To NDE or not to NDE (re-done)

I don't think you can call these, and other similarly labeled experiences "unreal". They are "real", they are real experiences. So perhaps you might want to try and find some more accurate way of defining them?

The label I see most in the literature is "non-veridical", it is perhaps a little more accurate, as veridical suggests the idea of some information that is not only truthful, but I would say that can be verified as such at a later time. But, I'm not convinced this way of slicing (labeling) the data is particularly useful either, because the phenomena we tend to discuss on here is of interest specifically because it *is* sometimes considered to contain veridical information, and this seems to happen whether or not it occurs under the label of NDE's, hallucinations, dreams or any other similar label.

These types of phenomena are therefore considered by some as anomalous, that is, some of us find the generally accepted ways of explaining some of these phenomena to be particularly unsatisfying, and requiring a major rethink, in my own case, I think another round of generalization in science is on it's way.

It's not my label - it's a term used by researchers into these experiences. It doesn't mean that the experiences aren't real, but rather is one of the terms used to indicate that they are looking for memories of experiences which are different from ordinary awake experiences. Even then, there are many hallucinations which appear to be ordinary awake experiences to the experiencer, but they are later recognized to be 'unreal' in some way (the content is fantastical, the events are disconfirmed, the subject was unconscious/comatose at the time, etc.).

I agree that "non-veridical" doesn't overcome that issue, since these experiences tend to incorporate elements from the environment regardless of their label.

I'm more worried about trying to be as inclusive as possible when looking at these experiences. Part of what we are calling "anomalous" just seems to reflect the post hoc selection process some engage in to pick out a tiny subset from a huge pool of experiences. Focussing on these experiences doesn't tell us about something "anomalous" as much as it tells us about "stuff humans find compelling".

Linda

Is that last post from Tim or Linda?? It reads like Linda and I certainly don't think Tim would be happy lumping NDEs together with "other kinds of emotionally charged 'unreal' experiences", potentially or otherwise.

I was just making a note of what she wrote, Dave. She never ceases to amaze me.

I'm disinterested as to whether 'unreal experiences' is your label, or not. It simply doesn't make any difference to me, because it's the label you used (twice).

You then attempt to explain that what you wrote "..unreal experiences..", actually means the exact opposite of what you wrote... "It doesn't mean the experiences aren't real..."

I don't disagree with you on that. 

I tend to be okay with using using a label as a placeholder as long as we all on the same page as to what phenomena the label is being used for, which I think is the case here. But this isn't helpful if someone finds the label distasteful.

So what label would be useful for these experiences? Penny Sartori used words like "was this the kind of experience which is difficult to put into words?" to ask about them (but that's too long ). I'm probably okay with whatever you suggest.

Linda

Like I've previously suggested. You might try defining precisely what you are measuring with regards to experience (bearing in mind that you want to be as inclusive as possible), and then demonstrate how these measurements allow you to categorize experiences in the way that you have, (i.e. showing a difference between them).

I'm just interested in looking at an inclusive set of experiences, not in categorizing them in some way. That is, I may go through a list of suggestions when asking people what they remember when they were in the ICU or when they had their cardiac arrest or when they were in the car accident - do you remember anything? did you have anything like a dream or hallucination? did anything seem a bit unreal in some way? did anything strange happen? etc. - as a way to prompt them to talk about anything they remember. But as far as I can tell, many of these supposed distinctions - hallucination, dream, NDE, 'real' experience, etc. - are inconsistent and arbitrary and wouldn't be particularly helpful.

Once you look at the characteristics within an inclusive set of experiences, there may be ways to distinguish groups of experiences (e.g. with respect to the degree they correspond to the events at the time, level of perceived awareness (from both the subject and the medical team's perspectives), themes, etc.), if you feel the need to categorize them.

Linda

Where does this exchange leave ‘realer-than-real’ experiences? ;)

I think you are missing the point I was making... it was you who was categorising experiences into real, and unreal. You categorised something as an unreal experience? (Which seemed to suggest you had a method of defining some difference between experiences ?).

I didn't categorize the experiences into real and unreal. I gave a list of various ways in which people might refer to the various experiences which fall in to that inclusive set of experiences from which NDEs (among other things) are drawn. One of the ways people may refer to them is to note that something about them may seem unreal (I even set it apart with quotation marks in my original post). But as I mentioned earlier, they are still real experiences in the sense in which the term "real experience" is used. That is, "real" refers to a number of different definitions, and a negation of one of those definitions doesn't necessary have anything to say about one of the other definitions. This shouldn't be confusing - when somebody says, "Whoa, that was unreal," after they've been on a rollercoaster ride, they don't mean that it didn't really happen. 

I was looking for a word which might represent "the inclusive set of experiences from which mainstream researchers and parapsychologists draw" as a sort of shorthand, so I could avoid typing that whole line out over and over again.  

Linda

Where does this exchange leave ‘realer-than-real’ experiences?

I recently learned about this meme.

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.p...20Crackers

Linda