Is there consciousness after decapitation?

[Gail]

According to Josh Clark and Charles Bryant of How Stuff Works, there is, for about 4 seconds. So it is possible in that time to notice your body lying there before it's lights out.

There is apparently also other lesser impulses that carry on for 50 seconds.

Hmm...

[Textus Receptus]

Ha! Very interesting Gail. I have pondered this subject before. I do believe it maybe possible to have a certain degree of consciousness at the moment of decapitation if we are willing to concede that the body's sole purpose is to provide oxygen to the brain, then yes, it may be possible. Yet, there is one caveat to this theory, who is going to test it?

If memory serves me correctly, I do believe that I read that the practice of holding the decapitated head to show the body was not uncommon during the French Revolution.

[Gail]

Well, according to the podcast, the "wacky Dutch" took that task upon them, to do the testing.

The history of beheading is macabre but I thought it actually interesting. Apparently the killer of Marat, a woman whose name escapes me now, was beheaded and her head actually smacked around by the headsman (a crime for which he got 5 years). It is reported that her face changed its expression to one of contempt afterward as it was being showed to the crowd. Heads such as Anne Boleyn and others who were cleanly chopped also showed emotions.

Very weird, but it makes one consider whether beheading is actually humane as used as capital punishment. Victor Hugo was reported as saying that one look at a guillotine cures that thought. The weight on the blade (called a mouton {sheep- I had to laugh to myself about that}) is about 150 lbs, ensuring a clean cut. The machine is an intimidating-looking apparatus.

[cricket]

I've known two people who've had nothing but brain stems, who were able to "show emotion". I don't believe they were consciously expressing emotional feelings, but rather, simply having (for lack of a better term) "knee jerk" reactions to non-apparent stimuli.

[Bravus]

M. Guillotine invented the machine that bears his name as a *more* humane means of execution, in the knowledge that axemen sometimes missed or needed multiple blows.

[phkrause]

M. Guillotine invented the machine that bears his name as a *more* humane means of execution, in the knowledge that axemen sometimes missed or needed multiple blows.

Thanks for that picture Bravus.

[Gail]

LOL

[Woody]

Well, this is one of the more interesting and informative threads I've come by.

[Gerr]

According to Josh Clark and Charles Bryant of How Stuff Works, there is, for about 4 seconds. So it is possible in that time to notice your body lying there before it's lights out.

There is apparently also other lesser impulses that carry on for 50 seconds.

Hmm...

Don't know, Gail. I've never gone through the experience and no one has survived to tell. :)

[Amelia]

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read...er-decapitation

http://www.damninteresting.com/lucid-decapitation

[Kountzer]

yuck.

[phkrause]

yuck.

[rudywoofs (Pam)]

[John317]

The answer is almost certainly yes-- because of the oxygen in the brain. As you point out, it lasts only a very short time, though.

Dostoyevksy, the great Russsian writer who himself came within moments of being executed, wrote impressively about consciousness after decapitation, in his splendid novel, The Idiot. (No, not a real idiot.)

There are true horror stories about decapitations in merry old England, when the executioner would need to run after the axe only chopped part of the head and didn't get the whole thing. This one poor woman moved her head-- I believe she was royalty-- just as the axe was about to strike her, so she was able to get up and run. And all the crowd were laughing hysterically while the poor thing ran off screaming. People can be awfully cruel. They dragged her back for one more try and she held still that time.

[Dr. Rich]

Would this be called an "out of body " experence? Here is the thing. Once you remove the spirit from the body you have a dead soul. As for being alive for a few seconds, that is nonsense as I have shot many animals in the head and they were GONE! I almost shot a man in the head but he moved and I only put a hole in his ear. This was while I was on the police department.

[rudywoofs (Pam)]

As long as the brain has oxygen, it is possible for it to think...the cranial nerves would still be intact, as would the brainstem (depending on how close to the occipital bone the cut would come). From pictures I've seen, it is a person's neck that rests on the block and is severed....that's with a guillotine, mind you, not some lunatics using knives to slice someone's head off from the ventral aspect, anterior to posterior.

[Bravus]

I wondered though (I know, we're in macabre dimensions now) whether the shock of the impact from the guillotine blade on the muscles in the neck would shock the brain into instant unconsciousness, much like a heavy blow on the head. Not sure.

[Guest]

I think we should set up a test and find out...

[Woody]

Are you going to be a volunteer?