While many medical and psychological explanations have been offered, they remain speculative and often fall short of explaining the entire phenomenon. Numerous articles and a book about various aspects of NDEs have been written by members of our staff. There is also a list of recommended books by other authors . We are particularly interested in studying NDEs that may bear on the question of whether the mind can function outside the physical body, and on whether we may survive bodily death. One such type of experience is the so-called veridical NDE , in which experiencers acquire verifiable information that they could not have obtained by any normal means.
Many persons have the experience of seeming to be located in space away from their physical body.
Some persons having this experience report that from a position above their body they could look down on it and observe its condition. The experience of being out of the body also occurs to many persons who are not near death. Some are fatigued or mildly ill, but others are in good health. Although many of these experiences do not suggest any paranormal process, two features that sometimes occur do suggest such a process. Second, in a small number of cases, the person who reports having been out of his or her body may be perceived by another person at the place where the first person said he or she had gone.