Near Death Experience's of Maori...

Max_B

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A young Northland woman is researching near-death experiences among Northland Maori in a bid to find out if culture impacts what people see when they are close to death.

Hannah Young said as many as one in five people had visions during a near-death experience, but because international research was focused mainly on European cultures she said it was unknown if different cultures had different experiences.

So, the 24-year-old from Opua decided to look into it for the thesis part of her Masters of Psychology she is studying at Massey University.

"A near-death experience can be someone who has had a heart attack and been pronounced clinically dead but is successfully resuscitated. Sometimes they will say they've seen a bright light and heard the doctors talking or have gone out of their body and seen themselves."

Miss Young said a near-death experience could also affect someone who was close to death.


For example, she said someone who was in a serious car crash might experience watching the crash from the sideline. She has six Northland Maori participating in her research and has interviewed four so far.

"I thought [their experiences] would be different, very dissimilar. There's only ever been one Maori near-death experience recorded and it was an older lady in 1985 who had little contact with Pakeha and her experience conformed closely with tradition."

She said she could not be certain as her research was incomplete, but so far it looked like that prediction was wrong.

"So far it's remarkably similar [to current studies] ... "

She hoped the research would help people better understand the phenomenon.


http://www.nzherald.co.nz/northern-advocate/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503450&objectid=11516829



 
A, but because international research was focused mainly on European cultures she said it was unknown if different cultures had different experiences.
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Huh? I don't know what's meant by "internationals research" but there are many case files with Native Americans and other non-Europeans.It has long been seen that NDEs do have a strong cultural influence. The idea that it could be otherwise seems to be yet another concept rooted in physicalism. If there were no cultural )and individual) differences - there'd be one single form of spiritual and/or religious practice.
 
Huh? I don't know what's meant by "internationals research" but there are many case files with Native Americans and other non-Europeans.It has long been seen that NDEs do have a strong cultural influence. The idea that it could be otherwise seems to be yet another concept rooted in physicalism. If there were no cultural )and individual) differences - there'd be one single form of spiritual and/or religious practice.

Miss Young seems to suggest that she hasn't found a 'strong cultural influence' amongst the Maori NDE's. Although that is apparently what she was expecting to find, as she claims the only other previously recorded Maori NDE had a traditional Maori theme... I thought that was interesting.
 
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Cultural influence as an argument seems to be a red herring. Consider the following:
  • A cultural influence exists = expectation bias.
  • A cultural influence does not exist = physical stimulus bias.
Either way the NDE gets "explained" by nothing.
 
Cultural influence as an argument seems to be a red herring. Consider the following:
  • A cultural influence exists = expectation bias.
  • A cultural influence does not exist = physical stimulus bias.
Either way the NDE gets "explained" by nothing.

Cultural influence argument.., not sure where that came from, Hannah's just gathering useful data as far as I'm concerned.
 
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