Dead?

November 12th, 2016| Topic: RaMbLeS | 0

Continuing last week’s theme …

The other day a couple of scientists, not Christian as far as I know, claimed that human consciousness continues after death.

Stuart Hameroff, Emeritus Professor of Anesthesiology and Psychology and Director of the Center of Consciousness Studies at the University of Arizona, is one of them. He has always been fascinated by “microtubules,” components of the cell’s “skeleton,” so to speak, that are involved in a number of processes at the cellular level—division, mobility, transport of materials, etc. Hameroff thinks that, in addition, or perhaps even primarily, microtubules constitute some form of computing and information storage—he speculates that the microtubules of neurons in the brain form the building blocks of consciousness.

Sir Roger Penrose, Emeritus Professor of Mathematics at Oxford, and Hameroff’s collaborator, agrees. Together they hypothesize that the consciousness in the brain stems from processes within neurons, rather than from connections between neurons. They postulate the mechanism for consciousness to be a quantum physics process called “objective reduction” orchestrated by those microtubules that carry quantum information—information stored at a subatomic level.

Upon death, said Penrose, this quantum information is released from the microtubules into the universe.

However, if they are resuscitated the quantum information is channeled back into the microtubules and that is what sparks a near death experience. If they’re not revived, and the patient dies, it’s possible that this quantum information can exist outside the body, perhaps indefinitely, as a soul.”

Hans-Peter Dürr, former head of the Max Planck Institute for Physics in Munich chimed in:

The body dies but the spiritual quantum field continues. In this way, I am immortal.”

And your soul goes back into the universe, where it was, in the first place, before you were conceived.

Here’s Haemeroff:

I believe that consciousness, or its immediate precursor proto-consciousness, has been in the universe all along, perhaps from the Big Bang.”

The quantum theory of consciousness and, perhaps, that of the soul/spirit, nicknamed Orch-OR, “Orchestrated Objective Reduction.”

Needless to say, this hypothesis remains controversial among the wider scientific community. One scientist from MIT called all of this not quantum science, but quantum mysticism. Declared he:

Quackery always accompanies science especially in controversial and areas still under development.”

Whatever!

Despite microtubules, Orch-OR, and quantum physics/mysticism, the Bible claims that there is a part of the human that is non-material.

Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely;
and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete,
without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
1 Thessalonians 5:23

Now I’m not convinced of a tripartite division—body, soul, and spirit. There might be more parts to the human.

And He [Jesus] said to him [a religious lawyer],
“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,
and with all your soul, and with all your mind.”
Matthew 22:37

The Bible doesn’t make it clear what exactly our composition and constitution is, but evidently there is, at least, material (body) + non-material (soul/spirit/heart/mind/…).

And there clearly is existence after death.

… it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment.
Hebrews 9:27

As Jesus told the repentant thief on the cross:

“Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise.”
Luke 23:43

Paul echoed that sentiment:

But I am hard-pressed from both directions,
having the desire to depart and be with Christ.
Philippians 1:23

We are of good courage, I say, and prefer rather
to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord.
2 Corinthians 5:8

All that to say, science is getting there … slowly!