Yes, I do accept that such abilities are real, but to ask if it can be learned? By anyone? Although lekatt states that everyone has some ability, I tend to think otherwise after reading posts on this board over the last few years.
A computer will be of no aid, IMHO. (Yes, it is Great Debates, however, a discussion that will very likely include witnessing on spiritual matters automatically end up in Debates. I don’t provide cites on my own personal experiences and understanding.)
I haven’t tried to enhance my ability because it’s not necessarily a blessing in all cases. Neither is it a plaything for my own amusement, but comes with a certain responsibility towards others. Right now, it isn’t a priority for me to focus upon so I don’t.
I just read the entire thread at once and I’m still not totally clear on what psychic abilities have to do with NDE’s. Although I’m certain my soul tried to leave my body while I was reading. So I just had a couple of questions for Lekatt. Isn’t there some biblical warnings about magicians, soothsayers or soccerers? Wouldn’t psychics fall into one of those categories? And does anybody take into account that in a NDE, they may spend a little time with no vitals, but the fact that they came back basically says they had obviously never truly crossed that line into clinical, irreversible death. And isn’t the brain (our thoughts and memories) the last to go. I’ve read some accounts, but have also had many dreams that weren’t any different. Temporary death seems like it would have the same or more potential for vivid dreams than REM sleep. Make no mistake about it, I believe in God and the soul. I have just learned that there is such a thing as a “Healthy dose of skepticism”. I also wonder about the depth of someone’s faith in God, when they are so eager and sometimes desperate to prove earthly things. What is the point?
MUSICAT- You have got to be lying. Everyone knows IPU’s can’t resist nuts and the cookies would never make it that far. Unless…maybe it…hmmm…isn’t nuts in your cookies. Love too.
Hey, it’s obvious that there are two camps here, skeptics and believers. I’m sort of in the middle, I am not totally convinced but “I want to believe.” -simply because I’ve experienced things that defy known physical laws. I believe there is an infinite amount unknown to man as compared to the quantifiable amount known to man.
I would propose that everybody put their money where their mouth is and actually participate in the ongoing, controlled, online Remote Viewing study (very similar to the PEAR precognitive remote viewing experiment) at The Boundary Institute (There is actually a battery of “Psi” tests there, but it is entirely up to you in which you participate.).
This will give the skeptics a chance to experiment, and actually receive quantifiable results. Sign up, it can’t hurt and you are actually participating in ongoing research (all info is confidential! they only need an email addie). Hey, it’s fun too! and you can all compare to see who has the most psychic ability, they have a daily statistics and “Hall of fame” page that lists the “high scores” for each test. I suggest that everyone involved in this thread do a series of the Remote Viewing tests and post their “score” here. See who’s got the most Mojo!! LOL!
It’s kind of hard to tell lekatt’s exact religious views but he has expressed ideas in the past which would indicate that he’s not doctrinally a Christian and that he doesn’t regard the Bible as necessarily authoritative. He bases his beliefs on personal experiences, most notable his own NDE, and his expressed beliefs tend to wander outside of any particular religious doctrine. I might call his beliefs sort of “new age” but I’m not sure how he feels about that term. I know he’s no fundie, though, so quoting the Bible at him isn’t going to shake him any.
NDEs (Near-Death Experiences) and OBEs (Out of Body Experiences) fall in the psychic realm primarily because of the wild and fantastical interpretations of either those who experience them or devotees of the genre.
No one doubts that some people have unusual experiences at traumatic moments or other times in their life. The problem arises from the interpretation of them. Two of the more common interpretations are:[ul][li]They represent the supernatural; that is, a glimpse of the afterlife or spirit world, or[*]They are a natural phenomena brought on by anoxia, trauma, extreme physical, emotional and mental stress, hallucination, or to put it simply, the brain is playing tricks on the subject.[/ul]Now, IWLN, from our encounters in other threads, you have become acquainted with Occam’s Razor, no? Which one of these would the Razor lead you to believe is the most likely cause?[/li]
A personal story. When I was a very young sprout, before ever having heard about OBEs or NDEs, I was subjected to a medical procedure, a tonsilectomy. Either the doctor thought I was too young to be told how the operation and anesthetic worked, or he just didn’t care. On the operating table, held down by several adults, I felt like I was falling into a tunnel; there was a bright light at the end; I fell more and got closer to the light; I was screaming, then I woke up. An extremely traumatic event for a small child. Did I “cross over” to the other side? Maybe, but I think it is more likely that I experienced the ether with a large dose of ignorance, innocence and fear. (And I never forgave that doctor for my ignorance.)
By some people’s analysis, I had an NDE. I don’t think so.
Yo – my IPU can beat up your IPU and be back from Jupiter by lunch.
Until you brought that up, I had forgotten about the experience I had during my tonsilectomy. It was almost identical. They told me I had a bad reaction to the anesthetic. I remember the tunnel and the bright light. You may have gotten the impression from that other thread that I am not a big Razor fan. That’s actually true for the “God event”, but not true in general. I am entirely sure that my tonsilectomy experience had something to do with the bright lights, my narrowing field of vision as I lost consciousness and a whopping hallucination type event. I did not experience any happy, warm fuzzies. I pretty much just felt scared. So either I’m going to hell or it was just a bad reaction.
That is so lame. My IPU goes to Pluto and is back by my coffee break. Your’s must be older than mine. I hope those are really brownies she’s bringing back. It’s hard to tell.
I thought I had seen lekatt quote the bible, but doesn’t matter. I was just curious how it all fit together. I’m not sure of my own “religious label”, since none of them fit my beliefs, so can understand how someone wouldn’t necessarily be one in particular. I’m not globally loving enough to be “new age” though. I know this would be difficult for anyone to believe after my “revelations” in that other thread, but I really am fairly skeptical, but at the same time non-judgmental about most things.
First of all, I shouldn’t have said “proof”; I should have said “a lot of evidence”. That said, Musicat, I know you don’t actually believe you have an IPU in your garage (unless my assessment of your character is way off) but for the moment let’s assume you really do. I don’t believe you have an IPU in your garage. Now, if neither of us can prove the other wrong (yes yes I know I said “proof” in my last post :smack: ) then we don’t have to agree. Such is the nature of diversity.
It has yet to be revealed to me why in the world a forum that hosts religious debates and witnessing should require cites. :smack: :rolleyes:
IWLN and others; let me try to clear up something here. An NDE is a form of OBE associated with potentially fatal distress and/or (temporary) clinical death. Astral projection is another form of OBE which often happens while the subject is healthy. Having had astral projections myself, I can assure you they are quite different from dreams. I suspect that true remote viewing is actually a form of astral projection. Abilities that do not usually involve any kind of OBE would be classified as telepathic or clairvoyant. It is highly unlikely that the participants on these web sites are actually inducing OBEs in order to make their predictions.
So anyway FWIW that’s what one has to do with the other.
I was responding to cityboy, who said there were good reasons to take both sides of the science v psychic argument.
Eclipses are routinely predicted by science (my diary gives them).
Psychics have no record of successful predictions, so I don’t think they deserve equal weight of belief.
Well I agree with you.
However people still claim that dowsing exists, that they can do it at will (and they offer to teach you how to do it for money), despite every dowsing test having failed.
Debunking may not be that easy.
Well spoonbending is done by misdirection and brute force - ask a magician!
So do you believe in all of Diogenes’ list? (speak with dead, read minds, “remote view” events in other location, predict the future)
I was brought up with Santa Claus, but I don’t believe in him now.
As for spaceflight, I don’t recall any Ancient Greek scientists claiming it was possible. Scientists worked in steps - tackling gravity by throwing a stone, firing a catapult, chemical explosions etc. The reason we had to wait till the 1960’s to reach the Moon was the technology. If Leonardo Da Vinci had access to more technology, various inventions would have happened centuries earlier.
By contrast, presumably Ancient Greek psychics could have sent their mind to the Moon. Why didn’t they? What progress has the paranormal made in the last 2500 years?
Indeed. If you can project across a room, then it might well be possible to travel even further.
However that brings us to your claim. Can you prove it? has anyone else witnessed you doing it?
More interestingly, you can earn $1,000,000 for doing that under test conditions. As I posted earlier:
" The Foundation is committed to providing reliable information about paranormal claims. It both supports and conducts original research into such claims.
At JREF, we offer a one-million-dollar prize to anyone who can show, under proper observing conditions, evidence of any paranormal, supernatural, or occult power or event. The prize is in the form of negotiable bonds held in a special investment account. The JREF does not involve itself in the testing procedure, other than helping to design the protocol and approving the conditions under which a test will take place. All tests are designed with the participation and approval of the applicant. In most cases, the applicant will be asked to perform a relatively simple preliminary test of the claim, which if successful, will be followed by the formal test."
The Randi Foundation has the money in the bank. Sending your mind across a room certainly qualifies for the award.
Are you interested?
Well why don’t NASA use these people? It takes years and billions of dollars to send a space probe. According to Dr. Monroe, it can be done quickly, safely and cheaply.
Why do you need proof for IPU’s, but not for Dr. Monroe’s claims?
Eclipses are independent proof that science works. You can consult a diary and witness astronomy in action. There is no equivalent for the paranormal.
I hope you won’t take it personally if I say I don’t believe you or Dr. Monroe can astrally project. I do think his Institute is a quack.
It would be easy to change my mnid however.
Please could either of you demonstrate your abilities under test conditions.
I have a much better idea.
Why don’t you tell the Boundary Institute about the million dollars they can collect from the Randi Foundation?
(See previous posts for the Internet address.)
Do you think they want the money?
Do you think they will apply?
Do you think they will succeed?
I don’t believe Musicat has an IPU in his garage either.
I do think he is using that statement as a way of challenging what you will accept with / without proof. (I’m doing much the same myself.)
If someone makes a fantastic claim, then they should provide evidence.
Musicat will not convince me of his IPU without it.
You will not convince me of astral projection without it.
And of course there is no evidence of any God, so I’m an atheist.
Saying which forum witnessing should go in is not the same as saying God exists.
If God does exist, that would be important. So we debate it.
I think van Lomel et al are sincere – if they had found physical causes they would have said so. Did I say otherwise?
To conflate “did not show” with “could not find” is sloppy; to take “we did not show that psychological, neurophysiological, or physiological factors caused these experiences” to imply the existence of the soul is to jump into a sea of sloppiness feet first.
The paper itself reports that “neurophysiological processes must play some part in NDE,” so, “we did not show…” must be qualified by that – “we did not show… …were the only factors causing these experiences” might be a more accurate way of putting things.
Lekatt has no exact religious views, and certainly no “new age” ones either. Years ago the new age movement was great, and I thought it would eventually gain the most members. But it fragmented into many paths as Christianity has done becoming more commercial than spiritual. Today, one can not tell what is “new age” any more than one can tell what is Christianity.
I follow spiritual teachings learned in my near death experience, most NDEers do the same thing. Universal unconditional love is the central theme, the law, so to speak. The more you learn to love the more knowledge you gain about the world.
I will use quotes from any source that follow the path of Love.
Love
Love is its own reward and not loving is its own punishment.
Second, you linked to a paper that highlights some of the more interesting things about the research of several people rather than a peer reviewed analysis of the experiment, its methods and controls. If you’d like to discuss the PEAR experiements, please provide a detailed explanation of what the experiment. Then also provide some links to the various peer reviewed journals where it has been discussed and analyzed.
Which ones are they? How bouyt you discuss them here, one at a time?
I did not say “the research (shows) NDEs to be caused by physical circumstances”, the question is whether the research shows “the spiritual world’s existence,” which was the claim that you intended to support by your cite.
Your repeated misrepresentations, your bloody-minded misreadings, and your playground retorts are unbecoming of this forum.
Actually, what they said is:
“We did not show that psychological, neurophysiological, or physiological factors caused these experiences after cardiac arrest.”
It does NOT say that no physical cause could be found after cardiac arrest.
It can also be noted that they failed to find any spiritual cause WHATSOEVER for these experiences.
All of the “alternate theories” that involved P. van Lommel showing that psychological, neurophysiological, or physiological factors caused these experiences after cardiac arrest in this study are put to rest any way. Doesn’t have much relevance on most “alternate theories” of skeptics, esp those that relate to aspects of apparent paranormal psychic phenomena that are outside the scope of Lommel’s study, (ie nearly the entire body of apparent paranormal psychic phenomena).
Me too. I also expect that they’ll continue to not find any spiritual cause whatsoever for these experiences.
No, actually, it doesn’t mean that.
It doesn’t even imply that consciousness continues after the death of the body anymore than it means that it doesn’t.
It only means that “We, [Lommel et al] did not show that psychological, neurophysiological, or physiological factors caused these experiences after cardiac arrest.”
The rest is your personal, unfounded, unsupported, speculation.
It certainly doesn’t explain anything AT ALL about any other apparent paranormal psychic phenomena.
Too bad it isn’t solidly in support of what you seem to think it’s in support of.
So I just had a couple of questions for Lekatt. Isn’t there some biblical warnings about magicians, soothsayers or soccerers? Wouldn’t psychics fall into one of those categories? And does anybody take into account that in a NDE, they may spend a little time with no vitals, but the fact that they came back basically says they had obviously never truly crossed that line into clinical, irreversible death. And isn’t the brain (our thoughts and memories) the last to go. I’ve read some accounts, but have also had many dreams that weren’t any different. Temporary death seems like it would have the same or more potential for vivid dreams than REM sleep. Make no mistake about it, I believe in God and the soul. I have just learned that there is such a thing as a “Healthy dose of skepticism”. I also wonder about the depth of someone’s faith in God, when they are so eager and sometimes desperate to prove earthly things. What is the point?
That’s actually true for the “God event”, but not true in general. I am entirely sure that my tonsilectomy experience had something to do with the bright lights, my narrowing field of vision as I lost consciousness and a whopping hallucination type event. I did not experience any happy, warm fuzzies. I pretty much just felt scared. So either I’m going to hell or it was just a bad reaction.
