Would you feel the impact if you fell to earth or got hit by a train?

[engineer_comp_geek]

@Machine_Elf

People have survived falls from much greater heights, but only onto more forgiving surfaces.

Mostly onto more forgiving surfaces.

Alan Magee was a turret gunner in WWII whose plane, and also importantly, his parachute, were both shot apart by the enemy. With his only other choice being to burn to death in the falling wreckage, he bailed out without a parachute, fell roughly 20,000 feet, and came crashing down through the skylight of the St. Nazaire train station, landing on the hard floor below (not exactly a forgiving surface). Alan couldn’t tell you how he managed to survive. He passed out in the high altitude and was unconscious when he hit.

Surprisingly, he wasn’t the only guy to basically get shot out of his bomber in WWII and live. The other guys did fall into snow, though, which is definitely a much more forgiving surface.

Even though he had a much softer landing, Nicholas Alkemade is still pretty noteworthy. When the order came to bail out of his plane, he found his parachute on fire. Like Alan, he was faced with the choice of jumping without a chute or burning to death in the falling plane, and chose to jump. Also like Alan, he fell roughly 20,000 feet and lost consciousness on the way down due to the altitude. Unlike Alan, he landed in fir trees, bushes, and a bit of snow, and walked away with some minor cuts and bruises and a slightly sprained knee. His biggest problem afterwards was convincing the Gestapo not to shoot him as a spy since they didn’t believe that he had just fallen out of a plane from 20,000 feet up and basically walked away with barely a scratch. Fortunately for Nicholas, they found the wreckage of his plane, along with the charred remains of his chute, exactly where he said it would be in the plane.

Ivan Chisov was a Russian navigator who, unlike the other guys, jumped with a perfectly good chute. He was afraid that if he popped his chute immediately, a pissed off German pilot would just shoot him as an easy falling target. So, what he planned on doing was dropping below the level of the battle and then popping his chute. What he actually did was pass out on the way down, and never opened his chute. Again, he fell roughly 20,000 feet or so (this was a common altitude for bombers if you are wondering why they all fell roughly the same height) and according to witnesses, he hit the side of a snowy ravine and bounced, rolled, and slid his way to the bottom, breaking several bones alone the way, but surviving.

So, relevant to this thread, there is no height (well, that a plane can reach) that you can fall from and have a 100 percent mortality rate. Apparently though, if you fall from roughly 20,000 feet or so, you won’t be conscious when you hit, so you won’t feel the impact. If you survive and wake up later, though, it’s probably going to hurt like a bitch. Alan and Ivan both spent months recovering from their injuries.

[Baron_Greenback]

@engineer_comp_geek

Even though he had a much softer landing, Nicholas Alkemade is still pretty noteworthy.

Nicholas’s good/bad luck continued after the war. From this article on the RAF Museum website:

After discharge from the RAF in 1946, Alkemade returned to Loughborough, finding work in a chemical plant. Not long after starting his new job, he again cheated death. While removing chlorine gas-generating liquid from a sump, he received a severe electric shock from the equipment he was using. Reeling away, his gas mask became dislodged and he began breathing in the poisonous gas. An agonising 15 minutes were to pass before his appeals for aid were answered and he was dragged to safety, nearly asphyxiated by the fumes.

Not long after, a siphoning pipe burst, spraying Alkemade’s face and arms with industrial sulphuric acid. With astounding presence of mind, he dived head-first into a nearby 40 gallon drum of limewash, thereby neutralising the acid. Alkemade ‘escaped’ with first degree burns. Returning to work, Alkemade was pinned beneath a nine foot long steel door runner that fell from its mountings as he passed by. Somehow only minor bruising resulted.

[Your_Great_Darsh_Face]

Causing the well-aired comment:

I’LL GET YOU YET, CULLY, SEE IF I DON’T.

[Machine_Elf]

@engineer_comp_geek

…fell roughly 20,000 feet, and came crashing down through the skylight of the St. Nazaire train station, landing on the hard floor below (not exactly a forgiving surface).

“crashing down through the skylight” probably took a lot of energy out of him; I wonder how fast he was going when he finally hit the floor.

[Just_Asking_Questions]

On the other hand, there was a story mentioned by one of the rescuers in Sioux City for Flight 232, where he found a survivor who was alive, but had severe injuries (like, no limbs severe). The victim calmly asked if he was going to make it (he did not survive). Apparently, he was in no pain (or no great pain).

One comment about the crash was that, since rescuers were so close, some of the people who had fatal injuries “didn’t have time to die” before help got there.:eek: Something to contemplate on those long flights…

[Ambivalid]

@Velocity

I doubt falling 100 feet to concrete would kill instantly. I think it would involve several minutes of internal agony, especially if you landed feet-first.

I know a girl who jumped out of a second-floor window to escape her psychotic brother and landed directly on her feet. She suffered a spinal cord injury and is now paralyzed from the waist down.

[engineer_comp_geek]

@Baron_Greenback

Nicholas’s good/bad luck continued after the war. From this article on the RAF Museum website:

Heh. I wasn’t aware of those. Thanks.

There’s the makings of some sort of Final Destination type movie in his life.

[Boyo_Jim]

They should have made him the “Unbreakable” guy instead of that poser Bruce Willis.

[Honey]

@Kenm

When I stub a toe hard, there’s a delay from the relatively little initial pain before it suddenly, not gradually, increases. At least I perceive it that way.

I did it again last week when I walked through my dark kitchen. I knew the pain would increase in a second or so, leaving me enough time to loudly swear “[expletive deleted] ME” before it increased.

This gives me hope that in the unlikely event I fly again, I’d be dead before the pain hits from a fatal crash.

Yeah, like when you bump your knee on the desk. You have enough time to think, “Oh boy, this is gonna hurt like a mother***** in a second”. Owwww!!

[Senegoid]

Here’s a thought that scares me: Okay, suppose one experiences the “intact” --> “smithereens” transformation of a spectacular plane crash, resulting in blobs of protoplasm and brains being splattered on the trunks of nearby trees.

Now, we know that pain and other sensations are registered and recognized in the brain, which can create “phantom” sensations even in limbs that aren’t even there.

What I wonder is: Might any of those fragmentary blobs of brain on the tree trunks, disembodied though they are, be experiencing some sort of pain? Even in the absence of any consciousness? I’m terrified at the prospect that, even after I die (and however horribly splattered I might be), there might be globs of my former self still experiencing unbearable agony!

How do we know it’s all over when it’s over?

[Just_Asking_Questions]

@Senegoid

How do we know it’s all over when it’s over?

We don’t. Not only is there no way to know, there’s nothing we can do about it!

What if religions have it mostly right, and there is a soul-like presence in us, and it lives forever. And it remembers the pain of dying, and can never talk to another soul, or do anything to make the endless misery end.

Another thing to think about on those lonely nights. Sleep well!

[Velocity]

@Senegoid

Here’s a thought that scares me: Okay, suppose one experiences the “intact” –> “smithereens” transformation of a spectacular plane crash, resulting in blobs of protoplasm and brains being splattered on the trunks of nearby trees.

Now, we know that pain and other sensations are registered and recognized in the brain, which can create “phantom” sensations even in limbs that aren’t even there.

What I wonder is: Might any of those fragmentary blobs of brain on the tree trunks, disembodied though they are, be experiencing some sort of pain? Even in the absence of any consciousness? I’m terrified at the prospect that, even after I die (and however horribly splattered I might be), there might be globs of my former self still experiencing unbearable agony!

How do we know it’s all over when it’s over?

Which brain glob would *you *be feeling, though? Let’s say your brain was shattered into four separate globs, several feet apart each, and that each of them was feeling pain. Which one would be you, though? Or can you somehow feel all four separate brain globs’ pain simultaneously? I don’t know how that would even work.

[Gyrate]

@Senegoid

Here’s a thought that scares me: Okay, suppose one experiences the “intact” –> “smithereens” transformation of a spectacular plane crash, resulting in blobs of protoplasm and brains being splattered on the trunks of nearby trees.

Now, we know that pain and other sensations are registered and recognized in the brain, which can create “phantom” sensations even in limbs that aren’t even there.

What I wonder is: Might any of those fragmentary blobs of brain on the tree trunks, disembodied though they are, be experiencing some sort of pain? Even in the absence of any consciousness? I’m terrified at the prospect that, even after I die (and however horribly splattered I might be), there might be globs of my former self still experiencing unbearable agony!

How do we know it’s all over when it’s over?

I’m going to recommend that you not watch that last Doctor Who Cybermen special. Ever.

[MacLir]

@Velocity

Which brain glob would *you *be feeling, though? Let’s say your brain was shattered into four separate globs, several feet apart each, and that each of them was feeling pain. Which one would be you, though? Or can you somehow feel all four separate brain globs’ pain simultaneously? I don’t know how that would even work.

Four possibilities, philosopically.

1. Conciousness resides in a particular area - whichever chunk has it is experiencing its local sensations.
2. Conciousness is networked but hardwired - each chunk has insufficient processing power to be concious.
3. Conciousness is networked “psychically” - each chunk gets it all
4. Conciousness is distributed - each chunk perceives its local sensations as a separate, simultaneous “I”, coexistant with three other "I"s but independant

Science to this point does not support 1.

The “split-brain” experiments, where the corpus callosum was severed as treatment pretty much rule out 3, and to the extent of two half brains supports 4. :dubious:

Lobotomies seem to support 2, to the extent that a lobotomized person apparently loses some of their level of conciousness. Which is sort of the point to the procedure - the pre-frontal lobe handles higher functions like anxiety. ♫ Don’t Worry … Be Happy … ♫

[gnoitall]

@MacLir

Which is sort of the point to the procedure - the pre-frontal lobe handles higher functions like anxiety. ♫ Don’t Worry … Be Happy … ♫

♫ I’d rather have a bottle in front of me, than have to have a frontal lobotomy… ♫

[dasmoocher]

@marshmallow

I can’t cite anything offhand, but usually when people get hit hard and almost die they often report they black out instantly. Or if they’re hit by an explosive force they remember being in one area and then suddenly being somewhere else.

@Telemark

A concussion or other severe trauma may prevent experiences from being stored in long term memory. So while they may have experienced the impact/pain/sensation it never made it from short term to long term storage. Their recollections of the event may not be an accurate representation of what they experienced.

I have a related experience. I was once riding my bicycle when a car turned in front of me. Instinctively locking up both brakes threw me over the handlebars and into the car’s windshield. I had just enough time to tuck myself into ball before impact.

What was strange was that I thought I rolled off the car and immediately pushed myself off the ground and back up standing. However, when I stood up I was surrounded by paramedics and an ambulance was parked nearby. So I must have been unconscious long enough for them to get there. The impact was severe enough that I crushed in the car’s windshield and bent the roof some; there was a hole completely through the windshield where my elbow had impacted.

It made me realize that if the impact had killed me, I never would have known it, since in retrospect my consciousness was flipped off like a light switch. I don’t remember any pain from the impact because I was knocked out so quickly.

Luckily, I did more damage to the car than it did to me. I walked out of the ER a couple hours later with only three stitches and some “road rash” with glass fragments embedded in it (those worked their way out over the next several weeks). Still have the scars on my elbow.

[JoshuaSD]

@Senegoid

I’m terrified at the prospect that, even after I die (and however horribly splattered I might be), there might be globs of my former self still experiencing unbearable agony!

Makes me think of line from a movie I saw in the 80’s
The Return of the Living Dead

Ernie Kaltenbrunner speaking to half a zombie strapped to a table.
(Dramatic superfluous dialog edited out)

Ernie: Why do you eat people?
Zombie: Not people, brains.
Ernie: Why?
Zombie: The pain.
**Ernie: **What about the pain?
Zombie: The pain of being dead.
Ernie: It hurts to be dead?
Zombie: I can feel myself rotting.

[Boyo_Jim]

@Velocity

Which brain glob would *you *be feeling, though? Let’s say your brain was shattered into four separate globs, several feet apart each, and that each of them was feeling pain. Which one would be you, though? Or can you somehow feel all four separate brain globs’ pain simultaneously? I don’t know how that would even work.

Would that be 4 times the pain? Except, what would add them together?

Also, no compassion for your non-brain cell globs? I imagine any still functioning would be pumping out intense pain signals, but they don’t get to the brain to be counted.

[Velocity]

@Boyo_Jim

Also, no compassion for your non-brain cell globs? I imagine any still functioning would be pumping out intense pain signals, but they don’t get to the brain to be counted.

If it’s not connected to your brain, there’s no pain. If one’s hand was severed, there’d be intense pain in the arm stump, but you couldn’t feel anything in the hand because it’s…not part of you anymore.
Also, isn’t it true that the brain itself doesn’t feel pain? So maybe separated brain globs can’t feel pain (although bits of membrane, skull, other stuff attached to the brain globs might).
I think it’s time for a variant of the “No Pain, No Gain” motto: “No Brain, No Pain!”

[Boyo_Jim]

Oh, I like that one!