There is only one possible explanation – which they did explain, every one of them. They left their bodies and floated above them observing what went on below, some of them went into other rooms close, and some have gone to look in on people far away from their bodies. It is very clear. They were in spiritual form in the spirit world. This is good, very good evidence we are spiritual in nature. Read some near death experiences and you will see what happened.
:smack: Oh, FF’sS. What they “explain” (a recounting of events) is not an explanation (an exposition describing the mechanisms through which a process or phenomenon occurs). “Spirit”, as you call it, is obviously not the only explanation.
I have an idea – let’s play “Egregiously Blunt Occam’s Razor”:
[ul]
[li]Maybe everyone who experiences an NDE has a unique and normally undetectable brain structure, only activated upon “body death”, that works through spooky (very spooky!) action at a distance. When activated, their neuronal activity is directly affected by other (nearby) peoples’ thoughts – similar to what an EEG picks up – that “imprints” the bystanders’ sensations into their memory. Temporary psychics/thought readers, if you will. Naturally, this structure is deactivated once the body comes “back to life” and recedes into undetectability once again.[/li][li]All these people are unwilling participants in a top-secret government experiment; the doctors/nurses/caregivers are actually CIA operatives who have added some chemical to the affected people’s food or water (and, actually, have been doing so for years!). Under severe trauma (i.e., an NDE), the chemical causes these people to enter a hypnotic state, during which the agents (er, I mean, “caregivers”, wink, wink) “implant” appropriate memories. There is a lurking suspicion that this explains the results of the 2004 presidential election. It’s a conspiracy, I tells ya![/li][li]Aliens. Our technology is to primitive to even scratch the surface of how this is done. They’re all aliens. ALIENS!!! AAUUGGH![/li][/ul]
Ah, but those are just silly, right? And honestly, I’m just kidding. Right?
But perhaps some people might feel that any one of these “explanations” are accurate…which is exactly the point.
I, for one, welcome our NDE-experiencing alien overlords! 
I didn’t want to use insects as an example, since they are clearly just reacting. But put a hamster near heat, and it will indeed have the experience of hotness, but not the concept of hotness, as far as we can tell. I doubt any hamster ever abstracted anything. Is it aware, in the sense of reacting to stimuli? Sure. Conscious? I’ve had hamsters, and I doubt it.
Not in the human sense of knowing. But awareness of heat is built in.
I’m sure all will agree that consciousness is not the brain. Whether it is physical depends on your definition of physical. If you mean something you can hold in your hand and weigh, then no. If you mean the interaction of physical things, then I’d say it is clearly physical, since remove the physical basis and you have no mind left.
A short but provocative hijack:
When a honey bee dances to describe the direction and distance to a food source, is it abstracting? I admit it’d be a pretty big leap to conclude that honey bees are conscious. Consciousness seems a hard thing to define.
I enjoyed your post, and I did feel like an alien for a three years until I learned to cope with this place again. Thanks.
According to the research it is the other way around, when the physical (body) is removed the mind is still present and working.
We can identiofy, catagorize and measure “THINGS”… I e, we can weigh a cat, we can photograph a cat, we can analize the DNA of a Cat… we can do all sorts of things to a cat.
In that sense, a Cat is a thing.
Consciousness is NOt a “thing” - it is a process. Process is a lot harder to catagorize. We “know” a lot about processes (photosynthesis, the Krebbs Cycle, How to make an automobile, etc) Consciousness is a complex process with a huge amount of feedback loops. Out of these feedback loops, a new “complexity” arrises (see Doug Hoffstaeder’s I am a strange loop" ( I Am a Strange Loop - Wikipedia ) Wiki link.
The emergence of complexity from recursive feed back loops has been observed and seen in all sorts of things. It is the Basis of Chaos Theory and Fractal Geometry.
just some thoughts, from this particular strange loop…
Regards’FML
Untrue; that’s never happened.
Some would say a process is a thing. If the process is a physical process then it can be seen. Consciousness is not physical. We know that because consciousness still exists after the death of the physical body. We have scientific evidence that consciousness is not physical. But just in case the research is wrong please show us your process of consciousness.
Name one physical process that can be seen.
If it reacted to never before seen stimuli, maybe. I’ve read somewhere how they do this, and it isn’t as impressive as at first glance. However, every bee will do the same dance for the same food source, so it is genetically defined. So are reactions to heat - even for us.
So you can see subatomic decay ? Osmosis ? Suuure you can.
Three evidence free, and ridiculously implausible assertions.
Ever seen a brain scan, showing what areas are using energy or oxygen or whatnot ? There it is. No, we can’t read it yet, but that’s not the same as not seeing it.
What evidence could there possibly be that would qualify as valid to you?
I’m obviously not explaining my point very well. I’ll try to demonstrate with an example, instead:
Person A: If I lift this brick up and then let go of it, it falls to the ground (evidence).
Person B: Why does it fall to the ground?
Person A: Because there are invisible pixies that pushed it to the ground. (hypothesis).
Person B: Why do you think invisible pixies pushed it to the ground?
Person A: Well, it fell to the ground didn’t it? What other explanation could there be?
You can see how this could be frustrating to debate, right?
LilShieste
I understand your example, but let me say that since I have visited the spirit world and talked to people there, not once, but many times. There is no doubt of any kind in my mind that I am spirit. I have been out of my body, I have felt the awesome power of unconditional love. I really didn’t need the research, but I know others do need something like the evidence shown in the studies that consciousness continues to live after the death of the body. I have met in person, and throught my web site hundreds of others who also have experienced the spirit world as I did. So I am ready to move on now. We could go on forever with these “what if” and “what about” questions and answers. I think if you would take the time to actually read a bunch of near death experiencers nearly all of these questions would be answerer by them. There is a lot of material and I can’t possibly teach you about it through my posts on this board. I would hope that some would be interested enough to do their own research and form their own opinions. Some will never consider the possibility that they are spirit. The only convincing thing would be their own experience.
So I believe I have come to the logical end of this thread. There is a huge benefit in following the spirit path of love. It can cure all the problems you have in time. But you will never know this unless you do it.
I really enjoyed this thread and believe a lot was accomplished here. I post this in humility knowing I have nothing more to add on this subject.