Can science agree with the concept of life after death?

@Leonard,

In Ian Stevenson's cases of investigation of children who remember their previous lives, there are a number of cases where there is a birthmark corresponding to the injury that caused the previous death (i.e. a birthmark where the bullet entered the body of the previous identity).

1 Reply

@jeeprs,

jeeprs;92325 wrote:

In Ian Stevenson's cases of investigation of children who remember their previous lives, there are a number of cases where there is a birthmark corresponding to the injury that caused the previous death (i.e. a birthmark where the bullet entered the body of the previous identity).

Jeeprs ,there will always be this divide between those who can be foolish enough to imagine more and those sceptics who will forever find reasoning to discount the experiences of life.

The new studies on NDE are placing a card above the operating table with a message on it that can only be seen if you were floating above the table. Now ide find it pretty amazing that someone who finds themselves in that situation would look around for written messages. Lets say it happens, you and I would obviously say" there you go its conclusive", but I can guarantee that the sceptics will argue that someone could have given them the message or they overheard the medical staff talking about it. No side will ever concede, we are locked into a debate for ever. The truth is, no one when deaths comes will be disappointed with the outcome, of this last great mystery.

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@xris,

xris;92323 wrote:

These are old arguments and I will probably reply with the same old arguments. Imagine . . .

First of all, if we were to just sit around and imagine, I guess we could come up with all kinds of scenarios, xris. Then, can you not see that I have already answered your question?

You have quite specifically stated that a soul is the individual, correct?

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@Leonard,

Actually there was an amusing statement in the book about Stevenson's work. In the West, he was always getting the comment 'Why are you investigating reincarnation? Everyone knows that this is impossible." In the East, he would get "Why are you investigating reincarnation? Everyone knows it happens all the time."

My attitude is that these things do happen, but don't attach too much importance to them. And don't ever try and figure out how it happens, because even if it does - and it's a big if - I am sure we will never figure it out.

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@KaseiJin,

KaseiJin;92343 wrote:

First of all, if we were to just sit around and imagine, I guess we could come up with all kinds of scenarios, xris. Then, can you not see that I have already answered your question?

You have quite specifically stated that a soul is the individual, correct?

Now your being just a bit silly, no one has said that anything is possible by imagination alone ,have they. I know you have answered my question, i have answered yours, does that define the result?

I am not totally convinced of the existence of an ethereal soul but by experience i have not rejected this notion, you have.

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@xris,

xris;92347 wrote:

Now your being just a bit silly, no one has said that anything is possible by imagination alone

Thought experiments are imaginative scenarios usually, and you have tended to use them rather often when dealing with this basic subject of brain/mind/consciousness.

xris;92347 wrote:

i have answered yours, . . .

If you could please be more specific and detailed, and let me know just which question of mine it is that you have answered, and just what your answer was again . . . I kind of feel as though I may have missed it.

xris;92347 wrote:

I am not totally convinced of the existence of an ethereal soul but by experience i have not rejected this notion, you have.

I have rejected the notion, holding that it is by far the least likely scenario, based on accumulated empirical knowledge over a range of variable yet relevent matters. Would you be willing to specifically relate all the exact details of your experience (not just your mother's), and the circumstances of the occasion? That may help in my possibly being able to explain how your working brain could be seen as having created the experience internally.

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@KaseiJin,

To convey my beliefs i have had to be imaginative as you only appear to examine this subject through a microscope.

How would you like to answer your questions in way that would give you an idea of my understanding or to prove conclusively I'm right ? I thought as it was non provable topic opinions would be the only answers.

I would be only to pleased to give you more examples but without committing yourself to belief, what would you see as the problems with my mothers experience as an example to me, not you, me.thanks xris.

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@KaseiJin,

I'll ask once more, then:

KaseiJin;92355 wrote:

Would you be willing to specifically relate all the exact details of your experience (not just your mother's), and the circumstances of the occasion? That may help in my possibly being able to explain how your working brain could be seen as having created the experience internally.

In the event that you have talking of experience in the objective, or third-person view, and that it had actually been your mother's direct experience which you have always been talking about, then please do related that in detail here.

1 Reply

@KaseiJin,

KaseiJin;92554 wrote:

I'll ask once more, then:

In the event that you have talking of experience in the objective, or third-person view, and that it had actually been your mother's direct experience which you have always been talking about, then please do related that in detail here.

I'll answer one more time, I have posted my mothers experience and i asked you to comment. To save you searching i will briefly tell the story again.

In the late sixties , it was reported a train crash had happened and four passengers had died. The names of those killed would not be published till the next of kin had bee informed. My mother, that night, dreamed one of the passengers, a certain major in the army had left home without saying goodbye to his wife. In my mothers dream he told her of his name and requested she contact his wife telling her he loved her and to say good bye. My mother told my daughter in the morning , me later on in the day, she was visible shaken by the dream. The next day this major was reported in the news papers as one of the dead. My mother refused to contact the wife as she thought the wife might think her cranky. I rang the police and the BBC to see if the names had been announced prematurely, assuming my mother might had overheard this subconsciously, they assured me they had not.

1 Reply

@Leonard,

I don't doubt this story, nor its meaning. However such stories are what scientists will generally call 'anecdotal'. They are stories, which may indeed be true. But there is no way to independently ascertain the truth or falsehood of the story, nor to re-create the circumstances in which it was told. This is the frustrating thing about researching these kinds of topics. How do you reproduce these types of things so that they can be examined? Won't stand up scientifically, and probably wouldn't stand up in a court of law, either. And that is the way us moderns run things.

I have an anecdote of my own. One morning in May this year I signed up for the free online New York Times because I wanted to read an article. Part of the registration, as is normal, was 'the security question that only you will know the answer to'. I picked 'First Pet Name', to which the answer was - 'Haaji'.

Now Haaji was a small black cross-breed, that we had when I was a boy. When we went overseas for a year, we left her with the neighbours. And when we came back, the little boy next door had bonded so much with the dog that my mother said he could keep her. She couldn't stand to take the dog back and upset this boy who was convinced the dog was his.

Of course us kids were just outraged. Screamed about it for days. "How can you take OUR dog?" No justice in the world. We got over it in time but we were never happy about it and it remained a sore point for years.

Cut to 2009. I visited Mum in the nursing home. She has very advanced senile dementure and rarely says anything. She has to be fed, lifted, cleaned, 'by at least two attendants' according to the notices next to her bed. Anyway I sat next to her that same day. After about 5 minutes, she suddenly said about the first thing she had said to me for many, many visits.

She said "Sorry about that dear".

"Sorry about what?", I said.

"About Haaji".

And that was it. The only thing she has said since is "you look nice today dear". Now of course this does not constitute "scientific evidence" of anything. I know how science works.

I also know what I heard.

1 Reply

@jeeprs,

My question was not to get the reader to believe my story, as that is an impossible task, but to tell me how I should view this experience my mother had. No experience can be given as proof, but the question remains for those who experience them. Anecdotal evidence is not valid for others but if it convinces those who experience them , how do they cope with this reasoning?

I have had numerous experiences, that for me defy reason , so what should i tell my self your, delusional , cranky, your character is inclined to believe the mundane to be significant. I have questioned myself but still come to the conclusion my experiences are relevant and do make me question certainties in life.

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@Leonard,

Well I think that is good. The 'scientific worldview' is in itself a dogma. Since when is it the case that nothing spiritual is real? Who declared it? These things definitely happen. There are people who remember their past lives, their are telepathic experiences, and there are mediums who communicate with the dead.

But so what? I really don't want to get too interested in it either. It is not healthy. If you are practising a spiritual path you are told that psychic events occur, but not to get attached to them, just view them as phenomena that arise. I think they are just facts of life. The issue is that materialism rules and most people only think that the material is real.

1 Reply

@jeeprs,

jeeprs;92665 wrote:

Well I think that is good. The 'scientific worldview' is in itself a dogma. Since when is it the case that nothing spiritual is real? Who declared it? These things definitely happen. There are people who remember their past lives, their are telepathic experiences, and there are mediums who communicate with the dead.

But so what? I really don't want to get too interested in it either. It is not healthy. If you are practising a spiritual path you are told that psychic events occur, but not to get attached to them, just view them as phenomena that arise. I think they are just facts of life. The issue is that materialism rules and most people only think that the material is real.

Mediums , who make the claims of the ability to instigate communion with the dead are to be treated with the most care. Science should never be dogmatic, only those who put their faith in its claimed certainty can be classified as dogmatic.

View them as phenomena, that naturally arise and what? dont put any significance to them ?

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@Leonard,

Science certainly is dogmatic. The 'scientific worldview' only contemplates certain kinds of realities. This is discussed all the time in this forum and doesn't need to be repeated again. 'Cosmos is all there is' said Sagan. And the rest of the scientific community agrees with him. This is the nature of scientific materialism and the secular outlook - reality is what you see through the microscope and the telescope, what can be measured, what can be sensed, proved empirically, shown mathematically, and so on. What is hard to understand about that? However the reality of paranormal phenomena challenges this understanding. That is what this thread is about, isn't it?

Actually now I think about it, the way the question was asked was, can science agree? Why would you ask that? Because you want scientific validation. Why? Because 'science knows what is real'. Science knows best. Therefore, we are appealing to science to validate something we think might have some truth in it but is not mainstream. Is that the motivation?

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@Leonard,

jeeprs wrote:

Science certainly is dogmatic.

Science is a method. People can be dogmatic, not methods. People can stubbornly believe (with little evidence) in some things dealing with science and assert their opinions, but this makes the person dogmatic not the method. It makes no sense to say that science is dogmatic. It's like saying the number three is angry; it's a categorical error. Not to mention, science is entirely too diverse for you to be liberally throwing out adjectives, positive or negative.

Quote:

The 'scientific worldview' only contemplates certain kinds of realities

Please elaborate. What kind of realities are there?

Quote:

Actually now I think about it, the way the question was asked was, can science agree?

Once again, a categorical error. Science does not have the capacity to agree or disagree. It's a method and does not have an opinion or will to speak.

Quote:

Because 'science knows what is real'. Science knows best.

Your anthropomorphizing of science is astounding.

Quote:

Therefore, we are appealing to science to validate something we think might have some truth in it but is not mainstream. Is that the motivation?

One doesn't have to appeal to science to consider paranormal phenomena. I don't know how this conclusion was drawn.

---------- Post added 09-22-2009 at 09:33 AM ----------

xris wrote:

the late sixties , it was reported a train crash had happened and four passengers had died. The names of those killed would not be published till the next of kin had bee informed. My mother, that night, dreamed one of the passengers, a certain major in the army had left home without saying goodbye to his wife. In my mothers dream he told her of his name and requested she contact his wife telling her he loved her and to say good bye. My mother told my daughter in the morning , me later on in the day, she was visible shaken by the dream. The next day this major was reported in the news papers as one of the dead. My mother refused to contact the wife as she thought the wife might think her cranky. I rang the police and the BBC to see if the names had been announced prematurely, assuming my mother might had overheard this subconsciously, they assured me they had not.

So you believe your mother had a premonition?

KaseiJin wrote:

I have rejected the notion, holding that it is by far the least likely scenario, based on accumulated empirical knowledge over a range of variable yet relevent matters. Would you be willing to specifically relate all the exact details of your experience (not just your mother's), and the circumstances of the occasion? That may help in my possibly being able to explain how your working brain could be seen as having created the experience internally.

This man is on the right track, at least probing some questions. Thanks, Kas.

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@Zetherin,

Its not a premonition, the accident had occurred, my mother new of the accident.

1 Reply

@xris,

xris;92713 wrote:

Its not a premonition, the accident had occurred, my mother new of the accident.

How do you believe she acquired the knowledge of that man's death?

1 Reply

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;92769 wrote:

How do you believe she acquired the knowledge of that man's death?

She did not acquire knowledge of his death, but learnt his name. I have asked a question, i dont intend answering yours first.

1 Reply

@xris,

xris;92796 wrote:

She did not acquire knowledge of his death, but learnt his name. I have asked a question, i dont intend answering yours first.

I don't understand the hostility. I, like Kas, am making an attempt to understand.

1 Reply

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;92683 wrote:

Science is a method. People can be dogmatic, not methods. People can stubbornly believe (with little evidence) in some things dealing with science and assert their opinions, but this makes the person dogmatic not the method. It makes no sense to say that science is dogmatic. It's like saying the number three is angry; it's a categorical error. Not to mention, science is entirely too diverse for you to be liberally throwing out adjectives, positive or negative.

Scientists, then, if not science, definitely exclude some categories of phenomena from consideration on the basis that their reality is not tenable within their overall picture of the world. Bertrand Russell said, in the concluding sections of History of Western Philosophy, something to the effect that while we (analytical philosophers) recognise there are questions which the intellect cannot answer, we refuse to accept that there are hidden or higher ways of knowledge not available to the intellect or to science.

The 'scientific worldview' has been normalised within Western society to such an extent that many don't realise it is a worldview. Irrespective of the effecitiveness of the scientific method, the worldview that accompanies it posits certain fundamentals, such as that, for example, the realm of ordinary perception and objective measurement is the sole reality, no other dimension or modes of reality can be perceived; that matter and energy are the fundamental constituents of reality and that mind is the product of the brain.

If you propose there are alternative ways of understanding the human condition or modes of perception which illuminate a separate reality, you will not be accorded any respect by science.

And that is what I mean when I say that 'science is dogmatic'. It will explore any route of enquiry, within certain bounds.

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Can science agree with the concept of life after death?

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