Debate: That veridical NDEs are a myth [split: A splendid video about evolution]

I agree with your post overall but unsure about this?

I'm trying to think of a historical example?

Well, what comes to mind is a claim like "all swans are white". It takes just one example of a black swan to disprove that statement.

Likewise ~ according to Materialists, NDEs should just not happen, not be possible. And yet, we have many examples of NDEs where the NDEr has knowledge of things that should just be impossible. The Pam Reynolds case being a good example.

Or the example of that father who met his deceased daughter in his NDE, and was very confused, because they had communicated (both alive) a few days ago, and after he returned, found that the college she was at had been trying to contact him and tell him that his daughter had died.

It's entirely unexpected stuff like that that solidifies it for me.

The two BEST studies we have give us a total pool of 16 to work with, with two veridical NDEs, one of which was verified via timestamps. And using that miniscule dataset, you're saying that veridical NDEs are a myth?

Like I said in my other comment, there's always the question of whether or not these instances provide accurate information, but saying they're a myth based on the scientific evidence we DO have I feel is a very hard thing to argue.

I just thought I should add that this is the recollection from AWARE 1 that could be verified 

(Before the cardiac arrest) I was answering (the nurse), but I could also feel a real hard pressure on my groin. I could feel the pressure, couldn’t feel the pain or anything like that, just real hard pressure, like someone was really pushing down on me. And I was still talking to (the nurse) and then all of a sudden, I wasn’t. I must have (blanked out)… but then I can remember vividly an automated voice saying, “shock the patient, shock the patient”, and with that, up in (the) corner of the room there was a (woman) beckoning me… I can remember thinking to myself, “I can’t get up there”… she beckoned me… I felt that she knew me, I felt that I could trust her, and I felt she was there for a reason and I didn’t know what that was… and the next second, I was up there, looking down at me, the nurse, and another man who had a bald head… I couldn’t see his face but I could see the back of his body. He was quite a chunky fella… He had blue scrubs on, and he had a blue hat, but I could tell he didn’t have any hair, because of where the hat was. The next thing I remember is waking up on (the) bed. And (the nurse) said to me: “Oh you nodded off… you are back with us now.” Whether she said those words, whether that automated voice really happened, I don’t know… I can remember feeling quite euphoric… I know who (the man with the blue had [sic] was)… I (didn’t) know his full name, but... he was the man that… (I saw) the next day… I saw this man [come to visit me] and I knew who I had seen the day before.
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The other, the 57-year-old man who had produced Recollection #1, was able to accurately describe people, sounds and activities during his resuscitation. Medical records confirmed the use of an automated external defibrillator with an automated voice (hence the robotic words ‘shock the patient’), and the role of the man in the blue hat. It was calculated that the patient had been aware for as much as three minutes after cardiac arrest.

Again, there could be conventional explanations for this, but it's not like there is minute or shaky evidence these things have happened in a scientific study, just that they are very rare and very difficult to document.

Again, there could be conventional explanations for this, but it's not like there is minute or shaky evidence these things have happened in a scientific study, just that they are very rare and very difficult to document.

The same can be said for profound spiritual experiences ~ they simply can't be replicated on command. They just don't work like that. They are never repeatable ~ they can only be added to.

For instance, I have my very particular spiritual experiences that are made seemingly more real over time by their stability ~ the entities that I seem to have clear communication with, yet in no way interrupt my life, rather enhancing it, and encouraging my participation in the inter-subjective world of the physical. And yet, I can never demonstrate evidence of this to anyone else ~ it appears to be a very private experience.

Spiritual phenomena of any kind seems to be like this ~ with the exception of very clearly shared experiences like telepathy and shared death experiences.

It's little wonder that telepathy seems to be one of the few spiritual abilities that can be tested ~ albeit with the decline effect to due participant mental fatigue.

I feel like something should be put into perspective with this. 

In AWARE 2, there were 567 participants. 53 survived, 28 were able to complete interviews and there were 6 NDEs, no veridical perceptions. 

In AWARE 1, there were 2060 participants. 140 survived, 101 were able to complete interviews, 10 people had NDEs and there were 2 accounts of veridical perception. One of those accounts was verified via timestamps, but the room it occured inside had no targets. 

The two BEST studies we have give us a total pool of 16 to work with, with two veridical NDEs, one of which was verified via timestamps. And using that miniscule dataset, you're saying that veridical NDEs are a myth?

Like I said in my other comment, there's always the question of whether or not these instances provide accurate information, but saying they're a myth based on the scientific evidence we DO have I feel is a very hard thing to argue.

@Smaw I stand corrected - my claims are exaggerated and the veridical NDE hypothesis warrants further investigation to validate the accuracy of the perceived information. But it's certainly not a common occurrence as was the initial claim in this debate.
I sometimes get the impression that the believer community thinks the real world is like in the movies where a resuscitated patient jumps up from the table and starts talking about what just happened from a vantage point above the operating theater. In reality, most (even short-term) survivors are in an unconscious or delirious state when spontaneous blood circulation is restored, and it may take days before they are eligible for an interview.
It's so rare that it may never be validated in a prospective setting.

Still, the reasonable position is to be open-minded that new data may support a different hypothesis than originally proposed, like with the psi research where we now have strong evidence for the "Not feeling the future" effect as opposed to the original "feeling the future" effect.

The standards for proclaiming discovery should be no different for psi than for conventional sciences. Take the example of daily aspirin where older data suggested a clear survival benefit, but newer, larger studies have zero effect for primary prevention. That's how science works - or would you use the same flawed logic as with psi that the effect suddenly changed sign? That in the 80's and 90's people had a positive biological response to aspirin and suddenly in the last 10 years our biology changed and aspirin now doesn't work anymore? By any reasonable logic, the early positive effects were likely due to methodological limitations or selective reporting - equally, there never was any "feeling the future" psychic ability (ohh wait I forgot the metaanalysis of these studies now show evidence for the “NOT feeling the future effect” with more misses than expected).
And by the same logic - if new and better studies can't prove the existence of veridical NDEs where cardiac arrest patients observe the entire resuscitation theater from above (which should be almost common nowadays according to David), then the reasonable conclusion is that it simply doesn't happen.

We're going in circles now. You could try addressing the substantive points I made for a change, for example with respect to potential contributions to the lability of conventional and unconventional effects. Differences in sampling across time could indeed lead to differences in the average genetic characters of the people in studies on the effect of aspirin (especially because these studies have typically paid no attention to genetic variability), which, given the effect magnitude is very small, could change what recommendations seem to be best supported. Suitbert Ertel conducted some very interesting and informative studies about individual differences in psi performance, finding different persons have stable psi-hitting and psi-missing tendencies for as yet unknown reasons. Differences in sampling across time happening to favor psi-hitting vs. psi-missing people could certainly cause a reversal of effect direction, especially when an effect is tiny.

"if new and better studies can't prove the existence of veridical NDEs where cardiac arrest patients observe the entire resuscitation theater from above"
I noted a while ago in this thread that veridical NDEs have been found in prospective NDE studies including AWARE-I. Strangely you recently acknowledged this and accepted your error because @Smaw raised the issue, but you ignored it when I highlighted it.

Well, what comes to mind is a claim like "all swans are white". It takes just one example of a black swan to disprove that statement.

Likewise ~ according to Materialists, NDEs should just not happen, not be possible. And yet, we have many examples of NDEs where the NDEr has knowledge of things that should just be impossible. The Pam Reynolds case being a good example.

Or the example of that father who met his deceased daughter in his NDE, and was very confused, because they had communicated (both alive) a few days ago, and after he returned, found that the college she was at had been trying to contact him and tell him that his daughter had died.

It's entirely unexpected stuff like that that solidifies it for me.

I think the idea of the "black swan" needs some unpacking, IMO anyway, to distinguish the existence of something that is verifiable by the consensus versus a single anecdote about a black swan.

To be clear I do believe in Survival, because I don't think every witness is lying or deluded. Additionally I think there are philosophical, a priori reasons to accept this evidence as something we should expect.

I just don't think a single anecdote is enough to change scientific consensus. A single fossil, or an alien artifact that could be publicly examined by the STEM community? - Sure. 

Perhaps a single event seen by masses and captured on film / radar / etc would be enough, though not sure that counts [as] a single anecdote...though maybe I'm just splitting hairs on that...

I feel like something should be put into perspective with this. 

In AWARE 2, there were 567 participants. 53 survived, 28 were able to complete interviews and there were 6 NDEs, no veridical perceptions. 

In AWARE 1, there were 2060 participants. 140 survived, 101 were able to complete interviews, 10 people had NDEs and there were 2 accounts of veridical perception. One of those accounts was verified via timestamps, but the room it occured inside had no targets. 

The two BEST studies we have give us a total pool of 16 to work with, with two veridical NDEs, one of which was verified via timestamps. And using that miniscule dataset, you're saying that veridical NDEs are a myth?

Like I said in my other comment, there's always the question of whether or not these instances provide accurate information, but saying they're a myth based on the scientific evidence we DO have I feel is a very hard thing to argue.

"In AWARE 2, there were 567 participants. 53 survived, 28 were able to complete interviews and there were 6 NDEs, no veridical perceptions"

This isn't strictly true. Auditory perceptions were reported that were, as far as could be determined, accurate, but the evidence isn't too compelling as the NDEr had to be prompted to recall the names of "three fruits" that were able to be heard during cardiac arrest. The hit could've been a chance effect. By contrast, it's generally said that there was no evidence of visual NDE perceptions. On the other hand, Patrick Brissey gives as an example of anomalous veridical perception (of what kind is unclear from his paper) the following from AWARE-II: "One NDEr reported while having a nonfunctional brain, 'they were putting two electrodes to my chest, and I remember the shock,' a claim that was confirmed by Parnia’s team (p. 5). Parnia et al. wrote, 'during stage-3, the claim of being shocked was verified by chart review.'”

I think the idea of the "black swan" needs some unpacking, IMO anyway, to distinguish the existence of something that is verifiable by the consensus versus a single anecdote about a black swan.

What I mean by "anecdote" is just a single example of something that runs counter to an asserted consensus ~ science is not about "consensus" anyways. It is about challenging and progressing past consensus, because consensus is the stuff of religion and ideology. All progress in science has been made by challenging such.

To be clear I do believe in Survival, because I don't think every witness is lying or deluded. Additionally I think there are philosophical, a priori reasons to accept this evidence as something we should expect.

I agree ~ however we can never test or reproduce such reasons scientifically, even if we have strong reasons to believe that there is a definite reality to survival of mind, consciousness, beyond bodily death.

I just don't think a single anecdote is enough to change scientific consensus. A single fossil, or an alien artifact that could be publicly examined by the STEM community? - Sure. 

A single fossil? A single alien artifact? These are anecdotes ~ but my point is that this is all you need to counter ideological claims that they don't exist. Science can never work with negative evidence ~ that is, we can't claim that black swans don't exist, if we've never seen any. We can just conclude that it's probable that they don't exist, if we have never encountered any. But a single black swan is positive evidence ~ which is what science can work with.

Perhaps a single event seen by masses and captured on film / radar / etc would be enough, though not sure that counts [as] a single anecdote...though maybe I'm just splitting hairs on that...

Ah, maybe it's just a problem of definitions, then... for me, an anecdote is just an event, an example, without bias. The Materialist dismisses anecdotes they don't like simply because such examples run counter to their pseudo-scientific claims, whereas anecdotes are the stuff of science ~ many anecdotes forming patterns that science needs to begin an investigation.

[Laird]

First off: welcome to the forums, @InterestedinPsi. Your responses in this thread have been very constructive. Please feel free to introduce yourself (and optionally to tell us how you found us while you're at it), but also feel free to ignore that invitation.

5. *critical remarks about the Gospels from Laird and sbu*

I recommend that both of you consider reading the following book, which is open access and so downloadable for free at the link, and which rather demolishes this notion of the Gospels as uncorroborated works lacking historicity: https://academic.oup.com/book/60034

To be clear: I think that the historical record, including the Gospels, leaves no room for doubt that Jesus existed and was a powerful ethical and spiritual teacher.

Beyond that, I don't think that the Gospels are strong evidence (of the sort we have for particular veridical NDEs) for any particular miraculous event, up to and including the resurrection, in part because they contradict one another. Compare them side by side and there are glaring discrepancies.

Thus, as an analogy for modern accounts of "miraculous" veridical NDEs, the Gospel accounts of miracles fail (the analogy also fails for the other reasons I listed originally, plus the fact that the very identity of the authors is unknown or at least questionable).

I appreciate the book reference, but it doesn't seem to contradict my preexisting position.

[Laird]

After 70+ years of claims, believers have produced exactly zero alien artifacts that can survive basic scientific scrutiny. Every piece of supposed "otherworldly" debris has either disappeared, been revealed as mundane materials, or conveniently remains in the hands of people who won't submit it for independent analysis.

I haven't looked into the existence and scrutiny of public-domain alien artifacts for myself, and I'm not going to pretend otherwise. My (admittedly limited) interest has instead been on whistleblowers like David Grusch. Their claims are that these artifacts are in the hands of the murky intersection of the public and private sector in the military-industrial complex. In this respect, your claim - whether or not true - is irrelevant: any such artifacts are by definition not in the public domain in the first place, so can't be publicly scrutinised scientifically.

In any case, I'm pretty sure that, like much in this area, you haven't looked into this question either, and are simply talking from your preconceptions, so I don't put much stock in these supposed "facts" that you list. @InterestedinPsi has pointed out a counterexample, which confirms my assessment.

It's remarkably convenient that these "alien crashes" always seem to happen near top-secret military installations during the height of experimental aircraft development.

Coming again from the perspective of the whistleblowers, I'm not aware of any of them generally claiming that this is where these crashes from which craft/bodies are retrieved "always seem to happen". More broadly, I'm not aware of such a claim about crashed craft in general. I suspect that, once again, you are simply talking from your preconceptions.

The most dramatic accounts invariably emerge decades after the alleged events, often from people who somehow forgot to mention seeing alien technology until UFO culture made it profitable or famous to do so.

Re the profit/fame motive, let's take David Grusch as an example: he explicitly denied being compensated for his groundbreaking interview with News Nation, and I'm not aware of any evidence he has been paid for any other interview.

As for fame, that argument cuts both ways, as I pointed out originally: to people such as yourself, he's not so much famous as infamous. Why would he deceive so as to seek fame from some only to ruin his hard-won reputation amongst others - for no financial gain?

It's also worth pointing out that you failed to respond to my invitation:

I have no solid evidence that the people reporting that such a thing has in fact occurred are lying, confabulating, or deceived. If you do, then go ahead and share it.

It seems safe to assume, then, that you lack such solid evidence. (In fact, I'd expect to find it for some of these folk - there are always grifters in areas like this - but I'd be surprised to find it for somebody like David Grusch. I'm open to it if you can provide it though.)

UFO believers simultaneously claim the government is competent enough to orchestrate massive cover-ups involving thousands of people for decades, yet incompetent enough to let the "truth" leak out through blurry photos and dubious witnesses. Which is it?

They're not mutually exclusive. Cover-ups aren't necessarily perfect. Disclosing classified information is a serious crime. That's a big deterrent to most (and there might be other deterrents), but it's not foolproof.

Any civilization capable of interstellar travel wouldn't crash with the frequency that UFO enthusiasts claim.

Yet the only evidence you provide for this claim is that they would have "mastered physics we can't even comprehend". Well, compared to our ancient ancestors, we have mastered physics that they couldn't even comprehend, to the point that we can fly to the moon (and, unmanned, beyond the solar system) - yet our spacecraft, planes, and cars still crash, even here on our home planet.

The same people demanding rigorous proof for conventional scientific claims will accept grainy photos, third-hand testimonies, and government document fragments as iron-clad evidence of the most extraordinary event in human history.

Are you still talking about retrieved materials from crashed craft or are you now talking about UFOs in general? The evidence for the former is admittedly weaker, and I'm not claiming it to be iron-clad, but the evidence for the latter is solid.

The crashed UFO narrative isn't just unsupported - it's an insult to critical thinking itself.

No, it's not, but your "arguments" for that claim are an insult to logic.