Near-death experiences and consciousness

Read it and actually included the quotes in context. If I have missed it in the article, please post it in context so we can all learn.Others can read the Lancet article for themselves and they can form their own opinions about who is picking and choosing quotes out of context.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Look under Discussions. All of the objections raised thus far are answered in the study. There is a reason he concludes their results eliminate medical factors in explaining NDEs, and that Lancelet published the findings.Keep reading to the last page, first column, 3rd paragraph from the bottom and read the whole paragraph, not selecting a quote out of context. He obviously makes the same point he does in the Ode article, that there is clear consciousness outside of the body when the brain is not functioning and this is an observed fact. He raises the issue that the previously maintained idea that consciousness resides in the brain should be discussed because he has demonstrated "clear consciousness outside of one's body" when the "brain no longer functions."He is stating that clear consciousness outside of the body when the brain no longer functions is a fact attested to by the study and that we should consider the question of where consciousness resides in light of this factual claim.This message has been edited by randman, 11-29-2005 06:15 PM

He asks questions. It goes on for several paragraphs. There is NO conclusion drawn.Once again, here are the paragraphs that you point to so others can see them in context.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

There is absoloutely no evidence presented in the article to show the timing and therefore simultaneity of NDE with flat lining, its sole argument for that is based on anecdotal accounts of verified details from out of body experiences, something which the study didn't actually look at.TTFN,WK

Moreover, the study defines clinical death for that study as: The study is designed to deal with the brain and consciousness, and clearly asserts the memories cannot be the result of brain activity due to flat EEGs in the Discussion part.

WK, the article is in medical journal and specifies that they define clinical death as when insufficient blood flow goes to the brain causing unconciousness. They also flat out state that it is a given that during this period of time, there is a flat EEG.What's not to understand about this?He mentions the flat EEG occurs within about 10 seconds. He clearly states in the study that consciousness occurs when there is no EEG.Keep in mind. All of these people were people that experiences cardiac arrest or something similar in real life. No, they probably did not have strings attached to their heads to measure EEGs because they were trying to rescussitate the people to save their lives. The study thus treats the flat EEG claim as a common medical fact, not even debatable.This message has been edited by randman, 11-29-2005 06:42 PM

randman,You've got it close, but not quite. You seem to be reading "medical factors" to be a broad term that is undefined here. However, it's not. It's defined in table 3: One of these factors is cognitive, but none of them are measurements of "brain activity."The authors are saying that no measured medical factors can account for NDEs. Thus, the unmeasured cognitive / brain factors (which they describe as "thus far assumed, but never proven") need to be rigorously studied in order to establish any scientific hypothesis of NDEs.To summarize again; the paper eliminates all "medical" hypotheses and makes a call for cognitive / brain research to be done on NDEs. They then summarize the extroadinarily limited literature on the cognitive side, and reiterate their call for cognitive research to be done, in order to put evidence where now there is only assumption.Hope that helps clear things up.Ben

Wrong. He draws a clear conclusion that consciousness occurs outside of the body with a flat EEG.He then questions how can this be?The questioning is not that it occurs, but how it can occur, specifically how can consciousness outside of the body occur if consciousness is located in the brain.Geesh, man. It's totally unequivocal.

But that's all within the scope of a factual claim the author makes, namely that consciousness occurs during a flat EEGs and that this consciousness is from a perspective outside of the body, and also he relates the significance of such experiences and the type of awareness involved.So we have a factual claim, and then we have discussions on how this could occur. I can grant that medical reasons are as you say, but that does not change the claim of flat EEGs during these experiences.

Now where does it say that there is a flat EEG for the entire period of time? Have you read the paper? He does mention the 10-15 seconds in the journal paper, that has absoloutely no bearing on the fact the the actual instance of the experience of the NDE is impossible to pinpoint unless there is some real hard objective evidence to tie experiences within the NDE with external events. The only reason to include anecdotal accounts of veridical observations during an NDE is to tie the timing into that of the fltlining EEG, and it is the only evidence presented to tie them in. The fact they choose to use that as an a priori assumption doesn't mean that all of those people were flatlining when they had their NDEs. Whether there was any electrical activity or not is only important if you can show that the NDE actually occurred during that period, not merely that they recall it as having done so but some actual objective measure to allow you to place the timing. Please provide the relevant, non-anecdotal, evidence from the paper.TTFN,WK

There is only one claim of flat EEGs... so it's really hard to accept as scientific evidence. I think this point is best dropped; conscious processes ARE reconstructive all the time. Arach did a good job pointing out some instances. Another simple instance is during dreaming; we often take a viewpoint outside our own bodies.But it's not an important point. The important point is whether there's believable evidence of conscious activity happening without corresponding brain activity. The quality of the conscious experience doesn't matter at all. Sorry, I didn't catch what this means. Could you restate or point to a section in the paper? It was really helpful when you did that before. I totally agree that the "flat EEGs" are the interesting point. And thanks for your clarifying statement, I'm glad we can agree on that. But with only one anecdotal data point, you can't get at any scientific conclusion. It makes a suggestion that, in the author's words, "pushes at the limits of medical ideas about the range of human
consciousness and the mind-brain relation."But the paper is a call for further research. A statement that conflicting ideas and theories are out there, we have crappy data, and we've eliminated all other explanations. You cognitive guys, get off your asses and do some work.That's how I'm reading it. I see the whole final page as a "we have a bunch of flimsy data and theories. Hey yo, do some work!" I don't see that they give credence to the one data point for more than this type of "look, we can't make sense out of what you've said and the lacking data. We need more." That's why they say things like This is a criticism that the current theories lack data. They're really unimpressed with the lack of data behind the theories. They're puzzled. Some relation is there... but what could it be? Wish there was some data. Remember, they failed to reject the null hypothesis (that such factors caused NDEs). This doesn't mean the hypothesis is false, at all. It means that further studies need to be done. In other words, ... damn, it'd be nice to have some friggin data.By the way, sorry for the randomized ordering there. Sometimes I read sequences of paragraphs backwards, sometimes forwards. Helps me in reading the paper how they want me to read it, and also helps me parse the paper for my own interpretation (i.e. break the flow of their ideas, so I can capture the data and think about it on my own).

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I guess what it comes down to is believing that no scientist would make a conclusion based on a single data point. Instead, they would want more data. Maybe that's where our interpretations diverge?Ben

I saw the 10 seconds mentioned and corrected that in an edit. No, you are right. It just says there is a flat EEG within about 10 seconds and mentions specific memories that occurred after those 10 seconds.What's not to understand here?Also, the memories and specific events are not really anecdotal in this context. They are specific evidence. The paper describes a common experience, and lists specific examples of remembered facts that occured over a longer period of time than 10 seconds.Once again, what's not to understand about this? Specifically, why do you consider the evidence anecdotal? In this context, it is not anecdotal. The patient had memories during a time of flat EEGs, and the memories proved correct when those were present were questioned. That's not anecdotal. That's real evidence.

Actually, the claim is much wider, that in cardiac arrest, flat EEGs occur in about 10 seconds. I agree for the context of this debate, but not from a medical perspective which is one reason he places so much emphasis on the quality and effect of such experiences. It's not important for this thread. He discusses the impact of NDEs on patients. That's all. There are intriguing aspects of greater mental awareness, etc,...but it's a secondary issue. Maybe we can pick it up later.I think you are mistaking a little of the questioning as questioning whether brain activity can be the explanation. I see him as ruling out brain activity and saying, guys, what is going on?

I didn't feel that the author tied this fact with the data they measured explicitly. That bothers me. But it's an important point. That's the point that I marked as "investigate further." I'll try tonight, when I need a break from my research stuff. Well at this point I think we've extracted the relevant issue (how prevalent are flat EEGs) and question further investigation (what does a flat EEG mean for brain activity?) out of the paper, so I'm willing to drop the discussion of "what the authors meant" as irrelevant at this point.If the connection can be made above that you're making, then the viewpoint that you're stating is much more plausible. I'd be surprised if the authors were using that point, because they didn't make the deduction that many EEGs were flat explictly. But I've been surprised many times, so ... let's simply do the fact-checking ourselves, and see if that is a valid deduction!Talk to you later. Thanks for being very clear about what points you extracted from the article and what quotes you got that from; it made your POV very accessible. I appreciate it!BenThis message has been edited by Ben, Tuesday, 2005/11/29 04:10 PM

The bit where the 'specific memories' are supported by anything other than anecdotal evidence. No, it doesn't. It records a number of common experiences associated with NDE, it doesn't provide any timing for them based on anything other than assumption and the two anecdotal accounts, one within the paper and one referenced, perhaps the referenced one is not merely anecdotal we would need access to that paper to find out. It doesn't list 'remembered facts' it lists remembered experiences, can you spot the subjectivity? Have you read any of the paper? That entire section is in quote marks because it is the authors recounting an ANECDOTE told to them by a nurse about an instance the nurse recalled where they were struck by the accuracy of details the patient gave while he was being revived after being in a coma. In what way is this anything other than pure anecdote?Anecdotal evidence is real evidence, it just isn't strong or compelling evidence as it is so dependent on the subjective experiences of human beings. A Factual claim might well be supported by anecdotal evidence, but not well supported enough for everyone to accept it as a fact.TTFN,WK