--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "salyavin808"
<fintlewoodlewix@...> wrote:
>
>
>
> --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Emily Reyn emilymae.reyn@ wrote:
> >
> > Read the book and get back to me...your research is perhaps not
comprehensive enough......"There are two ways to be fooled. Â One is
to believe what isn't true; the other is to refuse to believe what is
true." - Soren Kierkegaard
>
> I've no doubt it's a wonderful story but I've read those before.
> Unless you can *unprove* that people meet relatives who are still
> alive (remember it was the experiencers who claim this) all you
> do is add to the mythos.
>
> So why would I need to read *another* book about something when
> the first objective one demonstrated that the experience wasn't
> what people thought it was?
>
> This is how you have to treat claims of the paranormal, first
> you see if there is a signal above the noise - something you
> can't account for any other way. In the NDE there isn't. But
> research is being carried out in hospitals and it's inconclusive
> to say the least.
>
> Most Out of Body Experiences are explainable by taking the timing
> of anaesthetic withdrawal into account, because people are
> paying attention to this and collating statements from care staff
there is less chance of someone saying "but I was clinically dead
> so it *can't* be my brain". In several cases things people have
spookily witnessed could be accounted for by what was occurring
> around them when medical procedures were taking place. Obviously
people aren't always as out of it as was thought. Maybe that
> explains why so few have NDE's?
>
> Another good study taking place is objects being placed on high
> shelves so that people who are floating out of their bodies can
> report what they cannot have seen any other way. The idea for this
> came about because someone having a claimed OBE allegedly saw a
> training shoe outside on a window sill that he couldn't have seen
> from where he was. The plural of anecdote is not data though and
> no one has yet followed up with a "hit" on whatever these objects
> are.
>
> That's the way with paranormal research, early hope turns into
> disappointment when data gets stronger. Nail down the variables,
> like how long it takes to come off anaesthetic, and the amount
> of undeniably unexplainable experiences diminishes rapidly.
> It was always thus. I suspect the NDE belief will run and run
> as peoples desire to have confirmation of life after death is
> going to be good at papering over any cracks as you demonstrated
> in dismissing my point about seeing living relatives as well as
> dead ones. To the objective mind that's a clincher.
>
> So please don't assume that my placing NDE's in the "Bollocks"
> file means it was put there because it simply doesn't fit in with
> the way I see the world. The way I see things came about because
> the mystical world failed to make a good enough case for itself.
Here is an example of someone being gracious and taking the time to
explain clearly and concisely, without rudeness, why they feel like they
feel. A couple people might want to take note and try and see how nice
it is to read viewpoints when they are expressed without slamming what
someone else believes.That is all class, your are dismissed.
>
>
> >
> >
> >
> > >________________________________
> > > From: salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@
> > >To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com
> > >Sent: Monday, March 25, 2013 11:55 PM
> > >Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: Michael Shermer rebuts Eben Alexander
> > >
> > >
> > >Â
> > >
> > >
> > >--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Xenophaneros Anartaxius"
<anartaxius@> wrote:
> > >>
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Emily Reyn <emilymae.reyn@>
wrote:
> > >> >
> > >> > This is a beautiful picture. ÃÂ Can you believe I just
finished this book? ÃÂ Eben Alexander refutes all this in the later
Chapters of this book - he addresses this supposition of hallucination
specifically by making the very real point that his neocortex was not
functioning, amongst other things. ÃÂ
> > >> >
> > >> How would he, in that state, know whether he even had a
neocortex? Someone had to feed him this information. Neurologists point
out that even in states where the patient seems to be in cardiac arrest,
there is some slight activity that keeps a small amount of blood flow to
the brain. In these emergency situations, there is no
electroencephalographic monitoring of the brain, though that might be
introduced as additional controls someday. No one has figured out just
when a patient has the NDE in these situations as they cannot point out
they are having an experience, so currently there are a lot of unknowns
about these experiences. Those that believe in NDEs assume the brain is
not functioning, but this is unknown except in the case where the
patient does not revive, and then of course they do not report an NDE.
These kinds of experiences often occur under very specific circumstances
where a patient or a subject is not in a life threatening situation
> > such as cardiac arrest, which is why scientists very substantially
question whether they have any 'supernatural' component at all.
> > >
> > >In the first big study of NDE's it was discovered that of
> > >the people who meet relatives only two thirds meet the already
> > >deceased. The rest meet people who are still alive, which
underlines
> > >the wholly subjective nature of the phenomenon.
> > >
> > >And there isn't much in it that I haven't experienced from
meditation
> > >let alone hallucinogen experiments. It's all in the mind guys...
> > >
> > >_______________________________
> > >> > > From: Yifu <yifuxero@>
> > >> > >To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com
> > >> > >Sent: Monday, March 25, 2013 7:04 PM
> > >> > >Subject: [FairfieldLife] Michael Shermer rebuts Eben Alexander
> > >> > >
> > >> > >
> > >> > >ÃÂ
> > >> > >"Allegory of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ" by Pat Devonas:
> > >> > >http://www.museumsyndicate.com/images/2/10741.jpg
> > >> > >
> > >> > >Dr. Michael Shermer attempts to rebut Dr. Eben Alexander's NDE
as being genuinely "out of body" and supernatural. (Alexander is a
neurosurgeon who had an NDE. Claims he traveled out of the body into
supernatural dimensions in which he met deceased relatives, and listened
to the OM.)
> > >> > >...
> > >> > >Shermer in Scientific American, Apr 2013, 86, essentially uses
a "similarity" argument coupled with Occam's Razor. Shermer states:
"Migraine headaches also produce halluncinations, which Sacks
[neurologist Oliver Sacks] himself has experienced as a longtime
sufferer, including a 'shimmering light' that was 'dazzlingly bring'"
etc, etc, clouds, blah, blah.
> > >> > >Then Shermer goes on to make the comparison: "Compare Sack's
experience with that of Alexander's trip to heaven, where he was "in a
place of clouds. Big, puffy, pink-white ones that showed up sharply
against the deep blue-black sky. Higher than the clouds - immeasurably
higher - flocks of transparent, shimmering beings arced across the sky,
leaving long, streamerlike lines behind them.".
> > >> > >...
> > >> > >Then Shermer says "In any case, there is a reason they are
called 'near'-death experiences: the people who have then are not
actually dead". Also he inquires how Alexander could have a memory of
the experiences.
> > >> > >.
> > >> > >Finally, Dr. Shermer states "To me, this evidence is proof of
hallucination, not heaven."
> > >> > >.
> > >> > >[his arguments on the whole are similar to those of Sam
Harris].
> > >> > >
> > >> > >
> > >> > >
> > >> > >
> > >> > >
> > >> >
> > >>
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
>
