Merged A new argument pro Near Death Experiences

[MaartenVergu]

How do you, sceptics, explain OOBE's with veridical perception during an absence of brain activity. People hoover over their body and see things, that are confirmed afterwards by medical staff. How is the brain doing that, while the brain is shut down. How is your model of the brain explaining this experience where people can see 360 degrees, very vivid and clair all around them, while all blood flow to the brain stopped and while there is no electric activity in the brain left. What is your model saying.

(my answer: your model can't explain it at all...)

 

[Porpoise of Life]

I'm not sure about OOBEs, but I'm quite sure resurrection is real.

This zombie thread has gotten up many times and keeps shambling around, bumping into things.
I also think it's trying to eat my brain.

 

[eerok]

How do you, sceptics, explain OOBE's with veridical perception during an absence of brain activity. People hoover over their body and see things, that are confirmed afterwards by medical staff. How is the brain doing that, while the brain is shut down. How is your model of the brain explaining this experience where people can see 360 degrees, very vivid and clair all around them, while all blood flow to the brain stopped and while there is no electric activity in the brain left. What is your model saying.

(my answer: your model can't explain it at all...)

According to my model, people tell stories, stories get embellished, and embellishments get exaggerated. That's what people have been doing forever, and they're not likely to stop.

That's why anecdotes are not sufficient to support extraordinary claims.

 

[Mojo]

How do you, sceptics, explain OOBE's with veridical perception during an absence of brain activity. People hoover over their body...

That must really suck.

 

[eerok]

That must really suck.

What's one more dam pun?

 

[MaartenVergu]

I already thought it: no serieus answer.

 

[Pope130]

How do you, sceptics, explain OOBE's with veridical perception during an absence of brain activity. People hoover over their body and see things, that are confirmed afterwards by medical staff. How is the brain doing that, while the brain is shut down. How is your model of the brain explaining this experience where people can see 360 degrees, very vivid and clair all around them, while all blood flow to the brain stopped and while there is no electric activity in the brain left. What is your model saying.

(my answer: your model can't explain it at all...)

Could you point to the rigorous studies that show this to be true? All of the studies I recall seeing show that the evidence reduces to nothing when proper controls are applied.

Remember, the plural of "anecdote" is not "evidence".

 

[Pixel42]

I already thought it: no serieus answer.

This was a perfectly serious, and entirely adequate, answer:

According to my model, people tell stories, stories get embellished, and embellishments get exaggerated. That's what people have been doing forever, and they're not likely to stop.

That's why anecdotes are not sufficient to support extraordinary claims.

You do not have a shred of objective evidence that anything you claimed in your post is true. Until and unless you provide some, simply pointing that out is the only response that is required.

 

[Cosmic Yak]

How do you, sceptics, explain OOBE's with veridical perception during an absence of brain activity. People hoover over their body and see things, that are confirmed afterwards by medical staff. How is the brain doing that, while the brain is shut down. How is your model of the brain explaining this experience where people can see 360 degrees, very vivid and clair all around them, while all blood flow to the brain stopped and while there is no electric activity in the brain left. What is your model saying.

(my answer: your model can't explain it at all...)

Bumped. How about attempting an answer to this?

How many patients were able to read the cards in the first AWARE study?

Oh, now I remember: none.

Why are they now doing a second study of the same thing, and why are they expecting the results to be any different? What's changed? Are people (nearly) dying differently now?

The study you mentioned showed not one verified incidence of people reading things from above. Can you explain why you can only produce anecdotal evidence, and that nothing in your post above has been verified?
My answer: your model can't explain it.

 

[Mojo]

I already thought it: no serieus answer.

You seem to have failed to give a “serieus answer” (or indeed any answer) to eerok’s response.

 

[abaddon]

I already thought it: no serieus answer.

Except that I have had one and I know your idea is full of it.

 

[dann]

It must be a big coincidence that the dying brains of all these people are functioning so well that they have the same sequence and patern of electric activity.

They aren't "functioning so well." They are hallucinating. They couldn't function much more incorrectly than that!

 

[Mojo]

They aren't "functioning so well." They are hallucinating. They couldn't function much more incorrectly than that!

Although I can’t find it at the moment, I think Maartenn has claimed that hallucinating brains are working better than normal. He’s certainly suggested that a hallucination is “an observation of an existing object in an alternate reality”.

 

[SOdhner]

I already thought it: no serieus answer.

Well the last example you brought to us was a poor anecdote with no way to verify it. I pointed out the problems with it and you ignored me.

Your standard of evidence should be consistent. What level of evidence do you require for other claims? I feel like with the level of rigor you're applying here the Cottingley Fairies would be declared proven.

 

[MaartenVergu]

you all expect from me, on a forum like this on the internet, a peer reviewed scientific answer, worth a nobel prize. Sorry, I can't give you that. That's too much asked. You cannot expect that from an participant on a discussion forum on the internet. Sceptics always expect this from people here on the forum: to provide an answer, worthy a nobel prize or a breakthrough in science. We only can give you some arguments to support our statements. That's all. No new scientific theories worth a nobel prize on this forum. Sorry. We cannot give you that. You can't meet these standards either.

 

[Pixel42]

All you're required to provide on this board is objective evidence for your claims. If you cannot, then those claims can be dismissed out of hand.

Yes, if there were peer reviewed papers describing compelling evidence supporting the claim that NDEs were real a Nobel Prize would be a real possibility. Likewise if there were peer reviewed papers supporting the reality of astrology, telepathy, dowsing and many other such claims. But there aren't, are there? If any of these things were real objective evidence would be trivially easy to obtain, and Nobel prizes would already have been handed out. The conclusion seems inescapable: none of these things actually exist, and any belief in them is mistaken.

There are plenty of discussions here about claims for which such objective evidence and the papers that describe it are available - The Big Bang, the existence of the Higg's Boson, evolution etc etc. Some of these claims are extraordinary too, so that's clearly not what makes the difference. What makes the difference is whether or not the claim is actually true.

 

[Twoflower]

I think that demanding objective evidence for what is a subjective experience is crying in the wind.
The only thing I can suggest if you need concrete evidence is try putting yourself under the same conditions and see if it happens to you.

 

[Pixel42]

I think that demanding objective evidence for what is a subjective experience is crying in the wind.
The only thing I can suggest if you need concrete evidence is try putting yourself under the same conditions and see if it happens to you.

What good would that do? Whatever experience I had could also be explained as a dream, odd behaviour of an oxygen-deprived brain etc.

The AWARE study was specifically designed to provide objective evidence that NDEs are more than that. No such evidence was obtained. Until and unless such a study gets different results, the null hypothesis stands.

 

[Cosmic Yak]

How many patients were able to read the cards in the first AWARE study?

Oh, now I remember: none.

Why are they now doing a second study of the same thing, and why are they expecting the results to be any different? What's changed? Are people (nearly) dying differently now?

Bumped. How about attempting an answer to this?



The study you mentioned showed not one verified incidence of people reading things from above. Can you explain why you can only produce anecdotal evidence, and that nothing in your post above has been verified?
My answer: your model can't explain it.

you all expect from me, on a forum like this on the internet, a peer reviewed scientific answer, worth a nobel prize. Sorry, I can't give you that. That's too much asked. You cannot expect that from an participant on a discussion forum on the internet. Sceptics always expect this from people here on the forum: to provide an answer, worthy a nobel prize or a breakthrough in science. We only can give you some arguments to support our statements. That's all. No new scientific theories worth a nobel prize on this forum. Sorry. We cannot give you that. You can't meet these standards either.

Please stop trying to play the poor, put-upon victim. There is absolutely nothing in my posts requiring what you describe. I have asked you straightforward questions, requiring only straightforward answers. If you cannot back up your claims with anything resembling objective evidence, then perhaps you should think about why you believe these things, rather than complaining about how your critics are making unrealistic demands of you.

 

[bruto]

The topic heading is "a new argument." It's not a new assertion or a new opinion or a new statement of faith. An argument is an argument, and yes, if you're going to claim an argument you need to provide one.