Last Minutes of Life/ Brain Experiments

Hosted byConnie Willis

Last Minutes of Life/ Brain Experiments

About the show

In the first half of the program, Karrissa Hartley joined guest host Connie Willis (YouTube Channel) to discuss her work as a medical medium who can pick up on the health aspects of those who have passed over, including how the departed died. "I think most of what I do makes the families feel better, especially when we're dealing with someone that died in a horrific way - it's good to know that they have crossed on and they are with loved ones," she said. Hartley detailed a few of her cases where family members wanted to know what happened in the last minutes of their loved ones' lives.

In one of her most memorable readings, Hartley recalled a man who came through smelling of marijuana and chatting about conspiracy theories. She described feeling intoxicated before something like a pile of bricks hit her fast and sudden. "It was just so intense that feeling of being hit, but it was over really quick," Hartley said. The family revealed the man had been struck by a train. In another case, a man whose death had been ruled a suicide came through screaming the name of his ex-wife. According to Hartley, the man had been ambushed before being killed over ownership of a bar. Hartley shared a case of a father who was thought to have died while intoxicated when his head struck a sink. "When I feel heart attacks it's like this really intense throbbing pain," she explained, noting the autopsy revealed the father had died of a heart attack.

------------------------------------------------

In the latter half of the show, Dr. Eric Haseltine discussed his impressive background in R&D, the fascinating intricacies of how the human brain works, as well as shared some brain teasers. Haseltine talked about leading research and development for the Walt Disney Company, where he helped develop new attractions, as well as his role as director of research at the NSA where he focused on the roadside bomb problem in Iraq and Afghanistan. "Probably the most satisfying thing that I've done in my life is to put a dent in the [bomb] problem," he said. Haseltine tackled some fascinating fringe topics related to the brain, including telepathy. According to Haseltine, some people are able to understand what is going on in the mind of another, and science is just beginning to work out how this is possible. He briefly covered the role implicit learning plays in reading another person.

The brain does not faithfully reproduce what is out there but instead creates what we perceive on the fly, he explained. "We see what we expect to see, we hear what we expect to hear, not what is actually there," Haseltine continued. He played a series of acoustic illusions to demonstrate this aspect of brain function. In the 'Infinitely Ascending Tone' clip, musical notes seem to ascend forever showing an issue the brain has with taking shortcuts. In another audio illusion, 'Phantom Words,' a seemingly nonsensical pattern gives rise to understandable words as the brain grasps to something which closely matches the sounds. Haseltine tricked Connie with his 'Toin Coss' illusion in which the brain hears "coin toss," even though "toin coss" is actually said. "Perception is not real, it's what we create," Haseltine reiterated.

Bumper Music