Dr. Gregory Shushan, NDEs Vs. Transhumanism |556|

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Dr. Gregory Shushan, NDEs Vs. Transhumanism |556|
by Alex Tsakiris | Jun 14 | Consciousness Science
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Dr. Gregory Shushan is the world’s leading authority on the study of near-death experiences across culture and time.
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Why not aliens? They could be the key to the whole thing. There's more evidence in support of that than any other theory — that is except the theory that NDEs are a product of brain function. Logically, brain function is the first most rational explanation. Afterlives as people typically think of them are impossible, and alternate universes, although possible, are much farther out there than brain function or aliens. And let's not forget the hoaxes.

Personally, I like a combination of brain function, alternate universes, and aliens, but what I prefer doesn't mean I think it's true. I just think it's the most interesting ( to me ). Good show & guest ( as usual ).

On the issue of afterlives and technology — I'm sure most of us have already seen this one ...

 
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Thoroughly enjoyed this, thanks Alex! You may want to look at your transcript & make a change re: “That’s quite a buildup and I hope I can live up to it even sexually
its interesting that it’s said that there r more ndes due to technology bringing us back, vs a choice being given to us to return or stay. So if we say the numbers go up due to technology, does that mean that people r brought back no matter what they want, or that they would have died without the technology?
I don’t know if I am expressing my thoughts clearly enough, but saying more ndes probably due to better technology goes against our choice to go or stay, does it not? Basically that technology trumps choice?
 
Thoroughly enjoyed this, thanks Alex! You may want to look at your transcript & make a change re: “That’s quite a buildup and I hope I can live up to it even sexually
oops :) fixed

its interesting that it’s said that there r more ndes due to technology bringing us back, vs a choice being given to us to return or stay. So if we say the numbers go up due to technology, does that mean that people r brought back no matter what they want, or that they would have died without the technology?
I don’t know if I am expressing my thoughts clearly enough, but saying more ndes probably due to better technology goes against our choice to go or stay, does it not? Basically that technology trumps choice?
good point. I don't think anyone has a really good answer to this one.

One of the great takeaways for me was shushan's next-level agnosticism :) I mean, it's not like he's saying we can't come to any conclusions... and the conclusions he does reach are absolutely stunning given the crazy scientific paradigm we're in... on the other hand, he's careful not to go too far... he's willing to leave the mystery be.
 
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One of the great takeaways for me was shushan's next-level agnosticism :) I mean, it's not like he's saying we can't come to any conclusions... and the conclusions he does reach are absolutely stunning given the crazy scientific paradigm we're in... on the other hand, he's careful not to go too far... he's willing to leave the mystery be.

This really impresses me too.
For his academic open-mindedness, Shushan is a role model for how the humanities could be.

Your introduction of Shushan was also appropriate. He is one of the most important researchers in the world.
 
I'm actually amazed that Shushan has been tolerated by the system, because as you discussed in your first interview with Shushan, his work not only undermines dogmatic materialism but also the dogma that one shouldn't really compare cultures. But it is in following the evidence wherever it leads, looking at the data across time and between cultures, that the patterns in the data really stand out....

In other words,
(1) what is specific in NDEs to a certain culture?
and
(2) what is a commonality of NDEs across all cultures and throughout all of history?
 
Why not aliens? They could be the key to the whole thing. There's more evidence in support of that than any other theory — that is except the theory that NDEs are a product of brain function. Logically, brain function is the first most rational explanation. Afterlives as people typically think of them are impossible, and alternate universes, although possible, are much farther out there than brain function or aliens. And let's not forget the hoaxes.

Personally, I like a combination of brain function, alternate universes, and aliens, but what I prefer doesn't mean I think it's true. I just think it's the most interesting ( to me ). Good show & guest ( as usual ).

On the issue of afterlives and technology — I'm sure most of us have already seen this one ...

If you haven't watched some of this lady's extensive work w/ ADC (After Death Communication), you might find it enlightening.
The other source for your examination is the best evidence for the existence of the afterlife.
What I really liked is Shushan's admission, right up front, that his work is "messy." Just like studying alien encounters, NDEs, psi anecdotes of practically every kind, there is a lack of consistency but a few common themes show up.
 
oops :) fixed


good point. I don't think anyone has a really good answer to this one.

One of the great takeaways for me was shushan's next-level agnosticism :) I mean, it's not like he's saying we can't come to any conclusions... and the conclusions he does reach are absolutely stunning given the crazy scientific paradigm we're in... on the other hand, he's careful not to go too far... he's willing to leave the mystery be.
IMO, techno means of resuscitation aren't taking away our choice to go or stay. As I recollect it, the ppl who resist returning to a bodily existence are tolerantly shown why it is best that they return. Since NDE anecdotes are "messy," then I'm assuming there are some that are quite a bit more forceful than others.
The other issue is the most enigmatic or miraculous types, like Eben Alexander, MD, Mary C, Neal, MD, or Anita Moorijani, who were extremely sick & expected to die while in a terminal coma. Neal's story is brutally impressive, since she was underwater for over 10 minutes & her body was so traumatically broken that the shock alone from her injuries should have killed her. Yet all three "came back" & thrived after a complete recovery. Modern rescue breathing or CPR was not a feature in these cases.
 
Shushan is the man! A most precious nugget was the agreement w/ Alex about the nature of Love, Unconditional Forgiveness, Undying Affection experienced by most ppl. He mentioned Native Americans were told to tell ppl that wife beating was not good & that using precious food sources to "feed the dead" were not necessary. He was unawareness of any person being told they needed to go back & do a school shooting!
 
About the time I thought Shushan had said it all, he pointed out the stories of ppl who suffered for "coming back." They were zombies or some other unnatural creature. This made me think of one of my all-time favorite movies, "Highlander." As an immortal, Connor MacLeod (Chris Lambert) can't stay "dead" so he rears up in his wake & is chased out of the village. If you've never seen Highlander, it's a blockbuster for an old action movie.
Howard Storm is one of those "hellish experience" ppl. He became a christian minister who traveled extensively on missions for christ. His account of his NDE is starkly different from a lot of NDEs. For instance, he was suffering terribly in Hell, when he was swept up by J.C. after reciting the Lord's Prayer.
 
Dr. Gregory Shushan, NDEs Vs. Transhumanism |556|
by Alex Tsakiris | Jun 14 | Consciousness Science
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Dr. Gregory Shushan is the world’s leading authority on the study of near-death experiences across culture and time.
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I quite enjoyed this one. I do think it's one of the more fundamental research areas for
Dr. Gregory Shushan, NDEs Vs. Transhumanism |556|
by Alex Tsakiris | Jun 14 | Consciousness Science
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Dr. Gregory Shushan is the world’s leading authority on the study of near-death experiences across culture and time.
skeptiko-556-Gregory-Shushan-300x300.jpg
I quite enjoyed this interview. The Yuval Harari clip revealed a myopic view nicely counter-balanced by Gregory Shusan's work. This is core material for Skeptiko and the fundamental questions it explores.
 
I quite enjoyed this one. I do think it's one of the more fundamental research areas for

I quite enjoyed this interview. The Yuval Harari clip revealed a myopic view nicely counter-balanced by Gregory Shusan's work. This is core material for Skeptiko and the fundamental questions it explores.
thx William.
 
Thanks for this interview, Alex! Shushan's research is unique and important. The only "negative" aspect is that this is the second book within a month I had to buy after listening your show

Take care,

Antti
 
On one level Harari is right... Humans are an optimized solution to a set of environmental problems and technology has removed most of these environmental problems leaving many people to feel like they're leading depressing meaningless useless lives. When a person is working together with a small team of others to accomplish a difficult goal and becoming exceedingly proficient at the necessary useful skills to accomplish this goal that enables them and their children to survive, the person is "in their element"... picture a native American buffalo hunt or something like that. Most modern people don't fully get to experience the elation of "being in their element".

Technology has created a new type of environment to which we are not biologically or psychologically optimized and this has resulted in mass scale poor physical and mental health.

Sure there are some people who are self-motivated learners and achievers who thrive in this environment where all basic needs are easily met so that they can focus on achieving more lofty and esoteric or artistic goals for themselves... the Lex Fridman's and Elon Musks and Alex Tsakiris's... But for most people, solving all their basic problems destroys them.

I'm not saying the answer is to destroy technology and revert to a more primitive era (this was Ted Kaczynski's answer) although some part of me kind of wants to see that happen. I think most preppers kind of want the collapse to happen. Perhaps as Suspicious0beservers argues, the sun will go micro-nova and give us the real Great Reset.

Elon Musk's answer is: go find a new challenging environment (Mars) and merge with technology (Neuralink) so that we can become optimized for the new type of environment we are creating for ourselves.

Harari's answer is: lots of people probably just need to die and others will probably find meaning in virtual reality worlds or self-medicate with drugs and we need a new religion to help people find meaning in this new environment. I do agree with the last point. We will invent a new religion and it is already in process.. I think the new religion is that of the simulation and with this new technological spin all the old myths and religions could be recovered and reformed. For example: saving your soul is actually a thing... You don't want to delete any copies that were successful at achieving the goal but those that didn't do so well may be discarded. UFO/UAP sighting? Must be the administrators avatars popping in to check on things in the simulation they are running.

Here is the new religion of the simulation being indoctrinated into young kids:

NDE's are the life review of your stats and missions accomplished and achievements unlocked before you respawn and while you glance at those you can see for a few moments the game continuing on without you.

People are already exploring the idea of falling in love with an AI... is this just a fractal repetition of the "Sons of God" falling in love with the "daughters of men"?


Is life a game? Yes. Does that mean it isn't serious? No. Pain and threat of loss are what makes anything serious. The more potential pain and loss there can be the more serious the game. If you voluntarily give up everything: possessions, goals, ambitions, and make peace with the pain, then life is not serious. It will hurt a lot less. But what is the fun in that?

Regarding questions of free will and pre-destiny where NDE's reveal key events far in the future ahead of time...

There is no such thing as completely free will. Meaningful choices can only exist within a structure that limits those choices. Like JP's example... "Let's play a game!"
"Ok."
"Your move!"
"Uh... what do I do? What are the rules?"
You need rules to play a game. You need limitations on actions in order to take actions.

We have free will but only within the bounds of a structure and there is a structure organizing the events in our lives. Just as in many games/simulations, you have a lot of freedom to move around explore, but to keep the story progressing you have to proceed down the path and talk to certain characters and complete certain tasks. It is a mixture of high level planning and free will and that is how I think our lives are structured.
 
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Just finished listen #2 on this one. Since this is Level 3, and Level 3 players present, I'm going to critique instead of praise. and will go to read previous comments after, so sorry if any of my notes repeat previous mentions.
Notes:
  1. "After Life" - Disservice to use this term. We have no evidence that the human life is primary. I prefer "higher-realm", but not married to it.. Maybe "other realm" would also cover.
  2. Drowning Induced NDE - Not discussed. Could be the origin of water baptism, and if so, could indicate that we're trailing far behind our ancestors in NDE Research.
  3. The OA - Essential study material. See Note #4 "Military Weapons/weaponization Research"
    1. Have come to assume it was a military decision to scrap after season 2
      1. Too much public exposure to the subject of NDE research, and induced NDE's.
      2. Poss. of Higher-Realm > NWO > Military > Hollywood
      3. Increasingly likely that military active in the research (inductive, of course).
      4. Show was probably designed at military behest to bellwether test public comprension of the subject.
        1. Side note - Netflix anomaly: The OA had a huuge almost-religious following and scrapped after S-2.
  4. Military Weapons/weaponization Research - Of course they have/are.
  5. Modern Medicine - Multiple recent Skeptiko mentions of modern med = increase in NDE's. Of course that means they're inducible.
    1. (stay with me) If military had discovered proof that Higher-Realm is fake, the trans-h NWO would have played the card already.
  6. "Level 3 NDE Research" ? - If the military or others are practicing inductive research, then that drops us down to level 2, until we get ahold of their data.
  7. NDE Reports of "Going Home" (+) NDE Reports of some degree of omnipresence through time (=) Time to stop shaming the simulation model just because it was popularized. The simulation model is ancient, long before computers existed. Need to scrap the idea that it must be run on a computer disk
 
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Afterlives as people typically think of them are impossible
You're straw-manning this one again. People typically do not typically think of "after lives" as their physical body+brain being transported elsewhere. People typically think of "after life" as scientifically undetected possibilities beyond this life which may involve individual human consciousnesses. Therefore the scientific deduction you're leaning on is parsing out a fully separate subject.
 
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Just finished listen #2 on this one. Since this is Level 3, and Level 3 players present, I'm going to critique instead of praise. and will go to read previous comments after, so sorry if any of my notes repeat previous mentions.
Notes:
  1. "After Life" - Disservice to use this term. We have no evidence that the human life is primary. I prefer "higher-realm", but not married to it.. Maybe "other realm" would also cover
great point! all the NDE lang can be hard, but some are worse :)

  1. The OA - Essential study material. See Note #4 "Military Weapons/weaponization Research"
    1. Have come to assume it was a military decision to scrap after season 2
      1. Too much public exposure to the subject of NDE research, and induced NDE's.
      2. Poss. of Higher-Realm > NWO > Military > Hollywood
      3. Increasingly likely that military active in the research (inductive, of course).
      4. Show was probably designed at military behest to bellwether test public comprension of the subject.
        1. Side note - Netflix anomaly: The OA had a huuge almost-religious following and scrapped after S-2.
interesting. maybe. but there might be reason to think this other realm doesn't do that stuff.

  1. [*]Modern Medicine - Multiple recent Skeptiko mentions of modern med = increase in NDE's. Of course that means they're inducible.
    1. (stay with me) If military had discovered proof that Higher-Realm is fake, the trans-h NWO would have played the card already.
    [*]"Level 3 NDE Research" ? - If the military or others are practicing inductive research, then that drops us down to level 2, until we get ahold of their data.
    [*]NDE Reports of "Going Home" (+) NDE Reports of some degree of omnipresence through time (=) Time to stop shaming the simulation model just because it was popularized. The simulation model is ancient, long before computers existed. Need to scrap the idea that it must be run on a computer disk

interesting... gotta keep an eye on this one.
 
You're straw-manning this one again. People typically do not typically think of "after lives" as their physical body+brain being transported elsewhere. People typically think of "after life" as scientifically undetected possibilities beyond this life which may involve individual human consciousnesses. Therefore the scientific deduction you're leaning on is parsing out a fully separate subject.

No straw-manning. If you think that then you don't understand the rationale — that's okay. Not everyone takes the time to get it. Or maybe I'm just lousy at explaining it. I also don't think that people typically think of afterlives the way you describe it either. But again, that's okay. I haven't taken any formal polls on the subject. Maybe what's typical for you is very different than for me.

I'm just going on my personal investigations and what the vast majority of people I've encountered tend to think it means — which is a continuation of themselves as the person they are here in some other realm following the death of their body, which I refer to as their brain-body system. In other words they tend to say things like, "When I die I'm going to a better place." or have some other similar notion.

Rarely do they go into a scientific/philosophical discussion about consciousness. If they do, then that funnel inevitably leads exactly to where I am now, and I don't know of anyone who has resolved those issues in a way that allows one to consider whatever it is they think carries on after their death here to constitute a continuity of themselves there without arbitrarily ignoring or hand waving some really important issues.

Now — If you want to move the goalposts and start talking about the loopholes we've already been through, or that your version of an afterlife is something else that has nothing to do with any notion of a continuity of you when you die. That's a whole other conversation with a whole other set of possibilities. Let's just not conflate the two concepts.
 
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my personal investigations and what the vast majority of people I've encountered tend to think it means — which is a continuation of themselves as the person they are here in some other realm following the death of their body, which I refer to as their brain-body system. In other words they tend to say things like, "When I die I'm going to a better place." or some other similar notion.
You’re adding the “brain-body system” assumption to their picture of “when I die….”. Most people if you asked them specifically wouldn’t agree with this phrasing for a clear reason. Ask one stranger next time you get a chance: “do you think it’s your brain-body system that exists in the other side?” Let me know what the first one says.

Now — If you want to move the goalposts and start talking about the loopholes we've already been through, or that your version of an afterlife is something else that has nothing to do with any notion of a continuity of you when you die. That's a whole other conversation with a whole other set of possibilities. Let's just not conflate the two concepts.

I find your assumption far more loop-holey than mine. Where else in science do we see phenomenon and assume a counterpart or correlate impossible? Only with self-consciousness?
Matter - Dark Matter
Black hole - Singularity
Earth life - Drake Equation
Cause and Effect - Quantum Entanglement
Solid outer Planet - Core
Climate Change - Humanity responsibility

Science loves assuming things are possible. Pretty much anything except for conscious being more than human2022science can understand. Takes a big loop hole to carry that water in my opinion.

I would never say “it’s impossible that consciousness is a fluke” because thinking scientifically I understand that all of my comprehension/judgment/et all is subjective. Instead (as a scientist apparently) I say “I find it unlikely.”
 
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