Why an afterlife/soul may not be so crazy

bnt

As with all these things: what's the point in speculating about something we can never detect or interact with? The existence of an afterlife would do me absolutely no good whatsoever in this life.

Lucy8080

"life is what happens to u while ur busy making other plans."

john lennon.

ill get in on this when i get a chance. good questions being asked...lets keep it in the spirit of possibilities rather than whose right or wrong.

exploration might serve us all equally.

hope to get back soon.

Zombrex

mickrock wrote: »

Large quantities of DMT are released during major physical or psychological stress and, it is thought, during the process of dying.

Instead of merely producing hallucinations during a near-death experience, as you suggest, DMT may lift the body's natural inhibitions against experiencing an enhanced consciousness.

Why would the body have inhibitions against experiencing enhanced consciousness. What evolutionary advantage would that provide.

Logical Fallacy

mickrock wrote: »

Large quantities of DMT are released during major physical or psychological stress and, it is thought, during the process of dying.

Instead of merely producing hallucinations during a near-death experience, as you suggest, DMT may lift the body's natural inhibitions against experiencing an enhanced consciousness.

Hang on, i thought the consciousness was outside the body...so i fail to see why the limitations of the body would affect it.

Unless we are looking at a square peg, round hole scenario in which case i would state that our consciousness is clearly not very smart to need a physical avatar which severely limits it's experience.

Lucy8080

just a quick reply about consciousness.

who said it was " ours"?

who is the tyrant making the claim on it?

soterpisc

Zombrex wrote: »

I could literally feel my brain getting dumber as I read that.

The argument is basically TV's have external source inputs, so if (for absolutely no reason at all) we assume that the brain is like a TV, then it stands to reason that the brain also has external source inputs.

In other news it turns out that the idea that the Moon is made of cheese is not so crazy after all. Let me explain

Cheese has a hard lining on the outside where the material is exposed to the air, and then in the middle where there is no air it is soft and mussy.

Now lets, for absolutely no reason at all, imagine that the moon was like cheese. Now when man kind examined the crust they found it was hard. It stands to reason then that the Moon also has a soft creamy centre since we know the Moon is like a ball of cheese (and by "know" I mean assumed this was the case for absolutely no reason).

Look Science can't fully explain basics like matter. There are still lots of question marks around subatomic structures.. And you think a post about the complexity of out mind is crazy?? We will have a long way to go to understand consciousness.

Lucy8080

would a nonlocal consciousness...depend on evolution?

or would evolution depend on it?

and whats the difference between local and nonlocal consciousness?

Zombrex

soterpisc wrote: »

Look Science can't fully explain basics like matter. There are still lots of question marks around subatomic structures..

And.....?

soterpisc wrote: »

And you think a post about the complexity of out mind is crazy??

I don't know what "out mind" is, but I think a post that uses its own analogy to support its position is crazy (if we assume the mind is like a TV then it stands to reason that the mind will be like a TV....QED mo-fo).

Zombrex

Lucy8080 wrote: »

would a nonlocal consciousness...depend on evolution?

or would evolution depend on it?

Non-local consciousness would depend on it. I would be very interested in anyone who believes the brain is not solely responsible for the production of the mind explaining how we evolved a "mind" external to our own bodies.

Lucy8080 wrote: »

and whats the difference between local and nonlocal consciousness?

In the sense that it is being used I think they mean produced by the brain vs something external to the brain (and the rest of the human body one assumes).

Lucy8080

hi zom,

what does nonlocal mean?

what is the sense that it is being "used"?

Zombrex

Lucy8080 wrote: »

hi zom,

what does nonlocal mean?

what is the sense that it is being used?

Ok .... lets try this again

In the sense that it is being used I think they mean produced by the brain vs something external to the brain (and the rest of the human body one assumes).

Dave!

soterpisc wrote: »

Look Science can't fully explain basics like matter. There are still lots of question marks around subatomic structures.. And you think a post about the complexity of out mind is crazy?? We will have a long way to go to understand consciousness.

And as we all know, the best way to understand something is to pull baseless theories out of the sky!

Lucy8080

hi zom,

not playing with ya. thx for ur reply.

ill ask again

what does non local mean.

thx for ur smiley...i wish i wasnt so computer illiterate

i would have started and ended this post with one.

King Mob

mickrock wrote: »

Just because being in the physical body under normal circumstances seems to put a limit on consciousness doesn't mean that consciousness isn't ultimately nonlocal.

So if it behaves exactly as if it wasn't non-local or as if it's totally dependant on biology, and that none of the silliness claimed in the article has actually been verified, why should we take the notion at all seriously?

And if the body is somehow made to limit stuff, why does the eye behave exactly as if it's the source for vision?
And since without the lens or retina's or other stuff we need to see, by what mechanism does the separated conciousness detect light as our eye does?

mickrock wrote: »

Large quantities of DMT are released during major physical or psychological stress and, it is thought, during the process of dying.

Instead of merely producing hallucinations during a near-death experience, as you suggest, DMT may lift the body's natural inhibitions against experiencing an enhanced consciousness.

So then, if we give DMT to blind people they would suddenly be able to see?

And why if the conciousness is separate, why would DMT have an effect on it at all?

Lucy8080

can nonlocal consciousness behave as if it was anything other than it is?

King Mob

Lucy8080 wrote: »

can nonlocal consciousness behave as if it was anything other than it is?

I don't know, but the OP is claiming that it behaves pretty much like normal conciousness.

Zombrex

Lucy8080 wrote: »

ill ask again
what does non local mean.

Given that the question has been answered (twice in fact) perhaps you can expand on the question and what precisely you are asking, since there is clearly some misunderstanding take place either on my part or yours.

Do you mean what do the words "non-local" mean in a general sense?

strobe

Lucy8080 wrote: »

ill ask again

what does non local mean.

Well I thought his description was pretty good but to put it another way. 'Non local' consciousness in the context being discussed in the OP means conciousness that is originating from somewhere that is not the brain.

So to use the awful TV analogy from the OP. If you are watching the All Ireland Final on a TV, it is not originating in the TV. It is originating in Croke Park, and the signal is being received by (the aerial on) your TV. So in terms of 'non local' conciousness, conciousness is originating from somewhere else and your brain is just acting as the TV aerial that is receiving the signal...

God, it really is an awful analogy...

Where as 'local' (awful terminology too) would mean that conciousness is actually originating in/from your brain.

Lucy8080

o.k ill expand.

can the brain be separate from nonlocal consciousness?

how would a physicist describe nonlocal consciousness?

as none here are physicists...lets give the o.p. a break for opening an interesting topic..

cos ill tell ya something guys...i could have played ya on this one...

the way ya played the o.p.

but it strikes me as mean. for the sake of meaness.

Sarky

Really? No physicists?

Lucy8080

no sarky physicists anyhow...they tend to have a bit of class.

King Mob

Lucy8080 wrote: »

how would a physicist describe nonlocal consciousness?

as none here are physicists...lets give the o.p. a break for opening an interesting topic..

Um.. I am.

And a physicist would not describe a non-local conciousness as anything as the idea is kinda stupid.

Lucy8080

give us your description so k.m.

and whats " a " nonlocal consciousness?

Zombrex

Lucy8080 wrote: »

can the brain be separate from nonlocal consciousness?

Well anything is possible, but at the moment there is no evidence suggesting it is and a lot of reasons to suppose it isn't coming from evolutionary biology and physics.

Lucy8080 wrote: »

how would a physicist describe nonlocal consciousness?

They wouldn't. Physicists describe observed phenomena. There is no observed phenomena that requires the explanation of non-local consciousness.

Non-local consciousness is a concept that either comes from religion with the view as the essence of a person is contained in their soul/spirit, or from new age superstition which supposes that there is some form of undetectable energy wave (or something, details are fuzzy) where our consciousness exists.

Needless to say there is no support for either of these ideas. In fact the only scientific bit in any of this is the Theory of Mind, which supposes that humans have evolved a tendency to think of a person independently to their physical body (this allows us to imagine for example what someone is doing when we cannot directly see them), which has lead to the idea in humans that the mind must some how be seperate to the body, an idea that has found very little support when it came to actually looking at the brain.

Lucy8080 wrote: »

as none here are physicists...lets give the o.p. a break for opening an interesting topic..

You don't have to be a physicists to see the flaws in the logic presented in the article the OP linked to.

Lucy8080 wrote: »

cos ill tell ya something guys...i could have played ya on this one...

the way ya played the o.p.

but it strikes me as mean. for the sake of meaness.

Sorry, you could have played us on what exactly?

Lucy8080

mean boards guys. you let yourselves down sometimes. u deserve every kick up the behind u get.

and so many decent folks here.

clear off...or clean up ur act.

i can handle ya...but think for others.

Zombrex

Lucy8080 wrote: »

mean boards guys. you let yourselves down sometimes. u deserve every kick up the behind u get.

and so many decent folks here.

clear off...or clear up ur act.

i can handle ya...but think for others.

Yeah, maybe come back to us when you aren't drunk ...

Lucy8080

^^^^^^^^^^^^

proof positive!

Sarky

Well you aren't exactly making an awful lot of sense. Coherent sentences really are the way forward.

Lucy8080

ive asked mostly questions here sarky. i think most have understood the questions ...and blame me for their lack of answers.

but hey...go to the religious forums were they get castigated for not showing up to the cleverness of some here.their faith is somehow lesser than urs.


ive posted links...ive stood up for the lone guy...ive stood against accusations of drunkeness...ive even ignored the debunk debunk debunk mantra of some on other threads

but hey...ill stand alone....u debunk my last post on the origin of the species nonsense...

great with a crowd around ya...and a gallery to play to...

get a laugh . badger and cajole.. no space or respect for another.

if only we all had ur brains.

18AD

The theory is an attempt to explain the so called hard problem of consciousness.

I think this theory tries to explain it in terms of consciousness existing separately from the brain. The brain simply tunes in consciousness. So with the OBE example the persons brain is not functioning but they are having experiences because they don't need a brain to have experiences. Consciousness not residing in the brain is what is meant by non-local.

It is in response to the failure of science that tries to explain things under a mind/brain identity theory. That is, the mind has a one-to-one correspondence with brain states. The failure is that qualitative experience looks and feels nothing like neural network firing. The taste of orange juice is qualitatively distinct to a description of brain activity.

I don't think the non-local consciousness does much to solve this problem. The definition of consciousness is too loose. Take the example of blind sight or split brain patients. These people are unable to report on visual stimuli but exhibit behaviour as if they have seen. So with blind sight, a man can navigate a corridor, but will report that he can't see at all. So the question is, can you have conssciousness that you aren't aware of?

Interesting article anyway. Morphic field theory is another one that's similar. Unfortunately I haven't kept up to date on the consciousness debate.