Is the Filter Theory committing the ad hoc fallacy and is it unfalsifiable?

Interesting link.

My information comes from How Not to Do Survival Research: Reflections on the Bigelow Institute Essay Competition p368.  He references his source as (Holden, 2009, p210). 

Your link comes from Explore, which is a journal that has been highly criticized for not meeting scientific standards. Your link says it includes more studies than the only previous meta-analysis, which probably is a reference to the Holden study. I suspect that the Explore meta-analysis includes a number of controversial studies that the other study excluded. There is a lot of published literature on mediums that is not reputable.

On the lighter side, what do you call a short psychic who escapes from jail? A small medium at large.

So, instead of addressing the study itself, you go ahead and take shots at the journal that published the study. Sounds a bit like an attempt to poison the well to me.
I can likewise point to the fact that you draw your criticism from Wikipedia, which has been criticised for citing unreliable sources in it's entries about the paranormal.

The Holden study that you are citing is about clinical studies of near-death experiences, not mediumship.

Augustine's source for his claim--"The actual outcome of several decades of such experiments (over a century’s worth for mental mediumship) 'continues to frustrate researchers' (Holden, 2009, p. 210) and ought to have spurred soul-searching questions for survival researchers by now"-- is Holden, J. M. (2009). Veridical perception in near-death experiences. In J. M. Holden, B Greyson, & D. James (Eds.), The handbook of near-death experiences (pp. 185–211) Praeger/ABC-CLIO." Somebody here might have that book and could check it out for us.

You can actually just search for the book page - 210 - on Amazon (this link *might* work) ->

The essay is about NDEs and Holden is actually quoting Kenneth Ring.

Holden was talking about a variety of anecdotes [of OOBE perception during NDEs] with some very convincing ones in the literature but the lack of hits in controlled settings. He quoted Kenneth Ring who said there should be at least one "hit" in a controlled setting, and the lack "continues to frustrate researchers".

How does one misinterpret this ->

What we need is a clump of matter, in this case the Paris neurons, that by the very arrangement of its synapses points at, indicates, singles out, picks out, identifies (and here we just start piling up more and more synonyms for “being about”) another clump of matter outside the brain. But there is no such physical stuff.

Physics has ruled out the existence of clumps of matter of the required sort. There are just fermions and bosons and combinations of them. None of that stuff is just, all by itself, about any other stuff. There is nothing in the whole universe—including, of course, all the neurons in your brain—that just by its nature or composition can do this job of being about some other clump of matter. So, when consciousness assures us that we have thoughts about stuff, it has to be wrong. The brain nonconsciously stores information in thoughts. But the thoughts are not about stuff. Therefore, consciousness cannot retrieve thoughts about stuff. There are none to retrieve. So it can’t have thoughts about stuff either.

Rosenberg, Alex. The Atheist's Guide to Reality: Enjoying Life without Illusions (p. 179). W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.

To mean the opposite of what he is saying?

Again, Rosenberg's entire point in this section is that the neurons inside our brain are the thing doing the deciding. Those neurons do not represent conscious thoughts thinking about different things. Rather, he says they are simply mechanical devices doing electro-mechanical things that determine what we do. Consciousness, to him, is just an interpretation over top of these neurons interpreting what the neurons are doing. Rosenberg writes,

Our conscious thoughts are very crude indicators of what is going on in our brain. We fool ourselves into treating these conscious markers as thoughts about what we want and about how to achieve it, about plans and purposes. We are even tricked into thinking they somehow bring about behavior. We are mistaken about all of these things... Whatever neural arrangements these conscious markers consist of, they are almost certainly not sufficient in number or organization by themselves to drive the behavior that is supposed to result from conscious thoughts about stuff. (Locations 3407-3412, emphasis added.)

So he is saying that are consciousness, by itself, is not sufficient to determine our actions. Rather, our actions are all determined by the dumb neurons that work it all out.

And again, even if Rosenberg did think that neurons could not be doing our thinkING, that would not make him right. You keep arguing that he is an atheist WHO says this, therefore I should think he is right. That is a bogus argument.

If I should think every thing an atheist says about consciousness is right, should I think this Atheist is right?

The Mind Is a Process Not an Object: On Not Understanding Mind-Brain Physicalism

The Bogus Idea of the Bogus Mysteries of Consciousness

The Mind Is a Process Not an Object: On Not Understanding Mind-Brain Physicalism

What Does It Mean to Call Consciousness an Illusion?

And again, even if Rosenberg did think that neurons could not be doing our thinkING, that would not make him right. You keep arguing that he is an atheist WHO says this, therefore I should think he is right. That is a bogus argument.

If I should think every thing an atheist says about consciousness is right, should I think this Atheist is right?

Oh I don't think you have to think he's right because he's an atheist & materialist. I'm not trying to evangelize my beliefs.

But I do think he's right [about what Materialism entails] because of the argument I've quoted a few times over ->

We see why the Paris neurons can’t be about Paris the way that red octagons are about stopping. It’s because that way lies a regress that will prevent us from ever understanding what we wanted to figure out in the first place: how one chunk of stuff—the Paris neurons—can be about another chunk of stuff—Paris. We started out trying to figure out how the Paris neurons could be about Paris, and our tentative answer is that they are about Paris because some other part of the brain—the neural interpreter—is both about the Paris neurons and about Paris. We set out to explain how one set of neurons is about something out there in the world. We find ourselves adopting the theory that it’s because another set of neurons is about the first bunch of neurons and about the thing in the world, too.

This won’t do. What we need to get off the regress is some set of neurons that is about some stuff outside the brain without being interpreted—by anyone or anything else (including any other part of the brain)—as being about that stuff outside the brain. What we need is a clump of matter, in this case the Paris neurons, that by the very arrangement of its synapses points at, indicates, singles out, picks out, identifies (and here we just start piling up more and more synonyms for “being about”) another clump of matter outside the brain. But there is no such physical stuff.

Physics has ruled out the existence of clumps of matter of the required sort. There are just fermions and bosons and combinations of them. None of that stuff is just, all by itself, about any other stuff. There is nothing in the whole universe—including, of course, all the neurons in your brain—that just by its nature or composition can do this job of being about some other clump of matter. So, when consciousness assures us that we have thoughts about stuff, it has to be wrong. The brain nonconsciously stores information in thoughts. But the thoughts are not about stuff. Therefore, consciousness cannot retrieve thoughts about stuff. There are none to retrieve. So it can’t have thoughts about stuff either.

Rosenberg, Alex. The Atheist's Guide to Reality: Enjoying Life without Illusions (pp. 178-179). W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.

I've yet to see a reason to think differently [though Rosenberg and I disagree on what we should conclude from Materialism's negation of Cogito Ergo Sum].

But going back to the point being debated - If a brain made of non-conscious constituents - a Materialist brain in other words - cannot have thoughts it cannot hold memories either. And so *if* a soul exists, I don't think it would need said Materialist brain for its cognitive functioning.

Unless there is some argument that shows Rosenberg's reasoning is wrong I see no reason to think that *if* there are souls AND *if* the brain is made of non-conscious constituents then the soul would lack cognitive functioning without said brain.

If the reason is within one of those links please quote an excerpt of the relevant part. I've already noted the one trying to explain what it means to say Consciousness is an Illusion is poorly reasoned AFAICTell.

 But terminal lucidity, considering alzheimer's damage to the brain, is rather compelling, at least in my opinion.

Do you have any evidence that terminal lucidity happens in patients more than would be expected by chance? People sometimes have good days and sometimes have bad days. If their last day is good, other people remember it. If their last day was bad, people expect it, and don't think about it.

If a person's last day is good in terms of motor skills, would you say that is a sign that people will move their physical arms and legs long after death? If not, why is a good day mentally considered a sign of soul survival?

Do you have any evidence that terminal lucidity happens in patients more than would be expected by chance? People sometimes have good days and sometimes have bad days. If their last day is good, other people remember it. If their last day was bad, people expect it, and don't think about it.

If a person's last day is good in terms of motor skills, would you say that is a sign that people will move their physical arms and legs long after death? If not, why is a good day mentally considered a sign of soul survival?

I think this is preposterous, especially for cases involving obvious brain damage (such as strokes, tumors, advanced Alzheimer’s disease) that should render the patient all but vegetative.

For example, from Terminal Lucidity: A Review and a Case Collection, by Michael Nahm, Bruce Greyson, Emily Williams Kelly and Erlendur Haraldsson (at https://med.virginia.edu/perceptual-stud...ty-AGG.pdf ):

Haig (2007) reported the case of a young man dying of lung
cancer that had spread to his brain. Toward the end of his life, a
brain scan showed little brain tissue left, the metastasized tumors
having not simply pushed aside normal brain tissue but actually
destroyed and replaced it. In the days before his death, he lost all
ability to speak or move. According to a nurse and his wife,
however, an hour before he died, he woke up and said good-bye to
his family, speaking with them for about five minutes before losing
consciousness again and dying.

Morse and Perry (1990) reported the case of a 5-year-old boy
who had been in a coma for three weeks dying from a malignant
brain tumor, during which time he was almost constantly
surrounded by various family members. Finally, on the advice of
their minister, the family told the comatose child that they would
miss him but he had their permission to die. Suddenly and
unexpectedly, the boy regained consciousness, thanked the family
for letting him go, and told them he would be dying soon. He did in
fact die the next day.

Just a status check.
I asked Merle, how are "controlled studies" supposed to be carried out when the phenomena being studied are by their very nature rare and are uncontrollable and unpredictable as to when and where and to whom they occur, such as NDEs and past life memories in small children? We're still waiting for an answer to this, along with an answer to Sam's request for actual references to some of the specific papers documenting the numerous "controlled" scientific research studies on paranormal phenomena like NDEs and reincarnation memories, that Merle has repeatedly referred to in general. It's just cricket chirping so far.

As to controlled studies of practicing mediums, what about Julie Beischel's work, in particular the study posted about in #490? Is this not controlled enough for Merle? After all, the experimental conditions of the study eliminated normal, sensory sources for the information the mediums reported, and still yielded very positive results.

[Ninshub]

Augustine's source for his claim--"The actual outcome of several decades of such experiments (over a century’s worth for mental mediumship) 'continues to frustrate researchers' (Holden, 2009, p. 210) and ought to have spurred soul-searching questions for survival researchers by now"-- is Holden, J. M. (2009). Veridical perception in near-death experiences. In J. M. Holden, B Greyson, & D. James (Eds.), The handbook of near-death experiences (pp. 185–211) Praeger/ABC-CLIO." Somebody here might have that book and could check it out for us.

I do. That's a strange twisting of the quote, or adding to the quote that really isn't here. It's from an embedded "personal communication" dated 2006 where NDE researcher Kenneth Ring says that what "continues to frustrate researchers and gives ammunition to the skeptics" is "the search for the elusive white crow in the laboratory". Notice it does mention the laboratory. The personal communication makes it clear that he's talking specifically about veridical perceptions during their NDEs "under controlled conditions". I think the topic of why that research is hard to do because of the nature of the phenomena (and the circumstances!) has been covered in the thread.

What's strange in terms of that omission is also what Augustine adds - because nowhere does Ring in that citation, or the authors themselves in that page, mention mediumship research. Augustine's phrasing is making it sound as if Holden is talking about survival-evidence experiments at large, which is clearly not the case.

I do. That's a strange twisting of the quote, or adding to the quote that really isn't here. It's from an embedded "personal communication" dated 2006 where NDE researcher Kenneth Ring says that what "continues to frustrate researchers and gives ammunition to the skeptics" is "the search for the elusive white crow in the laboratory". Notice it does mention the laboratory. The personal communication makes it clear that he's talking specifically about veridical perceptions during their NDEs "under controlled conditions". I think the topic of why that research is hard to do because of the nature of the phenomena (and the circumstances!) has been covered in the thread.

What's strange in terms of that omission is also what Augustine adds - because nowhere does Ring in that citation, or the authors themselves in that page, mention mediumship research. Augustine's phrasing is making it sound as if Holden is talking about survival-evidence experiments at large, which is clearly not the case.

Perhaps a screen-capture or photograph or just a text quote of a whole paragraph or couple of sentences would help everyone to see the Kenneth Ring comment in context?