The afterlife worries almost everyone living on this earth. Some are afraid of death, believing that it is similar to oblivion. A person thinks that he will close his eyes and fall asleep and never wake up again, and behind the veil of sleep there is only darkness without beginning or end. Someone thinks differently, believing that death is not the end, but only the beginning of a new path, the characteristics of which will directly proportionally depend on how a person lived on Earth. It is not really known what exactly the afterlife is, but there is a lot of evidence proving that this is not the end.
1. The phenomenon of electronic voice
The phenomenon of electronic voice is a mystical phenomenon, in which human voices are heard in recordings or noises. Thus, in 1959, Friedrich Jurgens recorded bird voices on a tape recorder. Nothing unusual happened during the recording, but when Jurgenson listened to the recordings, in addition to the bird voices, he found a recording of a strange male voice in Norwegian on the tape. Jurgenson was sure that there were no people nearby during the recording, and therefore decided that the tape recorder accidentally recorded a program from one of the Norwegian radio stations. Having made inquiries, he found out that on the day he made the recording, none of the Norwegian radio stations broadcast programs of similar content. Then Jurgenson began to conduct experiments to study this phenomenon. Soon he even managed to allegedly establish contact with his late mother.
Fun fact: The 2005 film White Noise depicts this phenomenon, with the main character attempting to contact his recently deceased wife using a radio.
2. Experiments with dead body weight
In 1907, Dr. Duncan MacDougall placed six people in a dying state on a specially made bed that acted as a highly sensitive scale. He then weighed them before and immediately after death. Each patient lost approximately 21.3 grams in weight. Duncan had previously performed a similar experiment with 15 dogs in a similar state, but it was not confirmed, as no changes in weight were detected. The doctor combined all of his research into a theory that humans have souls, but dogs do not.
Interesting fact: McDougall's complaints in his diary about his inability to find dogs dying of natural causes led to suspicions that he was poisoning them. And yet: these experiments inspired the Sean Penn film 21 Grams.
3. The God Helmet Experiment
God Helmet - refers to a controversial experiment in neurotheology (the study of correlations between neural phenomena) by Michael Persinger, during which a modified snowmobile helmet was placed on the subject's head. And the magnetic fields emitted by the device stimulated his brain. Persinger claimed that in this state, people saw bright lights, dead relatives, and even God. Scientist Richard Dawkins, who is known for his atheistic views and criticism of religion, volunteered to test the device. Later, he admitted to the BBC that he was very disappointed that he did not manage to connect with space or meet some spiritual entity.
Interesting fact: Persinger claimed that approximately 80% of the subjects felt like God, while others felt or saw dead people.
4. Philip's Ghost Experiment
The Philip Experiment was conducted in the early 1970s by the Society for Psychical Research in Toronto. The purpose of the experiment was to see if a fictional historical figure could be brought into being by the efforts of a focused group. The researchers named the ghost Philip, created a personality, invented his appearance and character, and even drew his portrait. The eight participants also memorized a fictional biography and studied the period in which Philip was supposed to have lived. The sessions yielded no results until 1973, when Philip made contact. He manifested by rapping on a table. Over the next few months, the group communicated with him using 1 rap for yes and 2 raps for no, allowing them to actually have an intelligent conversation with their ghost.
Fun fact: The study came to a strange end when one of the participants told Philip that he was just made up. After that, all communication ceased.
5. "Ghostbusters"
Ghostbusters is a reality show that aired on TV3 in 2004. In the show, a team of investigators went to places where ghosts were said to live. To determine their location, the crew experimented with Geiger counters, EMF (electromagnetic field) scanners, infrared and night vision cameras, portable digital video cameras, digital audio recorders, and laptops. The Ghostbusters claimed to have made several good recordings of ghostly entities that appeared in front of the cameras for a few seconds.
Interesting fact: Critics and skeptics of the program point to a lack of scientific methodology and critical expertise in the investigations, as well as questionable production aspects, including editing.
6. Harry Houdini's Secret Code
Houdini's experience with magic and sorcery allowed him to expose many so-called mediums who had successfully fooled scientists and academics. Fearing that spiritualists would exploit his image after his death, he left a special secret code with his wife. Ten words were chosen at random from a novel written by Conan Doyle, which he would use to contact after his death. On October 31, 1926, Houdini's friend Reverend Arthur Ford claimed to have contacted both Houdini and his dead mother in a seance. However, many believe that Ford and Houdini's wife (who was ill and self-medicating with alcohol) conspired to create the impression that Houdini's spirit had made contact.
Fun fact: Houdini's wife, Bess, held séances on Halloween for ten years, but Houdini never made contact.
7. "Experiments with the Afterlife"
Gary Schwartz, a psychology professor at the University of Arizona, wrote a book in 2002 called Experiments with the Afterlife. In his studies, he used mediums and people who had recently lost loved ones. The goal was to find out if there is life after death. The mediums started with very specific facts about the deceased people so that skeptics would not call their work fraud, cold reading, or lucky guessing. The first results showed that the mediums were right 77–95%. The average success rate was 83%. To rule out lucky guesses, Schwartz created a second control group of 68 students from the University of Arizona. However, the success rate was only 36%.
Fun fact: When such a huge difference in the average rate blew the psychics away, Schwartz said the statistical probability of getting the data right was 1 in 10 million.
8. William Crookes' Experiment
Sir William Crookes was an English chemist and physicist who studied at the Royal College of Chemistry in London. Crookes's interest in spiritualism arose after the death of his brother in 1867, at the age of 21. In 1870, Crookes decided to apply a scientific approach to spiritualism. The conditions he set for mediums and mentalists were quite strict: "Experiments must be carried out at my house, in the presence of witnesses invited by me and in full compliance with all my requirements; I reserve the right to use any apparatus." Crookes claimed to have observed with his own eyes the appearance of ghostly and tangible figures, the phenomenon of levitation, heard mysterious voices, measured the loss of weight of a medium during the release of ectoplasm, recorded the appearance of inscriptions on slates without the participation of those present. In 1874, William Crookes came to the conclusion that the phenomena could not be explained and that further research was needed.
Interesting fact: Most scientists considered spiritualism a fraud, and when Crookes performed a similar experiment, the question of his expulsion from the Fellowship of the Royal Society arose.
9. Experiments on reincarnation
Australian Psychologist Peter Ramster created a documentary in 1983 called "The Reincarnation Experiments." During his experiments, he found very convincing evidence of past lives. One of the heroines of the film remembered her previous life during the French Revolution. In a trance, she spoke French without an accent, understood and answered questions, and also knew the names of streets that had changed and could only be found on old maps.
10. The Scholes Experiment
In 1993, four psychic researchers and observers undertook a series of experiments in the Norfolk village of Scole. Over the course of five years, they conducted more than 500 different experiments during which they captured on film a host of astonishing phenomena, the most astonishing of which were bright lights and disembodied beings.
Interesting fact: James Webster, a professional magician with 40 years of experience investigating supernatural phenomena, came to the following conclusion about the Scoles experiment: "I was unable to detect any evidence of fraud, and it seems to me that fraud was impossible both from the type of phenomena observed and from the conditions under which they appeared."
11. An interesting case with a priest
Once something amazing happened to a priest who was the rector of the Baptist Church in the United States of America. The man was driving home from a meeting about the construction of a new church, but a truck flew out towards him. The accident could not be avoided. The collision was so strong that the man fell into a coma for some time.
An ambulance arrived shortly, but it was too late. The man's heart was not beating. Doctors confirmed cardiac arrest by re-checking. They had no doubt that the man was dead. Around the same time, the police arrived at the scene of the accident. Among the officers was a Christian who saw a cross in the priest's pocket. He immediately noticed his clothes and realized who was in front of him. He could not send God's servant on his last journey without a prayer. He said the words of prayer, climbing into the dilapidated car and taking the man whose heart was not beating by the hand. While reading the lines, he heard a barely audible groan, which shocked him. He checked his pulse again and realized that he clearly felt the pulsation of blood. Later, when the man miraculously recovered and began to live his former life, this story became popular. Perhaps the man really did return from the other world to finish important things at the behest of God. One way or another, they were unable to give a scientific explanation for this, because the heart cannot start on its own.
The priest himself said more than once in his interviews that he saw only white light and nothing else. He could have taken advantage of the situation and said that God himself spoke to him or that he saw angels, but he did not do so. A couple of reporters claimed that when asked what the man saw in this afterlife dream, he smiled reservedly and his eyes filled with tears. Perhaps he really saw something secret, but did not want to make it public.
When people are in a short coma, their brain does not have time to die during this time. That is why it is worth paying attention to the numerous stories about people who, being between life and death, saw a light so bright that even through closed eyes it seeped through as if the eyelids were transparent. One hundred percent of people came back to life and told that the light began to move away from them. Religion interprets this very simply - their time has not yet come. A similar light was seen by the Magi approaching the cave where Jesus Christ was born. This is the glow of paradise, the afterlife. No one saw angels, God, but felt the touch of higher powers.
12. Dreams from the afterlife
Scientists have proven that we can see in dreams everything that our brain can imagine. In a word, dreams are not limited by anything. It happens that people see their dead relatives in their dreams. If 40 days have not passed since death, it means that the person really talked to you from the afterlife. Unfortunately, dreams cannot be analyzed objectively from two points of view - scientific and religious-esoteric, because it is all about sensations. You can dream of God, angels, heaven, hell, ghosts and anything, but you do not always feel that the meeting was real. It happens that in dreams we remember deceased grandparents or parents, but only rarely does a real spirit come to someone in a dream. We all understand that it will be unrealistic to prove your feelings, so no one shares their impressions further than the family circle. Those who believe in the afterlife, and even those who doubt it, wake up from such dreams with a completely different view of the world. Spirits can predict the future, which has happened more than once in history. They can show discontent, joy, sympathy.
13. The story of one builder
There is a rather famous story that happened in Scotland in the early 70s of the 20th century with an ordinary builder. In Edinburgh, a residential building was being built. Norman MacTagert, who was 32 years old, worked at the construction site. He fell from a fairly large height, lost consciousness and went into a coma for a day. Not long before that, he dreamed of falling. After he woke up, he told what he saw in a coma. According to the man, it was a long journey because he wanted to wake up, but he could not. First, he saw that same blinding bright light, and then he met his mother, who said that she had always wanted to become a grandmother. The most interesting thing is that as soon as he regained consciousness, his wife told him about the most pleasant news that could be - Norman was to become a dad. The woman found out about the pregnancy on the day of the tragedy. The man had serious health problems, but he not only survived, but also continued to work and feed his family.
14. Something very unusual happened in Canada in the late 90s.
A doctor on duty at a Vancouver hospital was taking calls and filling out paperwork when she saw a little boy in white nightgown. He was shouting from the other end of the emergency room, "Tell my mother not to worry about me." The girl was scared that one of the patients had left the room, but then she saw the boy walk through the closed doors of the hospital. His house was a few minutes away from the hospital. That's where he ran. The doctor was alarmed by the fact that it was three in the morning. She decided that she had to catch up with the boy at all costs, because even if he was not a patient, she had to report him to the police. She ran after him for literally a couple of minutes until the child ran into the house. The girl started ringing the doorbell, after which the boy's mother opened the door. She said that it was impossible for her son to leave the house because he was very ill. She burst into tears and went into the room where the child was lying in his crib. It turned out that the boy had died. The story received great resonance in society.
15. Guardian Angel During World War II
In the brutal Second World War, one French private spent nearly two hours shooting back at the enemy during a battle in a city. Next to him was a man of about 40 years old, covering him from the other side. It is impossible to imagine how great was the surprise of the ordinary soldier of the French army, who turned in that direction to say something to his partner, but realized that he had disappeared. A few minutes later, the cries of approaching allies were heard, rushing to help. He and several other soldiers ran out to meet the reinforcements, but the mysterious partner was not among them. He searched for him by name and rank, but never found the same soldier. Perhaps it was his guardian angel. Doctors say that in such stressful situations, mild hallucinations are possible, but a conversation with a man for an hour and a half cannot be called an ordinary mirage.
There are quite a few such stories about life after death. Some of them are confirmed by eyewitnesses, but doubters still call it a fake and try to find scientific justification for people's actions and visions.
16. After death, a person becomes exactly 22 grams lighter.
Scientists cannot explain this phenomenon in any way. Many believers are inclined to believe that 22 grams is the weight of the human soul. Many experiments have been conducted, which have all resulted in the same thing - the body has become lighter by a certain amount. Why - that is the main question. People's skepticism cannot be destroyed, so many hope that an explanation will be found, but this is unlikely to happen. Ghosts can be seen by the human eye, therefore, their "body" has mass. Obviously, everything that has some outline must be at least partly physical. Ghosts exist in larger dimensions than we do. There are four of them: height, width, length and time. Ghosts are not subject to time from the point of view from which we see it.
17. The air temperature near ghosts decreases
This is typical, by the way, not only for the souls of dead people, but also for the so-called brownies. All this is the result of the afterlife in reality. When a person dies, the temperature around him immediately drops sharply for literally a moment. This indicates that the soul leaves the body. The temperature of the soul is approximately 5-7 degrees Celsius, as measurements show. During paranormal phenomena, the temperature also changes, so scientists have proven that this happens not only during immediate death, but also afterwards. The soul has a certain radius of influence around itself. Many horror films use this fact in order to bring the filming closer to reality. Many people confirm that when they felt the movement of a ghost or some entity next to them, they felt very cold.
