Critical Review of NDE/OBE's...

Max_B

Member
A critical review of NDE/OBE's by Michael Marsh...

http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/5/2/18/pdf

I thought it was a quite unbalanced article, taking a rather dismissive, and popularist polarised position.

It referred to lots of things that may indeed be problems for those who think something leaves the body during the OBE, or that the NDE is a glimpse of the afterlife.

But... IMO it failed to balance up these arguments, by not referring to lots of things that may also be problems for those (like the author), who think the brain is somehow perfectly isolated from the external environment whilst inside the scull.

I thought that many past in-depth discussions we've had on Skeptiko about NDE/OBE's have gone far deeper than this paper, and have been far more balanced, and far far more creative.

Anyway... have at it... I'm sure the authors obvious bias will make many here roll their eyes.
 
I've only just discovered that Alex has already interviewed Marsh back in 2010...
That is an easy mistake to make - Alex has done so many podcasts!

Without wasting my time and money reading the book, my feeling is probably like yours - if you mainly focus on the medical aspects of this phenomenon, you are unlikely to say anything useful about the significance of NDE's. For me, the number one curious feature of NDE's is that their scenario is directly related to death, and to the idea that we go on having experiences after death. This is true even for NDE's experienced by young children, who normally have only a very hazy notion of death.

David
 
That is an easy mistake to make - Alex has done so many podcasts!

Without wasting my time and money reading the book, my feeling is probably like yours - if you mainly focus on the medical aspects of this phenomenon, you are unlikely to say anything useful about the significance of NDE's. For me, the number one curious feature of NDE's is that their scenario is directly related to death, and to the idea that we go on having experiences after death. This is true even for NDE's experienced by young children, who normally have only a very hazy notion of death.

David

Without trawling through his work, his motivation seems to be a need to hold on to his Christian faith by sidelining the NDE/OBE at any cost.
 
Without trawling through his work, his motivation seems to be a need to hold on to his Christian faith by sidelining the NDE/OBE at any cost.
Such people seem particularly bizarre to me. Faced with evidence that a portion of the Christian message might be true - that materialism is false (or should we call it incomplete), their fear of having to amend the rest of their world view, makes them blank it out!

David
 
Such people seem particularly bizarre to me. Faced with evidence that a portion of the Christian message might be true - that materialism is false (or should we call it incomplete), their fear of having to amend the rest of their world view, makes them blank it out!

David

What else are you supposed to do with evidence that contradicts your view of the world? Other than ignore it of course.
 
Such people seem particularly bizarre to me. Faced with evidence that a portion of the Christian message might be true - that materialism is false (or should we call it incomplete), their fear of having to amend the rest of their world view, makes them blank it out!

David

I suspect this is why we haven't seen a lot of support for parapsychology in religious circles. Even in Hinduism, which would be reinforced by Psi & reincarnation research...

As I said before I think this is because Psi doesn't buttress religion, but - in perfect Trickster fashion - confuses and confounds many supposed truths in the world's major faiths.
 
What else are you supposed to do with evidence that contradicts your view of the world?


Change your world view? :)

Regarding scientific parapsychology / paranormal research and religions, I very highly recommend this excellent book (I think also mentioned in the Blessed Virgin Mary thread) about the Medjugorje visions as it covers a lot of interactions related to the Catholic Church, scientific investigation, and the whole general attitude of this organised religion to "mystical" events.

As Sciborg hints at with his thread's title, it really does fit in perfectly with the ideas Hansen presents in the excellent "Paranormal and the Trickster" book.

In a tiny, dilapidated trailer in northeastern Oregon, a young Mexican woman saw a vision of the Virgin Mary in an ordinary landscape painting hanging on her bedroom wall. After being met with skepticism from the local parish, the Catholic diocese officially placed the matter "under investigation." Investigative journalist Randall Sullivan wanted to know how exactly one might conduct the official inquiry into such an incident and set off to interview "the miracle detectives." These were the theologians, historians, and postulators from the Sacred Congregation of the Causes for Saints who were charged by the Vatican with testing the miraculous and judging the holy. What Sullivan didn't know was that his own investigation would lead from Vatican City in Rome to the tiny village of Medjugorje in Bosnia-Herzegovina, where six visionaries have been receiving apparitions of the Virgin Mary. These raptures have been the subject of more medical and scientific examination than any other purported supernatural event ever recorded. An examination of the longest-running Marian apparitions in history, and the author's own faith and beliefs as he himself becomes a miracle detective, are at the heart of Randall Sullivan's stunning new book, The Miracle Detective.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/319305.Miracle_Detective
 
I said this many many times and it might have offended someone and perhaps including myself. I apologize but I tell the truth.

The criterion for someone to consider a narration about something - about some claim to be real, to be true, is the information quantity it gives.

I have read many many NDE OBE accounts in the several previous years and I can say that the whole information quantity of the sum of all the narrated near death experiences and out of body experiences, including their claims about afterlife, heaven, God, plan, love, etcetera, is indeed very very tiny and trivial and unimpressive and unimaginative and cliche.

Take an example, please refer the page 6 of the pdf document shared by dear Original Poster Max_B, the end sentence of 2.6. The Jesus Characteristics and Geography of Heaven: True Insights - or Not?
------------------------------------------------------------------ Cite -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unfortunately nothing retold is novel, or truly "transcendent": only lacking in meaning and imparting a totally valueless message.
------------------------------------------------------------------ Cite -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This sentence is one of what I especially want to express and emphasize.

Someone who would disagree with me, probably would debate with me on two points, they would insist:
1, the information quantity is not even a suitable criterion to consider something's reality or truthfulness.
2, the information quantity included by so many already told and existent nde/obe accounts, is actually very very large (contradicting to my previous saying "tiny and trivial and unimpressive and unimaginative and cliche").

Nah friends, I don't agree, I will be brief but I insist that:
1, the information quantity contained by a narration, is a very important criterion for us to consider whether it might be truth or not. Lies and fancy dreams always contain little or hollow or disguised information.
2, my friends, if you would say that the afterlife, heaven and God information revealed by nde/obe has already been very large, I might think probably you didn't read a lot of stories, didn't watch a lot of fiction and fantasy movies, and also have seldom been deceived by malicious frauds.

No offence to anyone, but if anyone has seen so many conspiracies, he wouldn't be so credulous. If there can be a truth, it must bring with it explosive information quantity, and the truth will probably not be like fancy dreams but instead be intrinsically dark or bleak.
 
About materialists who firmly spit on the possiblity that consciousness, awareness, or more concerned by human nature of us - the "me" dwelling in our body, might be able to exist without the brain, my opinions go here:

I understand them, they know a lot of science and they are proud of that, if anyone talks about the possibility of afterlife (the "me" dwelling in our body existing without the brain), a materialist would push him away saying: "You know absolutely zero science and that makes your saying very stupid."

Because, a neuro-scientist knows how this chemical substance in our brain affects our mood and thoughts, how that chemical substance in our brain affects our mood and thoughts in other way. The linkage is too strong, too powerful, too synchronous and too determinative, how could anyone imagine that our thoughts could exist without brain, without neurons, without those chemical substances?

I think we shouldn't say a thing so firmly, the strong linkage between neuro-science and how they determine our existence, doesn't strictly exclude the possibility of afterlife.

Imagine this possibility, the Creator (or God if you prefer to call him this) who created lives, in his laboratory, created a subatomic structure (for example some form of superstring structure) first, and made it a human individual, and then, linked some "knots" in this subatomic structure to the neurons.

In this imagination, it is those "knots" in the subatomic structure which determine our existence, not the neurons. Furthermore, in this imagination, one can say that, it is those "knots" in the subatomic structure which simultaneously determine both our existence and also the neurons' behaviors, so this makes us feel like that as if the neurons determine our existence. Current science can't see, can't examine, or even can't discover those subatomic structures, but can see, can research neurons, so modern scientists insist that neurons determine our existence. In this imagination, I can make an analogy, consider that the subatomic structures are the ultimate sources of our existence, they determine what we are, how we think and every details about our existence, and they project images to the macro atomic world, like real objects project images into mirrors. Those images are neurons. When the images in the mirrors disappear, the sources of the images don't disappear, similar to that when the neurons disappear, the subatomic structures persist, and they are the sources of our existence.

So materialism only researches the relationship linkage between neurons and the way we think, we behavior, it doesn't rule out the possibility that it is not neurons which determine our existence, no matter how strong the influences might seem.

But, this subatomic structure is only a fancy imagination which shouldn't be taken seriously, though it prevents materialists from firmly discarding afterlife possibility, like I always say, the only meaningful thing is the information quantity, science has provided pretty large information quantity so science is meaningful, we haven't seen any information quantity about afterlife, heaven, God, plan, love messages, etcetera, we haven't seen any information quantity to support the possibility that neurons are only projections by some subatomic structures which simultaneously determine the behaviors of neurons and our thinking, so it is not meaningful to take this imagination seriously, at least in our times.

Don't know whether my grasping of English language is like of a retarded pupil. If my writing is uncomprehensible, I apologize. If anyone would like to figure out what's the problem (grammar, words using) of my writing, I would be very very appreciate. Thanks for sharing opinions in this forum, thanks for Original Poster Max_B to share this document. I couldn't emphasize my core opinion more, I think the information quantity is the most important.
 
I want to extend the topic of my previous writing, to the degree that contains one of my biggest puzzles about nde/obe phenomenon. And I wish someone in this forum would like to shed some light to help me to unravel this puzzle.

First, let me introduce my opinion about "what is real" and "what is not real".

In a sense, everything is real, dreams are real because "they are really dreams", I had a dream last night, and I'm not lying, then that was really a dream. The dream is real in the sense that it is a dream, I actually experienced the dream, my experiences actually happened, and I'm not lying, this is why I'm saying I really really had that dream. If the background reason that I had that dream is my brain activities influenced by the environment when I was sleeping (for example the environment in which my house is burning gives me a nightmare to wake me up), it gives the explanation to why I was dreaming and gives the interpretation to the content of my dream, it doesn't repudiate the fact that "I was dreaming" was a really happened thing.

The atmospherical or optical illusions (for example mirage) are real in the sense that these phenomenon really happened, no matter what are the causes of them. You see, then your seeing is real, the problem is only how to explain the "visual phenomenon".

But why we often say that dreams, mirages, etcetera are not real? To remind us that, to consider them as real is a dangerous thought. For example, if you believed the grotesque information received in your dream, you would behavior wrongly. Dreams are often utilized by superstition to control ignorant people. Superstition would tell a person who had a bad dream to commit some vicious activities to prevent misfortune's advent. "Because those are the divine revelations of your dream." so as said by superstition.

Again, why we often say that dreams, mirages, etcetera are not real? The reason is all about "INFORMATION QUANTITY", as I said many many times before. When we are dreaming, dreams make us think they contain quite a lot of information, but actually, dreams don't contain much information. Let me conceive an example, you had a bad dream last night, in which the 6 years old little girl of your neighbouring family became a demon. When you were dreaming, your obscure mind truly believed that she had become a demon, and you then were frightened greatly and woke up and the dream ended. But if the girl had "really" become a demon then there should have been much more information than the dream had imparted. You could have investigated further in the dream, what would happen after she had become a demon, and why these would happen. She might have attacked you, persecuted you, or done more terrible things to you, and you could have chosen to fight against her, beg mercy from her, talk to her, ask why and persuade her to become good again. In other words, more information generated. But no information expected from the ended dream. Therefore, the event (girl becoming a demon) is not real, and you shouldn't listen to any superstition to suggest you to kidnap that lovely girl just because you are silly to believe that she is now really a true demon.

Similarly, when we say that mirages are not real, we actually mean we shouldn't expect the mirage to give us the information that we want and that it seems to contain, because the mirage itself truly doesn't contain those information, it's only an optical phenomenon. Of course if there is a mirage, there should be a ture oasis somewhere but the oasis is much more remote then the traveler expects, so it is not practical to expect to reach it and get the information that the traveler wants and the oasis truly contains. To believe the mirage contains the information it seems to contain, is dangerous and could potentially deviate the traveler from his correct path.

Voila, they are all about "INFORMATION QUANTITY".

Now let me refer to another aspect. I said that "In a sense, everything is real.", "You see something, then your seeing is real, the problem is only how to explain that visual phenomenon". On the other hand, you can't 100% guarantee anything to be 100% real. After all, we use our eyes to see the objective material world, we use our brain to analyse and think, but eyes and brain are not reliable, they could deceive us. We could have an illusioned vision by a pair of ill eyes, we could analyse wrongly of what we observe.

Up to this point, I run out of my time to write, I have something to do soon, so I will be brief, sorry for my previous interminable writing, I feel difficult to express my meaning clear ^_^.

Ok, so we can't 100% guarantee the genuine of what we see, what we sense, what we think and what we believe, but we can 50%, 70%, 90% sure, the key is "INFORMATION QUANTITY", the more information quantity we grasp, the more believing we feel worth putting. We subconsciously rely on "INFORMATION QUANTITY" to believe a thing. When someone believe a thing without many information, it is truly because 1, he can't get information anyway 2, he is in angst about something. The tribe or poor villagers in our world or in ancient times feel angst about famine, natural disasters, diseases, plagues, etcetera, and they can't have science anyway, so even if they know little information, they have no choice other than to believe superstition. The consequence is 1, they feel solaced a bit because they think they get explanation from superstition, 2, bad consequences caused by they believing superstition ensued. Then comes one of my biggest puzzle, the nders/obers seem to be unable to hold much information, why they claim so certain about afterlife etcetera.
 
Well I'm not convinced by NDEs telling us about the afterlife though they they are intriguing...but Materialism being false doesn't make NDEs true. But that materialism is false makes it easier to accept NDEs as possible.

I suspect there are at least three reasons people find NDEs compelling evidence:

1. Veridical information.

2. Similarity in received content.

3. Brain not working, or not working enough to produce the experiences.

I think arguing against NDEs would require challenging any of these three points, rather than worrying about "information quality" which AFAICTell is not relevant?
 
Don't be ridiculous. That would mean admitting I wasn't right. :)
I know this is humour. But it raises a thought.

Some people have difficulty in admitting to someone else that they were wrong. My question (not to you, just to the world) is this. Is it easier, or more difficult to admit privately, to oneself, that one was wrong?
 
I know this is humour. But it raises a thought.

Some people have difficulty in admitting to someone else that they were wrong. My question (not to you, just to the world) is this. Is it easier, or more difficult to admit privately, to oneself, that one was wrong?
Only humour to make a point :)

As to how easy it is to have to admit, I suppose to some extent it depends how we presented our position in the first place.
 
I confess I said paradoxically about "real" and "not real". I didn't make my meaning clear. I said, in a sense everything is real, and then I also said we shouldn't make affirmatives about anything because our oculus and our thinking are not reliable so we can't 100% trust what we see and our impression on what we see. What I said in previous posts seem mutually contradictory. Now I am going to attempt to make my meaning clearer.

Actually I meant, and will always mean that:
1, everything is real, as long as you don't interpret "the content of the phenomenon" with more information than those shown by the phenomenon itself.
2, when we say a thing to be very real, we actually mean this thing contains large "information quantity" so we can hold practical expectation for the information contained by it, and we can expect to utilize those information to help us with something (curing disease for example, realizing our wishes, and so on).

I think the above makes my meaning relatively clearer, in a word, all are about "information quantity".

So, mirages are real, they are real phenomena, when a traveler said, that he had seen a lake and a tree and delicious fruits on the tree, and he also emphasized what he had seen are super vivid and detailed and too lucid and not like an illusion, "I could even see the venulose in the leaves and the textures on the hull of the fruits." so as he said, he was all right, he didn't lie, he reported what he had seen and his honest feelings towards them, by this far, he had not interpreted "the content of the phenomenon" with more information than those shown by the phenomenon itself.

Then, he insisted that what he had seen was not a mirage but a true oasis, he claimed that the fruits on the tree could be fetched not very far and he walked towards that vision and expected to eat those fruits to solve the problem of his thirsty. He believed that as he could see so clearly the textures on the hull of the fruits, then he must have been very close to the flesh and juice within the hull. "I know, not believe, but just, know." so as he said, then he was wrong and he held a wrong expectation which could deviate his route and disturb his mood and behaviors and endanger him. The problem is: he interpreted "the content of the phenomenon" with more information than those shown by the phenomenon itself. Seeing clearly the textures on the hull of the fruits doesn't mean that he could eat the flesh, because he didn't see the flesh, he said the vision was very detailed, that was right but just not detailed enough! He got the information of the hull, how could he extend the information to the envisioned flesh which he had not actually seen yet? And the fact is that, what he saw was not real oasis but a mirage, a mirage containing the information of the textures on the hull of the fruits but not the flesh and can never be eaten.

Voila, real, not real, when we say these, our meaning, our interpretation are all about "information quantity".

What puzzled me, is that how could someone claim the information more than what they actually know? For example, the nders never bring any sufficient information for any to envision an afterlife, how could they claim that they are 100% sure that there is afterlife?
 
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