Heaven is real, says neurosurgeon

You never did get to the part where it falls apart. You repeat the casual scrutiny line. Elaborate. It's well known that very detailed and length memories can be created in just moments of a dream state, so why is this so easily brushed aside? How can you explain memories of a state of "death" if you yourself state that no electrochemistry means no brain storage going on? When did these memories get placed?

 

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1 How much do we know about Dark mater ? are we not following some authority opinion ?
The glimpse we see in the after death is a very short period after death , yet hundreds if not thousands are reporting they have seen some thing extraordinary. Should we flatly reject their experience and ridicule them ? Just that we believe in the present knowledge of science, Is science not evolving because some oddball observation ?

 

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What we know about it is almost exclusively related to certain basic neuronal functions, like movement control, vision and so on - but I must stress that we don't know really much even about these things. However, we know absolutely nothing about the thought process, how people think and so on.
The current state of psychiatry and psychology is similar to that of astrology and witchcraft, the difference being that most people have no idea that there no real science in either. Everything in psychology and psychiatry is based on extremely flawed "research" methodologies, full of bad sampling, logical fallacies (correlation=causation is almost a law), relative and qualitative data/concepts/etc. The latest "fashion" in psychology/psychiatry is a new variant of phrenology, a high tech version: fMRI (+ sometimes ECG) "studies" where people look at brain scans for all kinds of patterns and "link" them to certain events/responses/behaviors/personality types/etc. (which is nothing more than a bunch of fallacies like correlation=causation, confirmation bias), then you hear in the press that the "scientists" discovered/confirmed that x behavior/drug/food/personality or "brain scan pattern" is "linked" to y "mentall illness" or who knows what else... an that's how the general population gets fooled! Yet they are extremely afraid to be tested and refuse to do the reverse testing, like bringing them a bunch of people who they don't know in advance, to "detect" what kinds of "mental illnesses" they have (if that's the case)

 

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Well, if we are going to argue from authority, I’ll raise you one Victor Stegner. DR. Alexander said that as a scientist, he looks at quantum mechanics and goes into this in great detail in his book. Stegner may not be a neuroscientist but he is a particle physicist.

If you read the book, how does he explain it from a quantum mechanical standpoint? A spec on a butterflies wing, is that supposed to be a particle?

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Here's a question. If the brain is the only carrier of consciousness, then why does it go through this elaborate storyline of pretending there is life after death, dead relatives to meet, God, Light, a tunnel, when the brain is in trouble and is about to go offline forever? Why don't we have these experiences when we go to sleep? Only when we are about to die?

 

We don't understand much about consciousness. Almost nothing. What you are asking, is both the thrust of my post, I can tell you read it, and the pertinent question. What we do know they aren't, is 'brain cells deprived of oxygen' that are storing memories of hallucinations. We know that for sure. Hence that most common 'scientific explanation' that is used to supposedly 'debunk' NDE experiences is simply not accurate. Which was and is my simple point I've been making.

This man's thoughts are precisely what I described above. Religious dogma and personal ideological bias masquerading as 'scientific inquiry' or consideration. That excerpt screams it. One can read that and imagine a young child stomping the floor with his fingers in his ears screaming "The supernatural isn't real!!! The supernatural isn't real!!"

There have been many cases in hospitals, witnessed by many surgeons and OR nurses and the like, of people who are dead, for more than 10 minutes lets say, who tell the people what was happening in the room, in adjoining rooms, etc, when they are revived. It's more than reasonable to expect a good portion, if not a majority of such incidents to be at the least 'enhanced' in some way, as it is in human nature to do such. But there have been more than enough of them with very credible witnesses under the 'controlled conditions' of an OR room with highly credentialed and experienced observers to establish that it happens, and somehow that person's consciousness was aware of what was occurring and it did not revolve around their brain, as the brain was inactive and they were dead. Some notion that all of these highly credentialed surgeons, doctors, nurses, and etc are suddenly yokels on a beach 'that done seen a UFO' as to the credibility of their experiences and stories is ridiculous. It's just ideological prejudice being employed to make that assertion.

Surgeons have been very aware of this NDE stuff long before the 'new age' type of fascination with it was trendy in the last few decades. Many surgeons don't even talk about it, and tell their patients it was hallucinations and to forget it and move on.

If you are looking for some dogmatic assertion like 'Dr Alexander's experience PROVES X/Y/Z!' from me don't hold you breath. That's not my point. His case adds some data and knowledge to a human occurrence that has been recorded and experienced for thousands of years in every culture around the world, it's documented in the bible and many other books of history. As to proof? We can't prove ANYTHING about consciousness. All of you reading these words now, are doing so in a state that science has no proof of, or data about. So you must not be actually reading this! Science says so! Such dogmatic assertions are nonsense. There is much that we simply don't understand.

My point is just what I posted above. We know almost nothing about how we are conscious in this place, this universe, we know next to nothing about the nature of it in any way. The existing dogmatic and ideological 'scientific' assertions that claim to 'debunk' the NDE do not hold water. The NDE is a fascinating aspect of the human experience and consciousness that we don't understand. And last, that the overwhelming majority of people who discuss or comment on this issue approach it in the most simple minded dogmatic fashion, people who may have very advanced degrees even, try to approach the matter from either 'side', I guess, wanting to to 'prove' something or 'disprove' something at the low level of some primate tribal association instinct revolving around "My side is right!". That's just so stupid. An NDE doesn't 'prove' God or heaven or whatever, and completely flawed explanations that don't stand up to scrutiny don't 'disprove' the nature of NDEs.

 

So is an NDE some kind of program that runs in the brain, as an evolutionary tool to trick us into thinking we survive death? could it just be an audio/video program in the brain that runs when we know we're going to die?

If the sick and dying (and disabled brain) is just running an audio video program to fool us into thinking that an afterlife exists, then it won't be able to tell us information that we don't already know. But if it's real, if we really are seeing/communicating with angels, deceased family/friends, then we could ask them to send us back with information that we wouldn't be expected to know. Information that we have know way of knowing. Wouldn't this be proof of an afterlife?

For example, what if deceased grandma tells you that your younger sister is pregnant, and you didn't even know she was seeing anyone. What are the odds?

 

NDE is subjective, that's one of the biggest problems. But since the same effect can be simulated through other means (to also answer Mazulu's last question), most that subject the brain cells to similar conditions, basically the first stage of them dying, then why is it so unbelievable to conclude that, without further evidence, this is exactly what is happening in a NDE?

You didn't answer my question though, why is it impossible for these memories to be created as the patient recovers? If they are memories of before this point, how did they get stored, if as you claim, the physical mechanism was not active? You can't dismiss a reasonable answer without having a better replacement.

 

Thing is, NDE predictions are about as good as psychic readings. Sometimes they seem close enough to be something, and a non-objective viewpoint will give that closeness more weight than it deserves. No one makes a connection if that grandpa told you she was pregnant, and she isn't, do they? We tend to filter out the failures, particularly when we want to believe and emotion is involved.

 

And so is this man’s.

A Conversation with Eben Alexander III, M.D. - Near Death Experiencer -

Note that when he’s asked why he’s so convinced because there are other neuroscientist, who study NED’s that say that it’s all brain chemistry, he says that he’s certain it’s not all brain chemistry. For one thing, his experience is a good starting point. That it was a strong argument for consciousness. That if it was just his experience, and that’s all he had to go on, he’d be stuck, but the fact of the matter is that we have thousands of reported cases of other people’s experiences.

He also said that the good news is that you don’t have to almost die to experience it and I do agree with this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_experience#Causes_of_religious_experiences

 

And it may be possible that some people are wired to experience this more than others.

Realize that explaining consciousness as a physical phenomena doesn't make it any less fascinating.

 

Sadly, this can be the case at times.
In a perfect world, folks could get together and hash out differences without appeals to emotion and would consider the validity in the oppositions arguments regularly.
This is not our nature, though. Whether fundamentalist or atheist; a human being is still human and will act like one.
The purpose of learning critical thinking, logical fallacies and rationality is to be a little more capable of overcoming our nature.

Injury. Don't add insult to injury.

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This is an excellent and strong argument and I'd like to come back to this in a bit. This post will be too long as it is. I also want to gather up a few references.

Dark Matter is a "place Holder." Astronomers are very clear about this: It's something unknown. Ask any astronomer what it is and they will tell you bluntly, "We do not know."
They don't tell you it's Heaven or Something made up for which there is no evidence.
There is evidence that the galaxy is contained when it should not be- and dark matter is not an explanation. It's a place holder until we find the explanation.
This is a very poor example to use. "We don't know" is entirely different than, "Absurd claim to be taken on faith."

Many NDE's reported are reported honestly. I have no doubt those that report it truly believe they experienced something. These people are often not ridiculed and only Eban has been in this thread and for a reason I'll come back to in a lengthy reply to Dr. Mabuse.

We do. We do have all those in those moments. Dreaming often carries these same concepts.

What is interesting is when you study them between cultures. While one individual from a largely Christian culture will describe what you just wrote, one from a tribe in Africa will have a wildly different experience. The Inuits experience is one in which case they often experience being an animal, like an elk or a bird. They believe that life never ends, it just changes form and returns to Earth to experience life as the many forms that are on it.

So there is no consistency to NDE's except for the claim that "something" was experienced and that "something" is almost always based on the familiar and known beliefs of that culture.

 

I happen to be a spiritualist. But I'm trying to look at NDE's from the opposing point of view. What is the evolutionary advantage of perpetuating a fake afterlife? But like I said, I think that it's a real phenomena beyond the standard model..

 

Many spiritual and religious atheists believe they have souls. Many spiritual but non-religious atheists do, as well.

Acceptance of such entities as based, having their life, as patterns supported (ultimately, some levels down) on a physical substrate, does not "explain" them, and need not be rejected as unworthy or oversimplistic as explanation. The choice is not between supernatural or magical explanations, and a pack of neurons firing around in sequences.

 

It sounds like a weak excuse. I don't dream about tunnels and dead family/friends and angels.

Why wouldn't the afterlife be culturally driven? When I die, I would be culturally shocked to have a bunch of lions and moose showing up, welcoming me to the African spirit world.

No consistency? Why do you have to be intellectually dishonest? Tunnels, floating above your body, light, meeting relatives, friends, angels, deity. That sounds pretty consistent to me. I bet their are African tribesmen who have NDE's of their relatives.

 

Dr, Mabuse;
This is a direct rebuttal to your post but also addresses points raised by Mazulu, CCDan and Auraca.

The human brain is without a doubt the most complex organ on the planet. It is not, however, unique. It's progressed.
The brain is a layered. One evolutionary stage upon the next. We literally have a cat-like brain upon which the higher functions is layered. A lizard and a bird brain too.
Like a city, that has bridges, tunnels, railways and roads, each development is layered over the previously used.
So, you had wagons and horses in the old days. Steam locomotives, ferries and dirt roads. As society progressed, we replaced ferries with bridges. Steam with diesel-electric and dirt roads with pavement.
Not so with the brain.
If the brain was analogous to this city, there would be carriages and Ferrari's sharing roadways. Ferries running across alongside bridges. Steam thundering the rails alongside bullet trains and horses. Every bit of the brain gets used. Primitive and modern.
In evolution, an advantage is an advantage. However, as long as something works well enough to survive, that's all that is needed. Ability to survive is the impetus, not improvement. The physiology of a slug may not be the most advantageous- but the slug was still able to survive and reproduce and so- it is here to be seen. So there needs be no evolutionary advantage to the way our brain is structured other than that it functions long enough for the species to breed.

This co-reliance on modern brain and primitive brain is a large part of what makes our own brain confusing. It leads to pareidolia, superstition, instinctive and programmed behaviors as well as modern intuition, resourcefulness, intelligence and rational thought. All together in one organ.

So why is it when you get knocked out by a punch or baseball striking your noggin, you remember nothing? Yet someone near death will experience another thing entirely?
Because the brain is that complex- there are a great many factors involved and they all play significant roles.
Let's examine the dorsolateral prefrontal region.
We'll start with a quick Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorsolateral_prefrontal_cortex

For you scientifical types, here's some hard shit:
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/288/5472/1835.short
Our primitive brain layer?
http://www.springerlink.com/content/f9xu683yrpkg5jbc/
Ok, tell me if I'm wrong but, why is this important?
I mean, this part of the brain is only active when awake, not when a person is asleep, right? It shouldn't be an issue!
Not always... It does activate when the brain is asleep if the conditions are right.
http://psycnet.apa.org/psycinfo/2002-04142-004
And it's when it's active while sleeping that interesting things happen.

Ok hang on! I got a question. S'rsly...

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Ok, fine. In depth articles. Sorry.

Well, here's the short of it. When a boxer is knocked out, the brain gets shut down to a reboot state, including all the regions that are normally active when awake.
However, in anesthesia induced comas, medical comas and near death brain trauma, this doesn't always happen. It happens maybe half the time. Maybe a little less.
A boxer can and on rare occasions, does experience an NDE like experience or an Out of Body experience. Unconscious is not always unconscious.
The rest of the time, the awake mind is functioning even when sensory regions are shut down. This can also happen when melatonin did not induce sleep or serotonin is present in a brain not awake. This often leads to lucid dreaming, night sweats or night terrors (Where you're in between asleep and awake- you may feel paralyzed, yet not asleep. You may have trouble breathing, hear strange noises or voices in this state but be unable to move or call out.)

There is a profound difference between the two- again, something a neurosurgeon should be well aware of all these factors.
That our fanciful good doctor here has neglected all of these details demonstrates just how 'human' he is. Given to irrationality and desire. It's also intellectually dishonest of him. He's neglecting the facts to promote his own agenda.

http://www.prweb.com/releases/near-death/experience/prweb9213606.htm

Ruh Roh!
It seems that well understood medical principles still come into play, no matter how often we can point out we do not fully understand the human brain. We cannot reject or ignore what we do know. Nor can we claim we know nothing at all.

Mazulu

You just totally contradicted yourself. You agree that there is no consistency:

And then you say it is consistent:

Make up your mind.


Next weeks episode: How to use Mind Zonking Drugs to induce NDE's, OBE's and possibly naked face gobbling...

 

You've gone from coddling a nut, who's embracing the dreams from his fevered and comatose brain, to inquiring into materialism.

I'm still back at the initial premise: assume that fever, infection and coma are sufficient basis for opening the mental pathways to divine revelation . . . Huh? :bugeye:

 

Neverfly,
I don't know the mechanisms of how an afterlife would exist. As if anyone could know. But if I had to guess, I would go back to the wave-function description of the aether medium. I would guess that the aether, the quantum vacuum, allows objects beyond the standard model to exist. I would guess that such objects are more like particles or better yet fields that can retain and express neurological information about the brain. When the brain is dead, this neurological information carrying field still exists. A skeptic would have no clue what I'm talking about. But someone who knows a little bit about spiritualism would recognize that I am describing the astral body.

A neurological information carrying field (astral body) is going to be the same for Americans, Africans, Christians, and atheists alike. But culture and beliefs are going to code it with information related to one's cultural and religious beliefs. Out of body experiences might be the effect of this "astral body" getting separated from the physical body by who knows what. Mike Tyson comes along and belts you in the face. Your body gets knocked across the room, but your astral body is still standing there. With your astral body separated from the physical body, it floats and has whatever sensory system taking in information. The information is eventually passed down to the wave-function-aetheric counterpart of the neurons, then seeps in to the neurological information processing center. And you have your out of body experience.

 

By the way does the neurosurgeon is practicing his trade ? if he is, then he is not insane.

 

There can't be insane neurosurgeons?