Perhaps you understand that death is a part of life, and this is your time, so you accept it.
I admit thats a stretch, but I still think thats a great quote to live by.
Whats your point?
We are not supposed to remember them, when it happens it is an anomaly.
The difference is how they approach the answer to a question. If woo whackos devised repeatable experiments and openly published the results, they’d be scientists.
I’m very confident because damaging the brain damages consciousness. If the soul were outside the brain, say a field of energy, you would be unlikely to have behavioral changes if I damaged a part of your brain.
The more brain that is damaged, the more of “you” that is lost. There is literally no reason whatsoever to assume that the capability is floating out there, ready to click back in to your consciousness once the brain is entirely dead. That’s just silly.
The brain distributes functions, and can to some extent redistribute them when damaged. That itself is evidence for lack of an immortal soul. Because your brain wouldn’t be moving (for instance) speech control to another area after a stroke, unless the brain is what had to produce speech.
See above.
It can sometimes move to some extent. It’s not a given, and as I said above, it is evidence that the brain is struggling to keep aspects of consciousness and life functioning. Something it wouldn’t do if a soul provided those functions.
More evidence for the brain producing consciousness.
I’ve only ever heard of that in a Stephen King novel, so I’m no expert. But I assume you’d find that function is remapped to the places that are left. It’s not happening in some floating soul that’s hovering inside the body.
It actually suggests the opposite of that. Why the need of remapping if the soul is doing something?
If she had feared radiation just a bit more, she might have been more cautious.
Good point.
Sure, I was being ironic, but the sarcasm was inadvertent. Sorry about that.
My comment regarding scientists studying consciousness was aimed at pointing out that they are studying individual aspects of the phenomena that are in aggregate the same as the beliefs of the woo whackos. However, since they wear white coats while doing so, they are afforded a respectability denied the whackos.
My comment regarding “the jigsaw” was in reference to the complexity of the issue. Once sufficient pieces have fallen into place, the overall picture will inevitably either prove or disprove “woo”. The point being, this is respectable science being conducted which is aimed at producing useful knowledge, regardless of what it is called.
Regarding the plasticity of the brain: the issue is not that it has occurred in only a small number of instances. The significant thing is that it has happened at all. As Albert Einstein more or less said: “All it takes is one negative result to prove my theory wrong”. I have no idea if this has any relevance to the past/future lives issue.
However, of more interest is the phenomena of apparently normal people having minimal brain mass. It leads me to wonder what is the minimum mass of brain matter that is required to maintain a “normal” person.
In fact, extrapolating to the extreme, is the brain required at all? This clearly relates to both the independence of consciousness, and the life after death issue.
Further to woo: I have come across numerous references to evidently respectable scientists who are studying the near death experience.
For example, to quote from Wikipedia: (Charles) Bruce Greyson (born October 1946) is Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Virginia. He is co-author of Irreducible Mind (2007) and co-editor of The Handbook of Near-Death Experiences (2009). Greyson has written many journal articles, and has given media interviews, on the subject of near death experiences.
I have found reference to the UVA Hospital having a long standing study of the near death experience being conducted by the cardiology department. But, so far haven 't found any more on that.
And here: World's Largest-ever Study Of Near-Death Experiences | ScienceDaily
And here: http://www.near-death.com/evidence.html
So, are these people whackos of woo, or are they respectable scientists conducting legitimate research?
No, they aren’t. They’re studying the brain and consciousness; the people you’re talking about are studying souls and reincarnation. This is a false equivalence.
They’re afforded respectability because they’re actually doing science. People like Stevenson are not.
The existing picture does that.
But it has no bearing on souls or anything related to them. If some part of us existed outside the brain, neuroplasticity would seem to be unnecessary, or if it were connected to the brain you might expect it to happen all the time.
Here’s one example of such a person. You might not be surprised to learn he had a below average IQ.
It clearly is. There’s no sensible reason to look at neuroplasticity and Dandy Walker and then assume the brain isn’t necessary at all.
It would depend on what they’re actually doing. Are they conducting well controlled research into a reported phenomenon, or are they (like Stevenson) cataloging reports, making little effort to debunk them, and trying hard to convince themselves and others that the reports are true?
There are a number of parallel, but convergent, issues that relate to the life after death/reincarnation issue:
-
In the 1930’s when scientists started to get into the nitty gritty of the finer points of the mechanics of living organisms, they determined that they could not specify how the interactions of basic chemical reactions give rise to life. Furthermore, they could not either identify or characterize “life”.
Accordingly some of them have theorized that there must be some kind of unidentified force that gives inanimate molecules life.
To date, nobody has explained how life arises, what it is, or where it is located. And the theory of a “life force” persists amongst life scientists. -
Scientists studying the brain know to a very high level of detail the chemical and physical mechanics of brain activity. But nobody has yet explained how that activity gives rise to either thought or consciousness.
-
While many physical functions of the brain have been located to specific areas, nobody has yet located consciousness. For all we know, it could be located in the left thumb.
-
Nobody has yet explained how or why general anesthesia works. What happens to consciousness when an anesthetic is administered? Where does consciousness go?
-
Nobody has yet explained the difference between unconscious due to anesthesia and that caused by traumatic injury. Are they the same? Where does consciousness go?
-
When people are unconscious due to anesthesia, very few if any, have out of body experiences.
However, there are numerous accounts of people who have “died” on the operating table, and have out of body experiences. Why do these experiences only seem to occur to “dead” people? -
The plasticity of the brain, the fact that people have been observed to function normally with minimal brain mass, the lack of location for consciousness and the apparent ability of consciousness to detach from the body suggest that the there are two separate processes occurring: the physical/chemical functions of the brain, and consciousness.
This suggests that the questions are: what function does the brain serve, what makes the brain “alive”, where is consciousness?
The logical extension of this is, that if consciousness is non specific and mobile, then it may survive the death of the organism, and may be transferable.
It does? What scientists? I only hear “life force” from woo laypeople.
While we know that different functions of the heart have been located to specific areas in the heart, nobody has yet located “blood pumpingness.” For all we know, the blood pumpingness could be located in the left thumb.
I always wonder - when I put my computer in standby mode, where does its processing go?
OK, snark mode off, this brings up a question that I’ve been wanting to ask of someone. Jeffrey M. Schwartz is a psychiatrist who is associated with the notorious Discovery Institute. I’ve heard him interviewed a few times, and his major point is that the fact of neuroplasticity disproves that consciousness is a result of physical brain processes. I’ve heard him try to make this point multiple times, but he never explains how he gets from here to there. How on earth could the fact of neuroplasticity even remotely point to an immaterial consciousness? He just asserts it without explanation. Now, Polar Iceman, it sounds like you’re making the same connection, but I just don’t get it. Or can anyone else explain Schwartz’s thought process? To me, it sounds like saying that since the kidney can recover from kidney stones, that proves that blood filtering is an immaterial process that happens independently of the kidney. WTF?!?
Many seem to equate past lives with reincarnation (Reincarnation – per wiki - is the religious or philosophical concept that the soul or spirit, after biological death, begins a new life in a new body…etc.)
But the wiki definition of “reincarnation” discusses philosophical and religious concepts. But those are not the only views on “past lives”. There are views which are neither religious nor philosophical in nature. They do not require belief in a “soul” or “spirit”, nor do they have to do with an ongoing function of an intact brain.
They have to do with the transformation of energy.
Would you mind explaining that a little, JustSue? What is that supposed to mean and how does it relate to the topic? That seems to be a theme in this thread: people who believe in this stuff seem to think the concepts are very obvious, and they aren’t.
From what type of energy to what type of energy?
I find this very fascinating and quite impelling, and many of my friends ascribe to a transformation of energy concept of some sort or another. I am not a scientist, so I will probably not do it justice, but will give it my best shot.
As I am sure you already know, energy transformation is the process of changing energy from one form to another. We have developed the means by which to recognize natural transformational processes, or can assist or perform other transformation processes. Chemical energy from coal or oil into heat (thermal) energy, or thermal energy (the sun) into chemical energy (photosynthesis); electric into radiant (light through a light switch); solar panels transform light into electricity; sound energy; nuclear energy, etc.
Scientists know an incredible amount about energy and how it works, and have established “fundamental laws” of energy transformation (documented, observed results) both useful and destructive, but there is so much more that we do not know, or understand, about energy and it’s incredible potential. That is the foundation for some variations of past life concepts, but there is so much more to it than just that.
Even among my friends there are differences of opinion of course. And all seem to have easily incorporated energy theories into their own personal religious, non-religious or philosophic concepts.
It isn’t as far out as it sounds really. As I said, I probably don’t do it justice here. I wish I were better at articulating it because it really is fascinating.
Some of that was discussed upthread. We know energy can’t be created or destroyed. That doesn’t have anything to do with reincarnation. When we die, the energy in our bodies does go away, but that’s because our bodies go away. The energy doesn’t turn into something else or someone else.
I’m not talking about reincarnation. I am just talking about past lives. Any past life.
What’s the difference?
Thermodynamics is the branch of science dealing with the laws and theories related to energy in the universe. The are two main laws of thermodynamics, the first and second law.
Energy in our bodies does no just go away. It is transformed. The First Law of Thermodynamics says that energy under normal conditions cannot be created or destroyed, simply transformed from one type of energy to another.
There may not be a difference depending on your meaning…but when people talk of reincarnation, they are normally referring to a direct transformation from one life (incorporated in one body) to another - hence the need for a soul, or spirit, or some other vessel to carry forward in tact.
I am referring to the transformation of energies - not an intact capsule full of an entire life, or complete set of life memories.
Again I ask: What type of energy is being transformed in this case, and what is it being transformed into?