I've been seeing the name of Susan Blackmore for a while but recently just became acquainted with her in more detail.
She is super-impressive in my view and her views on spiritual naturalism are extremely close to my own.
On NDEs and OBEs, she also has an unique perspective. From Wikipedia:
n 1987, Blackmore wrote that she had an out-of-body experience shortly after she began running the Oxford University Society for Psychical Research (OUSPR):[8][9]
Within a few weeks I had not only learned a lot about the occult and the paranormal, but I had an experience that was to have a lasting effect on me—an out-of-body experience (OBE). It happened while I was wide awake, sitting talking to friends. It lasted about three hours and included everything from a typical "astral projection," complete with silver cord and duplicate body, to free-floating flying, and finally to a mystical experience. It was clear to me that the doctrine of astral projection, with its astral bodies floating about on astral planes, was intellectually unsatisfactory. But to dismiss the experience as "just imagination" would be impossible without being dishonest about how it had felt at the time. It had felt quite real. Everything looked clear and vivid, and I was able to think and speak quite clearly.
In a New Scientist article in 2000, she again wrote of this:
It was just over thirty years ago that I had the dramatic out-of-body experience that convinced me of the reality of psychic phenomena and launched me on a crusade to show those closed-minded scientists that consciousness could reach beyond the body and that death was not the end. Just a few years of careful experiments changed all that. I found no psychic phenomena—only wishful thinking, self-deception, experimental error and, occasionally, fraud. I became a sceptic.[10][11]
She seems to be a good and honest scientist and a bad philospher (which she isn't, so really not something to hold against her). She is clearly an expert of the phenomena of consciousness, but she fails to address the fundamental questions (WHAT IS QUALIA?).
Hedge90 wrote: ↑Sun Aug 29, 2021 4:30 pm
She seems to be a good and honest scientist and a bad philospher (which she isn't, so really not something to hold against her). She is clearly an expert of the phenomena of consciousness, but she fails to address the fundamental questions (WHAT IS QUALIA?).
For what it's worth I suspect that BK would disagree that she's not a bad philosopher. In this more recent 'debate' she describes herself as an 'illusionist', and comes across as pretty much befuddled by the perplexity of it all, and is nowhere close any kind of comprehensive metaphysical offering.
Here out of instinct or grace we seek
soulmates in these galleries of hieroglyph and glass,
where mutual longings and sufferings of love
are laid bare in transfigured exhibition of our hearts,
we who crave deep secrets and mysteries,
as elusive as the avatars of our dreams.
Except I said she (seems like) a bad philosopher And mostly because of the illusionist thing. That's the most absurd and illogical concept of consciousness I can imagine.
Hedge90 wrote: ↑Sun Aug 29, 2021 4:58 pm
Except I said she (seems like) a bad philosopher And mostly because of the illusionist thing. That's the most absurd and illogical concept of consciousness I can imagine.
Perhaps I worded my comment poorly. I suspect BK would say she seems like a bad philosopher because she is a bad philosopher.
Here out of instinct or grace we seek
soulmates in these galleries of hieroglyph and glass,
where mutual longings and sufferings of love
are laid bare in transfigured exhibition of our hearts,
we who crave deep secrets and mysteries,
as elusive as the avatars of our dreams.
She is a scientist not a philosopher but the only criticisms so far have been on philosophical grounds whereas the topic of the interview is the science of near death experiences.
Hedge
Qualia? Really you expect her to solve that to be able about to talk about NDEs.
SOS
It seems she might be more correctly defined as a "dellusionist".
Frankish asks why the illusion of phenomenality is so powerful. I would ask the related, but different, question of why this deluded theorising is so tempting and so powerful. The answer, I suggest, is amusingly simple, if counter-intuitive. Ask yourself this question:
Well you can't be surprised that on a philosophy forum you will get comments on the philosophical views of a person. Nevertheless I'm interested in what she has to say, I just offered my initial impression.
Hedge90 wrote: ↑Sun Aug 29, 2021 6:32 pm
Well you can't be surprised that on a philosophy forum you will get comments on the philosophical views of a person. Nevertheless I'm interested in what she has to say, I just offered my initial impression.
I suppose we should also reject Sam Parnia's or Bruce Greyson's research because they don't solve the qualia question either.
I can understand how people on this forum might be having a hard time getting a handle on her and want to fall back to the purely philosophical domain.
She not only had her own out of body experience - apparently quite significant in fact - but also spent 30 years doing psychical research. She obviously brought to her career all of the intellectual openness about the paranormal that any scientist reasonably could have, but in the end, rejected all of it. However, where she ended up isn't at some cynical and simplistic materialist view, but instead, an encompassing view that accepts science and spirituality.
If you simply search "Susan Blackmore controversy", you will find references that might interest you. I'm not going to link any here.
Her "origin story" as a "skeptic" is at least interesting. She's been controversial for quite a while.
Not claiming that you should be interested, only that you might be.
Sorry, but the first page of Google hits on that doesn't return a whole lot that is remarkable. Mostly it is just links to Wikipedia, her own web sites, or papers she's written.
The mind matter interview INTERVIEW WITH A WOMAN (OR WOMEN) FORMERLY CALLED SUSAN BLACKMORE is actually just making the point that her view is the self is a delusion, which is also the view of a good many Eastern philosophies.
And mostly because of the illusionist thing. That's the most absurd and illogical concept of consciousness I can imagine.