A splendid video about evolution

So you would rather just blindly believe in a particle whose existence has never been confirmed? I suppose you would never question epicycles, either, if you lived in that time, because it did so well at predicting the movements of the heavens... nevermind it was fundamentally incorrect.

Absolutely spot on!

David

The author I had in mind with that point has been quite recently. It was neither you or David I insinuating at.

The AWARE study showed that out-of-body experiences in cardiac arrest survivors, especially ones that can later be corroborated by witnesses are far too rare to measure reliably (if such phenomena even exist outside of the spiritual self-help bestsellers on Amazon).

The author of the AWARE study seems increasingly convinced that Survival is true, so I don't see how that follows.

The author of the AWARE study seems increasingly convinced that Survival is true, so I don't see how that follows.

Yes, and I suspect it may be due to the celebrity status he’s gained, after all, we’re not seeing thousands of other resuscitation doctors following suit. In fact there are nobody stepping forwards even though cardiac arrests occurs in the thousands everyday on the planet.

Yes, and I suspect it may be due to the celebrity status he’s gained, after all, we’re not seeing thousands of other resuscitation doctors following suit. In fact there are nobody stepping forwards even though cardiac arrests occurs in the thousands everyday on the planet.

This is just speculative ad hominem. 

It seems to me the reason he was convinced is that, as he reported, an OBE with veridical information did occur.

We know Bruce Greyson was convinced by a similar NDE that had an OBE with veridical components.

As for why other doctors haven’t had these experiences, we actually don’t know they haven’t. Most doctors also aren’t coming out to tell us when they make fatal mistakes yet we know some doctors have said that in their long careers they have made such errors.

What we do know is that there have been NDEs recorded from thousands of years across the globe, and that NDEs share certain key features with other Survival evidence. We also have philosophical reasons to doubt human consciousness is reducible to material components.

Basically the reports of NDEs are what we should, IMO, expect when considering a priori arguments for consciousness being immaterial. So I don’t see a reason to think the many reports are due to these claimants all being liars or fools.

If anything I think the existential dread of God’s judgement and desperate need for reality to be fully described by physics leads to the kind of pseudo-skepticism that insists researchers who don’t go along with the materialist-atheist faith are seeking celebrity status….meanwhile we know Blackmore’s Psi research was garbage yet she gets to go on the BBC and claim she never found any Psi effects…

The AWARE study showed that out-of-body experiences in cardiac arrest survivors, especially ones that can later be corroborated by witnesses are far too rare to measure reliably.

There have been zero studies measuring the visual accuracy of the recalled NDE OBE, so it's hardly surprising we have virtually no data. Researchers either hide the visual targets so they can't be seen (Sartori, Parnia), or they don't even bother using visual targets (Blanke).

As far as the the AWARE studies go, they were so terribly slow in recruiting and interviewing patients that the deeper experiencers (who seem to die earlier), were already dead. Penny Sartori's 5 Year Study and van Lommel's 2001 study both show what can be achieved with properly managed studies.

The AWARE study showed that out-of-body experiences in cardiac arrest survivors, especially ones that can later be corroborated by witnesses are far too rare to measure reliably (if such phenomena even exist outside of the spiritual self-help bestsellers on Amazon).

The AWARE study was flawed in certain ways ~ designed, I think, to placate and convince Materialists and Physicalists who don't about the evidence anyways:

https://psi-encyclopedia.spr.ac.uk/artic...-nde-study

However, these cases exposed a key limitation: although a thousand shelves had been set up in key areas in the participating hospitals, as many as 78% of the cardiac arrests recorded in the study happened in rooms that were not so equipped. While the patients who supplied Recollections #1 and #2 might have been in a position to observe the image on the upper side of the shelf – fulfilling the study’s aims – neither could have done so, since there was none.

The authors note that the study’s results, particular the one verified case of visual awareness, suggest that awareness during cardiac arrest is different from awareness during anesthesia, as measurable brain function ceases within seconds of cardiac arrest and the entire brain is without electrical activity until CPR provides enough blood flow to fulfill its metabolic needs. Within a model that assumes cortical activity generates consciousness, the authors write, this evidence of consciousness over a period of minutes in a patient lacking cortical activity lasting is ‘perplexing… as reductions in [cerebral blood flow] typically lead to delirium followed by coma, rather than an accurate and lucid mental state’.7

[Laird]

The two papers that you refer to only solve the simpler problem of reproducing the fact that life only uses L or D chemicals as appropriate.

@sbu, I'm surprised that you didn't respond to this, because, on a bit of cursory reading and skimming of the papers to which you linked, David is completely wrong here. They solve the problem of how homochirality arose prebiotically, that is, prior to biological cells, which is not the "simpler" problem to which David refers but the "harder" one.

If I'm mistaken about this, then please correct me.

@sbu, I'm surprised that you didn't respond to this, because, on a bit of cursory reading and skimming of the papers to which you linked, David is completely wrong here. They solve the problem of how homochirality arose prebiotically, that is, prior to biological cells, which is not the "simpler" problem to which David refers but the "harder" one.

If I'm mistaken about this, then please correct me.

@Laird I think you’re correct that this is what the authors are suggesting. However, biology and chemistry lie outside my comfort zone, so I’ll refrain from commenting on the technical details. In any case, until someone reproduces life in the laboratory from basic elements, there remains room for supernatural interference as a necessary ingredient. I don’t dismiss that argument, but I’m not convinced it’s definitive, as David seems to be.
Secondly, I’m uncomfortable with attempts to separate religion from “the Designer.” I would characterize any being whose powers aren’t constrained by our universe’s fundamental principles, like thermodynamics, as a god.

Penny Sartori's 5 Year Study and van Lommel's 2001 study both show what can be achieved with properly managed studies.

Alternatively, these NDE studies may have been so poorly designed and executed that they left substantial room for interviewer biases to influence the findings.

As for why other doctors haven’t had these experiences, we actually don’t know they haven’t. Most doctors also aren’t coming out to tell us when they make fatal mistakes yet we know some doctors have said that in their long careers they have made such errors.

I’m referring only to out-of-body experiences supported by objective facts corroborated by witnesses. I’d compare the lack of endorsement from the broader community of resuscitation experts to a “cold fusion” moment for these claims.