Michael Cremo - Human Devolution - A Vedic Alternative To Darwin's Theory

To account for the accuracy of the visual impressions reported in OBEs, Blackmore and others have proposed that the mind of a person losing consciousness uses touch and sound sensations to manufacture accurate visual imagery without actually leaving the body and seeing things from that perspective. But in many cases the visual perceptions extend to things the subject could not easily have learned about through touch or sound. One of Sabom’s OBE subjects reported seeing gauge needles moving in an appropriately real fashion on a piece of medical equipment (a defibrillator). Blackmore (1993, pp. 118–119) suggested that the information could have been obtained after the operation (perhaps from a television program) and then incorporated into the subject’s report. Of course, one can suggest anything, but according to the subject, he had not seen any television programs in which defibrillators were used (Griffin1997, p. 246).

One of Sabom’s patients reported seeing himself getting a shot in his right groin. Actually, it was not a shot. The doctors were withdrawing blood for a test. Sabom said this confusion would be natural for the subject, if he were actually viewing the action from outside his body, as a shot and blood withdrawal would look the same—the insertion of a needle. If the subject had manufactured an image of this from overheard words, it is unlikely that a withdrawal of blood would have been confused for a shot, because the doctors would clearly have been calling for a withdrawal of blood for testing. Blackmore replied that an image could have been reconstructed not from sound but from touch sensations. But here is an important detail: the medical reports said that the blood withdrawal was made from the left groin but the patient reported that incident, which he interpreted as a shot, had taken place in the right groin. If the subject had manufactured an image of what was happening from touch sensations, there should not have been any confusion. He should have felt the pricking on his left groin. But Sabom pointed out that if the subject had been looking down at his body from the foot of the bed, he would have seen, from his perspective, that the needle was going into the right groin. Blackmore chose to characterize the subject’s entire report as uncorroborated, but neglects to mention that Sabom had interviewed the man’s wife, who said that her husband had told her and her daughter the story soon after the event and had later repeated it several times, without any change. This tends to rule out the suggestion that the story was manufactured and gradually elaborated with newly acquired information about medical procedures (Sabom 1982, 109–111; Griffin, 1997, p. 248).

In view of Blackmore’s objections, OBE accounts of events beyond the immediate area of subject would be important. In 1976, one of Sabom’s subjects had a heart attack during a stay in a hospital. during his resuscitation he reported seeing his relatives. “I couldn’t hear anything. not one peep . . . And I remember seeing them down the hall just as plain as could be. The three of them were standing there—my wife, my oldest son and my oldest daughter and the doctor . . . I knew damn well they were there.” from accounts of the man’s resuscitation, it does not seem he would have been able to see his relatives or receive any information about them. The man was not expecting any visits from relatives that day, because he was due to be discharged. Even if he had been expecting a visit, it would have been hard for him to know who would be coming. He had six grown children and they had been taking turns coming to see him with their mother. On this particular day, the man’s wife, eldest son, and eldest daughter had met and on the spur of the moment had decided to come visit him. They arrived at the hospital just as he was being taken out of his room back up to the operating rooms. The family members were stopped in the hallway, ten doors away from where their father, lying on a bed, was being worked on by doctors and nurses. The man’s face was pointed away from his relatives. His wife recalled that she could only see the back of his head at a distance. He was immediately taken away to the emergency room without passing his relatives. The man’s wife said, “He couldn’t have seen us.” Blackmore does not comment on this case (Sabom 1982, pp. 111–113; Griffin 1997, pp. 249–250).

dr. Kimberley clark, a professor of medicine at the University of Washington and a social worker at Harborview Medical center, reported another case that is difficult to account for in terms of hallucinations formed from sound and touch impressions entering the mind of a person approaching complete unconsciousness. A migrant worker named Maria underwent treatment for cardiac arrest at Harborview. Afterwards, she told clark she had experienced an OBE. She had been floating above her body and looking down at the doctors and nurses. clark figured she could have imagined the scene, drawing upon things she saw and heard before she lost consciousness. Maria then told how she had found herself floating outside by the emergency room driveway. clark concluded that she could have seen the driveway during her stay and incorporated it into her OBE. Maria further explained how she had noticed something sitting on the ledge of the third floor of the hospital building. She found herself floating right up next to the object, which turned out to be a tennis shoe. She described little details, such as a worn place in the spot where the little toe would have been, and a shoelace looped under the heel. clark went to check, and at first saw nothing. She went up to the third floor, and after looking through many windows finally found one where she could see the shoe. The ledge was not easily visible from the window. One had to press one’s face against the glass, and angle the eyes down. And from there she still could not see the details described by Maria. clark stated: “The only way she would have had such a perspective was if she had been floating right outside and at very close range to the tennis shoe.” When the shoe was retrieved it matched the description given by Maria (clark 1982, p. 243; Griffin 1997, pp. 250–251). Blackmore (1993, p. 128) dismisses this case, calling it “fascinating but unsubstantiated.” But Griffin (1997, p. 251) points out that “she does not make clear, however, what further substantiation, beyond the written testimony of a health-care professional, would be needed.”

Kathy Kilne, a nurse at Hartford Hospital in connecticut, told of a female cardiac arrest patient who had an OBE. The event took place in 1985. Recalling the patient’s testimony, Kilne said: “She told me how she floated up over her body, viewed the resuscitation effort for a short time and then felt herself being pulled up through several floors of the hospital. She then found herself above the roof and realized she was looking at the skyline of Hartford . . . out of the corner of her eye she saw a red object. It turned out to be a shoe.” Kilne told the story to a doctor who was doing his residency at the hospital. He mockingly dismissed the story. But later that day, he had a janitor take him up on the roof, where he saw a red shoe. He took the shoe and showed it to Kilne, who said by then he had become a believer (Griffin 1997, p. 251; Ring and Lawrence

1993, pp. 226–227).

These kinds of experiences are not uncommon. In 1954, Hornell Hart published a summary study of out-of-body experiences during which the subject reported information that required some kind of paranormal knowledge. Hart (1954) found 288 cases mentioned in various publications and determined that in 99 of these cases the information reported by the subject was later confirmed. This indicated that the reports were genuine. furthermore, in 55 cases, witnesses reported seeing an apparition of the subject at a location different from the subject’s body (Griffin 1997, p. 254). In some cases the subjects voluntarily induced their OBEs, and in some cases the OBEs were spontaneous.