NDE links and discussion

[UniversalFriendliness]

Thanatos

Int'l Ass'n for Near Death Studies

Anthony Chene productions

Diane Willis (more IANDS)

 

An interesting counter-argument from Christian sources is that unfavorable NDE experiences are underreported because the forces of evil and profit would prefer to keep the truth hidden, and cannot make as much money from bad experience reports. But in reality there would be an ample market for negative experiences. The sober view seems to be that the progress of the soul or spirit after shedding the body is characterized by reflection, love, beauty, and betterment. A key idea one finds also is that we are here for a reason, and that being here is a tremendous opportunity not to be squandered. One notable source discussing this idea is Hans Wilhelm. He expounds the idea that we have actually chosen this life.

 

 

 

[pantheory]

56 minutes ago, UniversalFriendliness said:

Thanatos

Int'l Ass'n for Near Death Studies

Anthony Chene productions

Diane Willis (more IANDS)

 

An interesting counter-argument from Christian sources is that unfavorable NDE experiences are underreported because the forces of evil and profit would prefer to keep the truth hidden, and cannot make as much money from bad experience reports. But in reality there would be an ample market for negative experiences. The sober view seems to be that the progress of the soul or spirit after shedding the body is characterized by reflection, love, beauty, and betterment. A key idea one finds also is that we are here for a reason, and that being here is a tremendous opportunity not to be squandered. One notable source discussing this idea is Hans Wilhelm. He expounds the idea that we have actually chosen this life.

 

 

There's some interest here in near-death-experiences and related religious testimonials but no science seems to be involved.

[UniversalFriendliness]

There's a category of these called "verifiable incidents", in which the consciousness that has left its usual body observes something that it couldn't possibly have observed from the body's position (whether on the surgery table, on the ground, or whatever it may be), and is able to give a detail that others confirm later. 

[midniterider]

Here's an article showing that telepathy is a real thing, according to scientific experiments. And if telepathy is a real thing then human thought can somehow transcend the physical body to communicate with other human minds. If the human mind can transcend the physical body then NDEs aren't necessarily a clear cut case of dying brain matter causing hallucinations. 

 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6179515/

 

 

[Tsathoggua9]

10 hours ago, midniterider said:

Here's an article showing that telepathy is a real thing, according to scientific experiments. And if telepathy is a real thing then human thought can somehow transcend the physical body to communicate with other human minds. If the human mind can transcend the physical body then NDEs aren't necessarily a clear cut case of dying brain matter causing hallucinations. 

 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6179515/

 

 

 

Fascinating!  I experimented with astral projection as a teenager (in the 1970s), but never experienced anything truly veridical. Had some good fun, though....

[pantheory]

16 hours ago, UniversalFriendliness said:

There's a category of these called "verifiable incidents", in which the consciousness that has left its usual body observes something that it couldn't possibly have observed from the body's position (whether on the surgery table, on the ground, or whatever it may be), and is able to give a detail that others confirm later. 

 

Near death experiences are thought to be amazing by many who listen to them. They are interesting to listen to since most telling such stories are honest and sincere.  But such experiences are logically and scientifically explained by neuroscientists as seen below.

https://www.livescience.com/16019-death-experiences-explained.html

https://theconversation.com/are-near-death-experiences-hallucinations-experts-explain-the-science-behind-this-puzzling-phenomenon-106286

https://owlcation.com/stem/The-Truth-About-Near-Death-Experience-Scientific-Explanations

There is nothing to NDE outside of biological science IMO. I believe you should always question in your mind "woo woo" experiences when you hear of them since most all reek of the supernatural.

[UniversalFriendliness]

Here is a discussion of hallucination, dreamy, disorganized thought progression vs. the NDE experience:

from YouTube channel "NDE Accounts"

 

It doesn't surprise me that as interest increases, especially within the medical community, in understanding these experiences--not least because it is safer for patients if medical staff are able to understand what is happening, there will be research concluding that the current paradigm, namely that consciousness is created by the brain, is correct and sufficient. It is due diligence, if nothing else. But caregivers and doctors are both spearheading research and coming to the other conclusion, namely that these experiences are not hallucinatory.

 

 

From the nih article above, a conclusion I can agree with:

Quote

An improved understanding of NDEs may well be found to involve a host of mundane brain-oriented effects, but it may also include glimpses of realities that are presently beyond our imagination. Given the revolutionary changes in our understanding of the physical world over the last century through the development of relativity and quantum mechanics, it is virtually certain that the scientific worldview of the next century will include entirely new ways of thinking about space, time, and – given the challenge of NDEs – consciousness.

 

[midniterider]

1 hour ago, UniversalFriendliness said:

Here is a discussion of hallucination, dreamy, disorganized thought progression vs. the NDE experience:

from YouTube channel "NDE Accounts"

 

 

This is a good point. If my dream experiences under normal, healthy brain conditions are a wild mishmash of crazy, disjointed scenes like from a music video, then is it reasonable to conclude that a dying brain will produce a highly coherent scene that is what people who have had NDEs commonly report? I dont think so. 

[pantheory]

On 9/4/2019 at 9:47 PM, midniterider said:

 

............. If my dream experiences under normal, healthy brain conditions are a wild mishmash of crazy, disjointed scenes like from a music video, then is it reasonable to conclude that ...................

 

Then it's reasonable to conclude that you're perfectly normal As to  dreams, "crazy" dreams are the norm. I have had dreams where I get up in the morning, take a shower, brush my teeth, go to work, tell jokes, wash my clothes; geez, why was I dreaming this uneventful stuff at all. Maybe dreaming stuff without anything unusual happening is crazy Why would I even remember such dreams?

[Tsathoggua9]

Hey, look up the title ""Stop Worrying, There Probably Is An Afterlife". It is available as a PDF file, and you can also buy it through Amazon.com if'n ya like!

 

I don't have time ta read it right now, but I thought that it would be fun ta share!

[UniversalFriendliness]

3 hours ago, Tsathoggua9 said:

Hey, look up the title ""Stop Worrying, There Probably Is An Afterlife". It is available as a PDF file,

 

Thanks, enjoying it now!

[florduh]

As always with these discussions, bear in mind that near death is not death. Nobody who actually died has reported anything at all; they're dead.

[disillusioned]

30 minutes ago, florduh said:

As always with these discussions, bear in mind that near death is not death. Nobody who actually died has reported anything at all; they're dead.

 

This is entirely anecdotal, but I've read a number of accounts from people who "died" and were later revived who say that death was like, well, nothing. It seems to me that these accounts ought to be given at least as much weight as any other accounts which claim that something else happened.

 

We just don't know what happens after death. But it seems most likely to me that death results in the cessation of consciousness. Hence, it's probable that nothing at all happens to us after death, because death entails that we don't exist anymore. Perhaps the process of dying brings about some strange perceptual experiences. Nevertheless, discussing these experiences is only possible for those of us who are still alive. And therein lies the problem. 

[florduh]

Seems to me if you want to know what death is like, examine dead things, not live things.

[midniterider]

2 hours ago, florduh said:

 Nobody who actually died has reported anything at all; they're dead.

 

Or have they??? muhahahaha

 

https://uvamagazine.org/articles/the_science_of_reincarnation

[UniversalFriendliness]

Here is a particularly good NDE video. 

 

Ingrid Honkala

 

She experienced a continuity of interaction from NDE to OBE.

[Joshpantera]

18 hours ago, UniversalFriendliness said:

Here is a particularly good NDE video. 

 

Ingrid Honkala

 

She experienced a continuity of interaction from NDE to OBE.

 

But the main thing here is that this sort of anecdotal testimony doesn't prove or substantiate the claims of the experience. These beings of light told her time and again that trying to prove any of this to people was of no real value.

 

What she experienced early on is something I completely understand. I had something of a similar experience but not via near death. It was more the case of allowing myself to drift towards an aware state of self identification with the whole. I wasn't dying or near dying. But I was conscious of the necessary interconnection between the totality and the perceived part. And how unavoidable identification with the whole is. How futile it is to resist such an identity. And how it doesn't matter one bit how we spin it, if we exist, then we are necessarily "existence itself." That's exactly what she experienced and described in those exact same words - though she did so via a drowning incident and thereafter. 

 

But trying to prove or substantiate the above seems highly irrelevant. It doesn't strike me as a situation where proving it matters one way or another. Because reality is what it is. If reality consists of a whole, where all of the parts are the whole itself, that's just the reality of the situation. Whether or not everyone sees or believes such a reality according to what it is, doesn't in any way change the reality. It just is what it is. There doesn't seem to be any need for a great commission or pressing need to proselytize people into seeing or believing it. And ultimately it's just an unavoidable situation. If you exist, you are therefore an aspect of existence itself. Cut and dry. End of story. 

 

Do you agree or disagree with the above? 

 

And if so, why? 

 

Thanks. 

 

[UniversalFriendliness]

We exist, and existence is, true. But our nature is to seek to make sense of our experiences: to clarify them and assign meaning to them within our understanding. I haven't come across a culture that lacked some correspondence with the other side. What we'd like is to have as safe and rational an understanding as possible, so we can know more fully who and what we are. Rejecting the religion of Christianity doesn't mean we must become materialists.

[Joshpantera]

2 hours ago, UniversalFriendliness said:

We exist, and existence is, true. But our nature is to seek to make sense of our experiences: to clarify them and assign meaning to them within our understanding. I haven't come across a culture that lacked some correspondence with the other side. What we'd like is to have as safe and rational an understanding as possible, so we can know more fully who and what we are. Rejecting the religion of Christianity doesn't mean we must become materialists.

 

You're right, it doesn't mean that. Has anyone suggested that it does? 

 

 

[midniterider]

11 hours ago, Joshpantera said:

 

But trying to prove or substantiate the above seems highly irrelevant. It doesn't strike me as a situation where proving it matters one way or another. Because reality is what it is. If reality consists of a whole, where all of the parts are the whole itself, that's just the reality of the situation. Whether or not everyone sees or believes such a reality according to what it is, doesn't in any way change the reality. It just is what it is. There doesn't seem to be any need for a great commission or pressing need to proselytize people into seeing or believing it. And ultimately it's just an unavoidable situation. If you exist, you are therefore an aspect of existence itself. Cut and dry. End of story. 

 

 

If I am everything and everything is me then I dont need to prove that to anyone...who are all me...though they will probably disagree. Alan Watts says the game we play is to pretend we aren't the 'all that is.'  

 

Anyone here read 'I am That' by Nisargadatta Maharaj? Good discussion on Zen/Advaita. 

[florduh]

10 hours ago, midniterider said:

Alan Watts says the game we play is to pretend we aren't the 'all that is.' 

If there is a woo aspect to existence, Alan Watts probably has the most reasonable view of the unreasonable. Again, nobody talks about Fight Club, m'kay?

[Joshpantera]

On 9/3/2019 at 11:22 PM, UniversalFriendliness said:

There's a category of these called "verifiable incidents", in which the consciousness that has left its usual body observes something that it couldn't possibly have observed from the body's position (whether on the surgery table, on the ground, or whatever it may be), and is able to give a detail that others confirm later. 

 

I find these stories interesting, but do so cautiously.

 

My mother had some type of out of body experience during the birth of my sister. It was very real to her. She says that she was out and hovering above her body. But I also understand that there could be other explanations than taking all of this at face value. My grandfather, during his quadruple bipass surgery ordeal had an elaborate and well described journey into and meeting with, "the light." It was very real to him. Again, his sincerity doesn't do much to make it literally true as there are myriad other explanations for what he seemed to legitimately experience. 

 

I've been close to drowning death at least twice, and several stages into hypothermia during winter conditions over the course of my surfing over the last 30 years. I do know first hand what it's like to give up the fight for air underwater and transition into the peaceful stage and then to black out completely, underwater. But I'm one of the cases who experienced zero memorable consciousness during that time. Nothing at all. Just drifting out, a blank where time lapsed, and then coming to floating at the surface and coughing out water. I obviously didn't die, but I was somewhere near death. So I didn't have any elaborate experience, no light, no beings of light, or any of that sort of thing. 

 

 

 

 

[RogueScholar]

On 9/3/2019 at 10:38 PM, midniterider said:

Here's an article showing that telepathy is a real thing, according to scientific experiments. And if telepathy is a real thing then human thought can somehow transcend the physical body to communicate with other human minds. If the human mind can transcend the physical body then NDEs aren't necessarily a clear cut case of dying brain matter causing hallucinations. 

 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6179515/

 

 

The Ganzfeld experiments that the author heavily relies on have been the target of much scrutiny. An honest assessment of the methods and potential pitfalls in these experiments should uncover concerns. A couple of abstracts of articles that point out some of the issues with these studies:

 

https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fa0019457

 

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0153049

 

Additionally, other experiments have been done with null results. At this time, telepathy evidence is dodgy at best and not subject to replication.