The Illusion of Death: A Non-believer's Guide to the Afterlife The Illusion of Death: A Scientist's Guided Tour of the Afterlife by John Dworetzky

Prologue to The Illusion of Death

Each of us has a very strong commonsense understanding about the experiences we call life and death. We are born, we live, and eventually we die. Our lives follow an arc through time. Although we might have many experiences in common, we are all individuals.

However, if we take what is known at the forefront of science, we can come to a very different understanding of life and death than is dictated by our common sense, an understanding that leads to a surprising new world. Not only is this new world consistent with the recent discoveries of science, it is also a world in which many of the ancient paradoxes of the philosophers vanish. This new world is also a simpler world than the one in which we imagine we live, giving it, I believe, an even greater ring of truth.

However, this new world is so extraordinarily counterintuitive that I believe the best way to begin this book is to tell you the ending. You are immortal; just you and no one else. In fact, other people don’t really exist. They are merely previews of other lives you will lead. In fact, nothing in your experience actually exists unless you are looking at it or thinking of it. You are the entire universe. Time does not flow forward, but rather flows randomly. During this random flow of time, you will experience every life that it is possible, both good and bad, because when you “die” you simply become someone else at some point in his or her life, a life that, with all its associated memories, now becomes yours and in a very real sense, was always yours. It is also an amoral world, because nothing you do, no behavior in which you engage, really matters. Acts and consequences are not actually connected in any way; the belief that they are is an illusion.

I am well aware that these assertions will seem fantastic in the extreme. But I can lead you to this world and do so with only reason, logic, and scientific discovery, and without the requirement of odd entities (no ghosts or spirits here) or strange concepts (no request for you to “head toward the light” will be made). I am a psychologist and I hope, a serious scientist, who has spent years studying human consciousness, and who also has an amateur’s love for physics and astronomy. To be honest, the path down which I will take you has been taken by many others, mostly physicists and philosophers, but not with the conceptualization of consciousness I will bring to the discussion. That last bit, I believe, takes the final step into the world I will describe. So, let me show you what I have found. I can’t prove it, as it lies beyond any possible proof. All I can show you is that your life, and what it actually is, might be amazingly different from the commonly held view that you are an individual who is born, lives, and dies. Come with me and determine for yourself what worlds may be.

—John Dworetzky