near-death experiences - Are they evidence of an afterlife??

[amortalman]

Debate Question: Do you believe that near-death experiences are evidence of immaterial "souls" surviving death?

Near-death experiences came to the forefront with the publication of Life After Life: The Investigation of a Phenomenon by Dr. Raymond A. Moody Jr. in 1975. Since then, hundreds of books have been written on the subject, and thousands of testimonies have been researched and published. I was particularly impressed with the book Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon’s Journey into the Afterlife by Dr. Eben Alexander.

I would like to hear the views of Christians, atheists, and anyone who has read enough about NDEs (or has had one) to have an informed opinion. Thank you.

[Miles]

Q. near-death experiences - Are they evidence of an afterlife??

A. #1: No.

You're welcome.

.

[TRANSPONDER]

They are not. This was a big thing for theist apologetics when it hit the headlines and immediately the believers tried to force this as conclusive evidence before we even knew what was going on. It eventually became clear that it was more to do with the brain seeing imaginary things than seeing real things. NDE's are the crop -circles of Theist apologetics. They are dead and buried, but some Theists keep digging it up and shaking it about while shouting: 'It lives!'

[amortalman]

[Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #3]

Transponder wrote: "It eventually became clear that it was more to do with the brain seeing imaginary things than seeing real things."

How did it eventually become clear and to whom?

It certainly hasn't become clear to those who have had NDEs. To many, the experience was more real than life itself and it has changed their whole lives.

The fact that Christians used it as "evidence" of God and heaven has no bearing on its validity, as you well know. Had Christians read enough accounts from NDEs they would have undoubtedly seen that their theology is questionable.

The facts are that many doctors and others in the medical field have testified that their patients were clinically dead with no brain activity when this occurred. Most NDEs have reported out-of-body experiences prior to going through a "tunnel" and into another world. Many have reported leaving their bodies behind in the emergency room and seeing and hearing loved ones in the waiting room. What they saw and heard was later verified. How do we explain that? Witness testimony carries a lot of weight in a court of law. Why not in cases like this?

[TRANSPONDER]

It became clear to we on the former board that this was a known experience in all faiths and none, and the experience varied from person to person and culture to culture and thus the 'heaven' being shown could not be taken as real. Of course one can pick and choose experiences, but this is not good reasoning. It could also be argued that everyone gets their own afterlife. But the explanation that came up eventually was of a known phenomenon wherein people during extreme death - conditions had such visions. That people became clinically dead and were revived is not unknown, and I am sure from personal experience (though I haven't researched it) that REM - conditions means that mental visions (e.g dreams) can happen so fast that it can seem like an hours' experience but only takes seconds.

I said 'clearly'. There's an old saying or rather an old polemicists' or rhetorician's saying - 'when someone says something is "clearly so", it really isn't clear at all'. Guilty. And you are right to challenge. It isn't quite clear yet, but the evidence indicated a mental effect deriving from lack of breath as the better explanation than real afterlife experiences.

I also know some anecdotes of NDE's or rather the related OOB (the person is not dying) supposed to prove that the event was real. Even citing doctors (1) present at the time swearing it was true...

"And the doctors had no explanation" As in the oft - repeated cancer -remission story.

I also heard that story or a similar one related as proving that it could not be real. (some numerical or time display that should have been read wasn't) and "clearly" such an anecdote, unverified, cannot be admitted as evidence either way.

P.s . Anecdotes as a polemical device was one of our toughest challenges in the old days. They would come up with some miracle or proof of God and the atheists had to debunk it. I well remember days of research into the story of the Priests who survived the Bomb. But we came to realise that we could not be made to respond to a grab bag of miracle claims. Uncannily...or quite cannily, rather, like the piles of UFO sighting thrown at 'skeptics' which supposedly shows that if the skeptics cannot explain each one, that supposedly proves flying saucer to be real. No. Piles of unverified anecdotes cannot be accepted as evidence.

Another Axiom "A pile of anecdotes does not amount to data'. But religious polemicists do try that one. I have seen it: 'It is cumulative'. That is, a lot of poor evidence supposedly piles up to become good evidence'. It is not, It is a pile of bad evidence.

Sorry for the digression. Flawed reason is endlessly fascinating and this is why the rationalist has to recognise the informal logical fallacies.

(1) another polemicists' trick is to use a 'doctor' (or a 'scientist') who is clearly out of his mind on supernatural delusions to make some absurd claim and expect us to accept his authority. That's assuming the story is fairly related (tweaking is common), and even not made up. Anecdotes are dodgy.

[amortalman]

[Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #5]
Food for thought. For now, I'm keeping an open mind on it. Thanks for your input.

[Tcg]

[Replying to amortalman in post #1]

NDEs are not life after death. They are as the one book title you mentioned states, life after life. All too often folks who try to build them as evidence of life after death forget the "N" in the acronym. Given this, whatever they are evidence of, it is not of life after death. One thing they are evidence of is that some people keep on living after nearly dying. Not terribly earth-shattering really.


Tcg

[AgnosticBoy]

Debate Question: Do you believe that near-death experiences are evidence of immaterial "souls" surviving death?

Near-death experiences came to the forefront with the publication of Life After Life: The Investigation of a Phenomenon by Dr. Raymond A. Moody Jr. in 1975. Since then, hundreds of books have been written on the subject, and thousands of testimonies have been researched and published. I was particularly impressed with the book Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon’s Journey into the Afterlife by Dr. Eben Alexander.

I would like to hear the views of Christians, atheists, and anyone who has read enough about NDEs (or has had one) to have an informed opinion. Thank you.

Near-death experiences are probably on the same level of evidence as 'anesthetic awareness'. In both cases, awareness is present when it is thought that it should not be present.

Near-death experiences cases are usually reported by patients who experienced cardiac arrest. Once the heart stops pumping, you're supposed to lose consciousness in seconds. When or if awareness is not lost, and the victim or patient is able to report it, then that's certainly something remarkable. Some NDE supporters even argue that our ability to bring people back from "near" death or even death gives us an opportunity to show that consciousness persists, but that's assuming that people will experience something during the time that they are dead, or that what they're experiencing happened during death and not moments before.

[amortalman]

[Replying to amortalman in post #1]

NDEs are not life after death. They are as the one book title you mentioned states, life after life. All too often folks who try to build them as evidence of life after death forget the "N" in the acronym. Given this, whatever they are evidence of, it is not of life after death. One thing they are evidence of is that some people keep on living after nearly dying. Not terribly earth-shattering really.

Tcg

I offer the following excerpt from Neurosurgeon Eben Alexander's book Proof of Heaven. Dr. Alexander went into a two-week coma caused by E. coli meningitis from which his recovery chances were extremely small. In this excerpt, he takes on the predominant oppositions to NDEs. Given this respected neurosurgeon's knowledge of the brain and experience in the medical field, I think his comments deserve consideration and further study:

Sorry, but for some reason, I'm unable to copy and paste the excerpt. What I wanted to share comes from Chapter 31 of his book, pages 140 -143. Basically, he says that his neocortex was non-functioning, and without a functioning neocortex the various science-based "explanations" for NDEs simply aren't possible.

[amortalman]

Debate Question: Do you believe that near-death experiences are evidence of immaterial "souls" surviving death?

Near-death experiences came to the forefront with the publication of Life After Life: The Investigation of a Phenomenon by Dr. Raymond A. Moody Jr. in 1975. Since then, hundreds of books have been written on the subject, and thousands of testimonies have been researched and published. I was particularly impressed with the book Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon’s Journey into the Afterlife by Dr. Eben Alexander.

I would like to hear the views of Christians, atheists, and anyone who has read enough about NDEs (or has had one) to have an informed opinion. Thank you.

Near-death experiences are probably on the same level of evidence as 'anesthetic awareness'. In both cases, awareness is present when it is thought that it should not be present.

Near-death experiences cases are usually reported by patients who experienced cardiac arrest. Once the heart stops pumping, you're supposed to lose consciousness in seconds. When or if awareness is not lost, and the victim or patient is able to report it, then that's certainly something remarkable. Some NDE supporters even argue that our ability to bring people back from "near" death or even death gives us an opportunity to show that consciousness persists, but that's assuming that people will experience something during the time that they are dead, or that what they're experiencing happened during death and not moments before.

If NDEs are on the same level of evidence as anesthetic awareness it's on firm ground. As far as I know, anesthetic awareness has not been disputed, but then neither have NDEs. What is disputed is whether or not consciousness exists beyond brain function. If the brain is non-functional during these experiences then the issue of consciousness surviving death has to be confronted. I just came across this excerpt from Psychology Today :

The prevailing consensus in neuroscience is that consciousness is an emergent property of the brain and its metabolism. When the brain dies, the mind and consciousness of the being to whom that brain belonged ceases to exist. In other words, without a brain, there can be no consciousness.

But according to the decades-long research of Dr. Peter Fenwick, a highly regarded neuropsychiatrist who has been studying the human brain, consciousness, and the phenomenon of near-death experience (NDE) for 50 years, this view is incorrect. Despite initially being highly incredulous of NDEs and related phenomena, Fenwick now believes his extensive research suggests that consciousness persists after death. In fact, Fenwick believes that consciousness actually exists independently and outside of the brain as an inherent property of the universe itself like dark matter and dark energy or gravity.

This also seems to be the view of Neurosurgeon Dr. Eben Alexander (who himself experienced a life-changing NDE) in his book, Proof of Heaven and later writings.