ORIGINS: UNIVERSE, LIFE, HUMANKIND, AND DARWIN

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Comment by John Hunt on April 8, 2012 at 10:32am

I was unable to access the first link, but after several attempts found the "Daily Telegraph" article dated 22 Dec 2008.

Towards the end, the article states.  --

Experts believe that blindsight trades on our subconscious ability to recognise things we cannot see.

They think that even though the eyes do not identify objects something in the brain can still respond to what they see on a subconscious level.

I was careful in my previous posting to write:  "Normal vision requires signals from the optical nerves to be processed by the visual cortex ..."

It's been suggested that our brains retain an earlier evolutionary pathway, bypassing the visual cortex, enabling us to obtain some visual feedback, though without the high degree of processing which a fully functioning visual cortex allows.

Comment by Kyu on April 8, 2012 at 10:21am

While not precisely the same as someone who was blind from birth, this does point to how it might occur.

Comment by Marc Draco on April 8, 2012 at 10:20am

Kyu: although this isn't strictly part of the NDE, it's worth nothing that there are many types of blindness - including people who are blind from birth. It's been shown that some people are fully sighted but that the sight is only available to the subconscious - which is weird, but true. So in other words, they can see without being aware of it - this guy was probably an example of this phenomena.

Comment by Kyu on April 8, 2012 at 10:19am

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/3902864/Bli...

Comment by Kyu on April 8, 2012 at 10:13am

news/newstopics/howaboutthat/3902864/Blind-man-navigates-obstacle-course-using-blindsight.htm

Comment by Littlejohn Dellar on April 8, 2012 at 10:10am

@ Chris Tidman

When we believe (as opposed to know) we have already closed our minds.

Comment by Marc Draco on April 8, 2012 at 9:50am

Seems like Kenneth Ring (Ph.D) is a bit of a Rupert Sheldrake! ;-)

A trained scientist who seems to have deserted the facts in favour of a personal fancy. There are some interesting reviews of his work on Amazon - and those from the more skeptical readers are cutting.

Frankly, it doesn't take a lot to see where he's coming from - and he doesn't strike me as much of an atheist... 

Comment by Jennifer Moran on April 8, 2012 at 9:45am

Chris Tidman: No idea how you arrived at those conclusions. Darwinism has nothing to do with a hierarchy. Creationists historically were great proponents of eugenics. Most of the US believes in creationism and still racism permeates society.

Comment by Marc Draco on April 8, 2012 at 9:39am

http://www.near-death.com/experiences/experts04.html

One study - and this is from people who want to believe it; that's hardly a scientific consensus. Note that this appears to have been done in the 1970s which was long before we figured out how to trigger NDEs in sighted people.

I've had two, by the way, so I know what it feels like first hand and I'm still an atheist - what does that tell you?

 

Comment by Susan Stanko on April 8, 2012 at 8:34am

Or posses a Pensive.

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