General anesthesia and consciousness

Going through this thread again, I do wonder one thing: is it just me or do all the 'slamdunks' for OBE near death experiences always seem to be a decade at the most or a few years AFTER the fact has occured?

Bradskii said:

Nearly missed this.

No, we don't have independent reports. All the reports do is simply repeat the story as it was first told. There was and has been no attempt to verify any of it.

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Hopefully the independent report looks at everything, weights up the evidence for and against and comes to a conclusion one way or the other based on the facts of the case. This is the same procedure a court would take.

The point is we have investigations specifically done to determine the truth. This is opposed to the skeptics approach which is not even to investigate, interview those involved, check the details to see if they are consistent, look for contrary evidence.

None of that has been done by skeptics. So its the audacity that they claim truth when they have not even made the effort to find that truth but rather just throw mud.

Tinker Grey said:

@Tropical Wilds and @Jesse Dornfeld,

These discussions get a little sloppy with short hands like using NDE as an indicator of what is under dispute.

I don't think @Bradskii would dispute that NDEs occur. Rather the dispute is whether the NDE is an actual out-of-body experience or whether just an artifact of the brain shutting down or rebooting.

Some have alleged (in this thread?) that these things were experienced when the brain was*actually* shut down. Nobody has provided a way to know that that is true.

That NDEs happen is not the dispute; it's whether the subject saw what they saw and how.

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Sorry, I used it because it’s the common shorthand and I saw it used earlier. Didn’t mean to cause confusion.

As for if it’s an actual out-of-body experience or a byproduct of the brain shutting down, there isn’t nor will ever be a way to prove the former, and the latter is almost certainly a component but I don’t think rules out the former. There had to be some biological trigger point that tells the body and brain “well, I guess that is it” and starts the ultimate shutdown.

But since the process is entirely internal, self-reported, not universal, and purely anecdotal, not to mention subjective, there aren’t the quantifiable waypoints that would ever qualify as scientific proof of what they are and what their function is. I’d really be dubious of anybody who says there is objective, tangible proof of it being an out-of-body or spiritually led transition.

Even when training as an EMT, but more relevantly a death doula, their occurrence is treated like a “just FYI, it could happen and people report them, here’s what it means for how you do your job” not a “it could happen and the science/medical reasons why are…” Other similar phenomenon include a burst of energy before death or people reporting that deceased people of personal significance said they were coming to get them.

Is the activity the result of a last adrenaline dump by a system shutting down? A way to prepare the body biologically for death? A protective measure designed to internally regulate the death process to make it easier? Was the seeing of people a dream? A hallucination from a brain working less efficiently and beginning the death process? Actual visits from the deceased acting as fetches? A means for the brain to reconcile with itself the process of death as sort of a pre-trauma response? A combination of all those things? From a medical professional stance, and in our death doula training, nobody ever says “science says it happens and it happens because…” only that it seems to be anecdotally reported experience that happens enough across the spectrum that it should be noted.

Like, in training, it’s made clear that nobody knows why this occurs, but if Mi Ma’s day-to-day is sleeping until 10a, shuffling out of bed to the TV, wearing the same PJs all day, and low social engagement, then suddenly one day she’s up at 8a, in the kitchen making pancakes, fully dressed and throughly engaging the people around her, call the family. Tell them the writing is on the wall and it’s best to visit Mi Ma one last time ASAP. Why is it this way? Not sure, just know it can happen. Is it a universal experience all have? No. But common enough to discuss.

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

Going through this thread again, I do wonder one thing: is it just me or do all the 'slamdunks' for OBE near death experiences always seem to be a decade at the most or a few years AFTER the fact has occured?

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From most of the videos I've watched, they say they've never heard of NDE before so they are afraid to talk about it. That's why a support group like IANDS was created.

Laodicean60 said:

From most of the videos I've watched, they say they've never heard of NDE before so they are afraid to talk about it. That's why a support group like IANDS was created.

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Yeah, but still, it does call into question the authenticity of out of body experiences in NDEs. Near Death Experiences happen, that's a fact. Out of Body Experiences like what is described above is a whole differen kettle of fish and that sort of thing is harder to ascertain as factual since it is, as shown repeatedly, all just anecdotal.

Tinker Grey said:

It's fascinating to me that all NDEs seem to use a evidence things about the place they are being resuscitated at rather than, say, the goings on in the oval office at the same time.

Why don't DNEs talk about things that the patient couldn't possibly know such as what was happening between Rishi Sunak and his spouse rather than the regular goings on in an ER?

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To be fair, some of the NDEs we’ve read about do focus on things not in the room. Some have said they saw what friends and family were doing at the moment of death, others say they saw places of personal significance one last time, some have said they saw places they had always wanted to see (Paris came up a lot). One woman even talked about seeing the Disney castle one last time.

If they actually had an out-of-body experience they took them there, completely unprovable. You can’t look back and say “there was a person standing in front of Cinderella’s castle wearing a red sweater at 11:23a, the time when this person died.” It could just as easily be a brain doing an instinctual dump of serotonin or dopamine to protect itself in trauma. Heck, it could even be hallucinations from meds given, like opioids.

Any belief that a person’s awareness left their body and traveled to anywhere, in the room or in Disney, would be 100% based on faith and not provable science.

I think that the reason it’s not “I saw what Dr. Rishi was doing for breakfast that day” is because death is a self-centered experience. It’s not about Dr. Rishi, it’s about the dying person. Also, seeing what Dr. Rishi (who I’m assuming was in the room for the NDE) did that morning implies the transference of consciousness or consciousness traveling through time. Time shifts aren’t commonly reported in NDE, though “I saw me through the yes of my doctor” or “I saw how my family would cope without me” or “I saw what would happen to my family/a person” comes up more frequently.

Again, subjective, self-reported, anecdotal, not quantifiable or provable. And with seeing the future, the prediction paradox kicks in… It happened because it was the logical outcome or it didn’t happen because whomever got the prediction changed their behavior and changed the outcome as it was foretold they should do.

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

Going through this thread again, I do wonder one thing: is it just me or do all the 'slamdunks' for OBE near death experiences always seem to be a decade at the most or a few years AFTER the fact has occured?

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I can't remember which case it was but one of the researchers said that this area of study is only recently becoming more relevant and important. But there is a stigma for those who engage in such studies as its still regarded as woo and betraying the sciences.

But there are millions of these experiences which have never really been reported properly. People put them down to something else, are fearful of ridecule. There is a site for NDE stories and there are 1,000s happening. You just have to investigate and you will find many. Its up to you whether you believe them or not.


There has even been studies into the whole phenomena showing there there is remarkable consistency of certain aspects like meeting dead realatives as opposed to living ones, the bright light and tunnel, meeting some divine being or light, having a life review, supernormal senses like 360 degree sight, hearing distant conversations, instant travelling, super memory knowing long forgetton of unknown event later revealed as true.

Now if it was all down to subjective dulusions or imagination there would be vast differences especially culturally but there is remarkable consistency implying some common phenomena beyond the psychological or cultural influences. Thats why we need more reseach as I think this is the new area of discovery about human consciousness.

stevevw said:

I can't remember which case it was but one of the researchers said that this area of study is only recently becoming more relevant and important. But there is a stigma for those who engage in such studies as its still regarded as woo and betraying the sciences.

But there are millions of these experiences which have never really been reported properly. People put them down to something else, are fearful of ridecule. There is a site for NDE stories and there are 1,000s happening. You just have to investigate and you will find many. Its up to you whether you believe them or not.

NDERF Home Page

Near Death Experience Research Foundation the largest collection of Near Death Experiences (NDE) in over 23 Languages. With thousands of full-text near death experiences posted. Share your near death experience, research, spiritually transforming events, consciousness studies, extensive...

www.nderf.org

Newest Accounts

IANDS, International Association for Near Death Studies

iands.org

There has even been studies into the whole phenomena showing there there is remarkable consistency of certain aspects like meeting dead realatives as opposed to living ones, the bright light and tunnel, meeting some divine being or light, having a life review, supernormal senses like 360 degree sight, hearing distant conversations, instant travelling, super memory knowing long forgetton of unknown event later revealed as true.

Now if it was all down to subjective dulusions or imagination there would be vast differences especially culturally but there is remarkable consistency implying some common phenomena beyond the psychological or cultural influences. Thats why we need more reseach as I think this is the new area of discovery about human consciousness.

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I still feel that since all claims about out of body experinces in near death experiences are only anecdotal claims that cannot be independently verified do make it impossible to independently verify them as factual.

People can claim they have out of body experiences until the cows come home, and there's nothing wrong with that. What a person thinks they experience is what they think they've experienced. But by the very nature of out of body experiences, it is virtually impossible to accurately verify them because there is no ethical way to do so. Claims by themselves are not evidence of anything.

Tropical Wilds said:

To be fair, some of the NDEs we’ve read about do focus on things not in the room. Some have said they saw what friends and family were doing at the moment of death, others say they saw places of personal significance one last time, some have said they saw places they had always wanted to see (Paris came up a lot). One woman even talked about seeing the Disney castle one last time.

If they actually had an out-of-body experience they took them there, completely unprovable. You can’t look back and say “there was a person standing in front of Cinderella’s castle wearing a red sweater at 11:23a, the time when this person died.” It could just as easily be a brain doing an instinctual dump of serotonin or dopamine to protect itself in trauma. Heck, it could even be hallucinations from meds given, like opioids.

Any belief that a person’s awareness left their body and traveled to anywhere, in the room or in Disney, would be 100% based on faith and not provable science.

I think that the reason it’s not “I saw what Dr. Rishi was doing for breakfast that day” is because death is a self-centered experience. It’s not about Dr. Rishi, it’s about the dying person. Also, seeing what Dr. Rishi (who I’m assuming was in the room for the NDE) did that morning implies the transference of consciousness or consciousness traveling through time. Time shifts aren’t commonly reported in NDE, though “I saw me through the yes of my doctor” or “I saw how my family would cope without me” or “I saw what would happen to my family/a person” comes up more frequently.

Again, subjective, self-reported, anecdotal, not quantifiable or provable. And with seeing the future, the prediction paradox kicks in… It happened because it was the logical outcome or it didn’t happen because whomever got the prediction changed their behavior and changed the outcome as it was foretold they should do.

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Except people have seen a deceased relative standing in front of them and then this was verified later by the deceased person after recovery. There are several cases I have read like this.

stevevw said:

Except people have seen a deceased relative standing in front of them and then this was verified later by the deceased person after recovery. There are several cases I have read like this.

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'Verified later by the deceased person'? What?

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

I still feel that since all claims about out of body experinces in near death experiences are only anecdotal claims that cannot be independently verified do make it impossible to independently verify them as factual.

People can claim they have out of body experiences until the cows come home, and there's nothing wrong with that. What a person thinks they experience is what they think they've experienced. But by the very nature of out of body experiences, it is virtually impossible to accurately verify them because there is no ethical way to do so. Claims by themselves are not evidence of anything.

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Yes there is no way to actually be there during that experience to see it happening from the NDE'ers point of view. But that would be the same for many things we are quite willing to accept as true or real. We cannot see subatomic particles, we cannot be there to actually see the events in history as actually happening as they did. Much of our accepted history comes from second hand accounts. Eye witness testimony cannot be proven as we were not there so we have to take the persons word for it and then weight things up.

In fact our entire conscious experience is subjective and nothing can be said to be verified outside our own heads. We only agree that it must be real but we could even be all deluded into thinking its real. We may be living in a simulation. Even many scientists claim the reality we see is only a surface relection of a deeper reality.

So in some ways our conscious experience may be the true reality. We we sense somethings going on beyond what we see this may actually be a glimpse into that deeper reality. People have known this for 1,000s of years from the ancient prophets and monks to modern scientists studying consciousness like David Chalmers and Roger Penrose and even going back to the pioneers of quantum physics who supported some form of consciousness as fundemental like Werner Heisenberg, Max Planck, Hugene Wigner, John Archibald Wheeler and Henry Stapp.

Max Planck
I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as derivative from consciousness. We cannot get behind consciousness. Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

'Verified later by the deceased person'? What?

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Sorry I meant to say verified by the person who was deceased for a time and came back. They travelled to another place in their OBE and visit a relative which was later confirmed by matching stories when they were miles apart and had never contacted each other beforehand. All accounts verified later.

Though I do remember a case where a person met the deceased person but they did go on to die but left the person with information that no one could have known. Its usually about the deceased or temporarily deceased passing on messages to loved ones.

stevevw said:

Yes there is no way to actually be there during that experience to see it happening from the NDE'ers point of view. But that would be the same for many things we are quite willing to accept as true or real. We cannot see subatomic particles, we cannot be there to actually see the events in history as actually happening as they did. Much of our accepted history comes from second hand accounts. Eye witness testimony cannot be proven as we were not there so we have to take the persons word for it and then weight things up.

In fact our entire conscious experience is subjective and nothing can be said to be verified outside our own heads. We only agree that it must be real but we could even be all deluded into thinking its real. We may be living in a simulation. Even many scientists claim the reality we see is only a surface relection of a deeper reality.

So in some ways our conscious experience may be the true reality. We we sense somethings going on beyond what we see this may actually be a glimpse into that deeper reality. People have known this for 1,000s of years from the ancient prophets and monks to modern scientists studying consciousness like David Chalmers and Roger Penrose and even going back to the pioneers of quantum physics who supported some form of consciousness as fundemental like Werner Heisenberg, Max Planck, Hugene Wigner, John Archibald Wheeler and Henry Stapp.

Max Planck
I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as derivative from consciousness. We cannot get behind consciousness. Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.

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See, you cannot really compare evidence of historical events since there will be, a good 9 times out of 10, extra evidence for said event. Multiple lines of first hand evidence and above all physical evidence. That's why we can take historical evidence as being factual. And as someone who's been in a court of law on a jury, for a murder case no less, eye witness testimony is practically worthless in the face of other evidence.

Out of body expeiences from NDEs can only be claimed by the person who's had them. And that's it. That does not make for compelling facts.

For my own opinion, I do have my doubts about what people experience in situations where it is a life or death situation, I'm not 100% on the side that they're lying or fully making stuff up. What their mind tells them is what their mind tells them. Or shows them rather.

stevevw said:

Sorry I meant to say verified by the person who was deceased for a time and came back. They travelled to another place in their OBE and visted a relative which was later confirmed by matching stories when they were miles apart and had never contacted each other beforehand. All accounts verified later.

Though I do remember a case where a person met the deceased person but they did go on to die but left the person with information that no one could have known. Its usually about the deased or temporarily deceased passing on messages to loved ones.

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I was going to say. I thought we'd entered into a new weird realm of science.

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

See, you cannot really compare evidence of historical events since there will be, a good 9 times out of 10, extra evidence for said event. Multiple lines of first hand evidence and above all physical evidence. That's why we can take historical evidence as being factual.

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Yes and thats the same for NDE. We have an event that happened and we can follow a number of lines of extra evidence to determine its validity. Just like we would check say the description of a ancient city and its people by finding the same archeology and artifacts to confirm. As with the NDE we can check the description by checking if their description is correct. This is physical evdience supporting the description.

There are many people and events we accept from the past that were only found in literature and often a small mention so we have to take their word for it. Much of Roman governers and senators have little to no evdience as it was destroyed but we accept them and the events as real people in history based on the written testimonu of pthers. Josephus is one who we take a lot of history from his annals. .

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

And as someone who's been in a court of law on a jury, for a murder case no less, eye witness testimony is practically worthless in the face of other evidence.

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It depends on the evdience. Where there is little else evidence eye witness accounts gain more importance. Sometimes there is little esle. THis is especially true in abuse cases and we have seen people being convicted from many years ago based on personal testimony, eye witness accounts and circumstancial evidence.

But we accept eye witness or personal experiences everyday. You know "tell me what you seen, what happened". Or" I seen you out and about, you were in the doctors about 2pm". "Oh that must be true because I was at the doctors around 2pm"ect. It sexactly the same thing with NDE except what happened is out of the norm. BUt in each case there is only circumstancial and personal testimony evdience. There was no independent evidence that the person actually seen their firend at the doctors.

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

Out of body expeiences from NDEs can only be claimed by the person who's had them. And that's it. That does not make for compelling facts.

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But when the persons experience can be verified by indpendent sources outside them thats a different story. I guess that is what makes some NDE more verified and come to out attention. Like the UFO inquiry I guess. We hear a lot of personal experiences and testimony and everyone wants hard evidence. But we could see that hard evdience presented on TV but still not believe until we actually experience it ourselves.

I really don't think skeptics would still believe if they were given that hard evidence. THeir mindset, beliefs are are it cannot happen so even hard evdience would be rationalised as being fake or some conspiracy or some natural phenomena that we don't understand yet.

Admittedly unusual events require extra evdience as its well unusual, beyond natural, counter intuitive. Thats why only some NDE qualify as even though some may have reasonable evdience people will still doubt as there may be other possibilities like the patient was actually conscious, someone told them of the details, it was a lucky guess. But some like I believe the case I linked have a higher standard of evdience thats hard to refute. But for some no amount of evdience will do.

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

For my own opinion, I do have my doubts about what people experience in situations where it is a life or death situation, I'm not 100% on the side that they're lying or fully making stuff up. What their mind tells them is what their mind tells them. Or shows them rather.

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I that thats a good way to see things. Not be completly for or against. I tend to be towards the middle but a little on the belief side as I have also research other lines of evdience as I have presented earlier like from the tests on brain waves during unconsciousness and death showing activity in the conscious areas of the brain and from Physics showing that fundemental reality is more like MInd that matter inferring that some form of consciousness exists independent of the physical body.

So I don't depend on NDE alone and would agree on its own its not enough in the overall scheme of whether consciousness is something real beyond the material world.. In some ways consciousness our conscious experience is the only real thing despite our bodies and the physical world. As Max PLanck says we cannot get behind consciousness everything we regard as existing or real points to consciousness.

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

I was going to say. I thought we'd entered into a new weird realm of science.

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And the existing experiences of NDE'ers is not weird enough for you lol. Technically its verified by the deceased person because they were deceased at one stage and then came back to life.

stevevw said:

Except people have seen a deceased relative standing in front of them and then this was verified later by the deceased person after recovery. There are several cases I have read like this.

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An yet when asked for your best example of a verifiable NDE you came up with one that was easily refuted. And I'm sorry but you only get one chance, that's all. Because otherwise we'll have to put up with what you're doing right now, constantly claiming that there's some other "irrefutable" example. It's simply a parade of poor example after poor example. As has been this entire thread, when asked for their best example of a verifiable NDE proponents simply can't come up with a credible one.

That's the problem... no credible examples. So proponents of NDEs simply rely on quantity over quality, figuring that having lots of poor examples equates to irrefutable evidence simply by volume alone... it doesn't. It equates to people misinterpreting what is in the end a perfectly natural event.

stevevw said:

The problem is what you are doing is assuming all cases are unreliable.

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If the ones that have been presented are examples of the best...then yes. I am.

stevevw said:

Except people have seen a deceased relative standing in front of them and then this was verified later by the deceased person after recovery. There are several cases I have read like this.

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The dead person was able to verify they appeared in front of the person who had the NDE? That certainly is astounding.

partinobodycular said:

An yet when asked for your best example of a verifiable NDE you came up with one that was easily refuted.
And I'm sorry but you only get one chance, that's all. Because otherwise we'll have to put up with what you're doing right now, constantly claiming that there's some other "irrefutable" example. It's simply a parade of poor example after poor example. As has been this entire thread, when asked for their best example of a verifiable NDE proponents simply can't come up with a credible one.

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This is blantantly untrue. The example has not been refuted. I presented several lines of evdience supporting the case and no one has refuted this with any likewise evidence. No one has shown the doctors were lying, no one has shown the patient was lying, no one has shown the patient opened their eyes or was even conscious during the entire event and no one has shown that anyone colluded to make this story up.

To the contrary I have shown the patients eyes were closed the entire time while in the OR room so could not have physically seen the things he described with his physical eyes. I have shown that two independent witnesses verified the description the patient gave. I have also presented an independent review which supports the case. Two completely different levels of evidence where the skeptics have absolutely nothing but heresay and gossip.

I mean you and the skeptics have not interviewed those involved, have not been to the location of the event, have not interviewed anyone involved, have not presented any review of the case showing any arguement or evidence against and somehow you can claim with confidence the case is false.

So therefore until someone provides evidence against this case it stands as a verified NDE.

partinobodycular said:

That's the problem... no credible examples. So proponents of NDEs simply rely on quantity over quality, figuring that having lots of poor examples equates to irrefutable evidence simply by volume alone... it doesn't. It equates to people misinterpreting what is in the end a perfectly natural event.

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These words " no credible, easily refuted and poor examples where is your evidence. It would have to be good because to easily refute the case you will need good evidence. For example you will need to show the patient opened their eyes or that the doctors are lying.

But you havn't done that.