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In Search of the Dead: A Scientific Investigation of Evidence For Life After Death
In the scientists' attempts to unlock the question of what lies behind death, quantum physicists suggest reality may be a dimension of thought. Have science and mysticism finally met? In the course of investigating this and other questions, the author of this book looks at famous near-death experiences and claims of reincarnation.
224 pages, Paperback
First published October 8, 1992
About the author
Jeffrey Iverson
158 books5 followersJeffrey James Iverson.
Iverson produced the 1976 BBC documentary “The Bloxham Tapes”, presented by Magnus Magnusson, and the 1992 TV Mini-Series Documentary “In Search of The Dead” (both for BBC Wales).
Iverson produced the 1976 BBC documentary “The Bloxham Tapes”, presented by Magnus Magnusson, and the 1992 TV Mini-Series Documentary “In Search of The Dead” (both for BBC Wales).
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 18, 2012
Whether you believe in the paranormal or not, there are a lot of people *trying* to do genuinely scientific research on various paranormal fronts/subjects: repeatable lab tests, building equipment, inducing paranormal experiences in human subjects through the use of electromagnetic fields, etc. I thought this book was going to be on those kinds of things, given that the subtitle is "A Scientific Investigation of Evidence for Life After Death", but no - it's basically just a long & boring collection of anecdotal stories about people who've had out-of-body experiences on operating tables and children who recount details from their past lives. I alllllmost made it through, but when I got to the third (very short) chapter from the end, called "Quantum Leaps" and the writer began using the word "quantum" on its own as a noun to indicate quantum theory (a "quantum" is a discrete package of energy; the word "quantum" is NOT synonymous with the entire phrase "quantum theory" or "quantum field theory"), as in "Some scientists...pretend quantum doesn't exist....On the other hand, some scientists, familiar with quantum and the best research in parapsychology, see the need for a new science," and I just had to stop reading. Seriously? You're going to write and *publish* an entire book and not get your basic terminology right? And no one else in the publishing process is going to stop you? I suppose since I'd long ago entered that reading mode of just turning pages so I could get to the end, I was just looking for an excuse to put this book down and never have to pick it up again.
June 18, 2024
THE BASIS FOR A BRITISH TELEVISION MINI-SERIES
Author and filmmaker Jeffrey Iverson wrote in the Introduction to this 1992 book, “There is more evidence for life after death than is generally realized. Carefully pieced together over many years by individual scientists, it has led some to believe that a new science of Mind is necessary, if we are to understand the nature of our consciousness and how we fit into a universe whose ultimate reality is still a mystery.” (Pg. viii) He continues, “Before examining the evidence for life after death, there was an obvious preliminary question: is there any scientific sign of some quality or force within us which might be capable of surviving the death of the body? Science teaches us that our body is a machine made of meat, our brain a sort of computer. Everything vanishes without trace at death, or is there some alternative explanation? In the first part of this book, we scrutinize the evidence that there might be more to us than this---there might be mind as well as brain.” (Pg. x)
He goes on, “One aim of this book is to interest non-scientists in the somewhat neglected and maligned work of parapsychologists… The evidence they have uncovered is startling and of value to non-scientists and scientists alike. It should cause all of us to pause and think more deeply, and optimistically, about what we truly are and what may be our destiny. With television colleagues from Britain and the United States, I followed the trail of the parapsychologists across the continents of Europe, America and Asia. It was an enlightening journey ‘in search of the dead.’”
He acknowledges, “In general, psychics are called in by police as a desperate last resort in the investigation of serious crime where conventional methods are not getting results, like the Son of Sam case. On the other hand, it is also true that psychics, although not called in regularly, are used more often than the public is told. If a medium helps locate a body or murder weapon, the police avoid courtroom complications by saying simply that ‘acting upon information received’ they recovered the weapon of found the body. Prosecutors and policemen don’t encourage the believe that unorthodox methods of detection are used. In court, the evidence of a psychic might be open to challenge and could even be inadmissible.” (Pg. 26)
He explains a series of ‘chair tests’ performed by a Dutchman named Gerard Croiset, and explains, “chair tests were not always successful. They worked in Holland… but in New York the experiment flopped… Perhaps it is that psi cannot be turned on and off like a light switch, even by the acknowledged best in the world!... Dr. Osis says [of] the celebrated psychic Eileen Garrett… that her performance could vary from excellent to nil, depending on health, mood, motivation and state of consciousness, as well as compatibility with those she was reading or working with---a long list of variables.” (Pg. 29)
He admits, “Two of the psychics Dr. Osis worked with… are said to have led police directly to corpses. More often, says Dr. Osis, the psychic can provide only a few clues---previously unknown details of the murder, characteristics of the getaway car, or perhaps information about where the killer lives. A psychic may tune in to the killer, but mostly there is so much going on at the scene of a murder or plane crash that he becomes confused… On site, psychics often cannot work at their own pace… ‘With most psychics, accurate impressions occur in spurts, often fragmented, and with large gaps. If the questioner is impatient or aggressive, the spontaneous flow can turn into story-telling.’” (Pg. 31)
He summarizes, “Today, more scientists and policemen have little faith in psychic detectives. Perhaps scepticism would be diminished if scientists, working with psychics, could devise a way of detecting when information truly comes from the inner eye of psi, and is not a guess or fantasy.” (Pg. 32)
He recounts, “the Seattle Study [as a] group set up by Dr. [Melvin] Morse which analyzed data about NDEs in children. In 1986 Dr. Morse published the group’s findings in the ‘American journal of Diseases of Children,’ and came to several important conclusions. NDEs didn’t seem to happen to children who were simply seriously ill, they had to be close to death. In 121 seriously ill children, no NDEs were reported, but twelve children who had been close to death, eight said they had left their bodies and travelled to another realm. These NDEs were not caused by drugs of hallucinations due to lack of oxygen.” (Pg. 82)
He states, “widows and widowers in a country parish in mid-Wales were asked in 1971 if they had been contacted by their dead partners---astonishingly almost half said they had. Dr. W. Dewi Rees published hi findings in the ‘British Medical Journal.’ … The survey showed widows who had been happily married were most likely to have had encounters with their dead husbands… He also discovered why most of us never realized widows and widowers lead such an active spiritual life---it’s because they don’t talk about it. None of the widows interviewed had ever told her doctor, and only one had told a clergyman. The reasons for their secrecy were... a fear of being ridiculed… those widows apparently grieving the most, the ones being treated for depression, were least troubled by apparitions.” (Pg. 96)
He observes, “In 1882, some leading scientists and intellectuals decided to test the truth of [psychic] claims… and formed the Society for Psychical Research in London, and a few years later along came the American Society for Psychical Research... There has been nothing quite like the early days of the SPR and the ASPR before or since… Some fakes were exposed, some claims made for supernatural activity…Today’s medium and the general level of public interest in them are only a shadow of those days. The scientists have mostly returned to their laboratories and even the spirits, so profuse a century ago, seem largely to have quit the scene. But the SPR and the ASPR are still with us and their records of the pioneers of parapsychology allow for us to glimpse those turbulent years in the nineteenth century.” (Pg. 114-115)
Of Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and the Theosophical Society, he relates, “The SPR had already made a preliminary finding, accepting much of these alleged phenomena, but disturbing reports of fraud were coming out of India and Richard Hodgson was sent to investigate. When Hodgson returned months later, his report was a sensation. The phenomena were faked and Blavatsky was behind it all. The Mahatmas were Blavatsky accomplices wearing dummy heads and shoulders. The messages had all been written by Blavatsky herself… and Hodgson demonstrated how they materialized in mid-air… The evidence was overwhelming and Blavatsky was forced out of the leadership of the Theosophical Society, which nevertheless survived.” (Pg. 122)
He comments, “Some mediums, on investigation, have turned out to be unwitting frauds, deceiving themselves as much as anyone else. Dr. James Hyslop, who succeeded Richard Hodgson as Secretary of the ASPR, was once invited to test a woman medium. ‘The medium sat in complete darkness…Tambourines played and bells were ringing. On a given signal by the medium a picture was taken… this showed the medium was herself playing the tambourines and ringing the bells with her own hands! She was dumb-founded… and she had no conscious knowledge that she herself was producing the phenomena.’ Some mediums felt compelled to cheat because they were faced with a public performance, for which people paid good money, and they could not always produce phenomena by genuine means.” (Pg. 139)
Or reincarnation, he says, “What I have written about is just the tip of [the] statistical iceberg. There are hundreds of other similar cases… and there is more to come… A good case for reincarnation as a form of survival after death seems to have already been made out. The problem is that the critics seize on the weakest aspect of any case, which the parapsychologists as good scientists always include, and publicly deride that part of the material and pretend the rest of the evidence doesn’t exist. The case for survival is stronger than is generally realized, There is even a range of relevant circumstantial evidence, about science and the nature of reality, which we haven’t touched on yet.” (Pg. 192)
He concludes, “Fortunately, all the cases don’t have to be equally strong to undermine the materialist rule that death annihilates life… The first thing we tested in this project was psi. If survival was possible, we needed to show that a human being was more than flesh and cerebral cortex---all destroyed at death. ESP, telepathy and clairvoyance were tell-tale signs of some mind-force that might exist outside the brain, perhaps even capable of surviving the death of the body… In the second of our searches, there were compelling narratives about apparitions and Near Death Experiences… It was difficult to doubt the sincerity of witnesses whose brush with death in many cases seemed to change their lives… This seemed to corroborate the claim that an NDE is at least a genuine out-of-body experience and not a simple hallucination. This non-locality… was central to much of the evidence we looked at.” (Pg. 203-204) He adds, “Today, I believe in the possibility of life after death and reincarnation as perhaps a next stage in the evolution of human consciousness. But I am convinced of two concepts: telepathy and synchronicity. I have seen both in action… the world is full of surprises.” (Pg. 206)
Although this book contained MUCH more ‘verbatim’ quotations from individuals than I would have preferred (remember that it was a television mini-series), it will be of keen interest to those looking for a broad overview of both psychical research and other studies about the possibility of life after death.
Author and filmmaker Jeffrey Iverson wrote in the Introduction to this 1992 book, “There is more evidence for life after death than is generally realized. Carefully pieced together over many years by individual scientists, it has led some to believe that a new science of Mind is necessary, if we are to understand the nature of our consciousness and how we fit into a universe whose ultimate reality is still a mystery.” (Pg. viii) He continues, “Before examining the evidence for life after death, there was an obvious preliminary question: is there any scientific sign of some quality or force within us which might be capable of surviving the death of the body? Science teaches us that our body is a machine made of meat, our brain a sort of computer. Everything vanishes without trace at death, or is there some alternative explanation? In the first part of this book, we scrutinize the evidence that there might be more to us than this---there might be mind as well as brain.” (Pg. x)
He goes on, “One aim of this book is to interest non-scientists in the somewhat neglected and maligned work of parapsychologists… The evidence they have uncovered is startling and of value to non-scientists and scientists alike. It should cause all of us to pause and think more deeply, and optimistically, about what we truly are and what may be our destiny. With television colleagues from Britain and the United States, I followed the trail of the parapsychologists across the continents of Europe, America and Asia. It was an enlightening journey ‘in search of the dead.’”
He acknowledges, “In general, psychics are called in by police as a desperate last resort in the investigation of serious crime where conventional methods are not getting results, like the Son of Sam case. On the other hand, it is also true that psychics, although not called in regularly, are used more often than the public is told. If a medium helps locate a body or murder weapon, the police avoid courtroom complications by saying simply that ‘acting upon information received’ they recovered the weapon of found the body. Prosecutors and policemen don’t encourage the believe that unorthodox methods of detection are used. In court, the evidence of a psychic might be open to challenge and could even be inadmissible.” (Pg. 26)
He explains a series of ‘chair tests’ performed by a Dutchman named Gerard Croiset, and explains, “chair tests were not always successful. They worked in Holland… but in New York the experiment flopped… Perhaps it is that psi cannot be turned on and off like a light switch, even by the acknowledged best in the world!... Dr. Osis says [of] the celebrated psychic Eileen Garrett… that her performance could vary from excellent to nil, depending on health, mood, motivation and state of consciousness, as well as compatibility with those she was reading or working with---a long list of variables.” (Pg. 29)
He admits, “Two of the psychics Dr. Osis worked with… are said to have led police directly to corpses. More often, says Dr. Osis, the psychic can provide only a few clues---previously unknown details of the murder, characteristics of the getaway car, or perhaps information about where the killer lives. A psychic may tune in to the killer, but mostly there is so much going on at the scene of a murder or plane crash that he becomes confused… On site, psychics often cannot work at their own pace… ‘With most psychics, accurate impressions occur in spurts, often fragmented, and with large gaps. If the questioner is impatient or aggressive, the spontaneous flow can turn into story-telling.’” (Pg. 31)
He summarizes, “Today, more scientists and policemen have little faith in psychic detectives. Perhaps scepticism would be diminished if scientists, working with psychics, could devise a way of detecting when information truly comes from the inner eye of psi, and is not a guess or fantasy.” (Pg. 32)
He recounts, “the Seattle Study [as a] group set up by Dr. [Melvin] Morse which analyzed data about NDEs in children. In 1986 Dr. Morse published the group’s findings in the ‘American journal of Diseases of Children,’ and came to several important conclusions. NDEs didn’t seem to happen to children who were simply seriously ill, they had to be close to death. In 121 seriously ill children, no NDEs were reported, but twelve children who had been close to death, eight said they had left their bodies and travelled to another realm. These NDEs were not caused by drugs of hallucinations due to lack of oxygen.” (Pg. 82)
He states, “widows and widowers in a country parish in mid-Wales were asked in 1971 if they had been contacted by their dead partners---astonishingly almost half said they had. Dr. W. Dewi Rees published hi findings in the ‘British Medical Journal.’ … The survey showed widows who had been happily married were most likely to have had encounters with their dead husbands… He also discovered why most of us never realized widows and widowers lead such an active spiritual life---it’s because they don’t talk about it. None of the widows interviewed had ever told her doctor, and only one had told a clergyman. The reasons for their secrecy were... a fear of being ridiculed… those widows apparently grieving the most, the ones being treated for depression, were least troubled by apparitions.” (Pg. 96)
He observes, “In 1882, some leading scientists and intellectuals decided to test the truth of [psychic] claims… and formed the Society for Psychical Research in London, and a few years later along came the American Society for Psychical Research... There has been nothing quite like the early days of the SPR and the ASPR before or since… Some fakes were exposed, some claims made for supernatural activity…Today’s medium and the general level of public interest in them are only a shadow of those days. The scientists have mostly returned to their laboratories and even the spirits, so profuse a century ago, seem largely to have quit the scene. But the SPR and the ASPR are still with us and their records of the pioneers of parapsychology allow for us to glimpse those turbulent years in the nineteenth century.” (Pg. 114-115)
Of Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and the Theosophical Society, he relates, “The SPR had already made a preliminary finding, accepting much of these alleged phenomena, but disturbing reports of fraud were coming out of India and Richard Hodgson was sent to investigate. When Hodgson returned months later, his report was a sensation. The phenomena were faked and Blavatsky was behind it all. The Mahatmas were Blavatsky accomplices wearing dummy heads and shoulders. The messages had all been written by Blavatsky herself… and Hodgson demonstrated how they materialized in mid-air… The evidence was overwhelming and Blavatsky was forced out of the leadership of the Theosophical Society, which nevertheless survived.” (Pg. 122)
He comments, “Some mediums, on investigation, have turned out to be unwitting frauds, deceiving themselves as much as anyone else. Dr. James Hyslop, who succeeded Richard Hodgson as Secretary of the ASPR, was once invited to test a woman medium. ‘The medium sat in complete darkness…Tambourines played and bells were ringing. On a given signal by the medium a picture was taken… this showed the medium was herself playing the tambourines and ringing the bells with her own hands! She was dumb-founded… and she had no conscious knowledge that she herself was producing the phenomena.’ Some mediums felt compelled to cheat because they were faced with a public performance, for which people paid good money, and they could not always produce phenomena by genuine means.” (Pg. 139)
Or reincarnation, he says, “What I have written about is just the tip of [the] statistical iceberg. There are hundreds of other similar cases… and there is more to come… A good case for reincarnation as a form of survival after death seems to have already been made out. The problem is that the critics seize on the weakest aspect of any case, which the parapsychologists as good scientists always include, and publicly deride that part of the material and pretend the rest of the evidence doesn’t exist. The case for survival is stronger than is generally realized, There is even a range of relevant circumstantial evidence, about science and the nature of reality, which we haven’t touched on yet.” (Pg. 192)
He concludes, “Fortunately, all the cases don’t have to be equally strong to undermine the materialist rule that death annihilates life… The first thing we tested in this project was psi. If survival was possible, we needed to show that a human being was more than flesh and cerebral cortex---all destroyed at death. ESP, telepathy and clairvoyance were tell-tale signs of some mind-force that might exist outside the brain, perhaps even capable of surviving the death of the body… In the second of our searches, there were compelling narratives about apparitions and Near Death Experiences… It was difficult to doubt the sincerity of witnesses whose brush with death in many cases seemed to change their lives… This seemed to corroborate the claim that an NDE is at least a genuine out-of-body experience and not a simple hallucination. This non-locality… was central to much of the evidence we looked at.” (Pg. 203-204) He adds, “Today, I believe in the possibility of life after death and reincarnation as perhaps a next stage in the evolution of human consciousness. But I am convinced of two concepts: telepathy and synchronicity. I have seen both in action… the world is full of surprises.” (Pg. 206)
Although this book contained MUCH more ‘verbatim’ quotations from individuals than I would have preferred (remember that it was a television mini-series), it will be of keen interest to those looking for a broad overview of both psychical research and other studies about the possibility of life after death.
May 2, 2023
This was such an interesting read!
I picked this one up from my favourite secondhand bookshop with a huge esoteric collection, having never even heard of the BBC documentary.
The book is split into different sections which made for very easy reading - you get a summary of psi/telepathy experiments which had me totally convinced, before delving into how psychics helped to solve the Son of Sam murders.
Then there are near death experiences, apparitions, reincarnation and psychics/seances - and honestly it was all super interesting.
I’m kind of convinced, too? Although I’m purposely avoiding reading a sceptic’s view on life after death at the moment because this book gave me some hope instead. I especially enjoyed the story of the woman who floated out of her body and saw shoes on a windowledge that were actually there, and the reincarnation stories in Sri Lanka.
The only thing that bothers me is the focus on religion. As an atheist it’s hard to imagine someone going through the bright tunnel of light and then chatting to Jesus/god/whoever. But meh we’ll pretend that didn’t happen.
I picked this one up from my favourite secondhand bookshop with a huge esoteric collection, having never even heard of the BBC documentary.
The book is split into different sections which made for very easy reading - you get a summary of psi/telepathy experiments which had me totally convinced, before delving into how psychics helped to solve the Son of Sam murders.
Then there are near death experiences, apparitions, reincarnation and psychics/seances - and honestly it was all super interesting.
I’m kind of convinced, too? Although I’m purposely avoiding reading a sceptic’s view on life after death at the moment because this book gave me some hope instead. I especially enjoyed the story of the woman who floated out of her body and saw shoes on a windowledge that were actually there, and the reincarnation stories in Sri Lanka.
The only thing that bothers me is the focus on religion. As an atheist it’s hard to imagine someone going through the bright tunnel of light and then chatting to Jesus/god/whoever. But meh we’ll pretend that didn’t happen.
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