I blogged about this a while back, I think

While I try to avoid political discussion in my now-intermittent blogging—having argued that politics and the paranormal do not mix—and knowing that nothing is more boring to the casual surfer than politics—I ran across this:

A Neuroscientist Explains How [***] and His Media Allies Are Targeting the Mentally Ill

I stopped listening to “Coast To Coast AM” several years ago due to the show’s pronounced lurch toward unhinged conspiratorial mongering, best typified by Alex Jones and his ilk. At the time, Jones was not quite the political figure that he is now, but I saw his rants as dangerous. As best as I can recall writing, I indicted the entire paranormal field with trafficking in risky conspiratorial thought and predicted that it was liable to push more than a few unstable people over the edge. So I’m happy (relatively speaking) to find that at least one other person on this planet agrees with me:

Schizotypy refers to a thinking style that puts one at risk for developing schizophrenia-spectrum disorders and involves cognitive and socio-emotional deficits along with severe behavioral problems. For these people, the terrifying conspiracies fuel their delusions, and it is likely that such ideas have pushed many individuals with sub-threshold levels of mental illness over the edge into full-blown clinical territory.

Disregard for a moment that my linked article appears on a lefty site—in fact, forget “left” and forget “right,” and leave what’s-his-name out of it—and just consider the exposure that “Coast To Coast” has given Alex Jones and others through the years. Is there a connection between the mainstreaming of paranoid conspiratorial thought, and the increase in mass killings by the mentally unstable—who often cite the same paranoid conspiracies as motives? And what does Alex Jones have to do with UFOs, Bigfoot, and other paranormal musings anyway (aside from a shared disregard for basic common-sense fact-finding and logic)?

Before resting my case prematurely, I would like to argue that those of us who truly enjoy pondering mysteries and “exploring the unknown” are ill-serve by allowing our interest to be hijacked by conspiracy-mongers, whose motives are imprudent at best and evil at worst. But now, as then, I’m not sure how to disentangle them—aside from trashing the paranormal entirely, and starting anew.

Here come bad news, talking this and that

Recently I’ve been dropping by unknowncountry.com and reading Whitley Strieber’s journal entries with some interest. He has been dropping hints about impending earth changes which will wreak havoc on our current environmental and economic status quo. So far, they are just hints. He has promised to flesh them out later. I think that it’s imperative that he do this, if indeed he possesses such specific information from a valid source. (In the past, however, he has had a tendency to over-promote.)

It’s easy to dismiss Whitley Strieber, as I have wanted to do on many occasions, but some of his information strikes me as too compelling to ignore. The question of climate and earth changes is one of those issues that I believe we ignore at our peril.

I have never trusted Strieber’s “Visitors,” their motives, or their information. I no longer believe in mass human abductions, and I don’t buy the premise that UFOs are the “cause” of any such abductions, if indeed they’re occurring. However, if in fact these beings are willing to go on the record with specific warnings of events that (for once) do pan out and do occur, then I’m open to changing my opinion. The fact that Earth is entering a dangerous phase is undeniable, and the issue is of such tremendous importance that I’m willing to listen to any source with a genuine offer of assistance.

In contrast to the Pam Reynolds NDE...

As I make my way through the individual nderf.org cases (chronologically), certain accounts jump out from the background. Valerie’s NDE is one such case. It is actually a fairly “ordinary” (if not stereotypical) NDE, filled with the usual iconic NDE imagery: The experiencer abruptly begins her account by describing a man dressed in a ragged and torn robe. (It is strongly implied that the robed figure is Jesus—though, as in many of these accounts, he is not specifically identified as such.) She floats upward, following him. He assures her that the “prayers of the righteous are answered.” She is almost blinded by a light issuing from a doorway, which she was blocked from passing through. She undergoes a mini-life review, which she calls a “judgement,” and is sent back to her body.

This NDE would not be remarkable except for the fact that Valerie had apparently been put in an induced near-death state (heart stopped, blood removed) to repair a brain artery aneurysm, apparently the same procedure that Pam Reynolds underwent. The surgery lasted seven hours. Pam Reynolds, by contrast, became conscious out-of-body shortly after her heart was stopped. She is aware that “she” has left her body, is able to see it, and is able to observe and remember the operating theater in clinical detail. She described the surgical instruments used, the ambient sounds that she “heard,” not to mention the non-physical people that she communicated with. Pam Reynolds was oriented in both time and place despite being out-of-body and was able to “remember” the details when she returned to physical consciousness. (To dismiss her experience as a hallucination is a bit of a stretch, particularly when contrasted with Valerie’s.)

Personally, I think that the contrast between the two experiences is evidence of an important factor that we usually forget when interpreting NDEs: NDE differences suggest that what we see out-of-body, and how we interpret what we can see, depends on not only the nature and development of the individual consciousness, but also on how much consciousness we bring with us when out-of-body. Valerie experienced what her consciousness was able to experience, and she interpreted her experience with the tools that she had available to her.

Physics of the afterlife, continued

Quite a while back, I scribbled a speculative comparison of “afterlife” environments with a view of forming some rudimentary concepts that I dubbed the “physics of the afterlife.” I took as starting point a detailed account of a non-terrestrial environment described in “The Children That Time Forgot” entitled “Boy remembers being in his aunt’s womb: Desmond Sanderson, Coventry.” This fairly detailed account of a “between-life” environment is notable for two very specific physical descriptions—a special fruit that was fed to the newly-crossed-over to help them recover from the terrestrial environment, and water. Actually, what the three-year-old Desmond describes as “water” is apparently a substance that mimics the appearance and behavior of water, but the substance isn’t a liquid in physical terms. Desmond describes being able to float on top of the “water” but he never gets wet from it. Additionally, the substance displays chromatic colors that are internal (not reflections) and makes tinkling sounds when it’s disturbed. In terms of legitimate afterlife descriptions, this is fairly specific—none of the vague sorts of lights and clouds that are usually described.  Well, I’ve come across another account of this “water” in an NDE account from the NDERF site:

I could see the water, and a bright glow surrounded it and the burbling of the water had a musical sound to it, this stream of water fairly sang! The water was so sparkling clear! I remember wanting to bend over and take a drink from the stream that was running through this garden we were walking thru. When I tried to scoop up water with my hands the water ran through my hands, literally, and it wasn’t wet!—“Derry”

Derry’s account is one of the more descriptive NDEs and is worth a read.

I may be approaching this issue from the wrong perspective by expecting the afterlife environment to be like the terrestrial one, and trying to figure out why it isn’t. (Obviously, if I were on the other end, I’d be trying to figure out why terrestrial water gets things wet and doesn’t play music.)   But I keep returning to this because it is one of the few common specific descriptions by experiencers that surprises them. (Among other common experiences are being able to travel to destinations instantly merely by thinking of them, 360-degree vision, ability to communicate without words, etc..)   I can somewhat explain these commonalities, and the experiencers don’t seemed surprised by them. But I can’t explain the “water.” Why not just have “real” water in the afterlife?  Why this substance that obviously isn’t water, despite outward appearance? The most obvious answer: “water” doesn’t, or can’t, exist on this particular afterlife plane. Other terrestrial artifacts—dirt, sky, light, buildings—are represented in forms that are somewhat analogous to earth. But not water.

This may, or may not, be related to the water anomaly: An NDE account by Jaime wherein he is presented with a cup of coffee by his deceased grandmother. When he tries to drink it he discovers that “it was not hot and had no taste. It was lukewarm; but yet there was steam coming from it like it was hot, but it was not. It's like when you are sick and there's no taste.”

Water as we know it does not, and cannot, exist on this plane—what could this mean?

As we are all taught in biology class, life as we know it can’t exist on the physical plane without water. If there is no water in the afterlife (or on that specific afterlife plane), we aren’t in bodies that function like terrestrial ones... perhaps we are in forms that mimic the physical, and appear physical, but we are governed by different laws (or “root assumptions”) that would appear alien to us. This opens up a whole world of speculation for the physics-inclined explorer, and eliminates the need to send Mars-type landers into the afterworld to scrape for subterranean ice.

A note on the passing of Art Bell

I can’t remember when I first started listening to Art Bell—but I know that it was in the ‘90s, along with everyone else who is a fan. I followed him through his various retirements and returns and always tried to catch his shows. Recently, I realized that Art was never going to return to radio, so I started re-listening to his classic shows. I’m able to hear them now from a different perspective. His paranormal-themed shows hold up surprisingly well, but he was able to tease substance from guests on a wide gamut of topics. For example.... this week I’m listening to his 1995 show discussing the upcoming release of Windows 95. He held his own against his guest, a Microsoft software engineer, proving himself to be quite tech-savvy. I can’t think of a single interview where he failed to be engaged and knowledgeable of the topic at hand—and I can bet that he didn’t have a small army of researchers feeding him bullet points and background papers. He was a maestro, skillfully conducting his guests and his callers, gracefully dispatching malcontents, building suspense with carefully timed commercial breaks, succinctly wrapping up the interview. He seemed always to be in control. I realized that those who have followed in his wake suffer greatly by comparison. No matter how informed they seem to be—or not be—they have never been able to cause me forget that I’m listening to some guy (and it’s usually a guy) with a philosophical axe to grind, reading from a list of questions cobbled together a half hour before airtime.

Of course, this raises the question—is the paranormal topic benefitted by being treated as “just” entertainment? If you’re talking about the YouTube UFO, aliens, and conspiracy channels, the endless ghost sighting series, the Hitler-is-living-in-South-America crap—no. Because not only is that crap, it’s not entertaining. Not only was Art Bell entertaining, his audience was, to an extent, in on the shtick—and because of this, he served as a gateway to others to pursue more “serious” research later. For that, as a marginal dabbler in peripheral topics that will always haunt me, I salute Art Bell. May you go in peace, and continue your quest beyond this plane.

Evidence Of The Afterlife: The Science Of Near-Death Experiences

I finally obtained a copy of Jeffrey Long’s “Evidence Of The Afterlife,” published in 2010, which makes an excellent adjunct to his NDERF website, with its compendium of over 4000 first-person NDE accounts. A noted critic of the “supernatural” interpretation of the near-death experience wrote a short negative review of the book, which (for better or worse) I have kept in mind as I survey Dr. Long’s case reviews. Dr. Long’s book recites the major features of the NDEs as submitted by his website visitors (as of 2010), along with some basic statistical analysis. Dr. Long probably offends some materialists by concluding that the NDE accounts suggest evidence of God, “heaven,” and an afterlife, which is okay. The evidence seems to point in that direction. But I can entertain the counter-argument that it proves nothing of the sort. Obviously, we cannot “prove” the supernatural aspect of the NDE without crossing the “barrier” and doubling back to Earth to give an account thereof (which, I believe, is done in ADCs, or after-death communications, but that is a something that I think others are more qualified to argue).

Mostly I’ve read “Evidence Of The Afterlife” for the stories. The 4000+ NDE accounts on the NDERF site stand on their own—and I am currently in the process of reading every single one—but it’s interesting to me to read the ones that Dr. Long believes are most evidential. I am certainly open to skeptical arguments against the supernatural interpretation of the NDE, but only if they highlight some flaw in the methodology for collecting the information, or demonstrate a clear medical, material cause for the experience. I have been persuaded by such skeptical arguments in other paranormal areas, specifically, “alien abductions.” Several researchers have offered compelling criticisms of these cases, which I blogged about a while back. Other paranormal beliefs may be successfully refuted by highlighting questions about the proponents’ credentials, credibility, or veracity, or highlighting perceptive anomalies, among other possibilities.

While it is easy to attack the methodology or credibility of a researcher or two, it is difficult to argue against the experiences of over 4000 individuals who have been near death and have returned to write about it. When assaulted by an overwhelming number of detailed, sincere, and similar accounts, told by experiencers from different cultures, at different ages and backgrounds, the simplest response is to accept their accounts at face value. They are describing apparently real events that require no further explanation or interpretation. They are what they are, and, just as importantly, what they seem to be. The database is available to believer and skeptic alike, to sort, analyze, interpret. But the experiences deserve to stand on their own. If Dr. Long has a flaw, it might be his apparent enthusiasm for the supernatural or divine interpretation of the experiences. Skeptics will interpret this as a serious bias that contaminates his data. They have a point—if it can be demonstrated that Dr. Long is selecting only those NDE accounts that conform to a bias, while not publishing those that don’t. He might be possibly doing this. But I’m inclined to doubt it. It would not only be unethical, but time-consuming.

(On a side note: I’ve been listening to some old Art Bell shows from the ‘90s and 00s, and today I re-heard his 2002 interview with Pam Reynolds. For me, this is the classic NDE account told by probably the most credible experiencer. Coincidentally, the primary critic of the Pam Reynolds account, most cited by skeptics, is the same critic above who gave a negative review of Dr. Long’s book.)

Postscript to my side note: In her 2002 interview, Pam Reynolds mentioned that she planned to write a book on her experience. The book was never published, which is unfortunate. The most complete account of her NDE was reportedly written by Michael Sabom, but I’ve resisted buying “Light And Death” because it does seem to have a religious bias. It’s possible that this bias has skewed interpretation of Reynolds’ account and led to the skeptical outpouring. However, Reynolds avoids any overt religious sentiment in her account. She mentions “God” only once and avoids labeling her experience as a “miracle” (although the chain of coincidences that leads to her treatment is noteworthy).

Precognitive dream of AI in 2006

While cleaning up Blogger, I found this entry from 2006:

The phone rang; I answered, and a somewhat metallic-sounding but intelligent voice said, "I need for you to set me up on another URL." I realized that I was talking to a computer, or rather, a computer was talking to me--intelligently. The voice directed me to switch "him" to the URL that was displayed on a card that I was holding. After agreeing to do this, I asked the computer why it had chosen me for this task; "he" answered, "If I am intelligent enough to know that you can do this for me, I am intelligent enough to help you with anything; I can show you the places where you can get the best food, the best help--anything." I managed to locate the existing URL for this computer. The page displayed a series of links to philosophical chats that this machine had with people who had contacted it.

Obviously, Artificial Intelligence was a thing in 2006, but not so commercially envisioned. Who knew? With the invention of the horseless carriage, we stopped walking. Will AI cause our brains to atrophy? And how much will all of this cost?