Aware II results

Basically saying something is in violation of laws of physics isn't a reason to automatically discount an account.

Thanks for spelling it out for me   I agree with you.

Yet shouldn't pseudo-skeptics be less quick to say NDEs have a materialist/reductionist explanation? They seem to insist their faith in atheist-materialism is correct at every turn?

This, IMO, is the more compelling counter.  This is the "faith" element that some of our former (or dormant) skeptical posters refused to acknowledge.  It isn't faith, they'd say.  "Science has been the most explanatory power" inferring it would eventually explain NDE's which is, quite simply, a form of "faith".

The lack of self awareness here is always shocking to me.

This, IMO, is the more compelling counter.  This is the "faith" element that some of our former (or dormant) skeptical posters refused to acknowledge.  It isn't faith, they'd say.  "Science has been the most explanatory power" inferring it would eventually explain NDE's which is, quite simply, a form of "faith".

The lack of self awareness here is always shocking to me.

Yet it does seem to me that materialism is less a "faith" and more an axiom, i.e. 'that which commends itself as evident'. It is "evident" because evidence supports that basic assumption. To a materialist, there is no earthly reason to question it because 400 years of scientific investigations has confirmed that all known laws and all of physics and chemistry and cosmology and so on and so on serve only to confirm materialism (or, to be more precise, naturalism).

But, referring back to my own post earlier in this thread, this is because science is itself constrained to investigate ONLY naturalistic causes. So if we ask why consciousness remains unexplained, you will often get the response that it is explained - that it is merely an epiphenomenon of brain activity or that it doesn't really exist at all: it is an illusion. If, further, we ask about the fine tuning of the universe or the origin of life, again we are venturing into areas that have not been adequately explained yet nevertheless have pat, purely invented just-so stories purporting to explain them.

Take this a step further (meaning further away from materialism) and we have accounts from all over the world and attested to by countless individuals and groups, of phenomena that defy a materialst explanation. Experiences that, if true, destroy the materialist axiom: it is no longer self-evident because it cannot account for everything we experience. The hard-line materialists dismiss these challenges as illusory or even deliberate deception (usually blaming religion or uninformed superstition). One has to wonder how much this denial is due to fear - the kind of fear expressed so forcefully by Richard Lewontin:

Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism.

I make no apology for quoting Lewontin yet again because we need to be reminded that there is a bastion of resistance to the phenomena we discuss here which is ideological more than evidential. The evidence in favour of these phenomena is overwhelming if serious research and investigation is undertaken honestly and open-minedly. Yet we can continue to post such evidence here or point to other places where it is discussed seriously and we will still be dismissed with a hand-wave because the person waving that hand is confident that Lewontin's scientific community will be hand-waving for exactly the same reason.

I make no apology for quoting Lewontin yet again

Very good, Dave. Wasn't he at loggerheads with Dawkins. A bit like Trotsky with Lenin, broadly. (I posted this once and it disappeared)

Very good, Dave. Wasn't he at loggerheads with Dawkins. A bit like Trotsky with Lenin, broadly. (I posted this once and it disappeared)

I don't know, Tim. I know they are (or were, in the case of the late Lewontin) both biologists of sort and both outspoken atheists but I haven't followed their interactions.

What is important though is the fact that they are/were both ideologically driven which is somewhat rich considering that they nor anyone else in the scientific community seem to have any concerns about ideological bias when it comes from a materialist/atheist but just hear them howl if someone with a religious or spiritual leaning tries to question their just-so stories related to origin of life or evolution. Apparently is does not matter a jot how well qualified, scientifically speaking, someone might be - he or she is automatically disqualified by reason of their religious faith or spiritual beliefs.

I once mentioned this to one of my atheist family members (who is well aware that I am not religious either) and was assrured that there are probably a significant percentage of practising scientists who are religious. Sure, he may be correct, but most don't rock the boat. Just watch what happens if one of them mentions that there may be some merit to Intelligent Design arguments ... watch what will happen to their career. Same is true when it comes to NDE or paranormal research although religion seems to be a little less of a threat than Woo-Woo magical thinking which is, by definition, unscientific because it invokes a supernatural cause. I say less of a threat but the undelying fear is still there. To quote Lewontin from that same article:

Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.

watch what will happen to their career.

It certainly is the case, isn't it. My oldest friend who is a professor of psychology has discussed this taboo (with me) in academia over the decades he's been part of it. He believes you go to heaven when you die (he freely admits to that in the pub, just like that, unsophisticated and straight to the point, no different from Tolstoy's happy peasants) and some of his colleagues believe the same. However, such opinions remain secret in public.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?...id=4246760
There is already a preprint for AWARE II
In the blog it's said that there was not much difference between it and the AHA presentation.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?...id=4246760
There is already a preprint for AWARE II
In the blog it's said that there was not much difference between it and the AHA presentation.

Interestingly the preprint paper mentions my own major concern with all these Internet NDE accounts/retrospective accounts collected many years after the fact:

However, differences in time from CA onset to recall may introduce bias.

Interestingly the preprint paper mentions my own major concern with all these Internet NDE accounts/retrospective accounts collected many years after the fact:

The problem is number of out of body experiences verified by medical staff for me. Radical materialists so far could only compare them to UFO sightings...

The problem is number of out of body experiences verified by medical staff for me. Radical materialists so far could only compare them to UFO sightings...

What are your sources?