tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post8763232077092945402..comments2024-02-29T03:57:00.088-05:00Comments on The Mermaid's Tale: Dead certain?Anne Buchananhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09212151396672651221noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-67352129305673626322011-11-09T12:01:55.672-05:002011-11-09T12:01:55.672-05:00There are many medically documented cases of peopl...There are many medically documented cases of people recovering after temporary brain inactivity. And there are numerous cases of people recovering from documented temporary brain inactivity who report memories of events for example in the hospital or of meeting a divine being, but the historical question involves determining if these memories actually developed during brain inactivity or shortly before/after brain inactivity. In the case of positivists, they are positive (dead certain) that the events occurred shortly before/after brain inactivity.James Goetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02412501436355228925noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-76293059327114561672011-11-09T10:14:47.046-05:002011-11-09T10:14:47.046-05:00I'd go farther,and we tried to in the post. I...I'd go farther,and we tried to in the post. It's irrelevant to the question of the 'genuineness' of NDEs. If one assumed that there were something of some sort out there---some spiritual realm, true postmortal existence of awareness, and so on, there is no reason not to expect that one in some sort of contact with that entity would have to experience it without brain activity. The brain would just be the mediator of the experience in a human body.<br /><br />So the report of such experience during brain activity doesn't deal with its 'reality'. How would one do that? I think there is no as-yet known way, so that one can believer or not believe the reports as being literal.<br /><br />If they can be shown somehow or some day to be fabricated out of the person's real-life experiences, rather than out of some a priori reality, then one could at least argue that they are simply imagination.<br /><br />Of course, if there were some brain-inactive later reporting, that would raise the kinds of questions you refer to, I think.Ken Weisshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02049713123559138421noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1812431336777691886.post-8244054361176807882011-11-09T10:08:35.341-05:002011-11-09T10:08:35.341-05:00I have some conjecture about this. First, the repo...I have some conjecture about this. First, the report is no new conclusion that the human brain has mechanisms capable of delusions and hallucinations that mimic a death experience. The best science can do is verify with electroencephalography if somebody had no brainwaves during a specific event. And this of course depends on a patient being hooked to respective machinery during the respective event. Beyond that, it would be up to historical methodology to determine if the patient had genuine memories during their event of no brainwaves. And historical and philosophical conjecture could say that genuine memories during brain death would be a near death experience (NDE). This is a historical question that needs to be fully informed by science, but conclusions will ultimately be historical and philosophical.<br /><br />I heard of a systematic experiment where patients where medically cooled until their brainwaves stopped and then medically revived. This resulted in no memories during the events with no brainwaves. Some say that this experiment is scientific proof that there are no genuine NDE, but it merely proved that the respective methodology could not simulate a NDE. And of course ethics limits science from systematically simulating human death.James Goetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02412501436355228925noreply@blogger.com