Following up on my recent video about the Ghost Exhibition in Basel, I’m shifting the lens toward a woefully underexplored historical puzzle: How did spirit visions and related experiences go from being dismissed as “insanity” to being explored as modern therapeutic tools?
Part 1 of this new video trilogy sets the stage by exploring dramatic shifts in recent medical opinion on mental health and “afterlife experiences”.
Watch to the end and drop your answer to the quiz in the comments!
Hope you enjoy – if you do, please remember to share widely.
[Click the image or here to play the video]
As always, here is some of the literature I drew upon to make the video:
Bibliography
Bertão, M., Ú. Dalcolmo, & F. Rego. ‘Deathbed phenomena, other End-of-Life Experiences and their effects in palliative care teams: a systematic review.’ OMEGA – Journal of Death and Dying (2025), https://doi.org/10.1177/00302228251321203
Carhart-Harris, R. L., M. Bolstridge, C. M. J. Day, et al. ‘Psilocybin with psychological support for treatment-resistant depression: six-month follow-up’. Psychopharmacology 235 (2018): 399–408.
Elsaesser, E., C.A. Roe, C.E. Cooper, & D. Lorimer. ‘The phenomenology and impact of hallucinations concerning the deceased.’ BJPsych Open 7, no. 5 (2021): e148.
Fenwick, P., H. Lovelace, & S. Brayne. ‘Comfort for the dying: five year retrospective and one year prospective studies of End of Life Experiences’. Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics 51 (2010): 173–79.
Greyson, Bruce. ‘Near-Death Experiences and personal values’. American Journal of Psychiatry 140 (1983): 618–20. 1574.
Greyson, B. ‘Persistence of attitude changes after Near-Death Experiences: Do they fade over time?’ Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease 210 (2022): 692–96.
Griffiths, R., M. W. Johnson, M. A. Carducci, et al. ‘Psilocybin produces substantial and sustained decreases in depression and anxiety in patients with life-threatening cancer: a randomized double-blind trial’. Journal of Psychopharmacology 30 (2016): 1181–97.
Holden, J. M., B. Greyson, & D. James, eds. The Handbook of Near-Death Experiences. Thirty Years of Investigation. Praeger/ABC-CLIO, 2009 [Buy on Amazon].
Rees, W. D. ‘The hallucinations of widowhood’. British Medical Journal 4 (1971): 37–41.
Renz, D., O. Reichmuth, D. Bueche, et al. ‘Fear, pain, denial, and spiritual experiences in dying processes’. American Journal of Hospice & Palliative Medicine 35 (2018): 478–91.
Sabucedo, P., C. Evans. & J. Hayes. ‘Perceiving those who are gone: Cultural research on post-bereavement perception or hallucination of the deceased.’ Transcultural Psychiatry 60 (2020): https://doi.org/10.1177/1363461520962887
