October 2025
Nine leading experts team up in a new book to share frontline research on near-death phenomena. People’s experiences at the border between life and death hint that consciousness is not merely a byproduct of the brain.
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The anthology, “On the Banks of the River Styx. New Perspectives on Terminal Lucidity and other Near-Death Phenomena“, is the sixth volume in a postmaterialist sciences series published by The Galileo Commission, The Scientific and Medical Network and The Academy for the Advancement of Postmaterialist Sciences (AAPS).
The book’s authors and editors are biologist Michael Nahm, psychologist Natasha Tassell-Matamua, Karalee Kothe, M.A., psychologist Chris A. Roe, psychologist Maryne Mutis, physiologist and neuroscientist Marjorie Woollacott, psychiatrist Marieta Pehlivanova, independent researcher Evelyn Elsaesser and psychotherapist William Peters.
In Greek mythology, the river Styx represents the boundary between the land of the living and the land of the dead. The researchers, experts in the field, describe what people experience in that borderland.
It can be Near-Death Experiences (NDE) – more common since the advent of modern resuscitation methods – communication with deceased or Terminal Lucidity (TL). The latter is a sudden surge of cognitive functions that have previously been altered, the hours or days immediately preceding death.
Studies of these phenomena indicate that consciousness is nonphysical, something more than the result of chemical processes in the brain.
The online book launch on 16th October features a round-table discussion and Q&A. The record will be made available.
Anders Bolling
