I didn't know whether to post this here or on the proof that God exists thread, so I'll post it on both, because I have never heard this but it really made me think and I hope it generates discussion. It come from Greg Easterbrook, a guy that writes a football column, called the TMQ (Tuesday Morning Quarterback), that has football anaysis and alot of his thoughts on a wide range of topics. You can find threads about him and his column, and the controversy surrounding it in the politics or sports forums (fora?) Anyway, here it is.
Quote:
TMQ is a churchgoer who believes there are higher powers and a life to come, but since the Bible tells us nothing about what the afterlife may be like, I don't pretend to know details. I can note, however, that the dying in many places having similar mental experiences is not "impossible" absent the supernatural. There may be a perfectly natural reason why people facing mortality see hallways of peace or wisdom: because that is what culture conditions people to expect on death. (Let's hope it's right!) As for the bright lights the dying sometimes report experiencing, this article by Brendan Koerner explains mundane physical theories. Among them are that brain anoxia, or oxygen depravation, causes the optic nerves to sense white; and that at death the body releases all stored endorphins (no need to keep saving them) to stop mortal agony and create a sense of peace, making dying less traumatic.
The latter biological possibility is actually one of the reasons TMQ believes that human beings were made by a God who loves us. Why would natural selection have cared about reducing a person's trauma at death? All natural selection cares about is fitness in passing down genes; if after replicating its DNA an organism dies in pain or panic, what's that to evolution? In Darwinian terms, there would be no "selection pressure" favoring the peaceful death over the horrible death. Yet there appear to be biological mechanisms that help most people die peacefully. Why are such mechanisms in our physiologies? Maybe because somebody loves us.
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article mentioned in column
link to full TMQ