Dualism or idealist monism as the best model for survival after death data

In a 2016 essay called "The Idealist View of Consciousness After Death", published in an issue of the Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research dedicated to "Theories of Consciousness and Death", he wrote


The hallmark of dissociation is “a disruption of and/or discontinuity in the normal
integration of consciousness, memory, identity [and] emotion” (Black & Grant,
2014, p. 191). Therefore, the end of dissociation can only entail a reintegration of
“memory, identity [and] emotion” lost at birth. This means that bodily death,
under idealism, must correlate with an expansion of our felt sense of identity,
access to a broader set of memories and enrichment of our emotional inner life.

This conclusion is the exact opposite of what our mainstream physicalist
ontology asserts. Moreover, there is nothing in the popular dualist alternative—
mainly found in religious circles—that requires it either. So idealism is not only
unique in its ability to explain reality more parsimoniously and completely than
physicalism and dualism, it also offers a unique perspective on death.

Circumstantially but significantly, much of the literature regarding near-death
experiences (NDEs) seems to corroborate this prediction of idealism (Kelly et al.,
2009). To mention only one recent example, Anita Moorjani (2012) wrote of her
felt sense of identity during her NDE: “I certainly don’t feel reduced or smaller in
any way. On the contrary, I haven’t ever been this huge, this powerful, or this all-
encompassing. ... [I] felt greater and more intense and expansive than my
physical being” (p. 69). It’s hard to conceive of a more unambiguous
confirmation of idealism’s prediction than this passage, although Moorjani’s
entire NDE report echoes the prediction precisely.

I would completely disagree with Kastrup on this. Spiritualist, Theosophical and other Dualistic Western esoteric thought clearly expects that after physical death, consciousness (after a period varying with the personality) may expand greatly to assume the grandeur of soul consciousness, or it may more typically stall in a place nicknamed the Summerland, or it may go on further, and it may or may not choose to go back into another round of incarnation. And Kastrup doesn't even hint of the obvious complications of the actual mechanism that must underly the sort of transformation Moorjani described, under Idealism.

Good points to ponder, Sci.

Regarding just this one point: if we envision a OTS or God that creates the universe or reality through the unfolding of itself - like a carpet that is unfolded but that remains the carpet using one classic Hindu analogy I'm reading about - couldn't part of that creation be Subjects that through their intersubjectivity/consensus create realities within that Reality? So that "they" create the sub-realities, but at the same time "they" remain characters within God's ultimate play/reality and/or part of that God/Source?

I don't know if that contradicts the arguments you're making.

This idea is reminiscent of a number of Spiritualist and New Age teachings, that our physical Universe and Reality's actual creator was not God directly, but through the vastly intelligent creative activity of extremely powerful spiritual beings that were directly created by God, termed archangels in the Catholic tradition. And that there exists a hierarchy of such beings, in charge of various aspects or elements in our Reality, such as evolution, for example. Such beings would be the very high intelligences responsible for the creative innovation of Life's evolution. Such beings would also be the agents responsible for the fine tuning of the laws of physics.

Just quoting myself because I came upon this thread from January 2021 where Kamarling wrote:

Just to say this video I posted maybe puts another spin on this understanding of where Spira specifically is at.

I'm also hoping that by posting this I'm *pinging Kamarling to come join this thread from wherever he is. Hope you're well David.

If I happen to, on rare occasions, come out of my self-imposed exile it is becuase my lurking here has highlighted something that has been, through some synchronicity, at the forefront of my recent thinking and I will allow myself an occasional comment.

I do listen to Rupert Spira although I find it a frustrating experience because I feel he deliberately avoids addressing the points people in his sessions bring up in the hope of a direct answer. The video posted by you here is yet another example of that and I am left with the question - what is he saying about the possibility and nature of the afterlife (which I think, by her mention of Anita Moorjani, the questioner was hoping to have answered)?

I have just finished a book by William Buhlman who does address this point directly and, like other sources before him such as NDE accounts, channeled  material and mediums, we are looking at a more philosophically developed afterlife landscape than we had, say 100 years ago from books such a "Life in the World Unseen". So these sources, like Spira and Kastrup, point to an idealistic understanding of reality extended into the spiritual realms. Those realms appear to be created and maintained by conscious beings who reside at various levels - often referred to as vibrational levels - reflecting their individual and collective spiritual evolution.

Coming back to Spira - I still get the impression, despite his talk of the soul finding itself in a different reality at death, that he considers this to be a fleeting experience before the ultimate dissolution of the personality into the single, ubiquitous consciousness. I've also been listening to some YouTube videos produced by a Buddhist monk who tries to answer similar questions to those posed to Spira and, of course, a lot of the answers are similar. Again, I have problems with the Buddhist view because it also seems to affirm that the purpose of reincarnation is to attain enlightenment (which I have no problem with) and that enlightenment is when all thoughts, feelings, purpose and identity have been eliminated. Nirvana, according to him, is the complete dissolution of the soul into the whole (which I do have a problem with). Also, as a side note: Buddhists seem preoccupied with suffering as much as Christians are preoccupied with sin.

So it has become difficult for me to offer a point of view that is at once substantially in agreement with and, at the same time, profundly in opposition to the views of reality offered by Spira, Kastrup, Buddhists, etc.  I find myself forced to bang a familiar (to those who remember some of my posts) drum: the sub-title of "Seth Speaks" is "The Eternal Validity of the Soul." Even if our individuality is not eternal, I believe there is a long process of soul evolution covering perhaps thousands of lifetimes here in the physical realms (and perhaps prolonged afterlife intervals) followed by graduation through higher levels to what is perhaps an assimilation rather than a dissolution.

So, with thanks to Ian for the *ping*, I'll retire to the lurk-o-sphere and watch with interest how the discussion develops.

[Ninshub]

If I happen to, on rare occasions, come out of my self-imposed exile it is becuase my lurking here has highlighted something that has been, through some synchronicity, at the forefront of my recent thinking and I will allow myself an occasional comment.

I do listen to Rupert Spira although I find it a frustrating experience because I feel he deliberately avoids addressing the points people in his sessions bring up in the hope of a direct answer. The video posted by you here is yet another example of that and I am left with the question - what is he saying about the possibility and nature of the afterlife (which I think, by her mention of Anita Moorjani, the questioner was hoping to have answered)?

I have just finished a book by William Buhlman who does address this point directly and, like other sources before him such as NDE accounts, channeled  material and mediums, we are looking at a more philosophically developed afterlife landscape than we had, say 100 years ago from books such a "Life in the World Unseen". So these sources, like Spira and Kastrup, point to an idealistic understanding of reality extended into the spiritual realms. Those realms appear to be created and maintained by conscious beings who reside at various levels - often referred to as vibrational levels - reflecting their individual and collective spiritual evolution.

Coming back to Spira - I still get the impression, despite his talk of the soul finding itself in a different reality at death, that he considers this to be a fleeting experience before the ultimate dissolution of the personality into the single, ubiquitous consciousness. I've also been listening to some YouTube videos produced by a Buddhist monk who tries to answer similar questions to those posed to Spira and, of course, a lot of the answers are similar. Again, I have problems with the Buddhist view because it also seems to affirm that the purpose of reincarnation is to attain enlightenment (which I have no problem with) and that enlightenment is when all thoughts, feelings, purpose and identity have been eliminated. Nirvana, according to him, is the complete dissolution of the soul into the whole (which I do have a problem with). Also, as a side note: Buddhists seem preoccupied with suffering as much as Christians are preoccupied with sin.

So it has become difficult for me to offer a point of view that is at once substantially in agreement with and, at the same time, profundly in opposition to the views of reality offered by Spira, Kastrup, Buddhists, etc.  I find myself forced to bang a familiar (to those who remember some of my posts) drum: the sub-title of "Seth Speaks" is "The Eternal Validity of the Soul." Even if our individuality is not eternal, I believe there is a long process of soul evolution covering perhaps thousands of lifetimes here in the physical realms (and perhaps prolonged afterlife intervals) followed by graduation through higher levels to what is perhaps an assimilation rather than a dissolution.

So, with thanks to Ian for the *ping*, I'll retire to the lurk-o-sphere and watch with interest how the discussion develops.

I'm happy to have dragged you out, David, if only to know you're well! And its a bonus just to know you're reading and are "with us".

I think people like Spira are more interested, as in the self-enquiry method pioneered by Maharshi, to focus on our experience and seeing what we can know from there experientially, rather than usually speculate about life after death. But your points are well taken. (Although I don't often encounter videos where he doesn't answer a person's question directly, so just private message me if you care to if you run across them.)

(I would also separate the Buddhists from Spira and the Vedantists. All Vedantists hold to a self, even if that self in the Advaita tradition is also (ontologically deeper) the Universal self, whereas Buddhists usually don't.)

I was thinking about you the other day because I was wondering what the Seth material would say about all this. Thanks for the Buehlman reference. He was already on my reading list!

This also makes me think of the book "The Afterlife of Billy Fingers" (about a prolonged ADC), and if I remember correctly the discarnate there at the end of his journey has decided (?) or is going to (?) merge with Source or some such (I really hope I'm remembering this right).

[Ninshub]

I do listen to Rupert Spira although I find it a frustrating experience because I feel he deliberately avoids addressing the points people in his sessions bring up in the hope of a direct answer. 

Going back to this, which is really outside the purview of this thread, so please forgive me, I think this may have to do because he's answering people attending experiential seminars. And they ask a question from the old-paradigm perspective, and in his spiritual teaching (or whatever you want to call it), a bit like Socrates in some way, his job is not to just "provide the information", but to get the person to understand though a new paradigm (usually collapsing a view which involves separation of subject and object), which involves seeing what's problematic in the question itself, to help their "enlightenment" along (i.e. a more accurate perspective of self and reality). (Part of it is also the self-enquiry method: you don't give answers, but help guide the person in their questions so they experience the answer themselves, not just intellectually.) You'll notice in videos of the past few years they involve more Zoom questions because of the pandemic, and often I find it's a bit more "user-friendly" to the person talking. And he's said in recent interviews in support of his latest book that he's enjoyed having to "preach/teach outside the choir" and that it's stretched him to try to talk and write in a different way, more relatable if you're not already "partly in". He apparently wrote his latest book (You Are The Happiness You Seek) with that perspective in mind, and using more Western references also.

Going back to this, which is really outside the purview of this thread, so please forgive me, I think this may have to do because he's answering people attending experiential seminars. And they ask a question from the old-paradigm perspective, and in his spiritual teaching (or whatever you want to call it), a bit like Socrates in some way, his job is not to just "provide the information", but to get the person to understand though a new paradigm (usually collapsing a view which involves separation of subject and object), which involves seeing what's problematic in the question itself, to help their "enlightenment" along (i.e. a more accurate perspective of self and reality). (Part of it is also the self-enquiry method: you don't give answers, but help guide the person in their questions so they experience the answer themselves, not just intellectually.) You'll notice in videos of the past few years they involve more Zoom questions because of the pandemic, and often I find it's a bit more "user-friendly" to the person talking. And he's said in recent interviews in support of his latest book that he's enjoyed having to "preach/teach outside the choir" and that it's stretched him to try to talk and write in a different way, more relatable if you're not already "partly in". He apparently wrote his latest book (You Are The Happiness You Seek) with that perspective in mind, and using more Western references also.

OK so it would not be nice of me to jump in with one response and then ignore the responses to my response so I'll provide some context to my Spira comments. As I said, I watch quite a few of his YouTube sessions and I do get where he's coming from. I get the Socratic method too. I even agree with a lot of what he says - it gels quite well with my own worldview in most areas.

What I'm being critical of is the fact that a lot of the questions he answers in that way are coming from people who are looking for a definitive affirmation of what faces them in life and death. I say this because they ask the questions I would ask and I know where those concerns are coming from - specifically from a deep and lifelong death anxiety. I watched one where he came close to answering a question about the afterlife and he said something to the effect that he can't speculate on what faces us after death so he doesn't. What he does instead is to provide analogies which the questioner (and audience) might or might not understand. What I keep coming back to is his insistence that we dissolve back into the ocean of consciousness. This is similar to Kastrup and his whirlpool analogy (which I maintain he nicked form me but that's another story ) which exists for a brief moment and then dissipates back into the body of the ocean. So that loss of identity, of individuality, of personality, feeling and thought is tantamount to the kind of death people like me (with death anxiety) fear. I sense that is what those particular questions are intended to probe and, perhaps, find some reassurance from him. I don't feel reassured listening to his answers, however.

On the other hand, people like Buhlman or Anita Moorjani have actual experience of another reality via OOBE and NDE. They do give the kind of reassurance that I talk about above and they do so from a conviction that they had a real (ultra-real) experience during which they we shown these other realities. They even try to weave their stories into some kind of philosophical framework which very often corresponds closely to some of the assertions of Spira and Kastrup. Now we who have not had these experiences (and I have been doing daily meditations for 3 months now to try to achieve OOBE, so far without success) may be sceptical of the claims of NDE survivors or people who travel out of the body. I read such accounts with a wary eye - looking for holes and inconsistencies because I do not want to be duped. But I find those two and several others to be towards the more trustworthy end of the spectrum. I cannot know for sure that what they experienced is real until I experience something similar myself but I can say that what they say about what they learned fits very well with my own understanding and worldview. It all makes sense to me.

OK so it would not be nice of me to jump in with one response and then ignore the responses to my response so I'll provide some context to my Spira comments. As I said, I watch quite a few of his YouTube sessions and I do get where he's coming from. I get the Socratic method too. I even agree with a lot of what he says - it gels quite well with my own worldview in most areas.

What I'm being critical of is the fact that a lot of the questions he answers in that way are coming from people who are looking for a definitive affirmation of what faces them in life and death. I say this because they ask the questions I would ask and I know where those concerns are coming from - specifically from a deep and lifelong death anxiety. I watched one where he came close to answering a question about the afterlife and he said something to the effect that he can't speculate on what faces us after death so he doesn't. What he does instead is to provide analogies which the questioner (and audience) might or might not understand. What I keep coming back to is his insistence that we dissolve back into the ocean of consciousness. This is similar to Kastrup and his whirlpool analogy (which I maintain he nicked form me but that's another story ) which exists for a brief moment and then dissipates back into the body of the ocean. So that loss of identity, of individuality, of personality, feeling and thought is tantamount to the kind of death people like me (with death anxiety) fear. I sense that is what those particular questions are intended to probe and, perhaps, find some reassurance from him. I don't feel reassured listening to his answers, however.

On the other hand, people like Buhlman or Anita Moorjani have actual experience of another reality via OOBE and NDE. They do give the kind of reassurance that I talk about above and they do so from a conviction that they had a real (ultra-real) experience during which they we shown these other realities. They even try to weave their stories into some kind of philosophical framework which very often corresponds closely to some of the assertions of Spira and Kastrup. Now we who have not had these experiences (and I have been doing daily meditations for 3 months now to try to achieve OOBE, so far without success) may be sceptical of the claims of NDE survivors or people who travel out of the body. I read such accounts with a wary eye - looking for holes and inconsistencies because I do not want to be duped. But I find those two and several others to be towards the more trustworthy end of the spectrum. I cannot know for sure that what they experienced is real until I experience something similar myself but I can say that what they say about what they learned fits very well with my own understanding and worldview. It all makes sense to me.

I think there are many NDEs that say something positive and valid regarding the likelihood of an afterlife, because of the veridical features of many of them that definitely indicate that they are probably real. I don't think the NDEs bearing directly on the question of an afterlife are limited to a few with especially persuasive accounts; to hold so is a sort of hyperskepticism. Many NDE  accounts have later verified details that could not be plausibly explained except by the hypothesis that the NDEer left the body as some sort of mobile immaterial center of consciousness, to travel to other places in the physical world and other "places" in spiritual realms, where they made certain observations and experienced certain communications that could be later checked. Of course, part of the empirical evidence in these cases is confirmation that the NDEer's body was moribund with mostly nonfunctioning brain.

And in addition to the NDEs having veridical details, there are the many cases of there being a long-term profound transformation of personality after the experience apparently linked to its "realer than real" nature, of greatly enhanced consciousness. The NDEer loses any fear of physical death, absolutely is convinced he or she is not the body, and his orientation fundamentally changes to being a much more spiritual one. Of course there are also cases where the personality resists these changes and suffers. Again, indicative of the experience having been real not hallucinatory or a fabrication. 

The Self Does Not Die by Rivas, Dirven and Smit, (https://www.amazon.com/Self-Does-Not-Die...0997560800), exhaustively documents over 100 independently and carefully investigated and confirmed veridical cases, firsthand accounts of perceptions during NDEs that were later verified as accurate.

Of course veridical NDEs taken alone plus the NDEs with greatly spiritually positive personality transformations do not provide absolutely conclusive evidence of life after death, that is, anything like absolute proof. They are at best glimpses of an apparent afterlife existence or at least of the outlying approaches to it. But I think the NDE phenomenon is still a very important and powerful body of evidence that strongly bears on the issue.

I would be curious why feelings of love are so prominent in so many afterlife accounts - whether it's the NDEr speaking of a divine transcendent love or a dead child assuring their parents to not worry and not to suffer grief - if ultimately it's all illusion? Self-love to an extreme degree is usually seen as narcissism, yet a prominent message from the afterlife seems to regard the kind of admirable & generous love that necessitates individuals to actually exist.

Why is there a life review, if none of those decisions mattered and were not even genuinely willed by the individual and what was really happening was the One was acting through all apparently illusory subjects?

I think the Absolute Idealist can only claim the One Mind needed to be entertained or that it could not help but fracture into infinite illusory selves...neither of these seems like a completely satisfying explanation?

I would be curious why feelings of love are so prominent in so many afterlife accounts ...

Seems I also have something to say about this (oh dear, what have I got myself into?).

My observation is that love is the central and prime driving factor within consciousness. Religions put it first too (although couched in their terms such as "for the love of God" which gets [mis-]translated to worship). I also think that the word love is used to denote, not some kind of heart-fluttering emotion or intense liking but rather the unconditional giving of oneself to the needs of others. Sharing, caring, concern and empathy are all synonyms for love. "Love" is thus the catch-all word that informs us how to become better evolved by rejecting selfishness and embracing unconditional love. It is *the* positive driving force.

So I think that one of the first things that guides and helpers share with those recently passed over is their love which is probably something so intense that it dominates those afterlife accounts.

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I also think that the word love is used to denote, not some kind of heart-fluttering emotion or intense liking but rather the unconditional giving of oneself to the needs of others. Sharing, caring, concern and empathy are all synonyms for love. "Love" is thus the catch-all word that informs us how to become better evolved by rejecting selfishness and embracing unconditional love. It is *the* positive driving force.

I get that and I agree. But the impression I get whenever I read or hear NDE accounts is that love is greater than just "care for others" (although in practice it will become that), it seems to be a massive vibration that just engulfs everything. I don't know if this is what you meant by "love is the driving force of consciousness".

Which is why I resonate with when Rupert Spira (to name but him, and this is irrespective of whether this teachings are incomplete, which I think he would be the first to agree - it can never be ultimate truth) speak of love as when the false sense of separation with others (others meaning not just selves, but all beings and everything really) collapses. So it's beyond "giving to others", it's, at a more fundamental level, "you and I are one".

And this connects with this other theme that I constantly hear through NDE accounts, which is: I realized in that experience that we're all interconnected, we're not separate.

Here's a video by Spira where he expresses his views on this: