Dialogues with Jay. Donald R. Fletcher

which we can give a definition; and that’s because it is not part of the space/time cosmos. Our brain, with its marvelously intricate functioning, is. The brain dies off, whether abruptly or by gradual disintegration. As it dies, thinking dies. Emotions flare and fail. Personality may seem to change. Is the essential person dying off, the individual simply ceasing to be? Neurologically, that’s the way it appears. What proof is there of anything different? No proof; no fact. Factual, scientific proof requires observation, and here there is no possibility for observation. There can be no tools of space and time capable of reaching outside, beyond, to what transcends space and time. We aren’t playing with words here. We’re just recognizing that soul, spirit, or whatever word we give it, is that essential being that most of us are aware of, even while, because it is transcendent, no definition and no proof of it is possible.”

      “That’s good,” Beth said. “Thank you. It won’t convince my skeptical friends, but I say that it’s very well put.”

      Luc twisted in his chair, but Jay was smiling, nodding agreement.

      “We’re not expecting to convince anyone,” he said. “If soul or spirit is real to most of us, so be it. Apparently from far back in the dawning of human consciousness the idea has been there. Now, in these early stages of brain science, we can be pressing to find out where and how the connections may be. Plainly, a good deal may be learned, but I, too, am persuaded that this is not of the stuff of space and time; that it can and does transcend the material cosmos; even though we have no words for describing such transcendence, nor images to picture it. The problem is that our words and images are all just from our present existence.”

      “Jay,” I added, “that thought, that the idea of some sort of soul or spirit seems to go back to the dawning of human consciousness, would appear to be linked from very early with some notion of existence after death. Isn’t it so, that from ancient burials and early religious sites on back, humans seem to have believed in an existence after death that wasn’t very different from their present life? We find that ancient people, whether in Egypt, China, or the Americas, buried their dead with provisions for a journey or an after-life, even of some grandeur.”

      “All of which supports the perception,” Luc commented, rejoining the discussion, “that the notion of an after-life—including the imagining of it as essentially a continuation of present existence—was and is wishful thinking. Naturally people don’t want to die. Those, in particular, for whom life has been good, who have enjoyed rank and prestige, as well as the best comforts their civilization affords, would like to think of this as continuing in some unearthly future realm.”

      “That sounds cynical,” Beth remarked.