I commonly see NDErs claim that they saw deceased loved ones (e.g., family, friends, pets) and that these bonds are eternal. This was very comforting at first, and it's still what I want to believe, but after digging deeper I've found conflicting NDEs.

Some claim Earth relationships don't matter and that we're just going to merge with a homogeneous blob once we die, and/or all relationships are the same. Your relationship with a beloved parent, sibling, or child (whether biological or adopted) is apparently as meaningful as your relationship with an abuser/bully because "we're all one." Being taken away from your family and plopped in with strangers every time you reincarnate also seems kinda cruel to me.

I don't understand why a universal mind and individual souls need to be mutually exclusive. Souls could be distinct waves while still being part of the same ocean. I think you can have greater affinity towards certain souls while having cosmic unity.

I've seen many NDErs affirm that they felt like they were one with everything while still being themselves and retaining relationships with their loved ones eternally, even relatives that they've never met in their current/latest life. Again, it is common, but it isn't ubiquitous across all experiences.

If god/source and souls are eternal and transcend time, then I don't understand why bonds between certain souls (i.e., soul tribes/families) can't be. Do your loved ones just skedaddle after welcoming you to the afterlife?

I constantly dread the universe (or god/source, whatever you want to call it) separating me from my loved ones forever and this is one of the many inconsistencies that make me skeptical of non-veridical NDEs.

To clarify, when I refer to "veridical NDE," I'm talking about a case where someone sees or hears something they couldn't have possibly known while having zero brain activity. There have been many such cases recorded, but none in an official scientific study, which is why scientists and philosophers don't take them seriously.

Some people claim that the failure of the AWARE studies to provide any veridical NDEs is already proof that they're fake, but I think it's way too soon to claim that, given how small the sample sizes are. AWARE I only had 15 hospitals and AWARE II only had 25 hospitals.

Let's say in a hypothetical scenario that there's a study with 1,000+ hospitals. How long do you think it would take for a veridical NDE to be officially spotted? How many veridical NDEs would it take to convince skeptics to stop dismissing them as hallucinations of a dying brain? They could perhaps dismiss a couple of cases of people getting the targets right as lucky guesses, but after dozens or hundreds of times, it stops being a coincidence or "statistical noise."

Unfortunately, a study like this probably isn't feasible, due to the bias against NDEs and ethical concerns.

To be clear, this isn't an "is X closer to Y or Z" post. I don't believe in equally distanced years skewing towards one or the other. You could cherry-pick examples to make it seem closer to one or the other. However, I still see value in comparing equally distanced years as an analysis of the flow of time.

Similarities to 2000 (Y2K)

• The global financial crisis (GFC) hadn't occurred yet
• Forums and IMs (instant messengers) were still the standard (despite social networking being on the rise)
• Video rental stores were still relevant, and full-on streaming services didn't exist yet
• 6th gen consoles were still relevant (2000 already had the Dreamcast and PS2)
• Y2K shows were still airing, like That '70s Show and Malcolm in the Middle
• The iPhone hadn't been unveiled yet, feature phones were the standard
• Pop-punk was still popular
• 16:9 HD wasn't the standard yet
• CRT TVs were still more common than LCD TVs
• Pluto was still considered a planet

Similarities to 2010

• Post-9/11
• MySpace was popular (2010 was its final year of relevance)
• Precursors to streaming services existed (cable on demand and video hosting websites, such as Google Video and early YouTube)
• The Nintendo DS, PSP, and Xbox 360 were available
• Shows that were popular in the late 2000s and early 2010s, like The Office and HIMYM, premiered in 2005
• Phones already had cameras, Java games, and even basic web browsers (albeit crappy ones)
• Kanye West and Rihanna were popular
• Widescreen TVs were less niche than they were during Y2K
• LCD computer monitors (not to be confused with LCD TVs) were popular
• Obama was a senator (not yet president, but more relevant than he was in 2000)

The cusp and midpoint (CAMP) method

I prefer viewing years individually rather than putting them into boxes, so I use the cusp between two decades (years ending in 0) and midpoint of a decade (years ending in 5) as cultural markers when discussing longer spans of time, with everything between them being a gradient.

This isn't numerology, as I don't view these markers as shifts, they're simply for convenience and organization. Every year is ultimately a transition from one state to another. As per rule 2 of the anarchy sub, I will explain why these years work as markers from a cultural perspective.

• 1980: Ronald Reagan was elected
• 1985: Gorbachev became the leader of the Soviet Union
• 1990: Germany reunified
• 1995: PlayStation and Windows 95 were released
• 2000: the dot-com bubble burst
• 2005: MySpace mainstreamed social networking
• 2010: iPad was released
• 2015: Trump announced his candidacy
• 2020: COVID-19
• 2025: second president in U.S. history gets two non-consecutive terms

This post isn't meant to disparage anyone who uses ranges, it's still valid for people to use them as long as there's logic behind it. This is just how I personally prefer to do things.

I constantly see people do stuff like claim that things were popular or ubiquitous before they even came out, overblow something's relevance, or act like something was popular for longer than it actually was.

Some examples include:

1. Acting like late '60s culture/events represent the whole decade
2. "The NES was popular worldwide throughout all of the '80s"
3. "Absolutely nothing has changed since 2000 (or 9/11)"
4. "2003 and/or 2004 were culturally still the '90s"
5. "6th gen consoles were dead and smartphones and modern social media were ubiquitous in 2005"
6. "OMG I MISS 2016!! IT WAS PEAK HUMANITY!" (brings up trends from like 2012)
7. "Every single 2010s trend was obliterated in March 2020"

The last one makes a little bit of sense, but the rest can easily be debunked by using Google or watching a film or TV show from the era.

They'll often be so smug and condescending about it too, that's the icing on the cake.

This post isn't calling out any specific users, it's a general observation. Nor does it apply to the members that actually put effort into their posts.

The mid 2000s were the final era to completely proceed smartphones and streaming services (early YouTube and cable on demand don't count) and the presence of social media in this era is overblown (especially in regard to 2004), so I feel like it should be out of the equation.

Instant messengers (IMs) and video rental stores even had a presence in the late 2000s, albeit on the decline.

Cable TV, feature phones, and physical media were still prevalent in the early 2010s. Video rental stores were irrelevant by then, but Redbox and Netflix's DVD-by-mail service were very popular.

2013 is extremely overlooked as a shift. It was the year that smartphones became ubiquitous, streaming really took off with Netflix making originals, and short-form content was popularized thanks to Vine.

Can't forget the Isla Vista attacks and GamerGate in 2014, which influenced the current culture war, and the annoying orange being in the limelight 24/7 since June 2015.

By "stagnation," I don't mean "nothing has changed since the mid-late 2010s," but the pace of change has slowed down significantly. The difference between 1996 and 2006 or 2006 and 2016 is much greater than between 2016 and 2026.

iPhones look the same besides more cameras. The jump between console generations has gotten smaller and smaller with each generation. We still watch shows on streaming services which look and function the same. Flat design and short-form content are still prevalent.

While AI-generated slop and Trump need to go, technology stagnating a bit isn't a bad thing. It just means that stuff like phone/tablet design has more or less been perfected or that the refinements hereafter are minimal compared to previous generations. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."

This is actually the norm rather than rapid advancement. A decade in the 1700s barely meant anything.

I don't think people want to use crap like Google Glass or Neuralink. A rectangle that you touch with your finger to do stuff is a timeless concept that will suffice. We'll still probably be using smartphones in 20+ years. If brain computer interfaces that pump ads and brainrot into you 24/7 become ubiquitous, I'm killing myself. Only Elon Musk fanboys want that.

For this post I'll use the normie 2004-2006 range, but it's valid to include 2003 and/or 2007.

Some people act like IMs like AIM and MSN were exclusively a Y2K thing and got instantly obliterated the moment Facebook launched, but they were still highly relevant, arguably at their peak.

In late 2006, the major early social media platforms combined (MySpace, Facebook, YouTube) combined had roughly ~150 million users, mostly consisting of MySpace users, while the major IMs combined (AIM, MSN, Yahoo) still had more than double that amount (>300 million), and this isn't even factoring in forum websites, so the notion that social media replaced everything in 2004-2005 is ridiculous.

The presence of 7th gen consoles is also overblown. While there was hype surrounding the next generation of consoles, the Xbox 360 was absent in 2004 and barely around in 2005, and the PS3 and Wii were released at the tail end of 2006. Not to mention that the best-selling games of the PS2 and Xbox, GTA: San Andreas and Halo 2, were released in late 2004.

Regarding portables, the Game Boy Advance was still very popular. The DS didn't officially surpass the GBA until late 2008 (even later than I initially presumed), and the PSP was never as popular as either. And many of the best GBA games came out in 2004-2005.

And last but not least, 2004 was Blockbuster's most profitable year. The exact peak was apparently Q4 2004 or Q1 2005, but don't quote me on that. Similar to IMs, video rental stores weren't dead and buried until the early 2010s.

I think the mid 2000s look more modern because people hyperfocus on 2006, which already had late 2000s elements.

2004 wasn't a nuclear bomb that destroyed everything from the early 2000s and prior. A ton of TV shows that premiered at the turn of the millennium and prior were still airing new episodes well into the 2000s.

1. Jackie Chan Adventures (2000-2005)
2. All That (1994-2005)
3. The DC Animated Universe/Timmverse (not a single show, but I'm including it here; 1992-2006)
4. Malcolm in the Middle (2000-2006)
5. That '70s Show (1998-2006)
6. Charmed (1998-2006)
7. Ed, Edd n Eddy (stopped airing new episodes regularly after 2007; 1999-2007/*8/*9)
8. Gilmore Girls (2000-2007)
9. The Sopranos (1999-2007)
10. Stargate SG-1 (1997-2007)

I probably missed a ton, but this proves my point.

It was also before SpongeBob's seasonal rot got really bad (season 4 gave us Krusty Towers and Have You Seen This Snail, it wasn't that bad) and pre-movie Simpsons, the movie is often considered the final point when The Simpsons were relevant.

u/Ok-Following6886 has informed me that u/OverallEstate2, the individual responsible for all those "2004/5-2013" ranges floating around, is back, so I guess I'm making this for closure.

Aesthetics: Closer to neither. The Y2K aesthetic was reduced to trace amounts and "fRUTIGER aERO" is honestly overblown in general. Even in the early 2010s, it was mostly used in a few UIs rather than a ubiquitous aesthetic across all media, and it especially wasn't prevalent before Windows Vista even came out.

Gaming: Closer to the early 2000s. 2005-2006 was still predominantly sixth gen. While the Nintendo DS and PSP were out, the Game Boy Advance was still relevant. Some of the best GBA games came out in 2004-2005. The PS3 and Wii weren't released until the tail end of 2006. The Xbox 360 is the only reason why it isn't a landslide.

Music: Closer to the early 2000s. This was long after boy bands and teen pop, yet before Recession Pop. Pop-punk was popular in both the late '90s/early '00s and mid '00s, while in 2012-2013 it was completely irrelevant.

Politics: Closer to the early 2000s by a landslide, especially post-9/11 early 2000s. 2005-2006 was still firmly in the Bush era. This shouldn't even be a debate.

Technology: Closer to the early 2000s. Not by a landslide, but 2005-2006 was still firmly pre-smartphones and pre-streaming services. The iPhone and Netflix as a streaming service weren't a thing until 2007, and it took even longer for them to catch on. Forums and instant messengers still reigned supreme, social media was in its primordial state. MySpace was basically halfway between 1990s GeoCities pages and 2010s social media profiles in terms of looks and functionality.

Conclusion: While there were precursors to the 2010s, like early social media platforms or the Xbox 360 being released, grouping the mid 2000s with the early 2010s over the early 2000s is absurd