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A. J. Ayer – ‘What I Saw When I Was Dead’ (1988)

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Re: A. J. Ayer – ‘What I Saw When I Was Dead’ (1988)

#91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Actionable: To Consider the significance of kindness, compassion, love to and for each other, which world, at large, is missing owing to many factors. And to consider one's own superficiality and have profound thoughts for others.

Why is that tied to some notion of an afterlife? If anything, it seems to me that the reality that this one life is all any of us have should make one care way more for their fragile peers, and for making it the one life they have count. As The Doors once put it, "no eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn".

It doesn't have to be. But it does indicate accountability, and some people do hope get away without it.

I can't think of a more important idea for a conscious living being than some hope for an afterlife, perhaps a better one than is here.

Most people resorting to and flood the discussion with rational X or Y are simply getting high off of their own sounds and are plain dishonest with themselves and others.

Re: A. J. Ayer – ‘What I Saw When I Was Dead’ (1988)

#92

I've told only a few people about my near death experience, and most of them were polite, but obviously didn't believe a word I was saying. To be honest, I wouldn't believe it either if I had not experienced it myself. I did not "see" anything other than a bright light, but I was overcome with an incredible feeling that I was in the presence of, and communicating with somebody who was conveying a message of absolute…

It matches what I briefly experienced when I felt ill staying alone in a hotel. (E. g. I understood that the events of the few recent days were sort of preparing me for that; I could ask questions.)

BTW there's a book "The night of fire" by Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt that describes a similar experience he got staying alone in a desert. And, of course, countless other descriptions, e.g. "The varieties of religious experience" by W. James. You cannot convince anyone, of course; but there's also no way to fake it.

Re: A. J. Ayer – ‘What I Saw When I Was Dead’ (1988)

#93

Probably the contrarian take, but an informed one. Near death experiences are probably the best way we have to assess the nature of reality. Now, it's almost impossible to reach people who aren't ready with any arguments, but I'll outline some possible steps for anyone who's on the verge. - Go to youtube, type in NDE and listen to a few - Try to come up with a "rational" explanation (hallucinations, the brain dumping…

I never remotely believed this because I don't even believe in a "me" really. One hard hit in the head can literally change your personality entirely, then you have alzheimers and all the other degenerative brain diseases that will erase "you". Even if you avoid all that "you" will be wildly different every 15-20 years. Christianity gets through this by saying you will return to your prime. That just seems kind of ch…

Hrm. I've thought about this a lot and came to the conclusion that we, or rather our brains are just an antenna, 'receiving stuff' from another plane of existence.

If you change/destroy parts of the antenna or the 'bioelectronic circuits' the channel fades out, and you get more and more noise, until there is no signal anymore.

No more resonance with the frequency of your station.

That equals death on this plane.

What lead me to this apart from NDE/OOBE are the cases of so called Terminal Lucidity, when old or very sick people die, but regain conciousness in their last moments. In a timeframe from sometimes two to three days before exitus, but mostly just a few dozen seconds to minutes before exitus.

The thing is that some of these brains are so rotten and degenerated, that it is impossible according to our current understanding, that these people are even able to do anything coordinated, not to mention speak, and recognizing their loved ones/family, telling them things.

And yet this happens again and again, not that often, but it does. While their brains are absolute mush.

In a similar vein, there are stories of lost animals like cats and dogs finding their way back to the humans they once lived with. Over long distances like several hundred miles, often after years.

That can't happen by random chance. So either they can read signs, and understand our words better than we think, or there are other mechanisms at play.

What that is telling about this otherplaneness is uncertain, just that it exists.

Probably impossible to gain any certain insights about that, because of wrong cabling, interface, modulation, format, whatever.

At best we can just hope to skim the interface, membrane and get a few hazy views from the other side near that membrane, but not that far through it.

Maybe there are even other interfaces, membranes, from up there, going on and on, and/or recursing into others.

Re: A. J. Ayer – ‘What I Saw When I Was Dead’ (1988)

#94

Probably the contrarian take, but an informed one. Near death experiences are probably the best way we have to assess the nature of reality. Now, it's almost impossible to reach people who aren't ready with any arguments, but I'll outline some possible steps for anyone who's on the verge. - Go to youtube, type in NDE and listen to a few - Try to come up with a "rational" explanation (hallucinations, the brain dumping…

I have two data points thet I ponder occasionally:

1. I have met three identical twins so far. Each of them has reported having some kind of communication with the other twin that could not be explained by conventional means. I have no reason to think any of them lied.

2. My sister used to be very into astrology. She could predict someone's star sign within a few minutes of meeting them to much better than 1 in 12 accuracy.

I do not present these as proof of anything. I do not expect anyone else to believe them or give them any credence. This is just anecdata. I haven't worked out any rational explanation for them.

But I'm inclined to believe two things from them:

1. Brains are weird. Human psychology is complex and fascinating and does things that we do not understand.

2. That there are well-conceived, well-constructed scientific experiments that show there is no scientific basis for telekinesis or astrology, that these are not "real" things, does not necessarily contradict the human experience of them as "real" things. We do not inhabit a well-constructed scientific experiment so our lived experience of life may be different from the actual truth.

Re: A. J. Ayer – ‘What I Saw When I Was Dead’ (1988)

#95

I've told only a few people about my near death experience, and most of them were polite, but obviously didn't believe a word I was saying. To be honest, I wouldn't believe it either if I had not experienced it myself. I did not "see" anything other than a bright light, but I was overcome with an incredible feeling that I was in the presence of, and communicating with somebody who was conveying a message of absolute…

My memory is a bit hazy, but I thought what you are describing is very common with people who flatline and come back? I have vague memories that a new anesthetic drug was developed and used on soldiers undergoing surgery in the Vietnam war, and there was something about it that caused the same kind of reaction in those who were put under. Again, my memory is very hazy on the subject. I should go do some research and…

I was going to mention ketamine. Famous for this type of effect. I don't want to belittle the meaningful experience, but the mind is a really powerful organ and it's a safer bet to treat these experiences as arising from mind rather than beyond it. Shrug.

Re: A. J. Ayer – ‘What I Saw When I Was Dead’ (1988)

#96
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> NDEs happening under monitored conditions (operating tables) I had general anesthesia 10 days ago. There was no NDE, felt like they flicked an off switch then turned me back on a few hours later. They wheeled me from the prep room towards the OR, opened the big door, and then I was in a different room waking up from anesthesia. That’s it.

Do you frequently experience and remember dreams?

Yes I even used to do lucid dreaming. These days best I can do is wake up and stop dreams on command.

I also regularly experience sleep paralysis. That took a lot of work to get used to.

Re: A. J. Ayer – ‘What I Saw When I Was Dead’ (1988)

#97

I've told only a few people about my near death experience, and most of them were polite, but obviously didn't believe a word I was saying. To be honest, I wouldn't believe it either if I had not experienced it myself. I did not "see" anything other than a bright light, but I was overcome with an incredible feeling that I was in the presence of, and communicating with somebody who was conveying a message of absolute…

I've written this about 20 years ago in haste and bad english:

https://www.nderf.org/Experiences/1kevin_p_nde.html

Which isn't my real name btw. They pseudonymized that.

Re: A. J. Ayer – ‘What I Saw When I Was Dead’ (1988)

#98

I've told only a few people about my near death experience, and most of them were polite, but obviously didn't believe a word I was saying. To be honest, I wouldn't believe it either if I had not experienced it myself. I did not "see" anything other than a bright light, but I was overcome with an incredible feeling that I was in the presence of, and communicating with somebody who was conveying a message of absolute…

This is HN so I'm not trying to evangelize you or anyone here, but what you described is 100% in line with Spiritism [1], a French-founded doctrine that's very popular both in France and Brazil [2]. I'm a believer.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardecist_spiritism

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardecist_spiritism#cite_note-...

Re: A. J. Ayer – ‘What I Saw When I Was Dead’ (1988)

#99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never remotely believed this because I don't even believe in a "me" really. One hard hit in the head can literally change your personality entirely, then you have alzheimers and all the other degenerative brain diseases that will erase "you". Even if you avoid all that "you" will be wildly different every 15-20 years. Christianity gets through this by saying you will return to your prime. That just seems kind of ch…

Basically if the base reality that we experience through a holographic world/emergent reality has no concept of time, consequence, etc, you have to create a simulation/game with rules that can allow free will to happen, that has a timeline, has consequences. Once setup, those rules apply even if they ruin the simulation experience for some, they are a necessary part of the holographic world/emergent reality serving i…

Nope. Everything decays. So does any substrate which reality may run on whichever way.

So there will be errors in the great plan of whichever nature. Some of them may get caught by error correction codes, some others not.

These uncaught exceptions are enabling deviations from the great plan :-)

Re: A. J. Ayer – ‘What I Saw When I Was Dead’ (1988)

#100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's realer than reality as it's directly experienced?

The raw electromagnetic emissions of uncountable atoms jostling through space and time.

But that's a model and models are of the mind
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