Commentary thread for tim's "NDE's" thread

Or maybe while in the "non-physical" he saw all the good that came from this life of apparent misery. Maybe he learned that it is possible to choose a hard life, but one that is what was necessary for some lessons he needed to learn.

When you watch a movie and the character goes through some hard times, do you walk out of the theater angry? Or do you see how the things the person went through made them what they are?

I have read channeled accounts where people who have passed on say that they see their recent life as a movie or a play,, that it wasn't "real". 

Yes, these are perspectives that require you to be dead to experience, but perhaps those who have an NDE get to experience this perspective, so when they return they realize these things.

This presumes that there was some lesson that could be learned through such suffering (say a life as a paranoid schizophrenic with mental and physical handicaps, or as a person with deep chronic clinical depression, all due to physical problems in the brain structure). It seems necessary to really get creative and ingenious to try to come up with something here.

It does seem as if the deep NDEer gets a taste of a mental perspective totally indifferent to, dead to, actual human experience. This is a state of consciousness totally unconcerned about what it is like to experience pain and also, presumably, pleasure or joy. This seems to be a state alien to human personal consciousness. A person couldn't be blamed for saying, "wait a minute, the "I" that made these choices wasn't really me. It was somebody/something else, totally alien. Stop this world process - I want to get off".

This presumes that there was some lesson that could be learned through such suffering (say a life as a paranoid schizophrenic with mental and physical handicaps, or as a person with deep chronic clinical depression, all due to physical problems in the brain structure). It seems necessary to really get creative and ingenious to try to come up with something here.

It does seem as if the deep NDEer gets a taste of a mental perspective totally indifferent to, dead to, actual human experience. This is a state of consciousness totally unconcerned about what it is like to experience pain and also, presumably, pleasure or joy. This seems to be a state alien to human personal consciousness. A person couldn't be blamed for saying, "wait a minute, the "I" that made these choices wasn't really me. It was somebody/something else, totally alien. Stop this world process - I want to get off".

Of course there are lessons that can be learned from these things! 

Try- forgiveness, patience, persistence, acceptance, humility. And maybe you are helping OTHERS learn their lessons such as: giving, helping, love, sharing, caring, empathy, self-sacrifice. Or maybe even "negative" lessons like loss.  

Don't see why anyone could need to learn loss? Well, can you think of anyone who is arrogant and belligerent in this world who might benefit from a lesson like this? I can think of a few (some in politics). Why would they WANT to learn this lesson? Don't you think they KNOW they were insufferable A-HOLES from the perspective of their afterlife ("larger") selves? Don't you think they know they need to learn these things?

Are you really saying that the only things you might learn something from in this life are positive things? 

Did you ever loose a ballgame or a girlfriend, or a job? Didn't you learn anything valuable from those experiences? I have,, from all of them.  Life is about more than rides on the ferris wheel and eating cotton candy.

Do you really think that a productive life is only about joy and comfort?

I really think you might want to give this a little more thought.

But I've had this conversation already, I'll let someone else jump in if they want. I've already typed all these words recently.

This presumes that there was some lesson that could be learned through such suffering (say a life as a paranoid schizophrenic with mental and physical handicaps, or as a person with deep chronic clinical depression, all due to physical problems in the brain structure). It seems necessary to really get creative and ingenious to try to come up with something here.

It does seem as if the deep NDEer gets a taste of a mental perspective totally indifferent to, dead to, actual human experience. This is a state of consciousness totally unconcerned about what it is like to experience pain and also, presumably, pleasure or joy. This seems to be a state alien to human personal consciousness. A person couldn't be blamed for saying, "wait a minute, the "I" that made these choices wasn't really me. It was somebody/something else, totally alien. Stop this world process - I want to get off".

"It does seem as if the deep NDEer gets a taste of a mental perspective totally indifferent to, dead to, actual human experience."

Hi, again nbtruthman. May I ask you, are you familiar with the phenomenon of the life review during NDE's or is it something new to you ? I'm not at all criticising you, I'm very open to constructive comments about anything I post on NDE's but I just can't follow any of your reasoning or what points you're trying to make TBH.

The NDE above is what it is. We either trust his report or reject it but there is nothing inconsistent or suspect about it. It was well documented. The man was dead for 5 minutes and he's telling you what he experienced in that time. He wasn't predisposed to anything, he made that clear in the opening passages. Did you read those ?  

It was also an extremely veridical OBE because he described conversations/ statements and actions far removed from his body and later checked them out. See the paper by Greyson Kelly and Cook (Do any near death experience etc)

http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q...e2MDjH_OZ7

.....Nevertheless, I somehow perceived what people were saying
and even what they were thinking, probably through some kind of
thought transmission.
The man kneeled down and gave me an injection in the left arm.... I realized
as the doctor felt my body that my legs were broken.... Then I saw how the doctor tried
to resuscitate me in a professional way, but then noticed that my ribs were also broken.
He remarked: I cannot massage his heart. After a few minutes he stood up and said:
Nothing is working. There is nothing more we can do. He is dead. He spoke Swiss
German with a Bernese accent and a sort of amusing Italian.

It was extraordinary that I could perceive not only the words spoken aloud by the
people around my body, but also their thoughts. For example, a woman from Tessin,
accompanied by a daughter of about 7 years, was shocked when she saw my corpse.
The young girl wanted to run away, but her mother caught her by the left hand and held
her back while she silently prayed, first an Our Father and then a Holy Mary, after
which she asked forgiveness for the sins of this unfortunate man. This woman’s unselfish
prayer impressed me greatly, made me joyous, and I felt radiated with love.

On the other hand, there was an older man with a moustache [in the crowd of onlookers],
who had negative thoughts about me: Well, he is done for. But it was certainly
his own fault. He was just the sort of person who would rush thoughtlessly through
this area in a sports car. I wanted to call down to him from above: Stop talking
nonsense. I was not even driving. I was only a passenger. I somehow sensed the negative,
even evil vibrations of this man....

Then one of the doctors turned to the other and said: Look, unless you have some
objection, I am going to..., and he gave me an injection of adrenalin right into my
heart. The face of this man became fixed in my mind. A few days later, a man came
into my hospital room dressed in ordinary clothes. I recognized his face immediately
and deliberately greeted him by saying: Hello, Doctor. Why did you give me that devilish
injection? I also recognized his clear distinct speech. [Mr. von Jankovich had noticed
when he was above his body that this doctor had spoken a definite High German
when he talked with the other doctor.] He was nonplussed and asked how I knew him. I
told him how. We later became good friends.

He also was able to trace the woman because he saw the business vehicle she was driving
and the name of the town (her name etc)

When they met, they had the following exchange:

SvJ: Do you have a red vehicle?

Woman: Yes, I do.

SvJ: Do you have a 10-year old daughter? [This allowed for the 3 years that had

elapsed since the accident.]

Woman: Yes, I do. [She called her daughter, who came to the room.]

SvJ: Do you remember an accident on the highway to Bellinzona about 3 years ago?

Woman: No, I do not.

SvJ: Please think again and try to remember. You got out of your vehicle perhaps to

look at the body of a man who had been killed.

Woman: Yes. You are correct. Now I remember.

SvJ: And you prayed for the dead man.

Woman: Yes, that is right.

SvJ: I was that man.

At that Mr. von Jankovich and the woman both wept (according to Jankovich)

The veridical components do not of course mean that he is accurately reporting his life review but I have no reason
to suspect he isn't, personally. What benefits would it bring to make it up ? It is what it is. He never changed his story until his death in 2005 and he was responsible for a great may charitable projects even though his health was never fully recovered.

Of course there are lessons that can be learned from these things! 

Try- forgiveness, patience, persistence, acceptance, humility. And maybe you are helping OTHERS learn their lessons such as: giving, helping, love, sharing, caring, empathy, self-sacrifice. Or maybe even "negative" lessons like loss.  

Don't see why anyone could need to learn loss? Well, can you think of anyone who is arrogant and belligerent in this world who might benefit from a lesson like this? I can think of a few (some in politics). Why would they WANT to learn this lesson? Don't you think they KNOW they were insufferable A-HOLES from the perspective of their afterlife ("larger") selves? Don't you think they know they need to learn these things?

Are you really saying that the only things you might learn something from in this life are positive things? 

Did you ever loose a ballgame or a girlfriend, or a job? Didn't you learn anything valuable from those experiences? I have,, from all of them.  Life is about more than rides on the ferris wheel and eating cotton candy.

Do you really think that a productive life is only about joy and comfort?

I really think you might want to give this a little more thought.

But I've had this conversation already, I'll let someone else jump in if they want. I've already typed all these words recently.

I guess we will just have to agree to disagree on this issue. I would comment that perhaps you would like to try what it is like to live a fairly long life as the paranoid schizophrenic with handicaps including Parkinson's disease I used as an example of egregious suffering. I knew such a person. Or the severe lifelong clinical depression case I mentioned. Another example of someone I knew comes to mind, a woman who spent the last 20 years of her life (to the ripe old age of 96) bedridden with very limited mobility in several medical care nursing homes. She was often in quite a lot of pain. She was very intelligent with an inquiring mind to the end, but continually frustrated by difficulty in reading or watching TV and keeping her mind busy since she was mostly blind and deaf, and continually battling with despair and depression. A seemingly endless purgatory or hell of physical experience. She was my mother. Try this one on for size. These examples are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to this issue.  

It is true that such extreme examples don't represent the average or normal human experience, but the validity of a belief system needs to be tested with just such extreme examples.

I would just restate that I kind of accept that there seems to be at least some truth to the teachings you espouse regarding the apparent meaning and purpose of human suffering. I just think that the error is in believing that the perspective of this belief system and the learner of the lessons is necessarily the human - it seems to me it is instead the soul (which in effect is really a separate entity that does not suffer, or it wouldn't do this), and the process is profoundly unjust to the human self.

I guess we will just have to agree to disagree on this issue. I would comment that perhaps you would like to try what it is like to live a fairly long life as the paranoid schizophrenic with handicaps including Parkinson's disease I used as an example of egregious suffering. I knew such a person. Or the severe lifelong clinical depression case I mentioned. Another example of someone I knew comes to mind, a woman who spent the last 20 years of her life (to the ripe old age of 96) bedridden with very limited mobility in several medical care nursing homes. She was often in quite a lot of pain. She was very intelligent with an inquiring mind to the end, but continually frustrated by difficulty in reading or watching TV and keeping her mind busy since she was mostly blind and deaf, and continually battling with despair and depression. A seemingly endless purgatory or hell of physical experience. She was my mother. Try this one on for size. These examples are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to this issue.  

It is true that such extreme examples don't represent the average or normal human experience, but the validity of a belief system needs to be tested with just such extreme examples.

I would just restate that I kind of accept that there seems to be at least some truth to the teachings you espouse regarding the apparent meaning and purpose of human suffering. I just think that the error is in believing that the perspective of this belief system and the learner of the lessons is necessarily the human - it seems to me it is instead the soul (which in effect is really a separate entity that does not suffer, or it wouldn't do this), and the process is profoundly unjust to the human self.

I didn’t get a sense from jkmac that there is necessarily meaning in suffering.  More that often people can extract meaning, development and learning from even the most awful adverse circumstances.

Personally I find that the idea that we somehow choose our circumstances and sufferings before we come here and that it’s all part of some personal plan doesn’t make sense to me, partly for the reasons you mention (that doesn’t mean I’m right of course). There certainly seem to be purported communications that tell us this is the case, but there are others that say the opposite.

I guess we will just have to agree to disagree on this issue. I would comment that perhaps you would like to try what it is like to live a fairly long life as the paranoid schizophrenic with handicaps including Parkinson's disease I used as an example of egregious suffering. I knew such a person. Or the severe lifelong clinical depression case I mentioned. Another example of someone I knew comes to mind, a woman who spent the last 20 years of her life (to the ripe old age of 96) bedridden with very limited mobility in several medical care nursing homes. She was often in quite a lot of pain. She was very intelligent with an inquiring mind to the end, but continually frustrated by difficulty in reading or watching TV and keeping her mind busy since she was mostly blind and deaf, and continually battling with despair and depression. A seemingly endless purgatory or hell of physical experience. She was my mother. Try this one on for size. These examples are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to this issue.  

It is true that such extreme examples don't represent the average or normal human experience, but the validity of a belief system needs to be tested with just such extreme examples.

I would just restate that I kind of accept that there seems to be at least some truth to the teachings you espouse regarding the apparent meaning and purpose of human suffering. I just think that the error is in believing that the perspective of this belief system and the learner of the lessons is necessarily the human - it seems to me it is instead the soul (which in effect is really a separate entity that does not suffer, or it wouldn't do this), and the process is profoundly unjust to the human self.

I appreciate everything you are saying,,

But you couldn't come up with a type of suffering that makes the slightest difference to what I am saying.

Last week, I gave an example of a woman who lost her husband and one year old baby boy to a drunk driver and now suffers with chronic back pain from the accident, and will for the rest of her life. And she says that the accident although awful is probably the most valuable thing that has ever happened to her in terms of spiritual growth.

"It does seem as if the deep NDEer gets a taste of a mental perspective totally indifferent to, dead to, actual human experience."

Hi, again nbtruthman. May I ask you, are you familiar with the phenomenon of the life review during NDE's or is it something new to you ? I'm not at all criticising you, I'm very open to constructive comments about anything I post on NDE's but I just can't follow any of your reasoning or what points you're trying to make TBH.

The NDE above is what it is. We either trust his report or reject it but there is nothing inconsistent or suspect about it. It was well documented. The man was dead for 5 minutes and he's telling you what he experienced in that time. He wasn't predisposed to anything, he made that clear in the opening passages. Did you read those ?  

It was also an extremely veridical OBE because he described conversations/ statements and actions far removed from his body and later checked them out. See the paper by Greyson Kelly and Cook (Do any near death experience etc)

................................................
................................................

The veridical components do not of course mean that he is accurately reporting his life review but I have no reason
to suspect he isn't, personally. What benefits would it bring to make it up ? It is what it is. He never changed his story until his death in 2005 and he was responsible for a great may charitable projects even though his health was never fully recovered.

As I remarked, this is quite an impressive NDE. I also mentioned the veridical components of some NDEs that especially lend them credibility. I am familiar with the life review that is sometimes a feature of deep NDEs. 

Your comments seem mainly to address my suggestion that perhaps much of the Jankovich account could be a confabulation of the unconscious mind. There could be many reasons why the unconscious mind would confabulate a story and also weave in some veridical material, but this was mentioned just as maybe a last ditch possibility (that could perhaps be more likely applied to some other NDE accounts that have much more fantastical aspects). It should be noted that such a mechanism is very likely the source of most (but not all) past life "memories" elicited via past life hypnotic regression sessions. Anyway, my suggestion was just to try to resolve some of the issues I have brought up as to the apparent perspective of such experiences. 

I agree that this NDE example is compelling, especially the gently judgemental witnessing of various episodes of a life apparently from a soul perspective, and I would certainly accept that it appears to be a truthful account of his actual experience. For more on this I would refer to my response to jkmack in #27 above.

As I remarked, this is quite an impressive NDE. I also mentioned the veridical components of some NDEs that especially lend them credibility. I am familiar with the life review that is sometimes a feature of deep NDEs. 

Your comments seem mainly to address my suggestion that perhaps much of the Jankovich account could be a confabulation of the unconscious mind. There could be many reasons why the unconscious mind would confabulate a story and also weave in some veridical material, but this was mentioned just as maybe a last ditch possibility (that could perhaps be more likely applied to some other NDE accounts that have much more fantastical aspects). It should be noted that such a mechanism is very likely the source of most (but not all) past life "memories" elicited via past life hypnotic regression sessions. Anyway, my suggestion was just to try to resolve some of the issues I have brought up as to the apparent perspective of such experiences. 

I agree that this NDE example is compelling, especially the gently judgemental witnessing of various episodes of a life apparently from a soul perspective, and I would certainly accept that it appears to be a truthful account of his actual experience. For more on this I would refer to my response to jkmack in #27 above.

"Your comments seem mainly to address my suggestion that perhaps much of the Jankovich account could be a confabulation of the unconscious mind."

What is it about the experience that makes you think it was a product of his unconscious mind ? When you are clinically dead you're not supposed to be able to think. Before his experience, Jankovich's unconscious mind had never produced anything along similar lines. He told us he wasn't that kind of person.

Why would it be that when you receive 18 broken bones and a fractured skull you suddenly start subconsciously confabulating NDE's and past lives ? 80% of people who nearly die don't report them. If it was somehow a 'by product' of a medical crisis, shouldn't everybody report them ?


"It should be noted that such a mechanism is very likely the source of most (but not all) past life "memories" elicited via past life hypnotic regression sessions."

That may or may not be the case, who knows... but Jankovich reported being able to verify at least two of the past lives he'd seen by visiting the places he had seen them occur in (in his life review) (after he recovered etc.) Interestingly, he described feeling that he had made many of the same mistakes again in this life that he had made in previous lives and therefore had learned nothing. 

I am sorry to hear about the sufferings of your mother etc and I tend to agree that it's hard to see what benefit could be derived from such horrible suffering but I don't pretend to have the answers.

"Your comments seem mainly to address my suggestion that perhaps much of the Jankovich account could be a confabulation of the unconscious mind."

What is it about the experience that makes you think it was a product of his unconscious mind ? When you are clinically dead you're not supposed to be able to think. Before his experience, Jankovich's unconscious mind had never produced anything along similar lines. He told us he wasn't that kind of person.

Why would it be that when you receive 18 broken bones and a fractured skull you suddenly start subconsciously confabulating NDE's and past lives ? 80% of people who nearly die don't report them. If it was somehow a 'by product' of a medical crisis, shouldn't everybody report them ?


"It should be noted that such a mechanism is very likely the source of most (but not all) past life "memories" elicited via past life hypnotic regression sessions."

That may or may not be the case, who knows... but Jankovich reported being able to verify at least two of the past lives he'd seen by visiting the places he had seen them occur in (in his life review) (after he recovered etc.) Interestingly, he described feeling that he had made many of the same mistakes again in this life that he had made in previous lives and therefore had learned nothing. 

I am sorry to hear about the sufferings of your mother etc and I tend to agree that it's hard to see what benefit could be derived from such horrible suffering but I don't pretend to have the answers.

"What is it about the experience that makes you think it was a product of his unconscious mind ? When you are clinically dead you're not supposed to be able to think."

The unconscious mind is capable of elaborate constructions. Stephen Braude thinks the Patience Worth phenomenon was probably creative unconscious fabrication combined with ESP. We just don't know if the unconscious mind is carried over after physical death or during near death into the spirit body.

"Why would it be that when you receive 18 broken bones and a fractured skull you suddenly start subconsciously confabulating NDE's and past lives ? 80% of people who nearly die don't report them. If it was somehow a 'by product' of a medical crisis, shouldn't everybody report them" 

That we don't have knowledge of any actual mechanism is no more mysterious than the fact that for unknown reasons NDEs only happen in 15% or less of cardiac arrests, for instance.