'What Happens When We Die'

[Nearly Sane]

An interesting little meditation but one that my experience does not chime with. The dead bodies of loved ones that I have touched seemed nothing to do with the person. Perhaps because of those I touched,  one there had been no chance to know, and 4 of the others had been lost in different extents to forms of dementia.





https://www.themarginalian.org/2022/01/10/alan-lightman-death/

[Sriram]

Perhaps because, the body is not what a person is. It is a temporary home, a shell, a suit that we wear.

The actual person is gone. Ask NDE'rs...they'll tell you. Even they find it difficult to identity with their body when they are out of it.   

[Nearly Sane]

Perhaps because, the body is not what a person is. It is a temporary home, a shell, a suit that we wear.

The actual person is gone. Ask NDE'rs...they'll tell you. Even they find it difficult to identity with their body when they are out of it.   

So in your view what is dementia?

[Sriram]

The mind and body together make up the outer shell. Both the body and mind can deteriorate and become ill. That which experiences the dementia and the illness is the Self within. 

[Nearly Sane]

The mind and body together make up the outer shell. Both the body and mind can deteriorate and become ill. That which experiences the dementia and the illness is the Self within.

What is the mind as opposed to the self?

[Sriram]

These are matters one has to understand through an internal quest. But to give you an analogy....the body is like  computer hardware, the mind is like software and the person using the computer is the Self.

[Nearly Sane]

These are matters one has to understand through an internal quest. But to give you an analogy....the body is like  computer hardware, the mind is like software and the person using the computer is the Self.

So why would a fault in the software affect how the 'self' perceived itself?

[Sriram]

It is not about the Self wrongly perceiving itself.  It is about the computer mind (ego) wrongly perceiving itself as the Self. Correcting this wrong perception and identifying ones true Self is what Spirituality is all about. 

[Nearly Sane]

It is not about the Self wrongly perceiving itself.  It is about the computer mind (ego) wrongly perceiving itself as the Self. Correcting this wrong perception and identifying ones true Self is what Spirituality is all about.

  The analogy cannae take it, Captain

[Sriram]

Obviously! Analogies have their limits.

[Nearly Sane]

Obviously! Analogies have their limits.

  And their first limit is that they are not arguments por evidence. Since you were the person limiting the understanding of your idea to an analogy, then we immediately hit that problem.
 

[Sriram]

We are discussing philosophical matters. You never ask Schopenhauer or Kant or Plato for evidence, do you?!

[Nearly Sane]

We are discussing philosophical matters. You never ask Schopenhauer or Kant or Plato for evidence, do you?!

Depends on the claims. And you missed  that I included argument and pointed out that analogy isn't argument.

[Dicky Underpants]

It is not about the Self wrongly perceiving itself.  It is about the computer mind (ego) wrongly perceiving itself as the Self. Correcting this wrong perception and identifying ones true Self is what Spirituality is all about.

I've never quite understood whether you equate the Self with God (Atman = Brahman), as in Advaita Vedanta. If when we die we are effectively just a wave in the divine spirit, then what is our earthly life at all, and why does God need to forget himself as "us", in order to remember himself later? If the ego is wrongly perceiving itself as the Self, how did this come about if everything is the all-knowing God in the first place?

[Sriram]

I've never quite understood whether you equate the Self with God (Atman = Brahman), as in Advaita Vedanta. If when we die we are effectively just a wave in the divine spirit, then what is our earthly life at all, and why does God need to forget himself as "us", in order to remember himself later? If the ego is wrongly perceiving itself as the Self, how did this come about if everything is the all-knowing God in the first place?

These are just philosophical concepts and there are many different interpretations and opinions. No one can prove it one way or the other.

As far as I am concerned there are three different domains ....the Personality (with body mind and ego), the Lower Self (the soul), and the Higher Self (my personal guide, savior and God). This much I am very sure about from my own personal experience.  I also believe that the Higher Self  is somehow connected to higher levels of Consciousness beyond that.

I personally don't believe that the Higher Self is itself directly the Brahman...though it is possibly connected to it. 

From NDE's we get the impression of parallel worlds into which one goes after death. So, even if we are just a 'wave' in the universal spirit we will still have independent consciousness. 

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sriram,

From NDE's we get the impression of parallel worlds into which one goes after death.

Yet again: you cannot rely on NDEs to tell you anything at all about actually being dead. No-one who had an NDE was actually dead - they may have experienced dying perhaps, but not death.

In short, your cheat here is still to pretend that there's no "N" in "NDE".     

So, even if we are just a 'wave' in the universal spirit we will still have independent consciousness.

That's a non sequitur. That "so" might have legs if you had evidence from "DEs", but you haven't – you only have evidence from NDEs.

Try to remenber this. 

[Sriram]

Sriram,

Yet again: you cannot rely on NDEs to tell you anything at all about actually being dead. No-one who had an NDE was actually dead - they may have experienced dying perhaps, but not death.

In short, your cheat here is still to pretend that there's no "N" in "NDE".     

That's a non sequitur. That "so" might have legs if you had evidence from "DEs", but you haven't – you only have evidence from NDEs.

Try to remenber this.

That's a silly worn out argument. Someone called it 'Near' death doesn't mean it is not a real death experience.  There is enough reason to believe that these are actual death experiences.

You are defining death as a final state from which there can be no return and therefore concluding that no one can come back after death. This is a circular argument.   It has not been proved that no one can return after death.

[Stranger]

There is enough reason to believe that these are actual death experiences.

Such as....?

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sriram,

That's a silly…

No it isn’t – see below.

…worn out argument.

Arguments aren’t “worn out” or not – they’re either sound or not sound.

Someone called it 'Near' death doesn't mean it is not a real death experience.

Yes it does. You may as well call sex a “near pregnancy experience”: being on the way to death but not actually dead means you’re not, well, actually dead. People who recover from NDEs may have useful things to say about the process of dying, but there’s no reason to think they have anything at all to say about being dead.

There is enough reason to believe that these are actual death experiences.

No there isn’t. If you think otherwise though, tell us what that supposed “reason” is.

You are defining death as a final state from which there can be no return…

That's called a straw man. I’m doing no such thing (though I also believe that to be the case) – I’m actually defining it as the state of being in which none of the features of life remain. None. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Sweet FA.

That’s why NDAs don’t qualify. What on earth do you think the word "Near" means here if not "approaching but not arrived at"? 

…and therefore concluding that no one can come back after death. This is a circular argument.   It has not been proved that no one can return after death.

It’s also not an argument I make (see above).

[Sriram]

 
Hi everyone

A nice recent CNN article about NDE's

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/09/14/health/near-death-experience-study-wellness/index.html

*************

those experiences were categorized along with testimonies from 126 survivors of cardiac arrest who were not in the study, and “we were able to show very clearly that the recorded experience of death — a sense of separation, a review of your life, going to a place that feels like home and then a recognition that you need to come back  — were very consistent across people from all over the world,” Parnia said.

In addition, the study took the recorded brain signals and compared them with brain signals done by other studies on hallucinations, delusions and illusions and found them to be very different, he added.

“We were able to conclude that the recalled experience of death is real. It occurs with death, and there’s a brain marker that we’ve identified. These electrical signals are not being produced as a trick of a dying brain, which is what a lot of critics have said.”

“All (the study) has shown is that in some patients there is continued electrical activity in the head that occurs during the same period that other patients report having NDEs (near-death experiences),” Greyson said.

It’s correct that the study was not able to match electrical activity with a near death experience in the same patient, Parnia said.

****************

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sriram,

From the article:

“In the study, published Thursday in the journal Resuscitation, teams of trained personnel in 25 hospitals in the United States, the United Kingdom and Bulgaria followed doctors into rooms where patients were “coding” or “technically dead,” Parnia said.”

So not actually dead then. Right-oh.

Also from the same article:

“All (the study) has shown is that in some patients there is continued electrical activity in the head that occurs during the same period that other patients report having NDEs (near-death experiences),” Greyson said.”

Ah well.

[Sriram]

Sriram,

From the article:

“In the study, published Thursday in the journal Resuscitation, teams of trained personnel in 25 hospitals in the United States, the United Kingdom and Bulgaria followed doctors into rooms where patients were “coding” or “technically dead,” Parnia said.”

So not actually dead then. Right-oh.

Also from the same article:

“All (the study) has shown is that in some patients there is continued electrical activity in the head that occurs during the same period that other patients report having NDEs (near-death experiences),” Greyson said.”

Ah well.

It shows that NDE's and brain activity are unrelated. They happen in different people.

[Enki]

So, nothing particularly new then. The evidence that there is electrical activity in the brain after the heart stops and breathing ceases is becoming fairly well established. Here for instance is another study which shows electrical activity in the dying brain, something that has also been observed in other animal species, especially rats.

https://www.science.org/content/article/burst-brain-activity-during-dying-could-explain-life-passing-your-eyes

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sriram,

It shows that NDE's and brain activity are unrelated. They happen in different people.

No it doesn't. What it actually shows is that for NDEs to occur there still has to be electrical activity in the brain. You know, NDEs rather than actual DEs.

Nice try though.

[Sriram]

Sam Parnia clearly states that......“We were able to conclude that the recalled experience of death is real. It occurs with death, and there’s a brain marker that we’ve identified. These electrical signals are not being produced as a trick of a dying brain, which is what a lot of critics have said.”

Greyson says.....“That is, those patients who had near-death experiences did not show the reported brain waves, and those who did show the reported brain waves did not report near-death experiences,” Greyson told CNN via email.

I don't know what they were trying to establish but they did succeed in establishing that there is no correlation between brain activity and NDE's.