Sir, controlled scientific studies are not anecdotal. So no, it is not true I am ignoring that all evidence is anecdotal evidence. All evidence is not anecdotal. I am declaring to you for a fact that controlled scientific studies are built on something other than anecdotal evidence.
Anecdotal evidence is extremely unreliable. For years people were pitching snake oil and all kinds of claims based on anecdotal evidence. But guess what? People see what they want to see. So, if they invest in snake oil, they think they see fantastic things happen with snake oil. And they tell stories of the success of snake oil. That is why scientists got away from trusting anecdotal evidence, and look for the results of controlled studies instead.
Can you name one controlled study that verifies that a soul leaves a person to observe something far away?
Are you suggesting we go back to the days where all sorts of flimflam cures were promoted on nothing more than anecdotal evidence? Are you suggesting that we abandon modern medicine based on controlled studies, and that we should trust anecdotes instead? If we allow your anecdotal evidence, why we would then disallow all the anecdotal claims for flimflam cures?
People who claim they heard from a dying twin can be reporting what they want to hear. In such circumstances, the mind can easily be fooled into thinking it saw what it wanted to see. How can that be evidence?
Even if twins are shown to consistently know when a distant twin dies, how would that prove that a soul left a body? How would you know that is not just some yet unknown sense such as a bat's radar that can sense things from a distance?
There is much evidence that it is the brain that thinks. I gave you one evidence: the complete loss of consciousness under anesthesia. You simply ignore that evidence.
And I give other evidence at
Is There Life after Death? - The Mind Set Free. Are you going to ignore all that also?
Sounds like you do not understand the nature of observation.
I will ignore the many straw men and many false comparisons in what you said.
Consciousness is the ability to experience.
Experiences are documented as anecdotes - a recording of what took place.
All observation is indeed anecdotal.
An observation is not "3.5" on a meter, or "yes/no" or "red"
All observation is an anecdotal statement of context and outcome.
An observation is
"I sampled such (whatever) and did a southern blot test, on and found a band at a location that corresponds to such and such molecular weight"
Or
"I looked up in the sky on such and such a day and time and saw trails of meteorites shoot across the sky here is a photograph
Or
"I looked up in the sky on such a day and time and saw trails of meteorites shoot across the my camera was not responsive enough to catch a photo"
Or
"At the time specified, I looked up and saw multicoloured streaks emerging from the sun - I have never seen it before or since, but others certainly did - it was reported all over the newspapers at the time even by those far away not expecting anything would happen"
Or
" I saw a lady on top of a building at such a time who appeared progressively and disappeared progressively.. Others saw her too. Millions of them. I do not have a photograph, others did. It cannot have been a projection because the authorities turned all the power off"
Or
" I span a black and white disk but I saw coloured bands"
Or
" We observed the lady for 20 days , she did not eat , drink or go to the toilet. She could not have done so. She was paralysed. We thought it was fraud so we tightened security and all the personnel were changed. Nobody except two new officials were allowed to enter or leave. All interactions were closely watched by other personell.
Yet she still did not eat , drink , defecate or urinate her body weight did not change. Science has no explanation for this."
I wager your willingness to accept any of those is based on prejudice not observation.
Science can only handle it if the events can be repeated or repeat naturally.
That does not invalidate the rest, it makes it harder to test.
Which is only a subset of experience and generally can only apply to inaminate objects. Beings are not nearly so controllable.
In this case Medical doctor Greyson is convinced on the basis of both his and other case histories.
You are letting your faith and or prejudice run away with what you will or will not accept.
I have little doubt you accept abiogenesis, yet you have no "controlled trial" of what happened for the first living cell. You cannot say when where or how it happened. All you have to coin your phrase is "flim flam".
There is plenty of testimony of how eucharistic miracles happened and pathology evidence of what they are. Cardiac tissue which a pathologist states is "compelling evidence of creation of heart tissue".
So not "flim flam" like your kind of abiogenesis then!
But as a scientist I am happy to be convinced by a structure for the first living cell and the demonstration of some process to it from non living chemicals - also how it got from there to our hideously complicated minimum cells.
FYI there are controlled trials of some types of telepathy in peer reviewed journals showing way beyond statistical significance.
But this is about consciousness.
Which evidence is in essence anecdotal as is all observation. An observer describing experiences. If the experiences can be repeated science can try to find patterns.