The Afterlife debate: Is Death is Final?

Recently there was a debate about if death is the end of existence or a continuation into life after bodily death. Well on the pro side you had Dr. Raymond Moody a near death experience researcher as well as Neurosurgeon Dr. Eben Alexander who had a near death experience. On the con side you had Neurologist at Yale University Dr. Steven Novella and physicist Sean Carroll. At the beginning Sean Carroll mentioned why he thinks physics shows that its very unlikely that there can be any sort of an afterlife. Dr. Raymond Moody when on a spree about philosophy and Dr. Eben Alexander went on about his near death experiences also mentioning Dr. Carl Sagan. Before I even watched it which was hard to watch to put it mildly I already knew who was going to win. Because the pro side instead of mentioning the overwhelming evidence for survival instead just went on about his near death experience and didn't present himself well the same with Raymond Moody.


Dr. Steven Novella mentions that Ian Stevenson's work on reincarnation can probably be explain by contamination, where does he get the source of information that contamination was probably a factor well from skeptic dictionary. Obviously Steven has actually done any real research on Ian Stevenson's work if he did he would have known that Ian Stevenson went out of his way to do everything possible to make sure contamination wasn't a factor. He mentions another source that being the late Barry Beyerstein conjecture that the cases that Ian Stevenson brings out show internal inconsistencies. Then, says "Along the way, we are treated to some hilarious examples of gullibility among those seized by the will to believe". My response to that is true sometimes people can show gullibility but does it apply here? I don't think it does. Steven, also said that its a scientific fact that the mind is produced by the brain. Of course, ignoring the fact that other scientists that are naturalist's like him such as John Searle mentions its a preassumption that the mind is produced by the brain but if you accept that then you can at least make some headway. We know how that progress is going and its not so good.


The failure of behaviorism for example assumed that mind can be explained by the behavior of the brain. Then, besides the overwhelming evidence for psi and survival. We have cases such as terminal lucidity where patients with advanced dementia are able to get their memories back shortly before their deaths. Sean Carroll as intelligent as he is seems to be aware of parallel universes but obviously doesn't bring it up when he is trying to argue against an afterlife. Because, he knows that if their is parallel universes and there is a lot of mounting evidence supporting it now. That, it would weaken his case strongly because it also entails quantum immortality that our consciousness continues on after death and cannot be extinguish by death.


Dr. Steven Novella also mentions that the evidence for mind is produced by the brain is mounting more and more everyday. That couldn't be further from the truth the nature of causation is not known. Sure scientists can make assumptions by assuming that the causation runs from mind to brain as Dr. Steven Novella clearly does but assuming so doesn't make it so

A little update on this post I was recently discussing how the mind is probably not produced by the brain on Steven Novella's blog called Neurologica. The whole thing was a waste of time I knew it would it be but I though maybe just maybe one of the skeptics on there was open minded to at least admit that there is strong evidence for an afterlife and psi phenomena and say I don't know if there is or isn't an afterlife.