On March 13, 1928, nearly a year after Charles Lindbergh made history by flying across the Atlantic, from New York to Paris, Captain Raymond Hinchliffe, a veteran fighter pilot, and Elsie Mackay, a British actress and pilot, took off from Cranwell aerodrome in England in their small plane, Endeavor, in an attempt to complete the first east-to-west transatlantic crossing, considered riskier than the west-to-east crossing of Lindbergh because of the head winds. They were not to be heard from again, at least in the flesh.

About 2 a.m. on March 14, Colonel G. L. P. Henderson and Squadron Leader Rivers Oldmeadow, two Royal Air Force friends of Hinchliffe’s, were asleep on a ship in the Atlantic, headed from South Africa to England, completely unaware of their friend’s flight. Oldmeadow was awakened when Henderson pounded on his cabin door. “Hinch has just been in my cabin. Eye patch and all,” Henderson exclaimed. (Hinchliffe had lost an eye in the war). “It was ghastly. He kept repeating over and over again. ‘Hendy – what am I going to do? What am I going to do? I’ve got this woman with me, and I’m lost. I’m lost!’ Then he disappeared in front of my eyes! Just disappeared.”  Henderson needed three fingers of straight Scotch to calm down. The two flyers learned three days later that Hinchliffe was missing after a trans-Atlantic attempt and then related their story.

Seventeen days later, on the evening of March 31, Beatrice Earl was experimenting with her Ouija board, hoping to hear from her deceased son. However, instead of hearing from her son, she received a message that read: “Can you help a man who has drowned?” (No spaces or punctuation in the actual messages.) She asked who was communicating and the reply came: “I was drowned with Elsie Mackay.” Mrs. Earl asked how it happened and the reply was: “Fog storm winds went down from great height.” The communicator further stated that he went down off the leeward islands and requested that Mrs. Earl get a message to his wife as he wanted to speak to her.

Although Mrs. Earl had read about the disappearance of the Endeavor, she could not bring herself to attempt contact with Emilie Hinchliffe. On April 11, she again sat at the board and Hinchliffe again appealed to her to get word to his wife. Mrs. Earl requested an address and Hinchliffe responded with the name and town of his solicitor. After mulling over the situation, she sent a letter to Emilie Hinchliffe in care of the solicitors as well as to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Great Britain’s most famous Spiritualist.

Emilie read the letter but not believing in Spiritualism or even in life after death, she ignored it, apparently assuming it came from a depraved woman. Moreover, her friends pointed out that there were no leeward islands on her husband’s route. But Doyle did follow up, checking the maps and speculating that Hinchliffe could have been blown off course to the Azores Islands. He arranged a sitting for Mrs. Earl with Eileen Garrett, the famous Irish medium who was living in London at the time. After Garrett went into a trance, Uvani, her spirit control, began speaking through Garrett’s voice mechanism. Mrs. Earl asked Uvani if he could tell her anything about Captain Hinchliffe. Uvani responded: “Yes. He has been about you a good deal. He has been trying to get messages through, but thinks he has succeeded well with you.”

Mrs. Earl then asked what happened to Hinchliffe. Uvani said that he went far off course far to the south.  After a pause, the voice coming through Garrett changed and it was Hinchliffe talking. Mrs. Earl asked him if he had suffered and he replied that he did not as it happened too quickly. But Uvani then again took over the medium’s body and said that Hinchliffe is very confused and needs to speak to his wife.

It took a month for the report of the sitting with Garrett to reach Doyle. Impressed, he wrote to Emilie Hinchliffe and informed her of the information that had come to his attention. Emilie could not ignore a letter from someone as famous as Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes. So she immediately wrote to Mrs. Earl and arranged to visit her. Over tea, Mrs. Earl explained to her that she was hesitant about using the Ouija board again because “low-grade spirits” could intrude. She recommended a sitting with Mrs. Garrett.

On May 22, 1928, Emilie Hinchliffe sat with Eileen Garrett at the London Spiritualist Alliance. As was policy, Garrett was not given Emilie’s identity. As Emilie knew shorthand, she showed up prepared to take detailed notes. After Garrett went into trance, Uvani began speaking and said that “he shows me portraits. He mentions the name Joan, little Joan. He was full of strength, full of speed. Perhaps cars or planes. He passed after having flown in an airplane. He says it was no one’s fault. He was 33.”

While Hinchliffe called their daughter “Little Joan” and his age was correctly stated, Emilie remained skeptical as the information could have been researched. Uvani then said the communicator was referring to an eye problem and said that the man must be her husband as he kept pointing to the ring on her finger. He then gave some specifics about his own watch which he was wearing when he went down as well as her watch, bits of information which Emlie found very evidential.

Uvani then said that “he mentions the names Hermann and Wilhelm He has seen them both here…” Emilie clearly recalled Hermann Hess, her husband’s close friend who had been killed in a crash in 1925, and Wilhelm Hepner, also killed in a crash, in 1925. Slowly, Emilie was beginning to believe that this was all real.

Then details of the plane’s problems were communicated, going back and forth between Uvani’s voice and Hinchliffe’s voice. “…left strut breaks…He hovered near water…At 3 a.m. abandoned hope...Plug oiled...Terror never...But anguish…Knew every half hour it might be the end…Had to change course..I did go south, tell my wife. I went deliberately, deliberately south. I told her I would go north. I never lost my course. I knew exactly where I was, but went deliberately south hoping to find land.”

Details continued to come and Hinchliffe’s voice seemed to take over. “Have you seen Brancker? Brancker told you not to hope any more. I curse myself I did not listen to Brancker. I went against all observations. Everyone said the weather was bad…I was drowned 20 minutes after leaving the wreck.”

While none of the information about her husband’s demise could be verified, there were enough bits and pieces – references to their watches, a photo of their daughter that he carried on the flight with him, his two deceased friends, Sir Sefton Brancker, who had been helping Emilie – that Emilie was now convinced that it was for real.

The tone of the voice changed as Uvani again took over, mentioning that Emilie had been worried about finances but she would soon have good news. Wilhelm was again mentioned, this time stating that he was headed for Brussels when he crashed, a fact. After a pause, Uvani passed on a message from Hinchliffe: “Tell them there is no Death, but everlasting life. Life here is but a journey and a change to different conditions. We go on from unconscious perfection to conscious perfection.”

Emilie arranged another sitting with Garrett, on May 24, but this time Emilie took special precautions. While it was the policy of the Alliance not to disclose the name of the sitter to the medium beforehand, Emilie asked the secretary of the London Alliance to have Garrett go into trance before she entered the room. Uvani greeted her in a sonorous and masculine voice and said he had recognized her as having been there before. Hinchliffe came through and referred to Betty, the woman who was caring for their two children and also made reference to details of their home. But Emilie had been told that mediums can read minds and therefore did not consider this particularly evidential. However, her husband also referred to having changed the spark plugs on the plane to a different brand just before the flight, something she knew nothing about but later verified with one of the mechanics. He also mentioned that he had left two of his studs in a box in a cupboard, something Emilie did not know about until she got home and confirmed it as fact.

A week or two later, Emilie persuaded Mrs. Earl to go back to the Ouija board and brought along her husband’s friend, Captain John Morkham. Some technical information concerning the plane was communicated, things which Emilie concluded could not have been known to Mrs. Earl. At the end, Hinchliffe instructed his wife to look behind a drawer on the left of his desk and she would find a document concerning their house that she had been looking for without success. Upon returning home, she found it exactly where the Ouija board messages said it would be.

“Life used to be so jolly on earth at times, but this life is so much freer,” Hinchliffe communicated to Morkham. “Be good to my wife. I am anxious about my darling Joan baby is all right (sic).”

Hinchliffe continued to communicate with Emile through Eileen Garrett and would soon start sending warnings about an air disaster that would kill many people. That will be discussed in my next post here, about May 21.

Note: One of the very best references on mediumship has been the SurvivalAfterDeath.org website. Tom Jones, who created and maintains that site states that it is down due to technical difficulties, but he says it should be back up and running within the next 2-3 weeks.

 
avove:  Dr. Charles Richet

      Winner of the 1913 Nobel Prize in Medicine, Dr. Charles Richet (1850-1935) was a physiologist, chemist, bacteriologist, pathologist, psychologist, aviation pioneer, poet, novelist, editor, author, and psychical researcher.  After receiving his Doctor of Medicine degree in 1869 and his Doctor of Science in 1878, he served as professor of physiology at the medical school of the University of Paris for 38 years.

       Richet was awarded the Nobel Prize for his research on anaphylaxis, the sensitivity of the body to alien protein substance.  He also contributed much to research on the nervous system, anesthesia, serum therapy, and neuro-muscular stimuli.  He served as editor of the Revue Scientifique for 24 years and contributed to many other scientific publications.

      After attending experiments in Milan with medium Eusapia Palladino in 1884, Richet began taking an active interest in psychical research.  He befriended many of the top psychical researchers of the day, including Frederic W. H. Myers, Sir Oliver Lodge, and Dr. Albert von Schrenck-Notzing.   In addition to Palladino, he studied Marthe Bèraud (Eva C.), William Eglinton, Stephan Ossowiecki, Elisabeth D'Esperance, and others.  He served as president of the Society for Psychical Research of London in 1905.

      While clearly accepting the reality of mediumship and other psychic phenomena, Richet remained skeptical as to whether the evidence suggested spirits and survival.   "I oppose it (spirit hypothesis) half-heartedly, for I am quite unable to bring forward any wholly satisfactory counter-theory," he wrote.  Publicly, he leaned toward a physiological explanation, but privately, at least in his later years, he apparently accepted the spirit hypothesis as the best explanation,
   

     This "interview" is based on Richet's 1923 book, Thirty Years of Psychical Research.

Except for word in brackets, inserted to provide a transition or flow, the words are his.  The questions have been tailored to fit the answers.  I did the "interview" for the current issue of the Journal of Spirituality and Paranormal Studies, a quarterly publication of the Academy of Spirituality and Paranormal Studies, Inc.   The Academy is holding its 33rd annual conference at DeSales University, Center Valley, PA May 30 to June 2. The theme is "Beyond the Veil:  Evidence for Life After Death."  There's still time to sign up for the conference.  For more information, go to http://aspsi.org/  or e-mail bateyb@infionline.net  


      Dr. Richet, your book is dedicated to Sir William Crookes and Frederic W. H. Myers.  I gather, however, that when Sir William was reporting on his research with D. D. Home and Florence Cook back during the early 1870s, you did not have a particularly high opinion of him.

     "[True], the idolatry of current ideas was so dominant at that time that no pains were taken either to verify or to refute Crookes's statements.   Men were content to ridicule them, and I avow with shame that I was among the willfully blind.  Instead of admiring the heroism of a recognized man of science who dare then in 1872 to say that there really are phantoms that can be photographed and whose heartbeats can be heard, I laughed.   This courage had, however, no immediate or considerable effect; it is only today that Crookes's work is really understood.  It is still the foundation of objective metapsychics, a block of granite that no criticism has been able to touch."

     Would you mind explaining the difference between objective and subjective metapsychics? 

      "Objective metapsychics deals with certain mechanical, physical, or chemical effects perceptible to our senses, not proceeding from known forces, but seemingly directed by intelligence.  It states, classifies, and analyzes these material phenomena. Subjective metaphysics studies those phenomena that are purely intellectual.  These are characterized by an indication of some realities that are not revealed by our senses.  Everything takes place as if we had a mysterious faculty of cognition - lucidity - was the classical physiology of sensation cannot as yet explain.  I propose to call this faculty cryptestheisa, i.e., a sensibility whose nature escapes us.  Frequently, the phenomena pertain to both kinds and it is difficult or impossible to distinguish between them."

     Thank you for that clarification, Dr. Richet.   I would like to focus this interview more on the objective as I know you have had considerable experience with materialization phenomena. Who are the best among these objective or physical mediums?

    "To mention Home, Florence Cook, Stainton Moses, Eusapia, Mme. D'Espérance, Eglinton, Linda Gazzera, Slade, Marthe Béraud, Miss Goligher, and Stanislawa Tomczyk is to name nearly all; it is obvious that they are but few.  The number of those who give raps is very much larger, but I have no statistics regarding them."

        With the possible exception of Home and Moses, all of those you just mentioned have been accused of fraud at one time or another.    

       "Unfortunately physical mediums often misuse their powers; they think to enrich themselves and give public séances for profit.  The Fox sisters, the Davenport brothers, Eglinton, and Slade all did this, and from thence to fraud is but a step that has often been taken, so that professional mediums of this class are always to be looked upon with suspicion and the most rigid precautions must always be taken against trickery.  Indeed, this is always necessary, even when there is no possible suspicion of conscious fraud."

      Conscious as opposed to unconscious fraud?

     "We have defined metapsychics as the science whose subject matter is phenomena which seem to arise from an intelligence other than the human intelligence.  Mediums are therefore those persons who, in partial or total unconsciousness, speak words perform actions, and make gestures that seem not to be under control of their will and to be independent of their intelligence.  Nevertheless, these unconscious phenomena show intelligence and system, and are sometimes most aptly coordinated.  Therefore, the first thing to be discovered is whether they are due to a human or to a super-human intelligence."

     So you are agreeing with Sir Oliver Lodge and Sir William Barrett, both of whom concluded that various movements on the part of the medium which have been interpreted as cheating or fraud are in fact prompted by the controlling intelligence and are involuntary movements as far as the medium is concerned?

      "[Exactly], trance turns them into automata that have but a very slight control over their muscular movements.  When a medium is nearly or quite insensible, his eyes shut, sweating and making convulsive e movements, unable to answer any questions put to him, I do not think he ought to be reproached for anything he may do.  He is not himself; he has not that poised and quiet consciousness which can decided between right and wrong.  He has forgotten who he is and what he ought to do."

     But, clearly there has been much conscious fraud?

     "[No doubt], completely criminal are such acts as those of Eldred or Mrs. Williams preparing paraphernalia for deliberate fraud, hidden in a chair or upon their person; this is radically different from the suspicious movements of an entranced medium."

    Your reports talk about ectoplasmic arms extending from Eusapia and touching sitters or moving objects.

     "[Yes], the ectoplasmic arms and hands that emerge from the body of Eusapia do only what they wish, and though Eusapia knows what they do, they are not directed by Eusapia's will; or rather there is for the moment no Eusapia.   It is also quite easy to understand  that when exhausted by a long and fruitless séance, and surrounded by a number of sitters eager to see something, a medium whose consciousness is still partly in abeyance may give the push that he hopes will start the phenomena....There is a quasi-identity between the medium and the ectoplasm, so that when an attempt is made to seize the latter, a limb of the medium may be grasped; though I make a definite and formal protest against this frequent defense of doubtful phenomena by spiritualists.  More frequently, the ectoplasm is independent of the medium, indeed perhaps it is always so; though I do not mean to imply that the severance or capture of the ectoplasm can be effected without danger to the medium.  The case of Mme. D'Espérance is on record to show that a medium may incur a long illness by reason of such an attempt."

     I recall reading that there was much of this cheating that really wasn't cheating   going on when you, Sir Oliver Lodge, and Frederic Myers studied Eusapia at Ribaud Island.  

     "At Ribaud Island, experimenting with Eusapia in company with Sir Oliver Lodge, Frederic Myers, and J. Ochorowicz - three objective observers whose competence and honesty cannot be called into question - I held one of Eusapia's hands firmly in each of mine.  I then felt a third hand touch my shoulder, my head, and my face.  This was not in darkness; there was a lighted candle in the room.  All kinds of absurd hypotheses must here be eliminated: first that I was hallucinated - that is, disposed of by the fact that the slap on the shoulder given by ‘John King' (Eusapia's spirit control or guide) was heard by all present; then that Myers, Lodge, or Ochorowicz should have perpetrated this bad joke; then that I had let go of one of Eusapia's hands, which could not be, for my friends could all see her hands held far apart, one in each of mine.  Further, the same phenomenon of the materialization of a hand while Eusapia's hands were held separate by one person has been observed by Oliver Lodge, by Myers, and by Ochorowicz."

     Would you mind explaining a little more about the séances with Eusapia?

     "Provisionally, the sequence of materialization phenomena, as observed with Eusapia, may be stated as follows:  At first, touches and raps produced both easily and frequently; this is the first stage, in which nothing is visible, for the material energy disengaged from her body is formless.  In the second stage the hand is formed, but still cannot be seen, though it can execute well-defined mechanical actions, can take hold of a bell or book, and can touch one's head with fingers that are felt to be warm and jointed.  Finally, in the third stage, which was rarely reached in my experiments with Eusapia, the hand becomes visible and can be photographed.  In a still rarer, fourth stage, not only a hand but a whole body is formed and detached.  Vassallo, Porro, Morselli, and Bottazzi have been able to witness these complete materializations.  [And], luminous phenomena are relatively frequent."

     History has not been particularly kind to Eusapia and others you mentioned earlier, treating them as either charlatans or as a mixed mediums (producing both genuine phenomena and fraudulent phenomena).  

     "Even if there were no other medium than Eusapia in the world, her manifestations would suffice to establish scientifically the reality of telekinesis and ectoplasmic forms...  A powerful medium is a very delicate instrument of whose secret springs we know nothing, and clumsy handling may easily disorganize its working.  It is best to allow the phenomena to develop in their own way without any attempt at guidance.  It is probably a great mistake to try to educate mediumship...Mediums have not hitherto been treated with justice; they have been slandered, ridiculed, and vilified.  They have been treated as animæ viles for experiment.  When their faculties faded away they have been left to die in obscurity and want; when rewarded it has been with a niggardly hand, giving them to understand that they are only instruments.  It is time that this inhuman treatment should cease."

      But you observed much more dramatic phenomena with Marthe Bèraud, correct? 

     "[Correct], the materializations given by Marthe Bèraud are of the highest importance.  They have presented numerous facts illustrating the general processus of materializations and have supplied metapsychic science with entirely new and unforeseen data...[Marthe is] the daughter of an officer, betrothed to General Noel's son, who died in the Congo before the marriage.  She is a very intelligent and lively young lady, wears her hair short, and is a bright-eyed brunette...The first experiments at which I was present [in Algiers] impressed me greatly, but I always distrust first impressions.  In the following year, I returned to Algiers resolved to repeat experiments under more rigorous conditions."

     Please tell me what you observed on the second trip.

    "The materializations produced were very complete.  The phantoms of Bien Boa appeared five or six times under satisfactory conditions in the sense that he could not be Marthe masquerading in a helmet and sheet.  Marthe would have had not only to bring, but also to conceal afterwards, the helmet, the sheet, and the burnous (hooded cloak worn by Arabs).  Also Marthe and the phantom were both seen at the same time.   To pretend that Bien Boa was a doll is more absurd still; he walked and moved, his eyes could be seen looking around, and when he tried to speak his lips moved.  He seemed so much alive that, as we could hear his breathing, I took a flask of baryta water to see if his breath would show carbon dioxide.  The experiment succeeded.  I did not lose sight of the flask from the moment when I put it into the hands of Bien Boa who seemed to float in the air on the left of the curtain at a height greater than Marthe could have been even if standing up.   While he blew into the tube the bubbling could be heard and I asked Delanne (editor of Revue de Spiritisme), ‘Do you see Marthe?'  He said, ‘I see Marthe completely."

      I know you said the room was checked and you were certain that nobody else could enter, but isn't it possible that Bien Boa was a confederate hiding in the materialization cabinet or some secret entrance or trap door  into the room?

      "It is absolutely impossible that this phantom should be a stranger invading the cabinet; and it is impossible that Marthe could have invested herself with a helmet and sheet, and induced at the same time the white cloud in front of the curtain.  Everything happens as though fluidic vapour emerged from her head and her right side, masking both, and rising into the air without any means of support but her head and body."  
  

     I believe you reported an even more dramatic materialization with Marthe, didn't you?

     "However striking [that experiment] was, another experiment seems to me even more evidential:  Everything being arranged as usual, after a long wait I saw close to me, in front of the curtain which had not moved, a white vapour, hardly sixteen inches distant.  It was like a white veil or handkerchief on the floor.  This rose and became spherical.  Soon it was a head just above the floor; it rose up still more, enlarged, and grew into a human form, a short bearded man dressed in a turban and white mantle, who moved, limping slightly, form right to left before the curtain.  On coming close to General Noel, he sank down abruptly to the floor with a clicking noise like a falling skeleton, flattening out in front of the curtain.  Three or four minutes later, close to the general, not to me, he reappeared, rising in a straight line from the floor, born from the floor, so to say, and falling back to it with the same clicking noise."

      I know the cabinet is required for the materialization to take place in complete darkness, but it still sounds so hokey to the skeptic. 

      "It seems to me impossible, however slight and supple Marthe may be, that she should creep under the curtain without disturbing it and give the illusion of a person rising straight from the floor; and how can the head, standing as if decapitated, be explained, and the sinking into the floor afterwards, when very shortly after we saw Marthe sitting quietly in her chair, asleep.  Several photographs were taken by Delanne and myself, stereoscopic and other.  They show some interesting details on which Sir Oliver Lodge has made some acute criticisms, saying that they were the best metapsychic photographs that he had seen."

     These so-called ectoplasmic figures are often quite ridiculous looking and it is easy to assume that they are some kind of dolls.  Of course, it is difficult to understand why a fraudulent medium would think she or he could dupe anyone with something that doesn't even resemble a human form.  

      "[True], it is imagined, quite mistakenly, that a  materialization must be analogous to a human body and must be three dimensional.  This is not so.  There is nothing to prove that the process of materialization is other than a development of a completed form after a first stage of coarse and rudimentary lineaments form from the cloudy substance.  The moist, gelatinous, and semi-luminous extensions that come from the mouth of Marthe are embryonic formations which tend towards organization without immediately attaining it.

     What exactly is ectoplasm?  The skeptics would say that it nothing but cheesecloth stuffed into some cavity of the medium and then exuded at an opportune time. 

     "The word ‘ectoplasm,' which I invented for the experiments with Eusapia, seems entirely justified...Thanks to Ochorowicz, Schrenck-Notzing, and Mme. Bisson, and Crawford, who carried on Crookes's work, it seems now fairly proved that materializations are ectoplasms; that is, sarcodic extensions emanating from the body of a medium, precisely as a pseudopod from an amoeboid cell.  All zoologists are aware that an amoeba can project a sarcode to seize upon alimentary matter and infest it.  In a similar fashion fluidic filaments or extensions like clouds, veils, or stems may proceed from the body of the entranced medium, can then become organic, and take on the semblance of human limbs and occasionally of whole bodies...The ectoplasm is a kind of gelatinous protoplasm, formless at first, that exudes from the body of the medium, and takes form later.  This embryo-genesis of materialization shows clearly on nearly all the photographs.  In the early stages there are always white veils and milky patches and the faces, fingers, and drawings are formed little by little bin the midst of this kind of gelatinous paste that resembles moist and sticky muslin...[I observed] gelatinous projections come from the mouth or shoulders of Marthe.  I saw the arm of Bien Boa formed in this way.  At first it resembled a thin, rigid rod covered with drapery and became a stretched-out arm.  The same phenomenon was very clearly observable with Eusapia.  A kind of supplementary arm seemed to come from her body.  Once I saw a long, stiff rod proceed from her side, which after great extension had a hand at its extremity - a living hand warm and jointed, absolutely like a human hand."

    I'm confused on something here.  Is ectoplasm always visible?

   "In their first stage these ectoplasms are invisible, but can move objects and can give raps on a table.  Later on they become visible though nebulous and sketchy.  Still later, they take human form, for they have the extraordinary property that they change their forms and their consistence and evolve under our eyes.  In a few seconds, the nebulous embryo that exudes from the body of the medium becomes an actual being; though the human ovum requires thirty years to evolve into the adult form. Sometimes the phantom appears suddenly, without passing through the phase of luminous cloud; but this phenomenon is probably of the same order as the slower development.  This ectoplasmic formation at the expense of the physiological organism of the medium is now beyond all dispute.  It is prodigiously strange, prodigiously unusual, and it would seem so unlikely as to be incredible; but we must give in to the facts."

    Doesn't the materialization of garments discredit the hypothesis that a deceased human is materializing?

     "What about the astral presentment of a garment, a hat, an eye-glass, or a walking-stick?  This is the height of folly.  It seems to me much wiser to verify without pretending to understand, and to admit that any explanation we can give can hardly escape being ridiculous.  Instead of claiming that unknown powers pertaining to deceased humanity are capable of producing these phenomena, it is better to admit that we are dealing with facts as yet inexplicable, and await further elucidation.  But there is no reason to deny a fact because it is inexplicable.  Can anyone have the unpardonable presumption to claim to give an adequate explanation of all natural phenomena?  In metapsychics we come up against the inexplicable at every turn."

      In spite of your standing in the scientific community, mainstream science doesn't seem to accept the research on ectoplasm.

     "Assuredly, it is possible that I may be mistaken, even grossly mistaken, along with Crookes, De Rochas, Aksakoff, Myers, William James, Schiaparelli, Zöllner, Fechner, and Oliver Lodge.  It is possible that all of us have been deceived.  It is possible that some day an unexpected experiment may explain our prolonged deception quite simply.  So be it! But till it has been explained how we have all been duped by an illusion, I claim that the reality of these materializations must be conceded...What man of science worthy of the name could affirm that science has classified, analyzed, and penetrated all the energies of immeasurable nature, or could make the strange and pretentious claim that we know all the dynamic manifestations in the world!  To admit telekinesis and ectoplasms is not to destroy even the smallest fragment of science; it is but to admit new data, and that there are unknown energies.  Then why be indignant, when, on the basis of thousands of observations and experiments, we affirm one of those unknown energies?"     

      You've often used the word "absurd" when referring to the various phenomena.

     "Yes, it is absurd; but no matter - it is true." 

Above:  Steve Beckow 
 

       Steve Beckow, a resident of Vancouver, B.C., has a very unusual pastime.  You might call him an afterlife cartographer.   A sociologist, historian, and a former member of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, Beckow prefers to call himself a student of cross-cultural spirituality.   His primary interest now is in making sense of the afterlife from revelations that have come to us through various forms of mediumship, including the mediumship of the Bible and other sacred texts.   I recently had the opportunity to interview Beckow by e-mail.  Here are my questions and his answers:

Steve, what prompted your interest in charting the heavens?

       I followed what must have been a common path for my generation in the 1970s - through encounter groups, off to India, into spirituality.  At one point I spent time in a British-spiritualist development circle and at another time I had an out-of-body experience. It was these two latter influences that made me resolve to write a book on the conditions of life after death.
 

      Other spiritual experiences and the writing projects they inspired intervened, but a few years ago.  I returned to the original promise I had made myself and, drawing on my sociological training, began to piece together a picture of life beyond physical death.

What did you find?

     Well, first of all, working on the subject is a little like piecing together a gigantic jigsaw puzzle, all of whose pieces are in soft shades of blue.  It is only by nuances that one can tell the pieces apart.   For instance, the flora, buildings, and art of the Astral and Mental Planes are alike, both dazzling and indescribable. How is one to distinguish between them from an earthly standpoint?    Moreover, unlike earth, which is arranged geographically, the spirit planes are arranged hierarchically.  As Julia Ames said, "there are degrees in heaven."

       This has several impacts. First, examining the communicators themselves, I found that I was mostly reading accounts by the newly-arrived.  They occupied planes nearest to earth and knew the least about what they were describing. Second, the conditions of life become increasingly hard to describe as one mounts higher in the spiritual realms. Third, communicators lose their desire to communicate with us on this side the further up they mount the ladder of the planes.  All this biases communication in the direction of the least well-informed, speaking on the most familiar territory.

Have you succeeded in drawing a new map of heaven?

       Like all early explorers, I and other afterlife investigators so far have only mapped out known "continents," mostly the Borderlands or the Higher Summerlands.  Most spiritual communications, in earlier times, were primarily proving that we survive. Following them was a raft of spirit teachings. It is only rarely that a spirit communicator actually turns his or her attention to the conditions of life on the other side.

       Moreover, of the planes above the Astral (that is, above the Winterlands and Summerlands) and perhaps the Mental we know little at all. Theosophical commentators give only a general paragraph to what they called the Buddhic and Nirvanic Planes and confide that they are forbidden to say anything at all about higher planes.  All of this means that afterlife cartography is very much in its infancy.

What are the "Winterlands"?

      The Winterlands are the bottom planes of the astral - the Stony Plane and the Dark Plane. These are the equivalent of what Christians call "Hell."  The Stony Plane is described as resembling the American desert regions with much less heat and light. The Dark Plane is a quite miserable place to land in, cold, dark, and, in many respects, noxious.  Some people spend hundreds of years wallowing in self-pity before climbing their way back out of it.  Others work hard and make a mad dash to leave them behind.

      Nonetheless, they are not the same "Hell" as pictured in orthodox religion. In the first place, they are not everlasting; spirits are given the opportunity to mend themselves and leave. In the second, there is no hellfire in which souls are tormented.  The worst torment that occurs arises from the individual's own mind. An example of that would be a murderer condemned mentally to endlessly relive his or her crimes, which is what I understand occurs.

      Incidentally, one of the questions I had in the back of my mind that spurred this research was to discover what happened to the Nazis after death.  Almost all of them ended up in the Dark Planes, but I learned something else that startled me. I have encountered several spirits who say that the worst among evil spirits - Philip Gilbert even named one Nazi (google "Irma Grese") - have been, shall we say, re-assimilated back into the cosmic Spirit. They no longer exist as individuals. That was one of the sobering revelations from this work. Until then I thought not one sheep would be lost, but apparently this is not the case.

If there is a Hell, is there a Purgatory?

        Purgatory is a state rather than a place.  There are several purgatories. The Borderlands are a "place of purging," where we undergo a "full-life review" immediately after death. You probably already know that some people may undergo this review during an out-of-body experience.
 

       But there is a second place of purging, after one has become established in the "Mental Plane" or "Heaven" proper, which lies "above" the Astral Summerlands. Here one goes through a much more intensive review than the first, in concert with one's spirit teachers, which communicators call "the Judgment."  After this second review, there follows a time of making amends for one's errors and then what is called the "Second Death," when the remaining earthly traces fall away and one emerges in the mental body. I have heard that there are other purgations, or purgatories, as well.

Does your research confirm the existence of "earthbound spirits"?  If so, exactly what are they?  Do they know that they are dead?

      Yes, there are large numbers of earthbound spirits.  They share in common an unfinished longing for continued experience of mortal life.  Some may not know they are dead; some may know.
 

      Some may be malevolent spirits, spurring embodied people on to excesses and crimes so that the earthbound spirit can enjoy the sensations if even in a limited and vicarious fashion. Some may be loving spirits, unable to bear the pain of separation from loved ones. Others may simply miss their old castle or their old flat.
 

      Others can be mistaken for earthbound spirits, but are actually souls who remain near the earth for exalted purposes. The fascinating Nirmanakaya are one example.  The Nirmanakaya are incredibly-developed souls, who have renounced the right to enter Nirvana and agreed to remain more or less stationary in the spirit plane showering it and the earth with love.  Occasionally Theosophists would bump into one of these "stones in the guardian wall."

What is the highest plane from which we have communications?

      Again, spirits do not often say what plane they are communicating from. One who does is John Heslop, who communicates from an exalted region called the Christ Sphere.  This sphere is mentioned by others, but Heslop actually describes as many details of it as can be captured in our language.  Unfortunately these details are fewer than I would like, but listening to Heslop we can, from his words, get a sense of the caliber of inhabitants of that exalted sphere.

      Here I might add that two sources - John Heslop and Julia Ames - actually describe being taken up into heaven, Julia by an angel, meeting the Lord Jesus with a heavenly host behind him, and experiencing enlightenment at his hands. I mention this because some people - incarnate and discarnate - debunk Biblical descriptions like the "Rapture" these days, but I have found interesting examples bearing these descriptions out. They simply do not happen to most folks (and so are little known to, and sometimes denied by, the average spirit communicator).  They happen to more highly-developed beings.

      This raises the interesting question of the fallibility of spirits. Because most communicators are recently transitioned, they can be mistaken in their assessments of what does and does not happen on the other side. It was the newly-arrived Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson who said that there was no "rapture" and no "judgment."  But in fact he was in error on both points.

      The other source that is well worth studying is Stainton Moses' Spirit Teachings. His chief communicator, "Imperator," last incarnated as the prophet Malachi, who was one of those responsible for putting the Old Testament in the form it takes today. He is assisted by a band of 49 lofty souls and his teachings are fascinating.  Unfortunately Imperator does not talk about his own plane specifically, but still gives much valuable information on spirit life in general.

      I haven't read the Seth books again since long ago, but expect the same high-quality information from that source too.

 How many planes are there? Can you name them all?

        No, I cannot name them all. No classification scheme I have seen so far takes them all in - not those of the Theosophists or the Rosicrucians or anyone else.  A comprehensive map would have to include the Buddhic and Nirvanic Planes, the two planes above them that the Theosophists refuse to discuss, and the realms of the Dharmarajas, Elohim, Lipika, and nine orders of angels.  No cartographical scheme that I have seen shows where they all fit in or even names (or numbers) them in a consistent manner.
 

     Most schemes of description go no farther than the Third Heaven or third subplane of the Mental Plane.  There may very well be no words to describe them even if they were named or numbered. 

       Moreover, there are no maps that I am aware of that also include the life streams parallel to but independent of humans that exist alongside our planes, such as fairies, sylphs, etc. I have not concerned myself with these or, for that matter, with the spiritual planes that are associated with life forms on other planetary and star systems. (Yes, they exist too.)

      Not only can I not name all the planes, but I am faced with a plethora of names which appear to point to the same region while lacking spirit confirmation that they actually do.  Thus, the Borderlands are called the Near-Earth Plane, Kamaloka, Hades, Purgatory, the Vestibule, and the "Blue Island." That would be well and good if someone like Annie Besant did not come along and extend the word "Kamaloka" to the whole of the Astral Plane or someone else point out that there are many Purgatories, etc.  There is frighteningly little agreement on matters of prime importance in surveying the Heavens.

Your website mentions that there is a convalescence period in the Borderland realm.  Does the time spent there vary for different souls?  Do earthbound spirits undergo convalescence?  If so, why are they still earthbound?

        Spirits may or may not convalesce after their deaths. It depends on a number of factors. First, it depends on the degree of their familiarity with life after death. Those familiar may pass quickly through the Borderlands and take up their residence on the higher Astral Planes - Robert Hugh Benson, for instance.  Some will move quickly through the Astral Planes before taking their residence on the Mental Planes - W.T. Stead, for example. 
  

       It also depends on the nature of their death conditions. Those who have suffered a long illness or a sudden and violent death will generally need more time to convalesce than those who died, say, peacefully in their sleep.  Some people may need only a day's sleep and they are ready to function. Benson is an example of this too.   

       In Grace Rosher's The Travellers' Return, there is a wonderful description of the joyous reception Sir Winston Churchill received on the Astral Plane from former prime ministers and other historic figures. Prior to that reception, Sir Winston was convalescing. One detail that was interesting to hear was that he was awakened temporarily from his rest to hear the trumpets at St. Paul's cathedral and then sent back to bed. What a nice touch!

      Most earthbound spirits are surrounded by a mental wall of unconsciousness that spirits who help with transitions cannot penetrate.  Sometimes these earthbound spirits do and sometimes they do not know they have died. Others consciously choose to be earthbound and transition guides will not violate their freedom of choice.  Most of us are "earthbound" in a manner of speaking. Even Julia Ames sought permission to leave Jesus and return to tell her loved ones on earth the good news. We all spend a certain amount of time around those we have left behind.

      Again, certain spirits receive permission to work with their mediumistic relatives - Philip Gilbert, for instance, or "Sigwart" of The Bridge Across the River.  While we don't usually consider them "earthbound," they do account for some sustained spiritual activity around mortals.

Which have been your best or favorite resources for this information?

       I certainly have my favourites.  I have mentioned some already. I have found invaluable the books communicated by Philip Gilbert through his mother Alice (Philip in Two Worlds, Into the Everywhere, and Philip in the Spheres), Julia's letters in W.T. Stead's After Death, T.E Lawrence's Post-Mortem Journal, and Benson's Life in the World Unseen series. F.W.H. Myers is informative but idiosyncratic. It is difficult to know where to fit some of his information. Again I have not finished my reading for this project. 
 

      Among the books by incarnate scholars, my favourite is Paul Beard's Living On. The Theosophists are also wide-ranging and informative.  I should mention that there are a great number of primary and secondary texts available these days online.

 What does this research show us?

      Well, even more distinctly than research on earth life, research on spirit life shows us the Divine Plan: namely, spiritual evolution, from God to God.  (All of what follows is covered in clearly-marked sections of my website.) We have all of us come from God and are destined, at some distant future time, to return to God after we have experienced a very advanced stage of enlightenment.

      God's Will, as I understand it, is that, through Its created life forms, the Formless will enjoy the experience of Its own Bliss. And that moment of enjoyment occurs during enlightenment. The purpose of our lives therefore is enlightenment and our journey down and up the spirit planes, as depicted in Jacob's ladder, is to serve the Divine Plan of which our enlightenment forms a part. 

     Following spirit travel from plane to plane shows Jacob's ladder of spiritual evolution about as plainly as anything we could ever expect to see. The march from the Winterlands to the Summerlands to Heaven and beyond is a graphic illustration of the trajectory of our return to Divinity.  Revealing a picture of the Divine Plan at work is one of the major contributions of afterlife research.

 Is there anything else you are hoping to achieve by drawing new maps of heaven? 

        I know that spirits listen to us as much as we listen to them. While drawing maps, I am also trying to convey to them the message that we need them to tighten up the process of communication. One way would be to ensure that all communicators be required to tell us specifically from which plane (and subplane) they are communicating. Location on the other side is of critical importance to us who are trying to fit the pieces together.

       I also ask for the help of spirit teachers in correlating the different terminologies that spirits use. For example, I do not know what planes names like the "Christ Sphere" or "Empyrean Plane" refer to in general, but also how they correlate to numbering systems like "the seventh plane," etc.

      Even more importantly than that, I hope to persuade spirit and physical folks to get together on some really broad anthropological projects that would subject spirit planes to rigorous social-scientific study. Until recently, most accounts have resembled tourist guides.  We can do better than that and, I think, we are ready for intensive, scholarly examinations carried out by groups on this side co-operating with groups on "the other."  I still don't think this research should be affiliated with universities, though, who still appear to adhere to a paradigm of empirical materialism and can be influenced by the state.

      I think of the various interviews carried out by Robert Leichtman in the Seventies, collectively called From Heaven to Earth (unfortunately out of print now and hard to come by). Leichtman, through medium David Kendrick Johnson, interviewed Tesla, Churchill, Shakespeare, Cayce, Garrett, and many others. His work, while anecdotal, was still fascinating and showed the potential of organized, co-operative cross-border research, embodied spirits sitting down with disembodied.

       We are all of us interested in a small area of the total picture. Just because I don't mention something outside my own area of interest does not mean it is not important.  The same cross-border research that I request for anthropological purposes will be used by others to receive in-depth spiritual teachings that may help us end the tremendous difficulties we are falling into these days. Many of the chief problems of our era, and I mention the use of planet-threatening depleted-uranium weapons as just one example, are hardly mentioned in our press. We need spirit help with these problems too, even if I personally would not be prominent among the researchers carrying on that work.

        In my view it is time to pick up the pace and get serious about cross-border communication.  We have passed through the evidential phase quite some time ago, without having necessarily moved to much more intensive communication. I am saying that the time has now arrived to begin the next phase.

Most of Steve's research can be found at his website, http://www.angelfire.com/space2/light11/index.html

above:  Sir William Barrett
 

During a recent segment of the Lisa Williams show ("Talking with the Dead") on the Lifetime channel, two sisters and a brother appeared to be receiving a very evidential reading from Williams as their mother communicated through Williams' clairvoyance.    The three were affirming nearly everything Williams said and the two women were in tears.   When Williams said she was losing contact with their mother, one of the sisters asked if she had given her name.  Williams paused and then said she had not.

No doubt the skeptics watching the program had a good laugh, asking how Williams could get so much evidential information and not get a simple name.  Probably few of them stopped to think that the fact she didn't get the name works against both the fraud and telepathy theories.  Certainly if she or her staff had done some research beforehand, as the skeptics allege, she would at least have the mother's name.  And it is likely that the sister who asked the question had her mother's name in mind for Williams to telepathically receive, if that is the way she gets her information.

At times, Williams does get names; at other times she doesn't.   The problem with getting names was discussed in a previous blog (see "Why John Edward Struggles with Names" listed under at right; click on "popular").  However, I recently came upon another credible source.  It confirms and adds to the previous discussion.  

Beginning July 26, 1925, Lady Barrett, otherwise known as Dr. Florence Barrett, dean of the London School of Medicine for Women, began receiving messages from her late husband, Sir William Barrett, who had died on May 26, 1925 at age 80, through the mediumship of Gladys Osborne Leonard, the renowned London medium.   Sir William had spent nearly 40 years as a professor of physics in the Royal College of Science at Dublin and was knighted in 1912 for his scientific work, which included developing a silicon-iron alloy known as stalloy, used in the commercial development of the telephone and transformers, and also doing pioneering research on entoptic vision, leading to the invention of the entoptiscope and a new optometer.   Sir William was also a psychical researcher when alive and was instrumental in the formation of the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) in 1882.

Lady Barrett was not a gullible grieving widow.  She went to see Mrs. Leonard only after a member of the SPR told her that her husband had communicated at a recent sitting with Mrs. Leonard.  While Lady Barrett was well aware of Mrs. Leonard's reputation as a credible medium, she proceeded cautiously.  As a respected obstetrician and Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine, she had her own reputation to protect.   At that first sitting on July 26, Lady Barrett received some very evidential information - information which she was certain could not have been known to Mrs. Leonard or researched - including details of Sir William's last moments in his physical shell and mention of a leg problem he had been experiencing just before his death.  Over the next 11 years, Lady Barrett sat with Mrs. Leonard every few months, and in a 1937 book, Personality Survives Death, she published some of the transcripts of her sittings.

"Sometimes I lose some memory of things from coming here," Sir William told her in a February 8, 1927 sitting.  "I know it in my own state but not here."   He went on to liken it to having a dream in the physical state and to explain that when he goes back to the spirit world after a sitting he realizes that he did not get everything through that he wanted to.  He further explained that when we die, the subconscious and the conscious join up, making a complete mind that knows and remembers everything.  However, when he has to lower his vibration to communicate with her, he leaves the subconscious behind and must rely on what was his conscious memory.  He said the subconscious is housed within the etheric body.

"There are two lives here: one I can tell you about and you can understand, and one I cannot tell you about till you come over," Sir William told his widow.  She asked him which life was higher and he replied that it was the life he could not tell her about.  "I cannot come with and as my whole self, I cannot," he added, saying that he cannot make his fourth dimensional self the same as the third dimensional self.  "It is like measuring a third dimension by its square feet instead of by its cubic feet."

Lady Barrett occasionally visited mediums other than Mrs. Leonard.  At one sitting, apparently with a clairvoyant, Sir William identified himself as "William" rather than "Will," as she knew him.  This made her suspicious that it was not him. At a sitting with Mrs. Leonard on November 5, 1929 Lady Barrett asked him about this.  Sir William explained the problem.  "If you go to a medium that is new to us, I can make myself known by giving you through that medium an impression of my character and personality, my work on earth and so forth," he related. "Those can all be suggested by thought impressions, ideas; but if I want to say, ‘I am Will,' I find that is much more difficult than giving you a long comprehensive study of my personality.  ‘I am Will' sounds so simple, but you understand that in this case the word ‘Will' becomes a detached word.  If I wanted to express an idea of my scientific interests I could do it in twenty different ways.  I should probably begin by showing books, then giving impressions of the nature of the book and so on, till I had built up a character impression of myself, but ‘I am Will' presents difficulties."

The same problem presented itself with her name when he called her "Florrie" at one  sitting, whereas he had called her only "Flo" when alive.  Sir William explained that he couldn't get "Flo" through the medium's mind.

In a 1931 sitting, Sir William could get only the letter "B" through to describe her brother from Bristol who had recently passed over (his actual name is not stated in the book, so it is unclear as to whether "B" stands for his name, brother, or Bristol).  He told her that he was helping her brother adjust to his new reality, mentioning that her brother kept saying "But you are dead, you are dead, you are dead," and assumed he was dreaming.  It was not until several other "dead" relatives and friends greeted him that he began to realize that he had "died."

On another occasion, Sir William tried to explain that a message would reach his widow  from Leonora Piper of America.  However, he could only get "P" from "oversea" through the medium's mind. It was not until the message was delivered from Mrs. Piper in Boston that Lady Barrett understood the reference.  "The actual phrasing, therefore, in some places cannot be regarded word for word as that of the communicator himself, but as that of the control operating through the medium," Lady Barrett explained in the Introduction to the book.

 All the while, Sir William was able to get bits of personal information through to Lady Barrett so that she would know it was him   For example, at one sitting, he told her that he saw her take down a picture from the wall a few days earlier.  There was much personal information that came through, but Lady Barrett did not feel it should go in the book. 

Sir William explained that the ability to communicate between planes depended upon the ability of the spirit communicator to lower his vibration and for the "living" person on earth to raise her or his vibration.   Some people can raise their vibrations better than others and some of them are called mediums.   On the subject of vibration, Sir William said that he now understood the so-called physical resurrection of Christ.  "Through living in the most spiritual vibration, He was able to raise the vibrations of the physical so that there was no body to dispose of at His death - or as we prefer to say, at His transition," he explained.

Most of the communication came through Feda, Mrs. Leonard spirit control, as Sir William often struggled to lower his vibrations, and it was necessary for Feda to act as a go-between.  Occasionally, however, Sir William was able to lower his vibrations and directly control Mrs. Leonard.  At those time, Feda's high-pitched voice, which was  nothing like Mrs. Leonard's, gave way to Sir William's deeper voice.  On several occasions, when it appeared that Sir William was very emotional, he broke through in the direct voice (his actual voice emanating from outside the medium's body). On one such occasion, Lady Barrett recorded him as saying, "Life is far more wonderful than I can ever tell you, beyond anything I ever hoped for; it exceeds all my expectations."  

Debunkers and pseudo-skeptics claim that the phenomenon known as the near-death experience (NDE) is nothing more than an hallucination or some misfiring of the brain caused by chemicals or a lack of oxygen.  However, to those with an open mind, the NDE appears to be one type of out-of-body experience (OBE) --  an experience that suggests we have a spirit body or etheric body in addition to our physical body. The case of "Pam Reynolds" is often cited as one of the best, but skeptics have attempted to pick holes in that case.  Now, the "Sarah Gideon" case seems to plug those holes.    In The Scalpel and The Soul, a new release, Dr. Allan J. Hamilton, a Tucson, Arizona brain surgeon, tells about the Gideon case.  

 But back briefly to the Pam Reynolds case.  During August 1991, Reynolds was operated on for a giant basilar artery aneurysm.  Her body temperature was lowered to 60 degrees, her brain waves flattened, her heart stopped, her breathing stopped and the blood drained from her.   By medical standards, she was "dead."  And yet, she later recalled watching parts of the surgery from above.  She recalled seeing a particular kind of surgical instrument and hearing a comment that certain vessels were too small to handle the flow of blood.  She further remembered being met by some deceased relatives after going down a dark shaft.  An uncle took her back through the tunnel as it was not yet her time to cross over.

The skeptics and debunkers argue that she must have been hallucinating before or after she was clinically "dead."  As for seeing the surgical instrument (she had surgical patches over her eyes) she may have noticed it before the procedure started or have seen a similar one on a television program involving a surgical procedure on the brain and that picture was buried in her subconscious.  The comment about her blood vessels may have been overhead before she was clinically "dead."

Like Reynolds, Gideon also underwent surgery at the Barrows Neurological Institute in Phoenix.   According to Hamilton, Gideon was "as a corpse" for 17 minutes while a titanium aneurysm clip was positioned.   Some trivial conversations took place during this 17-minute period, including one of the nurses announcing that she had just gotten engaged, mentioning her one-and-a-half carat square cut-yellow diamond ring that her boyfriend had purchased at Johnston Fellows.  She also mentioned that the proposal came at Morton's, a restaurant, and that when her boyfriend got down on his knees and proposed, one of the waiters tripped over him and fell on the wine case.

After Gideon awoke in the intensive care unit, the surgeon, Dr. Thomas Reed, stopped into visit her.  Gideon told him that she remembered hearing something about a one-and-a-half carat yellow diamond from Johnston Fellows.  She also remembered something about Morton's restaurant and that someone fell into a wine case.  Reed was shocked and called the case to the attention of others, including Hamilton. 

Hamilton says there was no question that Gideon was brain dead at the time the conversation took place.   "...we also had here unequivocal, scientific evidence that not only was her brain not working, it specifically demonstrated the absence of all cortical electrical activity when these conversations actually took place," he writes, going on to say that ‘the notion that conscious awareness - something generated by and of each brain - could have a life (so to speak) independent from the brain itself is a baffling idea."

When Sarah Gideon was later questioned about what she might have seen while she was hearing, she was able to describe the nurse who talked about her engagement, including the color of her eyes and her hair.  Since the nurse had a surgical cap on, she was asked how she could know the color of her hair.  She recalled a curl of blonde hair sticking out of the cap  on her forehead.  She also described other surgical personnel in the room.

Hamilton tells of a debate between Sir Newton Pitcairn, a British anesthesiologist and an authority in the field of the application of quantum physics to the science of consciousness, and a neurophysiologist from the University of Arizona.   Sir Newton was certain that this was a case of the consciousness being separate and independent from the brain, while the neurosurgeon questioned whether Gideon's brain had been totally asleep during the surgery.  Hamilton then showed the EEG printouts to two colleagues who routinely read such printouts, not telling them whose printout it was, and both agreed that she was "brain dead" at the time the comments were made by the nurse.

Hamilton asks what those in the field of medicine are to make of such "unsettling disturbances" and then goes on to wonder:  "Can we not, as doctors, allow ourselves to entertain the possibility that the supernatural, the divine, and the magical may all underlie our imaginations?" 

Addendum (added March 28):  After posting this entry several days ago, I attempted contact with Dr. Hamilton in hopes of obtaining more information on the "Sarah Gideon" case.   I just heard from Dr. Hamilton and he explained that some of the stories in the book, including this one, are amalgams, or blended stories.  I had suspected that the names were pseudonyms for privacy reasons and recalled Dr. Hamilton mentioning this in the Introduction.  However, I had overlooked the fact that he also mentioned that some of the stories are amalgams.  It appears that the "Pam Reynolds" case is part of the amalgam.  I infer from Dr. Hamilton's comments that there is a case or two that  actually "plugs the holes" in the Pam Reynolds case, but for patient privacy reasons the name(s)  cannot be given.

 

While Near-Death Experiences (NDEs) have been reported for centuries, it was not until the 1970s when Drs. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross and Raymond Moody, both American psychiatrists, brought it into the public view with books on the subject.   The implication of the NDE is that we do in fact have two bodies, as St. Paul told us - a physical one and a spiritual one.  Or to put it another way, the research strongly suggests that the mind is separate from the brain and is able to operate independently of the physical body.

 NDE researchers have identified six basic characteristics associated with the NDE:

1.  Seeing things from outside the body as in observing one's operations from above or viewing an accident scene from outside the accident.

2.  A feeling that one is in a tunnel and that he or she is proceeding through that     tunnel toward a light at the end of the tunnel.

3.  Being greeted by deceased relative or friends who act as a guide, by an angel,    or by a Being of Light, and then receiving some kind of orientation relative to the person's situation.

4.  A life review in which the person sees every instant of her or his life flash in front of her/him.

5.  Being told by the Being of Light, the "angel," guide or relative that he/she must return to the body, and usually protesting it.

6.  A complete transformation in the person's outlook, generally moving from a materialistic outlook to a spiritual one.  

Many of the NDE stories are impressive and convincing, but  the "debunkers" - those cynical scientific fundamentalists whose have made science their religion while claiming to be skeptics - have attempted to  come up with arguments opposing the idea that mind and brain are separate.  I've rarely, if ever, seen all the arguments advanced by skeptics and debunkers addressed at one time.  However, R. Craig Hogan, Ph.D. addresses all of them in Your Eternal Self, a comprehensive overview of all the evidence for the argument that we are eternal beings temporarily housed in a physical shell.  "... all have been demonstrated to be implausible," Hogan states, referring to the debunkers' theories on the NDE.   Here are the primary theories offered by the debunkers:  

    The Oxygen Deprivation Theory:  One of the debunker's favorite theories is that the NDE is nothing more than the hallucination of an oxygen-deprived brain.  "That  explanation was never given credence by anyone who knows anything about the brain's function," Hogan states, pointing out that people who undergo a NDE describe their senses as being more acutely aware than they had ever been, while the person suffering from loss of oxygen is stuperous or comatose, with very little brain function.

     The Dying Brain Theory:    Hogan points to research indicating that a dying brain has confusional and paranoid thinking, not the alert thinking and aware observations of the NDEr.  He also mentions research by Michael Sabom, M.D. showing that the NDE occurred after the brain had already passed the dying experience.

    The Medication Theory:  Of course, there are numerous NDEs not involving medication or drugs.  But where there is some drug or medication involved, Hogan cites the research of Michael Sabom, a Georgia cardiologist, and Melvin Morse, a professor of pediatrics, both demonstrating that the experiences are quite different from hallucinations caused by drugs.  "The reports are of sensations and consciousness that are more lucid than normal, an effect opposite to that of a brain clouded by drugs," Hogan states. 

  

    The Mental Instability Theory:  Some debunkers have suggested that NDEs are a result of mental instability.  Hogan cites research indicating that NDE subjects were actually significantly healthier than psychiatric inpatients and outpatients and somewhat healthier than college students.   He quotes Dr. Melvin Morse as saying that NDEs are predominantly positive and an acknowledgement of reality.

   The Defense Against Dying Theory:   Debunkers also claim that the NDE is simply a self-defense mechanism for the person who is confronted with extinction. "But this conflicts with the feeling of the enhanced self-identity that invariably occurs in an NDE," Hogan points out, going on to mention that this theory suggests a dream-like state, whereas NDEs are marked by absolute clarity.

   The Religious Expectation Theory:   "If it were fulfilling the experiencer's expectations of what dying is like, we would expect that only people who believed in and expected a near-death experience would have one, not suicides who anticipate annihilation, fundamentalists who expect only to see God, or agnostics and atheists who would not believe in an NDE phenomenon at all," Hogan writes, adding that this is definitely not the case.

   The Cultural Expectation Theory:   Hogan cites research demonstrating that different cultures have produced remarkably similar findings, thus showing that they're not dependent on expectations in any culture.

     The Hearsay Theory:  Some debunkers speculate that the NDE is pieced together after a trauma from bits and pieces of information gathered from medical personnel while the experiencer floated in and out of consciousness.   Here again, research has shown that experiencers have observed things outside their visual fields and what is going on in the emergency room or trauma scene.

      The Temporal Lobe Seizure Theory:  While temporal lobe seizures produce illusions, hallucinations, and feeling of despair, these negative experiences are clearly not consistent with positive NDEs.

Hogan mentions some interesting research by Carl Becker, Ph.D., professor of comparative thought at Kyoto University and a scholar in bioethics, death, and dying.  Becker determined that NDEs are real, verifiable, objective events, as 1) experiencers have clairvoyant or precognitive knowledge they could not have known that is later verified; 2) the NDE is the same across cultures and religions; 3) the NDE is different from religious expectations and are thus not fantasies; 4) in some cases, a third party has observed visionary figures seen by the experiencers, thus indicating that they are not subjective hallucinations.

"Today, humankind, especially in the West, is intellectually precocious and spiritually retarded," Hogan opines.  "The result is that those areas of our lives based in technology are advanced and those that rely on understanding the meaning of life are primitive.  People are engineering moon landings during their work days and going home to family conflicts, financial stress, and fear of death that leaves their lives full of tension, fear, and unhappiness." 

 For more about Dr. Hogan and his book, check  http://greaterreality.com/indextext.html

above:  Alfred Russel Wallace: 

July 1 of this year will mark the 150^th anniversary of the reading of the famous Darwin-Wallace paper to The Linnean Society of London, a forum for discussions on genetics, natural history, systematics, biology, and the history of plant and animal taxonomy.  It was this paper - or combination of papers prepared individually by Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace - that announced the natural selection theory to the world.

While history has recorded that Wallace (1823-1913) was co-originator with Darwin of the theory of natural selection, usually referred to simply as evolution, most people seem to credit the whole idea to Darwin.  That may be because Darwin's book, On the Origin of Species, published in 1859, gave it more widespread recognition.  However, a secondary reason may be that Wallace's reputation among scientists was tainted somewhat by the fact that he became a champion of spiritualism.  

Wallace's conclusions concerning natural selection were arrived at after years of travel in wilderness areas, including the Amazon and the Malay Archipelago. According to one biographer, by the turn of the century, Wallace was very likely Britain's best known naturalist and one of the world's most recognized names, as he lectured extensively on Darwinism.   He was awarded honorary doctorates by the University of Dublin and Oxford University.

Below is my "interview" with Wallace.  This "interview"  is based on many of his papers, including those assembled in Miracles and Modern Spiritualism, published in 1896 by George Redway, London.  All responses below are verbatim from the various papers, except for the Americanization of such words as skeptic (sceptic) and color (colour).  The questions have been tailored and arranged to fit the answers.

Dr. Wallace, what were your early views relative to spiritual matters?

     "Up to the time when I first became acquainted with the facts of Spiritualism, I was a confirmed philosophical skeptic, rejoicing in the works of Voltaire, Strauss, and Carl Vogt, and an ardent admirer (as I still am) of Herbert Spencer.  I was so thorough and confirmed a materialist that I could not at that time find a place in my mind for the conception of spiritual existence, or for any other agencies in the universe than matter and force." 

So what changed your mind?

    "My curiosity was at first excited by some slight but inexplicable phenomena occurring in a friend's family, and my desire for knowledge and love of truth forced me to continue the inquiry.  The facts became more and more assured, more and more varied, more and more removed from anything that modern science taught or modern philosophy speculated on.  The facts beat me. They compelled me to accept them as facts long before I could accept the spiritual explanation of them; there was at that time no place in my fabric of thought into which it could be fitted. By slow degrees a place was made; but it was made, not by any preconceived or theoretical opinions, but by the continuous action of fact after fact, which could not be got rid of in any other way."

Would you mind elaborating on that occurrence with the friend's family?

   "It was in the summer of 1865 that I first witnessed any of the phenomena of what is called Spiritualism, in the house of a friend - a skeptic, a man of science, and a lawyer, with none but members of his own family present.  Sitting at a good-sized round table, with our hands placed upon it, after a short time slight movements would commence, and not often ‘turnings' or tiltings,' but a gentle intermittent movement like steps, which after a time would bring the table quite across the room. Slight but distinct tapping sounds were also heard.  They gradually increased; the taps became very distinct, and the table moved considerably, obliging us all to shift our chairs."

What did you make of that?

     "That there is an unknown power developed from the bodies of a number of persons placed in connection by sitting around a table with all their hands upon it.  And the fact that we often sat half an hour in one position without a single sound, and that the phenomena never progressed further than I have related, weighs I think very strongly against the supposition that a family of four highly intelligent and well-educated persons should occupy themselves for so many weary hours in carrying out what would be so poor and unmeaning a deception." 

Did you witness other phenomena after that?

     "In September 1865, I began a series of visits to Mrs. Marshall (a London medium), generally accompanied by a friend - a good chemist and mechanic, and of a thoroughly skeptical mind.  What we witnessed may be divided into two classes of phenomena - physical and mental.  Both were very numerous and varied."   

I gather from your various writings that you gradually came to accept the spirit hypothesis?  Would you mind explaining that?

     "Perhaps the most important characteristic of these phenomena [is that] they are from beginning to end essentially human.  They come to us with human ideas; they make use of human speech, of writing and drawing; they manifest wit and logic, humor, and pathos, that we can all appreciate and enjoy; the communications vary in character as those of human beings; some rank with the lowest, some with the highest, but all are essentially human.  When the spirits speak audibly, the voice is a human voice; when they appear visible, the hands and the faces are absolutely human; when we can touch the forms and examine them closely we find them human in character, not those of any other kind of being.  The photographs are always the photographs of our fellow creatures; never those of demons or angels and animals.  When hands, feet or faces are produced in paraffin moulds they are all in minutest details those of men and women, though not those of the medium.  All of these various phenomena are of this human character. 

     "The spiritual theory is the logical outcome of the whole of the facts.  Those who deny it, in every instance with which I am acquainted, either from ignorance or disbelief, leave half the facts out of view.  That theory is most scientific which best explains the whole series of phenomena; and I therefore claim that the spirit hypothesis is the most scientific, since even those who oppose it most strenuously often admit that it does explain all the facts, which cannot be said of any other hypothesis."

What about the theory holding that medium has a secondary personality which is somehow giving rise to all the phenomena?

     "But is this so-called explanation any real explanation, or anything more than a juggle of words which creates more difficulties than it solves?  The conception of such a double personality in each of us, a second-self, which in most cases remains unknown to us all our lives, which is said to live an independent mental life, to have means of acquiring knowledge our normal self does not possess, to exhibit all the characteristics of a distinct individuality with a different character from our own, is surely a conception more ponderously difficult, more truly supernatural than that of a spirit world, composed of beings who have lived, and learned, and suffered on earth, and whose mental nature still subsists after its separation from the earthly body.  On the second-self theory, we have to suppose that this recondite but worser half of ourselves, while possessing some knowledge we have not, does not know that it is part of us, or, if it knows, is a persistent liar, for in most cases it adopts a distinct name, and persists in speaking of us, its better half, in the third person.

       "There is yet another and I think a more fundamental objection to this view, in the impossibility of conceiving how or why this second-self was developed in us under the law of survival of the fittest.

      "This cumbrous and unintelligible hypothesis finds great favor with those who have always been accustomed to regard the belief in a spirit-world, and more particularly a belief that the spirits of our dead friends can and do sometimes communicate with us, as unscientific, unphilosophical, and superstitious." 

So you feel the spirit hypothesis is definitely a scientific one?

    "Why it should be unscientific more than any other hypothesis which alone serves to explain intelligibly a great body of facts has never been explained.  The antagonism which it excites seems to be mainly due to the fact that it is, and has long been in some form or other, the belief of the religious world and of the ignorant and superstitious of all ages, while a total disbelief in spiritual existence has been the distinctive badge of modern scientific skepticism." 

Do you feel there is as much evidence for survival as there is for biological evolution?

     "My position is that the phenomena of Spiritualism in their entirety do not require further confirmation.  They are proved quite as well as facts are proved in other sciences."

The skeptics often point to the trivial nature of mediumistic messages.  Do you have any thoughts on that?

    "The trivial and fantastic nature of the acts of some of these disembodied spirits is not to be wondered at when we consider the myriads of trivial and fantastic human beings who are daily becoming spirits, and who retain, for a time at least, their human natures in their new condition. So if we realize to ourselves the fact that spirits can in most cases only communicate with us in certain very limited modes, we shall see that the true ‘triviality' consists in objecting to any mode of mental converse as being trivial or undignified."

Materialists often say that you believe what you do simply because there is a will or need to believe.  Can you objectively say that is not the case with you?

    "For 25 years I had been an utter skeptic as to the existence of any preter-human or super-human intelligence, and that I never for a moment contemplated the possibility that the marvels related by Spiritualism could literally be true.  If I have now changed my opinion, it is simply by the force of evidence.  It is from no dread of annihilation that I have gone into this subject; it is from no inordinate longing for eternal existence that I have come to believe in facts which render this highly probable, if they do not actually prove it.  At least three times during my travels I have had to face death as imminent or probable within a few hours, and what I felt on those occasions was at most a gentle melancholy at the thought of quitting this wonderful and beautiful earth to enter on a sleep which might know no waking.  In a state of ordinary health I did not feel even this. I knew that the great problem of conscious existence was one beyond man's grasp, and this fact alone gave some hope that existence might be independent of the organized body.  I came to the inquiry, therefore, utterly unbiased by hopes or fears, because I knew that my belief could not affect the reality, and with an ingrained prejudice against even such a word as ‘spirit,' which I have hardly yet overcome." 

What do you say to those members of orthodox religion who seem to be satisfied with faith alone and ask what the use of spirit communication is?

     "It substitutes a definite, real, and practical conviction for a vague, theoretical, and unsatisfying faith.  It furnishes actual knowledge on a matter of vital importance to all men and most advanced thinkers have held, and still hold, that no knowledge was attainable." 

Thank you, Dr. Wallace.  Any parting thoughts?

     "If a man die shall he live again?  This is the question which in all ages has troubled the souls of men; the prophets and the wise men of antiquity were in doubt as to the answer to be given it.  Philosophy has always discussed it as one of the unsolved problems of humanity, while modern science instead of clearing up the difficulty and giving us renewed hope, either ignores the question altogether or advances powerful arguments against the affirmative reply.  Yet the ultimate decision arrived at, whether in the negative or affirmative, is not only of vital interest to each of us individually, but is calculated, I believe, to determine the future welfare or misery of mankind.

      "If the question should be finally decided in the negative, if all men without exception ever come to believe that there is no life beyond this life, if children were all brought up to believe that the only happiness they can ever enjoy will be upon earth, then it seems to me that the condition of man would be altogether hopeless, because there would cease to be any adequate motive for justice, for truth, for unselfishness, and no sufficient reason could be given to the poor man, to the bad man, or to the selfish man, why he should not seek his own personal welfare at the cost of others." 

For more on Wallace, read my article appearing in the March/April issue of Atlantis Rising Magazine.  See http://www.atlantisrising.com/index.shtml

I recently had the opportunity to interview Dr. Mitchell Gibson for “The Searchlight,” one of the two quarterly publications of the Academy of Spirituality and Paranormal Studies. Here is that interview. Incidentally, the Academy will be holding its annual conference May 30-June 2, 2008 at DeSales University, Center Valley, PA. The theme of the conference is “Beyond the Veil: Evidence for Life After Death.” For more information, go to the Academy’s website at http://aspsi.org/

Recently retired from the full-time practice of psychiatry, Dr. Mitchell Earl Gibson now works as a clairvoyant doctor. “During the last ten years of my medical practice, I began to receive very strong clairvoyant impressions about events in my client’s lives,” Gibson writes at his website, www.tybro.com “At first I ignored them, but over time I began to realize that many of these impressions were accurate. Science had trained me to think analytically and to dismiss any data that could not be examined with an objective skeptical eye. I quickly learned that the scientific method offered only one window into the universe.”

A resident of Summerfield, NC, Gibson explains that he developed the ability to see auras and attachments around people during his residency, but, for the most part, he did not share the information with others. He retired from orthodox medicine to focus on further developing his gift. He began to experience samadhi, (an early stage of spiritual enlightenment), several years prior to his retirement from medicine. The experience of samadhi radically changed his worldview.

A board-certified forensic psychiatrist, Gibson received his medical degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He then completed his residency training at the Albert Einstein Medical Center in Philadelphia. During his last year of residency he served as chief resident in psychiatry and received the Albert Einstein Foundation Research Award for his work in sleep disorders.

Dr. Gibson is a former chief of staff at the East Valley Camelback Hospital in Mesa Arizona and is currently a clinical professor of medicine and psychiatry at the Midwestern College of Medicine. A longtime member of Mensa, he has been listed among the top doctors in Arizona in Phoenix magazine on several occasions. He has also twice been named to the Woodward and White listing of the "Best Doctors in America". In 2003, 2004, and 2005 he was honored with listings in the Consumer Research Council of America’s compilation of the top psychiatrists in America. He is a Diplomat of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, the American College of Forensic Medicine, and the American Board of Forensic Examiners.

An accomplished contemporary artist, Gibson has displayed his works in New York, Los Angeles, Paris, Philadelphia, Scottsdale, San Francisco, and other cities around the world. He recently received the Jury Prize for Creativity awarded by the Museum of Fine Art in Paris. His work is published in the Encyclopedia of Living Artists and New Art International. He is the author of Your Immortal Body of Light, published in 2006 by Reality Press and has lectured extensively on various topics, including the soul, astrology, the spiritual causes of mental illness, human potential, cosmobiology, art, and creativity enhancement.

“We look at creation through the eyes of scientists, politicians, businessmen, athletes, journalists, singers, and even writers,” Gibson writes. “They are our Harry Potter priests that seek to bewitch us. University research facilities, sports arenas, movie theaters, shopping malls, concert halls, and luxury resort complexes have become our new place of worship. Research studies, television newscasts, magazine articles, newspapers, and Wall Street spin-doctors have dampened down our ability to think for ourselves. The illuminating ‘numinous’ experience has been consigned to holy men and philosophers – an age long ago – no longer a legitimate goal to seek for oneself in contemporary society. At least, many ‘fundamentalists’ would have us believe that is the case, but that is not what the Greeks taught in their temples. These priests chanted: ‘Know Thyself’.”

I recently put some questions to Dr. Gibson by e-mail.

Dr. Gibson, would you mind giving an example or two of the clairvoyant impressions you began receiving?
       “One client presented with marital problems and depression. I saw a large, portly man hovering over her…he was using foul language and berating her fiercely. The memory sticks out because his skin had very large discolored areas. The client stated that she had been having nightmares about her father, a large portly man who argued with her constantly and was verbally abusive. He suffered from a severe case of vitiligo, a rare skin disorder.
Another client had purchased a large plot of land in Mexico and wanted my opinion regarding the investment. I looked at the transaction clairvoyantly and saw that the seller had been dishonest with the client. In particular, the seller did not tell him about a lien on the property that would take effect in less than ten years, effectively negating the sale, nor did he tell him about the need to purchase separate water rights, both of which I saw clairvoyantly. The client did his own investigation and saw that the process was indeed as I said it was. He saved over $500,000 in the process.
        “Another client, an emergency medical technician, presented with intense suicid