Tricia Robertson, 30 Years of After-death Communication Research |462|

Tricia is actually Scottish, but the Irish and Scottish do get along well.
No we don't:D Bloody Irish.
But seriously, I also really enjoyed this show.
I'd never heard of Tricia before, but I'll make the effort to find her books now.
I'm not at Alex's Stage 3 yet - still getting a handle on how compelling the evidence for mediumship being evidence of survival rather than "super psi".
 
... still getting a handle on how compelling the evidence for mediumship being evidence of survival rather than "super psi".
Personally, I tend to take a range of different lines of evidence in considering survival, rather than resting on just mediumship.

On the topic of survival versus 'super-psi', there is a consideration of that topic in a thread on the Psience Quest forum. If the topic interests you, it could be worthwhile reading. Or join the forum and add your own thoughts too.
https://psiencequest.net/forums/thread-super-psi-some-notes-from-braude-s-immortal-remains
 
I'm not at Alex's Stage 3 yet - still getting a handle on how compelling the evidence for mediumship being evidence of survival rather than "super psi".
How seriously do you take the concept of super ψ?

To me, it is an absurdity. I mean some people have a point of view built around materialism, and then they try to argue against one non-materialist conclusion by concocting a theory which blows the limitations of materialism away - without actually providing any evidence!

David
 
How seriously do you take the concept of super ψ?

To me, it is an absurdity. I mean some people have a point of view built around materialism, and then they try to argue against one non-materialist conclusion by concocting a theory which blows the limitations of materialism away - without actually providing any evidence!

David
Not very seriously - but I have to consider given options and that appears to be one of the most commonly proffered.
I agree that it sounds a tad desperate, coming from the Usual Suspects.
 
Not very seriously - but I have to consider given options and that appears to be one of the most commonly proffered.
I agree that it sounds a tad desperate, coming from the Usual Suspects.
The thing is, that science needs Occam's Razor to come to any conclusions at all. Otherwise it is always possible to produce arbitrarily elaborate theories to thwart any conclusion you don't agree with.

How about a theory in which upon death our minds are copied to a simulator that can simulate what the person would have done and thought if he had survived death, but with no conscious awareness. Maybe mediums access one of these simulators!

I wish parapsychology had just bashed the concept of super- ψ on the head, and not tried to play their game.

I mean, once you give up materialism - which super-ψ does - you really have to rethink the likelihood of all sorts of outcomes. Life after death was only improbable if no psychic phenomena existed.

David
 
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Personally, I tend to take a range of different lines of evidence in considering survival, rather than resting on just mediumship.

On the topic of survival versus 'super-psi', there is a consideration of that topic in a thread on the Psience Quest forum. If the topic interests you, it could be worthwhile reading. Or join the forum and add your own thoughts too.
https://psiencequest.net/forums/thread-super-psi-some-notes-from-braude-s-immortal-remains
Thanks for that - a really interesting read.
 
Thanks for that - a really interesting read.

I'd just like to comment that I'm not a materialist by any stretch of the imagination (currently being much taken with idealism), but nonetheless, I find superpsi a plausible possibility. More plausible, perhaps, than the idea that after death an egoic personality survives and communicates with or via a medium. A personality, moreover, that in some cases can apparently be an observer of what is going on at the present time in, say, the life of a living relative.

It is possible that information is never lost and can in some circumstances be accessed by a living person, either purposely or accidentally. The accessor might merely personify the information, interpreting it as a deceased individual.

I'm not denying that mediums and talented psychics can have unusual perceptions that sometimes turn out to be verifiable. I'm rather questioning the necessity of survival of an egoic personality after death, and by that I mean a personality that is similar to when s/he was alive -- worrying about something unresolved in life, or anxious to communicate relatives, friends or acquaintances. When alive, many of us may have unresolved issues or painful memories or love/hate for certain people, and such things may be part of the ever-accumulating, usually subliminal or unconscious body of information out there somewhere in the ether, so to speak.

For the most part, this information is inaccessible, but some individuals with psychic propensities may be able to access portions of it. What they make of it depends on the way they're inclined to interpret what they experience. Avowed mediums and psychics may interpret it one way, and other people another, sometimes even rejecting it as something that at some level they might have been subliminally aware of.

The information, if it exists, wouldn't necessarily all be true. People think about all sorts of things, including those that are fanciful or speculative. It's mainly the information that turns out to be veridical that tends to draw the attention. If, say, a "spirit" or "ghost" says that incorporated in the foundations of a building can be found a certain object, and subsequently that object is found, that doesn't automatically imply that discarnate entities exist. Rather, it could imply that the accessor of the information in some unspecified way intuited it. Nor, if the object isn't found in the specified place, does it mean that the accessor is mistaken, self-deluded or even lying; maybe at some point, someone thought about secreting the object in such a place, and it is that information that has been accessed.

The reason that I'm rather sceptical about spirits (including channelled ones) and ghosts that seem to exhibit personalities possessed in life is that it conflicts with my ideas about what happens after death. I believe that the egoic personality really does die, but that the true or essential self persists. The last thing on the mind of this essential self, I posit, would be consideration of mundane events. Some might argue NDEs indicate that after death, there is at least some awareness of such events. However, people who've had NDEs, by definition, didn't actually die. They survived to tell the tale.

For me, the NDE is a state poised between life and death; actual death comes about when an individual's dissociation (at the human level at any rate) from mind at large, or cosmic consciousness, ends and we enter a different "realm" for want of a better word. The twilight experience of an NDE is coloured at least to some extent by what has been experienced in life, coupled with intimations of what is to come.

For an idealist like me, everything is mental, and that includes human beings, which we all know for sure exist, and which Bernardo Kastrup's version of idealism hypothesises are dissociated alters of universal consciousness. We are its "organs", if you like, for investigating itself in a metaconscious (i.e. self-ware) way, although it itself might well not be metaconscious. Fantastically intelligent, to be sure, but not self-ware (similar to how high-functioning savants can have incredible capacities in mathematics, linguistics or music for instance, without knowing how they do it -- check out Srinivasa Ramanujan, Daniel Tammet and Derek Paravinci.

If such individuals can have inexplicable ways of accessing information, why not psychics and mediums? They aren't savants in the usual sense, of course, and they would, I suspect, have to have some kind of rationale in their own minds to explain what they do. So they come up with what to them are rational explanations involving life after death, ghosts, spirits and so on. But to me, idealism prompts a simpler explanation for what we think of as unusual perceptions; and in my mind, it isn't incompatible with the general concept of superpsi. YMMV, of course.
 
For me, the NDE is a state poised between life and death; actual death comes about when an individual's dissociation (at the human level at any rate) from mind at large, or cosmic consciousness, ends and we enter a different "realm" for want of a better word. The twilight experience of an NDE is coloured at least to some extent by what has been experienced in life, coupled with intimations of what is to come.
Yes, but you have to start to postulate an awful lot of trickery out there - and for what purpose? I mean people have to appear as if they were dead relatives, and yet not be. There is often a narrative which sometimes ends in a simple choice - do you want to go back or not? The implication is that you can choose to stay, not that you will immediately suffer "egoic death".

Also, from everything I have read, NDE's are anything but twilight experiences!
For an idealist like me, everything is mental, and that includes human beings, which we all know for sure exist, and which Bernardo Kastrup's version of idealism hypothesises are dissociated alters of universal consciousness.
That may be ultimately true, but nothing suggests that we get immediately re-associated after death. Idealism admits too many different possibilities, I don't think it is helpful to reason from it. By analogy, from a physical point of view, we are all made up of elementary particles, but that does not mean that on physical death, we immediately dissociate into elementary particles! I think there may be many layers of complexity in between death and ultimate re-absorption.

David
 
TY to David and Typoz for looking into the suspension for us.

And for the link to the other forum--my afterlife cup of tea for sure.
 
Re: Alex's question to Tricia about Scottish Calvinism and views on money, magic and spirituality I'd offer this:

Why do cultures and economic arrangements as they stand get a pass? I think a lot of us receive our current conditions as though they are meant to be the way they are, or are morally acceptable, simply because that's how we and our recent ancestors received them. A lot of things seem natural when you don't think about them much, but, when viewed on a large enough scale, are historical anomalies and appear arbitrary.

Is it moral or right that a large amount of people around the world labor away for subsistence (or less) and spend their entire lives in this way? Is it right that even in the more developed parts of the world that many people spend their lifetimes pursuing the interests of their economic betters, essentially ensuring that the interests of these betters are protected and furthered, encoded deeper into the fabric of society, while the prerogatives of the lower classes become easier and easier to dismiss and ignore?

This is a silly example, but I notice it whenever I visit some family members who spend a lot of time watching the Hallmark channel: There are some folks who actually cannot see the poor and the downtrodden who are all around them, enabling their lifestyles, and who the upper classes are wholly dependent upon for their comfort. If you watch the movies on the Hallmark channel, or watch shows on HGTV where poor people's foreclosed houses are being scooped up for pennies on the dollar and flipped for wealthy people's profits, you will see what I mean. Any given Hallmark movie consists of a love story between two attractive and wealthy people who live in incredible comfort and if they just could connect those two last pieces of the puzzle together and find a sexy, romantic relationship to fill in the rest, then all would be right with the world. These people roll around in luxury vehicles, live in beautiful, comfortably furnished homes; have loving, caring, sane and stable family members who also have ample money and resources and the worst stressors most of these characters encounter is a little romantic ennui and some very formulaic and temporary misunderstandings that get easily cleared up by the end of the movie where everyone enjoys a big group hug and a warm cup of cocoa by the big stone fireplace in a room larger than most people's apartments. Meanwhile, it takes an army of conspicuously invisible people at the bottom of the pyramid scheme to lick the boots of these people and keep them hoisted up there on their stage of self-interest and self-involvement. People who don't get to pursue loving relationships or meaningful careers or buy dream homes for themselves. People who don't even get to go to sleep in a safe bedroom at night for a full night's sleep with a full belly.

I bring this up simply because I think it's important to look through the other end of the telescope at this EVIL question here on Skeptiko. Are the assumptions that we're looking at evil from sound? Is the current arrangement of reality as most people experience it GOOD? Is this life as it should be? What's the standard? 1950's America? 1980's Regan-era America? 1776 Colonial America? The time of the first settlers? Some other country and some other time? What folkways and mores are we talking about?

In this light I don't see any problem with people performing rituals to better their financial situations - the same as I wouldn't fault anyone for praying to Yahweh or to Christ himself to bestow riches on them. Poverty and social disempowerment are EVIL in my eyes. When a human life is bound and diminished within an economic arrangement that diminishes the vast bulk of humanity and wrecks the Earth in the process that is EVIL. If someone needs some money to get the hell out of a shit job that just makes it more likely that shit people get to keep calling the shots and pursuing shit prerogatives then so what if they call up some deity or say a prayer for financial deliverance? They're basically responding to something deep within their nature that is telling them that they deserve better than this state of affairs - and I agree with them.

Just some thoughts. I think it's a conversation worth continuing to pursue.
 
Re: Alex's question to Tricia about Scottish Calvinism and views on money, magic and spirituality I'd offer this:

Why do cultures and economic arrangements as they stand get a pass? I think a lot of us receive our current conditions as though they are meant to be the way they are, or are morally acceptable, simply because that's how we and our recent ancestors received them. A lot of things seem natural when you don't think about them much, but, when viewed on a large enough scale, are historical anomalies and appear arbitrary.

Is it moral or right that a large amount of people around the world labor away for subsistence (or less) and spend their entire lives in this way? Is it right that even in the more developed parts of the world that many people spend their lifetimes pursuing the interests of their economic betters, essentially ensuring that the interests of these betters are protected and furthered, encoded deeper into the fabric of society, while the prerogatives of the lower classes become easier and easier to dismiss and ignore?

This is a silly example, but I notice it whenever I visit some family members who spend a lot of time watching the Hallmark channel: There are some folks who actually cannot see the poor and the downtrodden who are all around them, enabling their lifestyles, and who the upper classes are wholly dependent upon for their comfort. If you watch the movies on the Hallmark channel, or watch shows on HGTV where poor people's foreclosed houses are being scooped up for pennies on the dollar and flipped for wealthy people's profits, you will see what I mean. Any given Hallmark movie consists of a love story between two attractive and wealthy people who live in incredible comfort and if they just could connect those two last pieces of the puzzle together and find a sexy, romantic relationship to fill in the rest, then all would be right with the world. These people roll around in luxury vehicles, live in beautiful, comfortably furnished homes; have loving, caring, sane and stable family members who also have ample money and resources and the worst stressors most of these characters encounter is a little romantic ennui and some very formulaic and temporary misunderstandings that get easily cleared up by the end of the movie where everyone enjoys a big group hug and a warm cup of cocoa by the big stone fireplace in a room larger than most people's apartments. Meanwhile, it takes an army of conspicuously invisible people at the bottom of the pyramid scheme to lick the boots of these people and keep them hoisted up there on their stage of self-interest and self-involvement. People who don't get to pursue loving relationships or meaningful careers or buy dream homes for themselves. People who don't even get to go to sleep in a safe bedroom at night for a full night's sleep with a full belly.

I bring this up simply because I think it's important to look through the other end of the telescope at this EVIL question here on Skeptiko. Are the assumptions that we're looking at evil from sound? Is the current arrangement of reality as most people experience it GOOD? Is this life as it should be? What's the standard? 1950's America? 1980's Regan-era America? 1776 Colonial America? The time of the first settlers? Some other country and some other time? What folkways and mores are we talking about?

In this light I don't see any problem with people performing rituals to better their financial situations - the same as I wouldn't fault anyone for praying to Yahweh or to Christ himself to bestow riches on them. Poverty and social disempowerment are EVIL in my eyes. When a human life is bound and diminished within an economic arrangement that diminishes the vast bulk of humanity and wrecks the Earth in the process that is EVIL. If someone needs some money to get the hell out of a shit job that just makes it more likely that shit people get to keep calling the shots and pursuing shit prerogatives then so what if they call up some deity or say a prayer for financial deliverance? They're basically responding to something deep within their nature that is telling them that they deserve better than this state of affairs - and I agree with them.

Just some thoughts. I think it's a conversation worth continuing to pursue.
As the grandchild of Scottish Calvinists, living in Johannesburg, I thank you for this.
The society around me here is one of the most egregious examples of the imbalance, yet I, too, cleave to the Protestant work ethic and Calvinist attitudes about money.
Even though it's maybe not strictly relevant in this thread, the ideas you put across are very, very important in the question of whether this human race lives or dies quickly.
 
My son Ryan, a registered nurse, died suddenly Sunday Sept 5 of heart failure, a ruptured aorta. He was into competitive weightlifting and we believe this contributed to his death. He was 33. As a Christian I should not question the fact that he is with God now as I believe all nurses go to Heaven. He was a good boy and a good man. But I remain overcome by grief and a longing to know he is well. Is there anything Trisha can do to help me?
 
My son Ryan, a registered nurse, died suddenly Sunday Sept 5 of heart failure, a ruptured aorta. He was into competitive weightlifting and we believe this contributed to his death. He was 33. As a Christian I should not question the fact that he is with God now as I believe all nurses go to Heaven. He was a good boy and a good man. But I remain overcome by grief and a longing to know he is well. Is there anything Trisha can do to help me?
I am really sorry to hear that - all I can say is that his death was presumably very swift.

I think Alex can probably put you in touch with a good medium living near you. From what I have read, it is better to wait a month or two before trying to get in touch.

David
 
Re: Alex's question to Tricia about Scottish Calvinism and views on money, magic and spirituality I'd offer this:

Why do cultures and economic arrangements as they stand get a pass? I think a lot of us receive our current conditions as though they are meant to be the way they are, or are morally acceptable, simply because that's how we and our recent ancestors received them. A lot of things seem natural when you don't think about them much, but, when viewed on a large enough scale, are historical anomalies and appear arbitrary.

Is it moral or right that a large amount of people around the world labor away for subsistence (or less) and spend their entire lives in this way? Is it right that even in the more developed parts of the world that many people spend their lifetimes pursuing the interests of their economic betters, essentially ensuring that the interests of these betters are protected and furthered, encoded deeper into the fabric of society, while the prerogatives of the lower classes become easier and easier to dismiss and ignore?

This is a silly example, but I notice it whenever I visit some family members who spend a lot of time watching the Hallmark channel: There are some folks who actually cannot see the poor and the downtrodden who are all around them, enabling their lifestyles, and who the upper classes are wholly dependent upon for their comfort. If you watch the movies on the Hallmark channel, or watch shows on HGTV where poor people's foreclosed houses are being scooped up for pennies on the dollar and flipped for wealthy people's profits, you will see what I mean. Any given Hallmark movie consists of a love story between two attractive and wealthy people who live in incredible comfort and if they just could connect those two last pieces of the puzzle together and find a sexy, romantic relationship to fill in the rest, then all would be right with the world. These people roll around in luxury vehicles, live in beautiful, comfortably furnished homes; have loving, caring, sane and stable family members who also have ample money and resources and the worst stressors most of these characters encounter is a little romantic ennui and some very formulaic and temporary misunderstandings that get easily cleared up by the end of the movie where everyone enjoys a big group hug and a warm cup of cocoa by the big stone fireplace in a room larger than most people's apartments. Meanwhile, it takes an army of conspicuously invisible people at the bottom of the pyramid scheme to lick the boots of these people and keep them hoisted up there on their stage of self-interest and self-involvement. People who don't get to pursue loving relationships or meaningful careers or buy dream homes for themselves. People who don't even get to go to sleep in a safe bedroom at night for a full night's sleep with a full belly.

I bring this up simply because I think it's important to look through the other end of the telescope at this EVIL question here on Skeptiko. Are the assumptions that we're looking at evil from sound? Is the current arrangement of reality as most people experience it GOOD? Is this life as it should be? What's the standard? 1950's America? 1980's Regan-era America? 1776 Colonial America? The time of the first settlers? Some other country and some other time? What folkways and mores are we talking about?

In this light I don't see any problem with people performing rituals to better their financial situations - the same as I wouldn't fault anyone for praying to Yahweh or to Christ himself to bestow riches on them. Poverty and social disempowerment are EVIL in my eyes. When a human life is bound and diminished within an economic arrangement that diminishes the vast bulk of humanity and wrecks the Earth in the process that is EVIL. If someone needs some money to get the hell out of a shit job that just makes it more likely that shit people get to keep calling the shots and pursuing shit prerogatives then so what if they call up some deity or say a prayer for financial deliverance? They're basically responding to something deep within their nature that is telling them that they deserve better than this state of affairs - and I agree with them.

Just some thoughts. I think it's a conversation worth continuing to pursue.
One comment I'd make - not in opposition to what you have written - is that money and happiness really do not equate. The movies you watch may not represent that well. For example, would you actually want the degree of luxury you describe? Would you want a household that needed to be run almost like a business, or a car that was so smart you daren't park it in most locations?

The extremely poor in third world countries are something else - it is much harder to believe they are happy. The strange thing is that even back when I was a kid, people were sending money to try to solve this problem - and nothing has actually changed.

I agree that evil isn't just about child molestation - important though that is.

David
 
My son Ryan, a registered nurse, died suddenly Sunday Sept 5 of heart failure, a ruptured aorta. He was into competitive weightlifting and we believe this contributed to his death. He was 33. As a Christian I should not question the fact that he is with God now as I believe all nurses go to Heaven. He was a good boy and a good man. But I remain overcome by grief and a longing to know he is well. Is there anything Trisha can do to help me?

I'm very sorry for your loss, Garry. I imagine there are a number of folks on this forum who can give you good advice and point you in helpful directions when you've had some time to process what has happened. I've consulted with a Windbridge medium in the past and have gotten some helpful feedback. I would imagine that Jim might have some helpful materials on his website that you could take into consideration as well. Please take care of yourself and give yourself the time and space you need to grieve right now. What David says about taking some time is well established, think of it as a way of being kind to yourself and your feelings.
 
My son Ryan, a registered nurse, died suddenly Sunday Sept 5 of heart failure, a ruptured aorta. He was into competitive weightlifting and we believe this contributed to his death. He was 33. As a Christian I should not question the fact that he is with God now as I believe all nurses go to Heaven. He was a good boy and a good man. But I remain overcome by grief and a longing to know he is well. Is there anything Trisha can do to help me?

I am so very sorry for your loss. My partner died suddenly in 2010 and I knew nothing about the afterlife so I was in misery for years Three yrs ago I found all the material about continuing life after physical death and I dove in. Before long I was able to communicate with all of my deceased loved ones.. This link will give you a lot to explore about Julie Beshel's offerings, much of it free and all of it aimed at helping those who are grieving. https://mailchi.mp/windbridgecenter/sep2020?e=[UNIQID]

I also recommend the FB group AREI Discussion very highly.

For me the most helpful book I found was Bob Olson's Answers about the Afterlife (it is at Amazon). He also vets mediums and has a list he endorses: https://bobolson.com/about-bob-olson/



P.S. Tricia works with Julie. Alex recommends her highly.
 
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My son Ryan, a registered nurse, died suddenly Sunday Sept 5 of heart failure, a ruptured aorta. He was into competitive weightlifting and we believe this contributed to his death. He was 33. As a Christian I should not question the fact that he is with God now as I believe all nurses go to Heaven. He was a good boy and a good man. But I remain overcome by grief and a longing to know he is well. Is there anything Trisha can do to help me?

I've come to believe that finding a medium that's right for you and your family ( if you choose to go that route) is part of the process.

hope you can peace for you and yr fam.
 
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