No, I ain't, PS. Go and look up the book online. Published in 2006. This Dr. Parnia is seriously trying to investigate OBEs associated with near death experiences. The book even lightly gets into the physiology of death, what happens to the body, the brain, etc. No concrete conclusions but things that warrant closer examination.

as some one who designs experiments for I living I must say

How is this experiment controlled? How do you know the images did not come before or after the child was brain dead?

I walked 47 mile of barbed wire

"He who knows the Tao does not care to speak of it. He who speaks of it does not know it."

THat Lao Tzu, He is a funny one. I actually like the Tao Ching. It is useful to me!


A couple of interesting books I read recently are Rational Mysticism by John Horgan, A Brief Tour of Human Conciousness by V. S Ramachandran and Beyond the Outer Shores by Eric Tamm (a biography of Ed Ricketts). I finished these. I picked up a couple of others for the summer and they are still laying around not quite read yet.

Some studies that he cites have the patients recalling events while they had little or no brain function and was verified by the medical staff. Read the book (or not if you so desire). I don't want to type out every friggin' example!

The guy questions both sides of the issue. And I don't think you could classify them as "experiments", rather more like observations. Like I said, no concrete conclusions, just more questions. Re: maybe. Or maybe not.

Not to ricochet sub-subjects, but previously, in another "religion" thread, the matter of animal sacrifice in certain rituals, religions, or metaphysical practices was brought up (i.e. the decapitation of chickens). Might I point out that, according to the Bible, Jesus' parents (I would assume Mary and Joseph) were said to have sacrificed some doves.

Then there was the incident made famous in "Highway 61": "God said to Abraham, 'Kill me a son!' " Well, we all know from George C. Scott & Hollywood that it was all a test god gave Abe to make sure he was faithful and an angel stopped him at the last instant before he dispatched his own kid because some disembodied voice told him to. (Nowadays, the DCS would have his ass hauled off to jail! The "god told me to do it" defense just doesn't work these days.) Things did not end well, however, for a nearby ram who was substituted as a sacrifice in ol' Abe's kid's stead. There would be blood, after all.

Yes, ritual animal sacrifices still happen. In a lot of cases, these unfortunate critters would be heading for a dinner plate in any event. But think about this.... how many of us just chow down a burger or pork chops or (ugh!) pigs feet without a second thought, without so much as a "Hey! Thanks for dyin' so I can go on livin'!" expressed. A lot of cultures that do sacrifice animals at least have it in their heads that something died (was killed, really) so that they could go on living and honor the animal for that (unwilling) sacrifice. How many going through the drive-thru at McDonalds even give it a passing thought? How many of us do?

I don't have any questions about this (i got loads of questions but not about this). Quite honestly, I don't know what people are looking for here in this type of stuff (except the guy writing the book is looking to score some coin). It is all anecdotal. The brains didn't die so there is a continuity between self before and self after so they bring all their preconceptions across with them (it might have been limited and below the sensitivity of the instrumentation but the electrons were still flowing in there). Maybe they just gotta believe in the great cosmic Hoo Doo or they wouldn't still be here so they are convinced the Hoo Doo is real. Whatever "visions or experiences" they seem to have in common could relate to normal brain processes under these conditions. The great cosmic light is just a normal brain imagine under these conditions. Then what is the fundamental thing being observed...The soul packing its suitcases and preparing for the electric chair that will send it to the great soul holding place in a different dimension of the cosmos to be redistributed (maybe Larry will get to be a Lesbian next time?) and receiving a last minute reprieve by the grand cosmic wazoo, the Governor Of Dispensation (the phone is ringing, please tell me it is the good news). Doesn't work for me, sorry!

I'm gonna take a trip
On that old Gospel Ship
It's going far beyond the sky
I am gonna shout and sing
until the heavens ring
and I bid this world Good bye
Good bye

I do love the Gospel music though

Seeing that nobody knows for sure, maybe it's just a want (not a need) to know if there's something else (ain't sayin' there is, PS) or to explain all of the reportedly similar experiences.

Of course, it's anecdotal. So are eyewitness accounts to accidents and crimes. (From another book I read: A Canadian Indian who had to testify in a court case was asked to "swear to tell the truth ..." etc. His reply was, "I can't tell you the truth. I can only tell you what I know.")

Iwas song singing and this one hit me

Send my stomach to Milwaukee if they run out of beer
Put my socks in a cedar box just getem outta here
Venus d Milo can have my arms
look out i got your nose
sale my heart to the junk man
and give my love to Rose

see in my world that rates as a Gospel Song,
it is funny how that works

send my mouth
way down south
and
kiss my ass good bye

Don't know if this should be in the "Religion" thread, but yesterday's Hartford Courant had an article about a study done on theraputic touch. Seems that it may even affect cells in petrie dishes.

http://www.courant.com/news/health/hc-h ... 9719.story

"And therefore as a stranger give it welcome.
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy." .....Bill Shakespeare

The more I ponder the religion thread and attempt to apply the dogma of Smartassism to it, the more I'm drawn to one of the other religions that I have studied, or not. It's the one me and the late Bumper, the late Todd sorta invented, with the help of some other folks I suppose. I speak of course of Selective Obliviosity, or as we in the Selective Obliviosity community simply refer to it......SO. SO leads to good answers for lottsa stuff and SO? is a good answer for lottsa stuff.
I have learned that when one morphs SO with Smartassism, it's very powerful indeed.

When one applies the ancient acronymian definition to the word “so” (selective obliviosity) along with the creative use of the run on sentence, it’s not too difficult to conceive of probable acronymians for other common words like “to”, meaning “technically oblivious” or “is”, meaning “irretrievably smartassism” and thereby changing the entire meaning of the what was originally stated in the first place. Therefore even the simplest of declarative sentences becomes rich with layered meaning. Is that what you’re saying…?

SO?

So, I'm thinking that Dick Cheney might possibly be a closet blunderite and Bill Clinton for sure. Just depends on the meaning of "so" an "is" and "to".