Challenge to materialist atheist accepted

None of the materialist attempts to explain NDEs can really explain them. NDEs cannot be explained by: a lack of oxygen, a dying brain, hallucinations, religious expectations, cultural expectations, hearing about medical procedures after the fact, hearing during resuscitation, brain dysfunction, retinal dysfunction causing an image of a tunnel, brain chemicals such as ketamine, endogenous opioids, neurotransmitter imbalances, or hallucinogens including DMT, REM intrusions, epilepsy or seizures, psychopathology, unique personality traits, residual brain activity during unconsciousness, the experience occurring before or after brain activity stopped, brain activity during CPR, evolutionary adaptation, depersonalization, memory of birth, medication, naloxone, defense against dying, partial anesthesia, misuse of anecdotes, or selective reporting.
http://ncu9nc.blogspot.com/2013/07/materialist-explanations-of-ndes-fail.html


NDE Anomalies. Nineteen Anomalies of near-death experiences that materialists cannot explain:
http://ncu9nc.blogspot.com/2014/04/anomalous-characteristics-of-near-death.html
Enhanced consciousness such as realer-than-real detail, 360 degree vision, and colors not seen before.

Blind people see during NDEs. (Hogan)

Memories of NDEs are more detailed than normal memories.

Visions of deceased people, sometimes deceased people the experiencer had never met or seen pictures of. (Hogan)

A life review where the experiencer feels how he affected other people from their point of view.

Veridical (verifiable) perceptions where the experiencer perceived something when their brain was not functioning, and or perceived something that they could not have perceived with their normal senses even if they were conscious.

NDEs have been experienced by people not close to death.

"Lucid consciousness, well-structured thought processes, and clear reasoning" (Beauregard), calmness and tranquility (near-death.com), when their medical condition should cause confusion and amnesia, disorientation and fear.

Spiritual transformation.

NDEs involve a subjectively conscious experience while the experiencer is objectively unconscious. Hallucinations almost always occur when the subject is awake and conscious. (near-death.com)

NDEs occur more often during flat EEGs and not during abnormal EEGs. (Hogan)

"NDEs are remarkably consistent across virtually all experiencers regardless of age, nationality, religious background, and all other demographics", including atheists. (Hogan)

"Many parts of the brain must be coherent for lucid experiences to occur yet NDEs occur when there is no EEG activity." (Hogan)

NDErs experience "heightened awareness, attention, and memory at a time when consciousness and memory formation are not expected to be functioning" and "only confusional and paranoid thinking... should occur" (Hogan)

"In some cases, a third party has observed visionary figures seen by the experiencers" (Tymn)

Healthy people attending the dying sometimes share in the NDE. (Facco and Christian)

Because of the way the brain is wired, it cannot produce an NDE. (Alexander)

Many NDEs occur during anesthesia when the patient should be unconscious. (Long)

"The most important objection to the adequacy of all ... reductionistic hypotheses is that mental clarity, vivid sensory imagery, a clear memory of the experience, and a conviction that the experience seemed more real than ordinary consciousness are the norm for NDEs. They occur even in conditions of drastically altered cerebral physiology under which the production theory would deem consciousness impossible. (Greyson)​
 
It seems like some sort of mental disorder to me

Maybe some of us are hard wired different ways, so as to deliberately complicate things? These then provide us with choices. Like snakes and ladders, making good choices moves us up like ladders, poor choices are like the snake.
 
Oops he chickened out after another atheist posted a link to rational wiki claiming Alex tsakiris is a Christian lol. I've read a lot of Alex's stuff to know he isn't Christian .

He was looking for a way out

Haha, Rationalwiki is such a horrible source of info. Their page on NDEs claims that because people remember them, It proves the brain was still active. Or that because one woman died 36 times and didn't have one, that it contradicts the millions of other NDEs.

I'm far more inclined to trust Encyclopedia Dramatica over that, Their page on Rationalwiki is hilarious.
 
Haha, Rationalwiki is such a horrible source of info. Their page on NDEs claims that because people remember them, It proves the brain was still active. Or that because one woman died 36 times and didn't have one, that it contradicts the millions of other NDEs.

I'm far more inclined to trust Encyclopedia Dramatica over that, Their page on Rationalwiki is hilarious.
Haha! Highly recommended! http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Encyclopædia_Dramatica
 
They feel
Most comfortable in large atheist congregations
Making each other feel secure about blinking into nothingness one day .
To some extent this forum is a place where people congregate who hold a view that we don't blink into nothingness. But all points of view are welcome here - the purpose of the forum is to discuss these things - primarily from an evidence-based standpoint. We may between us have a wide range of views, but evidence is surely the starting point for everyone, isn't it?

In any case, the investigation of the continued existence of consciousness is a neutral topic, it doesn't carry any obligation to hold or reject any particular views on theism/atheism. The topic is open to all.
 
Some people don't want an afterlife because they are depressed and want extinction (for the same reason depression causes suicide), or they see the end of existence as the end of suffering. Another reason is they are afraid of punishment in the afterlife (which they should not be).

I think some preachers of religion are to blame for converting people to atheism. If you look at the amount of suffering in the world, it doesn't make sense when religious teachers say that if you are good, God will protect you, and if you are bad, He will punish you. If you examine the world as it is and accept those teachings about what is rewarded and punished in life and in the afterlife, it can be hard to see the difference between God and Satan. What is hard for many people to realize, because they are so acculturated by some religions on one hand, and by materialist atheists on the other, is that there are other possibilities. There can be an afterlife and God even if some religions are not exactly right on the details. I am a Buddhist and a Spiritualist and I think they are a good combination because Buddhist practices help you to develop spiritually and live according to spiritual values, and Spiritualism provides a sane and rational understanding of God and the afterlife founded upon empirical evidence.
 
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If you examine the world as it is and accept those teachings about what is rewarded and punished in life and in the afterlife, it can be hard to see the difference between God and Satan. What is hard for many people to realize, because they are so acculturated by some religions on one hand, and by materialist atheists on the other, is that there are other possibilities. There can be an afterlife and God even if some religions are not exactly right on the details.

When faced with the choice between two untruths, atheism vs. the horror that the universe is run by a sadist, it is natural that many people would turn to atheism, simply because some things are too horrible for people to accept. And since science can provide explanations for so many phenomenon, atheists naturally adopt it as a tool to justify their naturalistic beliefs. Unfortunately the same straitjacketed thinking that prevents them from supposing we can still be spiritual beings even if some religions are wrong on the details, leads them to the misuse of science to reject the empirical evidence for the afterlife because they suppose any evidence of the afterlife is evidence of something too horrible to contemplate.
 
But even flew had this to say about ndes

""Atheist philosopher Antony Flew attests that NDE's certainly constitute impressive evidence of the possibility of the occurence of human consciousness independent of any occurences in the human brain. This evidence equally certainly weakens if does not completely refute my argument against doctrines of a future life''.


http://paranormalandlifeafterdeath....nother-interesting-piece-of-evidence.html?m=1

Interestingly enough Flew concluded There is A God, however he was never convinced there was definitively an afterlife despite reaching this conclusion.

Also:

Thomas Nagel, the cosmic authority problem and the fear of religion


So, the question is: In addition to the materialitic ideology behind this kind of obsessive anti-psi and anti-spiritual behaviour, is there any other factor that causes symphaty for that self-destructive and self-defeating ideology?

In his book The Last Word, first rate philosopher Thomas Nagel (an atheist and naturalist) made an amazing concession (that give us some lights about the psychology of materialists and metaphysical naturalists):

"I believe that this is one manifestation of a fear of religion which has large and often pernicious consequences for modern intellectual life.

In speaking of the fear of religion, I don't mean to refer to the entirely reasonable hostility toward certain established religions and religious institutions, in virtue of their objectionable moral doctrines, social policies, and political influence. Nor am I referring to the association of many religious beliefs with superstition and the acceptance of evident empirical falsehoods. I am talking about something much deeper—namely, the fear of religion itself. I speak from experience, being strongly subject to this fear myself: I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and wellinformed people I know are religious believers. It isn't just that I don't believe in God and, naturally, hope that I'm right in my belief. It's that I hope there is no God! I don't want there to be a God; I don't want the universe to be like that.

My guess is that this cosmic authority problem is not a rare condition and that it is responsible for much of the scientism and reductionism of our time. One of the tendencies it supports is the ludicrous overuse of evolutionary biology to explain everything about life, including everything about the human mind. Darwin enabled modern secular culture to heave a great collective sigh of relief, by apparently providing a way to eliminate purpose, meaning, and design as fundamental features of the world"
 
Yeah. Stupid materialists, not believing all those stories.
I'm totally with you in your caution and I don't believe you are stupid. I'm sorry if my humour came off badly but it was supposed to be friendly. We do attack a bit too much and maybe we should be cautious of developing a Brian Cox attitude to other people's beliefs. I think it would be better if we all only posted when we have something constructive to say and I don't think fighting is constructive. For my part, I'm sorry if I offended you malf or anybody else for that matter.
 
Wow that is an amazingly honest concession from a very well known atheist .

That took a lot of courage for him to say , but maybe he should take a deeper look into inclusivism . I had a fear of religion until I started reading the writings of other inclusivists like Justin martyr and origin .

They really calmed me down a lot. Most of my fellow Christians don't know who these people are and would be shocked at what they wrote so early on in Christian history

Nagel seems pretty honest. He's defended the scientific investigation into Intelligent Design while also stating that the kind of revelations about truth of scripture that motivate believers would make him believe he was insane rather than in communication with God.

One can disagree with him but he seems open about his own biases as well as his own reasoning. His work on the importance of objectivity (View from Nowhere) and the mystery of Reason as our logical foundation show him, IMO anyway, to be a genuine academic concerned with pursuit of knowledge.
 
I've been pondering the endless dream theory, reminds me of my favorite movie'The Neverending Story" The title more so in this case. Maybe all of this is a never ending story?
 
It's rather pointless to chuckle about atheists/materialisst being afraid of living forever. I mean, besides the fact that is a frightening thought. Because I can just as well say that believers are afraid of nonexistence. It doesn't advance the discussion.

~~ Paul
 
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