Thread: can the mind exist independent from the brain?

Originally Posted by Xaqaria

Well what about

LSD
PCP
DMT?

These acronyms can make you feel like you are experiencing those other acronyms.

Nah, i don't do drugs.

Originally Posted by Xaqaria

You use Occam's razor way too much, and in places that it doesn't really apply.

I don't believe I do.

Look, we have a brain. Every emotion we feel, every physical action we perform, has a different signature in the brain which corresponds with it. Everyon'es brain works slightly differently, of course, but it is possible even now to tell what basic state of mind someone is in by observing neuronal activity.

Is it possible that the brain is not in charge of thought, and some non-physical entity is? Of course. But that is completely unnecessary. By Occam's razor, we already have a simple explanation which seems to work. Why invent something non-physical?

The best analogy I can come up with is the car one. Every time you turn the wheel of your car clockwise, your car turns right. Is it possible that someone is watching you, and every time you turn the wheel, they flip some switch on a remote control to make your car turn? Sure. But a much simpler explanation is that your car's steering wheel is mechanically responsible for the car's turning. There is no need for some invisible source to intervene.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

I, too, am fascinated by NDEs. However, I'm fairly sure that they're just vivid hallucinations caused by a brain in trauma. I could be wrong, of course, but I see no reason to assume otherwise unless something makes non-physical entities a more plausible explanation.

over the last few days ive been thinking about it more than i usually do.

i have been trying to find some good stuff from the recent studies but my god its hard to find a neutral standpoint. most skeptic sites just want to destroy the notion of NDEs at all costs. And a lot of religious sites think a fly landing on the EEG is proof

but I’ve been reading a lot on the Dutch study. by Dr. van Lommel. it was completed in 2001 and was the largest research project to date. i believe another is being planned...but anyways. van lommel has doubts that NDEs are a hallucination. the study focused on patients of cardiac arrest. the researchers visited 10 hospitals and tracked 344 hand picked patients. most if not all of these patients had the perfect conditions to have an NDE but only 18% reported NDEs. so i think if these are hallucinations they are different and a bit more rare than normal hallucinations.

it was interesting to read the interviews of NDE patients as well. According to the researchers some NDE patients have had both a normal hallucination and an NDE and describe them as totally different. Its also possible to see when comparing hallucinations to NDEs the hallucinations tend to make little sense, are unstructured and create no after affects. people know that the normal hallucinations are just hallucinations. NDEs appear to deeply effect the patient and have a similar structure that can be seen in other NDEs from around the world. so this hints to me that these are probably not normal hallucinations but maybe complex chemical reactions that might be a bit more uncommon. perhaps the right temporal lobe produces this "structure".

any other ideas?

Originally Posted by Matt5678

over the last few days ive been thinking about it more than i usually do.

i have been trying to find some good stuff from the recent studies but my god its hard to find a neutral standpoint. most skeptic sites just want to destroy the notion of NDEs at all costs. And a lot of religious sites think a fly landing on the EEG scanner is proof

but I’ve been reading a lot on the Dutch study. by Dr. van Lommel. it was completed in 2001 and was the largest research project to date. i believe another is being planned...but anyways. van lommel has doubts that NDEs are a hallucination. the study focused on patients of cardiac arrest. the researchers visited 10 hospitals and tracked 344 hand picked patients. most if not all of these patients had the perfect conditions to have an NDE but only 18% reported NDEs. so i think if these are hallucinations they are different and a bit more rare than normal hallucinations.

it was interesting to read the interviews of NDE patients as well. According to the researchers some NDE patients have had both a normal hallucination and an NDE and describe them as totally different. Its also possible to see when comparing hallucinations to NDEs the hallucinations tend to make little sense, are unstructured and create no after affects. people know that the normal hallucinations are just hallucinations. NDEs appear to deeply effect the patient and have a similar structure that can be seen in other NDEs from around the world. so this hints to me that these are probably not normal hallucinations but maybe complex chemical reactions that might be a bit more uncommon. perhaps the right temporal lobe produces this "structure".

any other ideas?

I think that most, if not all, of those characteristics imply that NDEs are simply very STRONG hallucinations - you could call them 'death hallucinations', if you wanted.

When your entire brain is re-tasked to creating a pleasant landscape, it will undoubtedly be 'different' from your run-of-the-mill hallucinations. This would only occur in very extreme cases, so the 18% seems reasonable. It would also make sense that NDEs would be widely similar, since the brain itself is widely similar among human beings.

I don't really see how that guy has doubts about NDEs being hallucinations.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

I think that most, if not all, of those characteristics imply that NDEs are simply very STRONG hallucinations - you could call them 'death hallucinations', if you wanted.

so would you say they are different than the normal hallucinations of...say..dreams or drug induced. Of course normal hallucinations are easy to identify as hallucinations. NDEs would have to be a strong enough Hallucination to cause someone to change their life and structure it around their experience.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

When your entire brain is re-tasked to creating a pleasant landscape, it will undoubtedly be 'different' from your run-of-the-mill hallucinations.

im not really sure what you mean, my brain creates an entirely new landscape every night in my dreams. could you explain a little more?

Originally Posted by thegnome54

It would also make sense that NDEs would be widely similar, since the brain itself is widely similar among human beings.

again im not seeing the exact point. your brain and my brain are very similar in structure but that doesn’t mean you and I both dream the same scenarios each night.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

I don't really see how that guy has doubts about NDEs being hallucinations.

i dont know or understand all of the evidence he presents, he has been studying them for twenty or so years, so i dont think he is ignorant on the subject .but i would imagine interviewing thousands of people who present such moving stories would have a impact on anyone’s life. even if they haven’t had one themselves

Originally Posted by Matt5678

so would you say they are different than the normal hallucinations of...say..dreams or drug induced. Of course normal hallucinations are easy to identify as hallucinations. NDEs would have to be a strong enough Hallucination to cause someone to change their life and structure it around their experience.

Some people change their lives around reading a book, or getting chills when some preacher reads a verse. People can be impressionable at times, especially when they're half-dead and then are given a second chance at life. The overall trauma of the experience is more likely to imprint itself on them then the NDE itself, but it certainly adds to the whole impact.

Originally Posted by Matt5678

im not really sure what you mean, my brain creates an entirely new landscape every night in my dreams. could you explain a little more?

When you dream, some parts of your brain are 'inactive', as far as we know. When you're dying, I would assume that your whole brain goes into overdrive and if you were to have a hallucination, it would be the result of all of your brain working feverishly. Of course, that's just conjecture, but the idea is that when under stress, hallucinations are bound to be more impressive.

Originally Posted by Matt5678

again im not seeing the exact point. your brain and my brain are very similar in structure but that doesn’t mean you and I both dream the same scenarios each night.

Dreams are based on your daily experiences and your inner thoughts. When your brain is dying, it would make sense to me that certain things would occur (maybe the center of your field of vision is perceived to be sending strong signals, resulting in a tunnel effect with a white light, etc.) People often act fairly similarly when in trauma, so maybe the same applies to the brain itself.

Originally Posted by Matt5678

i dont know or understand all of the evidence he presents, he has been studying them for twenty or so years, so i dont think he is ignorant on the subject .but i would imagine interviewing thousands of people who present such moving stories would have a impact on anyone’s life. even if they haven’t had one themselves

As long as he doesn't let that influence his research. Touching stories which are completely believed by the tellers can still be false.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

Some people change their lives around reading a book, or getting chills when some preacher reads a verse. People can be impressionable at times, especially when they're half-dead and then are given a second chance at life. The overall trauma of the experience is more likely to imprint itself on them then the NDE itself, but it certainly adds to the whole impact.

true, but trauma? Are you saying that people are actually being changed by the shock of coming so close to death? Or because of the NDE itself

Originally Posted by thegnome54

When you dream, some parts of your brain are 'inactive', as far as we know. When you're dying, I would assume that your whole brain goes into overdrive and if you were to have a hallucination, it would be the result of all of your brain working feverishly. Of course, that's just conjecture, but the idea is that when under stress, hallucinations are bound to be more impressive.

from the patients that were observed. (Like Reynolds) the EEG was flat. Unfortunately, the EEG only measures the outer cortex so we cannot know for sure that the whole brain was inactive. We do know that in some cases the outer cortex was inactive. And accurate veridical perception suggests that the experience happened at that inactive time. But the 18% thing. 344 patients were tracked by the researchers . All went into cardiac arrest and were revived.i imagine cardiac arrest is extreamly stressful but 82% report no memory at all. if they were simply caused by the stress of dyeing I think a much larger percentage would have reported them

Originally Posted by thegnome54

Some Dreams are based on your daily experiences and your inner thoughts. When your brain is dying, it would make sense to me that certain things would occur (maybe the center of your field of vision is perceived to be sending strong signals, resulting in a tunnel effect with a white light, etc.)

The center field of vision is a famous theory that is brought up a lot. And seems plausible. In the book “Mind sight” blind patients report the same tunnel of light. Like you said we cant know for sure what they really saw. But the book has the detailed accounts of 21 patients blind from birth. ive just always found it interesting
.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

People often act fairly similarly when in trauma, so maybe the same applies to the brain itself.

You brought up a very interesting point. If anything I think this would say that we dont know enough about the brain to make a decision. But looking at the cases right now. An analysis from iands.org has studied the cases and identified 15 common elements reported.just to name a few...... almost all NDE patients said they felt an overwhelming sensation of love. many report all their dead relatives waiting to greet them. A lot report a door or line which if they cross they can never return. and high percentage of patients reported they talked with "beings made out of light" . its facinating really but I am a little skeptical that a brain under stress could produce very similar hallucinations in tens of thousands of people and have a specific order in which the events occur

Originally Posted by thegnome54

When you dream, some parts of your brain are 'inactive', as far as we know. When you're dying, I would assume that your whole brain goes into overdrive and if you were to have a hallucination, it would be the result of all of your brain working feverishly. Of course, that's just conjecture, but the idea is that when under stress, hallucinations are bound to be more impressive.

Not to mention that when you die, your brain releases large amounts of DMT (Dimethyltryptamine), which is a potent psychadelic drug.

Effects of DMT use include time dialation, euphoria, perception of visiting other worlds, and perception of being visited by other-worldly creatures.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grcqs9cDuN8

This is a good watch.

Originally Posted by Xaqaria

Not to mention that when you die, your brain releases large amounts of DMT (Dimethyltryptamine), which is a potent psychadelic drug.

Effects of DMT use include time dialation, euphoria, perception of visiting other worlds, and perception of being visited by other-worldly creatures.

i think that is a very interesting theory. but i have a few objections to it i would like to point out.

in all the hospitals across the world. thousands of people die each day, and thousands are brought back as well. of all the people brought back from being flat lined a small but significant percentage report NDEs. DMT is produced by the brain. but if DMT was the main cause of the NDEs i think many more people would report them.

DMT is naturally produced in small amounts in the brains and other tissues of humans, and other mammals. the hallucinations can be rather strange. when testing the effects of DMT some patients reported contact with 'other beings', alien like, insectoid and reptilian in nature, in technological environments where the subjects were 'probed', 'tested' and sometimes even 'manipulated' by these 'beings'. the hallucinations although intense were very strange, random and didn’t follow any order.

okay, i didnt feel like reading all of this thread, but i wanted to contribute anyway. DMT is interesting, but i dont want to get on that right now. check this out, princeton did a study on inducing out of body experiences, and trying to get the perception of oneself out of the body.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/24/sc...rssnyt&emc=rss

Originally Posted by Tavasion

okay, i didnt feel like reading all of this thread, but i wanted to contribute anyway. DMT is interesting, but i dont want to get on that right now. check this out, princeton did a study on inducing out of body experiences, and trying to get the perception of oneself out of the body.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/24/sc...rssnyt&emc=rss

that does provide some good evidence, but there are objections to that research

http://www.iands.org/research/import...the_brain.html

Originally Posted by Matt5678

i think that is a very interesting theory. but i have a few objections to it i would like to point out.

in all the hospitals across the world. thousands of people die each day, and thousands are brought back as well. of all the people brought back from being flat lined a small but significant percentage report NDEs. DMT is produced by the brain. but if DMT was the main cause of the NDEs i think many more people would report them.

DMT is naturally produced in small amounts in the brains and other tissues of humans, and other mammals. the hallucinations can be rather strange. when testing the effects of DMT some patients reported contact with 'other beings', alien like, insectoid and reptilian in nature, in technological environments where the subjects were 'probed', 'tested' and sometimes even 'manipulated' by these 'beings'. the hallucinations although intense were very strange, random and didn’t follow any order.

Yeah when you die you let out massive amount of DMT, and some people have the expierience, others don't. Everyone would expierience it if it was DMT.

Originally Posted by LucidFlanders

Yeah when you die you let out massive amount of DMT, and some people have the expierience, others don't. Everyone would expierience it if it was DMT.

from the patients that describe DMT hallucinations and any other artificial NDEs/OBEs say they are very strong hallucinations, but most say they are still identifiable as just a hallucination. meaning that the patients of the artificial NDEs produced little or not after effects because they know that they were not real. as is quite different of the Normal NDE cases. Maybe some unknown brain chemical is present in the natural NDEs but not in the artificial ones?

I'm a little late to the party, but I figure it's better to reply to an existing thread than to make a new one and I'd like to chime in on this debate.

Originally Posted by Thegnome54

Is it possible that the brain is not in charge of thought, and some non-physical entity is? Of course. But that is completely unnecessary. By Occam's razor, we already have a simple explanation which seems to work. Why invent something non-physical?

I don't think that our current explanation 'works' at all. It does adequately address some of the correlations between mind and brain, but it also dismisses a great deal of inconvenient observable evidence that throws the whole model into question.

For example, in the case of dying people who have developed severe brain damage. Often, in the later stages of disease, these people can't even remember the names and faces of family members. In the hours approaching their death, sometimes these people will spontaneously become lucid and clear of thought. They will remember faces, names, and be able to speak clearly despite the fact that the brain damage supposedly responsible for their cognitive affliction is still very much there. This phenomenon is well known as "Terminal Lucidity".

Similarly there is a brain affliction known as hydrocephalus. In the most severe cases of hydrocephalus, a patient can be left with less than 5% of the brain mass of a normal person - and yet, even in these most severe cases there are patients who have above average IQs and seemingly no mental deficits.

The last one I'll bring up here is acquired savant syndrome - where brain damage actually results in radically increased mental abilities.

Those who believe consciousness to be a creation of the brain are left in an uncomfortable position by these kinds of mysteries. After all, if the brain produces consciousness why would brain damage result in radically increased mental abilities? Why are some people with severe brain tumors suddenly able to transcend their brain damage and remember people, faces, and hold a normal conversation as their death nears? How would people be able to live a normal life with a miniscule fraction of a normal brain?

Originally Posted by Roller

If the mind is not physical, how does it seemingly have a causal effect upon the physical?

My own view is that consciousness is an intrinsic irreducible part of the universe and that the brain behaves as a kind of filter for consciousness. Cyril Burt sums this up well:

“The brain is not an organ that generates consciousness, but rather an instrument evolved to transmit and limit the processes of consciousness and of conscious attention so as to restrict them to those aspects of the material environment which at any moment are crucial for the terrestrial success of the individual”

Not only does this view instantly solve all of these neurological mysteries, but it also does not conflict with neuroscience, because it does not deny the correlations observed surrounding the brain – it simply interprets them differently than materialists do.

For example, is the brain activity correlated with certain states of consciousness the measure of consciousness, or the measure of the brain responding to consciousness?

When you take a drug, is the effect on consciousness caused by the brain altering the way it produces consciousness or does the drug merely alter the brain's ability to regulate consciousness which consequently produces the change?

When you hit your head, does it cause a mechanical change in the brain which translates to consciousness, or does it cause a mechanical change in the brain which alters the way the brain regulates consciousness?

Without wanting to get off-subject here, there have been no scientifically proven OBE's - at least, not in the dualist form.

What would you consider scientifically proven? There are scientists who have done extensive work around the out of body experience who do claim dualist results - notably, Robert Monroe’s team as well as the Societies for Psychical Research.

But I’m going to go off on a limb here and assume what you mean is large, peer reviewed studies? If that is the case, then I would say the reason that OBEs have not been proven is because to my knowledge there have been no large peer reviewed teams studying the phenomenon with a goal of testing the validity of dualism.

Recently, scientists have been able to induce OBE's by things such as electrodes, and even simple camera-delay setups.

While these may technically be OBEs by definition, they have little in common with a true OBE. Giving somebody a sense of being somewhere else is not the same thing as feeling yourself lift off your body, floating around, touching objects and feeling them, as well as feeling bizarre ‘new’ sensations.

If the mind is not physical, what is it made of?

Why does it have to be ‘made’ of anything at all?

If the mind is not physical, why do we end with our death?

We don’t end with our death.

Why are we 'anchored' to our bodies? Could we not be capable of swapping minds with another's body?

I don’t know why we are anchored here. From a philosophical standpoint this question could be viewed almost as saying, what is the purpose of life? Perhaps, we are not in this situation voluntarily. Perhaps we are here for a unique physical experience.

I doubt people are capable of swapping bodies. If it is possible, few people know how to do it, and they’re not talking. Look at the OBE, or the NDE, there are seemingly endless stories you can read from people who claim to have experienced these things and virtually none that claim that body swapping is possible.

Originally Posted by RideTheWalrus

Why does it have to be ‘made’ of anything at all?

If it isn't made of anything, it contains nothing, it is nothing, it doesn't exist.

Originally Posted by StonedApe

If it isn't made of anything, it contains nothing, it is nothing, it doesn't exist.

So where's the flaw in my logic? What is there out there that is non-physical?

Could you provide an example of something that isn't made of anything?

Originally Posted by StonedApe

So where's the flaw in my logic? What is there out there that is non-physical?

Could you provide an example of something that isn't made of anything?

dark matter

it doesn`t exist because most of it`s dimension are spread across in the "space"between the universes ... m-theory

it`s like wind blowing on water, the wind exists independent of water, it`s real, yet it still has an effect on it ... but a fish says close to the surface "wtf was that? there`s nothing ...riiiiiight???"

Dark matter is theoretical, but lets assume it does exist. It has to be something in order for it to exist. It isn't made of nothing, we just can't detect it with our technology. Dark Matter, implying it is a physical substance.

Your analogy shows this well, wind is made of air, yet the fish has no knowledge of air above water. But it is made of something. Just like how dark matter is real, it is physically there, yet we can't detect it.

Fo reals yo, what are you facepalming over? Even if it turns out I'm wrong it's clearly not something obvious.

If you have any other examples I'd love to hear them, I've asked this question a bunch of times and never gotten a single sensible answer.

Originally Posted by StonedApe

If it isn't made of anything, it contains nothing, it is nothing, it doesn't exist.

This whole thread is about that very question. Is the mind purely physical, or is it not limited to the body?

When you state that if consciousness exists, it must be made of matter you're essentially starting with your conclusion. It's not logically proving a case, it's just stating your belief system.

Show me one thing that exists that isn't physical. How can something exist if it isn't made of anything? I'm tempted to repeat my first post.

Even if the mind is non-physical, it has to be made of something, some kind of non-physical substance.

Do ideas exist? Does math exist?

And I resent the idea that I am immaterial...

It could be argued that the sensation of pain is not physical but is caused by physical stimuli.