NDE Hypothetical

[Socratease]

New poster, and just a quick thanks for hours of interesting reading. I often find my thoughts expressed here much better than I could ever attempt.

I am writing a novel about a skeptical paranormal investigator. One plot deals with an NDE his father has where he views a random-number generator set on a high shelf in the operating theatre. The way I want to take the story is that, after the initial excitement after this apparent "proof" of NDEs, it is regarded as somewhat inconclusive because the conditions can't be replicated. (His father dies soon after.)

Is this a reasonable scenario - at least for fiction - or do you imagine other consequences I may not have considered? Or do you think this would be sufficient proof in itself?

Tony

 

[LostAngeles]

Hmm. Well, my first thought would leap to someone who tries to replicate the conditions (with tragic results), but that seems a bit like the obvious path to take. I do think that one of things that should be kept in mind is that the number has to be long enough to be sufficently random, but short enough to be remembered. I think, and I'm not wholly sure, that average length of digits that can easily be remembered is seven. This would result in a 1 in 10,000,000 chance of a correct guess.

It could lead to some tentative actual research into NDEs, I'd think, with more random number generators. Another thought is, is that's it's entirely unethical to try and replicate the conditions for an NDE, so that might be an issue. I know that the ethicality of, "Do we allow these people to put themselves at the risk of severe bodily harm or death in the interest of proving the paranormal?" has come up here and generally the answer is (rightly, if you ask me), "No."

 

[Socratease]

Another thought is, is that's it's entirely unethical to try and replicate the conditions for an NDE, so that might be an issue. I know that the ethicality of, "Do we allow these people to put themselves at the risk of severe bodily harm or death in the interest of proving the paranormal?" has come up here and generally the answer is (rightly, if you ask me), "No."

Very true. The NDE, by its very nature, is unlikely to be replicated. Given the unlikelihood of someone actually reading a randomly-generated number, the probability of the same person having another NDE and reading another, is astronomically unlikely.

However, this is fiction and I was interested to know whether the cooling off after the initial excitement is at least a plausible scenario. After all, if it can't be repeated, some scientists may simply lose interest.

 

[geni]

A lot won't be any more interested than the gneral population in the first place .