Sam Harris versus Eben Alexander: Clash of neuroscience

Dr. Eben Alexander has written a book called Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon's Journey into the Afterlife, about his near death experience that resulted from a severe case of bacterial meningitis. Newsweek magazine recently published a cover story titled Heaven is Real: A Doctor's Experience With the Afterlife, about Dr. Alexander and his book. I was vaguely aware of the news. However, I've been busy with the current virtual book tour for my own recently published paranormal-thriller titled Secondhand Sight, and so I hadn't really had time to read stop and read it. If interested, you can follow my tour at The Virtual Book Tour Cafe. I'll be sure to tell a couple of my best personal ghost stories along the way to keep things interesting. I only mention ghost stories because I believe that near death experiences are real phenomena due to a number of my own personal experiences with ghosts. By simple extrapolation, I believe that ghost encounters could be considered as nothing more than After Death Experiences. Granted, some of them are more interesting than others. But then I noticed a very intelligent Facebook friend had offered his opinion on this subject, posting that atheist author Sam Harris had completely "demolished" Alexander's account, at least from a scientific perspective. Curiosity naturally got the best of me. My friend's strongly stated opinion made me wonder what exactly Harris had said about Alexander's NDE. I've read several books by Harris, most recently Free Will, so I am familiar with the author's work. Because my friend is a … [Read more...]