What is your take on this stuff?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8Ub2xx0KQ0
I had previously heard about NDEs but given them very little thought. I definitely have skepticism but I think I would give a little bit of a higher nonzero probability to after-death consciousness. This doesn't change the importance of promoting utility or well-being in the physical world though. Hopefully I haven't posted too much about death this weekend!

"Hallucinatory Near-Death Experiences" is a good skeptical review.

peterhurford wrote:"Hallucinatory Near-Death Experiences" is a good skeptical review.

Thanks; I skimmed through it. It is well-written. This is an exciting topic that I'm definitely going to read more about. It's disappointing the BBC documentary was so one-sided.

Here is a recent informative and balanced examination of the evidence published in the journal Review of General Psychology, which is one of the leading psychology journals.
http://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/features/gpr-15-1-1.pdf

I haven't made up my mind yet what to think about Near Death Experineces. To me, the best hint for postmortal are numerous stories of veridical out-of-body-experiences During NDEs, but I am sure that you can't take the experincers descriptions of the hereafter literally (they are to much influenced by culture). Until now, this phenomena couldn't be prooved by clinical experimental studies but they included only a few cases of cardiac arrest and even fewer OOBEs.
Right know theres a big study running in 25 hospitals in USA, UK and Austria, called the AWARE study, which is said to be published in 2014. Maybe we will know a lot more then.

I think untilitarians shouldn't ignore the possibility of an immortal soul. Not only because we might find a way to eternal bliss in the hereafter, but also because it will affect how we value death. For an materialist utilitarian death ends all consciousness and therefore it has zero utility. If theres life after death utility might also be positive or negative. Saving lives , health care, abortion, capital punishment, shlaughter (if animals have immortal souls,too) or euthanasia would logically depend on expected postmortal utility.

Given that even reincarnation was true (some people believe that we have evidence to presume this) the concept of immortal souls would also affect the way we think about procreation.
If we come to the conclusion that we cannot be non-existent and that existence on other planets or other "spiritual realms" has always more negative utility than life on earth we were obligated to create as much life as possible even if utiliy is negative.

Immortal souls have low prior probabilites. Evidence is against them. NDEs are evidence for a soul, but not for one that can survive long without a body.

DanielLC wrote:Immortal souls have low prior probabilites. Evidence is against them. NDEs are evidence for a soul, but not for one that can survive long without a body.

Probably you are right. A proof of postmortal existence due to Near Death Experiences is not possible because near death experiencers haven't died in an irreversible way. Nevertheless the possibility of extrasensual perception and consciousness immensely increases the probability of a survival after the physical death.

DanielLC wrote:Immortal souls have low prior probabilites. Evidence is against them. NDEs are evidence for a soul, but not for one that can survive long without a body.

If there are souls, I think we'd have to acknowledge that we have no idea how long they'd exist.

We know that we only evolved to do stuff before we die, and we know that minds are complicated. If you take them out of the circumstances that they're designed for, they'll be destroyed. Even just messing with someones hormones a little will have a major effect on their mind. Can you imagine what the body dying would do?

Also, if your mind lasts a lot longer than your body, it would seem unlikely that you'd still be in your body.

If there are souls (and I'm still saying *if*), I don't know how many useful insights into its functioning you'll get from evolutionary theory or current research on hormone levels.

If they're anything like what you're suggesting, we know they're complicated and useful, which means they were almost certainly created by an optimization process. They evolved. Evolutionary theory will help.

Why wouldn't stuff about hormone levels apply? Your consciousness is affected by it. If the seat of your consciousness is not your brain, that just means we don't fully understand how they affect it. They still affect it.

DanielLC wrote:If they're anything like what you're suggesting, we know they're complicated and useful, which means they were almost certainly created by an optimization process. They evolved. Evolutionary theory will help.

Why wouldn't stuff about hormone levels apply? Your consciousness is affected by it. If the seat of your consciousness is not your brain, that just means we don't fully understand how they affect it. They still affect it.

That makes sense if you take a materialist, biological rather than survivalist view of NDEs. It is unclear at this point which view is better supported though. If by "soul" you mean a nonphysical entity, hormones could affect it only if you explain how the physical and nonphysical worlds interact.

That makes sense if you take a materialist, biological rather than survivalist view of NDEs.

Yes. If you assume that your soul never dies, then any theory that your soul dies doesn't make sense. My point is that there is no reason to take the survivalist view.

hormones could affect it only if you explain how the physical and nonphysical worlds interact.

I have no trouble interacting with the physical world. If souls exist, and I am a soul, then this is proof that souls can interact with the physical world. How they interact is irrelevant.

There is a pascal's argument side to the whole thing. I can only be so sure souls don't exist. But there are other, easier ways to get infinite utility. Which is more likely: we evolved to create and modify a soul over the course of our lives, but build it in such a way that it can survive indefinitely despite there being no genetic benefit to us for it to do so, or that the average curvature of the universe is non-positive?

The first possibility is so unlikely that the real probability is just that you're completely misunderstanding it. The second is about 50%.

How are you defining "soul"? I think we're just using the term differently. It sounds like you're using the fifth most common definition in this listing (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/soul?s=t), while I was using the first definition.
I'd agree with your point that we should not assume the survivalist position or the existence of a soul in the religious sense but I haven't completely closed off the possibility of it.

I'm defining the soul as the seat of consciousness. I am also assuming for this argument that it is not the brain.

I'd agree with your point that we should not assume the survivalist position or the existence of a soul in the religious sense but I haven't completely closed off the possibility of it.

It's possible. It's just that we're lacking the massive amounts of evidence necessary to consider it as a hypothesis. In fact, as far as I can tell, the evidence is against it.

Why do you think it's likely enough to be considered as a hypothesis?