Shall we get really weird?

They have recently identified a possible third state of consciousness besides consciousness or unconsciousness, and they have also identified a brain signal that happens when the brain would otherwise appear to be “flat-lined.” Brain dead. They call this signal the nu complex. How these two relate…

Let’s start with the third state of consciousness which would by normal definition make no sense to anyone. Dysaesthesia. They put you under anaesthesia. You are completely under, except for your arm. Your head and brain are unconscious. The anaesthesia just has affected your arm. They can then begin to ask you questions and ask you to signal with your arm and you will be able to. The person in this state cannot initiate signalling. They can’t hold a conversation, but they give every indication of being able to make intelligible sense of speech while their brain is unconscious. When asked if they are experiencing any pain, they indicate that they are not, and the nu complex signal may also explain that much of what people are now calling a near death experience is not without consciousness.

In my personal experience, when I was having seizures I should have been incapable of any intelligible thought or awareness because the electrical signals in my brain were completely our of control, no sense to them at all. This of course was not at all true. I was very much aware, but my sense of space was gone. This was very disturbing. I also still had a sense of time. I felt almost as if I were waiting.

Does it feel like you are floating or maybe falling when you have a seizure? I wasn’t in any place, but I still existed, and I wasn’t aware of any body, but I was aware of the need to be connecting to something. No floating or falling. No sense of space at all, just being. No sitting or laying down. Definitely thinking though, definitely structured awareness, even expectation. So that is perhaps were attention comes in.

Could it be like the opposite of what someone who sleep walks might go through? It’s on a spectrum with that. It is deeper than sleep walking.

What is attention? And why does it occur?

Focusing your senses on something.

Attention is focus, yes. Do you have to focus on something for it to get your attention?

No. What makes things miss your attention? What makes you overlook things?

It doesn’t make enough noise.

When you are focused elsewhere.

It doesn’t make enough nonsense.

Expectation. What you expect to see, to notice. What you have trained yourself to think about.

Like looking at a card trick and the people’s clothes and background change and you don’t notice. Change blindness would indeed be an example of that.

It usually happens when you are counting.

Well, the theory is with the nu complex, when someone is deeply in a coma, brain dead, the scientific theory is the brain is in power saver mode trying to preserve your neural integrity, specifically your memory so you experience a life flashback. Your memory plays back, but this process is going on all the time. You don’t have to be near death or brain dead. It’s just all you can notice in those states. This baseline signal can be injured, strained or scarred.

So it DOES do the person good to have people still interacting with them even in the coma. It does indeed. Keep in mind this level of the consciousness is like your heartbeat. You don’t make it happen, but when it’s strained, the nu complex gets stuck in a threatened circuit.

Sometimes you just have to wait for the computer to sort itself out. No. That is the error. Passivity is definitely the error. It’s a heavily debated topic world wide.

I am living in a university town in Germany with a very well known medical department and they define comatose not as unconsciousness, but subconsciousness. What I think is a much better term. I agree. It only gets problematic when you try to venture a prognosis, say, because the person is subconscious or otherwise impaired that they are as good as dead. Nature, especially with these new findings, seem to favour the information theory of death.

I’ve been a very vivid dreamer all my life, as long as I can think of, and in my two surgeries, I noticed that I dreamt under the anaesthetics. So you can relate to having experience when your brain supposedly shouldn’t be able to, yes?

Yea.

Your thoughts are welcome. Be well friends.

Travis Saunders
Dragon Intuitive
~science,mysticism,spirituality~