Well there must be somthing higher then brain that can experiance it's neural patterns.
I think the article fails to acknowledge that a 'soul' as it is traditionally seen is not affected by the physical structures of the brain. Seeing as it is entirely supernatural and of no substance in terms of atoms and other particles, retaining memory or personality after the brain has died is not a problem. Although I appreciate that from a scientific point of view this is impossible, so is the idea of an object with no material substance. The subject of souls and an afterlife is completely beyond science, and must be addressed accordingly.
As for your parting questions, John Hick suggested that the purpose of life itself is to improve and prepare our soul for the afterlife, through suffering and consequential growth. Evolution should have nothing to do with the afterlife - when you say 'why bother with evolution', you appear to forget that evolution has no purpose as such, and is random. There is no 'bothering with it'. It just happens.
In response to angus: Something made of no material substances is by definition indistiguishable from nothing, so how can anyone reasonably claim that such a thing exists in the first place? Are there supposed to be different kinds of nothing? What means if any can be used used to obtain knowledge of a thing made of nothing? How would someone discover whether a thing with no material substances even exists, especially a thing that is supposedly beyond science?
The fact that individuals can remember near death experiences proves that the experience was a function of their brains, that it was "all in their heads", so to speak. Memories require a brain. I suppose those who argue in favor of an afterlife would say that the experience was integrated into the brain, and memories of the event were somehow formed once the near deceased was resuscitated; but for me, that seems a bit of a stretch, based on nothing more than conjecture.
Researchers in Germany were able to induce out of body experiences by stimulating certain areas of the brain.