From Sunday Morning, 4:56 pm on 14 March 2021

After 50 years researching near-death experiences, Professor Bruce Greyson says there is still no explanation for the vivid perceptions that some people report.

Professor Greyson is the world’s leading expert on near-death experiences. He is also the co-founder of the International Association for Near-Death Studies. His search for answers is chronicled in the new book After: A Doctor Explores What Near-Death Experiences Reveal about Life and Beyond.

Despite having grown up in a “very scientific household” and having previously never questioned the physical world, Professor Greyson started wondering about whether death really was the end after talking to patients who had been through near-death experiences.

“I just assumed the physical world was all there was. We never talked about anything spiritual or religious, it just wasn’t part of our family,” he said. “We thought when you die you die, and that’s the end of it. And that was fine with us.”

But in the 1970s, he had an experience with a psychiatric patient that made him begin to question what he believed.

Holly, a young woman, had attempted suicide through overdose and was still unconscious when Greyson first visited her in the emergency room as a psychiatric intern.

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