Sue Blackmore vs Graham Nichols Interview.

Here's Graham's blog post about the conversation:

http://www.grahamnicholls.com/blog/a-con...-blackmore

Thoughts?

Have had some personal contact with Graham as well - so will see if I can get him to grant us an interview .

[Laird]

Here's Graham's blog post about the conversation:

http://www.grahamnicholls.com/blog/a-con...-blackmore

Thoughts?

I thought it was a good piece, which made solid points. I'm wondering though whether he might have approached the TPJ issue in a different way than he did. Here's the way I see it: OBEs can be brought on by meditation, by hypnosis, by hemisync, etc etc - so what if they can also be brought on by stimulating the TPJ? It's just another method of induction - what's the big deal? It's not "explaining" anything.

Have had some personal contact with Graham as well - so will see if I can get him to grant us an interview .

You're an interviewing angel, Roberta. Go get him!

"Susan and I agree that definitions that include assumptions like ‘the soul leaves the body’ are unhelpful, as we simply do not know if a soul exists or if anything actually leaves the body."

Graham's statement above is not actually correct. We do know the soul exists because the soul is simply the "self," as Parnia puts it, "that thing that makes us into who we are !" The "mind," effectively. Sceptical scientists DO accept they have a soul, just that when the brain dies, the soul perishes with it.

"Susan and I agree that definitions that include assumptions like ‘the soul leaves the body’ are unhelpful, as we simply do not know if a soul exists or if anything actually leaves the body."

Graham's statement above is not actually correct. We do know the soul exists because the soul is simply the "self," as Parnia puts it, "that thing that makes us into who we are !" The "mind," effectively. Sceptical scientists DO accept they have a soul, just that when the brain dies, the soul perishes with it.

You seem a bit too sure of this for my taste. My view is: soul is not carefully enough defined to be nailed down so precisely as you claim. 

For example: those "skeptical scientists" you refer to may believe that we have something called soul, but they generally believe it is a meta-phenomenon of the brain's making. OTOH- others may have a completely different (probably non-physical) definition of it. 

Although both sides may use the same word ("soul") to describe this thing, I would say that the definitions/descriptions are so varying that we could never say that we have consensus of what soul is. 

This being the case, it is impossible for us to agree that we all "have one". After-all, how can we agree to have something, when we don't even agree with what that something is? 

Try this on for size... 
If a Brit and an American agree that they have a plate of "chips" in front of them, can we say they have consensus? 

Well, only if you think an American potato-chip (in the UK- crisp) is the same as an American French fry (in UK- chip), which it isn't. So there is no consensus here,,, or in the case of the scientist vs the spiritualist view of soul. 

For that reason, I agree with Graham here.

You seem a bit too sure of this for my taste. My view is: soul is not carefully enough defined to be nailed down so precisely as you claim. 

For example: those "skeptical scientists" you refer to may believe that we have something called soul, but they generally believe it is a meta-phenomenon of the brain's making. OTOH- others may have a completely different (probably non-physical) definition of it. 

Although both sides may use the same word ("soul") to describe this thing, I would say that the definitions/descriptions are so varying that we could never say that we have consensus of what soul is. 

This being the case, it is impossible for us to agree that we all "have one". After-all, how can we agree to have something, when we don't even agree with what that something is? 

Try this on for size... 
If a Brit and an American agree that they have a plate of "chips" in front of them, can we say they have consensus? 

Well, only if you think an American potato-chip (in the UK- crisp) is the same as an American French fry (in UK- chip), which it isn't. So there is no consensus here,,, or in the case of the scientist vs the spiritualist view of soul. 

For that reason, I agree with Graham here.

You're entitled to your opinion, JKmac but I stick by what I said. I'm referring to the self, the psyche, soul, call it whatever you like as long as it describes a conscious indentity which everybody possesses.   

 Soul, in religion and philosophy, the immaterial aspect or essence of a human being, that which confers individuality and humanity, often considered to be synonymous with the mind or the self.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/soul-re...philosophy

More wisdom from our Sue!! 

More wisdom from our Sue!! 

@ 0.22 love the leg slapping, how can anyone argue with that !

@ 0.22 love the leg slapping, how can anyone argue with that !

I got a chuckle out of her interview with Graham when she dismissed the pot story as being from when she was a young hippy,, vs now that she is a grown up and responsible adult scientist,,, as she sits there with green and pink hair...   ROFL

I got a chuckle out of her interview with Graham when she dismissed the pot story as being from when she was a young hippy,, vs now that she is a grown up and responsible adult scientist,,, as she sits there with green and pink hair...   ROFL

I think the pink bit (in between) might be a hint as to where one stimulates the brain to provoke an out of body experience.

[Ninshub]

Kudos on matching the clothes with the hair, though.