I know we have what have been called "mirror neurons" to aide in empathy. For example when I get punched in the shoulder it may actually hurt me, but when someone witnesses the visual of it they can practically feel the impact themselves with a neuron located near the actual sensory neuron in the viewer. But is this true empathy? When apes see someone in their group choking they all as a group start coughing in the event that the choking one ate poison that they have all possibly consumed. This is just a group survival behavior. It does nothing towards empathy towards other forms of life that ate not as familiar.

On a different note a person who is a psychopath may know the harm they do, but they don't empathize about it in the sense of feeling it. Are they immoral due to biological deficiency? Their intelligence is certainly there.

Other than shifts in day to day perceptions, are higher realities imaginable? It is quite easy to imagine we fall very short of seeing most in our environments. Only recently 2 independent experiments added evidence of 4D space. I can't even imagine that other than 3D straight lines having forces pulling them into curves over longer distances. I wonder if colors can be brighter and more exact. If we can see finer details beyond what an eagle sees, if distant knowledge of events will out of sight can be available to us. There are just too many things to imagine of a higher reality. As for a lower reality I regret I can't imagine a sentient being living in 2D space like a flatlander.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kT0HJkr1jj4

This video covers the topic pretty well. But to your point it usually is pretty easy to tell if someone is a transgender person either before or after hormones or surgery.

Not sure. Einstein did joke that the moon doesn't need to exist when we aren't looking towards where it should be. Would the idea of infinity be like a reality simulation in which things are only added to the information data base when it is needed for observation?

Near death experiences aside though.

I certainly prefer direct language from people. I just kind of want confirmation that she actually has no interest in me at all. If she does start dating someone else I will most certainly not be able to be her friend in any event with her new time restraints and perhaps his views on other males in the picture. Should I ask to be sure? If the main suggestion is to walk away the worst outcome would be her not wanting to be friends. Lol.

If Cartman devolved into a dog the dog trainer could discipline him.

Getting back to altered states. What was the final conclusion he made?

The conversation ends here?

I wasn't sure if the conclusion of Altered States was that existence after death or between lives is one of uncontrollable change and entropy or whatever. Maybe that only in life can we control our reality?

Brainstorm was a good one.

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/bering-in-mind/ian-stevensone28099s-case-for-the-afterlife-are-we-e28098skepticse28099-really-just-cynics/

Found this interesting, but has anyone ever reviewed the interviews he did?

If someone died and that person's loved ones see the body and confer with the doctor and confirm that they are dead and proceed to cremate them. But later that week they meet someone that looks exactly like their past loved one in the flesh. After talking they find this individual to be indistinguishable from their loved one and they start to doubt that their loved ones life/existence ever really ended. But technically this is a different body and lets assume they have no memory a whole 48 hours leading up to the first bodies' death. This would still be secondhand information as we can't prove they are the same person. So if accurate and otherwise not knowable information is derived, could a psychics' testimony be valid source information beyond physical life? That is still different from running physical experiments on physical things, but what if human special abilities of perception are all we can have for proof provided of course that it is better than chance accuracy?

There is some study of "near death lucidity" which can be interesting. It is when a person with dementia or other mental handicap speak or behave clearly and with purpose right before they die even when it shouldn't be possible.

It would be good to have proof that all people, not just skeptics, could rely on as an alternative to blind faith.

Who's "them"?

Multiple people corroborating evidence is the nature of science. If it wasn't necessary than my own subjective experience would be plenty to be sure that I won't get deleted. Lol.

Most religions believe in continued existence. It largely hasn't been cause of suicides compared to other reasons.

Maybe we could also ask what counts as proof or good evidence. This topic is certainly more flighty and hard to pin down versus quantum research of very small things with very exact measurements.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17234565/

I found this study interesting although I feel too much psychic research is done at University at Arizona to seem credible enough to my liking versus other colleges as well. I do know U@Virginia has a special department DOPS for such stuff as well, but two schools isn't enough. And I know this study doesn't show consciousness survival after death but does certainly insist that our abilities to acquire knowledge while alive has range.

When I said proof I certainly wasn't referring to first person accounts. That isn't even reliable enough when observing stars in the sky. But yes I am wondering how appropriate scientific methods could be applied to something along the lines of the accult. And lets also consider that although we can measure the brain and compare its activity to the activity of the person with great accuracy that doesn't strictly show that our mind doesn't have redundancy outside of the physical? What experiments could be done that the parapsychology researchers haven't tried yet?

Got it.

I just hope they succeed with a vaccine for all coronaviruses and other viruses that are otherwise particularly good at entering cells and using our hardware against us.

I'm not sure if I understand. Putting aside whether or not there is a God from whom the "gift" of life is given. Shouldn't all accounting of things had and things given start after life?

I just remember I think it was Buzz Aldren said the surface of the moon was the least hospitable place he had ever seen. Just cold ridge rock formation. From earth we imagine a face and the details aren't focused well because of distance, but it looks graceful and magical. High detail photos of the moon seem far less flattering and you see the places meteors hit it over millennium.

Art is beautiful because the concepts of it entertains the mind, but if we saw too well we would see every brush stroke and it might eventually seem nondiliberate? Is beauty less about seeing and more about understanding? Dopamine isn't superficial. That is how memories are created so strong impressions can be left.

What I find weird is the ability of a person to be intelligent enough to possibly know when someone else is more intelligent than they are without words. Should that even be possible?

I am assuming you're talking about Palestine and Israel. I think it might come down to the nature of the claim to the land. Personally I think nobody should own land that is considered "holy" or of religious historic value. Not lived on. Just held as a tourist destination without current financial interests.

Interesting. Would you say the awake mind and the asleep mind would be separate from a mind that is separate from the body? Being awake or asleep of course are simply bodily necessities.

Our population has only increased so I am not particularly worried although I think China's one child rule actually backfired this time and they started losing population fast.

I don't assume many religions to use expensive scientific equipment to try to measure the truth of things, but in religion there is some philosophical thought outside of strict dogma? And philosophy does contribute to science in some logical cases?

You can't disect the faults in both sole objectives?

No that wasn't it. This video was post 2002 I think. I emphasized labor over currency. Explaining how basically a Star Trek world could exist.

I don't mean absolute control over anything. Clearly there are billions of people all with consciousness and they may focus their thoughts on many of the same things including preferable weather. So the consensus is we can't control anything with only our thoughts outside of our bodies? Even if no conflict between people exists?

Why do some people think such a power exists? Sure humans have many psychological biases, but some must have rational to think their power exists only from their voice and hands?

So multiverse is treating the same 3D plane as many universes that simply can't meet because they are expanding faster than light information can return to their centers?

Well that is a theory some have. Not Sean Carrol as much who seems to think that new universes may only come about to accommodate paradoxes we create. But assuming all possible universes mathematically exist, what gives our reality a nod? Do we have free will or just the outcomes that are leftover?

I assume when you say gender you mean masculinity/femininity versus sex. Personally I am all for sex never being a consideration when hiring people for any job and shouldn't even be on an application. I don't know too much music that I would call feminine or masculine. Perhaps in country music the roles are more strictly defined, but I think in more pop music after 2000 the topics are too generic and meaningless that assigning a gender quality is pointless. Lol.

I have not heard of science changing sex chromosomes but certainly more subtle things have been changed in early stages of a beings life or in the case of sickle cell anemia in maybe 2 cases as possible cure.

As far as spectrums I don't agree in terms of sex. One is either male or female. Their sexuality can be a position along a 1D line, their sense of masculinity or feminity can be a position along a 1D line, but trying to muddy the definitions by combining them doesn't make sense. Multidimensional is how I see it. Not so much spectral.

I don't know what distinction most people make between sex and gender. I assumed most considered them synonymous although a sociologist professor claimed sex was the XX or XY and gender was the feminine or masculine characteristics. And the definitions of those categories is open to interpretation.

I simply want a world where ideas are more clear. A philosophy professor I had said philosophy's main purpose these days is to clarify ideas. I know calling a person male or female may tell you relatively little in a few cases. But it is defined by chromosomes. It doesn't box a person in. Men can have long hair like vikings, or where silks. That doesn't matter. I just think when asking a person their sex it shouldn't be a complex question. Again, it might not express even as much as 80% as much as what one hopes to know for sure. This only means that more questions are needed. But each question should be clear in what it's asking. There can be many spectrums.

I don't know what he has studied, but I definitely have heard news stories that our shores have lots of stuff piled up in shipping containers that hasn't gone anywhere. Isn't it conceivable that the government wanted a cool down even before the pandemic?

Yes sex is a physical distinction. Or at least a chromosome distinction. Hermaphroditism is rare and arguably is a defect. The way a person's body unfolds isn't always predictable, but if they are XX or XY they are defined as male or female. They can be gay or opposite fem/masc than might seem appropriate for their sex or be uncomfortable with the genitals that they got, but these are all different continuums outside of sex. People are beyond 3 dimensional. No reason to try to pack everything between male and female.