Absence of Evidence..............

Where an eye witness claims to have seen something take place, for example, that is a personal empirical experience.

Studies into personal auras do not make personal auras empirical.
Empirical means observable. Directly or indirectly observable but objectively verifiable either way.

Also Greyson2 writes in his discussion: “No one physiological or psychological model by itself explains all the common features of NDE. The paradoxical occurrence of heightened, lucid awareness and logical thought processes during a period of impaired cerebral perfusion raises particular perplexing questions for our current understanding of consciousness and its relation to brain function. A clear sensorium and complex perceptual processes during a period of apparent clinical death challenge the concept that consciousness is localized exclusively in the brain.” And Parnia and Fenwick3 write in their discussion: “The data suggest that the NDE arises during unconsciousness. This is a surprising conclusion, because when the brain is so dysfunctional that the patient is deeply comatose, the cerebral structures, which underpin subjective experience and memory, must be severely impaired. Complex experiences such as are reported in the NDE should not arise or be retained in memory. Such patients would be expected to have no subjective experience [as was the case in the vast majority of patients who survive cardiac arrest in the three published prospective studies1-3] or at best a confusional state if some brain function is retained. Even if the unconscious brain is flooded by neurotransmitters this should not produce clear, lucid remembered experiences, as those cerebral modules, which generate conscious experience, are impaired by cerebral anoxia. The fact that in a cardiac arrest loss of cortical function precedes the rapid loss of brainstem activity lends further support to this view. An alternative explanation would be that the observed experiences arise during the loss of, or on regaining consciousness. The transition from consciousness to unconsciousness is rapid, with the EEG showing changes within a few seconds, and appearing immediate to the subject. Experiences which occur during the recovery of consciousness are confusional, which these were not”. In fact, memory is a very sensitive indicator of brain injury and the length of amnesia before and after unconsciousness is an indicator of the severity of the injury. Therefore, events that occur just prior to or just after loss of consciousness would not be expected to be recalled. And as stated before, in our study1 patients with loss of memory induced by lengthy CPR reported significantly fewer NDE. Good short-term memory seems to be essential for remembering NDE.

However in the complete absence of any empirical evidence to even suggest that something might be possible and is worth investigating further the only rational and practical conclusion is that it does not exist.The lack of evidence for the soul, or for God or for angels has got nothing to do with technology.

Can you empirically verify the right person to marry? Even if theoritically possible, does anyone really do that?

However with the above in mind I see empirical evidence, in the broadest sense, as that which exists in an objective reality and which can therefore be experienced and independently corroborated by individual conscious beings existing in that same objective reality. Observable evidence in the widest sense of the word is that which can be independently verified because it is external to the ”experiencer’.

The fact that every person I have ever empirically experienced

Based on casual observations or indications rather than rigorous or scientific analysis: