Talk:Sam Parnia/Archive 1

Archive 1

Coast to Coast AM interviews

Parnia has talked on Coast to Coast AM writing:

• "The whole concept of what we are...mind & consciousness, doesn't seem to disintegrate after people have died, at least not in the first phase of death." [1]

• "Rather than the popular concept that death leads to unlimited knowledge in the afterlife, he suggested that "people take their own level of thought to the other dimension." Therefore, Parnia posited that perhaps the purpose of life on Earth is to prepare us to better understand this next level when we arrive there." [2].

Science is it? It sounds like paranormal speculation. Goblin Face (talk) 14:48, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Horizon Research Foundation

Parnia seems to be conducting his AWARE study with the Horizon Research Foundation, this is not a scientific institution or organization but a Registered Charity that investigates parapsychology, mind-body dualism and other fringe science. [3]. Regarding the Aware study it reads "the results of the first phase of the AWARE study have been completed and have been submitted for publication in a medical journal. The study results are now undergoing peer review. It is anticipated that after the completion of this process, the investigators will announce the results to the public through conventional media channels." [4]. Goblin Face (talk) 17:48, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Parnia is the Chairman of the Horizon Research Foundation, and the owner is Peter Fenwick (Fenwick has written books claiming reincarnation and spirits are real) [5]. Goblin Face (talk) 17:53, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Aware Study failure

It took me a long time to find this, basically the Aware study failed, just like all of the previous studies on the NDE and targets. None of the subjects saw the image targets [6]. I added this to the article. Goblin Face (talk) 18:13, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi, I've found the original abstract online,here and here. Bowman's conclusions seems to be rather different than those of the original source:

• He did not mention that only 22% of the rooms had images on display.

• He did not mention that the two patients who recall visual experiencies "did not have CA in areas with images.", thus putting in question his own conclusion (that none of the subjects saw the image targets).

• He fails to mention that one of the two patiens who recall visual experiencies "accurately described details corresponding with a verifiable period that may be up to 3-5 minutes of CA in which cerebral function would ordinarily not be expected."

• He fails to include in his analysis that barely 8.9% of the cases were consistent with a "conventionally defined NDE."

• More important, he fails to cite the abstracts main conclusions, i. e.: "Awareness during CA may be more common than previously thought. ", "These experiences may not reflect the conventionally defined NDE, yet indicate that consciousness may not cease as expected with cessation of heartbeat during CA.", and "Claims of visual awareness consistent with so called out of body experiences during CA are unlikely to be hallucinatory."

I will add the abstract's conclusions (from the abstract itself) and remove Blackmore's remarks, which not only are off-topic stuff but also are arranged in a way that seems to advance Bowman's flawed statement about the image targets (see WP:SYN and WP:NPOV).Darius (talk) 13:06, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

Darius you have added a source from [7], firstly this is not a scientific paper or a reliable reference. It's a talk that is going to take place on April 21-26, 2014 called "Toward a Science of Consciousness" [8] [9]. In the link that you cite which is titled "Awareness During Resuscitation - A Prospective Case Study" like I said this is a talk not a reliable reference, and search for the word "AWARE" in the text. There's no evidence this study is part of the AWARE project. It seems to me this is a separate study even if it is the results from part of the AWARE study it's a talk that hasn't even taken place not a scientific paper, it shouldn't be cited as it's an unreliable reference. You talk about Bowman's conclusions being wrong and that "he fails to cite the abstracts main conclusions"... you are talking about an "abstract" to a talk that has not even taken place yet. Like I said whatever this abstract is, it is not conclusive that it is the results of the AWARE study. A quick look online and no other websites mention this "abstract" yet many mention Bowman's conclusion that the AWARE failed on the targets.

You also write you will "remove Blackmore's remarks" because they were off-topic. They were not off-topic at all. WP:NPOV would indeed be a problem here because you are adding unreliable fringe claims to the article and deleting valid criticisms. Goblin Face (talk) 15:26, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

First of all, Bowman's article also fails to establish any relationship between Parnia's statistics and the AWARE project, therefore we should also have his statement removed.

"Awareness During Resuscitation - A Prospective Case Study" is a work by Sam Parnia himself and made public by a University's website (see WP:SOURCE), no matter if a paper, a comment or a mere interview to be published tomorrow, in 2015 or 20 years from now, thus it should be mentioned here.

The above mentioned abstract is published in the official page of the University of Arizona. The Center for Consciousness Studies (CCS) is hosted by the Department of Anesthesiology, Wayne Jacobsen MD Chairman, at the University of Arizona College of Medicine, and was established in 1997 by the Arizona Board of Regents, hardly a fringe source.(see the bottom line)

Yes, criticism should be cited in this article, but remember that the subject of this page is the biography of Sam Parnia, not the article on NDEs, where we should represents all scientific (and non-scientific) points of view.

Since it is obvious that Bowman's statement did not come out from nothingness, and he neither tell us a word on AWARE results, I propose to put the last paragraph of the "AWARE" section on hold until further notice from an indisputed source (IMHO, Sam Parnia's abstract is a reliable source).Darius (talk) 16:35, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

Just reading over this conversation, there's a couple points that seem to be missed.

1. Parnia is a primary source on himself. We can use him, per WP:SPS, but secondary sources are strongly preferred.
2. WP:CRYSTAL indicates we should not be reporting on things that haven't happened yet.
3. We can't do original research in order to analyze the sources we're using. Whether a source appears to us to properly cover the subject isn't a relevant factor in making content decisions.
4. Links to NPOV and SYN have been provided, but they don't apply here (at least in the way they are being advanced). I'd urge rereading both.

What I'm seeing from the discussion is that Blackmore is a secondary source, and his comments are being replaced by Parnia, a primary source, based on an event that hasn't yet taken place. We absolutely can't do that.   — Jess· Δ♥ 16:57, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

• Maybe the conference had not taken place yet, but the abstract is already published online.
• Blackmore comments are certainly a secondary source analysis about Parnia's methods, but we can hardly used them for the conclusions of AWARE since those conclusions still had not been full published.
• We should undestand that this article is about Sam Parnia, no matter if Parnia is considered by some, many or all a charlatan, we should represent his theories and point of view here (including, of course, criticism by other authors). All reliable material which relates to Sam Parnia should be included here.
• More important: User Goblin Face has put in question whether or not the abstract I cited refers or not to the AWARE project; but I found that Bowman's article also fails to clarify if the statistics he mentions come from AWARE or not. I repeat, I'am for putting the last paragraph of the "AWARE" section on hold until the definitive results are published by a reliable source.Darius (talk) 17:19, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

You're still arguing to use primary sources over secondary sources. Yes, we can and should use secondary sources to discuss the conclusions of AWARE. We don't hold off on publishing sourced criticism just because we expect more information to surface in the future. We publish what we have now. That is, the reception of AWARE in the relevant academic community as reported by our reliable (secondary) sources today. If that changes in the future, then we update our article in the future.   — Jess· Δ♥ 17:31, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

It's OK, but what I'am questioning is the inclusion of a source (namely Bowman's article) that doesn't mention the AWARE project at all (the same concern of user Goblin Face regarding the abstract). We should put this statement on hold (or at least move it from the "AWARE" section) not because "we expect more information to surface in the future" but because we are taking for granted that he is referring to AWARE, and this is WP:OR.Darius (talk) 17:41, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Yes, if the article doesn't mention AWARE, and we have no sources which explicitly set out the link, then it shouldn't be used to discuss AWARE. That's certainly correct.   — Jess· Δ♥ 17:54, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

I am not getting into an argument over this. I believe both myself and Dagos have basically said the same thing but about different sources. I removed any references to the results because they are not official. On the actual website it says:

"The study results are now undergoing peer review. It is anticipated that after the completion of this process, the investigators will announce the results to the public through conventional media channels. This will likely take place through collaboration between the university media offices, the medical journal and national and international media outlets. Unfortunately due to the strict nature of scientific peer review, the process can take several months. The authors and researchers cannot disclose the results until they have been formally published, as medical journals do not permit results to be revealed prior to publication and place an embargo on researchers and universities." [10]. Per correct policy I think we should wait till the results are published in a reliable scientific paper rather than public talks or other unconfirmed sources. Goblin Face (talk) 17:53, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

It would be ok to publish results discussed in news outlets when we don't have a scientific source available. If the "final results" hadn't been formally published, we could of course mention that too. The concern above is pertinent, however. An explicit link has to be present to AWARE to make it viable for that section.   — Jess· Δ♥ 17:58, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

I don't see how anyone wouldn't be annoyed or confused over this! Parnia and the AWARE study has been going on for years (since 2008) but no results are ever officially reported. And before the AWARE, Parnia has conducted similar experiments with the targets but never reported the results. Bold claims were made in 2000 by Parnia and Fenwick but the results were never reported [11]. In 2001 he co-wrote a paper [12] with Fenwick and others which talked about using targets to test out of body claims but the results were never published not even in the paper itself! Read the paper he mentions the targets in the abstract and briefly in the paper i.e. the methodology but the results are left out of the paper? I have never seen this before in any scientific paper. The results are left out?

In 2004, again Parnia and Fenwick made bold claims [13] about testing OBEs but the results were never published. No results can be found. The same is happening again, these are from 2008 [14] [15] which talk about testing out of body claims by using image targets but as of 2014 no results for those studies can be found anywhere. Parnia seems to have a history of making bold claims but not publishing any of the results. We now have the same situation again with the more recent AWARE studies that have employed targets, but no official results can be found and only contradictory or unofficial information on the subject. There's something weird going on here. There isn't a single scientific paper that reports any of Parnia's results on these target identification experiments, this has been going on since 2000. This website seems to conclude that the reason for this is because the results are all negative [16] which is supported by the history of target identification experiments which have been conducted in parapsychology for over 30 years, all of them have produced negative results. [17]. Goblin Face (talk) 18:30, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

Yep. Unfortunately, that sort of thing happens a lot. That's why it's appropriate to report on what we have now, and not wait for the "final results" to come out, leaving our article in a perpetual state of "we haven't yet figured out if this is a real phenomena." If we have any sources that say "preliminary results of AWARE", we can report that. If we have any sources criticizing AWARE for not publishing, that's reportable too. We can mention that the "final" report hasn't been published, if that's sourceable, but our weight should appropriately be placed on the consensus of the academic community, which AFAIK clearly rejects NDEs (including this research). We don't cover that much in the article now, which is a gross omission. I'd fix it, but I've been doing my best to do things off wikipedia, not spend all day looking at sources ;). I'll see if I can find some time to look too.   — Jess· Δ♥ 19:00, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

Just out of curiosity, shouldn't we make mention of the fact that the study is now undergoing peer review? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.151.195.30 (talk) 22:01, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

NDE Target Identification Experiments

This is very odd indeed. Parnia seems to have a history of conducting experiments where symbols or targets are placed in hospital rooms to test if a subject during an OBE or NDE can read them i.e. by their consciousness leaving their body but thing is Parnia never reports the results from these experiments because they are all negative. This type of experiment has been practiced in parapsychology since the 1970s but all have produced negative results (see the link below). He mentions it in his 2001 paper with Peter Fenwick:

• "hidden targets were used to test the transcendental theories on potential out of body claims" (In the abstract)
• "in order to test prospectively the possible veridical nature of out of body experiences, boards were suspended from the ceiling of the wards prior to the commencement of the study. These had various figures on the surface facing the ceiling which were not visible from the floor. If out of body experiences are indeed veridical, anybody who claimed to have left their body and be near the ceiling during resuscitation attempts would be expected to identify those targets. If, however, such perceptions are psychological, then one would obviously not expect the targets to be identified." (in the paper)

The paper can be found here [18] but the results are not mentioned! The results were deliberately left out because the experiments had obviously failed. This website concludes that all experiments into NDE target identification have failed [19] (and it mentions Parnia's paper). There needs to be a section on this added to the article. Goblin Face (talk) 16:43, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

And Parnia has performed similar experiments in 2008 which were also negative:

• "The study, due to take three years and co-ordinated by Southampton University, will include placing on shelves images that could only be seen from above." "And if no one sees the pictures, it shows these experiences are illusions or false memories." [20]

• Susan Blackmore commented in 2008 "If Parnia does the experiments properly, and his patients really can see those images, then I will change my mind about the paranormal. I don't think it's going to happen but I do think it's worth him making the attempt." [21]

Well it seems Blackmore was correct. I noticed the results were quietly hidden, obviously negative then. And now 2013-2014 Parnia is doing the same sort of studies again. All this needs to be added to the article. Goblin Face (talk) 17:13, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

I think repeated studies that were not published on the same thing deserves mention if we are mentioning another study on the same... - - MrBill3 (talk) 12:22, 14 March 2014 (UTC)

As Parnia has a long history of never actually publishing results, his statement that results have been submitted for peer review should not be added until supported by third party reliable sources. - - MrBill3 (talk) 02:04, 26 March 2014 (UTC)

According with the study, OBE´s are very rare. Only two were reported in the sample and none of them happened during a cardiac arrest in the environments where the targets were set. Indeed, as reported in the paper, 80% (if I remember correctly of CA´s ocurred out of hospital environment.

Other references

Two references here which criticize Parnia and the aware studies from the Skeptic's Dictionary [22] and [23]. The "Horizon Research Foundation" that Parnia belongs to [24], profile here [25] is definitely a pseudoscience organization or "charity". The president is Peter Fenwick (a believer in psychic powers) and includes other fringe proponents who endorse paranormal phenomena, quantum woo and dualistic "non-materialistic" models of consciousness. Goblin Face (talk) 07:27, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Also some information about Parnia here from the International Association for Near-Death Studies [26]. Goblin Face (talk) 07:33, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Vandalism

For the last few months this IP address 151.225.63.6 (talk · contribs) (and on other IPs) has been removing the Keith Augustine source from the article. This IP has been told many times not to remove this source as it is reliable but they keep removing it. The article may have to be locked if this IP is just going to keep logging in doing this. Goblin Face (talk) 18:58, 19 August 2014 (UTC)

As the IP user is a WP:SPA, I'd suggest that, should they continue, they should be blocked for edit warring, or I'll open an ANI into their content 'dispute'. The IP hopping can be picked up from there. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 02:01, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Edit warring noticeboard filing done. here. - - MrBill3 (talk) 00:33, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

The result was semi protected for 10 days. I don't think this is an appropriate resolution as the series of IP editors seems to return about monthly to do the same vandalism. Anyone care to weight in at 3RRNB or take this elswhere? - - MrBill3 (talk) 05:03, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

Parapsychology

An IP has removed any mention of parapsychology from the article a number of times, but his work in the field of near-death experiences is parapsychological based, you can read that here [27] Goblin Face (talk) 01:23, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Parnia's book What Happens When We Die was published by the new age publisher Hay House. His books are also on the "recommended reading" list from the Society for Psychical Research [28]. Goblin Face (talk) 01:30, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

172.56.19.197 (talk) has again removed the parapsychology template. From what I can tell from several dictionary definitions, all that parapsychology means is that the phenomena studied have no widely accepted scientific explanation at this time. It doesn't mean that the phenomenon of After-Death Experiences doesn't exist, simply that it is as of yet unexplained. The tag seems completely appropriate to me, although the Wikipedia article on parapsychology does seem to be a bit condescending about the subject. —Josh3580_talk/hist 05:23, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

To both - thank you for your input and comments. However the issue here is whether the subject of the person's research is considered parapsychological which according to Wikipedia also refers to pseudoscience. Clearly the study of the mind and brain in people undergoing sudden cardiac arrest is an important area and not considered parapsychological or pseudoscience by the mainstream. Furthermore the fact that people report near death experiences in relation to this life threatening condition does not make the subject of the research parapsychological either. In addition all of this person (Parnia's) scientific publications are in reputabile peer reviewed mainstream medical and scientific journals including the New England journal of Medicine and Resuscitation. The assumption that this work or subject is parapsychological would also imnply that these major scientific journals are publishing "pseudoscience". Labeling a scientist's work as paranormal, parapsychological or pseudoscience borders on libelous which is what the editorial policy requests to be avoided. A link to all of Parnia's publications can be found in the US national library of science's search engine pubmed: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=parnia+s%2C. These organizations do not endorse parapsychological works. It is important to avoid bias and remain impartial in Wikipedia. On review of the recent changes made to this article from Dec 2013 to March 2014 - it would appear that most of the changes have been made by people who consider themselves skeptical of the subject of near death experiences. While I am sure bias is not intended and all would agree it is important to address different opinions or interpretations, however this isn't enough to label a scientist's work (that doesn't fit with a specific personal (such as skeptical) opinion) in this way. Again it is important to use peer-reviewed scientific references as the gold standard to back up claims and this subject including Parnia's work being published in mainstream scientific journals doesn't fit the bill. Lastly, while I am sympathetic to the reasoning put forward by Goblin, but again references placed on various societies doesn't make a subject parapsychological or pseudoscientific, nor does a specific book publishers range of subjects. Many publishers publish a wide variety of subjects. I have removed the parapsychology link in order to ensure the article remains balanced and neutral and avoids misrepresentations. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.254.79.43 (talk) 06:42, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

172.254 (and on your other IPS) what you are ignoring is that there are references describing his work in the NDE as parapsychological on the article. Parnia holds strong fringe beliefs about the NDE which are at odds with the scientific consensus. Please also do your research - Parnia has co-written papers with Bruce Greyson and Peter Fenwick two famous parapsychologists who have also written books arguing for mind-body dualism and survival of consciousness. Goblin Face (talk) 13:26, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Gobin face i understand that some people are skeptical about the subject of near death but it is misleading to label a scientist work in the way you have. Your evidence is either non existent or weak at best. Please provide a series of scientific publications that claim the study of cardiac arrest and near death experiences during this time is parapsychological. None of the references you discuss in the article make such claims either as far as i can see. Please review the policy on living people which states that supporting evidence must be strong. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.254.79.43 (talk) 13:49, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Please see the section on near-death experiences in An Introduction to Parapsychology, 5th ed by Harvey J. Irwin, Caroline A. Watt [29]. Any researcher invoking paranormal ideas about the NDE (like Greyson, Fenwick and Parnia) are doing parapsychology. I also recommend you check out the book The Outline of Parapsychology by Jesse Hong Xiong (pages 193-196) which discusses the parapsychology work of researchers like Karlis Osis and Raymond Moody (who have shared similar views to Parnia on the NDE) they are both described as parapsychologists [30]. Goblin Face (talk) 14:08, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Also see the FAQ on the Parapsychological Association for the question "What do parapsychologists study?" - Near Death Experiences are on their list. [31] Goblin Face (talk) 14:17, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

We are not calling Parnia a parapsychologist. We're simply linking to a template on parapsychology. We're doing that because the study of NDEs falls into that category, so readers who are interested in the subject can investigate similar articles.   — Jess· Δ♥ 14:46, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Regarding scientific consensus on the NDE, Parnia's views are in complete opposition. The problem is that Parnia has not been around as long and is not as notable as other researches in the NDE like Raymond Moody so there is little critical coverage of his claims. This paper by Caroline Watt [32] contradicts what Parnia has claimed about the NDE. The problem is that it would be original research to mention it as Parnia is not mentioned in the references. Goblin Face (talk) 16:19, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Sam Parnia has published his research in peer-reviewed publications such as: Resuscitation, Medical Hypotheses, Critical Care Medicine and Respiratory Research (See PubMed database.) According to Stony Brook School of Medicine he is Director of Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation Research (with Board Certification in Pulmonary Medicine (ABIM) and Internal Medicine (ABIM)). I don't see a very strong link to Parapsychology here. Maybe some overlapping research interests, but hardly enough to qualify as Parapsychology. Just my opinion :) --Hawol (talk) 13:35, 2 November 2014 (UTC)

How does this affect the content of this article if he is not referred to as being a Parapsychologist? I don't see the point to your comment. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 04:07, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Well, I have followed Mr Parnia's research for some time and I do not see him as a Parapsychologist, and I have (so far) not found any indications that Mr. Parnia understands himself to be a Psychologist, let alone a Parapsychologist. However I welcome input on this matter if anyone cares to investigate it further. He might have some overlapping research interests with the field of Parapsychology but I don't know if it's enough to call him a Parapsychologist? I can see that there is some popular precedence for labeling his popular (mainstream) books as Parapsychology. The bookseller Barnes & Noble has put his books in the Parapsychology section, and the Library of Congress catalogue mentions Parapsychology as one of the subjects of his popular book "Erasing Death". However, I find it difficult to classify him as a Parapsychologist based upon these secondary labels. His biography at Stony Brook School of Medicine has no mention of Parapsychology, and it describes him as a professor of Medicine, specializing in Pulmonary & Critical Care Medicine. His medical, peer-reviewed, publications are listed in the PubMed database. His 2001 study received approval by the local ethics committee at Southampton General Hospital, while the 2014 AWARE study obtained ethics approvals from each participating medical center prior to recruitment and data collection. These are all signs of professional approval which - in my view -indicate that his medical work belongs in the professional world of Internal and Respiratory Medicine.--Hawol (talk) 16:41, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Where has he been 'classified' as a parapsychologist? The fact is that his notability revolves around his AWARE study work which clearly ties in with parapsychology and there is no original research involved in the tie. The AWARE study is cited in a multitude of sources directly dealing with parapsychology, and that includes popular culture. The template at the bottom of the page merely indicates that his work is connected with parapsychology for readers who have come to Wikipedia in order to further pursue this line of investigation and information. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 23:58, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

I'm not gonna drag out the issue, only make a few final points...so bear with me :). I see that there is a popular perception (mostly among Skeptical blogs) to consider his work as a branch of Parapsychology, but I'm still not convinced about the template, which (in my view) appears to represent an over-simplification of the medical career of Sam Parnia. I don't see much reference to him as an exponent of Parapsychology in major periodicals and news sites. Newsweek (July 23, 2007) calls him "a British pulmonologist", The Register (09/16/2008) calls him "an expert in the field involving consciousness during clinical death", Science Daily (Sep. 10, 2008) calls him "an expert in the field of consciousness during clinical death", University of California, Riverside (May 21, 2013) calls him "director of resuscitation science" and TIME Magazine (Thursday, Sept. 18, 2008) calls him an "expert on the scientific study of death". No mention of Parapsychology in any of these articles. In an interview with Der Spiegel (July 29, 2013) Parnia says: I'm neutral. I'm just a researcher. For many people, death has to do with religion and philosophy, not science. To me, that makes no sense. I deal with death every day in my life. What we study is very scientific, there's nothing paranormal about it. With regard to the AWARE-study, it is possible that the study is associated with Parapsychology in popular culture and in the blog-culture of the WWW. I have not investigated the matter. However, I did notice that Jerry Nolan, Editor-in-Chief of the medical journal Resuscitation (www.resuscitationjournal.com), which published the study, stated that: “The AWARE study researchers are to be congratulated on the completion of a fascinating study that will open the door to more extensive research into what happens when we die.” (University of Southampton Press Release, October 2014). I do not associate this kind of recognition with the domain of Parapsychology. That said, I do of course welcome other viewpoints, and I see that some aspect of Parnia's work (mostly his popular books, published by Barnes and Noble) might be associated with Parapsychology in the popular culture. However, I do not think that this aspect of his work is sufficient in order to label his main work as Parapsychology. - Hawol.

AWARE

In a Dec. 2013 (a month after the paper cited above was published) forum titled "Experiencing death: an insider's perspective" Parnia was discussing dualism et al. when he referenced "the first case that we can verify of someone that had consciousness -at least during the 3-5 minute period in which the brain should not have been functioning- rather than when the brain was coming back online". He notes that they used external stimuli to gauge if the brain was (in layman's terms) still "offline" or if it was "rebooting". The transcript of the forum is here, or for a simpler approach, you can hear it directly from the horse's mouth at the 1:05 mark of this video. During the meeting, he mentions several times that he is unable to thoroughly discuss the results, so he merely "hints" that he is referencing to an OB/NDE. Thus we can't directly say that, but a quote of that assertion should be more than enough. The fact that it may be a "first case" of a medical recording is notable enough for inclusion. And in either case, that particular bit should probably be included to balance the article a bit and deal with the warring. 172.56.0.124 (talk) 09:26, 25 September 2014 (UTC)

Not done: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{edit semi-protected}} template. — LeoFrank  ^Talk 13:03, 27 September 2014 (UTC)

I'm always dubious of using 'straight from the horse's mouth' content per primary source recommendations. In this context, I'm be particularly unreceptive to using the forum material as it leaves far too much scope for being on the POV side of 'interpretative'. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 00:02, 28 September 2014 (UTC)

I propose that the following text is added to the end of the AWARE study section.

"The AWARE study said that "One [participant] had a verifiable period of conscious awareness during which time cerebral function was not expected". The "verification" was that the participant remembered event of the resusciation and a person who performed the resuscitation. The person who performed the resusciation visited the participant the day after the resuscitation. The study interview was conducted weeks after the resuscitation."

The passage demonstrates that the study uses a low standard for verification of the idea that near-death experiences involve people actually looking down on themselves. That is necessary. The issue of primary sources is not relevant here because the AWARE study is a primary source but this section of the article is about the primary source. As for the issue of parapsychology, Sam Parnia is studying parapsychology because he says that the mind can do things which are not accepted that it can do. Specifically, look down from a ceiling when the heart has stopped for two minutes. It does not matter that he is not declared to be a parapsychologist as the facts speak for themselves. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Andrew Nielsen (talk • contribs) 06:31, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

Recently published study

Content based on a study published in the last few days, supported only by that study and an article based on material provided by the institution sponsoring the study, needs careful consideration. Both sources are primary, making them low quality evidence. Content for an encyclopedia should be based on secondary, third party independent analysis, interpretion and context. The details of the results are undue, unless a secondary source considers them notable enough to discuss. - - MrBill3 (talk) 05:12, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Agreed. Essentially, it boils down to the fact that Wikipedia is an online encyclopaedia. Any OR parsing of primary sources runs contrary to the project. We don't write articles on miracle diet pills based on the research findings of the company who produce it. It may be a lame analogy, but it is appropriate. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 05:53, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Science Direct Article metrics (right column): http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0300957214007394 The article has been covered by secondary sources such as Huffington Post, USA Today, CBC and SPIEGEL ONLINE. However, these are not strong sources from a source-critical point of view. I am awaiting academic citing of the article. Preferably PubMed. --Hawol (talk) 16:47, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Well it looks like the study itself has been used for substantial content rather than a secondary source reporting on, evaluating or analyzing this primary source. This flies in the face of policy and the above consensus. This source while not high quality RS supports the content currently in the article and is secondary. Of note is the comment "a mere 2%". A lack of citations, review, analysis, and commentary brings WP:PARITY into play, especially for such a WP:REDFLAG. - - MrBill3 (talk) 06:14, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

References

Science Direct article level metric is now at 521. Two citing articles are mentioned, one of these is another article by Parnia. * Olvera-Lopez E., Varon J."AWAREness during CPR: BE careful with what you say!" Resuscitation, Volume 85, Issue 12, 1 December 2014, Pages A5-A6 * Parnia S. Death and consciousness--an overview of the mental and cognitive experience of death. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Volume 1330, Issue 1, 1 November 2014, Pages 75-93. -- Hawol.

WP:OR

The article contains the following statement, "This research has included investigation of near-death experiences." The source given is a link to a search of pubmed for parnia, s. We should find a source that actually makes this statement, not support it with original research. Doubtless one of the other sources state this, but it should be sourced appropriately. While this seem non controversial, it is necessary for a source to specifically state "research...investigation of near-death experiences" Original research may lead to that conclusion but without a study stating it was an investigation of near-death experiences or a secondary source it is characterization by a WP editor of the subject of research. Just pointing out issues I am finding as I do some ref cleanup and verification. - - MrBill3 (talk) 07:51, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Analysis of AWARE publication

Steven Novella has published an analysis of the published AWARE study in his blog Neurologica. Novella qualifies as an expert published in the scientific literature as a neurologist and on the subject of fringe and pseudoscience. His conclusions and analysis carry WP:DUE weight per WP:REDFLAG and WP:PARITY and should be included in the article. As the article seems fairly controversial I am bringing this here for discussion first. - - MrBill3 (talk) 05:50, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. I'll take a look into it when I have a moment (although I'm swamped elsewhere on Wikipedia). Perhaps you'd be gracious enough to ping me in a couple of days if I haven't gotten back to the publication in question. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 06:06, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for your interest/contributions. In support of WP:PARITY, "Even so, most of the scientific community isn’t interested in this type of inquiry." This source also provides quotes/commentary from notable/expert individuals. - - MrBill3 (talk) 06:30, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Weintraub 2014 in Psychology Today, "Seeing the light" (already a reference in the article) provides some analysis and commentary by experts on the subject of the AWARE study . - - MrBill3 (talk) 09:14, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

I also think given parity (resounding silence in academia) and due Lichfield 2015 in The Atlantic is a good source. Of course if published high quality academic sources would command much more weight. - - MrBill3 (talk) 10:21, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Here is your ping @Iryna Harpy: - - MrBill3 (talk) 18:01, 15 April 2015 (UTC)

References

@MrBill3: Cheers. I've literally just returned from a holiday, but will get to this ASAP! --Iryna Harpy (talk) 23:21, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

Academic consensus not presented

The article states, "Parnia has said he is uncertain the brain produces the mind and has suggested that memory is not neuronal." It does not present the mainstream scientific and academic consensus regarding memory being neuronal (or if the brain produces the mind) as WP:DUE which is required by WP:NPOV. When presenting WP:FRINGE theories they must be clearly identified as such and the mainstream consensus must be presented clearly and prominently per policy. - - MrBill3 (talk) 10:33, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

• It is actually not that "fringe", although I understand your point of view. Several commentators in the field of Near-death Studies share Parnia's viewpoints, and several commentators (See Near-death_studies#Explanatory_models) mention the three main explanatory models of NDE-research, which includes the Transcendental/Mind-Body Separation model. The view may not be mainstream, I agree, but I don't consider it to be fringe either. However, I agree that this is a difficult question, since it involves an explanatory model that is ontologically challenging. The academic consensus, the way I interpret it, seems to be that there are three models. However, I welcome other viewpoints.--Hawol (talk) 15:52, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

I can help with this, please see this article by science writer Mike McRae. Basically Parnia's beliefs in immaterial entities or memory not being neuronal smacks of pseudoscience [33]. Robert the Magician (talk) 20:49, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

Well, there is always a risk that an explanatory model, that is ontologically challenging, might be interpreted as pseudoscience. But let me clarify: Several reliable sources - The Lancet (1990;2001), Psychology Today (1992), Resuscitation (2001), Progress in Brain Research (2005) and Psychiatry (Edgmont) (2009) - include the "Transcendental model" as one of the three explanatory models of NDE-research. Even French (2005:354), who might be considered a skeptic, discusses the three broad categories of NDE-theories, including the Transcendental. When The Lancet published the research of Owens, Cook and Stevenson (1990), and van Lommel et.al (2001), the articles included discussions of the three explanatory models, including the Transcendental model. Please note that I am not saying that this is the correct model. What I am saying is that academic discourse seems to bring up three particular explanatory models.--Hawol (talk) 16:28, 15 April 2015 (UTC)

I think the transcendental model can fairly be called WP:FRINGE in that it "depart(s) significantly from the prevailing or mainstream view in its particular field" and "depart(s) significantly from mainstream science and have(has) little or no scientific support". A small amount of discussion of a model is not scientific support, the mainstream scientific view is widely accepted and has very substantial scientific support. Neuroscience is a strong field with a great deal of solid scientific evidence that has been evaluated, reviewed and replicated. The fact that a fringe theory is discussed in reliable sources does not mean it is not a departure from the prevailing mainstream view. As for scientific support, the evidence for the transcendental model is the definition of "little or no scientific support." While Parnia's ideas (not sure the sources even support a direct connection to the transcendental model) belong in the article, they "should not obfuscate the description or prominence of the mainstream views". The mainstream view is not presented at all, much less prominently and clearly as due. This is a violation of NPOV as explicitly laid out in that policy in multiple sections. - - MrBill3 (talk) 17:33, 15 April 2015 (UTC)

Well, my interpretation of the literature is that there is weak academic consensus. Most commentators, that I have read, present one or several of the three models. The neuro-biological model might of course be considered mainstream, but I'm not sure that it represents a consensus. The psychological model is also very influential, and the Transcendental model does have support in the field of Near-death studies. In an article from Topics in Emergency Medicine (James, Volume 26, 2004) it is even stated that "Absolute consensus on the definition of the NDE among researchers has not been reached.." We see that there is also a problem with definition. The recent article by Lichfield in The Atlantic (The Science of Near-Death Experiences, April 2015), which should be the most up-to-date review of the field from a popular perspective, did not leave me with a strong feeling of what the academic consensus is. I see that the research from Trends in Cognitive Science (Mobbs and Watt, 2011), fronted by Scentific American, often is presented as the official scientific consensus on NDE's. Very well, but lets wait and see if this is a long-lasting perspective. Scientific American is not an official medical manual. However, if there is a strong and solid source, from a well-established medical institution or publication, that officially defines the consensus of NDE-research, then it must of course be given a prominent position in the article.--Hawol (talk) 19:13, 15 April 2015 (UTC)

Whilst I haven't checked in to keep up with the changes being made to this article - my apologies, but I'm seriously bogged down in recent socio-political/economic and geostrategic events - in reviewing the additional content, I'm of the mindset that the content has slid into WP:OFFTOPIC. The article is, per WP:TITLE, a WP:BLP regarding Sam Parnia. This means that it isn't about metaphysics, his real (unless reliably sourced/stated by him) or imagined ontological security, or any other aspects surrounding Parnia and his research, nor anything outside of what his notability concerns (selectively having become AWARE research). Unless Parnia has stated otherwise (meaning the need for RS addressing his personal stance, and what he is attempting to demonstrate via his research), the latest entries are subjective and highly unbalanced interpretations as to the value and significance of AWARE outcomes.

Hawol, the introduction of the 'Transcendental' model is WP:GEVAL. Per WP:BALASPS, please don't mix and match that which is signification¹ / signification² with Parnia's research and empirical critiques with Parnia's intent. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 05:22, 15 May 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure what content you are referring to that you consider to be off-topic. The latest additions to the article were content regarding cerebral oximetry in CPR, which is one of the areas of emergency medicine where Sam Parnia has been active. There has been no input on metaphysical issues or the Transcendental model. The transcendental model has only been introduced to the Talk-pages as a reply to commentators who suggested that the theories of Sam Parnia should be categorized as pseudo- or fringe-science, with which I disagree. Although I understand their point of view :-) --Hawol (talk) 14:20, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

Weak sources

I am questioning two sources that are cited as support for information in this article, Doubtful News [34] and James Randi Educational Foundation [35]. The first mentioned source is a web-portal which bases much of its content on news-stories from other publications. Two editors are mentioned, but there is little information about the editorial process. The portal is operated by Lithospherica, LLC, a fairly unknown Limited liability corporation. This is, in my opinion, a weak source. The skeptical agenda of this site is also quite pronounced, but I'm not gonna make that my main issue here. The other source is a post from the James Randi Educational Foundation. It is published under the SWIFT headline which, according to the foundation, is a blog (See headline New posts on SWIFT! 3/15/2015). For Wikipedia policy on blogs, see Wikipedia:Reliable_source_examples. There is very little information about the editorial process of the Swift Blog and I was not able to find the name of an editor. The foundation has a Board of Directors, but this is not the same as an editorial board. This is also, in my opinion, a weak source. Please note that I am only judging the mentioned websites with regard to their suitability as sources for Wikipedia. As news-portals in the skeptical domain I'm sure that they provide a good service for their readers. If we contrast these two sources with the recently added citing from The Atlantic we will see that The Atlantic is a major periodical with a total circulation of more than 450.000 copies. It names several editors, senior editors, contributing editors, editorial fellows and writers on staff. The magazine has a Senior Director for media inquiries, and a FAQ-section that addresses "Submissions to The Atlantic". All of this makes the editorial process much more transparent. The Magazine's quality as a source is not as good as a peer-reviewed publication (with an editorial board), but it is, in my opinion, much stronger than the two sources discussed above. However, I do welcome other opinions.--Hawol (talk) 13:42, 7 April 2015 (UTC)

Having looked at the two sources (including methods for submitting articles, as well as generalised mission statements), I'm in agreement with you. In my estimation, neither would actually even qualify as reliable WP:BIASED sources for an encyclopaedic article dealing with this subject matter.

By the same token, op-ed pieces in newspapers need to be used with caution, despite "The Atlantic" qualifying as an RS and not yellow press. Perhaps this is worth taking to the WP:RSN providing the context in which it is being used in order to generate more input from uninvolved/neutral editors. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 05:12, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

The content the sources support is the quoted analysis of Caroline Watt. The only relevant RS question would be if the quotes were accurate. I think both sources are strong enough to hold up against that question. Of note also are WP:PARITY and WP:DUE. The article currently contains extensive information from a primary source not review or analysis by a secondary source. - - MrBill3 (talk) 05:33, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Ah, yes. Apologies, but it's been a while since I read over the article. Under those circumstance, of course interviews and quotes from Dr. Watt are entirely in keeping with the use of secondary sources.

In archiving the sources, I was quite shocked to see how many primary sources are being used in the article. Alongside these, university newsletters proliferate the content. I've had ample contact with such 'news' sources: they're unabashed promotional info for public consumption which seldom provide any real insights other than PR for the university, and boast headlines and content that would make the yellow press blush. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 06:03, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

The author (Sharon A. Hill) of the two questioned sources might be considered somewhat of an authority on news handling of fringe science and provides some commentary on this study being covered in the press (Novella also comments on this). The fact the study has been reported on (in the popular press) and some analysis of that reporting might be suitable content. Not sure how the fact that the study has been largely disregarded (it has been cited twice) in academia can be sourced and presented. - - MrBill3 (talk) 06:39, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Recent additions to the list of references include sources from the "skeptical blogosphere". I must express some reservation towards blogs as sources. My impression is that they are not well suited. I encourage contributors to find peer-reviewed journals (with an editorial board) or major periodicals (with editors and writers on staff) in order to build a solid reference-section for the article.--Hawol (talk) 16:44, 15 April 2015 (UTC)

I completely agree the strongest available sources should be found and used. In dealing with WP:FRINGE topics they often don't get evaluated in quality peer reviewed sources or discussed in major periodicals. Novella is a recognized expert in both neuroscience and fringe science. Hill could be considered one of the few with knowledge and experience that lends weight to her comments on coverage of fringe science in popular media. Hill's writing cites and quotes a recognized expert whose commentary and analysis carry due weight. Is there a question that Hill accurately quoted and presented the analysis by Watt or of Watt's or Novella's expert status? - - MrBill3 (talk) 17:59, 15 April 2015 (UTC)

I have replaced these two sources with other sources (see history) that I think are stronger, and which also preserve the skeptical view supported by the removed sources. I still believe that Blogs are not well suited as sources, and this includes the McRae-reference at the end of the article. If the skeptical position of McRae is important for this article, then it would be better to find a Skeptical publication (with an editorial process) that presents a similar argument to the one presented by McRae, and then cite this publication as a reference. Maybe this sounds a bit old-fashioned, but I believe that some kind of editorial process, surrounding the source, is important.--Hawol (talk) 11:06, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

The day I died - Blackmore's criticism

Please note that I removed the following paragraph: "In 2003, Parnia and Peter Fenwick appeared in the BBC documentary "The Day I Died".[5] In the documentary Parnia and Fenwick discussed their belief that research from near-death experiences (NDEs) indicates the mind is independent of the brain. According toSusan Blackmore the documentary mislead viewers with beliefs that are rejected by the majority of scientists. Blackmore criticized the documentary for biased and "dishonest reporting".[23]" I removed it because Dr Parnia appeared on numerous documentaries and TV shows and the level of evidence provided is below peer reviewed scientific publications by Dr Sam Parnia himself which I am using instead, to reflect exactly what Dr Sam Parnia thinks and believes in. Also, concerning Dr Blackmore’s criticism, this was directed at the producer’s reporting of Dr Hameroff’s theory. In fact, on the web she writes (http://www.susanblackmore.co.uk/Articles/Sceptic%202003.htm) : <<This was where my fury erupted. As I wrote to the producer afterwards “it is dishonest to present a completely unworkable and mysterious theory as though it were real science, and to dress it up in the trappings of real science, as you did with Hameroff's theory. It may be true that you "were very clear to point out that is not proven" but pointing out that it is not proven is not the same as pointing out that it (a) does not make sense (b) does not fit with lots of reliable evidence about the brain (c) is rejected utterly by most scientists and philosophers who know about it.”>>Ferrer1965 (talk) 08:57, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

• JuliaHunter (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) Hello, here below some paragragraphs you deleted. Please be so kind to provide explanation why each paragragraph may lead to copyright issues, because after re-reading them they should not - except for one of them which I have rewritten - thank-you in advance for your collaboration Ferrer1965 (talk) 07:23, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

Extended content

1st paragraph : As for any doctor involved in resuscitation medicine, Parnia focuses on cardiac arrest care. Cardiac arrest care consists of two complementary aspects: 2nd paragraph reducing the time period during which there is insufficient blood supply to the brain, heart and other organs in the body. This is done by carrying out cardiopulmonary resuscitation which consists in chest compressions, but which may also include breaths provided by the rescuer or rescue team, by either exhaling into the subject's mouth or nose or by using a an external device that pushes air into the subject's lungs. Great attention is also placed on avoiding hyperventilation which is excessive removal of carbon dioxide, and also providing “timely defibrillation, optimization of hemodynamics, and the use of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation”. 3d paragraph Reducing the effects of post-resuscitation syndrome. This is done by also lowering the body’s temperature (hypothermia). Furthermore, great care is placed on protecting organs from more damage that may result from fever seizures, excess or lack of oxygen, excess or lack of carbon dioxide. Finally an intensive care doctor always does his outmost to ensure that adequate blood pressure is maintained so as to provide adequate cerebral perfusion and avoid damage that may result from the lack of thereof. 4th paragraph Providing optimal cardiac arrest management and care allows to preserve patients’ cerebral functions. Impaired or severely impaired cerebral function (vegetative state) have a significant negative impact on patients’ quality of life. Also patients become a significant burden to society and their families. I propose the following modified version of this, please let me know if you agree : in order to preserve cerebral functions of patients which are significantly correlated to their quality of life, intensive care doctors should always try to provide the best possible care/management for cardiac arrest patients. Patients with very compromised cerebral functions represent a huge distress/concern for their families and very significant cost for society. 5th paragraph His work on monitoring and studying cerebral function in the context of optimal cardiac management has naturally led Parnia to be confronted with cognitive experiences and consciousness during cardiac arrest including the so “called near death experiences”, which he has renamed “actual death experiences". 5th paragraph In 2001, Parnia and colleagues carried out the first prospective study on cardiac arrest survivors in to investigate near death experiences. At that time Parnia still used the terms near death experiences and out of body experiences. References

....... there are more paragraphs where you undid my edits/deleted - but let's start with the above- cheers Ferrer1965 (talk) 07:23, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

Caroline Watt

Caroline Watt's analysis of AWARE's results fails to mention the fact that the patient accurately recalled the timing of the defibrillator, the appearances of the medical team, and what was said during the resuscitation. 94.13.81.144 (talk) 16:41, 17 December 2014 (UTC) 16:41, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

If these were 'facts', I'm certain she wouldn't have omitted such compellingly detailed 'recollections'. Moral of the story: don't read forums, blogs with obsessive believers in the paranormal who preface anecdotes with 'apparently'. Also, please note that this is a Wikipedia article talk page, not a WP:SOAPBOX. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 09:34, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Those recollections don't come from blogs or forums, they come from the Resuscitation journal itself. It's entirely plausible that Caroline Watt would have ignored them - Sam Parnia has been accused of lying, misrepresenting facts and having confirmation bias by a number of materialists, so it seems hypocritical to pretend that Watt is above such things (and I've seen materialists lie to defend their viewpoint just as often as non-materialists, most notably Dan Dennett's "consciousness does not exist"). If this really was not a soapbox, the article would not have randomly added quotes from Caroline Watt in order to disprove the research. 2.223.248.100 (talk) 18:22, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

This is a Wikipedia talk page, not a forum for espousing conspiracy theories. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 00:33, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

What conspiracy theory? I'm not sure what you mean, but I think you're either implying that: Sam Parnia is part of a conspiracy because he found evidence of something on which other scientists have declared some kind of absurd war; or that I think Caroline Watt is part of a conspiracy because there's no other way for a materialist to be wrong. Either way, I'd like actual reasons why all of my points are wrong, not just accusations about conspiracy theories. 90.212.64.68 (talk) 19:54, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Your words: "It's entirely plausible that Caroline Watt would have ignored them - Sam Parnia has been accused of lying, misrepresenting facts and having confirmation bias by a number of materialists, so it seems hypocritical to pretend that Watt is above such things (and I've seen materialists lie to defend their viewpoint just as often as non-materialists, most notably Dan Dennett's "consciousness does not exist")." This is entirely WP:OR on your behalf. What does or doesn't exist in the primary source is irrelevant to Wikipedia as it is based on conclusions/interpretations according to your reading, not the analysis of a peer reviewed and acknowledged academic/expert via a secondary source. Try reading WP:RS, WP:BIAS... and WP:NPOV. I'm not engaging in further communications on this level. Find reliable secondary sources relevant to the content: then there may be something to discuss (unless it's WP:UNDUE). --Iryna Harpy (talk) 02:50, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure why primary sources are irrelevant, but whatever, I'll go with it - I'm not trying to add another source, I'm merely pointing out that Caroline Watt is not a reliable secondary source because her review is incomplete and because she decided that near-death experiences were hallucinations long before the AWARE results were published (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-15494379). (I also wouldn't call her "an acknowledged academic expert", because she lacks a page here on Wikipedia, implying that she is not notable - but I admit that isn't such a good judgement.) 90.196.203.81 (talk) 17:15, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

(It's Feb 2016, I note here for future readers, here's Caroline Watt 's article. fyi. GangofOne (talk) 07:28, 11 February 2016 (UTC))

She doesn't need to be a 'notable' in your sense of the concept to be a secondary source. Neither does she need to be unbiased (see WP:BIASED). The only criterion she needs to meet is that of being an acknowledged expert in the field. You're welcome to have your own POV; form your own opinion through original research; indulge any fantasy world-view or empirical world-view you choose to... but it doesn't belong in the content of an encyclopaedic article. It certainly sounds to me as if you're trying to pick holes in her expert opinion because you just don't like it. Wikipedia has nothing to do with your opinion or my opinion. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 00:47, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

It isn't that she doesn't fit my concept of notability, it's that she doesn't fit what I assumed was Wikipedia's concept of notability. I'm not clear on why Watt doesn't need to be biased, as you've told me to have a neutral point of view before and the pages on systematic bias seem to be against the concept if anything. Being an expert in the field doesn't automatically guarantee freedom from dogmatism or prejudice (which I've already mentioned regarding Dan Dennett and others). As I've repeatedly said, this is NOT original research nor a fantasy world-view as the visual recall of the medical team and the memory of the words was mentioned in the Resuscitation journal. As for picking holes in her opinion, maybe I don't agree with her, but I've picked holes in opinions I do like just as often (as has Sam Parnia, I believe) - in this case I care more about how in-depth her analysis is (if she had come up with another way the patient could have remembered so many details about his cardiac arrest, I would treat this as another flawed study and move back to logical evidence rather than empirical). Besides, Caroline Watt could easily be accused of picking holes in an opinion she doesn't like, so again I have no idea why she is considered a good source for an encyclopaedia with an edit rule about such things. 2.217.197.175 (talk) 20:38, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

My final response: read WP:NPOV. In fact, please familiarise yourself with our policies and guidelines. This is a talk page, not a forum, blog or any other form of advocacy. Thank you for your understanding. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 23:29, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Alright, fine. I understand now that Wikipedia cares more about publicizing the views of "famous" people than presenting rational judgements and facts on a particular topic. I'll stop trying to talk sense into a brick wall. 90.196.201.202 (talk) 21:10, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Do you have any sources of comparable or higher quality? - - MrBill3 (talk) 10:25, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

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Recent edits

• Jess (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) *Debunkerofwoo (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) Hello Jess, I have seen that you have made significant edits to the Sam Parnia's page and deleted significant chunks of text that I had written, after numerous hours of work and careful reading of published Pubmed literature. Why have you not discussed this beforehand on the talk page? (first question)

(second question) Since you did not provide clear explanations, please explain edits/deletions on following pages?

First and foremost the massive deletes on: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=prev&oldid=708040479

then also https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=708040479

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=708084622

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=708087879

thank-you Ferrer1965 (talk) 05:18, 10 March 2016 (UTC)

The only edits you've referenced of mine were copyedits; the resulting text carries the same meaning in more appropriate language. What problem, exactly, do you have with those edits?   — Jess· Δ♥ 15:43, 10 March 2016 (UTC)

• Jess (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) Hello Jess, the massive edits were done by *Debunkerofwoo (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) who has not replied on this talk page and who has no info on his/her user page

Regarding your edits on page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=708040479

REPLACING Since "undoubtedly, as the pathophysiology of so-called near-death conditions, such as acute myocardial infarction, is likely to be quite different from other conditions, such as meningitis, severe pneumonia, or hemorrhagic shock following a car accident, then so too will be the cytokine and hormonal changes affecting the brain in response to these conditions." WITH Parnia writes that a patient will experience different hormone changes in response to different health conditions.

You lose 80% of the information and also it is medically not appropriate. Dr Parnia deals with patients in intensive care who will experiences changes in immune system, hormonal changes, ... So will undo delete and move on to next edits after your reply Ferrer1965 (talk) 15:39, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

We do not need that much detail, and the article does not benefit from the use of medical language. We also should not be using extensive quotes like that when a paraphrase would be sufficient. Lastly, the things Parnia is asserting should not be stated plainly in wikipedia's voice, especially starting with words like "undoubtedly...", as if to imply this is our conclusion. We're simply trying to communicate that Parnia focuses on cardiac arrest patients to control for differences in the patient's condition. That's as much detail as we need. Just a reminder that this is not a medical article; if it were we would need to abide by WP:MEDRS.   — Jess· Δ♥ 17:40, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

• Jess (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) Hello Jess and thank-you for your response. I understand your points and where you coming from. I would hence propose the following: "Parnia writes that a patient will experience different hormonal, immune system .. changes in response to his/her different pathophysiology, which will in turn affect the brain differently." if you are okay I will go ahead and make the edit. Please let me know Ferrer1965 (talk) 08:05, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

@Ferrer1965: Please note that there are a large number of editors watching this article who have grown weary of having to keep the content of the article under control. I, for one, was keeping abreast of the recent changes... and agreed with them 100%. Wikipedia is an encyclopaedic tertiary resource, not a research paper or essay. The eradication of WP:SYNTH and adherence to WP:NOR was very much appreciated. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 00:16, 12 March 2016 (UTC)

• Iryna Harpy (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) Thank-you for your comment and for pointing out WP:SYNTH which was an interesting read. Also I empathise with the weariness of some editors because I have read the talk page several times. However, they have nothing to worry about because I will propose changes via talk page first from now on. Furthermore according to WP:EP and in a good wikipedian spirit, am sure that through good collaborative editing this article will evolve over time into an excellent one WP:IMPERFECT WP:PERFECTION

The new proposal is better, but I'm not sure introducing the word "pathophysiology" is necessary, and it's likely to confuse our lay readers expecting to find a biography rather than a medical article. You're trying to introduce "immune system" into the current wording. Can we just insert that alone? "Parnia writes that a patient will experience different hormone and immune system changes in response to different health conditions." Does that help address your concern? I'd rather not get too into medical terminology, and instead stick close to "Parnia focused on cardiac arrest patients because they are similar." Does that make some sense?   — Jess· Δ♥ 08:34, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

Jess (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) Hi Jess, and thank-you for your message. I appreciate your good intention in making life easy for readers but an elegant solution (to make life easy for readers) is to refer them to a page where terms like "pathophysiology", "cognitive" are explained. And there are specific pages on Wikipedia where everything is very well explained. Regarding the sentence "Parnia focused on cardiac arrest patients because they are similar" am afraid it is not appropriate medically speaking. Rather it is the process they undergo - ie cardiac arrest - that is the same. So, I tried to rewrite the whole thing keeping in mind that we have lay readers whilst also trying to ensure it makes sense from a medical point of view. Here below my proposal:

According to Parnia, the term creates problems for clinical studies because different researchers could be studying patients with very different pathophysiological (refer to Wikipedia page) conditions under the same umbrella term. Some patients could face critical medical conditions, others instead less serious conditions. Some researchers could even study perfectly healthy subjects who had some sort religious experience.[18] So, in order to do away with ambiguity and to reduce the scientific debate and controversy associated with studying mental states of patients and/or subjects under very different pathophysiological (reference Wikipedia page) conditions, Dr Sam Parnia narrowed the focus of his research on the cognitive (reference Wikipedia page) experiences of patients who had a cardiac arrest, hence who actually died. This allows to precisely study the mental experience of death “since the final common biological pathway to death is cardiac arrest”. In other words, in order to die, you need to have a cardiac arrest and the process is well-known. Parnia has renamed the experiences occurring during cardiac arrest with a score of 7 or above on the Greyson's scale[19] to actual death experiences (instead of near death experiences).[18]

Please let me know if this suits you ? and have a nice day Cheers Ferrer1965 (talk) 07:41, 14 March 2016 (UTC)

Jess (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) Hello Jess - I did not hear from you during these last few days. Please let me know your thoughts. With hindsight we could change cognitive to the following :"has to do with reasoning, thinking and memory formation". Also, we could change pathophysiology to "very different disease states and physiologies" (refer to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pathophysiology)

Cardiac arrest management and cerebral oximetry edits

Jess (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) Hello Jess I would like to also work on the paragraphs that were deleted on page : https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=prev&oldid=708040479

I think it is important to talk about the work by Dr Sam Parnia in the field of cerebral oximetry. In order to do that a little bit of explanation is necessary regarding the field of resuscitation/intensive care medicine. Here below a few paragraphs that I would like to add again and that have been deleted by Debunkerofwoo (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) with no explanation:

---

As for any doctor involved in resuscitation medicine, Dr Sam Parnia focuses on cardiac arrest care. This consists of two complementary aspects:

1. reducing the time period during which there is insufficient blood supply to the brain, heart and other organs in the body. This is done by carrying out cardiopulmonary resuscitation which consists of chest compressions, but which may also include breaths provided by the rescuer or rescue team, by either exhaling into the subject's mouth or nose or by using an external device that pushes air into the subject's lungs. Great attention is also placed on avoiding hyperventilation which is excessive removal of carbon dioxide, “timely defibrillation, optimization of hemodynamics, and the use of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation”

1. Reducing the effects of post-resuscitation syndrome. This is done by also lowering the body’s temperature (hypothermia), by placing great care on protecting organs from more damage that may result from fever seizures, excess or lack of oxygen, excess or lack of carbon dioxide. Finally an intensive care doctor always does his outmost to ensure that adequate blood pressure is maintained so as to provide adequate cerebral perfusion and avoid damage that may result from lack of thereof.

Although clinical efficacy of the above procedures, aimed at ensuring optimal cardiac arrest management, has been repeatedly demonstrated, and although international medical guidelines stress their importance and need for implementation, Dr Sam Parnia has highlighted many times how these have been rarely fully implemented “possibly owing to the lack of external regulations regarding the provision of cardiac arrest care”. ---

These paragraphs lead to the work done by Dr Parnia on oxymetry, hence there are a few more paragraphs I would like to add. But let's start with those above. Please let me know your thoughts - Cheers Ferrer1965 (talk) 09:51, 20 March 2016 (UTC)

Dear Hawol and Bill Hawol (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) , since you have been involved on this page and since I have not had any more responses from Jess, I submit you the below paragraph

---

According to Parnia, the term creates problems for clinical studies because different researchers could be studying patients with very different pathophysiological (refer to Wikipedia page) conditions under the same umbrella term. Some patients could face critical medical conditions, others instead less serious conditions. Some researchers could even study perfectly healthy subjects who had some sort religious experience.[18] So, in order to do away with ambiguity and to reduce the scientific debate and controversy associated with studying mental states of patients and/or subjects under very different pathophysiological (reference Wikipedia page) conditions, Dr Sam Parnia narrowed the focus of his research on the cognitive (reference Wikipedia page) experiences of patients who had a cardiac arrest, hence who actually died. This allows to precisely study the mental experience of death “since the final common biological pathway to death is cardiac arrest”. In other words, in order to die, you need to have a cardiac arrest and the process is well-known. Parnia has renamed the experiences occurring during cardiac arrest with a score of 7 or above on the Greyson's scale[19] to actual death experiences (instead of near death experiences).[18]

---

this above paragraph should replace the below 2 paragraphs which also contain medically inaccurate information (for instance "will experience hormonal changes" as if that was the only change being experiences)

---

According to Parnia, the term creates problems for clinical studies because different researchers could be studying patients with very different physiological conditions under the same umbrella term. Some patients could face critical medical conditions, others instead less serious conditions. Some researchers could even study perfectly healthy subjects who had some sort religious experience.[18] Parnia writes that a patient will experience different hormone changes in response to different health conditions,[18] so he chose to focus on patients who had a cardiac arrest.[18] Parnia has renamed the experiences occurring during cardiac arrest with a score of 7 or above on the Greyson's scale[19] to actual death experiences (instead of near death experiences).[18]

Dear Hawol and Bill Hawol (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) also before talking about near death experience I wanted to add the below information which gives a broader perspective on the work done by Dr Parnia.I had added these paragraphs before but they were deleted (see page): https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=prev&oldid=708040479 without any explanations

Well, as it stands now, it will probably need a bit of re-writing. For example, it is unclear why the criteria of hormonal changes is an important motivation for Parnia's research in the field of cardiac arrest. This entry might need some elaboration. As for the general tonality of the article, I believe that it is important to establish that his professional career in the field of emergency medicine is the backbone of his medical orientation and practice. The paranormal aspect of his near-death research comes later, and must not overshadow the fact that this is a physician that is well grounded in the fields of internal medicine, and pulmonary and critical care. --Hawol (talk) 17:48, 24 March 2016 (UTC

COMMENT FROM HAWOL

Well, as it stands now, it will probably need a bit of re-writing. For example, it is unclear why the criteria of hormonal changes is an important motivation for Parnia's research in the field of cardiac arrest. This entry might need some elaboration. As for the general tonality of the article, I believe that it is important to establish that his professional career in the field of emergency medicine is the backbone of his medical orientation and practice. The paranormal aspect of his near-death research comes later, and must not overshadow the fact that this is a physician that is well grounded in the fields of internal medicine, and pulmonary and critical care. --Hawol (talk) 17:48, 24 March 2016 (UTC

Dear Hawol Hawol (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) thank-you for your response. Regarding your mention "criteria of hormonal changes" please note that in the new paragraph there is no reference to hormonal changes:

NEW PARAGRAPH According to Parnia, the term creates problems for clinical studies because different researchers could be studying patients with very different pathophysiological (refer to Wikipedia page) conditions under the same umbrella term. Some patients could face critical medical conditions, others instead less serious conditions. Some researchers could even study perfectly healthy subjects who had some sort religious experience.[18] So, in order to do away with ambiguity and to reduce the scientific debate and controversy associated with studying mental states of patients and/or subjects under very different pathophysiological (reference Wikipedia page) conditions, Dr Sam Parnia narrowed the focus of his research on the cognitive (reference Wikipedia page) experiences of patients who had a cardiac arrest, hence who actually died. This allows to precisely study the mental experience of death “since the final common biological pathway to death is cardiac arrest”. In other words, in order to die, you need to have a cardiac arrest and the process is well-known. Parnia has renamed the experiences occurring during cardiac arrest with a score of 7 or above on the Greyson's scale[19] to actual death experiences (instead of near death experiences).[18]

CURRENT PARAGRAPHS According to Parnia, the term creates problems for clinical studies because different researchers could be studying patients with very different physiological conditions under the same umbrella term. Some patients could face critical medical conditions, others instead less serious conditions. Some researchers could even study perfectly healthy subjects who had some sort religious experience.[18] Parnia writes that a patient will experience different hormone changes in response to different health conditions,[18] so he chose to focus on patients who had a cardiac arrest.[18] Parnia has renamed the experiences occurring during cardiac arrest with a score of 7 or above on the Greyson's scale[19] to actual death experiences (instead of near death experiences).[18]

---

So, Hawol, if you agree with the change, I will go ahead and add the new paragraph and remove the 2 current ones - best Ferrer1965 (talk) 07:30, 26 March 2016 (UTC)

Regarding the other part of your comment "As for the general tonality of the article, I believe that it is important to establish that his professional career in the field of emergency medicine is the backbone of his medical orientation and practice." I totally agree. So please go to page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=prev&oldid=708040479 where several paragraphs I had previously added, were deleted. If you agree I will add them back. The benefit of these paragraphs is to provide an overview of the work done by Dr Parnia in the field of oxymetry. Regards Ferrer1965 (talk) 07:30, 26 March 2016 (UTC)

Hi there Ferrer. You have obviously put a lot of thought into this proposal for a new edit, and it sounds reasonable. The main source for the edit, which I understand to be Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, is also fairly strong. However, I have not read the main source, so I don't know the background for your input. Also, I'm just a regular contributor to Wikipedia, like you, so I'm not in any privileged position to grant editorial green lights. I would rather say it like this: You will just have to test your edit in this community of peers and see wether it holds up. That's the only recommendation I can give. Best regards!--Hawol (talk) 09:57, 26 March 2016 (UTC)

Education

The education section has one source that supports only that Parnia received post graduate PhD supervision from Donna Davies. It does not state he completed the PhD or the field. There is no source for the MD, where granted or the residencies. This may be fairly uncontroversial but should be sourced. A published CV would meet the source requirements, or this may be present in one of the other sources. - - MrBill3 (talk) 07:43, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

• The closest thing to a published CV, that I have found, is the Faculty info (Board Certification, Training and Specialties) and Provider Profile provided by the Stony Brook School of Medicine.--Hawol (talk) 15:27, 9 April 2015 (UTC)
  • Documentation for the PhD-Thesis ("The effect of particulate matter pollution on bronchial epithelial cell responses" - University of Southampton, 2007) is available from British Library EThOS, http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.437882 --Hawol (talk) 10:19, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
    • Documentation for the MBBS (University of London, Bachelor of Medicine + Bachelor of Surgery, 7/15/95) is provided by the The State Education Department (ALBANY, NY 12234), Report of the Committee on the Professions Regarding Licensing Petitions, DATE: October 2, 2012. See Board of Regents: October 2012. The source is strong. However, I am hesitant to include it as a source since I don't know the profile of the document. It is obviously public, but I'm not sure whether it can be used as source-material. Hawol (talk) 15:45, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
      • I have now received indications that the document is available for public review and dissemination. I will include the source, which then will replace the "missing citation"-tag.--Hawol (talk) 09:48, 2 April 2016 (UTC)

BBC

Hello Hawol Krelnik, since you have been involved in the recentest edits of Dr Sam Parnia's page, please find here below proposal to edit the following paragraph:

"In 2003, Parnia and Peter Fenwick appeared in the BBC documentary "The Day I Died".[5] In the documentary Parnia and Fenwick discussed their belief that research from near-death experiences (NDEs) indicates the mind is independent of the brain. According to Susan Blackmore the documentary mislead viewers with beliefs that are rejected by the majority of scientists. Blackmore criticized the documentary for biased and "dishonest reporting".[23]"

I propose to replace it with following:

Dr Sam Parnia has stated that “human mind and consciousness may continue to function in the absence of brain function” (refer to Article - "Do reports of consciousness during cardiac arrest hold the key to discovering the nature of consciousness?") and more recently has written that “our verified case of visual awareness (VA) suggests conscious awareness may occur beyond the first 20–30 s after cardiac arrest ( CA) when some residual brain electrical activity may occur while providing a quantifiable time period of awareness after the brain ordinarily reaches an isolectric state” (refer to Article - Awareness Study")

The reasons for this change are as follows: •First and foremost Susan Blackmore is being misquoted. If you check her blog it becomes clear that her outburst is directed at at the BBC’s reporting of Dr Hameroff’s theory and she is not attacking Dr Sam Parnia or Prof Fenwick. On her blog (http://www.susanblackmore.co.uk/Articles/Sceptic%202003.htm) she writes: <<This was where my fury erupted. As I wrote to the producer afterwards “it is dishonest to present a completely unworkable and mysterious theory as though it were real science, and to dress it up in the trappings of real science, as you did with Hameroff's theory. It may be true that you "were very clear to point out that is not proven" but pointing out that it is not proven is not the same as pointing out that it (a) does not make sense (b) does not fit with lots of reliable evidence about the brain (c) is rejected utterly by most scientists and philosophers who know about it.”>>. •Secondly, as per "WP:NOR" I prefer to use Dr Parnia’s peer reviewed publications since they are more reliable sources of information about what Dr Sam Parnia said (or did not say), than TV shows

Your thoughts ? Ferrer1965 (talk) 12:21, 14 April 2016 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree that Blackmore is being misrepresented here. It's clear in the original text that she is upset with the documentary ("Blackmore criticized the documentary"). Meanwhile, her blog uses the phrase "a completely unworkable and mysterious theory" to describe Parnias work. How is this not an attack on Parnia? I'd say she quite clearly disagrees with both the documentary producers and Parnia/Fenwick too. --Krelnik (talk) 16:56, 14 April 2016 (UTC)

I agree with Ferrer that the TV-show is a poor starting-point for the presentation of Parnia's mind-brain separation model. My proposal would be this: As suggested by Ferrer, find peer-reviewed articles that present Parnia's theory of a mind-brain separation (I have engaged with the tricky issue of "transcendental categories" in the Near-death studies entry [[36]], but only sketchily), and present the theory. The PubMed-database includes the medical journals where Parnia presents his mind-brain separation model. Then include the related criticism of the theory, or skepticism towards the theory. However, I do find that this kind of criticism (the skeptical viewpoint) often is cited from skeptical portals, or publications, with a diffuse editorial process. I would prefer peer-reviewed publications or academic books from a credible publisher. For example, Chris French (Progress in Brain Research, 2005) provides the kind of skeptical viewpoint, on Parnia's theory, that is robust from a source-critical point of view. Best regards! --Hawol (talk) 11:04, 16 April 2016 (UTC)

Hello Hawol I agree with you. Also Wikipedia guidelines clearly state that one should be using reliable sources. On page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_original_research one can read that:

In general, the most reliable sources are: Peer-reviewed journals Books published by university presses University-level textbooks Magazines, journals, and books published by respected publishing houses Mainstream newspapers

I will get back and submit a brief paragraph summarizing Dr Sam Parnia's statements on consciousness. I will try to find Chris French (Progress in Brain Research, 2005).

However, dear co-editors Krelnik, Hawol I also have a general question regarding Dr Sam Parnia's page. Is it really the place to discuss different viewpoints, theories? Isn't it more appropriate to do that on the Near Death Experiences page ? To prove my point, you can check Prof Chris French page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_French it does not go into presenting different viewpoints and theories, and discussing one versus the other. It just summarizes what Prof Chris French has done and thinks. Your thoughts? Ferrer1965 (talk) 08:29, 17 April 2016 (UTC)

In principle I agree with you. I would also have preferred that the article only presented Sam Parnia in an objective, dry, fashion. "This is what he has done, this is what he has published, this is his medical specialty, these are his theories on consciousness..and so on. The reason why skeptical viewpoints are inserted into this article is, I believe, because of Wikipedia-policy (that I have read somewhere, but which I can't retrace right now) that implies that topics that are ontologically challenging, such as aspects of Parnia's mind-brain model, must be elaborated upon. Preferably in a cautionary, skeptical, fashion based upon the consensus view of mainstream medicine. Which I respect! I have no problem with this editorial policy. But it sure makes for some strange reading in Wikipedia-articles, now and then, when every challenging theory is followed by a skeptical insertion explaining away the theory. Maybe this problem has more to do with style, and the flow of language, than with the presentation of opposing views. I believe that opposing views should exist within the article, but the language has (in my view) to be more nuanced. I will not get into the whole "fringe-mainstream-debate", this has been discussed earlier. I only notice that Sam Parnia publishes his research in mainstream medical journals (Critical Care Medicine (journal), Resuscitation (journal), Respiratory Research, Current Opinion in Critical Care ) so, in my view, he belongs to the mainstream. Also, the editorial boards of mainstream journals (such as The Lancet and Resuscitation (journal)) are equipped to handle ontologically challenging (even paranormal-transcendental) theories. This we know from previous publications.--Hawol (talk) 14:49, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

Needs improvement in style and sourcing

We don't say "Dr. Sam Parnia" we say "Parnia". This is written in a chatty style and needs to made encyclopedic. Most importantly, need third-party sources for these claims about themes of his research - who ever wrote this really did WP:OR.

Cardiac arrest management and cerebral oximetry ==

As for any doctor involved in resuscitation medicine, Dr Sam Parnia focuses on cardiac arrest care. This consists of two complementary aspects:

1. reducing the time period during which there is insufficient blood supply to the brain, heart and other organs in the body. This is done by carrying out cardiopulmonary resuscitation which consists of chest compressions, but which may also include breaths provided by the rescuer or rescue team, by either exhaling into the subject's mouth or nose or by using an external device that pushes air into the subject's lungs. Great attention is also placed on avoiding hyperventilation which is excessive removal of carbon dioxide, “timely defibrillation, optimization of hemodynamics, and the use of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation”

1. Reducing the effects of post-resuscitation syndrome. This is done by also lowering the body’s temperature (hypothermia), by placing great care on protecting organs from more damage that may result from fever seizures, excess or lack of oxygen, excess or lack of carbon dioxide. Finally an intensive care doctor always does his outmost to ensure that adequate blood pressure is maintained so as to provide adequate cerebral perfusion and avoid damage that may result from lack of thereof.

Although clinical efficacy of the above procedures, aimed at ensuring optimal cardiac arrest management, has been repeatedly demonstrated, and although international medical guidelines stress their importance and need for implementation, Dr Sam Parnia has highlighted many times how these have been rarely fully implemented “possibly owing to the lack of external regulations regarding the provision of cardiac arrest care”.

Cerebral functions of patients are significantly correlated to their quality of life and, if compromised or severely compromised (vegetative states), they negatively impact patients’ quality of life, create concern and distress for patients’ families and also represent a significant cost for society as a whole. In order to preserve them, intensive care doctors should always try to provide the best possible care/management for cardiac arrest patients.

Since the development of modern system of cardio-pulmonary in the sixties, it has suffered from the lack of a device capable of monitoring oxygen perfusion to the brain. Hence Dr Sam Parnia has greatly focused and successfully tested, through a study on 34 in-hospital patients, a noninvasive real-time method, to be used during cardiopulmonary resuscitation (by the medical teams), that enables monitoring and assessment of the quality of oxygen delivery to the brain.

Dr Parnia's work on monitoring and studying cerebral function in the context of optimal cardiac management has naturally led him to be confronted with cognitive experiences and consciousness during cardiac arrest including the so “called near death experiences”, which he has renamed “actual death experiences".

References

- Jytdog (talk) 14:00, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

@Jytdog: Hello I reverted your edit. As you can see from the long talk page, the text that you deleted (even though you opened a talk page section) has been on the talk page for some time, open to discussion and improvement. Then after sometime it has been published. Hence it would have been appreciated had you opened discussion section on talk page before deleting it. So I feel you kind of started the edit war but I am sure this was not with a bad intention. Feel free to report the first paragraph you think can be improved but allow for sometime for my response. Let's take 1 paragraph at a time okay? Cheers Ferrer1965 (talk) 19:26, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

Do not add this back as it stands. It is not OK as it stands. It doesn't matter how long it was here. It violates the manual of style and needs independent sourcing to show it is worthy of any WEIGHT. if you don't understand the problems, please ask. Jytdog (talk) 19:30, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

@Jytdog: Hi, I see you reverted back the edit despite my reply. I find your tone agressive. I am calling in other editors since given the length of the previous discussions and the volatility of the talk page, changes should be the result of a consensus of a few editors and not just one person. Cheers Ferrer1965 (talk) 20:03, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

Hello Iryna Harpy I know you are somewhat tired of the endless discussions on this talk page, still, could you please jump in and provide your opinion + suggestion for way forward - see above exchanges with Jytdog? Ferrer1965 (talk) 20:37, 20 April 2016 (UTC) Hello Hawol could you also join discussion? Ferrer1965 (talk) 20:37, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

I reverted before you wrote here Ferrer1965. You don't know what you are doing. Please see your talk page. Jytdog (talk) 20:17, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

Hi Jytdog to comply with WP:OR I propose following changes/additions

First 2 paragraphs

As for any doctor involved in resuscitation medicine, Dr Sam Parnia focuses on cardiac arrest care. This consists of two complementary aspects: 1. reducing the time period during which there is insufficient blood supply to the brain, heart and other organs in the body. This is done by carrying out cardiopulmonary resuscitation which consists of chest compressions, but which may also include breaths provided by the rescuer or rescue team, by either exhaling into the subject's mouth or nose or by using an external device that pushes air into the subject's lungs. Great attention is also placed on avoiding hyperventilation which is excessive removal of carbon dioxide, “timely defibrillation, optimization of hemodynamics, and the use of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation” 2. Reducing the effects of post-resuscitation syndrome. This is done by also lowering the body’s temperature (hypothermia), by placing great care on protecting organs from more damage that may result from fever seizures, excess or lack of oxygen, excess or lack of carbon dioxide. Finally an intensive care doctor always does his outmost to ensure that adequate blood pressure is maintained so as to provide adequate cerebral perfusion and avoid damage that may result from lack of thereof

Regarding these first 2 paragraphs, the following pages also confirm that they (2 paragraphs) do not infringe WP:OR  : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiac_arrest and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiopulmonary_resuscitation hence I would add these references as well, to the 2 paragraphs

Regarding the next paragraphs I have found some secondary sources, see below

Although clinical efficacy of the above procedures, aimed at ensuring optimal cardiac arrest management, has been repeatedly demonstrated, and although international medical guidelines stress their importance and need for implementation, significant inter-hospital variations of cardiac arrest patients rates of survival have been shown (comment - secondary source supporting Dr Sam Parnia’s statements)

Dr Sam Parnia has also highlighted many times how these have been rarely fully implemented “possibly owing to the lack of external regulations regarding the provision of cardiac arrest care”.

but please note that Parnia's article can be considered a secondary source in regards to the last above paragraphs

Jytdog Please let me know your thoughts and if okay I will modify the page + move on to work on the remaining paragraphs you deleted - cheers

References

Ferrer1965 (talk) 07:43, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

Hi. With regard to the first two paragraphs, please have a read of WP:RS - Wikipedia articles are not considered reliable sources! {which is wise :) } And in any case, our two Wikipedia articles don't discuss Parnia per se, so would be of no use per WP:VERIFY. What is in the content, has to actually be in the source. On the middle bit, it isn't clear to me what the point of that is exactly. For all of that, you seem to be trying to describe generally what someone who is "a critical care doctor and director of resuscitation research" would be doing. But the sources need to provide information about what he, specifically, has actually been doing.

Hi - okay understood. I have a few references about what he does but they will never be secondary Ferrer1965 (talk) 15:44, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

On the last bit, those articles by Parnia are both primary and not-independent, and the source there is one instance, not "many"... it doesn't support the content you are bringing. For something like, primary and not-independent sources are OK, actually. You are trying to provide content about what he says, and he is the best source for that. But the best thing here would be some profile of him, published someplace respectable, that lays out these broad themes. You just summarize that here and cite that source.

Hello Jytdog read carefully one source analyses 6 independent articles. You can find this under "Executive summary" at

Here is the exceprt: "There are striking disparities in cardiac arrest survival, with some systems of care reporting a 5-fold difference in survival. 1–6 For an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) or in-hospital cardiac arrest (IHCA)"

Number 1-6 refers to sources they analysed

However I agree that the reference to the guidelines makes the article stronger but it is not secondary. Ferrer1965 (talk) 15:44, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

Please think of this like a market research report or the like. If somebody writes that doctors find that drug X isn't working for their patient because of some bad side effect, and they cite some source, you want to be able to go read that source and see that the authors of that report actually went out and talked to doctors about drug X, and that the authors cited medical literature showing that the side effect is real, and maybe showed declines in sales of that drug. real world validation of the claim. You would be disappointed if you looked at the citation and it was something handwavy, and you wouldn't base a business decision on it. Jytdog (talk) 12:02, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation, but see paragraph above Ferrer1965 (talk) 15:44, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

by the way, i just want to say that it is often hard to find good sources on what practicing doctors/researchers are doing. Fortunately Parnia is pretty famous, so there should be interviews and profiles on him. I will look too. Jytdog (talk) 12:06, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

No worry about that, I know many, but unfortunately these will never be secondary. Give me a few days and I will post a proposal. Cheers Ferrer1965 (talk) 15:44, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

Interviews with, and profiles of, Sam Parnia are provided by major periodicals such as Der Spiegel, The Atlantic and Popular Mechanics. --Hawol (talk) 15:04, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

References

Postgraduate student supervision

It is unclear whether the postgraduate student supervision with Donna Davies was part of the postgraduate work with the Human Consciousness Project at Southampton. The way the sentence is formulated now, with the corresponding reference, one gets the impression that these two events are linked. Davies might have been part of the Human Consciousness Project, but I have yet not succeeded in finding a reference for it. She is not listed here. My guess is that the postgraduate student supervision with Davies in 2007 was in cell biology or respiratory medicine, and that it was not part of the Human Consciousness Project, which was launched in 2008. The Davis reference therefore seems out of place, as it stands. Suggestions are welcomed!--Hawol (talk) 15:57, 7 June 2016 (UTC)

we could just delete is as trivia. Jytdog (talk) 20:39, 7 June 2016 (UTC)

Worked over

I worked this over and got rid of junk sources (press releases and blogs). Content about the actual science is sourced to reviews. I could not find any scientific review that has discussed the AWARE trial so I let the content be silent about that. We really need a review to say much about this, despite what the talking heads have to say. Jytdog (talk) 10:49, 25 April 2016 (UTC)

According to PubMed central the Aware study is cited by 3 articles (Case Rep Anesthesiol. 2016; Front Psychol. 2015; Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2015). I don't know how extensively the study is discussed by each article, or if it is just a minor citation. I encourage editors to investigate. As for Cerebral Oximetry I would suggest a PubMed search with the search-terms "Parnia and "cerebral oximetry", which, in my case, produced 11 reults. As for the status of University Press-releases (such as the Southampton University Press release, 2008, Ref: 08/165): I do not view them as strong sources, but I do prefer them over general web-pages such as the the Nour Foundation, Speaker Profile web-page, which seems to be lifted from a program of events, but seems to have no independent context as a type of publication. Best regards! Hawol (talk) 15:49, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

The Nour Fdn page is only used for biographical detail of his career. Nothing more. Jytdog (talk) 16:16, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

I'm including the following information as a blueprint for a paragraph on the impact of the Aware-study (2014). Oksar and Turhanoglu (Case Reports in Anesthesiology) cite the Aware-study in the introduction to their article, noting that "Cardiac arrest survivors recall memories of awareness, fear, and persecution after CPR." Rabeyron and Loose (Frontiers in Psychology) cite the Aware-study in their discussion of Near Death Experiences (NDE), noting that these experiences "occur especially after comas or clinical death, and which some people (after seeing, for example, a tunnel or deceased loved ones) interpret as being a journey in the after life". Li et.al (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) cite the Aware-study in their research on Asphyxia, noting that "Many cardiac arrest survivors report positive near-death experiences with pleasant and peaceful feelings paradoxically during their unconscious period". Lallier, Velly, and Leon (Critical Care) cite the Aware-study in their study of Near-death experiences in survivors of cardiac arrest, and note that "Previous studies, essentially, have been trying to estimate their incidence in various populations, notably after cardiac arrest resuscitation, and to understand the implication of resuscitation characteristics". All sources are gathered from the PubMed-database. None of these articles discuss the Aware-study in detail, but they demonstrate that the results of the study are being picked up by mainstream academic discourse. --Hawol (talk) 11:41, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

PMID 26981288 is a case study, not a review. PMID 26732646 is something, not sure what. PMID 25848007 is a primary source - a research paper, not a review. Lallier is not pubmed indexed but appears to be a primary source. We need a review. You do not seem to be aware of what MEDRS actually says - please see Wikipedia:Identifying_reliable_sources_(medicine)#Definitions. I am sure this will eventually be discussed in a review; it just hadn't been yet, as far as I can tell. Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 19:41, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

Well, as I stated above. None of these sources discuss the Aware-study in detail. That is, they are not reviews. However, they are examples of the Aware-study being picked up by mainstream academic discourse, and a starting point for exploring the impact of the Aware-study here on the Talk-page. It is not only the PubMed-database that gives the citing-history. According to the Scopus Preview the Aware-study has been cited by 11 academic sources. Some of minor importance (such as letters to the editor), while other are more substantial (peer-reviewed articles). According to the Science Direct database the Aware-study is also cited in the second edition of The Neurology of Consciousness (Academic Press, 2016, Pages 323-347). According to the ProQuest database it is also cited in the newly published Nursing Case Studies in Caring (Springer Publishing Company, 2015, p.97). The Aware-study is also cited in peer-reviewed publications that are not picked up by the PubMed-technology, including Mortality (2016, 21:1, pp. 71-87) which is a Taylor and Francis journal, and Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift (2014, 51/52). But again, it is not my understanding that these are reviews. As for reliable sources: I regard most studies, with a PMID, accessed from PubMed, to be fairly reliable. But I now understand that there are some criteria for their use in Wikipedia-articles. Which I will study, thanks to your suggestion. Best regards!--Hawol (talk) 11:15, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

Where it is cited really has no bearing on the discussion.... Jytdog (talk) 15:52, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

Hello Jytdog regarding your edit https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=prev&oldid=717015841

can you please explain why you moved articles by Parnia into bibliography, added subsections instead of leaving them in the main text? Is there a policy you are following? Cheers Ferrer1965 (talk) 05:38, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi. I think I mentioned this above, but if you want to write about someone's work, summarizing it, you really need to be working from a source that actually summarizes his work. His work is his work, not a summary of his work. This is the weird thing about encyclopedia writing. If you or I were writing a review in the literature, we would read all his papers ourselves and summarize them. But that is not OK here - that is WP:OR. Instead I used sources that pull out themes from his work, and cited them. I could have left his own papers in as additional sources, but articles about investigators often have bibliography sections and there is little point in having a paper there, and also in the body. Make sense? Anything that was biographical or really broad themes of his research, I used popular media but when it got down to actually discussing his scientific findings, I used review papers from the biomedical literature. Jytdog (talk) 05:45, 8 May 2016 (UTC)(redact for clarity, sorry Jytdog (talk) 07:09, 8 May 2016 (UTC))

Thanks Jytdog so to discuss broad themes or biographical information you can use popular media but as soon as you start talking about one's research more specifically then you need review articles. Can you then explain to me why you added lots of populat literature references (Time, Psychology today, The Atlantic etc...) right after the Aware study paragraph? Because according to what you say and WP:OR, you should have included a review article or nothing? Ferrer1965 (talk) 06:15, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

You'll notice there is not content about the results of the AWARE trial. Am waiting for a review in the literature to discuss that, to add that content. The popular media is just supporting content giving discussion information about the trial, not the results. Jytdog (talk) 06:34, 8 May 2016 (UTC) (redact for clarity, sorry Jytdog (talk) 07:09, 8 May 2016 (UTC))

Hello again Jytdog - can you explain why you removed "Cognitive Sequelae of Surviving Cardiac arrest including Near Death Experiences" on page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=717018193  ? Because that is an important part of his work as shown by the Aware study Ferrer1965 (talk) 06:27, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

There isn't content about "Cognitive Sequelae of Surviving Cardiac arrest including Near Death Experiences" in the article; there is content about the near death experiences part of that. Jytdog (talk) 06:36, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

Jytdog I would remove reference that you added on https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=717022534 becasue it is 14 years old !

References

--Ferrer1965 (talk) 06:34, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

That source is being used to support content about the founders of HRF. Historical information doesn't become outdated and the older source is fine for that; it is one of the few that I could find actually - the current HRF website is oddly silent about who runs and controls it.. Jytdog (talk) 06:38, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

Last question Jytdog on page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=717024631 you removed because it provided no reference to Sam Parnia. But it certainly provided much needed information to understand the science behind Parnia's work and it is very similar to the wikilink to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Near-death_experience in the first paragraph or to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiopulmonary_resuscitation - your comment ? any policy that come into play here ?

References

-- Ferrer1965 (talk) 06:49, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

That whole section went into a long thing about the theory of studying near death experience, which is not about Parnia; it was what we call WP:COATRACK. That stuff should be in Near death experience perhaps, but not here - you'll notice almost the content that was there is gone. Jytdog (talk) 07:04, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

About that review. I have now had a chance to study these latest findings a bit closer. There is actually one article that, besides quoting the Aware-study several times, devotes two paragraphs (about half a page) to a short review of the study, as well as a reflection on its findings. The article is published in Mortality by authors Tassell-Matamuaa & Lindsay. This is a Taylor & Francis journal promoting the interdisciplinary study of death and dying. A peer-reviewed journal with an editorial board. The journal is indexed in several major databases (for example Applied Social Sciences Index & Abstracts (ASSIA), British Humanities Index (BHI), Educational Research Abstracts online (ERA), PsycINFO, Scopus). However, it is not my impression that this is a biomedical publication. Ingrenta Connect list it as a journal covering the areas of Public Health, Psychology and Families & Communities. So, if the criteria for a new edit is a biomedical treatise, then this article probably does not qualify as a review. However, if the criteria for a new edit could be expanded to also include shorter mentions, and other epistemologies (psychology, sociology), then this article could (in my view) be a modest starting point. Just a suggestion! --Hawol (talk) 15:38, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

Howol. A "review' is a kind of scientific article, a genre. Here are three kinds: read: Literature review and systematic review and meta-analysis. If you look at a ref in pubmed, there is a actually a field called "Publication Types, MeSH Terms, Substances " that if you look there, will tell you if the article is a review or not. To be clear the article you seem to be referencing is this one. That is not a review article. It is some kind of theoretical hypothesis spinning. Look, Parnia is a hardcore scientist. He does research. We need an actual review article to work with here. Not this softcore stuff. Jytdog (talk) 22:08, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

Look, I respect this hardline Wikipedia policy of biomedical relevance. If you publish your research in Resuscitation, then you are obviously part of the hard data of biomedical research. Rest assured, I'm not gonna start the whole Hard data-Soft data-debate, because it's tedious. I just wanted to make the point that in the case of the Aware-study, which introduces the Greyson NDE Scale (Table 1) as a crucial epistemological tool, as well as a broad range of (soft data) cognitive themes, it is not implausible that the social sciences, represented by the short review in this article, might also contribute some insight (however soft, or modest) to the topic. Both tables 2 and 3 are also soft data. Actually, I won't be surprised if the social sciences come up with a review that will satisfy Wikipedia-policy. But, I'm not gonna drag this out. As you say, Parnia is a scientist that does research, so we'll keep looking for a good review.--Hawol (talk) 13:37, 13 May 2016 (UTC)

Hello Jytdog on page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=717029759 you justified the edit by writing that "‎Near death research: that ref was a train wreck. not a book" - can you explain? ThanksFerrer1965 (talk) 03:48, 17 May 2016 (UTC)

There are various templates you can use to format a citation. See all the examples here: WP:Citation templates. Who over created that citation used the "cite book" template, but the reference was a journal article. I generally don't care how people format a ref (some people are unbelievably anal about this) but what is there, should be actually useful to find the reference. The citation as it stood was barely useful because it had all the wrong parameters - it was a train wreck. I changed the format so that it cited a journal article, removed the useless information, and added useful information including the PMID, as that is the single most useful parameter for a journal article. Jytdog (talk) 04:04, 17 May 2016 (UTC)

Thank-you for your reply Jytdog- another question - on page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=prev&oldid=717030598 you justified the edit saying "not about research" - that is because the text was under the near death research section right? Ferrer19 (talk) 18:38, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

Yes, and that was mind-body stuff. Jytdog (talk) 19:02, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

arbitrary break

Thanks Jytdog- and what about edit on page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=717034076  ? Why did you remove "with methods aimed at measuring the quality of oxygen delivery to the brain." You said that "‎Near death research: remove discussion of results; we have no independent reviews in the biomedical literature discussing them yet." but that specific sentence you removed is not mentioning any results ! so why did you remove it? Ferrer19 (talk) 19:27, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

Yes I wanted to have minimum description of any thing scientific there - protocol as well as the results - until we have a review. I mentioned the target thing as it has been so prominently featured in the media coverage and is pretty simple but more technical stuff like everything they measured, we should source from a MEDRS source. Jytdog (talk) 19:38, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

you mean a medical review source? in other words a secondary article , Ferrer19 (talk) 19:41, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

yes Jytdog (talk) 22:29, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

Also, regarding page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=717037237 which policy allows such long quotes in the references? And why do you never add reference to scientific articles by Sam Parnia in the actual text? Ferrer19 (talk) 19:53, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

putting quotes in references is something I rarely do. Some people do it a lot -- see the refs at the bottom of Talk:Beta-Hydroxy beta-methylbutyric acid for an example from someone who does that all the time. The length of quotes is really governed by fair use copyright law. In my view the length of this quotation is within bounds. The reason I chose to do it with this ref in particular, is that it ~seemed~ to me while I was editing, that a bunch of the content around the mind/brain thing had been added by advocates who really love Parnia and or think he is full of crap, and I wanted to provide a neutral summary of what he said in the actual article content, but provide a significant quote from him in case anybody (on any side) felt the summary wasn't fair one way or the other, both to check it and just to have it there in the footnotes. Jytdog (talk) 22:29, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

Jytdog thank-you for kind reply and explanation. It is clear. However what is still a puzzle is why there is never a single reference to Sam Parnia's article, review papers etc... I mean we have a selected bibliography section but we never, ever, refer to any of this material in the text of the page. Why is that? Thanks for your answer Ferrer1965 (talk) 00:21, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

In general I always try to use independent secondary sources, and summarize them, instead of reading what Parnia wrote, deciding myself was was important that he wrote there, and expressing that - doing that comes close to WP:OR. Independent, secondary sources are just about always best. Jytdog (talk) 07:25, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

Hello Jytdog - on page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=717602147 you deleted following text: "An area of Parna's research is also the testing of non-invasive real-time methods, to be used during cardiopulmonary resuscitation (by the medical teams), to enable monitoring and assessment of the quality of oxygen delivery to the brain. --- and you said that "this =brain oximetry which is already mentioned. Please do not add content like this based on articles by Parnia" -- but what you deleted is simply a brief 2 lines description of an area of research (of Dr Sam Parnia). Nowhere are results ever mentioned. You are probably going to reply we need information from a MEDRS source, but again I insist, there is absolutely no mention of results - simply a brief description of work on oximetry. We need to provide this description and explanation to readers

References

Ferrer1965 (talk) 00:45, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

Hm... so the start of the career section says "Parnia is known for his involvement in the field of emergency medicine and cardiac arrest resuscitation. He advocates for wider application of best practices for resuscitation when people die; namely better, perhaps automated cardiopulmonary resuscitation techniques, the use of targeted temperature management, extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, brain oximetry, and prevention of reperfusion injury, and wrote his book, Reversing Death (published in in the UK as the Lazarus Effect) as part of that effort." The content you added discusses those things again. but I think i see your objection, in that the existing content doesn't see that he does research - just that he advocates and is involved in. That is a good point. I will just add "studies and" to the 2nd sentence.... Good point, thanks! Jytdog (talk) 07:29, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

Hello Jytdog we are completely aligned - great!

Hello Jytdog last question - can you explain what you mean by "This is promotional and counting citations of Parnia and mentioning that count is WP:OR)" on page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=717651240 thanks in advance for your reply Ferrer1965 (talk) 00:51, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

OK, so the text that you added there said

"Significant 5-fold differences in cardiac arrest survival, both-out-of hospital and inter-hospital, have also been reported by an American Heart Association report (where six different publications were cited).

References

That was kind of a strange edit... it seemed to me that the content is trying to give Parnia credit for the increase in survival, and was trying to do that by actually counting how many times his papers were cited. If that source actually discussed Parnia by name and gave him credit I would see how the content would make sense (just summarizing that) but if I am right about what you were doing there, you can't do the OR of counting citations and yourself creditng Parnia.... Jytdog (talk) 07:35, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

Then I obviously did not express myself clearly enough. What I wanted to say is as follows: just like Dr Sam Parnia stresses and insists that many people who are actually dead from heart attacks or blood loss could be resuscitated if contemporary best practices were used promptly - the American Heart Association report points in the same direction by highlighting significant 5-fold differences in cardiac arrest survival, both-out-of hospital and inter-hospital.(in other words) these huge differences are due to the fact that some resuscitation teams use best practices and some do not. Basically this reference I added support Parnia's saying "that many people who are actually dead from heart attacks or blood loss could be resuscitated if contemporary best practices as defined by the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation were used promptly " if you agree - can we add the reference back ? Cheers Ferrer1965 (talk) 22:42, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

Hello Jytdog on page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=717651404 you said you (→‎Selected bibliography: declutter refs) and you removed lots of doi numbers - could you be so kind to explain why ? thanks in advance for your kind reply Ferrer1965 (talk) 22:50, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

that is just a style thing. To me they are not that useful and they are visual clutter. Pubmed is the really important and useful link. But if you or someone were to add the doi back, I would have no basis to formally object and would let it stand - it is a totally valid citation parameter. Jytdog (talk) 02:28, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

Hello Jytdog - I guess this is probably my last question about the Parnia's page. On page https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=next&oldid=720662730 you wrote that (→‎Career: don't need this here; cited below in bibliography) but I am not sure I understand why you never ever refer to publications within the text. Because you could for instance find yourself in a situation where certain infos are only mentioned within a publication and you need to refer to it within the text. So could you explain this "no refer to academic publications within the page's text" approach you have? please - is this a WP policy? thanks in advance - Best Ferrer1965 (talk) 23:55, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

So... the mission is to provide readers with accepted knowledge about whatever the topic at hand. We identify what is "accepted knowledge" - our epistemology here, as it were - is that we look at what independent, reliable sources say about something. The content there is completely well supported by the Spiegel ref. Nothing else is needed. Additionally that source - as much as it goes over resuscitation science, only says once "Although these measures have been shown to be efficacious and have largely been recommended through international medical guidelines, they have rarely been implemented in= their entirety, possibly owing to the lack of external regulations regarding the provision of cardiac arrest care." and doesn't go so far as our content does, to express Parnia's explicit claim made elsewhere that many more lives could be saved if best practices were implemented. So it didn't really support the content.

On your policy/guideline question, it would be fine to add a primary source in addition the secondary one, if that primary source actually supported the content. To be even more clear, under policy and guideline you can support content with primary sources only. It is not what one should do, but one can. You just have be to be careful not to interpret the primary source at all. Jytdog (talk) 03:14, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

Hello Jytdog and thank-you for your reply. You are saying that "and doesn't go so far as our content does, to express Parnia's explicit claim made elsewhere that many more lives could be saved if best practices were implemented. So it didn't really support the content." but if you read carefully the source that I proposed, it says:

"Executive Summary

For >40 years, the American Heart Association (AHA) has produced guidelines for cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and emergency cardiovascular care (ECC). Through promoting the principles of the chain of survival, that is, early recognition and activation of emergency medical services (EMS), early CPR, early defibrillation, and early access to emergency medical care, the AHA has contributed to saving hundreds of thousands of lives around the world over the past 50 years. Despite this success, the full lifesaving potential of an optimized system of care remains elusive in most communities. There are striking disparities in cardiac arrest survival, with some systems of care reporting a 5-fold difference in survival.1–6 For an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) or in-hospital cardiac arrest (IHCA) victim to survive, witnesses and initial responders must be ready, willing, and able to take quick action within a comprehensive patient-centered system of care. Such systems must be able to rapidly coordinate and integrate each aspect of resuscitation care that is focused on optimizing patient survival with good neurological function and return to prearrest state. "

Reading the above executive summary, it seems that and it goes very far and supports the content. Also, the Journal Circulation (by the American Heart Association) is Pubmed indexed and provides several references to support its claims. We could consider it a secondary source. So I am surprised you do not agree with adding it as a reference. Cheers Ferrer1965 (talk) 05:38, 9 June 2016 (UTC)

Muddle and woo, sourced to press release too

Content about Parnia's notions of the brain/mind issue were formerly scattered around the article, for example in this version which had the following bits of content:

Career

Parnia is often confronted with the paranormal aspect of his research, and the resistance to the type of studies that he is conducting in the mind/brain-area. His answer has been that he does not consider it to be paranormal, but to represent a new field of science.

Near death research

In 2003, Parnia and Peter Fenwick appeared in the BBC documentary "The Day I Died". In the documentary, Parnia and Fenwick discussed their belief that research from near-death experiences (NDEs) indicates the mind is independent of the brain. According to Susan Blackmore, the documentary mislead viewers with beliefs that are rejected by the majority of scientists. Blackmore criticized the documentary for biased and "dishonest reporting".

In his book Erasing Death and a series of interviews, Parnia has explained that, although most people view death as irreversible, he claims that resuscitation research shows it may be reversible. Parnia has said he is uncertain the brain produces the mind and has suggested that memory is not neuronal. He has claimed that research from NDEs may show the "mind is still there after the brain is dead". However, neurologist Michael O'Brien has written that "most people would not find it necessary to postulate such a separation between mind and brain to explain the events," and suggested that further research is likely to provide a physical explanation for near-death experiences.

AWARE

Science writer Mike McRae has noted "While Parnia's work contributes valuable data to understanding NDE as a cultural phenomenon, his speculations do indeed sit on the brink of pseudoscience."

References

After reading all the sources and considering the article as a whole, I gathered this together into a section on its own, and removed what I see as POV pushing from skeptics as well as proponents. After reading every thing, in my view the exact nature of the relationship between the brain and mind is not a big deal to Parnia and when he says things it is generally couched in something like, "Well I don't know and this is not the point but based on the results I have seen maybe X is what is going on". It is not something that should be given a lot of WEIGHT but should be mentioned briefly. So this is where I ended up:

Parnia and others have suggested that a mind that is mediated by, but not produced by, the brain, is a possible way to explain NDE.

Science writer Mike McRae has noted "While Parnia's work contributes valuable data to understanding NDE as a cultural phenomenon, his speculations do indeed sit on the brink of pseudoscience." Neurologist Michael O'Brien has written that "most people would not find it necessary to postulate such a separation between mind and brain to explain the events," and suggested that further research is likely to provide a physical explanation for near-death experiences. The psychologist Susan Blackmore appeared with Parnia and Peter Fenwick on a BBC documentary called "The Day I Died" and disagreed with their interpretations of NDEs, finding purely physical explanations to be more plausible.

References

That was replaced with this, which sources things to ^U*^%$^&* press releases, mixes reactions to the study which is actual science, with reactions to Parnia's acknowledgely semi-formed notions of brain/mind. A badly sourced muddle.

Parnia and the AWARE study investigators have stated that the occurrence of consciousness and awareness during cardiac arrest may reflect cases in which individuals undergoing cardiac arrest resuscitation had received higher quality oxygen delivery and resuscitation to the brain, leading to conscious awareness and mental recollections . However, according to Parnia results of studies of consiousness during cardiac arrest may also indicate that like electromagnetic waves, human consciousness may be a very subtle type of matter that mediates brain activity, but is not necessarily produced by the brain. There have been mixed reactions to the results of Parnia's research into consciousness and near death experiences during cardiac arrest. The editor-in-Chief of Resuscitation, stated: “The AWARE study researchers are to be congratulated on the completion of a fascinating study that will open the door to more extensive research into what happens when we die.” Gerald Woerlee an anesthesiologist and writer called it a "landmark study". Science writer Mike McRae has noted "While Parnia's work contributes valuable data to understanding NDE as a cultural phenomenon, his speculations do indeed sit on the brink of pseudoscience." Neurologist Michael O'Brien has written that "most people would not find it necessary to postulate such a separation between mind and brain to explain the events," and suggested that further research is likely to provide a physical explanation for near-death experiences.

References

--Jytdog (talk) 18:11, 19 August 2016 (UTC)

Content sourced to press release

This whole section with its near COPYVIO-length quoting is sourced to a press release. We don't source important content to garbage sources like press releases.

According to a joint State University of New York and University of Southampton press release: "39% of patients who survived cardiac arrest and were able to undergo structured interviews described a perception of awareness, but interestingly did not have any explicit recall of events. Among those who reported a perception of awareness and completed further interviews, 46% experienced a broad range of mental recollections in relation to death that were not compatible with the commonly used term of NDE’s. These included fearful and persecutory experiences. Only 9% had experiences compatible with NDEs and 2% exhibited full awareness compatible with OBE’s with explicit recall of ‘seeing’ and ‘hearing’ events. One case was validated and timed using auditory stimuli during cardiac arrest". Summarizing the conclusions of the study investigators, Parnia had stated: “This is significant, since it has often been assumed that experiences in relation to death are likely hallucinations or illusions, occurring either before the heart stops or after the heart has been successfully restarted, but not an experience corresponding with ‘real’ events when the heart isn’t beating. In this case, consciousness and awareness appeared to occur during a three-minute period when there was no heartbeat. This is paradoxical, since the brain typically ceases functioning within 20-30 seconds of the heart stopping and doesn’t resume again until the heart has been restarted. Furthermore, the detailed recollections of visual awareness in this case were consistent with verified events. Thus, while it was not possible to absolutely prove the reality or meaning of patients’ experiences and claims of awareness, (due to the very low incidence (2%) of explicit recall of visual awareness or so called OBE’s), it was impossible to disclaim them either and more work is needed in this area. Clearly, the recalled experience surrounding death now merits further genuine investigation without prejudice." The researchers also advocated for further studies to "explore whether awareness (explicit or implicit) may lead to long term adverse psychological outcomes including post-traumatic stress disorder".  

References

-- Jytdog (talk) 17:50, 19 August 2016 (UTC)

Jytdog - it is important to summarize the results of the study- don't you agree? then why are you deleting them. There are multiple sources. If your issue is the press release we can add the information based on other neutral reports. There are many sources that have accurately condensed the study findings. Please explain the issue? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ferrer1965 (talk • contribs) 18:08, 19 August 2016 (UTC)

We discussed this issue several times in the past. I will repeat is since you have forgotten or are ignoring those discussions. The results of the study are medical science and we source medical to secondary sources to reviews in the literature per MEDRS. Jytdog (talk) 18:13, 19 August 2016 (UTC)

Sponsored

Not true. The underlined content was added by Ferrer and is not true and not supported by the Time source:

Parnia was the principal investigator of the AWARE Study, which was sponsored by the University of Southampton and launched in 2008.

References

I removed it. Jytdog (talk) 17:48, 19 August 2016 (UTC)

Jytdog - please read the sources again. It clearly states University of Southampton is the study sponsor. Why do you disagree? If so who is the AWARE study sponsor? This is in the official press release from the university of Southampton. There is another source that I had added and you had deleted. I dont want to get into edit wars but you do not explain why you have deleted my edits. So can't follow your logic? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ferrer1965 (talk • contribs) 18:06, 19 August 2016 (UTC)

Please provide the quote from Time that says that. Jytdog (talk) 18:11, 19 August 2016 (UTC)

My suggestion is that we forget about the TIME source, and (instead) focus upon finding other sources. The press-release (published on the University's own website) does in fact say that "The AWARE (AWAreness during REsuscitation) study is to be launched by the Human Consciousness Project of the University of Southampton". Both the BBC and The Independent confirm the University of Southamptons involvement in the project. Then again, these are news-sources. Stronger sources are welcomed.--Hawol (talk) 13:21, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

The issue is the word "sponsored". This word has meaning in the field of clinical research. Generally it means "the one who paid for". With regulatory agencies, it means "the entity/person who was granted the legal right to run this trial and is responsible for it before the law". None of the sources support either meaning. Jytdog (talk) 19:30, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

Well, the sponsorship is stated by the press-relsease (7 October 2014), which appears to be published by the University of Southampton Media Relations office. Whether or not this is a strong source can probably be discussed. I think it is o.k., but I would prefer a stronger source for an encyclopedic entry. The Science Daily also confirms the sponsorship, but I think this source is not strong enough. However, my point was not the sponsorship. I'm only bringing attention to the fact that the University of Southampton is fairly involved in the project. A further search for credible sources will then, hopefully, throw some light upon the extension of the involvement.--Hawol (talk) 13:35, 24 September 2016 (UTC)

does this edit give you what you want? Jytdog :(talk) 18:02, 24 September 2016 (UTC)

Well, he started at Southampton, but at the time of publication in 2014 he was at Stony Brook, but that is only a minor detail. He was probably still affiliated with Southampton at the time, I'll check. However, regarding the issue of sponsorship; the EurekAlert!, an an online, global news service operated by American Association for the Advancement of Science, brings some relevant information. In a note to editors (Public Release: 7-Oct-2014, note 4) they inform that the "The AWARE study was sponsored by the University of Southampton, UK and funded by The Resuscitation Council (UK), Nour Foundation and Bial Foundation." According to this source sponsorship and funding appears to be divided among different organizations. The University of Southampton Media Relations seems to be the main source for this public release, but Elsevier newsroom is also involved.--Hawol (talk) 14:00, 26 September 2016 (UTC)

use of the word "sponsored" is not acceptable as discussed above. Please propose something acceptable. Jytdog (talk) 20:44, 26 September 2016 (UTC)

It's not a proposal. Only relevant information.--Hawol (talk) 11:14, 30 September 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Manual of Style

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Hello Jytdog (talk · contribs) - provide explanations for your deletions especially for deleting information from a review article and reverting to bloggy sources - grazie Claire.Poggi (talk) 06:38, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

i said MOS issues were one of the problems. "Dr. Parnia" is one of the MOS issues. Please do read WP:MOS. Pleaase also read WP:INDY, WP:RS, and WP:MEDRS. Please also read this Talk page and its archives - most of the changes you proposed have already been discussed here. Jytdog (talk) 06:48, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

Jytdog (talk · contribs) your deletions go against what you wrote on the 24th of October https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sam_Parnia&diff=prev&oldid=745928415 "we want secondary sources that describe what he thinks". A secondary source has been provided but you deleted it. Also your deletion goes against the policies you point to – for instance WP:INDY talks about

Reliability: this is a review article and standards of peer review are met as well as fact-checking.

Third-party: this is obviously published by a third-party source which is independent and unaffiliated with the subject

Finally the review article you deleted has never been used in the section on brain/mind/consciousness and has never been discussed in the talk page for such a use (I have read the archives)

... so what you say ? Bohbot366 (talk) 05:24, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Oh hi, you came back! here is your dif. Which part are you talking about? Jytdog (talk) 05:27, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Hi Jytdog if you check [37] you wrote "no thanks. we want secondary sources that describe what he thinks", then a few days later, after a review article has been added you erase that as well - so it makes no sense. If you do not bring a rationale justification I am reverting to what Claire.Poggi edited. What does everyone else Alain110995 (talk · contribs) Claire.Poggi (talk · contribs) think ? Bohbot366 (talk) 09:41, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Both accounts added articles by Parnia, to describe Parnia's ideas. This is what i mean about the issue with indy. We want third party sources, everywhere in WP. Jytdog (talk) 19:15, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Let’s break down the WP:INDY criteria and apply them to all publications currently referenced under

Brain/mind hypotheses

also including the review article by Parnia (and deleted by Jytdog). Also let’s take into consideration WP:MEDRS and the need for secondary sources

Point 1: Reliable: A third-party source is reliable if it has standards of peer review and fact-checking. In general, the more people engaged in checking facts, the more reliable the publication.

Point 2: Third-party: A third-party source is independent and unaffiliated with the subject, thus excluding first-party sources such as self-published material by the subject, autobiographies, and promotional materials.

Point 3 Ideal sources for biomedical information include: review articles (especially systematic reviews) published in reputable medical journals;

Point 4 Point 4 Sources: At least two third-party sources should cover the subject, to avoid idiosyncratic articles based upon a single perspective.

Now let's look at the references one by one:

This reference meets all the above since it is from a review article, peer reviewed and referenced in Pubmed. It is written by someone with no vested interest in the topic since the author, the publisher have no financial or legal relationship to the topic.

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The above reference does not meet criteria 1 since not peer reviewed, and does not meet point 3 – it is not a review article, so should be eliminated.

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The above references do not meet criteria 3 they are not review articles (and are not even indexed by PubMed), so should be eliminated.

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Finally Meets all above points except point 2 since it is written by Sam Parnia himself. However, WP:INDY also says that “Interest in a topic becomes vested when the source (the author, the publisher, etc.) develops any financial or legal relationship to the topic. An interest in this sense may be either positive or negative.” And I personally do not see what vested financial/legal relationship could at stake here. Also, the author is just making a hypothesis saying that we should consider the possibility of a mind independent of the brain. That is all. He is not making any bold statements. So I would propose to keep the last and first article – both review articles which would also allow us to comply with rule (point 4) from WP:INDY

Is everyone okay with this ? Bohbot366 (talk · contribs) Jytdog (talk · contribs) Claire.Poggi (talk · contribs)

References

--Alain110995 (talk) 05:31, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

This part of the article is not WP:Biomedical information so MEDRS doesn't apply. So the analysis is above is incorrect. WP:INDY applies always, to MEDRS and RS. All we are trying to do here is briefly summarize Parnia's thoughts on the brain/mind issue. This is really biographical. This section has been subject to really bad advocacy from people who think Parnia is a loon and people who are his fans. It is not something he goes into great depth anywhere that i have seen, and when he does he is pretty tentative (from what i have seen his focus is trying to do science on near-death experiences, not solve ancient philosophy problems). There are few independent, reliable sources that talk about it much. (lots of bloggy sources that rip on him or love him, and we want to steer clear of them or touch on them lightly) Jytdog (talk) 06:05, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Weak sources for Brain/mind hypotheses section

@Jytdog: Hello – thanks for your comments. I'm a bit surprised by the alerts on my talk page (|Bite the newcomers|WP:BITE|). I've tried to replace weak sources by more neutral or expert comments (i.e. Editor-in-Chief of Resuscitation). I agree that press release are not that well suited too. So, ok to remove it. For the other reference, here is a comment from the archive that reflects my analysis about this section:

I still believe that Blogs are not well suited as sources, and this includes the McRae-reference at the end of the article. If the skeptical position of McRae is important for this article, then it would be better to find a Skeptical publication (with an editorial process) that presents a similar argument to the one presented by McRae, and then cite this publication as a reference. Maybe this sounds a bit old-fashioned, but I believe that some kind of editorial process, surrounding the source, is important.--Hawol (talk) 11:06, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

. What do you think about it ?

References

-- Enamdi (talk) 12:50, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

If you edit aggressively to remove criticism and add promotional content in Wikipedia, you will get firm pushback. Don't edit aggressively and then complain about BITE. If you were to edit more cautiously like someone who is claiming newbie protection should do, then you wouldn't get warnings like this. If you want to start over with a more appropriate level of caution, like someone learning how to drive, then do so. Jytdog (talk) 15:38, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

@Jytdog: Here is the edit from last September for more neutral sources in the section about the "Brain/mind hypotheses". This edits shows the two major models postulated by Parnia from a review article. I removed the blog post comment from Rae (see above the argument from Hawol). Is this "aggressively remov[ing] criticism and add[ing] promotional content in Wikipedia" as you have suggested ?

I agree to remove Nolan's comment (editor in chief of the journal Resuscitation) since it's a press release (weak source). So, here is my suggestion for this section:

Brain/mind hypotheses

Parnia and others have suggested that a mind that is mediated by, but not produced by, the brain, is a possible way to explain NDE.

Neurologist Michael O'Brien has written that "most people would not find it necessary to postulate such a separation between mind and brain to explain the events," and suggested that further research is likely to provide a physical explanation for near-death experiences. The psychologist Susan Blackmore appeared with Parnia and Peter Fenwick on a BBC documentary called "The Day I Died" and disagreed with their interpretations of NDEs, finding purely physical explanations to be more plausible.

In a review article, Parnia admits that the nature of consciousness is still an unchartered territory for science. Two different major models have been postulated:

1. one envisages the psyche/consciousness/mind (self) as the result of neuronal activity. So a causative relationship exists between cortical activity and consciousness
2. the other instead considers that consciousness is separate from the brain and can influence brain activity independently of the brain.

In the same article, Parnia explains that the observations that "the human mind, consciousness, or psyche (self) may continue to function when brain function has ceased during the early period after death" (such as during the AWARE study, but not only) points to the possibility that the second model may have to be taken into account.

References

-- Enamdi (talk) 12:34, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

Weak sources for Brain/mind hypotheses section

@Jytdog: Hello – thanks for your comments. I'm a bit surprised by the alerts on my talk page (|Bite the newcomers|WP:BITE|). I've tried to replace weak sources by more neutral or expert comments (i.e. Editor-in-Chief of Resuscitation). I agree that press release are not that well suited too. So, ok to remove it. For the other reference, here is a comment from the archive that reflects my analysis about this section:

I still believe that Blogs are not well suited as sources, and this includes the McRae-reference at the end of the article. If the skeptical position of McRae is important for this article, then it would be better to find a Skeptical publication (with an editorial process) that presents a similar argument to the one presented by McRae, and then cite this publication as a reference. Maybe this sounds a bit old-fashioned, but I believe that some kind of editorial process, surrounding the source, is important.--Hawol (talk) 11:06, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

. What do you think about it ?

References

-- Enamdi (talk) 12:50, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

If you edit aggressively to remove criticism and add promotional content in Wikipedia, you will get firm pushback. Don't edit aggressively and then complain about BITE. If you were to edit more cautiously like someone who is claiming newbie protection should do, then you wouldn't get warnings like this. If you want to start over with a more appropriate level of caution, like someone learning how to drive, then do so. Jytdog (talk) 15:38, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

@Jytdog: Here is the edit from last September for more neutral sources in the section about the "Brain/mind hypotheses". This edits shows the two major models postulated by Parnia from a review article. I removed the blog post comment from Rae (see above the argument from Hawol). Is this "aggressively remov[ing] criticism and add[ing] promotional content in Wikipedia" as you have suggested ?

I agree to remove Nolan's comment (editor in chief of the journal Resuscitation) since it's a press release (weak source). So, here is my suggestion for this section:

Brain/mind hypotheses

Parnia and others have suggested that a mind that is mediated by, but not produced by, the brain, is a possible way to explain NDE.

Neurologist Michael O'Brien has written that "most people would not find it necessary to postulate such a separation between mind and brain to explain the events," and suggested that further research is likely to provide a physical explanation for near-death experiences. The psychologist Susan Blackmore appeared with Parnia and Peter Fenwick on a BBC documentary called "The Day I Died" and disagreed with their interpretations of NDEs, finding purely physical explanations to be more plausible.

In a review article, Parnia admits that the nature of consciousness is still an unchartered territory for science. Two different major models have been postulated:

1. one envisages the psyche/consciousness/mind (self) as the result of neuronal activity. So a causative relationship exists between cortical activity and consciousness
2. the other instead considers that consciousness is separate from the brain and can influence brain activity independently of the brain.

In the same article, Parnia explains that the observations that "the human mind, consciousness, or psyche (self) may continue to function when brain function has ceased during the early period after death" (such as during the AWARE study, but not only) points to the possibility that the second model may have to be taken into account.

References

-- Enamdi (talk) 12:34, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

Sourced content removed, without discussion

Twice recently sourced content has been deleted without discussion and consensus here.MrBill3 (talk) 13:43, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

Holland Park school

Not mentioned - Sam also studied at Holland Park school and Richmond Upon Thames College - played football during break times and was good. Good to see him on TV National Geographic channel - The Story of God with Morgan Freeman - from his fellow footballer (Shanoo) 94.204.194.215 (talk) 14:58, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

Horizon Research Foundation

The article says that Horizon Research Foundation has ceased to exist. Then it goes on to cite the UK Charity Commission. 296655 - The International Association For Near-Death Studies UK. The International Association for Near-Death Studies is a different organization than Horizon. The official website of Horizon is up and running, see http://www.horizonresearch.org/. Is there some confusion here? Hawol (talk) 15:02, 19 June 2022 (UTC)