Matt Lambeau, Tree of Self-Evident Truth |546|

Well obviously it is best to avoid ruling out anything.

1) When people do access nonlocal information, they don't become in any way confused about their own identity (I assume). I think reporting one's own memories is just qualitatively different from reporting information about others (yes I know there is something called false memory syndrome). Those kids talk about "their real mummy", or "my previous mummy", or they show difficulty adapting to a lower status life, etc.

2) We really do not know how reality is constructed. Maybe people can reincarnate from the future, or can sequentially experience several lives at the same time - sequentially in T2 space, simultaneously in T1 space!

I feel that warping evidence to fit 'obvious' constraints may not be a wise thing to do. Think of those early electron diffraction patterns - wouldn't it have been easier to explain them some other way? Maybe the electrons got disturbed by the vibrations in the crystal lattices which act as the diffraction grating for objects of the electron's mass, or maybe there were some other vibrations in the measuring equipment itself...... It is always intellectually much easier to debunk an awkward observation rather than take it seriously, because you can leave the debunking details vague. I reckon that QM could have had a very checkered history if modern scepticism had taken off around 1900.



Well, clearly people live their lives with a lot of facts screened off them - if you assume any form of psi, up to and including afterlives.

I'd want to see a lot of reincarnation research done before I'd start changing the apparent facts. For example, at the moment, reincarnation cases select themselves - we can't deduce the frequency of reincarnation.

David



1)The thing about the Stevenson style cases though is that they primarily feature young children whose sense of “self” is not yet completely formed and thus is vulnerable. Under those circumstances, I think it is hazardous to assume that anomalous information showing up in the psyche would not be overpowering in ways that could well be thoroughly confusing and confounding. Most of these memories start to fade as the child begins to grow and the self becomes more stable, complete with its own memories. It strikes me more as an uneasy “resonance” with information elsewhere. Am I saying that I think it is impossible that it could be reincarnation? No – I am not saying that. But I also think there is not enough clarity to make such a conclusion. It is true that these cases are unusual in terms of the specificity of the information involved. I again come back to my suspicion that the collective (or individual) unconscious isn’t *primarily* concerned with what we are used to calling “truth” but with psychological validation. Especially in reincarnation-friendly cultures, the existence of such cases is powerfully validating.



2) On 'from the future', parallel lives, etc.

Okay, but then (imo of course) you’re starting to “melt” the very concept of reincarnation itself. If it’s from the future it’s not “re’ if it’s simultaneous, then it’s not really “incarnation” and so on. What if deep down, consciousness just has access to all its forms and events *everywhere*, and nonlocally in both time and space, but that’s too heavy and abstract for us, so we package it in multiple easier-to-digest ways, one of which is past lives.



On 'evidence warping':

Sure. But it’s exactly because of some anomalies that I have pause, along with some basic logical considerations, as I indicated above. It can’t be straightforward, for instance, if a child can remember details of a “past life” which are actually mixed together from two previous individuals who existed concurrently. The scars and birthmarks thing is interesting, along with the violent deaths and the “life cut short” pattern. But I’d caution again: the unconscious KNOWS how to pull all our strings. Don’t be too swift in falling for its patter.



On 'frequency of cases':

Yes, but obviously if there are 7 billion humans in 2020, and there were only 1.5 billion bodies available to incarnate in during 1900, it would have to be a rare phenomenon at best. Something's up.
 
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