Today I got an email from Amazon.com recommending a new book called The Science of Life after Death, by Stephen Martin. On the Amazon sales page I read the first few pages of the book, which can be accessed by clicking on the cover photo. The book seems well written and the table of contents covers some interesting subjects.
Still, one thing annoyed me. The book starts out by relating the famous Pam Reynolds NDE case. As soon as I saw that the Reynolds case was under discussion, I thought to myself, "I'll bet he gets it wrong." I'm cynical that way. Unfortunately my cynicism was justified. The author did get it wrong.
Here's how he summarizes the case:
Pam's ability to recall and accurately describe what was going on in the operating room while she was dead with the blood drained from her head and most of her body, indicates her mind had separated from her brain. [p. 13]
But this is incorrect. As Keith Augustine has pointed out, and as I discussed here, Pam Reynolds was not clinically dead at the time when the veridical part of her NDE took place. It is true that in one stage of the procedure her blood was drained, bringing on clinical death, but this happened later, after her skull had been opened with an electric saw. By the time she was clinically dead, Pam was not observing things in the operating room. Her NDE had apparently progressed to an experience of things in another dimension of reality (or, as a skeptic would say, to hallucinations).
Undoubtedly, Pam did have accurate knowledge of details of the procedure that would normally be unknown to her – things that took place while she was sedated and unconscious, with her eyes closed and her eyes plugged by devices that clicked loudly. The fact that she apparently saw and heard what was happening to her while in that condition makes her case a very good one.
But she was not clinically dead at that point. She was not "dead with the blood drained from her head and most of her body." That condition came later.
The authors of Irreducible Mind get it right:
The [Pam Reynolds] case is not perfect. The details were not published for several years after the experience occurred. More importantly, the verifiable events that she reported observing in the operating room occurred when she was anesthetized and sensorially isolated but before and after the time in which she was clinically "dead." Further, it is impossible to tell exactly when during the procedure she had the experience of going into a tunnel, seeing a bright light, and conversing with her deceased relatives… We cannot … say with certainty that any part of her NDE actually occurred during the period when she was clinically "dead." Even so, the extremity of her condition and her heavily anesthetized state throughout the entire procedure casts serious doubt on any view of mind or consciousness as unilaterally and totally dependent on intact physiological functioning. [pp. 393,394]
The mistake made in The Science of Life after Death is a very common one, which is why I was able to predict it. In the overall context of the book, it may be a minor thing. It still irks me, though. In reporting such controversial cases, it's important to get the details right. Otherwise, skeptical critics will (justifiably) pounce.