166. Psychic Spy Joe McMoneagle Tells How His Near-Death Experience Led to Remote Vi

[Bernardo]

Originally Posted by anonymous

Idealism has to be defined in a way that approximates realism because realism seems to be a pretty close approximation to human experience.

Indeed! That's the main theme running through all my work/books. I think explaining how a stable and continuous, shared "dream" can emerge from voluble minds is more amenable to rational thought than explaining how consciousness can emerge from autonomous matter.

Originally Posted by anonymous

Where would one expect the two theories to diverge?

In any non-ordinary state of consciousness where the correlation between brain activity and conscious experience breaks, and where the subject/object duality disappears, reality becoming a self-evident manifestation of mind. Dreams are a good avenue. The aspect of NDE testimonies where their reality seems dressed by each person's idiosyncratic myths and symbols is also suggestive.

Originally Posted by anonymous

How would you falsify either of them?

Study non-ordinary states of consciousness, be them NDEs, psychedelic trances, meditation, hyper-ventilation trances, etc. And then, study quantum entanglement.

[Bernardo]

Originally Posted by David Bailey

I do think it is vital to keep an open mind in these matters. Idealism seems a good candidate solution - but it might not ultimately pan out.

David

Fair enough...

[Michael Larkin]

Alex - A terrific interview: quite possibly the best you've ever podcasted. Joe McMonegle comes across as a very credible person indeed. I liked the way the conversation flowed and how it anticipated the questions I was in process of formulating, such as, well, what's the point of ordinary reality?

I immediately looked up Joe's books but was very disappointed to find they are not available in Kindle format. Any chance you could drop him a line saying at least one listener would appreciate Kindle editions?

[Arouet]

Halfway through.

Thought it interesting that McMoneagle felt heat during his NDE. We know that people report hearing sound, but I haven't heard other than this case about sensations such as heat. Is this common?

[anonymous]

Originally Posted by Bernardo

How do you empirically observe consciousness that is not your own?

It would be better to ask someone like McMoneagle who has observed that everything has consciousness. But my opinion is that it probably has something to do with the fact that spirits use telepathy as their normal mode of communication. Observing the consciousness of a rock could very well be by telepathy. Unfiltered (discarnate) consciousness has modes of perception that we do not normally experience while we are incarnated. We know this from people who have NDEs and from people who have veridical OBEs like McMoneagle.

When I was taking classes in mediumship, occasionally I would have a very good rapport with a spirit. It was like they were an old friend. I had a sense of what their mind was like, but in reality I had just met them. One time it was with a woman who was "pushy". Another time it was with a man who was very calm, clear thinking, and analytical.

I never developed rapport with a rock so I don't know if its the same thing. I've asked psychics what it means that all things are conscious and I haven't gotten an answer that I understood. Maybe someone who has experienced it can post here and try to explain it.

[Iyace]

Originally Posted by Arouet

Halfway through.

Thought it interesting that McMoneagle felt heat during his NDE. We know that people report hearing sound, but I haven't heard other than this case about sensations such as heat. Is this common?

Seriously? How many ndes have you actually read?

[Arouet]

Originally Posted by Iyace

Seriously? How many ndes have you actually read?

I periodically drop by NDERF and read a handful. Don't know how many... Maybe just luck of the draw.

[anonymous]

Originally Posted by Bernardo

How do we know this? Is it necessary to postulate the non-observable idea that the iron rod and the rock both have subjective perspectives of their own? In my mind, the empirical data is that nothing we know can be strictly said to exist outside of consciousness (otherwise, we wouldn't know it), so to say that everything is in consciousness seems to me the simplest hypothesis. Panpsychism has to postulate not only that things exist outside of consciousness, but also that they have consciousness of their own... hmm... other than materialism sort of requiring this, I don't see an empirical or philosophical reason to adopt this view, though I respect those who do.

We know it because a few people have gone outside of Plato's cave and then come back to tell the rest of us what the world is really like. Unfortunately we can't comprehend it without experiencing it for ourselves. Some of us can't fathom reality because it is beyone our limited experience. Others disbelieve it because they don't want to give up their own theories about what is causing the shadows.

Is it correct that panpsychism requires things to exist outside of consciousness? Isn't it enough to have consciousness divisible into distinct portions to explain panpsychism?

[Bernardo]

Originally Posted by anonymous

Observing the consciousness of a rock could very well be by telepathy... I never developed rapport with a rock so I don't know if its the same thing.

But then, how do you define the boundaries of a rock? Is every piece of mineral attached to the rock also conscious on its own (i.e. has a separate spirit)? Is every speck of dust or sand on it also conscious on its own? Are there dust spirits? What about a piece of rock that is almost falling loose from the rock, but still barely attached to it? Does it have a separate spirit that can communicate telepathically? Does it become separately conscious the moment it actually detaches from the rock completely? What if I press a bit of mud on another bit of mud? Do their separate spirits then become one when they are mixed together?

These are rhetoric questions; I don't mean them to sound mean. I'm just trying to illustrate the problems I see with the idea of panpsychism/animism.

[Bernardo]

Originally Posted by anonymous

Is it correct that panpsychism requires things to exist outside of consciousness? Isn't it enough to have consciousness divisible into distinct portions to explain panpsychism?

Panpsychism is consistent with realism -- i.e. with the notion that objects really do exist outside of mind -- and is likely required by a particular version of realism, namely, physicalism. What panpsychism then goes on to say is that every object that exists outside of mind also has a mind of its own. So I agree things get a little blurred here, but to say that an object has the property of being conscious is different than to say that the object exists in consciousness. The core point is that you can be a panpsychist/animist and still be a realist, as Whitehead's process philosophy makes clear. Rupert Sheldrake is another example of a realist who flirts with panpsychism.