Consciousness, identity, OBEs... (Identity)

by dhw, Friday, July 15, 2011, 14:53 (4668 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained

Tony drew our attention to various articles about new discoveries relating to consciousness and electromagnetic fields. I asked if these shed any light on such phenomena as OBEs and NDEs, but apparently they do not. My thanks to both David and Tony for this clarification. -The new discoveries therefore still indicate that consciousness is dependent on the electrical impulses that take place within the confines of our physical brain. If we accept the authenticity of experiences in which people receive information that would be inaccessible to them under normal circumstances, we can only infer either 1) that the brain has unknown physical means of transmitting and receiving electrical impulses beyond its own confines, or 2) that consciousness does NOT depend on the physical brain. Clearly this has a huge bearing on the concepts of "soul" and "afterlife", and is not exactly irrelevant to the concept of "God" (a universal consciousness). -Both of you, David and Tony, are theists, and I will be so bold as to suggest that your God must have some form of consciousness. Bearing this in mind, may I then ask you (and anyone else who is interested) which of the above alternatives you consider more likely?-******-I drafted this before reading your latest post, Tony, which seems to indicate a preference for 1). Nevertheless, I will leave my post as it is, since it raises questions which might be worth pursuing.