Near death experiences?

[JoeBobSmith]

 

[xSilverPhinx]

I never wonder 'why' I didn't die today or the 'whys' of life, as I go along I find out, but with no external purpose to it. And purpose is what you make of it, the main purpose being to live of course.  

Many times I'm thankful for things, but I'm not thankful to anyone...just thankful. It's sort of a bodiless feeling. Saying that I'm thankful to the universe just doesn't make sense.  

I've never had an acute near death experience.

[fester30]

Some research points to near death experiences (NDE) being something that occurs in the frontal lobe of the brain as someone is near death.  There are many ideas, such as oxygen depletion or extra carbon dioxide or just the altering of concentrations of chemicals in the brain.  Here is a link to one possibility in a news story:
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/MindMoodNews/study-links-carbon-dioxide-death-experiences/story?id=10324769

Whatever causes it, it's probably nothing more than a lucid dream.  Lucid dreams feel extremely real.  So real that some people develop mental illness because they find difficulty differentiating between the real world and the dream world (I know, sounds very Inception).  When I was on Chantix to quit smoking, I had lucid dreams.  This was caused by what Chantix does to the frontal lobe.  There were times I'd wake up and wonder if I was maybe still sleeping.  There were times while sleeping I thought I was awake, so I'd go to the men's room in my dream, and wind up wetting the bed... I'm 33!  My wife made fun of me, of course.

Often, dreams involve subjects that have been on our mind lately.  A Christian expects to see God or Jesus when they die, so it's possible that expectation leads to seeing them in a lucid dream during an NDE.  

I don't think about an afterlife, or what's next.  That also doesn't take away from the life I'm living, in fact, it adds to my current life.  It doesn't matter to me if I die tomorrow.  It matters to the people I leave behind.  Therefore, instead of dwelling on why I'm still alive, I make sure that the people I love understand that I love them.

[iSok]

Some research points to near death experiences (NDE) being something that occurs in the frontal lobe of the brain as someone is near death.  There are many ideas, such as oxygen depletion or extra carbon dioxide or just the altering of concentrations of chemicals in the brain.  Here is a link to one possibility in a news story:
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/MindMoodNews/study-links-carbon-dioxide-death-experiences/story?id=10324769

Whatever causes it, it's probably nothing more than a lucid dream.  Lucid dreams feel extremely real.  So real that some people develop mental illness because they find difficulty differentiating between the real world and the dream world (I know, sounds very Inception).  When I was on Chantix to quit smoking, I had lucid dreams.  This was caused by what Chantix does to the frontal lobe.  There were times I'd wake up and wonder if I was maybe still sleeping.  There were times while sleeping I thought I was awake, so I'd go to the men's room in my dream, and wind up wetting the bed... I'm 33!  My wife made fun of me, of course.

Often, dreams involve subjects that have been on our mind lately.  A Christian expects to see God or Jesus when they die, so it's possible that expectation leads to seeing them in a lucid dream during an NDE.  

I don't think about an afterlife, or what's next.  That also doesn't take away from the life I'm living, in fact, it adds to my current life.  It doesn't matter to me if I die tomorrow.  It matters to the people I leave behind.  Therefore, instead of dwelling on why I'm still alive, I make sure that the people I love understand that I love them.

Hmmm....Yeah dreams are pretty mysterious, we can only guess why that happens.
But, can anyone explain the following?:


A guy grows up as a Christian, leaves his faith because he does not understand the problem of evil at a young age and becomes an atheist.
In the processing of turning an atheist, he gets the following dream:

"It was a tiny room with no furniture, and there was nothing on its grayish-white walls.
Its only adornment was the predominantly red-and-white patterned carpet that covered the floor.
There was a small window, like a basement window, above and facing us, filling the room with bril­liant light.
We were in rows; I was in the third. There were only men, no women, and all of us were sitting on our heels and facing the direction of the window.

It felt foreign. I recognized no one. Perhaps I was in another country. We bowed down uniformly, our faces to the floor.
It was serene and quiet, as if all sound had been turned off. All at once, we sat back on our heels.
As I looked ahead, I realized that we were being led by someone in front who was off to my left, in the middle, below the window. He stood alone.
 I only had the briefest glance at his back. He was wearing a long white gown, and on his head was a white scarf with a red design. And that is when I would awaken."

This dream would repeat often in the next 10 years of his life, but he would never understand it.
After some while he becomes a Muslim. And one day after his difficult process of accepting Islam, he's in the mosque, attending a prayer.

"We bowed down in prostration with our faces on the red-and-white carpet. It was serene and quiet, as if the sound had been turned off.
And then we sat back on our heels again. As I looked ahead, I could see Ghassan, off to my left, in the middle, below the window that was flooding the room with light.
He was alone, without a row. He was wearing a long white gown and on his head was a white scarf with a red design.
"The dream! I screamed inwardly. The dream exactly! I had forgotten it completely, and now I was stunned and frightened.
Am I dreaming? I wondered. Will I awaken? I tried to focus on what was happening to determine whether I was asleep.
A rush of cold flowed through my body, making me shudder. My God, this is real! Then the coldness subsided, succeeded by gentle warmth radiating from within.
Tears welled up in my eyes."

Can science explain this?

Name of the person is Dr. Jeffrey Lang, in case you want to google him.

[Davin]

Did science verify that it even happened?

[iSok]

Did science verify that it even happened?

I think it's a rethorical question you ask.
Was 'science' there when he had the dream for the first time? No.

Was it coincidence, a lie or a sign from God?

Here's the guy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVQ1BWqjTjs
You can draw your own conclusion.

[fester30]

Is there any way to confirm he actually had these dreams?  This is some guy talking.  Benny Hinn is an evangelical that travels the world and fills huge arenas with supporters.  He preaches Christianity and practices "faith healing."  He has been shown to be a fraud (it was either ABC, CBS, or NBC that did the expose... can't remember which).  Just because someone says they had a dream, or says they were healed doesn't make it the truth.  I heard a story that a guy said he had an out of body experience and went to hell where he was warned that he better change his ways or he'd be back.  Charles Dickens wrote a story about a guy named Scrooge who was visited by four ghosts and changed his ways concerning Christmas.  There are stories everywhere, and these accounts of dreams and healing and such sound an awful lot like stories that can be found in the fiction section of any library.

Interesting that he writes books on his conversion to Islam and makes money off of it.  Seems like he has something to gain from his stories, just like the Lutz family did in the Amityville horror house, an admitted hoax, but one that made them money.  He's a smart guy.  How are we to know he's not making it all up to make some cash?

[Stevil]

These types of stories are a dime a dozen causing people to convert to every religion under the sun. All I can say is that people cannot be trusted they are often devious and have motives.

[iSok]

Is there any way to confirm he actually had these dreams?  This is some guy talking.  Benny Hinn is an evangelical that travels the world and fills huge arenas with supporters.  He preaches Christianity and practices "faith healing."  He has been shown to be a fraud (it was either ABC, CBS, or NBC that did the expose... can't remember which).  Just because someone says they had a dream, or says they were healed doesn't make it the truth.  I heard a story that a guy said he had an out of body experience and went to hell where he was warned that he better change his ways or he'd be back.  Charles Dickens wrote a story about a guy named Scrooge who was visited by four ghosts and changed his ways concerning Christmas.  There are stories everywhere, and these accounts of dreams and healing and such sound an awful lot like stories that can be found in the fiction section of any library.

Interesting that he writes books on his conversion to Islam and makes money off of it.  Seems like he has something to gain from his stories, just like the Lutz family did in the Amityville horror house, an admitted hoax, but one that made them money.  He's a smart guy.  How are we to know he's not making it all up to make some cash?

Certainly there are some people that claim a lot.
But the story of this guy is quite different.

1. He's not interested in converting someone, he doesn't care about what other people think.
2. He changed his way of life drasticly. He is a professor of mathematics at San Francisco university, I think he has plenty of ways to make money.
    Writing three books in almost 30 years on this topic (he converted at age 28) is very slim to make any money.
    Nonetheless he married a saudi woman years after he converted and is living the full 'muslim life'. Believe me..praying 5 times a day, fasting a whole month and quit drinking and many
    other restrictions takes a lot of effort for someone new.

All this, to write 3 books in 30 years..to make profit....It doesn't sound reasonable too me.
watch the video I posted, he seems a very honest and nice guy.

That he is a liar is impossible if we just take a look at this.
Leaves only two options.

Coincidence or a sign from God.

[Davin]

Did science verify that it even happened?

I think it's a rethorical question you ask.
Was 'science' there when he had the dream for the first time? No.

Was it coincidence, a lie or a sign from God?

Here's the guy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVQ1BWqjTjs
You can draw your own conclusion.

If science can't verify that it even happened, why would you need a scientific explanation?

There's no scientific explanation for why unicorns can be trapped in the ocean by a 100ft tall bull either.

[iSok]

Did science verify that it even happened?

I think it's a rethorical question you ask.
Was 'science' there when he had the dream for the first time? No.

Was it coincidence, a lie or a sign from God?

Here's the guy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVQ1BWqjTjs
You can draw your own conclusion.

If science can't verify that it even happened, why would you need a scientific explanation?

There's no scientific explanation for why unicorns can be trapped in the ocean by a 100ft tall bull either.

Lets assume this happened.
Can science explain that?

(This is a rethorical question if you didn't see)

[Davin]

I think it's a rethorical question you ask.
Was 'science' there when he had the dream for the first time? No.

Was it coincidence, a lie or a sign from God?

Here's the guy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVQ1BWqjTjs
You can draw your own conclusion.

If science can't verify that it even happened, why would you need a scientific explanation?

There's no scientific explanation for why unicorns can be trapped in the ocean by a 100ft tall bull either.

Lets assume this happened.
Can science explain that?

(This is a rethorical question if you didn't see)

Yes.

[iSok]

Lets assume this happened.
Can science explain that?

(This is a rethorical question if you didn't see)

Yes.

1. The guy was desperate to find a new religion, so while he turned towards atheism, his mind played tricks on him by interprenting different thoughts (things he has seen were melted to a central thought.
    Once he was praying, somehow his mind mingled all those thoughts into a realistic picture just to make him at ease?

2. He is confused with another dream, because he so desperately wants it, it looks as if it was the same dream.

Both points are laughable in my opinion.

Or can you add a third?

[Davin]

Or can you add a third?

How did science verify that he had the dreams?

How the dreams happened might be very important in describing what happened and how it happened.

[fester30]

He claims to have dreamed praying in this mosque before it happened.  I do have some problems with his claims.  For one, I was a lucid dreamer when I was on medication.  The dreams were so lucid at times I would wake up and wonder if I had just gone into a dream or woke up from reality instead of to reality.  It was really crazy.  Yet even as lucid as these dreams were, I never once woke up and remembered details anywhere near the details he says he remembered.  He may have had some cloudy dreams similar to his prayer experience, and after he had his experience, he retroactively filled in the memories of those dreams with his actual experience.  It could also have been simple deja vu, which can be explained as well.

I accept that I cannot prove God doesn't exist, therefore it is possible that his dreams were signs from Allah.  However, based on that logic, you also have to accept that you cannot prove that Hinduism isn't the real, true religion.  You cannot prove reincarnation doesn't happen.  Therefore, it is also possible that he was a Muslim in his life immediately previous to his life as Dr. Lang, and as a Muslim had prayed in that mosque or a similar one, and that his past life experience was returning to him in dreams.  This could also explain why he was pulled to Islam, and why he was pulled toward that mosque.

Also, your argument about how he changed his life does not prove that he isn't lying.  I had a preacher lie to me last month, telling me that I had just popped into his head while I was deployed one day, and it was spiritual in meaning.  I called him out on his Miss Cleo Psychic Friends Network tactic, and he admitted he hadn't thought of me.  He had no money to gain from it.  Some people make things up not for money or to convert people, but just for small measures of fame or importance or to legitimize their life in the eyes of others.