"Past-Life Regression"? LOL!!!

[Odin2005]

Sometimes I like to peek at the New Age section of Barnes and Noble for shits and giggles and ran into a bunch of books by some kook named Michael Newton that claims to use hypnosis to discover his clients past lives. Reading through the examples of his clients under hypnosis and the questions he asks makes pretty clear that this fool is inadvertently putting thoughts in his clients heads. ROFLMAO!!! :rofl:

[EvolveOrConvolve]

1. I'll bet he makes a shitload of money with it too

People are gullible, and often the nicest people are the most gullible and the most willing to open their wallets to fuck-faces like Michael Newton.

[onager]

2. Using my psychic powers...

I bet everybody in the book was somebody impotent important in a past life. We've discussed that in here before, when we talked about the past lives flummery.

All those Cleopatras and ancient Persian warriors...and not a single rat-catcher or Third Assistant Bedpan-Dumper To Her Majesty The Archduchess of Flopsy-Mopsy-and-Cottontailia.

Sometimes for laffs, I go looking for that stuff on the web. I found one woman whose past life was, basically, a short version of a romance novel. Yes, complete with a hanged highwayman who was her lover etc. etc. She lived in "London, England, sometime in the 18th century." I thought briefly about asking how her past life was affected by the Gordon Riots or the early Industrial Revolution. Then I thought better of it.

[Odin2005]

3. Actually nearly all of the claimed past lives were relative nobodies, suprisingly.

The kooks are at least smart enough to stay away from the idiots that think they were Cleopatra, apparently.

[SheilaT]

4. Guess what? The very, very vast majority

of past-life regression result in boringly ordinary lives, no one famous. If you actually bother to read the Michael Newton books you'll find that everyone in his book has ordinary, boring lives.

[Orrex]

8. Sure, but there has never been a single case that could actually be called "proven"

I've read extensively on the subject, and I've never heard of even one alleged past life experience that couldn't be 100% explained by present-day imagination. Not one.

If you're aware of one and would care to give a link, I'd be most appreciative. But it sure as heck ain't Seth.

[SheilaT]

26. Have you never read Ian Stevenson's

work?

[frogmarch]

31. I bought his book in the

late 1970s because my mother's family from India believe in reincarnation and I wanted to learn more about it as a doctrine. Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation is the book I mean.

I thought that some of the cases Stevenson discussed in the book were interesting, but certainly not convincing. I don't that believe in souls, and that may have been why I wasn't sold on it.

[onager]

9. I have some basic problems with his whole spiel.

It's all predicated on the existence on the soul, as shown by a glance at his book titles e.g, "Journey of Souls: Case Studies of Life Between Lives."

So first he needs to prove that the "soul" exists and is transportable between lives, sort of like a cosmic lunch box.

Another problem for me: he comes very highly endorsed by the...interesting people who hang out at shirleymaclaine.com. Sorry, but I just can't read this pap and keep a straight face.

"I think I'm picking up recorded energy." ??? Then you also need to go pick up your Nobel Prize, since you just fundamentally re-arranged the laws of physics.

http://www.shirleymaclaine.com/encounter/showthread.php?p=642627

[Warpy]

5. It's pretty clear it's garbage because no man was ever a serf

and no woman ever sweated her life away doing other people's laundry and that was the condition of over 99% of the population for most of our agrarian history.

[SheilaT]

6. Again, please read actual accounts

of past life regressions. 99% of them are about ordinary lives, not supposed recollections of famous people.

Not to say you should start believing in reincarnation, but please do find out what is actually uncovered in these past life recalls.

[trotsky]

10. Oxymoron:

"actual accounts of past life regressions"

LOL

[EvolveOrConvolve]

11. "Actual accounts"

Do people actually believe that shit? Whether you were a serf or a queen or the 3 nippled village idiot, does it really matter?

(sorry for my terse questions, but you ARE in the evul skeptics group forum)

[SheilaT]

12. I'm trying to point out that contrary

to what has been posted here, the vast majority of past life regressions do NOT result in a claim of being someone famous. I don't care what you believe about reincarnation, but at least get the facts about what kinds of lives are regressed to.

[laconicsax]

13. The fact is that no lives are regressed to.

If you can prove otherwise, please, do so.

[trotsky]

14. There are more people alive today than ever before in the history of the planet.

Where were these 6.7 billion souls when there were only a few million homo sapiens around? How are new souls created? What is the process by which a person's soul or essence or whatever the made-up term is, leaves their body and enters a new one?

[SheilaT]

15. No, there are not more people alive today than

ever before in the history of the planet. Estimates vary, but it's thought that anywhere from 100 to 115 billion people have lived ever since we became human.

Who is to say that new souls don't come into existence all the time? That's essentially what the believers in most religions think.

[laconicsax]

16. Who's to say that souls don't exist and reincarnation is bunkum?

That's essentially what rational people think.

[trotsky]

17. Nope, that's not what I said.

There are now 6.7 billion people on the planet.

At one time there were far, far less.

So where did all the new souls come from? And what about the answers to my other questions? You seem so confident that this made-up phenomena of "past lives" is real, I figured you must have some pretty solid evidence. What is it?

[SheilaT]

20. I quote from your header:

"There are more people alive today than ever before in the history of the planet."

A total of at least 100 billion people have lived on this planet. If people have souls maybe new ones come into existence all the time, maybe several trillion souls came into existence when the universe popped into existence. I don't know. If you don't believe that people have souls that continue after physical life ends, I'm not going to try to convince you otherwise. For me, what I have uncovered on my own, and what I have read is sufficiently convincing. But my belief does not depend on anyone else believing what I do.

However, I am calling you out on your statement that there are more people alive today than ever before in the history of the planet. Just because at least 100 billion people have lived, is by no means proof of reincarnation. Others earlier in this thread claim that everyone who has a past life regression recalls being some famous person. That's simply not true. The very, very vast majority recall ordinary lives. Again, if you don't consider this to be proof of reincarnation, fine, just don't go around claiming that every supposed past life regression results in remembering the life of some famous person.

[trotsky]

22. I am sorry I was not clear enough for you to understand me.

More people are alive today than have been at ANY ONE TIME. Clear enough this time?

Now that we've dealt with your red herring, you have admitted that you have no evidence at all to back up everything else you've claimed, so it would seem you're done.

[SheilaT]

24. There is a vast difference between

"more people alive today than ever before in the history of the planet." and "More people alive today than have been AT ANY ONE TIME."

I'm not trying to convince you about anything.

[trotsky]

25. Once again, I am sorry you misunderstood.

But your desperate efforts to make the thread about your misunderstanding rather than even begin to try to support your beliefs (whether you convince me or not is irrelevant) are quite telling.

[SheilaT]

27. I don't really think I misunderstood.

I think you moved the goalpost in this case.

Reincarnation does not suggest that all souls are incarnated at all times. Souls spend time between lives doing other things.

For me, what I read in various places convinces me. If it doesn't convince you, fine.

I have been responding to statements that "No one ever remembers life as a peasant; everyone always claims to be someone famous", which is simply incorrect. And the statement that there are more people alive today than have ever lived -- which you corrected -- is also not true.

I am not trying to convince anyone here that reincarnation is real, but I have no patience with totally incorrect assumptions about it.

[laconicsax]

28. It's pretty clear you misunderstood.

In trotsky's comment, he asked "Where were these 6.7 billion souls when there were only a few million homo sapiens around?" This clearly shows that the goalpost was always at more people being alive now than at any one time.

You still haven't answered the question of where the new souls come from. If not all souls are reincarnated at all times, then there must be billions more souls than people since reincarnation requires nearly seven billion just for those living. How many are there? Does the number of souls limit the future population? Are more created? If so, how?

What are these "other things" that souls spend time doing between lives?

[trotsky]

30. I moved no goalposts.

I offered no correction, because none was necessary. As pointed out, the rest of my post as context shows what I meant. You are just acting highly defensive about your belief in "past lives" and tried to avoid my questions by insisting I had been "wrong" about something.

Your belief in "past lives" is not rational. You need to realize it's going to get a heaping helping of scrutiny and criticism when you happen to be posting in the freaking Skepticism group. :eyes:

[mr blur]

23. "That's essentially what the believers in most religions think" ??

Are you offering this as evidence of something?

Please...

Most "believers in most religions" don't appear to think much at all.

[provis99]

21. that figure is wrong.

More people have lived and died than are alive today. But it is true that the population of the planet is higher than at any other time in history.

[Ian David]

7. Leave a note inside the front cover that says...

"You once read this book in a past life. Save your money."

[Evoman]

18. Damn I would have so much fun if he "hypnotized me"

After all, Michael Newton inappropriately fondled my horse in my past life. Also, in one of my past lives, I was a hooker, and Michael Newtons dad killed me and took my son to raise as his own. Oops.

[Deep13]

19. My past life was pretty regressive...

...especially when I was a teenager.

[onager]

29. Mine too. And I could regress to my teen-age past life...

I would kick my own ass.