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The Afterlife Experiments: Breakthrough Scientific Evidence of Life After Death
John Edward, Suzane Northrup, and George Anderson are just a few of the prominent American mediums who have been accused of being frauds. But what if a respected scientist challenged them to make contact with the beyond under controlled laboratory conditions? What if the results not only stunned a skeptical scientist but also offered astonishing answers to a timeless Is there life after death?
THE AFTERLIFE EXPERIMENTS
Risking his academic reputation, Dr. Gary E. Schwartz asked well-known mediums to become part of a series of experiments to prove, or disprove, the existence of an afterlife. This riveting narrative, with electrifying transcripts, documents stringently monitored experiments in which mediums attempted to contact dead friends and relatives of "sitters" who were masked from view and never spoke, depriving the mediums of any cues.
Here are the results that awed sitters and researchers a revelation about a son's suicide, what a deceased father wanted to say about his last days in a coma, the transformation of a man's lifelong doubts about the afterlife, and, most amazing of all, a forecast of a beloved spouse's death. Forced by data to abandon skepticism, Schwartz presents this amazing account of his groundbreaking work, compelling from first page to last.
THE AFTERLIFE EXPERIMENTS
Risking his academic reputation, Dr. Gary E. Schwartz asked well-known mediums to become part of a series of experiments to prove, or disprove, the existence of an afterlife. This riveting narrative, with electrifying transcripts, documents stringently monitored experiments in which mediums attempted to contact dead friends and relatives of "sitters" who were masked from view and never spoke, depriving the mediums of any cues.
Here are the results that awed sitters and researchers a revelation about a son's suicide, what a deceased father wanted to say about his last days in a coma, the transformation of a man's lifelong doubts about the afterlife, and, most amazing of all, a forecast of a beloved spouse's death. Forced by data to abandon skepticism, Schwartz presents this amazing account of his groundbreaking work, compelling from first page to last.
400 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2002
174 people are currently reading
904 people want to read
About the author
Gary E. Schwartz
43 books51 followersGary E. Schwartz, Ph.D., is Professor of Psychology, Medicine, Neurology, Psychiatry, and Surgery at the University of Arizona, at the main campus in Tucson. In addition to teaching courses on health and spiritual psychology, he is the Director of the Laboratory for Advances in Consciousness and Health.
Gary received his Ph.D. in psychology from Harvard University in 1971 and was an assistant professor at Harvard for five years. He later served as a professor of psychology and psychiatry at Yale University, was director of the Yale Psychophysiology Center, and co-director of the Yale Behavioral Medicine Clinic, before moving to Arizona in 1988.
In September 2002 he received a $1.8 million dollars award from the National Center on Complementary and Alternative Medicine of the National Institutes of Health to create a Center for Frontier Medicine in Biofield Science at the University of Arizona, which he directed for four years.
Gary collaborates with Canyon Ranch on biofield science and energy healing research and serves as the Corporate Director of Development of Energy Healing at Canyon Ranch.
Publications and Honors
Gary has published more than four hundred and fifty scientific papers, including six papers in the journal Science. Gary has also co-edited eleven academic books, is the author of The Energy Healing Experiments (2007), The G.O.D. Experiments (2006), The Afterlife Experiments (2002), The Truth about Medium (2005), and The Living Energy Universe (1999). His new book The Sacred Promise: How Science is Discovering Spirit’s Collaboration with Us in Our Daily Lives was published in January 2011.
The Energy Healing Experiments (2007) received the Gold Medial from the Nautilus Book Awards.
Gary is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, the American Psychological Society, the Society for Behavioral Medicine, and the Academy for Behavioral Medicine Research.
He received a Young Psychologist Award and an Early Career Award for Distinguished Research from the American Psychological Association. He served as President of the Biofeedback Society of America and the Health Psychology Division of the American Psychological Association. In 2004 he received a Distinguished Scientist Award for Energy Psychology from the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology, and in 2006 a Distinguished Scientist Award from the United States Psychotronic Association.
Gary received his Ph.D. in psychology from Harvard University in 1971 and was an assistant professor at Harvard for five years. He later served as a professor of psychology and psychiatry at Yale University, was director of the Yale Psychophysiology Center, and co-director of the Yale Behavioral Medicine Clinic, before moving to Arizona in 1988.
In September 2002 he received a $1.8 million dollars award from the National Center on Complementary and Alternative Medicine of the National Institutes of Health to create a Center for Frontier Medicine in Biofield Science at the University of Arizona, which he directed for four years.
Gary collaborates with Canyon Ranch on biofield science and energy healing research and serves as the Corporate Director of Development of Energy Healing at Canyon Ranch.
Publications and Honors
Gary has published more than four hundred and fifty scientific papers, including six papers in the journal Science. Gary has also co-edited eleven academic books, is the author of The Energy Healing Experiments (2007), The G.O.D. Experiments (2006), The Afterlife Experiments (2002), The Truth about Medium (2005), and The Living Energy Universe (1999). His new book The Sacred Promise: How Science is Discovering Spirit’s Collaboration with Us in Our Daily Lives was published in January 2011.
The Energy Healing Experiments (2007) received the Gold Medial from the Nautilus Book Awards.
Gary is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, the American Psychological Society, the Society for Behavioral Medicine, and the Academy for Behavioral Medicine Research.
He received a Young Psychologist Award and an Early Career Award for Distinguished Research from the American Psychological Association. He served as President of the Biofeedback Society of America and the Health Psychology Division of the American Psychological Association. In 2004 he received a Distinguished Scientist Award for Energy Psychology from the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology, and in 2006 a Distinguished Scientist Award from the United States Psychotronic Association.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 46 reviews
March 23, 2014
Bought this book after reading it at the library. I've noticed in reading the other comments that some haven't liked that it was overloaded by data, which for me was what makes it even more compelling. The methods used are made available for you to decide for yourself if you accept these findings as evidence of the afterlife or not. After analyzing the data myself, coupled with a few bizarre experiences in my everyday life, I'd say there is sufficient evidence to the probability that there is indeed more going on than meets the eye.
March 28, 2009
The author of this book is actually my professor and I'm taking a class on it. It's been very interesting in deed and has open me up to a lot of possibilities. I found this book very interesting and a good read. I recommend it to all people who are open to this kind of thing.
August 26, 2011
If you read a lot about Near Death Experiences, the Afterlife, or any sort of spiritual (in the non-theological sense, or not) non-fiction, I would recommend avoiding this book.
It's all about these experiments done with mediums, which is fine, but you can tell the scientist behind it all has a bit of an agenda, despite his constant protestations to the contrary, and it makes me feel like I'm reading a bit of a shell game, rather than a pamphlet.
He sort of overloads the whole thing with data, as if that will make it okay that he thinks sporting events in the future are going to be played by dead ball players and shit like that. I don't know, the book worked for a while but then the guy's inner-hippy comes out and you can just tell he's a couple cards short of a tarot deck...(you like that one?).
Anyway - avoid it, despite Chopra's advice otherwise. I recommend some other books along this field that are more worth your time.
It's all about these experiments done with mediums, which is fine, but you can tell the scientist behind it all has a bit of an agenda, despite his constant protestations to the contrary, and it makes me feel like I'm reading a bit of a shell game, rather than a pamphlet.
He sort of overloads the whole thing with data, as if that will make it okay that he thinks sporting events in the future are going to be played by dead ball players and shit like that. I don't know, the book worked for a while but then the guy's inner-hippy comes out and you can just tell he's a couple cards short of a tarot deck...(you like that one?).
Anyway - avoid it, despite Chopra's advice otherwise. I recommend some other books along this field that are more worth your time.
August 23, 2007
Regardless of your spiritual beliefs, even if you have none, this is a great read. The "science" is written for liberal arts majors, and the concepts are riveting. If you are wondering 'what comes next', this is a good place to start your exploration. Also, the author doesn't try to dissuade the reader from religion either, so avid believers shouldn't be scared away. In my opinion, this book helps marry concepts of science and spirituality.
August 24, 2007
The Afterlife Experiments follows a psychologist who risks his entire career and credibility in the academic community to answer a question posed by his girlfriend. She wanted to know if he thought her recently-deceased father's soul could still be near her.
This led him to design a series of experiments, increasingly stringent in the Scientific Method, to find the answer.
A really, really good read. I've read it twice.
This led him to design a series of experiments, increasingly stringent in the Scientific Method, to find the answer.
A really, really good read. I've read it twice.
July 12, 2014
Gary E. Schwartz used traditional scientific methods to study psychic mediums with remarkable success. He subjected some of the most prominent living mediums to double-blind and triple-blind experiments, and he found in some cases that the odds against chance for the results of their readings were in the multiple millions to one.
January 23, 2015
I couldn't complete this excellent book because at a certain point I felt like crying out loud, "Enough already! You are so stuck in the science box that even evidence that would be acclaimed as breakthrough in any other field still isn't good enough in this subject." If you are stuck in the science box yet open minded enough to consider the possibility that psychic senses may be real and valid, by all means give it a go. It's full of enough research protocols and academic buzzwords to satisfy most left-brained people. I get the feeling the author has gone a lot further along his road to a paradigm shift than he is willing to admit, at least in the portion of the book I have read.
June 12, 2025
STUDIES INVOLVING MEDIUMS ATTEMPTING COMMUNICATION WITH THE DEAD
Gary E. Schwartz is a psychologist who is professor at the University of Arizona. He wrote in the Preface to this 2002 book, “If it could be proved beyond a doubt and in an entirely convincing way, if it could be proved scientifically that life and love are eternal---would your love be enhanced; would your fears vanish; would your purpose in life be magnified?... This book presents the scientific possibility that all this, and more, has been proved and is real. How you handle this information is up to you; even skeptics will begin to evolve as a result of these findings… This journey unfolds as a scientific adventure tale investigating life after death… In a previous book… Linda Russek and I explained how contemporary science is leading to the conclusion that everything in the universe is eternal, alive, and evolving. Now I describe how Linda and I continued along that earlier path and explain how contemporary science is investigating the hypothesis of survival of consciousness after physical death… This work will show you how science is experimentally addressing the hypothesis of a living spiritual reality… This book is written for people who long to find scientific research that bears on what they hold most dear---that love matters, that love evolves, and that love continues forever… All of this is documented here for the first time.” (Pg. xv-xvi)
He continues, “Some people still insist that all we have been seeing in our laboratory experiments is examples of cold-reading technique that any professional stage magician can duplicate. But in fact, cold readers blanch when we challenge them to produce information this accurate and this unusual with a sitter unknown to them. And skeptics… have nonetheless been unable to point out any error in our experimental technique to account for the results. The mediums have provided information that is sometimes chilling, sometimes painful, sometimes shocking, sometimes unknown even to the sitter, but later verified as correct… But does all this mean the mediums are actually getting information from the departed? It seems unlikely---it contradicts accepted science. Yet we have been unable to find any other convincing explanation for the totality of the findings. And as you discover, many of the readings in these pages had an accuracy rate as high as 90 percent.” (Pg. xxi-xxii)
He recounts, “I asked myself, ‘What kind of God would allow the starlight from distant stars to continue forever, even after the star has ‘died’… yet would not provide the same opportunity for our personal biophotons?’ … If these cosmically ancient ‘info-energy packets’ persist in the universe today, why can’t our info-energy packets persist as well?... This realization was accompanied by a deep personal revelation, in which I experienced myself as an extended energy being … I came to know firsthand how our individually patterned energy is like all energy---that it extends into space at the speed of light throughout our physical life and beyond.” (Pg. 8-9)
He describes the first round of experiments, in which Susy (an elderly woman) “asked each of … four departed people to suggest a picture that she could draw for them… [Later] Laurie [a medium] attempted to contact each of the deceased individuals and receive specific information about the pictures that Susy had drawn…. We matched pictures with people based on the information Laurie provided from her readings…” (Pg. 38-40)
He acknowledges, “Certainly there are magicians who engage in fake mediumship and there are mediums who use cold readings. Could any of that have been going on here? Absolutely. Frauds with any skill at all would pull the wool over our eyes, probably without half trying… we would create an informal Magicians’ Advisory Committee so that we could have professionals in the field examine our experimental design and conduct of the research… Without scientific integrity, all of this is worthless… the possibility of clever fraud needed to be considered and ruled out.” (Pg. 42)
A new phase of the research (filmed by HBO) included some well-known mediums such as John Edward, George Anderson, and Suzane Northrup. Schwartz notes, “John had received names, causes of death, and many other specific facts but never recognized his mistake in thinking Pat’s husband was dead. John was confused; Pat was cagey. We would in time discover a possible explanation…” (Pg. 72) “Like the other mediums, Laurie made mistakes… she saw the two boys on the East Coast, through they had moved. She saw Pat’s son dying from some kind of what she identified as a ‘blood disease…’ but did not figure out that it was suicide by gunshot. However, like the other mediums before her, she received a pattern of information that most certainly fit Pat.” (Pg. 84)
After a session with Suzane Northrup, he states, “was this simple stretching to find a favorable interpretation for what Suzane had said? Despite my earnest intention to maintain a scientist’s critical detachment, was I unwittingly playing the game that magician mediums count on---so eager to believe that I was finding ‘facts’ where they really didn’t exist, in order to bolster the belief?” (Pg. 109)
He continues, “despite the impression we both had at the time of the sitting that Suzane had done poorly, when the scoring was completed… she had in fact obtained a remarkably high percentage of accurate facts. We were probably misled by the many mistakes in conveying opinions---only 30 percent of the opinion statements were correct. But overall, the experience illustrates how the unique selectivity of our memories can sometimes complicate and even confound this research… We believe that selective memory may also affect viewers observing readings on television… Selective remembering applies to all of us… That’s precisely why we make sure that the scientific date we report are based on careful scoring of the actual transcripts, not a person’s selective memory of the session.” (Pg. 110)
He summarizes after this phase, “I had a nagging certainty I could not yet answer all the challenges that might be thrown at me. Were there ways to make the experimental procedure even more fraud-proof? There must be… Yet for the time being, I could hardly help but feel elated… we had planned and carried out a significant experiment with fairly elaborate safeguards. The results were decidedly impressive, certainly enough to give us confidence and the strong desire to continue.” (Pg. 123-124)
He cautions, “We’ve discovered that sometimes… there are ‘anomalies within the anomalies’ as the data unfold. When you conduct research in such a way that you are open to uncovering the strange within the strange, you sometimes come upon an extraordinary class of data---information that does not easily fit the conventional ‘anomalous' explanations such as reading the mind of the sitter. While these kinds of data are the most difficult to detect, produce on demand, and evaluate, they are the most exciting and sometimes the most definitive.” (Pg. 185-186)
After a later stage, he admits, “it happened in these readings that the mediums sometimes got nothing---zero---for a given sitter… How are we to explain these dreadful performances? In a traditional scientific publication, we would simply report the lowered averages, period… Yet sometimes key evidence is revealed in the errors… anomalies in the anomalies. Sometimes the truth is revealed in the mistakes. We just have to be willing to listen to what the data are telling us. But despite the disappointment with the overall averages of the silent-period data, the Canyon Ranch experiment represented a major step in the development of our experimental techniques… In that sense, the experiment had been a rousing success.” (Pg. 200-201)
He asserts, “It’s one thing to be skeptical---open to alternative hypotheses. It’s another to be DEVOUTLY skeptical—always ‘knowing’ that cheating, lying, fraud, and deception are the explanations for any not-yet-explainable phenomenon…. At what point does the instinct to dismiss data reflect a bias so strong that it begins to border on the pathological? Simply put, when does skepticism become what I would call skeptimania?... Science will die if it does not follow the data with integrity.” (Pg. 216)
He observes, “Our dream team of mediums tells us that when they face hostile clients or a hostile audience, they get anxious. They get negative thoughts and feelings that distract them from getting the subtle information they’re trying to receive… Of course, if the mediums were engaged in fraud, it shouldn’t matter whether they were reading believers or skeptics… On the face of it, at least, the mediums’ explanation of why they don’t like to read for skeptics appears reasonable. Maybe it really is more difficult…” (Pg. 218-219)
He says, “In fairness to professional skeptics like James Randi and Michael Shermer, they claim that they will give in to compelling data. They have certainly played a valuable role by revealing tricksters and deceivers. However, if John Edwards … turns out to be the real deal… we hope the Amazing Randi won’t turn out to be the ‘Amazing Deceiver.’” (Pg. 224-225)
He summarizes, “If the living soul hypothesis is true, and we develop our abilities to ‘hear’ what the dead have to say to us, perhaps human deceit might come to an end. It’s possible that we could enter a new era of human caring that Linda and I call integrity love… as more of us openly look to the deceased for everyday guidance, this potential could make like easier, safer, and more rewarding… Some of what follows may sound laughable and unworthy… But it a given suggestion seems ludicrous to you, please remember that all of them are offered with a clear purpose. Though the question of the living soul opens a veritable Pandora’s box, it is a box that, for better or worse, must ultimately be opened if it truly exists.” (Pg. 242-243)
He concludes, “After three years of conducting the experiments laid out in these pages, Linda asked me one day how I could see all these data and still not believe… The truth is, I couldn’t believe… because I’m a scientist, and the data, though highly supportive, are not 100 percent certain… The truth is that I was being scientifically hypocritical. I had failed to do the very thing I always try to encourage my students and colleagues to do… My growing fear was that if I actually summarized and interpreted the entire set of observations, I might be forced to conclude… the skeptics were completely wrong… Linda was asking me to face my fear about believing in mediumship… I realized that concerning belief in survival of consciousness… Scientific theory strongly indicated the plausibility of the hypothesis… to enable me to hold the opinion that survival, in theory, was true… In terms of belief as having confidence---no, I did not have confidence in that reasoned opinion… My degree of doubt … was frankly irrational. I was experiencing skeptimania… It was time to tally up the score and see that the data revealed… I can no longer ignore the data and dismiss the words…” (Pg. 256-257)
I was frankly not as persuaded by these ‘results’ as Schwartz was; there seemed to be a lot of ‘suggestibility’ going in with answers from the mediums that he and Linda scored as ‘verified,’ for example. [E.g., “Was your gallbladder removed?” Not it specifically. “… Was their stomach surgery like gallbladder, appendix removed?” Yes. Pg. 192] But this book will be of great interest to those looking for research involving mediumship, and how it relates to the question of survival.
Gary E. Schwartz is a psychologist who is professor at the University of Arizona. He wrote in the Preface to this 2002 book, “If it could be proved beyond a doubt and in an entirely convincing way, if it could be proved scientifically that life and love are eternal---would your love be enhanced; would your fears vanish; would your purpose in life be magnified?... This book presents the scientific possibility that all this, and more, has been proved and is real. How you handle this information is up to you; even skeptics will begin to evolve as a result of these findings… This journey unfolds as a scientific adventure tale investigating life after death… In a previous book… Linda Russek and I explained how contemporary science is leading to the conclusion that everything in the universe is eternal, alive, and evolving. Now I describe how Linda and I continued along that earlier path and explain how contemporary science is investigating the hypothesis of survival of consciousness after physical death… This work will show you how science is experimentally addressing the hypothesis of a living spiritual reality… This book is written for people who long to find scientific research that bears on what they hold most dear---that love matters, that love evolves, and that love continues forever… All of this is documented here for the first time.” (Pg. xv-xvi)
He continues, “Some people still insist that all we have been seeing in our laboratory experiments is examples of cold-reading technique that any professional stage magician can duplicate. But in fact, cold readers blanch when we challenge them to produce information this accurate and this unusual with a sitter unknown to them. And skeptics… have nonetheless been unable to point out any error in our experimental technique to account for the results. The mediums have provided information that is sometimes chilling, sometimes painful, sometimes shocking, sometimes unknown even to the sitter, but later verified as correct… But does all this mean the mediums are actually getting information from the departed? It seems unlikely---it contradicts accepted science. Yet we have been unable to find any other convincing explanation for the totality of the findings. And as you discover, many of the readings in these pages had an accuracy rate as high as 90 percent.” (Pg. xxi-xxii)
He recounts, “I asked myself, ‘What kind of God would allow the starlight from distant stars to continue forever, even after the star has ‘died’… yet would not provide the same opportunity for our personal biophotons?’ … If these cosmically ancient ‘info-energy packets’ persist in the universe today, why can’t our info-energy packets persist as well?... This realization was accompanied by a deep personal revelation, in which I experienced myself as an extended energy being … I came to know firsthand how our individually patterned energy is like all energy---that it extends into space at the speed of light throughout our physical life and beyond.” (Pg. 8-9)
He describes the first round of experiments, in which Susy (an elderly woman) “asked each of … four departed people to suggest a picture that she could draw for them… [Later] Laurie [a medium] attempted to contact each of the deceased individuals and receive specific information about the pictures that Susy had drawn…. We matched pictures with people based on the information Laurie provided from her readings…” (Pg. 38-40)
He acknowledges, “Certainly there are magicians who engage in fake mediumship and there are mediums who use cold readings. Could any of that have been going on here? Absolutely. Frauds with any skill at all would pull the wool over our eyes, probably without half trying… we would create an informal Magicians’ Advisory Committee so that we could have professionals in the field examine our experimental design and conduct of the research… Without scientific integrity, all of this is worthless… the possibility of clever fraud needed to be considered and ruled out.” (Pg. 42)
A new phase of the research (filmed by HBO) included some well-known mediums such as John Edward, George Anderson, and Suzane Northrup. Schwartz notes, “John had received names, causes of death, and many other specific facts but never recognized his mistake in thinking Pat’s husband was dead. John was confused; Pat was cagey. We would in time discover a possible explanation…” (Pg. 72) “Like the other mediums, Laurie made mistakes… she saw the two boys on the East Coast, through they had moved. She saw Pat’s son dying from some kind of what she identified as a ‘blood disease…’ but did not figure out that it was suicide by gunshot. However, like the other mediums before her, she received a pattern of information that most certainly fit Pat.” (Pg. 84)
After a session with Suzane Northrup, he states, “was this simple stretching to find a favorable interpretation for what Suzane had said? Despite my earnest intention to maintain a scientist’s critical detachment, was I unwittingly playing the game that magician mediums count on---so eager to believe that I was finding ‘facts’ where they really didn’t exist, in order to bolster the belief?” (Pg. 109)
He continues, “despite the impression we both had at the time of the sitting that Suzane had done poorly, when the scoring was completed… she had in fact obtained a remarkably high percentage of accurate facts. We were probably misled by the many mistakes in conveying opinions---only 30 percent of the opinion statements were correct. But overall, the experience illustrates how the unique selectivity of our memories can sometimes complicate and even confound this research… We believe that selective memory may also affect viewers observing readings on television… Selective remembering applies to all of us… That’s precisely why we make sure that the scientific date we report are based on careful scoring of the actual transcripts, not a person’s selective memory of the session.” (Pg. 110)
He summarizes after this phase, “I had a nagging certainty I could not yet answer all the challenges that might be thrown at me. Were there ways to make the experimental procedure even more fraud-proof? There must be… Yet for the time being, I could hardly help but feel elated… we had planned and carried out a significant experiment with fairly elaborate safeguards. The results were decidedly impressive, certainly enough to give us confidence and the strong desire to continue.” (Pg. 123-124)
He cautions, “We’ve discovered that sometimes… there are ‘anomalies within the anomalies’ as the data unfold. When you conduct research in such a way that you are open to uncovering the strange within the strange, you sometimes come upon an extraordinary class of data---information that does not easily fit the conventional ‘anomalous' explanations such as reading the mind of the sitter. While these kinds of data are the most difficult to detect, produce on demand, and evaluate, they are the most exciting and sometimes the most definitive.” (Pg. 185-186)
After a later stage, he admits, “it happened in these readings that the mediums sometimes got nothing---zero---for a given sitter… How are we to explain these dreadful performances? In a traditional scientific publication, we would simply report the lowered averages, period… Yet sometimes key evidence is revealed in the errors… anomalies in the anomalies. Sometimes the truth is revealed in the mistakes. We just have to be willing to listen to what the data are telling us. But despite the disappointment with the overall averages of the silent-period data, the Canyon Ranch experiment represented a major step in the development of our experimental techniques… In that sense, the experiment had been a rousing success.” (Pg. 200-201)
He asserts, “It’s one thing to be skeptical---open to alternative hypotheses. It’s another to be DEVOUTLY skeptical—always ‘knowing’ that cheating, lying, fraud, and deception are the explanations for any not-yet-explainable phenomenon…. At what point does the instinct to dismiss data reflect a bias so strong that it begins to border on the pathological? Simply put, when does skepticism become what I would call skeptimania?... Science will die if it does not follow the data with integrity.” (Pg. 216)
He observes, “Our dream team of mediums tells us that when they face hostile clients or a hostile audience, they get anxious. They get negative thoughts and feelings that distract them from getting the subtle information they’re trying to receive… Of course, if the mediums were engaged in fraud, it shouldn’t matter whether they were reading believers or skeptics… On the face of it, at least, the mediums’ explanation of why they don’t like to read for skeptics appears reasonable. Maybe it really is more difficult…” (Pg. 218-219)
He says, “In fairness to professional skeptics like James Randi and Michael Shermer, they claim that they will give in to compelling data. They have certainly played a valuable role by revealing tricksters and deceivers. However, if John Edwards … turns out to be the real deal… we hope the Amazing Randi won’t turn out to be the ‘Amazing Deceiver.’” (Pg. 224-225)
He summarizes, “If the living soul hypothesis is true, and we develop our abilities to ‘hear’ what the dead have to say to us, perhaps human deceit might come to an end. It’s possible that we could enter a new era of human caring that Linda and I call integrity love… as more of us openly look to the deceased for everyday guidance, this potential could make like easier, safer, and more rewarding… Some of what follows may sound laughable and unworthy… But it a given suggestion seems ludicrous to you, please remember that all of them are offered with a clear purpose. Though the question of the living soul opens a veritable Pandora’s box, it is a box that, for better or worse, must ultimately be opened if it truly exists.” (Pg. 242-243)
He concludes, “After three years of conducting the experiments laid out in these pages, Linda asked me one day how I could see all these data and still not believe… The truth is, I couldn’t believe… because I’m a scientist, and the data, though highly supportive, are not 100 percent certain… The truth is that I was being scientifically hypocritical. I had failed to do the very thing I always try to encourage my students and colleagues to do… My growing fear was that if I actually summarized and interpreted the entire set of observations, I might be forced to conclude… the skeptics were completely wrong… Linda was asking me to face my fear about believing in mediumship… I realized that concerning belief in survival of consciousness… Scientific theory strongly indicated the plausibility of the hypothesis… to enable me to hold the opinion that survival, in theory, was true… In terms of belief as having confidence---no, I did not have confidence in that reasoned opinion… My degree of doubt … was frankly irrational. I was experiencing skeptimania… It was time to tally up the score and see that the data revealed… I can no longer ignore the data and dismiss the words…” (Pg. 256-257)
I was frankly not as persuaded by these ‘results’ as Schwartz was; there seemed to be a lot of ‘suggestibility’ going in with answers from the mediums that he and Linda scored as ‘verified,’ for example. [E.g., “Was your gallbladder removed?” Not it specifically. “… Was their stomach surgery like gallbladder, appendix removed?” Yes. Pg. 192] But this book will be of great interest to those looking for research involving mediumship, and how it relates to the question of survival.
August 31, 2018
Summer 2018 flew by with the speed of light. Yes. I read this summer! No. I did not keep up with reviews. I finished the Afterlife Experiments a few months ago when the promise of summer was new. Generally, I save my 'woo woo' books for autumn and winter when the whispers and perceived foot treads of spirits are all the more tempting to indulge during our long, dark and frigid North Coast nights. In an ironic pairing, I am currently writing this review while I am midway through a smart and witty book titled Fantasyland which debunks much of what I find delightful about 'woo woo'. I am an agnostic in most ways and I neither advocate for the theories and experiments put forward in The Afterlife Experiments, nor debase them. I both 'want to believe' and respect the care in which I need to enter such a yen to believe. I would suggest reading books such as this with an open but not overly credulous mind.
So yes, love reading books about ghosts, reincarnation, various versions of the afterlife, ESP and most 'supernatural' phenomenon. This mainly stems from a childhood spent in the 1970s when these topics were everywhere in books, film and television. I do not quite feel like the addled pervert sitting in the park reading a porn magazine when I sit with my 'New Age' material. But, kind of...
Our society is neatly bifurcated when it comes to the suspension of disbelief. If you purport to believe in supernatural occurrences as part of your recognizable religion, then anything goes and you can be unapologetic, not only in your strongly held beliefs about phenomena you cannot prove but in your attempts to convince others to join you in your belief system. If you purport to show even the slightest interest in supernatural phenomena outside of a religious context, you are considered a 'flake', 'evil' or 'crazy' and very much discouraged from talking to others about your beliefs. As an educated person and one who spent formative years in a more 'rational' age, I will likely never get past that somewhat embarrassed feeling that comes over me when I admit (merely to myself) that I like thinking that some of these 'unexplained mysteries' could be 'real'.
Thus, when a person who has a background in science or academic research indulges in their own supernatural speculations, I am only too happy to see what they have to say. It is rather like sliding a banal dust jacket over that smut you are reading on the park bench.
Gary E. Schwartz has an academic background and a Harvard degree. He taught at Yale before taking a job at the University of Arizona. While attending a conference, in the mid 1990s, he met a clinical psychologist, Linda Russek, who had recently lost her beloved father. Schwartz and Russek struck up a relationship and Schwartz agreed to help Russek test the theory of consciousness after physical death. The stage was then set for the experiments discussed in this book.
Schwartz used mediums (a few well known and others not at all high profile) in laboratory experiments to try to determine, statistically, what their success rates would be in imparting information that could not be known to them. (Think family nick names which were given to the subjects as very young children and never used again outside the family....or the name of a childhood pet that died 45 years ago, etc.) To summarize in a brief manner, the rates of success were above predicted levels, some subjects were somewhat floored by the 'messages' the mediums had for them and the data was interesting and even somewhat tantalizing.
Although there is not, at this point, any definite proof that our dear departed still have a sense of what is going on in our lives and still have the capacity to react and the desire to communicate with us, books like The Afterlife Experiments make us feel a little better about our need to believe.
Obviously skeptics have weighed in and have offered critiques of the research and statistical methods Schwartz employed. He tended to use subjects who were more prone to believe in the possibility of mediumship and communication with the dead. Some scholars have noted that his methodology is not the standard. A topic this mind blowing will always earn a lot of skeptical analysis and push back (as well it should.)
At this point, readers who are intrigued with the unexplained might want to use The Afterlife Experiments as description of an interesting set of exercises involving people who are portrayed as normal and reasonable but who experience a few out of the ordinary communiques.
As I read, I was not completely taken with the 'evidence'. Typically, many 'medium messages' were vague. Some interpretation was needed by the subjects in unpacking messages. On the other hand, it seemed extremely unlikely to me that any of the mediums involved would have been able to establish any contact with (or background research on) the subjects they were attempting to put in touch with departed loved ones. In other words, the unexplained remains unexplained, but I was not given any reason to deny my interest in respectable attempts to analyze the possibility of communication with personalities in spirit form.
So yes, love reading books about ghosts, reincarnation, various versions of the afterlife, ESP and most 'supernatural' phenomenon. This mainly stems from a childhood spent in the 1970s when these topics were everywhere in books, film and television. I do not quite feel like the addled pervert sitting in the park reading a porn magazine when I sit with my 'New Age' material. But, kind of...
Our society is neatly bifurcated when it comes to the suspension of disbelief. If you purport to believe in supernatural occurrences as part of your recognizable religion, then anything goes and you can be unapologetic, not only in your strongly held beliefs about phenomena you cannot prove but in your attempts to convince others to join you in your belief system. If you purport to show even the slightest interest in supernatural phenomena outside of a religious context, you are considered a 'flake', 'evil' or 'crazy' and very much discouraged from talking to others about your beliefs. As an educated person and one who spent formative years in a more 'rational' age, I will likely never get past that somewhat embarrassed feeling that comes over me when I admit (merely to myself) that I like thinking that some of these 'unexplained mysteries' could be 'real'.
Thus, when a person who has a background in science or academic research indulges in their own supernatural speculations, I am only too happy to see what they have to say. It is rather like sliding a banal dust jacket over that smut you are reading on the park bench.
Gary E. Schwartz has an academic background and a Harvard degree. He taught at Yale before taking a job at the University of Arizona. While attending a conference, in the mid 1990s, he met a clinical psychologist, Linda Russek, who had recently lost her beloved father. Schwartz and Russek struck up a relationship and Schwartz agreed to help Russek test the theory of consciousness after physical death. The stage was then set for the experiments discussed in this book.
Schwartz used mediums (a few well known and others not at all high profile) in laboratory experiments to try to determine, statistically, what their success rates would be in imparting information that could not be known to them. (Think family nick names which were given to the subjects as very young children and never used again outside the family....or the name of a childhood pet that died 45 years ago, etc.) To summarize in a brief manner, the rates of success were above predicted levels, some subjects were somewhat floored by the 'messages' the mediums had for them and the data was interesting and even somewhat tantalizing.
Although there is not, at this point, any definite proof that our dear departed still have a sense of what is going on in our lives and still have the capacity to react and the desire to communicate with us, books like The Afterlife Experiments make us feel a little better about our need to believe.
Obviously skeptics have weighed in and have offered critiques of the research and statistical methods Schwartz employed. He tended to use subjects who were more prone to believe in the possibility of mediumship and communication with the dead. Some scholars have noted that his methodology is not the standard. A topic this mind blowing will always earn a lot of skeptical analysis and push back (as well it should.)
At this point, readers who are intrigued with the unexplained might want to use The Afterlife Experiments as description of an interesting set of exercises involving people who are portrayed as normal and reasonable but who experience a few out of the ordinary communiques.
As I read, I was not completely taken with the 'evidence'. Typically, many 'medium messages' were vague. Some interpretation was needed by the subjects in unpacking messages. On the other hand, it seemed extremely unlikely to me that any of the mediums involved would have been able to establish any contact with (or background research on) the subjects they were attempting to put in touch with departed loved ones. In other words, the unexplained remains unexplained, but I was not given any reason to deny my interest in respectable attempts to analyze the possibility of communication with personalities in spirit form.
Read
January 23, 2020Since 7 years I have been searching strong evidences about Life after Death, Reincarnation, astral world, karma etc., I came to know about Dr.Schwartz thru Dr.Mark Pitstic who are finding a SoulPhone and making it workable in this Year. The Research done by Dr.Schwartz are highly unimaginable and nearer to the Truth as told by Hindu Saints and Sages long back. Sri.Paramahansa Yogananda ji in his master-work Autobiography of Yogi has told in detail, when his Guru Resurrects in flesh n blood body after his Death. This research is going to remove fear of death of loved ones, unfulfilled ambitions that they will again come back etc., and Reincarnation is now scientifically proved. Dr.Jim Tucker, Child Psychiatrist has already written some books and his Master Dr.Stevenson's books are highly authentic in this regard. This research is going to remove much of the madness for Material wealth in this Earth life and also instill faith in God and Karma in everyone. Let such great Scientists come to Earth Life and make this Life wonderful. Only we should be prepared to die!! and be born in the countries we love. //rudrappa agadi//
July 22, 2014
I had always thought that the scientific method was ill suited to exploring some of the more far-out aspects of consciousness, such as apparent contacts with those who have died. When a retired physicist recommended this book, I began quite skeptically. But in my view it really does provide powerful evidence that 'life' after death exists. The book earns its subtitle.
Very interesting to me was that with every successful test the author increased the difficulties for the next. He even at one point had a committee of professional magicians devise tests they knew they could not solve. His subjects came through all of them.
The second thing that most interested me was that beyond giving details to authenticate they were who they said they were, none of those on the other side offered any detailed advice to the living. We are to live our own lives without that crutch.
I am not impressed with what, for me, is the overly chatty style of the writing, but I am deeply impressed with what the book reports.
Very interesting to me was that with every successful test the author increased the difficulties for the next. He even at one point had a committee of professional magicians devise tests they knew they could not solve. His subjects came through all of them.
The second thing that most interested me was that beyond giving details to authenticate they were who they said they were, none of those on the other side offered any detailed advice to the living. We are to live our own lives without that crutch.
I am not impressed with what, for me, is the overly chatty style of the writing, but I am deeply impressed with what the book reports.
December 17, 2020
This book opened my mind to something I always questioned. Windbridge certified mediums, mediums who had been put through extensive scientific testing strategies, were evaluated at the University of Arizona. Put through a number of double blind studies 5 mediums were able to "READ" people who were in different rooms, on the phone etc. The findings literally blew me away. No longer do I doubt that there are people out there with gifts.
February 23, 2008
I know you all probably think I am crazy with all this afterlife reading I've been doing! Even if you think it is bunk...it is still an interesting read!
June 10, 2011
truly interesting. I have always been fascinated with this stuff, but this book made me think maybe there is something to it all!
May 15, 2013
OVER FILLED WITH RAW DATA.
January 21, 2016
didn't finish reading it. Was interesting but repeated a lot and got boring.
March 21, 2019
In the Afterlife Experiments a professor of psychology describes 4 experiments that he performed to demonstrate scientifically that mediums can contact the deceased. His essential argument is that these mediums provide information about these deceased at an average rate of accuracy that is statistically different than a pool of randomly chosen control subjects.
For anyone who is interested in the afterlife, ghosts, or just paranormality, this probably should be included in the must read list. I appreciate the scientific approach, and his geniune desire to seek truth. It is written well, in a way that most people can understand. He also sets the experiments in an overall story-arc, and includes some rather chilling anecdotes about some of the mediums' readings.
I appreciate his approach and found some of the stories entertaining and downright freaky. This is probably the most compelling book I've read (thus far) that validates mediumship, and life-after-death as a whole. But ultimately it isn't fully pursuasive. The authors take extreme measures to eliminate fraud (good), but the entire experimental system rests on a certain grading system that I found lacking for various reasons. Still, I think this book is well worth the read and should inspire thinking for any true, honest scientist, intellectual, or spiritual.
For anyone who is interested in the afterlife, ghosts, or just paranormality, this probably should be included in the must read list. I appreciate the scientific approach, and his geniune desire to seek truth. It is written well, in a way that most people can understand. He also sets the experiments in an overall story-arc, and includes some rather chilling anecdotes about some of the mediums' readings.
I appreciate his approach and found some of the stories entertaining and downright freaky. This is probably the most compelling book I've read (thus far) that validates mediumship, and life-after-death as a whole. But ultimately it isn't fully pursuasive. The authors take extreme measures to eliminate fraud (good), but the entire experimental system rests on a certain grading system that I found lacking for various reasons. Still, I think this book is well worth the read and should inspire thinking for any true, honest scientist, intellectual, or spiritual.
June 12, 2025
Sometimes when I read books or watch videos about the afterlife I wish that the author had cited support for the more general points they made. That is not something that could be said about this book. Here, the author provides extensive and detailed support for all the major points he makes. I found that very satisfying, particularly the background stories of some of the mediums used in the studies as well as the more usual experimental details, although I can imagine some readers finding the level of detail a bit more than they had hoped for.
I also enjoyed reading how the author progressively tightened up his experimental designs in response to the criticisms of sceptics so that the end result is a very solid case indeed for the existence of an afterlife.
All in all, a very interesting book about the scientific investigation of a vital aspect of life.
I also enjoyed reading how the author progressively tightened up his experimental designs in response to the criticisms of sceptics so that the end result is a very solid case indeed for the existence of an afterlife.
All in all, a very interesting book about the scientific investigation of a vital aspect of life.
May 20, 2021
I lost both of my parents within the space of 6 months at the end of 2020. I've always been a spiritual person and the subject of an afterlife had always interested me.
I've read many books on the subject over the years, and a lot since my Mum and Dad passed away, looking for comfort I guess.
This book has given me a great deal of the comfort that I was looking for. Written in a very matter of fact and objective way, much different to other books on the subject.
I've read many books on the subject over the years, and a lot since my Mum and Dad passed away, looking for comfort I guess.
This book has given me a great deal of the comfort that I was looking for. Written in a very matter of fact and objective way, much different to other books on the subject.
July 15, 2025
Very Interesting book
What a great idea to gather mediums to see how accurate they are. I personally believe in the Afterlife. I will let you be the judge to draw your own conclusions.
What a great idea to gather mediums to see how accurate they are. I personally believe in the Afterlife. I will let you be the judge to draw your own conclusions.
March 2, 2018
An absolutely eye-opening read, written with an interesting, engaging style.
August 6, 2018
Fascinating
October 1, 2018
Do numbers lie?
December 17, 2019
Loved it
October 12, 2024
Fascinating!!
December 20, 2016
Interesting to say the least! I am a John Edward fan so I was curious about these experiments which were apparently an HBO special.
In a nutshell, scientists trying to prove the survival of the consciousness...the living soul hypothesis!
Five top mediums, John Edward, Suzanne Northrop, George Anderson, Laurie Campbell, and Anne German were subjected to their controlled laboratory experiments.
There are numerous sittings but basically the mediums can't see the sitters and in one study were only allowed YES or NO answers while another they were not even allowed to talk.
So the mediums each did sessions without being able to see and sometimes hear the sitter. The mediums each sat with the same sitters in random order and the results were evaluated.
Of course, some amazing results came out of this. Details impossible to have known, sometimes details even the sitter didn't know but later learned.
I would've liked to have seen the HBO special...I think YouTube has some of the sittings.
In a nutshell, scientists trying to prove the survival of the consciousness...the living soul hypothesis!
Five top mediums, John Edward, Suzanne Northrop, George Anderson, Laurie Campbell, and Anne German were subjected to their controlled laboratory experiments.
There are numerous sittings but basically the mediums can't see the sitters and in one study were only allowed YES or NO answers while another they were not even allowed to talk.
So the mediums each did sessions without being able to see and sometimes hear the sitter. The mediums each sat with the same sitters in random order and the results were evaluated.
Of course, some amazing results came out of this. Details impossible to have known, sometimes details even the sitter didn't know but later learned.
I would've liked to have seen the HBO special...I think YouTube has some of the sittings.
July 4, 2016
This book got four stars because I appreciate the academic pursuit of knowledge involved in the experiments staged by Professor Schwartz and his colleagues. The description of the controls put in place to ensure integrity in the outcomes certainly helped to sway my opinion, particularly of one featured television medium who I've never quite trusted. However, the book was not an easy or enjoyable read: the narrative was disorganized and the constant sub-headings were disruptive and unnecessary. But my biggest complaint (read: pet peeve) is that the book was so poorly edited: spelling mistakes and grammatical errors abound, which detracts from the academic platform of the author.
In terms of scientific interest/integrity/relevance: A+
In terms of readability: D-
In terms of scientific interest/integrity/relevance: A+
In terms of readability: D-
August 23, 2025
The premise for this book is one the I was interested in. I have to admit I was put off by Schwartz's desire to make sure the reader understood what a brilliant person he is. Bragging about his intelligence and accomplishments did not add credibility to his book. Based on the evidence he provides in this book, I have no reason to doubt his observations even though the studies he based this book on are not very large or extensive.
January 12, 2009
This was an interesting book if you like the idea of ESP. The book is about trying to scientifically figure out if psychic powers are real or just a hoax. There are a number of interesting experiments that are done to try and prove or disprove this ability. I would definitely recommend this to anyone who is intrigued by the thought of psychic powers.
October 13, 2011
Have read a number books on the subject of the afterlife. This is by far the best from the 'proof' point of view. If you are struggling with the concept I thoroughly recommend this book. Brought (and continues to bring) and great deal of comfort to me.
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