Why don't more people know about
the scientific evidence for the afterlife?
In 2005 Professor David Fontana, Professor of Trans-personal
Psychology at Liverpool John Moores University, published
a scholarly 500 page book called Is
There An Afterlife which reviews some of the evidence
for the afterlife collected during more than 150 years of
scientific research.
In the Introduction to the book Professor Archie Roy pointed
out that, as yet, most traditional scientists are simply
unaware of the evidence for the afterlife. They have never
done psychic research, and have never read the evidence.
But they are often hostile to it because they think it challenges
their outdated scientific world view.
Traditional western science has been based on a strict separation
of science from religion. It is based on observation and
experiment which means it is only interested in things which
can be sensed and measured within the narrow range of vibrations
which make up our five senses.
It rejects the possibility of an afterlife because materialist
science teaches that consciousness is located only in the
physical brain and once the brain dies that is the end of
consciousness. This view is increasingly being challeneged
by modern physics.
Some religions want people to follow teachings
which were created hundreds of years ago and which have
been distorted over the years. They discourage people from
direct investigation of the afterlife, saying that it is
dangerous.
As a result people don't realise that all
religions started with psychic and spiritual experiences
like out of body experiences, near death experiences and
after death contacts which many many people are still having
today.
The combined pressure by science and religion in Western
society have created a "taboo" or prohibition
on publicly investigating or even talking about psychic
phenomena (psi) or the afterlife.
Dr Dean Radin calls this the "woo woo
taboo" [woo woo is a negative name given by skeptics
to the paranormal].
Dr. Rupert Sheldrake encounters this hostility
frequently in his work on telepathy and finds that, unlike
the general public, his academic critics refuse to look
at the evidence.
This academic hostility to the study of psychic
phenomena and the afterlife has meant that there has been
almost no money for research in it and no career possibilitites
for researchers even though the subject is of great interest
to most people, including many scientists. Even today there
are very few organizations dedicated to paranormal research
and most of the work is being done by dedicated people in
their spare time.
The research information is complex
As well, in a time-poor society most people
do not have the time to sift through the
huge amount of complex research materials that have been
accumulated by previous researchers. For example the
cross correspondences consist of three thousand scripts
transmitted over thirty years. Some of them were more than
forty typed pages long. Together they fill 24 volumes and
12,000 pages and contain much information that would only
make sense to a scholar of Latin and Ancient Greek.
Information was not shared
Until recently many of the best books on
psychic and afterlife research were not easily available,
even in most libraries. They were called "occult"
which means hidden. And people were frightened to talk about
their experiences in case others thought they were crazy
and attacked them.
It is only recently with the development of the internet
that many of these books have been made available online
and websites have been set up to allow people to share experiences.
Most people don't
know about the evidence
This has led many highly intelligent people
to wrongly conclude that there is no evidence for the afterlife
simply because they are unaware that scientists have been
systematically studying the afterlife for more than 150
years.
