this post was submitted on 28 Apr 2024
-49 points (17.3% liked)
Asklemmy
43336 readers
908 users here now
A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions
If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!
- Open-ended question
- Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
- Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
- Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
- An actual topic of discussion
Looking for support?
Looking for a community?
- Lemmyverse: community search
- sub.rehab: maps old subreddits to fediverse options, marks official as such
- [email protected]: a community for finding communities
~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_[email protected]~
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
It’s not hard to believe. It’s not like the neurons connecting the ears to Wernicke’s area magically disappear. The part of the brain which processes one’s name is known to have evolved earlier and is more basely integrated. And there’s no rule that says neurons cannot fire even once after death. Indeed, bodies are known to move or twitch hours after death – so why not there brain, where most of the body’s neurons are?
Arguments for and against: www (dot) cureus (dot) com/articles/133225-the-most-gentle-of-lethal-methods-the-question-of-retained-consciousness-following-decapitation#!/
Decapitation experiments of Louis: www (dot) cairn-int (dot) info/article-E_RHS_612_0333--the-debate-over-severed-heads.htm
(this isn’t hours later but it’s the first source I can find rn)
Some organisms have detectable brain activity 96 hours after death (nobody has done this experiment on a human) www (dot) sciencealert (dot) com/how-long-does-a-human-head-actually-remain-conscious-after-being-cut-off
I’m not claiming 100% that consciousness can return even for an instant after death. I just think there’s enough question marks here that it can’t be entirely ruled out.