http://www.skeptiko.com/224-john-searle-and-the-science-bullies/

This is one of the most severely mistitled web interviews I have ever read. The title is precisely backwards. It should read: Dr. John Searle and the Paranormal Bullies. Don’t believe me? Read the interview. All, and I mean -all- of the bullying comes from Mr. Tsakiris, himself.

That’s a fascinating opening gambit: bully your honorable opponent prior to declaring them a bully … because… uh,… you are the author? You imagine them as a bully? You have a memory of childhood trauma involving science?

My god. Literally. Has Mr. Tsakiris got religion or what? Apparently so.

Overall, I find these interviews interesting, but something has gone badly wrong in this case. Firstly, Dr. Searle is a person of incredible (and I do not use this word lightly), perception, insight, intelligence, and knowledge. I have no idea what motivated Mr. Tsakiris to begin his introduction with a bizarre smear campaign that has little to do with reality or Dr. Searle, who is obviously very clearly ready to talk openly about the topic, and does.

Here’s the thing that I find most inexplicable. Mr. Tsakiris apparently thinks that what are precisely these: anecdotal reports with some scientific stylization — comprise ‘a vast body of science of which the great Dr. is willfully unaware’. That, bluntly, is invented nonsense. NDE ‘research’, in so much as it exists, and that is *barely*, exists in a twilight zone largely beyond the scope of science. The fact that Mr. Tsakiris apparently believes otherwise is not a testament to Dr. Searle’s ignorance, or his bullying, but rather, the misinformed hubris of the former individual who, for reasons entirely unclear to me, wants to call reports of bizarre, utterly unreachable inner experiences… ‘science’. It’s just wrong. It’s really, deeply mistaken. The whole approach. And, especially, the complete failure to respect this eminent man and his mind, whether or not his perspectives are explicitly correct. That is unforgivable. It’s game over for any argument he might have had right there. Mr. Tsakiris tosses his own credibility -right out the window- right at the get-go… by name calling… and doing this where it is utterly and absolutely unwarranted.

I am forced to wonder what the agenda here is. Because it seems to be really personal and insipid. It seems to be a kind of ‘listen pal, we have a chip on our shoulder, and your kind is the reason’ thing.

I declare that this is as insulting to the topic as it is the listeners. Thankfully, Dr. Searle, rather than reducing himself to this confusing (if not crippling) program, continually rises above it in a simple, straightforward fashion.

Personally, I am glad to see Dr. Searle so active… teaching and writing. The man’s genius is profound and provocative, whether I agree with it or not. As an NDE experiencer and a person who works in neuroscience, I take the matter seriously. I am aware of many books written on the topic. Here are the facts as they appear to me:

We do not understand memory very well, and consciousness even less. The meager understandings we have cobbled together are fraught with the structure and naivete of our approaches. And internal subjective experience is not terrifically accessible to the tools and methods of science. Post-hoc reports of experiences, no matter how grandiose, terrifying, or bizarre, remain untouchable to science. They are internal experiences. We can ask questions about them but we cannot tell what category of phenomenon they represent with any degree of objective certainty. As for the semantic issues, these are real, but secondary. If you think this is bullying, allow me to suggest a remedial education in the meanings of terms like: science, death, -memory-, evidence, bully, and hubris.

Especially hubris.

P.S: An http://highwire.stanford.edu/ search for the ‘tons of science’ on NDE experiences mentioned by Tsakiris turned up exactly NOTHING. There are a scant few papers on tangentially related topics.

Actual science? ZERO. NONE.