The Holy Spirit has allowed me to see demons on occasion in visions and in real time interposed in our time/space and I have had many spiritual experiences both on the side of God and before that Satan. I have also had many spiritual dreams, but those seem to be discredited here, to the detriment of many people. The experiences have the physical presents of another entity, sometimes radiating such strong emotions it is beyond human capability. This board likes proof, and these entities have proven themselves real to me, by among other things predicting the future, but no lotto numbers :D.
This video is a small documentary of Pam Reynolds surgery. The surgeon is present who done the surgery and Pam. They are talking about the near death experience Pam had during the surgery. The surgeon is verifing Pam’s experience. Pam had the blood removed from her head in order to fix an aneurysm in her brain. She was without blood in her head for the hour it took to fix the problem. It is strong evidence of consciousness living after the death of the brain and body. Try to see it if you can.
Not exactly how it happened, lekatt. This wiki site contains a more accurate time-line of the procedure, and a more reasonable explanation of what might have happened, sans mysticism.
Just anyone can write in the Wikipedia, I think I will trust the chief surgeon who performed the operation and was there every minute of time, rather than someone who thinks he knows more than the people who had first-hand experienced of the event. Some day skeptics will overcome their denial.
So what if anyone can write in Wikipedia? What’s there that seems like lies?
See the little 1 at the end? Numbers are for references given at the bottom of the article. All of the section titled “Critical” has references to back up the claims.
Dr. Spetzler:
Skeptics are skeptical of outrageous claims, not in denial.
Are you sure you’re not Rebecca Brown?
I’m sorry, I can’t see it. How do you know she saw these things? Um, mayber because she TOLD people? But how could she when she died? Maybe this wasn’t the “death of the brain and body” but something rather close to it?
Her consciousness did not linger after death, as she did not die. I know the ‘D’ in NDE stands for ‘death’ but what does the ‘N’ mean? Clinically she might have been dead, but “clinically dead” is just a reasonable guess.
Try to see it if you can.
Now, I’m going to work of the wiki description of events - if you feel wiki has misreported the timeline or what she described, please correct me.
She is under general anesthesia at this point. Apart from the fact there is a hole in her skull, she is fine and dandy. Not an NDE, yet.
Happens to people under anesthesia all the time, whether they are being cut up or not. Anesthesia isn’t perfect.
But now we get to the blood draining bit:
Being pulled: lack of sensory input/balance. Ever felt dizzy? Feels like you’re being pulled. Ever felt dizzy while lying down, doped up and your brain is oxygen starved?
Tunnel vortex: Classic symptom. Pilots get it under g-forces during brown outs or black outs.
Bright light: Again, pilots.
Meets people: Are these relatives even dead? Doesn’t say. Doesn’t matter, either. Hallucination caused by lack of blood flow to temporal lobe.
Stops being pulled: As I speculated in my other giant post, either sense of balance returning, or the sense of balance shutting down entirely.
Sparkly? Come on. I’ve addressed this. As for feeling strong, hallucination or senses shutting down further. If your body feels weak, then you start to lose sensation, it can appear as though your strength is returning. Until you try to sit up, that is - but she can’t do that during surgery, so she can’t tell.
Oh, an out of body experience. You mean, the phenomenon that can be induced by direct brain stimulation? That is either a result of your spirit taking a walk, or by discord between your visual and tactile senses?
I’ll pass.
Urgh. I’d rather stay dead.
Questions? Comments?
K-bird, how did you become convinced that spirits/demons communicate through Ouija boards? The Bible doesn’t mention Ouija boards as far as I know.
There’s certainly people who’ve claimed to speak to spirits through Ouija boards. How did you come to believe them? Do you have personal experience?
The problem is, it’s exactly the same for people who are mentally ill - it’s real to them, and they feel bad because everyone says it isn’t - can you see the problem?
They don’t (rarely) use the board itself, but the person is using the board as a focusing device, the demon is communicating with the person. I believe them because I use to be involved with contact with spirit guides, aka demons.
Innocent till proven guilty. Can you imagine how damaging and frustrating and what mental torment you would be in if you could see things that others could not? The damage you could do to a person telling them what is really happening is not real, the mental torment you would put this person in, you would be the one causing the damage.
IMHO very sadly many people have seen the spiritual, have totally normal functioning minds but were made mentally ill by people trying to convince that they are mentally ill.
I have lost all inclination to [del]beat my head against a wall[/del] debate in this thread any longer, so I am just reading for entertainment value at this point. Thank you for not disappointing me.
I’m not sure if anyone is trying to prove you ‘guilty’ of mental illness, but the point is: if there’s no way for people differentiate you from mentally ill, how can you possibly expect to be treated any differently? If it walks and quacks like a duck, it may not actually be a duck, but it probably makes sense to treat it as one - or rather - what possible reason would anyone have for treating it otherwise?
If your predicament was one of mental illness (and I’m not going to assert that it is), how would it ever be demonstrated to you? You summarily dismiss everything that challenges your worldview - it’s impossible for you to be demonstrated to be wrong, even if you really are wrong.
OK, I’ll rephrase the question: How did you become convinced people communicate with demons through Ouija boards?
You say you believe them because you used to be involved yourself, but you don’t mention if you used Ouija. How did you contact demons?
This is ridiculous. Preposterous.
An elemental is a quasi-trans-temporal energy phenomenon. It is as impossible to speak of an elemental force “loving to play and fool anyone” as it is to describe a melody from a symphony by Strauss as sounding like “a Waldorf salad”. They are simply an energy which exists in time as light exists in space. As such it’s in some ways unknowable.
Nevertheless, we know certain things about the empirical nature of time which preclude the possibility of the conceivable proposition. Duration is an attribute of consciousness and not of the plenum. It has no Ding an Sich.
Thus we derive the necessity that an elemental is a poltergeist-like force that reacts to the people in it’s vicinity, through trans-quantum space.
When we consider the four bodily humours, we see that the nature of these humours corresponds to the four classic elements (water, Earth, Wind and Fire). All ‘N’ All, your emotions are a beacon…a Shining Star to these forces–and they manifest themselves accordingly-fire for Choleric, for example.
More interestingly, as quasi-trans-temporal forces, these elementals often manifest themselves based on how you are or will feel in the past or future. But these manifestations are reflexive mirroring you and don’t imply any will or temperament to the elementals.
To say that they’re “playful” is inaccurate and this is a website devoted to eradicating ignorance.
I await your retraction.
So how DO you help those who are truly, seriously, mentally ill? You can’t try therapy-you’ll harm them spiritually. But if you don’t treat their illness, you’re only going to make it worse-trust me, I’ve been there (not delusional, but I’ve suffered from depression and anxiety). So you’re basically screwed either way.
Maybe he called elementals “playful” because they correspond to humor(s). 
Best post in this thread! (And it’s a pretty darned entertaining thread.)
I note that the only posts the OP has made to SDMB are the three in this thread.
The scriptures speak of a characteristic that people are given called authority, it is the ability to influence others, how believable a person seems, or how much you will ‘naturally’ accept them as a authority on what they speak of without question. Some people have a great deal of authority, seem like natural leaders - have you ever knew a person that just commanded respect, they have been given authority. Then you have others in the middle, of varying degrees. At the low end you have people with no or such low authority, these people usually end up as mentally ill, in jail or homeless. There is nothing wrong with them, just they are treated so inhumanly, and people just can’t recognize them as fully human. I have worked with some of these people, the greatest damage these people get is from people who seemingly try to help them.
Some people like Silvia Brown has a great deal of authority, she sees spirits, and she makes a very good living at it, when she talks about her experiences people listen. Someone without authority sees these things and everyone jumps on them, tries to convince them that what exists doesn’t exist, messes with their mind, even giving mind altering medications.
From my own experience working with people with very low authority, what I have found they need is Love, non-sexual human contact (holding their hands), to be there for them, to listen to them. Many have had no childhood to speak of, and in many ways that has to be rebuild, and that seems to increase their authority. The worst cases IMHO are children that were unwanted in the womb.
Just to add, modern day therapy is the exact opposite of what they need, as they are not suppose to get emotionally attached, but that is exactly what they need, someone who truly Loves them. Therapy just beats them into submission, forcing them to act normal enough, but bearing and hiding the pain in themselves.