Estupendo artículo sobre Ian Stevenson.
May 19, 2018 23:31:13 GMT 2
Lidelcas and seronoser like this
Post by Admin on May 19, 2018 23:31:13 GMT 2
En el antiguo foro no lo traduje, hoy sí lo hago (bueno, las partes interesantes).
En inglés lo podéis encontrar aquí: blogs.scientificamerican.com/bering-in-mind/ian-stevensone28099s-case-for-the-afterlife-are-we-e28098skepticse28099-really-just-cynics/
Estaría encantado de decir que todo es una completa y solemne tontería —una fosa séptica de palabrería anticientífica descomponiéndose. El problema es que no me parece tan evidente que lo sea. Así que, ¿por qué no están los científicos tomándose los datos de Stevenson más seriamente? Los datos no "encajan" con nuestro modelo de funcionamiento de la ciencia materialista del cerebro, sin duda. ¿Pero se debe nuestra negativa a mirar incluso sus hallazgos, mucho menos debatirlos, a nuestro miedo a estar equivocados? "El deseo de no creer," dijo una vez Stevenson, "puede influir con tanta fuerza como el deseo de creer."
La obra maestra de Stevenson, publicada en 1997, era un trabajo de dos volúmenes, 2268 páginas, llamado Reincarnation and Biology. Muchos de sus sujetos tenían marcas y defectos de nacimiento inusuales, como deformidades en los dedos, orejas infradesarrolladas, o haber nacido sin una pierna. Había marcas de nacimiento similares a cicatrices, hipopigmentadas, y manchas en vino de Oporto, y algunos horribles lunares de rara apariencia en áreas donde nunca se encuentran lunares, como en las plantas de los pies. Reincarnation and Biology contenía 225 informes de casos de niños que recordaban vidas anteriores y que también tenían anomalías físicas que coincidían con esas vidas anteriores, detalles que en algunos casos se pudieron confirmar por el informe de autopsia de la persona fallecida y por fotografías.
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I’d be happy to say it’s all complete and utter nonsense—a moldering cesspool of irredeemable, anti-scientific drivel. The trouble is, it’s not entirely apparent to me that it is. So why aren’t scientists taking Stevenson’s data more seriously? The data don’t “fit” our working model of materialistic brain science, surely. But does our refusal to even look at his findings, let alone to debate them, come down to our fear of being wrong? “The wish not to believe,” Stevenson once said, “can influence as strongly as the wish to believe.”
Stevenson’s magnum opus, published in 1997, was a 2,268-page, two-volume work called Reincarnation and Biology. Many of his subjects had unusual birthmarks and birth defects, such as finger deformities, underdeveloped ears, or being born without a lower leg. There were scar-like, hypopigmented birthmarks and port-wine stains, and some awfully strange-looking moles in areas where you almost never find moles, like on the soles of the feet. Reincarnation and Biology contained 225 case reports of children who remembered previous lives and who also had physical anomalies that matched those previous lives, details that could in some cases be confirmed by the dead person’s autopsy record and photos.
I’d be happy to say it’s all complete and utter nonsense—a moldering cesspool of irredeemable, anti-scientific drivel. The trouble is, it’s not entirely apparent to me that it is. So why aren’t scientists taking Stevenson’s data more seriously? The data don’t “fit” our working model of materialistic brain science, surely. But does our refusal to even look at his findings, let alone to debate them, come down to our fear of being wrong? “The wish not to believe,” Stevenson once said, “can influence as strongly as the wish to believe.”
Stevenson’s magnum opus, published in 1997, was a 2,268-page, two-volume work called Reincarnation and Biology. Many of his subjects had unusual birthmarks and birth defects, such as finger deformities, underdeveloped ears, or being born without a lower leg. There were scar-like, hypopigmented birthmarks and port-wine stains, and some awfully strange-looking moles in areas where you almost never find moles, like on the soles of the feet. Reincarnation and Biology contained 225 case reports of children who remembered previous lives and who also had physical anomalies that matched those previous lives, details that could in some cases be confirmed by the dead person’s autopsy record and photos.
Stevenson, un experto en medicina psicosomática, sospechaba que las fuertes emociones están (de algún modo) relacionadas con la retención de recuerdos de vidas pasadas en un niño. Las muertes traumáticas, pensaba, dejan una huella emocional. De hecho, la mayoría de los niños que estudió afirmaban que habían encontrado un final violento anteriormente. También había un intervalo de varios años entre vidas; la reencarnación nunca es inmediata. Y por la mayor parte, las almas parecen quedarse en la misma región. Es decir, la "personalidad previa" vivía con frecuencia en un pueblo distante, pero no tan lejos como para necesitar un pasaporte. Muchas veces, Stevenson observó, el niño tenía hábitos y miedos ligados a la naturaleza de la muerte. Aquellos que decían haberse ahogado en una vida anterior tenían un miedo intenso e inusitado al agua; aquellos que eran apuñalados mostraban una paralizante fobia a los cuchillos, y así sucesivamente. Había incluso tres casos de niños que reaccionaban violentamente cuando inesperadamente se cruzaban con sus propios "asesinos". Es raro imaginarse a preescolares arrojarse al cuello de adultos desconocidos. No obstante, tenía sentido para Stevenson, ya que en su opinión, los niños estaban atacando a aquellos que habían eludido las consecuencias de sus asesinatos.
Curiosamente, y al contrario de la mayoría de las ideas religiosas sobre la reencarnación, había cero evidencia de karma. En conjunto, parecía ser un proceso bastante mecánico de renacimiento del alma, no uno moralizador. Lo que estos mecanismos implican, exactamente, es pura conjetura —incluso para Stevenson. Pero él no consideraba que una grandiosa teorización fuera parte de su trabajo. Su trabajo más bien era reunir todos los datos anómalos, investigarlos cuidadosamente, y descartar las explicaciones racionales usando todos los métodos disponibles para él. Y para muchos, él tuvo éxito haciendo justamente eso.
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Stevenson, an expert on psychosomatic medicine, suspected strong emotions are (somehow) related to a child’s retention of past-life memories. Traumatic deaths, he thought, leave an emotional imprint. Indeed, most of the children he studied claimed that they had met a violent end previously. There was also a gap of a few years between lives; reincarnation is never immediate. And for the most part, souls seemed to stay local. That’s to say, the “previous personality” often lived in a distant village, but not quite so far away as to require a passport. Oftentimes, Stevenson observed, the child had habits and fears linked to the nature of death. Those who said they’d drowned in a previous life had an unusually intense fear of water; those who were stabbed displayed a crippling knife phobia, and so on. There were even three cases of children who’d reacted violently when they’d unexpectedly crossed paths with their own “murderers.” It’s bizarre to picture preschoolers lunging for the throats of adult strangers. Nonetheless, it made sense to Stevenson, since in his view, the children were attacking those who’d gotten away with their murders.
Interestingly, and contrary to most religious notions of reincarnation, there was zero evidence of karma. On the whole, it appeared to be a fairly mechanical soul-rebirthing process, not a moralistic one. What those mechanisms involve, exactly, is anyone’s guess—even Stevenson’s. But he didn’t see grandiose theorizing as part of his job. His job, rather, was simply to gather all the anomalous data, investigate them carefully, and rule out, using every possible method available to him, the rational explanations. And to many, he was successful at doing just that.
Stevenson, an expert on psychosomatic medicine, suspected strong emotions are (somehow) related to a child’s retention of past-life memories. Traumatic deaths, he thought, leave an emotional imprint. Indeed, most of the children he studied claimed that they had met a violent end previously. There was also a gap of a few years between lives; reincarnation is never immediate. And for the most part, souls seemed to stay local. That’s to say, the “previous personality” often lived in a distant village, but not quite so far away as to require a passport. Oftentimes, Stevenson observed, the child had habits and fears linked to the nature of death. Those who said they’d drowned in a previous life had an unusually intense fear of water; those who were stabbed displayed a crippling knife phobia, and so on. There were even three cases of children who’d reacted violently when they’d unexpectedly crossed paths with their own “murderers.” It’s bizarre to picture preschoolers lunging for the throats of adult strangers. Nonetheless, it made sense to Stevenson, since in his view, the children were attacking those who’d gotten away with their murders.
Interestingly, and contrary to most religious notions of reincarnation, there was zero evidence of karma. On the whole, it appeared to be a fairly mechanical soul-rebirthing process, not a moralistic one. What those mechanisms involve, exactly, is anyone’s guess—even Stevenson’s. But he didn’t see grandiose theorizing as part of his job. His job, rather, was simply to gather all the anomalous data, investigate them carefully, and rule out, using every possible method available to him, the rational explanations. And to many, he was successful at doing just that.
Muy importante lo que he marcado en color. No os dejéis llevar por las teorías ampliamente aceptadas sin ninguna base, a no ser que vosotros mismos tengáis evidencias...
