness traveled while my body remained motionless on the bed.  I could see my body, but I couldn’t feel it.  I was being sucked away, as it were.  I entered an extremely dark, long, and spiral-shaped tunnel, which struck me as frightening though not unfamiliar at first.  I soared through this spiral-shaped tunnel, and the further or the higher I got, the lighter it became.  The intensity of the light changed to a deep purple/violet.  “Above” me I saw an extremely bright, radiant white light.  I whirled, floated, toward it.  (27)

I felt that I was letting go of my body and rising up.  Through the roof.  Over the hospital.  Everything became smaller, and I began to accelerate.  Everything around me was dark, with the exception of several stars that hurled toward me and I noticed their different colors.  I had no time to look at anything because I was moving so fast.  Things slowed down when I saw that I’d ended up in a kind of hourglass and that I was being “sucked” toward the opening.  Then I realized that I wasn’t alone because a flow of translucent beings was heading the same way as me and another flow was moving in the opposite direction.  When I thought about reincarnation, it later dawned on me that it could well be this flow.  [Latter-day Saints might perhaps propose a rather different explanation for the two-way traffic.]  Once I got through the opening everything began to change.  First off, I got this feeling.  It was so emotional that I can’t possibly describe it.  I was overcome with a feeling of peace that I’d never known on earth. . . .  An overwhelimng feeling of love came over me, not the earthly feeling I was quite familiar with, but something I can’t describe.  Above me, I saw a bright light, and on my way there I heard beautiful music and I saw colors I’d never seen before.  As well as the feelings I just described, I had the impression that this was a different dimension altogether.  And if anything was missing it was our earthly conception of time!  I had what you might call an enhanced vision of this other dimension.  On my way up, toward the all-encompassing light, I saw numerous other “beings” who were also heading there.  When I had nearly arrived at this light, a kind of membrane in front of it stopped me from going any further . . . (27-29)

***

Perhaps, if they become persuaded of the theory described in the article for which I provide the link immediately below, even my more unhinged and obsessive critics will want to consider the advisability of keeping more distance from me:

“Infectious Theory Of Alzheimer’s Disease Draws Fresh Interest”

In other news from the world of science:

“Ancient Jar of Roman Gold Coins Discovered Under Italian Theater”

“More Than 800 Egyptian Tombs Revealed in Ancient Burial Ground: Described for the first time, the 4,000-year-old “rabbit’s warren” represents one of the largest groupings of Middle Kingdom burials.”

“SpaceX Launch Fails After Rocket Bounces Off Firmament”

(Thanks to Christopher Jay Campbell for that last one.)