To NDE or not to NDE (re-done)

Well if researchers have included, or excluded the wrong people from the NDE study group due to the arbitrary self identified criteria of the Greyson scale questionnaire, that seems like a big problem when one is comparing the NDE group, with everyone else who is not in that group.

But who's saying they have ?

I don't know what you mean by NDE's are dreamlike. I would say just the opposite and that they are not normally meaningful, furthermore one cannot dream during cardiac arrest.

I believe he's referring to the whole "other worldly" quality to them as far as saying they are at least kind of dreamlike. There are a parallel or two between them and dreams, but a lot more differences.

Seems to me, as a complete layman, that information theory is something like what is happening with some consciousness researchers adopting some form of panpsychism: a kind of half-way house because they can't bring themselves to completely abandon a life-long commitment to materialism. The more they look, the more they find that materialism has failed to explain consciousness. Yet they cannot have anything which smacks of the supernatural so panpsychism within the bounds of physicalism: consciousness might be a universal fundamental like other "physical" fundamentals such as electro-magnetism or gravity.

To me, that says more about an ingrained philosophical bias than an open-minded attempt to reach the truth.

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cro...ciousness/

Hi, Stephen

What I'm referring to is now that Parnia has tightened up the methodology, I believe that we will start to see the first "hits." (but I could be wrong of course)  

I don't know what you mean by NDE's are dreamlike. I would say just the opposite and that they are not normally meaningful, furthermore one cannot dream during cardiac arrest.

I agree that methodology is critical and I admire S. Parnia as a professional.

Dreams are not clear communication of personal meaning.  However, my take is that they are dealing with raw, organic personal meaning, and are actively structuring our "inner-take" on life.  Dreams are not clear but -

  Across all three cultures, an overwhelming majority of the students endorsed the theory that dreams reveal hidden truths about themselves and the world, a belief also endorsed by a nationally representative sample of Americans, Morewedge said.

In another study, Morewedge and his colleagues wanted to explore how dreams might influence people's waking behavior. A total of 182 commuters at a Boston train station were asked to imagine that one of four possible scenarios had happened the night before a scheduled airline trip: The national threat level was raised to orange, indicating a high risk of terrorist attack; they consciously thought about their plane crashing; they dreamed about a plane crash; or a real plane crash occurred on the route they planned to take.
A dream of a plane crash was more likely to affect travel plans than either thinking about a crash or a government warning, and the dream of a plane crash produced a similar level of anxiety as did an actual crash, Morewedge found.

https://www.livescience.com/3340-people-...ngful.html

no "insights"; no meaningful ideas from noise (a formally defined information theory variable)

dreams and NDE's - can have meaning, and may have "deep-meaning" hence there is a source of meaning that is presented to the mind.  The sub-conscious (what ever it is) is the source for dreams and maybe part of the source for NDE's.  Dreams for the most part are from ourselves.  But history is replete with dreams sharing real information from the infosphere beyond the cranium.


Science discovered the superconducting rules and phenomena that seemed impossible; became rational and part how things are done.  Review how electrons "leak" thru physical barriers, such as in a Josephson Junction.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/artic...on-juncti/

Information, as meaning, is leaking into dreams and into NDE's.   There is a how is happens to be discovered.

I believe he's referring to the whole "other worldly" quality to them as far as saying they are at least kind of dreamlike. There are a parallel or two between them and dreams, but a lot more differences.

Thanks for that, Desperado. I don't think they are at all dreamlike; even Kevin Nelson (although he employs REM intrusion in his explanations) says they are not dreams or dream like.

I agree that methodology is critical and I admire S. Parnia as a professional.

Dreams are not clear communication of personal meaning.  However, my take is that they are dealing with raw, organic personal meaning, and are actively structuring our "inner-take" on life.  Dreams are not clear but -


https://www.livescience.com/3340-people-...ngful.html

no "insights"; no meaningful ideas from noise (a formally defined information theory variable)

dreams and NDE's - can have meaning, and may have "deep-meaning" hence there is a source of meaning that is presented to the mind.  The sub-conscious (what ever it is) is the source for dreams and maybe part of the source for NDE's.  Dreams for the most part are from ourselves.  But history is (replete with dreams sharing real information from the infosphere beyond the cranium.


Science discovered the superconducting rules and phenomena that seemed impossible; became rational and part how things are done.  Review how electrons "leak" thru physical barriers, such as in a Josephson Junction.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/artic...on-juncti/

Information, as meaning, is leaking into dreams and into NDE's.   There is a how is happens to be discovered.

Interesting, Stephen but I would refer you to the fact that in cardiac arrest dreaming is ruled out, all brain function is ruled out after 10-20 seconds because the brain stem is not functioning apparently. When I have time I'll follow your link and try to see what you're getting at because it probably isn't something I understand.

EDIT : I just had a quick look at the first link. Honestly I can't remember when I last had a humdinger of a dream that I knew was actually significant let alone a feeling that I'd communicated with "god". I probably have had one or two but I can't see how they are connected to NDE's or ADE's unless they're (what you are referring to) not actually dreams but some kind of altered state of consciousness.

Interesting, Stephen but I would refer you to the fact that in cardiac arrest dreaming is ruled out, all brain function is ruled out after 10-20 seconds because the brain stem is not functioning apparently. When I have time I'll follow your link and try to see what you're getting at because it probably isn't something I understand.

If dreaming is only a physical function or an epiphenomenon - brain stops --> function stops.

If dreaming is an informational process in the mind, and the mind is processing nothing physical - but is processing meaning, then dreaming in cardiac arrest would be possible.

If meaningful ideas are just physical - well  living things effect meaning only by physical actions.  We simply know that this is not true, living things can adapt, from mental work and not doing things can bring order and organization.

We used to think in science that matter was it and everything, then we modeled energy (a few hundred years ago).  No literate person today believes that the energy they exert is from their "being."  We know that we are only transformers of energy.  We don't think when a cut heals that the material healing the cut was from our being, but from what we drank, breathed and ate.

Why in the world, do we think that meaning is from our brain's being.  We live in a sea of meanings - that we assimilate, expel and build.  We are not meanings, we incorporate meaning from the inner and outer environments we inhabit.

In the model I am using - NDE's are just self-aware dreaming, without having the sensory inflow from the brain.  Better than dreaming - because it is focused only on what can be detected in the infosphere. (informational environment)

If dreaming is only a physical function or an epiphenomenon - brain stops --> function stops.

If dreaming is an informational process in the mind, and the mind is processing nothing physical - but is processing meaning, then dreaming in cardiac arrest would be possible.

If meaningful ideas are just physical - well  living things effect meaning only by physical actions.  We simply know that this is not true, living things can adapt, from mental work and not doing things can bring order and organization.

We used to think in science that matter was it and everything, then we modeled energy (a few hundred years ago).  No literate person today believes that the energy they exert is from their "being."  We know that we are only transformers of energy.  We don't think when a cut heals that the material healing the cut was from our being, but from what we drank, breathed and ate.

Why in the world, do we think that meaning is from our brain's being.  We live in a sea of meanings - that we assimilate, expel and build.  We are not meanings, we incorporate meaning from the inner and outer environments we inhabit.

In the model I am using - NDE's are just self-aware dreaming, without having the sensory inflow from the brain.  Better than dreaming - because it is focused only on what can be detected in the infosphere. (informational environment)

I think the problem might be semantic. We are used to thinking of dreaming and, especially, hallucinations as most decidedly non-real. The stereotype of someone who hallucinates is that person is deluded or has a psychological or neurological illness. Hallucinations tend to be described as being chaotic and irrational - usually disturbing or frightening. Dreams can be scary or comforting but we don't usually wake from them feeling that they were more real than our everyday reality. We usually quickly recognise them as dreams - whatever that means.

Without getting into obscure definitions, NDEs are usually described as having an entirely different quality, often a life changing quality with the experiencer convinced of the hyper-reality of what they saw and felt. I don't doubt that dreams can be valuable in terms of information and inspiration but I have never felt such a life-changing, positive certainty after a dream, no matter how realistic it seemed at the time.

So discussing definitions and where there might be a grey area between reality and dreams or hallucinations might advance our understanding of those areas but to lump NDEs in as if the only difference was some arbitrary scale by which to measure the feeling of reality is to fall short of recognising the true nature and impact of the NDE, in my humble opinion.

Also, there are the veridical cases which would require quite a stretch to explain how the reporting of an actual conversation which happened down the corridor while the subject was unconscious and under the surgeons knife might fit the definition of either hallucination or dream. The usual tactic of skeptics is to first dismiss these veridical reports as post hoc hearsay before introducing the brain chemical, hallucinatory catch-all explanations.

I think the problem might be semantic. We are used to thinking of dreaming and, especially, hallucinations as most decidedly non-real. The stereotype of someone who hallucinates is that person is deluded or has a psychological or neurological illness. Hallucinations tend to be described as being chaotic and irrational - usually disturbing or frightening. Dreams can be scary or comforting but we don't usually wake from them feeling that they were more real than our everyday reality. We usually quickly recognise them as dreams - whatever that means.

Without getting into obscure definitions, NDEs are usually described as having an entirely different quality, often a life changing quality with the experiencer convinced of the hyper-reality of what they saw and felt. I don't doubt that dreams can be valuable in terms of information and inspiration but I have never felt such a life-changing, positive certainty after a dream, no matter how realistic it seemed at the time.

So discussing definitions and where there might be a grey area between reality and dreams or hallucinations might advance our understanding of those areas but to lump NDEs in as if the only difference was some arbitrary scale by which to measure the feeling of reality is to fall short of recognising the true nature and impact of the NDE, in my humble opinion.

Also, there are the veridical cases which would require quite a stretch to explain how the reporting of an actual conversation which happened down the corridor while the subject was unconscious and under the surgeons knife might fit the definition of either hallucination or dream. The usual tactic of skeptics is to first dismiss these veridical reports as post hoc hearsay before introducing the brain chemical, hallucinatory catch-all explanations.

The "significant" dreams Stephen seems to be referencing are more or less precognitive dreams, something that from a psi/precog standpoint are actually great evidence of non local consciousness and psychical powers in their own right. Their existence only strengthens NDEs more to me