Not surprisingly, belief in an afterlife is an irresistibly attractive idea that has evolved in various forms throughout history. The idea of an afterlife gives some people hope. What else could there be after death? All of us have lost loved ones in the past and everyone seeks answers in one form or another, making us susceptible for irrational ideas. The sure answer to the question of life - after death - may simply be that it does not exist, because there is no way of proving this in a scientific way. Advances in science may very soon eradicate death completely, but we also want to know where our loved ones are who went before us and we hope that they are in a special place.
The story of life and death is also part of the story of the human demand for justice. Our rational mind just can't contemplate the idea that one can suffer so bad in this life just to die at the end without any compensation. On the other hand surely wrongdoers who caused a lot of pain and suffering should be punished in the afterlife right? Belief in an afterlife and the existence of God is widely accepted. Some surveys show that belief in reincarnation and spirits is not as popular as the belief in a supernatural afterlife. Sadly, the most convincing evidence of life outside death is only provided by many stories and accounts of paranormal phenomena which again, can't be proven scientifically.
But even if scientists one day manage to prove the existence of an afterlife, it's doubtful that they would ever really understand it because they don't even know how life in the here and now works. How can we overcome and suspend our fear of the hereafter, set aside our hopes and expectations and overcome our fears of the hereafter?
Raymond Moody, who wrote a book about his experiences with clinical death and the afterlife in 1975, told CNN in 2013: "For people who have had such experiences, the belief in the afterlife goes beyond any particular religion. Moody presented a study of 100 people who had all experienced clinical deaths and returned from the other side. They concluded that the conscious experiences of the individuals were illusory and that the brain produced these images long after the hart stopped working.
Since humans are instinctive dualists, the idea of life after death makes perfect sense to human intuition. When we acknowledge that consciousness is not local, it opens up the possibility of following physical death and experiencing life and death. This theory, he argues, could offer an explanation for the beyond: if conscious experience is entirely dependent on the brain, there is no beyond, because the mind is gone, and if the brain goes, the mind goes.
