The Spectral Voyager Episode 8: The Afterlife - Part I (Sample)
You are floating through a long, dark tunnel, towards a bright, warm light into Part I of our Afterlife episode. Who better to finally answer the question of where we go when we die than Brad and Jake? We take you on an out of body experience to the Division of Perceptual Studies at the University of Virginia’s medical school, where we meet our guides, professors of psychiatry and neurobehavioral sciences Jim Tucker M.D. and Bruce Greyson M.D. Together, they’ve amassed around 8000 case studies in their respective fields of near-death experiences and children who claim to remember past lives (aka reincarnation). We’ll not only delve into the science and history of the phenomena but take you through the wild personal stories of the experiencers. This will prime you for next week’s Part II, where we’ll drag you to the depths of Hell, and through the many dimensions of Quantum Immortality.
To listen to the full episode, and gain access to our other mini-series such as Manclan and Trickle Down, you can subscribe for just five bucks a month at: http://www.patreon.com/QAnonAnonymous
The Spectral Voyager theme composed by Nick Sena.
Additional music by Pontus Berghe and Jake Rockatansky.
Editing by Corey Klotz.
QAA’s website: http://qanonanonymous.com
SOURCES:
After: A Doctor Explores What Near-Death Experiences Reveal About Life and Beyond, Bruce Greyson M.D.
Life Before Life: A Scientific Investigation of Children's Memories of Previous Lives, Jim B. Tucker M.D.
Return to Life: Extraordinary Cases of Children Who Remember Past Lives, Jim B. Tucker M.D.
I'd like to believe that dying is like waking up from a dream.
The world that felt so real just moments ago fades into nothing and you instantly accept this new reality as if the previous one didn't matter at all.
Anonymous.
If there's one thing that each and every one of us has in common, it is the fact that one day this life as we know it will cease to exist.
This can be a difficult concept to grasp, as a friend once said to me, it's the leaving that's the hardest part.
Death has always been a prominent focus of the human species, as it is as much a mystery as it is a certainty.
Many a billionaire have tasked themselves with being the first to overturn this fate, either by uploading human consciousness to a computer or by harnessing the powers of extraterrestrials.
But in the end, no creature has cracked the code on mortality.
Except for maybe the Turnitopsis dohrnii, also known as the immortal jellyfish.
But perhaps the jellyfish's experience isn't all that different from ours when we pass, floating in a dark endless abyss until a monster comes along to gobble us up.
Fortunately for human beings, with the advancements of modern science, people have been brought back from the dead.
They have traveled beyond the third dimension and returned to tell us what they saw or experienced.
Sometimes their stories bring us comfort, an endless supply of extra-celestial love that surrounds us with warmth and acceptance.
But other times, they return to us horrified at what awaited them just outside the realm of the living.
And then there are those who are asking a much different question.
What if we never die at all?
What if death is merely a loading screen, and each playthrough is an opportunity to pick a different class, acquire new items, and unlock an alternate ending?
Prepare yourselves, dear listener, as this week's Spectral Voyager embarks on a journey through the afterlife.
Behind the cracking wallpaper of our reality, there exists another world that science has yet to explain.
In here dwell monsters and madness, and potentially, the answers to our most important questions.
In this world, gravity intensifies, time slows down, and your heart rate quickens.
I'm Jake Rakitansky.
And I'm Brad Abrahams.
And you're listening to The Spectral Voyager.
I don't know about you, Jake, but I'm afraid of death.
I've had perilously close brushes to it a few times, but the fear remains.
I was raised mostly as an atheist, with the belief that when we go, everything goes out like a light.
And maybe that's where the anxiety about it comes from.
I think when I boil it down, it's my consciousness that I'm afraid of losing.
Perhaps that means I'm attached to my own ego.
And though my esoteric pursuits are wide, for some reason, I never look too deeply into where we go after the light goes out.
So when you suggested this episode, I thought, why not throw myself at its two most controversial pillars?
Near-death experiences and reincarnation.
In particular, I think these two fields stretch credulity so much because they challenge a belief at the core of biology, that the mind and consciousness are not just products of the brain.
But somehow, More.
These subjects are a minefield, with extremes ranging from what I saw at the Conscious Life Expo in January, people talking of 5D immortal awakenings and extraterrestrial past life regressions, to completely legitimate, institutionally sanctioned scientific research.
This sphere is so woof-filled and derided by skeptics, I wanted to find researchers with credentials longer than a giant squid's tentacles.
What I found surpassed my expectations, and it's an armchair parapsychologist's wet dream.
The Division of Perceptual Studies at the University of Virginia's School of Medicine.
Here's a clip from their website.
The Division of Perceptual Studies in the School of Medicine at the University of Virginia.
We are a group of psychiatrists, psychologists, and neurobehavioral scientists who explore phenomena of consciousness.
For more than 50 years, we bring a rigorous scientific methodology to bear on the study of near-death experiences, altered states of consciousness, very young children who remember their past lives, and related phenomena that bear on the question of the relationship between the mind and the physical brain.
Yeah, so pretty cool, huh?
That it's like a whole... Yeah.
Seems legit.
Very professional video.
Very serious looking people.
I don't notice any cranks in this video thus far.
The division was founded by Dr. Ian Stevenson in 1957.
He graduated from the top of his med school at McGill, became a pioneer in psychosomatic medicine, and went on to publish over 70 extensively cited papers.
Intrigued by reports about children in India who reported past lives, he unexpectedly veered into the world of reincarnation research.
He brought his meticulous ethic to collecting cases from around the world, garnering respect from unlikely places like the Journal of the American Medical Association and the American Journal of Psychiatry.
One renowned psychiatrist said of him, He's a methodical, careful, even cautious investigator.
Whose personality is on the obsessive side.
Either he is making a colossal mistake or he will be known as the Galileo of the 20th century.
That's every scientist though, right?
You're either a huge mistake or you're Albert Einstein.
The two voices you hear in the video are his predecessors, Dr. Jim Tucker, who researches children who remember past lives, and Dr. Bruce Grayson, who focuses on near-death experiences.
Both are respected and experienced professors of psychiatry and neurobehavioral sciences at the university.
Surprisingly, For researchers pursuing these fringe subjects, I could find no controversial dirt or substantial criticisms about them or their methodology.
They're almost boring in a way, which I think is the hallmark of a good scientist.
Together, they've amassed around 8,000 case studies in their respective fields.
Wow.
The first we'll float towards the light to is Reincarnation, which previously held very little interest for me.
That was about to change.
Entering the flesh.
Again.
As after casting away worn out garments, a man later takes new ones, so after casting away worn out bodies, the embodied self encounters other new ones.
The Bhagavad Gita.
Although the belief in reincarnation isn't common here in the USA, I was surprised to learn that globally, we're in the minority.
The concept of soul rebirth, or as the ancient Greeks called it, metempsychosis, is foundational in Indian religions like Hinduism, and across South and East Asia in Buddhism and Taoism.
Less known, it also appears in some Jewish beliefs, as in the Kabbalistic concept of Gilgul Neshamat, as well as in indigenous cultures worldwide.
Closer to our more cursed modern times, names like William James, Carl Jung, and Annie Besant entered the reincarnation discourse.
Even Scientology posits that in the human is an immortal spiritual entity, a thetan, that slowly degrades through past life experiences.
Only Tom Cruise and David Miscavige have fully realized their true thetan selves.
Our guide into this eternal world is Dr. Jim Tucker, who's dedicated the last 40 years of his life to researching children who seem to remember past lives.
A child psychologist by trade, he navigates the stormy waters of past lives with a discerning, skeptical, unreligious, yet open mind.
And the fruits of his research have led him to a very unlikely conclusion.
Reincarnation seems to be the most compelling explanation for the strongest of cases he's encountered.
Before we get to the stories, here are some trends that Tucker's 3,000 cases pointed to.
Most children start sharing their past life stories between ages 2 to 4, usually ceasing by 6 or 7, and then leading ordinary lives.
There's an average time interval of 15 to 16 months between the previous personality's death and their birth.
A staggering 75% of cases involve sudden, violent, or unnatural deaths in the previous lives, suggesting a potential link between traumatic endings and reincarnation memories.
In 70% of the cases where the circumstance of death is known, the children display intense fears and phobias related to the mode of death, particularly when the death was a drowning.
The majority of children claim to have lived in the same country, village, or family in their past life.
When the children meet the previous personality's family, they often find relief and better integration of their past life memories.
While unusual desires for alcohol or tobacco aligned with the previous personality are rare, they are present in some cases.
We're talking two-year-olds demanding ciggies and booze.
Wow.
I mean, to me, that's the most damning evidence right there.
You wake up in a new body, you're like, oh man, get me a ciggy!
And then, we have to talk about the birthmarks.
Wildly, in a surprising number of cases, children claiming past lives are born with distinctive birthmarks or birth defects that align with the fatal wounds of the person they say they were.
What?
Yeah!
What?
Stay with me.
These birthmarks are usually prominent, varying in size and shape, and sometimes even replicate bullet entry and exit wounds.
When available, autopsy reports or medical records seem to substantiate the wounds.
In India, 33% of claimed reincarnation cases present these physical anomalies, with 18% backed by medical documentation.
But Jim Tucker notes these need more meticulous examination.
One example is Suleyman Kaper from Turkey, whose mother had a strange dream during her pregnancy.
I was killed with a blow from a shovel.
I want to stay with you and not anyone else.
You have been listening to a sample from The Spectral Voyager, a new miniseries from the folks at QAA, where we explore true tales from the edge of reality.
To listen to the full episode and gain access to our other miniseries, such as Man Clan and Trickle Down, you can subscribe for just $5 a month at patreon.com slash QAnonAnonymous.
