Dualism or idealist monism as the best model for survival after death data

[Laird]

Maybe I should have said 'intellectually dishonest' (that's a more environmentally friendly kind of dishonesty).

Yep, he does: with the caveats that they might need to have "senses, embodiment, world models and self models, recurrent processing, global workspace, and unified goals", he thinks (as of 23 August last year) that "it’s a serious possibility that we’ll have conscious LLM+s within a decade".

Just a bizarre statement grounded in nothing but computationalist religion, compared to the vast amount of Survival evidence that has been accumulated.

In sbu's "defense" (and please, I do not want ANYONE in this thread to see what follows as an attack in any form.  I truly appreciate being here, taking in what you all contribute, and considering these things.  Its invaluable!)....

I see a ton of value in his ardent skepticism.  And, while sometimes skepticism can frustrate me, I only truly find it to be a negative when the author is 1) close-minded and 2) superior/dismissive.  I really don't see sbu as either of these things.

Rather he strikes me as a person who REALLY wants the proverbial 1 + 1 to equal 2.  (I say proverbially and yet that might be my own proverb.  I want a neat, air-tight explanation.  I've felt since I was a child that I'd never get it; that its purposefully intractable (to me at least).  Yet, I still insist on being provided one.  Immaturity at the core I'm sure.)

So, when sbu provides "science of the gaps" explanations for things like terminal lucidity... I'm sympathetic to that thinking.  He wants it airtight and, at least to folks like sbu and me, things just don't seem airtight on this topic.  (And most topics we discuss for that matter)

Yet, and finally, without sbu I would be getting much less from this wonderful community.  He gets all you really smart types to post counters!  Counters that I learn from.

So, sbu, you've got a fan here in your online friend Silence!  (As do the rest of you all!)

Batthyany seemed very clear about this, sbu. They are absolutely certain as can be (they can easily scan the brain) that the brains of these patients are gone. If that wasn't the case then there wouldn't be the same mystery surrounding it, surely. Terminal lucidity also occurs according to him in different diagnosed pathologies, such as catastrophic injury etc. 

Here's one I've posted previously where the brain tissue had been replaced with tumour, apparently.

 But it wasn't David's brain that woke him up to say goodbye that Friday. His brain had already been destroyed. Tumor metastases don't simply occupy space and press on things, leaving a whole brain. The metastases actually replace tissue. Where that gray stuff grows, the brain is just not there.

The Brain: The Power of Hope -- Printout -- TIME

As Laird stated, you are a smart guy. Are you seeking to drop or reconsider your previous convictions or have you just not seen any evidence here that is persuasive enough to make you do so ? 

This Time article is very evidential. It was written by a medical doctor who left no doubt that in this particular terminal lucidity case there simply was no significant amount of brain left:

"When his doctors rescanned his head, there was barely any brain left. The cerebral machine that talked and wondered, winked and sang, the machine that remembered jokes and birthdays and where the big fish hid on hot days, was nearly gone, replaced by lumps of haphazardly growing gray stuff. Gone with that machine seemed David as well. No expression, no response to anything we did to him. As far as I could tell, he was just not there."

I guess sbu is selectively hyperskeptically suggesting that the author of the article could have been simply lying or greatly exaggerating. I suppose anything is at least remotely possible, but in this case I don't think so.

He wants it airtight and, at least to folks like sbu and me, things just don't seem airtight on this topic

Air tight (or the equivalent of absolute proof) is very difficult to establish, Silence. Isn't that only available in mathematics ? I believe so, anyway. With respect to NDE's which I 
personally consider to be by far the most interesting phenomena, some cases and one in particular, were and are still actually air tight, it's just that some commenters (not currently on here) who refer to themselves as sceptics are actually not true sceptics at all, and have been wholly dishonest, and one in particular, his (this Dr.) behaviour is disgraceful, at least IMHO. 

You'll know the case I'm referring to, I'm sure. It was/is absolutely as solid as any case ever could be, but because one can never rule out that there could in theory be a mass conspiracy in a medical institution, it is not absolute proof. However, there is certainly no satisfactory explanation for it...there never was nor will there ever be. Sometimes I think it's reasonable to just accept something happened the way it did, bearing in mind how many times this is recurring. That's just how I feel about it, anyway.

In sbu's "defense" (and please, I do not want ANYONE in this thread to see what follows as an attack in any form.  I truly appreciate being here, taking in what you all contribute, and considering these things.  Its invaluable!)....

I see a ton of value in his ardent skepticism.  And, while sometimes skepticism can frustrate me, I only truly find it to be a negative when the author is 1) close-minded and 2) superior/dismissive.  I really don't see sbu as either of these things.

Rather he strikes me as a person who REALLY wants the proverbial 1 + 1 to equal 2.  (I say proverbially and yet that might be my own proverb.  I want a neat, air-tight explanation.  I've felt since I was a child that I'd never get it; that its purposefully intractable (to me at least).  Yet, I still insist on being provided one.  Immaturity at the core I'm sure.)

So, when sbu provides "science of the gaps" explanations for things like terminal lucidity... I'm sympathetic to that thinking.  He wants it airtight and, at least to folks like sbu and me, things just don't seem airtight on this topic.  (And most topics we discuss for that matter)

Yet, and finally, without sbu I would be getting much less from this wonderful community.  He gets all you really smart types to post counters!  Counters that I learn from.

So, sbu, you've got a fan here in your online friend Silence!  (As do the rest of you all!)

Thank you, Silence, for your kind words. I truly appreciate it.

Here's one I've posted previously where the brain tissue had been replaced with tumour, apparently.

 But it wasn't David's brain that woke him up to say goodbye that Friday. His brain had already been destroyed. Tumor metastases don't simply occupy space and press on things, leaving a whole brain. The metastases actually replace tissue. Where that gray stuff grows, the brain is just not there.

The Brain: The Power of Hope -- Printout -- TIME

I appreciate any evidence you can provide that suggests there is meaning to our existence. Eventually, it might accumulate enough to significantly challenge my current beliefs. It's my intent to read Batthyany's book about terminal lucidity which is just about to become available in physical format. Then we will see if it will change anything (Threshold: Terminal Lucidity and the Border of Life and Death: Amazon.co.uk: Batthyány, Alexander: 9781250782281: Books)

This Time article is very evidential. It was written by a medical doctor who left no doubt that in this particular terminal lucidity case there simply was no significant amount of brain left:


I guess sbu is selectively hyperskeptically suggesting that the author of the article could have been simply lying or greatly exaggerating. I suppose anything is at least remotely possible, but in this case I don't think so.

I’m not selectively hyperskeptical. Just hyperskeptical  - there must obviously have been parts of this patient’s brain in a functional state. The organs involved in speech include the lungs, vocal cords, larynx, tongue, lips, oral cavity, and throat. To enable speech, the functional brain activity must coordinate and control these organs effectively

As I wrote earlier there are a trememdous amount of nuances in medicine.

I appreciate any evidence you can provide that suggests there is meaning to our existence. Eventually, it might accumulate enough to significantly challenge my current beliefs. It's my intent to read Batthyany's book about terminal lucidity which is just about to become available in physical format. Then we will see if it will change anything 

Nothing needs to change, sbu. You don't have to accept that there is a meaning to our existence, but when there are actually very good reasons
why reductionist physicalism alone cannot possibly account for the data we have, why wouldn't you ? By simple logical deduction, you must have accepted what sceptics have offered as alternative explanations.

A great many others have too; they've been successfully influenced by them and I'm suggesting to you that there's no good reason why they needed to be.
It's not that the data is absent or unreliable, it isn't. It's there and plentiful. But because of what's at stake here, materialist sceptics (in the main) have simply closed their minds to it.

At worst, some in particular have actually seen fit to tamper with the evidence (stating it didn't happen like that), effectively trying to discredit witnesses (surgeons and doctors) and ultimately "nobble" the "jury" (us). That's not doing science, that is the behaviour of philosophical "luddites" who don't want to change their minds. If this was about anything other than the meaning of our existence, then the argument would have been settled years ago. It's quite obvious that there's something extraordinary going on. 

When you die and have one of these experiences yourself (hopefully a long time in the future) you won't accept for a second, the ridiculously inadequate mechanical explanations proposed by sceptics...now I'm out of my body, so my temporal parietal lobe is clearly being stimulated somehow, and now I observe a tunnel and that is of course only a mere spasm of my eye, or the disinihibition of brain cells outwards to inwards (and vice versa for the return)...ah yes, there's that light, which is simply a by-product of my dying neurons firing off in the grey/white matter junctions ...and there's my deceased father and mother who look very real and strangely young again...but of course, they would do, it is only my Freudian subconscious desire to reassure me that annihilation occurs to others, not me. 

Apologies for the frivolity, sbu but you get the point, I'm sure.

Air tight (or the equivalent of absolute proof) is very difficult to establish, Silence. Isn't that only available in mathematics ? I believe so, anyway. With respect to NDE's which I personally consider to be by far the most interesting phenomena, some cases and one in particular, were and are still actually air tight, it's just that some commenters (not currently on here) who refer to themselves as sceptics are actually not true sceptics at all, and have been wholly dishonest, and one in particular, his (this Dr.) behaviour is disgraceful, at least IMHO. 

You'll know the case I'm referring to, I'm sure. It was/is absolutely as solid as any case ever could be, but because one can never rule out that there could in theory be a mass conspiracy in a medical institution, it is not absolute proof. However, there is certainly no satisfactory explanation for it...there never was nor will there ever be. Sometimes I think it's reasonable to just accept something happened the way it did, bearing in mind how many times this is recurring. That's just how I feel about it, anyway.

Great post tim.  The bold is my (self imposed?) quandary.