And After Death?
Blackmore (Susan)
Source: Blackmore - Dying to Live, Chapter 13
Paper - Abstract

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Conclusion

    All things considered, I can see no reason to adopt the afterlife1 hypothesis. For me the arguments are overwhelming. The dying brain hypothesis, for all its shortcomings, does a better job of accounting for the experiences themselves. And it reveals not a false hope of the self surviving for ever but a genuine insight beyond the self.
.Rejected arguments / hypotheses.
  1. The Consistency Argument: that NDEs are similar around the world and throughout history. So, NDEs are what they seem, and amount to evidence for an afterlife2.
  2. The Reality Argument: that NDEs feel so real that they must be what they seem, a real journey to the next world.
  3. The Paranormal Argument: that NDEs involve paranormal events that cannot be explained by science. Hence, NDEs must involve another dimension, another world or the existence of a non-material spirit or soul.
  4. The Transformation Argument: that people are changed by their NDEs, sometimes dramatically for the better, becoming more spiritual and less materialistic3; which is evidence for NDEs being spiritual experiences in another world.
Final Paragraph
    We are biological organisms, evolved in fascinating ways for no purpose at all and with no end in mind. We are simply here and this is how it is. I have no self and ‘I’ own nothing. There is no one to die. There is just this moment, and now this and now this.

Text Colour Conventions (see disclaimer)

  1. Blue: Text by me; © Theo Todman, 2021
  2. Mauve: Text by correspondent(s) or other author(s); © the author(s)


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