Aware II results

Anyone interested in the scientific investigation of NDEs should check out the awareofaware blog for links and comments. Not surprisingly the new Aware study indicates a materialistic explanation for NDEs as it is becoming increasingly clear that there`s in fact lots of brain activity during the CAs:

“Consciousness and awareness may occur during CA. The recommencement of near-normal/normal EEG may reflect a resumption of network-level of neuronal and cognitive activity, a biomarker of reported lucidity/consciousness, and recalled experiences of death (“near-death” experiences).”

Lucid Dying: Patients Recall Death Experiences During CPR

One in five people who survive cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) after cardiac arrest may describe lucid experiences of death that occurred while they were seemingly unconscious and on the brink of death, a new study shows.

Led by researchers at NYU Grossman School of Medicine and elsewhere, the study involved 567 men and women whose hearts stopped beating while hospitalized and who received CPR between May 2017 and March 2020 in the United States and United Kingdom. Despite immediate treatment, fewer than 10% recovered sufficiently to be discharged from hospital.

Survivors reported having unique lucid experiences, including a perception of separation from the body, observing events without pain or distress, and a meaningful evaluation of life, including of their actions, intentions and thoughts toward others. The researchers found these experiences of death to be different from hallucinations, delusions, illusions, dreams or CPR-induced consciousness.

Anyone interested in the scientific investigation of NDEs should check out the awareofaware blog for links and comments. Not surprisingly the new Aware study indicates a materialistic explanation for NDEs as it is becoming increasingly clear that there`s in fact lots of brain activity during the CAs:

“Consciousness and awareness may occur during CA. The recommencement of near-normal/normal EEG may reflect a resumption of network-level of neuronal and cognitive activity, a biomarker of reported lucidity/consciousness, and recalled experiences of death (“near-death” experiences).”

Following up on this it seems they only interviewed 28 survivors. That´s a very small data set. Seems it`s not possible to dismiss or validate any hypothesis from such small numbers. What a disappointment.

Anyone interested in the scientific investigation of NDEs should check out the awareofaware blog for links and comments. Not surprisingly the new Aware study indicates a materialistic explanation for NDEs as it is becoming increasingly clear that there`s in fact lots of brain activity during the CAs:

“Consciousness and awareness may occur during CA. The recommencement of near-normal/normal EEG may reflect a resumption of network-level of neuronal and cognitive activity, a biomarker of reported lucidity/consciousness, and recalled experiences of death (“near-death” experiences).”

Please help me out here.  I don't see the reasoning for disappointment. The fact that there is some detectable electrical activity during a CA is not surprising.  Is there propagation exhibiting coherent signaling that indicates a pattern of personal experience as would show in awareness or sleep?  NO, right?  I just see this as a continuum of the current learning curve.  Good data is good data, even if from elusive phenomena.

Is the science supposed to settle arguments or is it to tell us facts.  The facts are that the actual outcomes of these rare experiences are not from normal activity AND they are exceptional in being meaningful and effective in changing peoples character and personal worldview. 

 Experiences during states of unconsciousness may impact longer term psychological outcomes in survivors

The question remains - is there a simple model that would produce these outcomes?  The facts don't don't support magic brain materials creating experience from electron flows.

Lucid Dying: Patients Recall Death Experiences During CPR

One in five people who survive cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) after cardiac arrest may describe lucid experiences of death that occurred while they were seemingly unconscious and on the brink of death, a new study shows.

Led by researchers at NYU Grossman School of Medicine and elsewhere, the study involved 567 men and women whose hearts stopped beating while hospitalized and who received CPR between May 2017 and March 2020 in the United States and United Kingdom. Despite immediate treatment, fewer than 10% recovered sufficiently to be discharged from hospital.

Survivors reported having unique lucid experiences, including a perception of separation from the body, observing events without pain or distress, and a meaningful evaluation of life, including of their actions, intentions and thoughts toward others. The researchers found these experiences of death to be different from hallucinations, delusions, illusions, dreams or CPR-induced consciousness.

As usual the skeptics fixate on findings like this ignoring many facts such as there being hundreds of independently verified veridical NDEs (as witness the excellent survey volume "The Self Does Not Die" by Rivas, Dirven and Smit), and many other factors like the "realer-than-real" intensity and clarity of consciousness in these states, and long-term positive character/personality transformations towards higher spirituality occuring later in life, all combined with a largely disfunctional brain with negligible or greatly reduced neuronal processing (in the brain stem for instance). Very much not to be expected by the materialist neurological paradigm when the brain is largely disfunctional but still expected by the materialists to produce such extraordinary experiences as complex hallucinogenic illusions. This is very much against the materialist neurological assumption that the mind is the function of large parts of the brain, in particular the cerebral hemispheres.

We already know that even fear of death can induce an NDE.

The question has centered around the veridical aspects that occur either in the hospital or even a great distance away.

There are no good materialist explanations for consciousness, as pointed out by New Atheist horseman & Neuroscience PhD Sam Harris, so not sure why one would think there are going to be materialist explanations for NDEs.

Obviously the materialist-atheist fundamentalists will put their religion before reason, at this point I don't expect any honesty from that faction...

Hmm...what is there to say. 

Well, ignoring the materialist, this, consciousness that, reasoning this and there and just looking at it flat out, AWARE 2 seems to have turned out to be very uninteresting. The EEG results that seem to have come out of it so far aren't anything new, and are just confirming results that came out in OTHER studies while AWARE 2 was being conducted. We already know CPR can cause varying degrees of brain function to return, we already know that the dying process can cause different spikes in brain function and we already have people saying reasons why that isn't enough to explain NDEs. I know that some skeptics, like Steven Novella, are already saying this means that either NDEs happen either before or after cardiac arrest of the spikes are the cause of it. Same old same old.

These only seem to be vague preliminary results so far so we'll have to see what comes out in the next few days, but it otherwise seems uneventful so far. Certainly not enough to say NDEs don't have a physical explanation, and not enough to add more to the vague physicalist explanations we already have.

These only seem to be vague preliminary results so far so we'll have to see what comes out in the next few days, but it otherwise seems uneventful so far.

I agree on the need for patience. First there are formal presentations to a select few. Then published formal reports. Last of all, expanded discussions and sharing of details which don't make it into the formalised publications.

Certainly not enough to say NDEs don't have a physical explanation, and not enough to add more to the vague physicalist explanations we already have.

Even AWARE I was sufficient to show that no physical explanation is possible. In terms of physical details, there is a need to avoid confusing possible correlation with causation. Even more, to avoid leaps between different categories such as consciousness and matter and seeking to imply that they are the same thing.

The aim by now is to fill in more of the larger picture. That is the future aim too, it is a long-term, perhaps never-ending challenge. The nature of consciousness and its phenomena have eluded the greatest thinkers for millennia, there is no urgent expectation that these things will imminently be resolved. All we can do is discover more, rather than expect a solution or resolution.

(My bolding of text)

The study authors conclude that although studies to date have not been able to absolutely prove the reality or meaning of patients’ experiences and claims of awareness in relation to death, it has been impossible to disclaim them either. They say recalled experience surrounding death now merits further genuine empirical investigation without prejudice.

Source link.

Hmm...what is there to say. 

Well, ignoring the materialist, this, consciousness that, reasoning this and there and just looking at it flat out, AWARE 2 seems to have turned out to be very uninteresting. The EEG results that seem to have come out of it so far aren't anything new, and are just confirming results that came out in OTHER studies while AWARE 2 was being conducted. We already know CPR can cause varying degrees of brain function to return, we already know that the dying process can cause different spikes in brain function and we already have people saying reasons why that isn't enough to explain NDEs. I know that some skeptics, like Steven Novella, are already saying this means that either NDEs happen either before or after cardiac arrest of the spikes are the cause of it. Same old same old.

Maybe this is about expectations.  If the "story" or meme is to find the "answer" in the same context as physicalism (methodological) then a change in the paradigm is far off.

These experiments are not designed to explain NDE's.  They are designed to gain data and look for patterns that reveal the underlying process.  In that context - it was successful.  Slowly, but surely, this data is eliminating the claims of an underlying strictly physical process.  I hope that some here may share my confidence in the facts of the research.  

The stage we are in is the elimination of virtually any mode of operation where physics outputs (not matter or energy measurables) but something like changes to real-world probabilities enforcing action for self-interest.  I have yet to find SI units of measure showing decision making among molecules.

What Novella and friends have to resort to is the measurable brain signaling before and after CA and then claim it contains deep personal experience. - This only correlates if the electrical activity matches patterns from testing of other deep emotional experiences.

In my limited reach in understanding - the instruments readings around NDE are not close to normal signals during heighten aware perceptions.  Fundamaterialists are backed into ever-shrinking landscapes.  The ground they are standing on is about as stable as beach front high-rise during a Cat 5 hurricane.

The pathway to washing the last foothold is to substantiate the patterns of meaningful behavior as the mind transfers states to the physical array of electrical activity.

We already know CPR can cause varying degrees of brain function to return, we already know that the dying process can cause different spikes in brain function and we already have people saying reasons why that isn't enough to explain NDEs. I know that some skeptics, like Steven Novella, are already saying this means that either NDEs happen either before or after cardiac arrest of the spikes are the cause of it. Same old same old.

Yes, but what the hell did you expect - you can't expect health professionals to pause their resuscitation efforts!

My view is that some of the cases where people have NDE's in which they observe the process from above, are evidence enough. The next time you go to the dentist for a procedure not involving anaesthetic, see how much of what is going you can descibe!

It seems to me there is a fine line between wanting more evidence to be certain, and endlessly calling for more rigorous evidence in the hope that the phenomenon goes away!