Our server costs ~$56 per month to run. Please consider donating or becoming a Patron to help keep the site running. Help us gain new members by following us on Twitter and liking our page on Facebook!
(March 12, 2011 at 12:02 pm)Captain Scarlet Wrote: 1. Are you conceding there are no viable analogies here then? I'm sorry why do I have to explain NDE? There has been no case recorded where an individual who has claimed such, has ever "come back" with new information. The sense of floating often reported, has never given rise to actual instances where objects hidden in rooms and only observable from elevated positions have ever been reported back upon. Parsimony would lead us to beleive these are hullanactions of a damaged material body that can still sense activity around. Has anyone actually ever recovered from a brain death? From what I understand it can sometimes be hard to disntinguish between deep and severe coma and brain death. Scientifc studies in this area, clearly cite that were brain death was diagnosed the patient was infact dead and there heart stopped around 4 hrs later (naturally). Sure there are 'miraculous' cases where stuff happens that the professionals don't expect, these are hardly evidence of the immaterial, they are evidence of misdiagnosis. All research in this area is consistent with material processes, and there has never been a study across a statistcially significant sample to counter this. On the other hand there are lots of well documented cases of brain trauma giving rise to dramatic personality, mood, emotional changes. A result one would not expect if there was an immaterial self, which survived death.
3. I'm not sure where you are going with the squirrel stuff to be honest. My point was that abstract things are not real things and only exist in their own frameworks and are not physically instantiated in the universe. Thus appealing to them to demonstarte souls is a self defeating appeal. Whether they are human inventions (and I would contend those frameworks are) is not relevant to the argument over the existence of souls.
4. Confirmation bias of confirmation bias. There are also dis-similar experiences and non-experiences that you have just ignored to reach a conclusion.
5. No you did not state this, nor did you state what the soul is. If it doesn't contain us (inc personality) whats the point of it surviving death? Stating you don't know what a soul is would leave you in a position of believing something (you don't know what), which interacts with you (you don't know how), for a purpose (which is not known), that it cannot be evidenced nor proven nor reasoned and is as likely as invisible brain goblins. Not deeply impressive, is it?
7. We'll park Frankensteins experiments for now, it'll probably go nowhere. But we could test them on that squirrel ;-)
I don't recall all of the references to this but we'll just take it from here:
1- There are lots of well documented cases of brain trauma giving rise to dramatic personality, mood, emotional changes. A fact I'm not disputing and have already shown that the material brain does directly affect the mind. I never disputed that, I'm postulating that something else can also inform the mind that is insubstantial. There are also cases that cite people having experiences while in a "brain dead" state which I have cited in the other thread several places and instances. I'm not sure on the numbers but the people who survive brain death is probably a similar ratio to that reported experiences postmortem. When the sample availability is small you can't take a typical scientific sampling. However, I also cited that with about 50 studies (across various religious backgrounds) elements of NDE's were similar enough to at lead to the feasibility of the premise and certainly not delusional by default. Frankly I think it's ignoring evidence to be so dismissive and say they were all a misdiagnosis.
2- Ok so abstract concepts (like math) can inform and be useful and productive with regard to reality and are "real" and justifiable within their framework. What if your framework were outside of causality and were necessary logically for the abstract to exist?
3-Let's just start over and I'll define what I refer to as a soul
soul –supranatural aspect of humans that is imparted by God and informs the consciousness, survives death and is used in the final judgment by God.
Poke away
"There ought to be a term that would designate those who actually follow the teachings of Jesus, since the word 'Christian' has been largely divorced from those teachings, and so polluted by fundamentalists that it has come to connote their polar opposite: intolerance, vindictive hatred, and bigotry." -- Philip Stater, Huffington Post
always working on cleaning my windows- me regarding Johari
I feel there is enough support for the potential to be true that something still records after the brain has been drained of blood, no electrical activity and the heart has stopped and the body is unresponsive to external input (ie. pain light, etc.). This thing fits my definition of a soul from above.
I feel it productive and indicative to believe that a soul exists.
"There ought to be a term that would designate those who actually follow the teachings of Jesus, since the word 'Christian' has been largely divorced from those teachings, and so polluted by fundamentalists that it has come to connote their polar opposite: intolerance, vindictive hatred, and bigotry." -- Philip Stater, Huffington Post
always working on cleaning my windows- me regarding Johari
So your definition of the "soul" is the physical structure of the brain prior to decomposition, because that's what you've got left without the electrical activity and bloodflow... That's not every, err.... Eternal... Nor is it conscious...
And seriously, "I feel there is enough support for the potential to be true" is not a statement anywhere near "I feel it is reasonable to believe that it is true", which is what you are required to make given your beliefs. Even then, I disagree with the former, there is no support for the notion of the soul, I challenge you to present a sound and valid argument for one.
My wife is a spiritualist so would argue that her experience of talking wth he departed.(normally native north americans for some reason) was all the proof she requires for the existance of souls.
I point out that theres nothing hat happens at these events that couldnt be people just fooling themselves, especially as they meditate to put themselves in resceptive frame. Meditation makes you more suggestable so in my mind invalidates the experiences somewhat.
We tend not to talk about it much anymore to reduce conflict.
(March 12, 2011 at 11:29 pm)tackattack Wrote: I don't recall all of the references to this but we'll just take it from here:
1- There are lots of well documented cases of brain trauma giving rise to dramatic personality, mood, emotional changes. A fact I'm not disputing and have already shown that the material brain does directly affect the mind. I never disputed that, I'm postulating that something else can also inform the mind that is insubstantial. There are also cases that cite people having experiences while in a "brain dead" state which I have cited in the other thread several places and instances. I'm not sure on the numbers but the people who survive brain death is probably a similar ratio to that reported experiences postmortem. When the sample availability is small you can't take a typical scientific sampling. However, I also cited that with about 50 studies (across various religious backgrounds) elements of NDE's were similar enough to at lead to the feasibility of the premise and certainly not delusional by default. Frankly I think it's ignoring evidence to be so dismissive and say they were all a misdiagnosis.
I'm not sure what you are trying to say tack. Are you saying that the small number of such cases are positive evidence for the existence of a soul/s? If so I'm not sure how you get from 'hey I was floating above myself' to 'hey great souls exists'. The simpler explanation is of hallucination induced by a badly damaged material brain. The apparent similarity is also a so what. What would you say to 2 junkies who had a similar LSD trip? Also what about the cases of either no such experience and contrary experiences. These 'gee whizz' cases are not very impressive to me, and sorry if that is dismissive, its not aimed at you, its just not impressive. Now turn to the evidence we have lots of, in statistically signifiacnt quantities, where is the evidence for a soul? You accept brain trauma can effect an individuals personality/emotions/mood (and rightly so), but if you use NDE as evidence for souls, then from the excerpts I've read, these people clearly refer to themselves, meaning that if it is their soul, their soul contains 'them' (inc personality, mood, emotions) and isn't as amorphous as you defined it below. You can't have it both ways.
Quote:2- Ok so abstract concepts (like math) can inform and be useful and productive with regard to reality and are "real" and justifiable within their framework. What if your framework were outside of causality and were necessary logically for the abstract to exist?
What if there really were immaterial brain goblins?. You have given me no reasonable argument as to why this should be so
Quote:3-Let's just start over and I'll define what I refer to as a soul
soul –supranatural aspect of humans that is imparted by God and informs the consciousness, survives death and is used in the final judgment by God.
Firstly thank you. But it is far too amorphous to work with even as a rough sketch. What does it contain? Memories/personality/emotions; everything that makes a person. If it doesn't how does god judge it?, and why is it important that it survives death?. For example if I kill someone is it my material self or immaterial self that did it? If someones gave me a brain injury that turned me into a psycopath, is that my material self or immaterial self thats been damaged and who does god hold to account (surely not me, its not my fault!). You have already conceded that you do not have a proposal of how the material/immaterial interact, so you have to give a strong definition of a soul or at least what you believe the soul is, else we'll be grasping at straws (immaterial ones)
[/quote]
"I still say a church steeple with a lightning rod on top shows a lack of confidence"...Doug McLeod.
@dbp-Which is why I didn't include astral projection or suggestive states of mind. I am using the example of when the mind is dead.. people have still been able to experience, and something informs them to recant it after they have somehow come back (it has been an induced state of death for brain surgery and such, but can naturally occur to).
@CS- let me getback to that later tonight.
"There ought to be a term that would designate those who actually follow the teachings of Jesus, since the word 'Christian' has been largely divorced from those teachings, and so polluted by fundamentalists that it has come to connote their polar opposite: intolerance, vindictive hatred, and bigotry." -- Philip Stater, Huffington Post
always working on cleaning my windows- me regarding Johari
I'm not surprised that people have been able to 'experience' when in induced comas, (I dont think they induce 'death' for brain surgery).
When the brain is starved of stimulation it tends to fill in the gaps.
When you're dying your brain starts to shut down, it floods with chemicals including DMT an extremely potent psychoactive, and stops functioning normally - You are in absolutely no state at this point to add 2 and 2 let alone report on some experience. And do you have any idea how many contradictory NDEs people have had? When any line of evidence yields such numerous contradictory conclusions you cannot rely on it for justification.
And nobody has ever come back from brain death, they've recovered from what was misdiagnosed as brain death.
[quote='tackattack' pid='122940' dateline='1299986964']I don't recall all of the references to this but we'll just take it from here:
1- There are lots of well documented cases of brain trauma giving rise to dramatic personality, mood, emotional changes. A fact I'm not disputing and have already shown that the material brain does directly affect the mind. I never disputed that, I'm postulating that something else can also inform the mind that is insubstantial. There are also cases that cite people having experiences while in a "brain dead" state which I have cited in the other thread several places and instances. I'm not sure on the numbers but the people who survive brain death is probably a similar ratio to that reported experiences postmortem. When the sample availability is small you can't take a typical scientific sampling. However, I also cited that with about 50 studies (across various religious backgrounds) elements of NDE's were similar enough to at lead to the feasibility of the premise and certainly not delusional by default. Frankly I think it's ignoring evidence to be so dismissive and say they were all a misdiagnosis.I'm not sure what you are trying to say tack. Are you saying that the small number of such cases are positive evidence for the existence of a soul/s? If so I'm not sure how you get from 'hey I was floating above myself' to 'hey great souls exists'. The simpler explanation is of hallucination induced by a badly damaged material brain. The apparent similarity is also a so what. What would you say to 2 junkies who had a similar LSD trip? Also what about the cases of either no such experience and contrary experiences. These 'gee whizz' cases are not very impressive to me, and sorry if that is dismissive, its not aimed at you, its just not impressive. Now turn to the evidence we have lots of, in statistically signifiacnt quantities, where is the evidence for a soul? You accept brain trauma can effect an individuals personality/emotions/mood (and rightly so), but if you use NDE as evidence for souls, then from the excerpts I've read, these people clearly refer to themselves, meaning that if it is their soul, their soul contains 'them' (inc personality, mood, emotions) and isn't as amorphous as you defined it below. You can't have it both ways.
Quote:2- Ok so abstract concepts (like math) can inform and be useful and productive with regard to reality and are "real" and justifiable within their framework. What if your framework were outside of causality and were necessary logically for the abstract to exist?
What if there really were immaterial brain goblins?. You have given me no reasonable argument as to why this should be so
Quote:3-Let's just start over and I'll define what I refer to as a soul
soul –supranatural aspect of humans that is imparted by God and informs the consciousness, survives death and is used in the final judgment by God.
Firstly thank you. But it is far too amorphous to work with even as a rough sketch. What does it contain? Memories/personality/emotions; everything that makes a person. If it doesn't how does god judge it?, and why is it important that it survives death?. For example if I kill someone is it my material self or immaterial self that did it? If someones gave me a brain injury that turned me into a psycopath, is that my material self or immaterial self thats been damaged and who does god hold to account (surely not me, its not my fault!). You have already conceded that you do not have a proposal of how the material/immaterial interact, so you have to give a strong definition of a soul or at least what you believe the soul is, else we'll be grasping at straws (immaterial ones)
[/quote]
3-Perhaps I should better define a soul. My intent was not to be vague. I hope this is "stronger"
soul- supranatural aspect of humans that is imparted by God and can be used by the consciousness to inform the mind; contains an object based memory relative to the individual owner; stores an active concept of the mind (both conscious and subconscious); is a storage medium in taking data for reference; survives death and is used in the final judgment by God.
1-I'm not claiming that the evidence is up to scientific empirical standards, I am claiming that it's indicative and warrants more research. You talk about statistically significant quantities but the number of people that survive an actual death experience can't really be a large pool to pull from. Of them, I cited specific cases but the link is from my work computer. You can go back to the other thread or google it yourself again. I agree with my concept that their soul contains "them"
2-I'll save this for after we discuss our definition.. it's getting to be a confusing discussion.
(March 13, 2011 at 8:13 am)theVOID Wrote:
Quote:So your definition of the "soul" is the physical structure of the brain prior to decomposition, because that's what you've got left without the electrical activity and bloodflow... That's not every, err.... Eternal... Nor is it conscious...
And seriously, "I feel there is enough support for the potential to be true" is not a statement anywhere near "I feel it is reasonable to believe that it is true", which is what you are required to make given your beliefs. Even then, I disagree with the former, there is no support for the notion of the soul, I challenge you to present a sound and valid argument for one.
When you're dying your brain starts to shut down, it floods with chemicals including DMT an extremely potent psychoactive, and stops functioning normally - You are in absolutely no state at this point to add 2 and 2 let alone report on some experience. And do you have any idea how many contradictory NDEs people have had? When any line of evidence yields such numerous contradictory conclusions you cannot rely on it for justification.
And nobody has ever come back from brain death, they've recovered from what was misdiagnosed as brain death.
4-My definition for a soul is not "the physical structure of the brain prior to decomposition" please see 3 above. If it makes you feel any better I feel it is reasonable to believe that it is true that a soul exists based on indicative evidence and usefulness
5-Yet, I presented evidence that yields similarities in the concepts. Please support "And nobody has ever come back from brain death, they've recovered from what was misdiagnosed as brain death." Are you saying all of the cases are complete misdiagnosis, even when it's a medically induced death for the purpose of brain surgery? Nor would that explain why there are any perceived experience at all when the brain is shut down, Or retention of any prior conscious concepts after the brain starts again.
(March 13, 2011 at 9:48 am)downbeatplumb Wrote:
I'm not surprised that people have been able to 'experience' when in induced comas, (I dont think they induce 'death' for brain surgery).
When the brain is starved of stimulation it tends to fill in the gaps.
6- Agreed some of the cases are probably more rationalization and people seeing what they want, but if there was even one case with verifiable evidence of knowledge while the brain was shut off, that would then force science to find the explanation for that. So far I've seen that we can simulate and OBE and hallucinations, but there hasn't been an explanation of the origin of external information with the brain in the off position. It's called a standstill operation btw and they are clinically dead. If I ever have to go for one of these I expect one of you there holding up random flashcards for me to reiterate later.
"There ought to be a term that would designate those who actually follow the teachings of Jesus, since the word 'Christian' has been largely divorced from those teachings, and so polluted by fundamentalists that it has come to connote their polar opposite: intolerance, vindictive hatred, and bigotry." -- Philip Stater, Huffington Post
always working on cleaning my windows- me regarding Johari
