Life Reviews

Always found the "life review" phenomenon in NDEs as being a definite anomaly in the experiences. Not as totally compelling as the more objective/paranormal happenings in these experiences, but nonetheless very intriguing. So far, this is the only thing close to a "skeptical" explanation I've seen given for it: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w...ps_i9jdg9l

The problem here is any connections they draw in the article can just be legitimately chucked up to correlation rather than causation. Plus the fact that there are plenty of good reasons not to think memory is atleast only stored in the brain. It's clear these areas of the brain mentioned are included in different kinds of recall.

Quote from the article

To truly understand LREs [life review experiences], though, scientists would have to identify what’s happening in the brain as they’re happening.

What if nothing at all is happening in the brain?

The quote doesn't resonate with me. It seems on a par with saying, to truly understand literature, one must understand what's happening in the pen, paper and ink.


I would also echo the concern in  the opening post on the question of where memory is stored. It seems one of the biggest problems, one which is little understood, despite claims made in neuroscience. It is really a topic in its own right, and one which deserves more attention.

“When your life flashes before your eyes, in other words, it isn’t the brain reacting to the threat of death in some special, mystical way — it’s just a super-concentrated version of mental processes that happen every day. Which means that it’s such a common trope for good reason: If the researchers are correct, seeing a replay of your life in moments of danger can happen to pretty much anyone.“

What about seeing things that will happen in the future, like knowing that a child will die or seeing how things might turn out if you make the choice to return or to stay.

Such things are a long way from materialist explanations.

Wanted to add this bit that Keith Augustine argued about from a study by Peter Fenwick. 

But, remarkably, the Fenwicks almost always found random memories in their sample of life reviews:
Although 15 per cent of the people we questioned said that scenes or memories from the past came back to them during the [near-death] experience, most of these were simply fragments of memory, sometimes quite random memories. Only about half said the memories that came back to them were [even] 'significant' (Fenwick and Fenwick 116).
The Fenwicks conclude that near-death life reviews "are not necessarily particularly significant memories. They seem just as likely to be random moments plucked haphazardly from memory, trivial events or people or places" (118).
The Fenwicks' findings imply that the memories recalled during NDEs are barely distinguishable from the flashbacks of temporal lobe seizures. While this isn't flatly inconsistent with a survivalist interpretation, it is clearly readily explicable on physiological models of the NDE, making a survivalist interpretation unnecessary.

I have no real way of contacting him, but I'm sure Fenwick doesn't have the same conclusions as Augustine does, who seems to be very biased towards the brain = mind model in all situations just out of ideology

The problem here is any connections they draw in the article can just be legitimately chucked up to correlation rather than causation.

I disagree.  From the article:

 Another common element of LREs was the inclusion of deeply emotional experiences from the perspective of others close to them. Here’s what another participant had to say: ‘‘I could individually go into each person and I could feel the pain that they had in their life … I was allowed to see that part of them and feel for myself what they felt.” Another one: “I was seeing, feeling these things about him [my father], and he was sharing with me the things of his early childhood and how things were difficult for him. In fact, all interviewees in the study said after their LRE, they had experienced a major change in perspective regarding significant people in their lives or important life events. (In an interview, Katz said that she found this to be the most interesting part of the study’s findings.)

I got two finding from reading the review.  First, they gathered data that indicated that some phenomenal event was occurring and this legitimizes further research. 

Second, the quotation above highlights that "deep-meaning" is a leading indicator for separating brain signals without a meaningful source (hallucinations) from signals from the mind that are fully connected to reality in informational space.

 Information space is the set of concepts and relations among them held by an information system;[1] it describes the range of possible values or meanings an entity can have under the given rules and circumstances.

An information space is a type of information design in which representations of information objects are situated in a principled space. In a principled space location and direction have meaning, so that mapping and navigation become possible.
— MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory[2]

Information spaces surround us. When we retrieve a file from our computer, we are browsing through an information space; when we use a search engine we are sifting through an information space; and when we visit a website we are moving through yet another information space.
— Jason Withrow[3] 

I have no real way of contacting him, but I'm sure Fenwick doesn't have the same conclusions as Augustine does, who seems to be very biased towards the brain = mind model in all situations just out of ideology

Quite so. Fenwick's views may have shifted over the years, but I don't think the mind=brain model has ever been something he has promoted.

The Fenwicks' findings imply that ... [omitted]

I rather think that the supposed implication in the previous quote can only be supported by deliberately and misleadingly taking it out of context.

As I recall, often the so-called trivial or minor events recalled have some background, for example there may have been some impact on either the person, or others with whom they were in contact. It is the effects which are shown as important in an NDE life review. And that is very often something of which the person could have had no knowledge, hence it could not have been stored in the person's own memory, regardless of whether one supports mind=brain or not.

"They found that the stories all had several elements in common, including a few that contradicted commonly held ideas about what an LRE looks like. The order of events, for example, was rarely chronological — more often, interviewees reported witnessing their life events in random order, or even simultaneously. Here’s what one participant who went through a near-death experience had to say about the timeline of their LRE:

‘‘There is not a linear progression, there is lack of time limits […] It was like being there for centuries. I was not in time/space so this question also feels impossible to answer. A moment, and a thousand years… both and neither. It all happened at once, or some experiences within my near-death experience were going on at the same time as others, though my human mind separates them into different events.”

heh

Welcome to the Now, the One Moment.

Not a bad way to create a physical reality that includes this stark and compelling learning experience that time is illusory, space as well.

As I recall, often the so-called trivial or minor events recalled have some background, for example there may have been some impact on either the person, or others with whom they were in contact. It is the effects which are shown as important in an NDE life review. And that is very often something of which the person could have had no knowledge, hence it could not have been stored in the person's own memory, regardless of whether one supports mind=brain or not.

Forgive me Typoz, but I suggest that you may have meant "affects"  and not effects.

There is a science link in the root purpose of this forum.  I think that "life review" is an extremely important part of unraveling our experiences.  I have made the point, before, that much common sense can be had by analyzing where signals come from and what formal logic and information they may have.

Using the word affects - puts this idea of specified emotional meanings - into science.  Life-review, in any mode, is different from hallucination as to its signal source.  Life-review has to come with logical context of the person's experience.

These deep personal meanings exhibited during life-review - are based in reality - and can be researched by science.

 Affective science is the scientific study of emotion or affect. This includes the study of emotion elicitation, emotional experience and the recognition of emotions in others.

   

When I read Moody and other science-based thinkers, they use the term often.

Forgive me Typoz, but I suggest that you may have meant "affects"  and not effects.

No, I didn't. I meant effects. Think of it as for example after-effects (not after affects).

I've come across the usage you refer to, but that wasn't the way in which I intended it.

I agree there are plenty of posts online where people have trouble with you're and your, its and it's, as well as effect and affect. I came across another one yesterday: sit and set.

No, I didn't. I meant effects. Think of it as for example after-effects (not after affects).

I've come across the usage you refer to, but that wasn't the way in which I intended it.

I agree there are plenty of posts online where people have trouble with you're and your, its and it's, as well as effect and affect. I came across another one yesterday: sit and set.

Did you mean actual electro-chemical after-effects?

or do you mean metaphoric informational "after-effects"?