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Can Science Prove an Afterlife?

Fisher

Fisher

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A little tautological, but an interesting argument


Is there an afterlife? The science of biocentrism can prove there is, claims Professor Robert Lanza - Science - News - The Independent

...The answer, Professor Robert Lanza says, lies in quantum physics – specifically the theory of biocentrism. The scientist, from Wake Forest University School of Medicine in North Carolina, says the evidence lies in the idea that the concept of death is a mere figment of our consciousness.

Professor Lanza says biocentrism explains that the universe only exists because of an individual’s consciousness of it – essentially life and biology are central to reality, which in turn creates the universe; the universe itself does not create life. The same applies to the concepts of space and time, which Professor Lanza describes as “simply tools of the mind”.

In a message posted on the scientist’s website, he explains that with this theory in mind, the concept of death as we know it is “cannot exist in any real sense” as there are no true boundaries by which to define it. Essentially, the idea of dying is something we have long been taught to accept, but in reality it just exists in our minds.
 
I wonder if he knows that it's not science when he makes it up. That's not science, that's philosophy. There aren't any hard facts here.
 
Fisher said:
A little tautological, but an interesting argument


Is there an afterlife? The science of biocentrism can prove there is, claims Professor Robert Lanza - Science - News - The Independent

...The answer, Professor Robert Lanza says, lies in quantum physics – specifically the theory of biocentrism. The scientist, from Wake Forest University School of Medicine in North Carolina, says the evidence lies in the idea that the concept of death is a mere figment of our consciousness.

Professor Lanza says biocentrism explains that the universe only exists because of an individual’s consciousness of it – essentially life and biology are central to reality, which in turn creates the universe; the universe itself does not create life. The same applies to the concepts of space and time, which Professor Lanza describes as “simply tools of the mind”.

In a message posted on the scientist’s website, he explains that with this theory in mind, the concept of death as we know it is “cannot exist in any real sense” as there are no true boundaries by which to define it. Essentially, the idea of dying is something we have long been taught to accept, but in reality it just exists in our minds.
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I'm not buying this. It's turtles all the way down.
 
I think one has to look at more than just a paragraph of snippets to really evaluate this book. If you go to website on the book Biocentrism / Robert Lanza’s Theory of Everything you will see some noted scientists agreeing how this is earth shattering and remarkable thinking. Of course being the devil's advocate , it is easy to find some scientists to agree with your position as seen in the climate change debate.
 
Crosscheck said:
I think one has to look at more than just a paragraph of snippets to really evaluate this book. If you go to website on the book Biocentrism / Robert Lanza’s Theory of Everything you will see some noted scientists agreeing how this is earth shattering and remarkable thinking. Of course being the devil's advocate , it is easy to find some scientists to agree with your position as seen in the climate change debate.
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I always say that the universe did not exist before me and will not exist after me as far as I am concerned. Seems like I was right ;)
 
I think biocentrism and other crap theories churned out by Deepak Chopra and Jenny McCarthy, were the main reasons I deleted my Huffpo links....well that, and their aggressive popups and spyware ads.

Regardless, when Chopra tries to spin this biocentrism idea with quantum quackery and eastern mysticism, he never gets to making a point about how concepts like 'energy and information being eternal and timeless' blah blah blah provides supporting evidence for a highly organized and fragile material source for conscious awareness (the human brain) can maintain some form of integrity and identity after the components necessary for maintaining consciousness are destroyed!

I'm not a big fan of Sam Harris, for a number of reasons, but sometimes he comes up with the clearest, simplest examples of explaining a point; and re: consciousness, Harris says that most people have no difficulty understanding that people with dementia or other forms of brain damage have their conscious awareness impaired, but for some reason a majority of people believe that if you smash that brain to bits, the person lives on after death.
 
Of course science could prove an afterlife. Science can prove anything that actually exists.

This, however, does not do that. Biological life is not special and the universe is not affected by us being here to observe it.
 
Paschendale said:
Of course science could prove an afterlife. Science can prove anything that actually exists.

This, however, does not do that. Biological life is not special and the universe is not affected by us being here to observe it.
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The theory presented in the OP seems pretty convoluted to me, in some ways, but I have to take exception to the bolded statement: quantum mechanics has long known that observation affects measurement. Therefore the universe is arguably affected by us observing it. The wave/particle dichotomy is one example.
 
Goshin said:
The theory presented in the OP seems pretty convoluted to me, in some ways, but I have to take exception to the bolded statement: quantum mechanics has long known that observation affects measurement. Therefore the universe is arguably affected by us observing it. The wave/particle dichotomy is one example.
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It affects measurement. It makes our measurements wrong, on the subatomic level. It doesn't make electrons behave differently than they usually do. The main way that this problem manifests is that in order to observe the movements of an electron, we have to bounce something off of it, usually another electron. The observed electron is then knocked off course. That we're looking at something isn't altering it, it's that we have to throw things at it in order to see what it's doing.

In my first post, I was referring to more passive observation. The act of looking at something. Although, that our eyes are intercepting certain waves of light and not allowing them to hit whatever is behind us. Our matter and our particles affect other matter and particles, but they would do that if they were making up rocks instead of people as well. Our bodies affect the universe, bu our thoughts do not. Not without physical manifestations of those thoughts.
 
Why bother on an afterlife and not on what we can observe in this world.

Really... am I the only one who thinks that investing intellectual manpower in debunking religious topics is a waste? Look, religions, and I'll say it, Christianity, should not be taking the front row of any political discussion. I don't understand why people can't keep their religion to themselves. We need to grow and understand that it is the laws of man that govern mankind and it is the laws of physics and the known universe that constrain us. There is no reason what so ever to abide by any divine law, as a matter of state.... or seek for religious motivation to do something as a country. So this means investing in projects due to religious motivations.

If you want to be religious, do it for yourself... in your own community with the people who are like-minded if you want it... or do it for yourself by yourself. There is no reason why religion needs to be CONSTANTLY in the public spotlight and those who insist otherwise need to be thrown out of public light.
 
Fisher said:
I always say that the universe did not exist before me and will not exist after me as far as I am concerned. Seems like I was right ;)
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That's also usually the view that serial killers have on life. No one else is real or matters, only you create the universe.
 
The concept of death exists only in our minds. Death itself is also real. Just because information isn't tethered to reality doesn't mean reality doesn't exist.

Time and space are "tools of the mind" to help us interpret our environment and survive in reality. We surely need a way to regulate how often we need to breath and to provide timing for other bodily processes.

In theory if time is all fluid and smooshed together, you could argue that if you ever lived, then you'll live for eternity.

Again, that would be a "only in your mind" concept, and your bodily death would still be real.
 
Paschendale said:
It affects measurement. It makes our measurements wrong, on the subatomic level. It doesn't make electrons behave differently than they usually do. The main way that this problem manifests is that in order to observe the movements of an electron, we have to bounce something off of it, usually another electron. The observed electron is then knocked off course. That we're looking at something isn't altering it, it's that we have to throw things at it in order to see what it's doing.
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This is not true. You're confusing the quantum observer effect with the classical observer effect. In the quantum world observation affects a particle's physical state because it collapses the particle's wave function. It doesn't have anything to do with the measuring process accidentally interfering with the particle by hitting it with a photon or something, it's simply a result of information transfer. In other words, under the theory of quantum mechanics even if we had some magical measurement tool that didn't interfere with the particle the particle's state would still change because of the information leak to an outside "observer". There have been a number of experiments which have proven this, for example the quantum eraser.

Anyway, the op article is mostly quantum woo - an increasingly common phenomenon whereby people cite quantum mechanics as proof of anything they'd like.
 
Paschendale said:
Of course science could prove an afterlife. Science can prove anything that actually exists.
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This seems false to me. How could science prove that there's such a thing as conscious experience? How could it prove that there's a ghost-less universe?
 
I'm not a physicist, but I've taken graduate level courses in quantum mechanics. First...a lot of people are intimidated by the mathematics, but you really only need high school algebra and trigonometry to understand QM. It's not a complicated theory. So I'm not sure why someone would be bothered by a doctor having something to say about it simply because he's a doctor and not a physicist.

That said...I approach physics from a philosophical angle, because I'm interested in what physics has to say about philosophically interesting questions. I'm not sure if it tells us what Lanza says it does, but it does have some very strange implications for the way we conceive of the universe. I don't think this view should simply be dismissed as woo, or something like that. It may be wrong, but it is a view that deserves to be engaged.
 
ashurbanipal said:
This seems false to me. How could science prove that there's such a thing as conscious experience? How could it prove that there's a ghost-less universe?
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We experience consciousness. We are quite capable of measuring that. That's no challenge at all. As for a ghost-less universe, we can discover laws about the physical universe and discover that there is nothing that violates these laws. Ghost are supposedly visible yet contain no substance and no mass. Therefore, light passes right through them. If they do not reflect any light, then our eyes could not see them. In order for ghosts to be possible, they would have to be completely invisible all the time.
 
Pashcendale said:
We experience consciousness.
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Well, I experience consciousness. How do I know you or anyone else do?

Paschendale said:
We are quite capable of measuring that.
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Wow. I keep up with the relevant literature on this. I've never heard of anyone who made this claim.

Paschendale said:
That's no challenge at all. As for a ghost-less universe, we can discover laws about the physical universe and discover that there is nothing that violates these laws. Ghost are supposedly visible yet contain no substance and no mass. Therefore, light passes right through them. If they do not reflect any light, then our eyes could not see them. In order for ghosts to be possible, they would have to be completely invisible all the time.
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So...how does this prove a ghostless universe? I don't know whether ghosts have any substance or not. Maybe they do. That seems like a pretty big assumption on your part. But beyond that, perhaps ghosts simply violate the law of non-contradiction. To prove a ghostless universe (even on your assumptions) it looks like science would have to prove the law of non-contradiction. How could it do that?
 
ashurbanipal said:
So...how does this prove a ghostless universe? I don't know whether ghosts have any substance or not. Maybe they do. That seems like a pretty big assumption on your part. But beyond that, perhaps ghosts simply violate the law of non-contradiction. To prove a ghostless universe (even on your assumptions) it looks like science would have to prove the law of non-contradiction. How could it do that?
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Well, let's start at the basics. Define ghost. But really, no one tries to prove an anythingless universe. They observe something and then try to explain it. There are plenty of explanations for stories of ghosts and the phenomena surrounding them, and no serious observations that contradict these explanations, and zero that can be proven to contradict the known laws of physics.
 
Commie said:
I think biocentrism and other crap theories churned out by Deepak Chopra and Jenny McCarthy, were the main reasons I deleted my Huffpo links....well that, and their aggressive popups and spyware ads.

Regardless, when Chopra tries to spin this biocentrism idea with quantum quackery and eastern mysticism, he never gets to making a point about how concepts like 'energy and information being eternal and timeless' blah blah blah provides supporting evidence for a highly organized and fragile material source for conscious awareness (the human brain) can maintain some form of integrity and identity after the components necessary for maintaining consciousness are destroyed!

I'm not a big fan of Sam Harris, for a number of reasons, but sometimes he comes up with the clearest, simplest examples of explaining a point; and re: consciousness, Harris says that most people have no difficulty understanding that people with dementia or other forms of brain damage have their conscious awareness impaired, but for some reason a majority of people believe that if you smash that brain to bits, the person lives on after death.
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Deepak riles me too... You can tell he has had political training, he has the evasive qualities of a gazelle...

Sam Harris gives a great debate alongside Rabbi David Wolpe... Worth a look if you have a little time. Though it centre on the question of the existence of god, afterlife does come up as a topic.

Does God Exist?Debate Sam Harris V Rabbi David Wolpe - YouTube
 
Paschendale said:
Well, let's start at the basics.
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I think that's a good idea. I'm going to anticipate some of your replies below. You said that science could prove anything that exists. If there are no ghosts, and there is a universe, then there exists a ghost-less universe, no? Science should be able prove that is the case, if you're correct. I picked ghosts for a reason--no one has a good idea what ghosts might be. Science therefore cannot prove a ghost-less universe, contra your point.

Paschendale said:
But really, no one tries to prove an anythingless universe. They observe something and then try to explain it.
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Now, wait a minute. I didn't think explanation was necessary to prove the existence of something. Indeed, I'm not sure I know what the relationship is between explanation and proof, but it looks like in many instance it may be merely conventional. We think, for example, that gravity exists, but no one has every observed gravity. We only observe that objects seem to behave roughly in accordance with idealized laws and suppose there is a force called "gravity." So maybe "proof" in this sense just means labeling some effect, and that's enough to show that something actually exists.

Paschendale said:
There are plenty of explanations for stories of ghosts and the phenomena surrounding them
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Sure--one of which is that there are ghosts.

Paschendale said:
and no serious observations that contradict these explanations, and zero that can be proven to contradict the known laws of physics.
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Well, this seems to beg the question. Assuming there are no ghosts, this is correct.
 
WillyPete said:
The concept of death exists only in our minds. Death itself is also real. Just because information isn't tethered to reality doesn't mean reality doesn't exist.

Time and space are "tools of the mind" to help us interpret our environment and survive in reality. We surely need a way to regulate how often we need to breath and to provide timing for other bodily processes.

In theory if time is all fluid and smooshed together, you could argue that if you ever lived, then you'll live for eternity.

Again, that would be a "only in your mind" concept, and your bodily death would still be real.
Click to expand...

So the monsters in my dreams are real because they exist in my mind during a dream?
 
Fisher said:
A little tautological, but an interesting argument


Is there an afterlife? The science of biocentrism can prove there is, claims Professor Robert Lanza - Science - News - The Independent

...The answer, Professor Robert Lanza says, lies in quantum physics – specifically the theory of biocentrism. The scientist, from Wake Forest University School of Medicine in North Carolina, says the evidence lies in the idea that the concept of death is a mere figment of our consciousness.

Professor Lanza says biocentrism explains that the universe only exists because of an individual’s consciousness of it – essentially life and biology are central to reality, which in turn creates the universe; the universe itself does not create life. The same applies to the concepts of space and time, which Professor Lanza describes as “simply tools of the mind”.

In a message posted on the scientist’s website, he explains that with this theory in mind, the concept of death as we know it is “cannot exist in any real sense” as there are no true boundaries by which to define it. Essentially, the idea of dying is something we have long been taught to accept, but in reality it just exists in our minds.
Click to expand...

I bet that he even thinks that he thought of all that first. Idealism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia In philosophy, idealism is the group of philosophies which assert that reality, or reality as we can know it, is fundamentally mental, mentally constructed, or otherwise immaterial. Epistemologically, idealism manifests as a skepticism about the possibility of knowing any mind-independent thing. In a sociological sense, idealism emphasizes how human ideas—especially beliefs and values—shape society.[1] As an ontological doctrine, idealism goes further, asserting that all entities are composed of mind or spirit.[2] Idealism thus rejects physicalist and dualist theories that fail to ascribe priority to the mind.
 
"Can Science Prove an Afterlife?"

We will not know, until it does, which I doubt will ever happen, but who knows.

Robert Lanza is a great experimentalist and entrepreneur, but this "biocentrism" appears to me as just so much solipsistic hand-waving.

I share both the dislike for crude reductionism that rules modern biology and deep suspicions about philosophical soundness of modern physics, but dislikes and suspicions do not constitute a scientific hypothesis.
 
Natural science cannot prove the existence of an immaterial soul. Such is proven rather by the philosophical sciences.
 
Paschendale said:
Of course science could prove an afterlife. Science can prove anything that actually exists.
Click to expand...

False. Science can only deal with the material and tangible. If it is immaterial and intangible, then science can say nothing about it.
 
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