Recent content by Martin Brock

  1. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    I'm comparing dreams to NDEs, because I have no other subjective experience to compare with NDEs. Sure, but what are these other modes, and why do material bodies have eyes if an immaterial souls separable from the body doesn't need eyes to see? "Other mode" is not very specific. I offer one...
  2. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    "Soul" is not a silly word to me. Conscious souls are undoubtedly real, because I experience one continually. Whether or not my soul is immortal or separable from my material body (or what I experience as a material body) is a question that interests me for obvious reasons. Sure, but I've never...
  3. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    Clinical death involves EKG signals and the like. A brain might operate without an EKG or EEG signal, and even if it doesn't, I don't know the relationship between brain activity and later recollection of a subjective experience. We're discussing the subjective experience of other souls, and I...
  4. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    I state on the first page that I'm a convinced mortal, but I definitely do not believe that NDEs are "phoney". "Not phoney" does not imply an interpretation in terms of a disembodied, immaterial soul able somehow to see without eyes and hear without ears. Many other interpretations exist. I...
  5. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    My first post in this thread explicitly disputes the guest's accusation of "sandbagging", so I don't know what you're calling a "drawn gun" here.
  6. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    No. I'm asking how observing the shape of a shoe string (in the material world) during an OBE and recalling it later differs from observing the shape of a numeral drawn on a wall. I'm not equating the two. I'm asking why an OB experiencer can observe and recall one and not the other, because I...
  7. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    People on every side of every controversy don't play fair. Unfairness is not concentrated on one side of the NDE controversy. Unfair attacks appear in this thread. Either I'm so obstinate that I appear lazy or I'm so lazy that I appear obstinate. That's called a false choice fallacy. Individual...
  8. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    If ten people out of a thousand report four digit numbers correctly, the law of large numbers provides little relief. This observation has a well-defined statistical significance. The null hypothesis (that the reported numbers are guessed) is rejected with strong significance. If skeptics deny...
  9. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    Books record methods of doing these things. Computers (or robots) are not simply algorithms. They're organizations of matter performing operations in the material world isomorphic to the operations on symbols described by algorithms. Books don't literally drive cars, but computers do, however...
  10. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    Distinctive words or pictures, chosen mechanically, might also provide compelling evidence, but numbers lend themselves to precise statistics. We know precisely the probability of guessing a random four digit number. Why would a number be particularly difficult for a disembodied consciousness to...
  11. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    Agreed. A number could be generated randomly by a remote authority after the patient is unconscious. As described, the experiment doesn't rule out telepathic communication between the patient and a sighted also person in the room, so it doesn't establish the observation of a disembodied soul...
  12. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    I heard the episode with Shermer but didn't hear the questions addressed. Does the research reported in Holden's handbook address them?
  13. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    I'm open to other suggestions. You're saying that a null result (no significant reports of the numbers) would not prove the non-existence of immaterial souls leaving bodies and somehow seeing without eyes. You're right. Proving a negative is difficult, and the experiment is not designed to...
  14. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    Thanks, ES. I'm still struggling to pay $52 for the Kindle version of the NDE Handbook, but I listened to this four-part lecture by one of the editors. The subjective impressions of ND experiencers are interesting and worthy of research for their own sake, but Holden's reports of veridical...
  15. M

    217. DR. GARY MARCUS SANDBAGGED BY NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE SCIENCE QUESTIONS

    I know the colloquialism, but your use of it does compare a computer to a brick, and I'm not accusing you of being contentious for the heck of it. We're also comparing computers to books, and this comparison also seems extreme. Bricks and books don't play chess or Jeopardy or Go or drive cars or...
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