How would it feel to die?

[Dennis Toy]

I want to know if anyone would like to interpret on how it would feel to feel for your life to discontinue.

[Darth Raptor]

That would depend largely on *how* you die.

If your'e talking about kicking it due to natural causes, I would imagine you wouldn't notice it; much like how you don't notice falling asleep.

[Uraniun235]

Every time I think about this for too long, I become very acutely aware of my own mortality, and I have to go concentrate on happy thoughts for awhile.

[Rye]

You'd disappear when death actually happened, so I imagine it would be largely like going unconscious or the time in the womb before awareness only in reverse.

[The Guid]

For me, I believe that if I live like it will feel like an endless moment of enlightenment, truth and wonder without time and thought. Then again you probably think I'm just mad.

[Rye]

Actually, it is likely you'd have an interesting experience prior to actually dying, since the brain would lose various functionality, like the ability to percieve space and time and your position in it, and lots off other interesting brain stress effects. The brain being unable to accept its own death as it starts to fade away could come up with some truly interesting shit to rationalise stuff to itself, and reject what's actually happening.

[Stravo]

I had surgery once to get rid of kidney stones. They gave me this anestethtic and I have never been under before in my life so it was no bog deal at first. The guy asks me to count backwards from 20, so I start and I'm thinking, "Is this shit going to work? I don't feel in the least bit slee----" next thing I know I'm being gently awakened by a nurse as they put me in the recovery room. I see my dad standing by my bedisde and I was so disoriented because to my mind I literally lost all that time.

I assume that death would be like that - like a lightswitch followed by oblivion. I don't even remember dreaming during my unconcioussness. It was like a big nothing then suddenly there I am awake.

[Aaron]

I can only relate my personal experiance with death which was a near brush with it by electrocution. Basically I was electrocuted by a massive amount of current and I went unconcousius(?). It was like falling asleep, and was perhaps the most peaceful experiance of my life. I experianced a "vision" if you want to call it that, and the next thing I new I was being woken up by one of the Master Corporals that was working on me.

[Shinova]

So judging from what Stravo and Kendall say, if losing all brain activity is like what Stravo describes, there won't be a time when you wake up.


So..... would it be like....just that? Nothing? Bzaah, zip, nada?

[Elheru Aran]

So judging from what Stravo and Kendall say, if losing all brain activity is like what Stravo describes, there won't be a time when you wake up.


So..... would it be like....just that? Nothing? Bzaah, zip, nada?

Depends on how it happens, but yeah, I imagine it'd be a more or less gradual loss of consciousness.

[Surlethe]

I was wondering if time would slow down--as the brain loses consciousness, I tend to think the perception of life would slow down, sloooooowweeeeerrr..... Sort of like a horizontal asymptote of perception.

Or maybe, it would just be like falling asleep. As Yoda says, "Forever sleep."

[Aaron]

I was wondering if time would slow down--as the brain loses consciousness, I tend to think the perception of life would slow down, sloooooowweeeeerrr..... Sort of like a horizontal asymptote of perception.

Or maybe, it would just be like falling asleep. As Yoda says, "Forever sleep."

In my experiance it was like falling asleep. Everything happened in normal time, but I fully expect everyone to have a different experiance though.

[Castor Troy]

I think of it as drifting away...then hopefully waking up in heaven.

[Panzer Grenadier]

Okay if natural causes just feels like drifting off to sleep what do you think the following would be like?

Gunshot to the head
Falling a fatal distance
Getting decapitated

I always wondered how much pain you would feel in the first too. Like if you fell 10 stories or so you would have at least some degree a of consciousness when you hit the ground for the first few seconds, and the gunshot must be crazy because you have this tremndous impact and then lights out.

[Aaron]

Okay if natural causes just feels like drifting off to sleep what do you think the following would be like?

Gunshot to the head

Instant nothingness

Falling a fatal distance

Lots of "oh shit" followed by instant nothingness

Getting decapitated

Instant nothingness

I always wondered how much pain you would feel in the first too. Like if you fell 10 stories or so you would have at least some degree a of consciousness when you hit the ground for the first few seconds, and the gunshot must be crazy because you have this tremndous impact and then lights out.

I think you'd be dead before the pain registered.

[Robert Walper]

Having experienced near death by virtue of hypothermia, my experience was one of slowly losing self control and focus on the world around you, followed by complete lack of thought or memory. Honestly, it wasn't a bad way to go. If I had to choose a way to die, this would be one of them, since I know what to expect and it wouldn't be all that bad.

[Castor Troy]

Hypothermia?

You wouldn't mind telling the story, would you? What was it like?

[Rocker5150]

I've also had a procedure where they gave me an IV drug (versaid) and had me count down from ten. By six or seven, I woke up in recovery. No sense of time and no dreaming. It was different from sleep in that it was instantaneous.....almost like being 'teleported' from one room to the other in a millisecond. Since I don't believe in an afterlife, and was unable to percieve or remember anything while I was out, I would guess death would be similiar. Once it occurs, all perception/thought is gone, however no 'destination' exists.

If you were to die by slow blood loss or something, maybe some kind of dream-like state would be occur once a certain point is reached but before you 'slip off' into nothingness.

I saw a show about the guys who fish for king crabs, etc. out in the Bering Sea and other crazy places. They were talking about what happens when you go overboard and drown. It seems like they said it could take up to fifteen minutes....and that is fifteen minutes being deep down where the crab pot rests! I don't know how accurate it was, but they were describing a scenario where you wouldn't be 'brain dead' before the fish down there start eating you! Maybe all perception/feeling would be gone and you would even be blind....I can't remember exactly what they said, but the thought of the fish picking you apart made it seem an awful way to go!



-Kevin

[Tzeentch]

Getting decapitated

Instant nothingness

But you can still blink your eyes for a few seconds post decapitation. How do we know that all the pain circuits aren't firing full-caliber?

[Robert Walper]

Hypothermia?

You wouldn't mind telling the story, would you? What was it like?

Well, it involved a swim in the ocean in the middle of winter. No supervision or anyone else around. Swam about a 1/4 to /12 a mile through the water one way, and apparently made it back to land. Although at that point I don't recall anything beyond realizing on the way back, I was halfway between the mainland and the small island I had initially aimed for. I'm one lucky fuck to have made it back..apparently I just crawled onto the beach and laid there, virtually dead. Apparently an elderly couple found me on the beach. According to the medics, I was minutes from being beyond recovery.

[ArmorPierce]

Getting decapitated

I've heard that severed head can live for several seconds. I think there was some guy tthat was put to the guillotine said he would try to blink after he had his head chopped off.

QUESTION: DOES BEHEADING HURT? And, if so, for how long is the severed head aware of its plight?

William Wild, Oxford

ANSWER: YES, BEHEADING HURTS. How much depends on the executioner's skill, or lack of it.

Horrified witnesses had no doubt Mary's end was excruciating.
When Mary, Queen of Scots, was executed at Fotheringay Castle in 1587, a clumsy headsman gave her three strokes without quite managing to sever her head.

The headsman then had to saw though the skin and gristle with his sheath knife before the job could be regarded as complete. The profound, protracted groan Mary gave when the axe first hit left the horrified witnesses in no doubt that her pain was excruciating.

How long is the interval of consciousness after the head is severed? In France, in the days of the guillotine, some of the condemned were asked to blink their eyes if they were still conscious after the knife fell.
Some of the condemned were asked to blink if they were still conscious.

Reportedly, their heads blinked for up to 30 seconds after decapitation. How much of this was voluntary and how much due to reflex nerve action is speculation. Most nations with science sophisticated enough to determine this question have long since abandoned decapitation as a legal tool.

Dale McIntyre, University of Cambridge

Antoine Lavoisier, the French chemist who lived between 1743 and 1794, was caught up in the revolution and faced beheading. He asked friends to observe closely as he would continue blinking as long as possible after being killed. He was reported to have blinked for 15 seconds after decapitation.

[Dennis Toy]

Quote:

Getting decapitated


I've heard that severed head can live for several seconds. I think there was some guy tthat was put to the guillotine said he would try to blink after he had his head chopped off.

Quote:




QUESTION: DOES BEHEADING HURT? And, if so, for how long is the severed head aware of its plight?

William Wild, Oxford

ANSWER: YES, BEHEADING HURTS. How much depends on the executioner's skill, or lack of it.

Horrified witnesses had no doubt Mary's end was excruciating.
When Mary, Queen of Scots, was executed at Fotheringay Castle in 1587, a clumsy headsman gave her three strokes without quite managing to sever her head.

The headsman then had to saw though the skin and gristle with his sheath knife before the job could be regarded as complete. The profound, protracted groan Mary gave when the axe first hit left the horrified witnesses in no doubt that her pain was excruciating.

How long is the interval of consciousness after the head is severed? In France, in the days of the guillotine, some of the condemned were asked to blink their eyes if they were still conscious after the knife fell.
Some of the condemned were asked to blink if they were still conscious.

Reportedly, their heads blinked for up to 30 seconds after decapitation. How much of this was voluntary and how much due to reflex nerve action is speculation. Most nations with science sophisticated enough to determine this question have long since abandoned decapitation as a legal tool.

Dale McIntyre, University of Cambridge

Antoine Lavoisier, the French chemist who lived between 1743 and 1794, was caught up in the revolution and faced beheading. He asked friends to observe closely as he would continue blinking as long as possible after being killed. He was reported to have blinked for 15 seconds after decapitation.

Actually you wouldn't feel anything for the fact that the blow from the axe would render you unconscious.

[Castor Troy]

Wouldn't the blinking be some sort of involuntary reaction from the nervous system when the person is dead, like when a game bird is shot some of them start flapping around?

[Dennis Toy]

from straight dope.com

Dear Cecil:

A character in the movie Wolfen said that during the days of the French guillotine, some decapitated heads actually were cognizant of their plight. Since the brain can live over a minute without oxygen, could some of the heads have seen their headless bodies and realized what a predicament they were in? --Anonymous, Phoenix

Dear Anonymous:

You've been watching too many cheap horror movies--although to be frank about it, this kind of thing isn't confined to the silver screen. My somewhat credulous mother used to tell us a story about a Catholic martyr who, after decapitation, picked up his head and kissed it. Not being dummies, we pointed to out to her that there were practical problems involved in a headless body kissing anything. Anyway, the fatal blow in a beheading induces immediate unconsciousness, even though the brain may not actually expire for several minutes. Even if the head were somehow miraculously reattached to the body, a phenomenon known as "retrograde amnesia," common in accident victims, would most likely prevent the subject from remembering anything about the event.

[Molyneux]

Okay if natural causes just feels like drifting off to sleep what do you think the following would be like?

Gunshot to the head

Instant nothingness

That depends on what kind of gunshot wound it is, I'd say...
Keep in mind, Edward Norton at the end of Fight Club technically suffered from a gunshot wound to the head.