lekatt, please do not link to your website anymore if the link provides nothing more than a rehash of what you are saying here. Your musings have no more authority just become they come from your own website.
I provided links to serious scientific studies. The link to Dr. Moody was an “interview” provided a True Believer that allowed him to freely promote his opinion. the priliminary study(if you can even call it that) showed nothing conclusive(funny how non-conclusive evidence from the other side isn’t as easily dismissed, isn’t it?) and a real study has yet to be done, and the RN represents nothing more than someone who already believes gathering stories that support her viewpoint, and cannot be described a “study” in any sence of the word.
I can’t prove conclusively that there isn’t an invisible and undetectable spaceship manned by space marmosets hovering above Congress that influences how it votes, but how much time are you going to waste worrying about space marmosets now that I’ve brought up the possibility? Persuasive evidence may not be “conclusive” but in the real world it is a quite a few steps above unvarified and totally illogical “opinion”, and I’ll thank you to stop treating them as equal terms. No, I can’t prove that NDEs do not exist, but a preponderance of the available evidence shows that it is highly improbable that they do. Looking at all the real evidence, would you place the odds in favor of NDEs being some sort of mystical window into the spiritual world or against?
So I understand Mr. Moderator that you are not going to allow me to show the results of 18 years of research held on my web site because you have determined it all to be worthless since it doesn’t agree with your opinions. You have effectively censored my studies, and taken away my rights of free speech. You have also censored the studies of many legitimate research scientists. But I will say it is an effective way to eliminate any opposing views from this board. Do I get my money back?
Anyone wanting to continue this discussion may do so on my web site message board.
Bye
Your link was nothing of the sort-it was merely a rehash of what you have said here. It mentioned nothing about research(18 years old or otherwise), provided no studies, and named no scientists.
I think OR is improperly applied concerning spirituality. Perhaps I don’t understand it properly since I’ve only been aware of it a few months.
How does new information affect OR? Wouldn’t the simplest explainantion make drastic changes as new discoveries presented themselves. A few hundred years ago the simplest explanation would have been “God did it” or “It was magic” because of a lack of scientific data. As more information becomes available those scientific “facts” have to be factored in.
If that is true then in the area of spirituality there is far to few facts available for OR to be useful. Regardless, OR doesn’t prove anything. It is merely a principle and useful tool. Dragging it out in discussions about spiritual issues might be fun for some but it’s pretty meaningless. It doesn’t establish any facts one way or the other.
You and I won’t agree on what constitutes “real” evidence or what a totally illogical opinion is. The scientific studies you linked to offer some interesting information but not IMO enough to form an informed balanced opinion if you completely diregard everything else. Unless of course, as in your case, you are predisposed towrd that opinion anyway. While admitting it doesn’t meet scientific standards, I consider the studies of serious minded intelligent people who have reasearched a phenomonon for decades to have some value, while you summarily dismiss them. I find that completely illogical,but no matter. We won’t waste each others time any longer.
“Always choose the simplest explanation” is itself rather a misreading of the principle of parsimony: Ockham’s exact words (in Latin) were that a plurailty of explanatory entities ought not be proposed without necessity. For example, the weather can only be explained by a vast number of entities involved in an impossibly complex process - anything but simple! And yet, we recognise that no supernatural element need be proposed in explaining the weather. That is the essence of Ockham’s Razor, which is IMO entirely apporpriate to the yet more complex processes by which sensory input is filtered, stored and reactivated in neural memory to form the basis of “conscious experience”, even during vivid dreams in which the significance judgement modules in the temporal lobes go haywire (as in many epileptics who have NDE’s regularly).
I agree that it does not establish facts, but it anything but meaningless. It establishes which exact facts require which kind of explanatory entities. In discussions of NDE’s, the question is “Is there any datum which cannot be the result of dreams, misremembered events or neuropsychological brain function?” At the moment, all we have are a few anecdotes which might be explained by such mundane entities as a woman seeing a neurosurgical procedure on TV and years later “recalling” similar pieces of equipment being used in her neurosurgery. Again, proper application of OR is vital to scientific study: if all we have is anecdotes, we cannot really be sure that there is a datum to explain in the first place.
If I may briefly and pedantically clear up some syntax here: NDE’s most certainly exist just as any other uplifting or significant experience exists (and just as UFO’s exist - some flying objects are unidentified!) The question here is whether NDE’s are a literal look at the afterlife or vivid dreams of a neuropsychological nature (just as the question for UFO’s is whether they are alien spacecraft or mundane airborne or optical phenomena: Ockham’s Razor cuts just as finely in both cases).
I stand corrected. Of course NDEs exist, the same way UFOs exist.
Thanks for the insight. I consider myself a pretty logical person even though I haven’t studied the rules of logic. I appreciate any education I get. I still ask, wouldn’t that discovery of new information change which explanations were probable?
I agree that OR is appropriate for the study of how our consciousness works in physiological terms.
I see your point. What I refered to as meaningless was OR being trotted out as if it was proof that God doesn’t exist or that there’s no such thing as our spirit or soul.
How useful is OR in areas where there is very little datum to go by. To use the the weather example you used, how was OR applied when very little was known about what caused the weather. How was OR applied to the field of medicine before we knew about germs, and viruses. Does OR require a certain amount of datum to be useful. IMO the search for truth must include science not exclude it.
I understand the problem with anecdotal evidence bur isn’t it reasonable to consider the information gathered over decades during hundreds of case studies rather than dismiss it entirely?
Precisely put and appreciated.
The difference is, the people of the past had no good answer to how the weather and disease worked; they had guesses with no evidence.
We have a perfectly good evidence for NDE’s : Hallucinations and lying. And yes, I’m sure some of the people who claim to have visions are lying. Many of them are very fervent ( often religiously ) on the subject, and such people often lie - especially when the lie can’t be refuted.
There is simply no reason to seriously consider mystical/spiritual explanations ( explanations we have no proof are even possible, much less true ) when perfectly plausible reasons for claims of NDEs already exist.
The fact that so many ancedotal reports exit is an arguement against the mystic/spiritual explanation. With so many reports and so many people who desperately want it to be true, I find it hard to imagine that no hard evidence has turned up by now - unless such evidence doesn’t exist, and it’s all delusions and lies.
An expected illogical and prejudice response. Thanks for contributing nothing.
I’d be more impressed if you actually said why I’m wrong. :rolleyes:
No you wouldn’t. You are the atheists version of the Christian fundamentalists. Your arguements are illogical and unreasonable and you simply refuse to see it.
If by “hallucinations” you mean what you refered to in an earlier post as a “brain hiccup” or what SM refered to as “vivid dreams of a neuropsychological nature” then that portion of your response is reasonable.
Lying? Sure, some are lying consciouosly or unconsciously because humans are like that. Even scientists, being human, will lie for the sake of ego or money. Even scientists will unconsciously influence results or misinterpret results. So what? How does that statement contribute anything?
This only means “no reason for you” and you can’t seem to understand how anybody might see things differently. It reminds me of someone saying “All you have to do is look at nature and you’ll know that God exists”
All you have to do is look at the information provided and you’ see very clearly that some serious intelligent people do have a reason. That’s why we’re having this discussion. Once again this contributes nothing except your own prejudice. " Perfectly plausible explainations" that are very incomplete. Scientific information on brain function is still in it’s infancy and many unanswered questions remain. The fact that a God Helmet or a chemical can simulate something like a spiritual experience is interesting but doesn’t prove anything.
What can I say about this jewel? The portion I bolded I completely agree with.
As I say, all but the tiniest fragments of even the anecdotal evidence do not require any further explanatory entities than those required for other vivid dreams. The only fragments which demand these radically different supernatural-type explanations are these fleeting wisps regarding a very specific sequence of events, such as when exactly the patient learned the shape of the instruments used in that kind of surgery, or when exactly the nurse put the old man’s teeth in the drawer. If such new memories really did form in those precise periods of brain inactivity, yes, we would be looking at a revolution. But those anecdotes could so easily be mistaken or misremembered: “oh yes, I remember, the old man heard me say I was moving his teeth when he was merely sleeping” or “oh, of course, I actually saw that procedure carried out on that hospital TV show”. Ockham’s Razor asks us to consider which is more probable. Personally, I believe that if this supernatural afterlife is so easily accessible via simple oxygen deprivation in the temporo-parietal junction it should have effects which are unmistakably beyond those of mere dreams, and NDE’rs should regularly come back with all kinds of impossible information, which none of the controlled studies to date have returned. Why should such a remarkable phenomenon, if it exists, be so indistinguishable from statistical noise?
If in 1999, a blond bombshell gave me a blowjob, and if in 2019 technology advanced to the degree that my brain could be stimulated electrically to make me think that I was getting a blowjob from a blond bomshell, how does the latter experience invalidate the reality of the former?
And yes, like the Scotsman, the latter experience is not a “true” experience, while the former is, even though they both feel the same.
The difference, of course, is that there is hard(pun intended) evidence of blowjobs existing.
I see. I’m unsure as to why the “saw it on TV” answer is more probable. Seems to me that is more probable to those who don’t believe, while another answer is more probable to those that do. Am I wrong? What about other unexplainable knowledge such as the young boys discription of relatives who died before he was born. I realize there are other explanations, but isn’t this type of knowledge a factor, especially in young children? It’s possible for a child to overhear the name and the discription of a relative is passing conversation, but why would that information come to the fore during a vivid dream?
The fact that many people find this to be a life changing experience seems significant to me if only in the sense that finding out why people become more benevolant might be benifical to society.
In my own case regardless of what chemicals may have caused my OBE and what label you put on it, I recieved an incredible insight that took me from great emotional stress to incredible peace of mind and contentment. Thats why I continue to question and explore. If that kind of potential is within us then it is certainly worth exploring. Science can help but that doesn’t mean we can’t explore on our own outside the boundaries that science establishes.
That’s a big if. So far we don’t know if it is accessible that easily. I understand your thinking. I often see the “it should be apparent to all” arguement and I don’t find it an unreasonable question. For me the reason it isn’t is the unique personal nature of the spiritual journey. It is tied to our choices both conscious and unconscious and a willingness to surrender to new information that requires an act of faith. That can only happen when the individual is ready.
I have a vague recollection of a blowjob, but it’s foggy. Perhaps it was only a vivid dream. {Sigh} 