No one will deny that the human brain is a powerful thing. No one can deny that many dreams are  definitely connected to actual events that took place or thoughts that a person has recently been occupied with.

I also have a hard time accepting any reported NDE/OBE as a true real experience when it is possible that it is all brain related.

However!!!!!

I have read some OBE's in which the person reported an object on the roof of a building which they could not have possibly known was there because they were unconscious and lying on a bed in a hospital. For a person to be able to actually report a shoe or some object that is somewhere they have not been because they saw it when they were "out of they're body" is truly baffling.

The major issue is whether we can believe the sources of this information. I think the only way I would believe it for certain is if I or someone I knew personally to be truthful reported an object somewhere they have never been....and I can verify it.

So...next time you are OBE make sure to fly above your roof top and other roof tops and areas  you have never actually seen. Try to find verifiable evidence and report it to us so that we have scientific proof that you were in fact no longer using your brain at the time.

Kathy,

I guess I need to make my points through specific examples.  As time permits, I hope to start two new threads--one on the Jungian "structure" of the unconscious and the other on scientific research on ESP and personal ESP acecdotes and the relevance of this to the reality of "astral" dimensions.  In my own paranormal experiences, I have often encountered complications arising from the elusive line between ESP and divine guidance.  I acknowledge that there are clearcut cases of divine guidance and genuine OBEs, but I'm concerned about widespread indifference to the line between giudance from discarnates and mere ESP mediated through lucid dreams.  For example, my intuition tells me that Robert Monroe experienced some genuine OBEs, but it also tells me that he confused some of his lucid dream states with genuine OBEs.  I can't accept claims I've heard of ordinary dreams within a genuine OBE state.  For example, one guy on Robert Bruce's site claims to have OBEs in which he interacts with the characters of a fictional novel.  To me, that just means he can have lucid dreams about themes in a novel. 

Don

I have to again object to the notion that the general category of ESP somehow grounds an unknown event (mind reading, precognition) into a known process in the physical world.  There has been much research into various aspects of extra-sensory perception, but with little scientific conclusiveness about reproducible processes that underlie ESP.

In point of fact, science can not at this date adequately explain the concept of mind or consciousness.  There are models of psychology that have been applied from Freud, Jung and others.  These in general have been functional models that try to "make sense" of our behaviour without explaining the basic physiology behind human thought.  Neurotransmitters, brain physiology and Western science have never explained how we have sentience, or how an idea is generated. Does the brain generate human consciousness, or is it like a radio receiver, with consciousness existing in an interpenetrating plane of reality (my own personal model)?

In any event, it seems clear cut that while ESP phenomenon do not prove the existence of an afterlife, they do not disprove it.  A warning in a dream, the synchronicity of knowing a loved one's thoughts without speaking, may be examples of what is lumped into the catch all phrase "ESP," but that does not give us any true basis of what is happening in the physical world.

Pure biophysiologists do not believe in heaven, or even their own consciousness!  Sentience and self-awareness are seen by many pure scinetists as a freak of our evolution, with a feedback loop created in our brains, giving us a sense of individuality and what we call "mind," where nothing really exists.   Thoughts, to them are accidents, and could be easily created with electrical stimulation of the brain. And yet.......little progress has been made in understanding the pure physiology behind our simplest of musings.  These pure biophysiologists who doubt the existence of their own minds are the saddest examples of the scientific method going insane.

There is much new physiological evidence that the human brain may operate on a quantum level, not just on the basis of neurotransmitters and electrochemicl interactions. 

Unless one can tell me on what basis in the physical world telepathy or precognition work, I must come to a different conclusion than Don; that these are phenomena of consciousness, probably separate from the physical world.  As such, I see ESP as part and parcel of our very essence, which may in fact be important in exploration in both the physical plane and in the astral and afterlife realms as well.

Matthew

We actually do agree, Don, but I usually read your meaning quite clearly, so I am somewhat in shock.  I always assumed that you spoke of ESP as a given phenomenon of the physical world, akin to the circulatory system or any other explainable science. 

If the question now turns into "can ESP tap into a universal mind or storehouse of information," I think it is an excellent question and we are on the same page.  Those Akashic records, Jung's collective unconscious.....could a medium read information that way (akin to remote viewing) and how do we know when true contact is made in an objective sense?

Very difficult questions to answer.  It was much easier when I assumed you believed that ESP was a well explained physical phenomenon, separate from our thoughts.

Matthew

While most people are aware of the "classic" OBE, there is more to OBE than just that.  You can think of it in terms of the classic OBE being a "full consciousness" OBE.  It seems to be the thing that a lot of folks are out to get, thinking that if they could have such an experience it would just be the ultimate in proof, especially if they were to bring back verified facts that they witnessed while out of body.  It only sounds impressive to you if you haven't had some of the other various forms of OBE as well.  There is more to be had than just the classic version.  

There's a kind of experience that may not be as commonly associated to OBE and that is deja vu.  Everyone pretty much knows what deja vu is and has had many experiences with it throughout their lifetime.  Deja vu is one form of OBE, let's call it a mild one.  In deja vu, some part of your consciousness "went out" and gathered up some little bit of info and has brought it back to you.  You have no conscious memory of it, but you get that feeling that what you are experiencing has happened before.  What you see and hear seems very familiar and you just barely feel like you know what will happen next.  Deja vu can last quite a while at times but usually only lasts a few moments.  You may wonder what's the point of deja vu?  Well, maybe there is no point other than the acknowledgement that our conscious minds aren't just always sitting around in the tight little package called our head.  

When you have an experience of feeling someone's energy suddenly right next to you, or you know a specific person is about to call and the phone rings and it is them, or you suddenly get the feeling that so-and-so is sick, etc. most people have had some kind of experience like that.  That's another form of OBE in the sense that you are experiencing that person's consciousness reaching out to you.  That other person usually doesn't have conscious memory of an OBE, but they can usually verify that they were thinking strongly of you at that same moment.  The thing everyone calls "coincidence" is actually the proof and verification that skeptics are always on the prawl for.  Yet these kinds of experiences get brushed aside as "nothing but a coincidence".  

Now, when it comes to ESP in all its various forms, sometimes it is yet another lesser known example of OBE.  For instance, those of you who have clairvoyance know what I'm talking about, and this may even touch on the subject of remote viewing as well.  Some people think of remote viewing as being able to tap into the information of the target through ESP.  And that's a fine enough way to explain it, however the part of the RVer's mental capacity to seek out that info is using conscious ability, in part, to "go" and grab that info and bring it back to full conscious awareness.  This may be hard for people to understand.  However, when you think of consciousness as not being "in" the body and certainly not being in the body at all times, then it makes it a little bit easier to see what I'm talking about.  When it comes to clairvoyance, I think of clairyoyance as just a little step up from RV.  It is the same concept but different application.  RVing has it's intended purpose whereas (at least for me) clairvoyance is a more spontaneous event, not something I was trying to do.  I think of clairvoyance as yet another minor form of OBE, where some part of my consciousness went and gathered information and is presenting it back to me, this time in the form of a clairvoyant vision.  When the info I saw turns out to be precisely to a T the same thing I saw in my mind, then that is more proof that consciousness can operate outside of the physical body and outside of time as well.  

Yet skeptics say that that is just a coincidence, or that since there's no way to "prove" that what I saw was precisely exactly what actually happened then it cannot possibly be considered proof, or they say that that it only proves ESP yet it doesn't prove OBE.  However, when you've had these kinds of experiences as much as I have, you begin to realize there is more to how the conscious mind works than just what is commonly thought.  

This thread was started asking people how they've come to believe what they believe about OBE through their own experiences, and these are just my own personal beliefs.