[AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is (I think) the fifth installment in the series originally published several years ago, during my tenure as the Atlanta Creationism Examiner. Minor editing and re-formatting to accommodate the differences between the old and new platform have been done on every article, but the original content has otherwise remained unchanged. ] Supernatural evidence We have examined the few real "facts" of evolution. Then we reviewed the conjecture about evolution expressed in the theories of Charles Darwin. Then I suggested an alternative to Darwin's theory of natural selection (evolution theory) which I have called Iterative Creation (IC). And of course, we talked about DNA as a unique and dynamically generated source code for the creation of a new living organism. The remaining question left unasked thus far: is evolution theory clearly superior to IC? Are the theories equally unprovable, or does IC actually hold some advantage over evolution theory? The only way evolution theory can be considered superior to IC is by resorting to scientism. By asserting that evidence somehow "belongs" to science would imply IC can't use the same evidence, presumably because a different standard for scientific method is applied to each theory. At the heart of any scientific argument against any form of creation lies the postulate that a supernatural God is simply impossible to believe. This is a very important point. God is derisively referred to “an invisible man in the sky” by my atheist friends, as a legend or fairy tale. Tales of NDEs and other … [Read more...]
Atheism and the near death experience
Those familiar with my work know that I'm fascinated by certain aspects of the near death experience. However, all NDEs are not created equal. Some reveal more valuable information that other NDEs. And some accounts are fraudulent, of course. No matter what information a specific account may contain, my atheist friends refuse to believe them -- they simply can't afford to believe any of them could be true, because the only thing that could possibly continue to exist after the death of these material bodies is an immortal soul. Instead, the atheist will vehemently protest that every NDE is nothing more than a pleasant hallucination produced by the human brain in order to ease the transition from life into death. According to them, the NDE is evolution's contribution to death to make the experience slightly less unpleasant. But this creates a problem for NDE claims where the person describes a totally miserable experience in hell -- what are we to make of those particular "anecdotes" of dreadful hallucinations? If NDEs are nothing but hallucinations, why would some be pleasant and others unpleasant? Perhaps it is possible not every NDE account is a hallucination, or a lie. In fact, there is a category of NDE phenomena that offers clear and confirmable evidence that the physical brain and spiritual mind can literally separate, called corroborated veridical NDE accounts. This phenomena suggests that the mind can actually learn accurate information apart from the physical brain -- information that can later be independently investigated and either … [Read more...]
Sam Harris versus Eben Alexander: Clash of neuroscience
Dr. Eben Alexander has written a book called Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon's Journey into the Afterlife, about his near death experience that resulted from a severe case of bacterial meningitis. Newsweek magazine recently published a cover story titled Heaven is Real: A Doctor's Experience With the Afterlife, about Dr. Alexander and his book. I was vaguely aware of the news. However, I've been busy with the current virtual book tour for my own recently published paranormal-thriller titled Secondhand Sight, and so I hadn't really had time to read stop and read it. If interested, you can follow my tour at The Virtual Book Tour Cafe. I'll be sure to tell a couple of my best personal ghost stories along the way to keep things interesting. I only mention ghost stories because I believe that near death experiences are real phenomena due to a number of my own personal experiences with ghosts. By simple extrapolation, I believe that ghost encounters could be considered as nothing more than After Death Experiences. Granted, some of them are more interesting than others. But then I noticed a very intelligent Facebook friend had offered his opinion on this subject, posting that atheist author Sam Harris had completely "demolished" Alexander's account, at least from a scientific perspective. Curiosity naturally got the best of me. My friend's strongly stated opinion made me wonder what exactly Harris had said about Alexander's NDE. I've read several books by Harris, most recently Free Will, so I am familiar with the author's work. Because my friend is a … [Read more...]
