Reincarnation research

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Reincarnation research is research on the idea that human beings have multiple lives. Some of the field is paranormal research that records and analyzes the discourse of people who claim to have had past lives. This field is controversial and it has been described as pseudoscience in the The Skeptic encyclopedia of pseudoscience^[1] and also by the philosopher Paul Kurtz, of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry.^[2] It has also been described as fringe science by science writers such as Martin Gardner, who grouped it with research into beliefs such as astrology and alien abduction.^[3][4] In addition, there is a body of research in psychology and sociology on the prevalence, causes and consequences of human belief in reincarnation. This work has identified a possible link between psychological trauma and a belief in reincarnation.

Psychiatrists Ian Stevenson and Jim Tucker have described their efforts at the University of Virginia's Division of Perceptual Studies to examine children's recollections of past lives in a number of books. Their research papers discussing children's claims of past lives have been published in mainstream journals and their conclusions suggestive of reincarnation in journals devoted to parapsychology. Stevenson and Tucker consider the evidence inconclusive, though they maintain that reincarnation seems the best explanation in some of their cases. Stevenson's work found little acceptance in academic science.^[5]

Some past-life therapists, such as the psychotherapist Peter Ramster, have used trance and hypnosis to induce subjects to make claims about past lives. Ramster's research has almost completely been ignored by the scientific community, and there are concerns about the validity of past life regression therapy.

Critics are skeptical of the material published by reincarnation researchers, stating that it provides no objective proof for reincarnation, and that claims of past lives may originate from selective thinking, confabulation, and the psychological phenomenon of false memories. In particular, the use of hypnosis to recover memories of past lives has received much criticism.

Contents 1 Research on whether reincarnation exists 1.1 Early childhood memories and birthmarks 1.2 Research based on hypnotic regression 1.3 Criticism 2 Research on reincarnation beliefs 3 See also 4 References 5 Bibliography 6 External links

[edit] Research on whether reincarnation exists

[edit] Early childhood memories and birthmarks

This research typically involves the identification of young children who claim to remember a previous life and asking them to describe the events and the people that they recall. The child will usually begin talking about these memories near three years of age, and loses them by age seven.^[6] Authors describing these cases have stated that these memories appear to be corroborated, since they say that the child's memories match closely with actual people and events. If researchers can interview these children before contact is made with people familiar with the supposed previous family, then an comparison can be made between the statements made by the child and the people they describe.^[6]

Carl Sagan, a scientist and founding member of CSICOP, a group that set out to investigate paranormal and fringe-science claims from a scientific point-of-view,^[7] wrote The Demon-Haunted World in which he suggested that cases of children remembering details of "prior lives" was one of three paranormal phenomena deserving serious study, although he described the experimental support as "dubious".^[8]

A number of researchers around the world are attempting to examine cases of early childhood past life memories. One of the most prominent organizations is the International Centre for Survival and Reincarnation Researches, in India, headed by Kirti Rawat. A well known group of researchers are based at the University of Virginia.^[9]

Chester Carlson, the founder of Xerox, donated funds to the University of Virginia's paranormal investigation Division of Perceptual Studies, for the purpose of studying the survival of consciousness after death. The research conducted there includes not only reincarnation research, but research on near death experiences.^[9] Two researchers at Virginia are the psychiatrists Jim B. Tucker and Ian Stevenson who have published books and peer-reviewed papers^[10] about their work on early childhood memories and birthmarks.

Collections of anecdotal reports suggestive of reincarnation have been published by Stevenson, in books such as Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation. Stevenson spent over 40 years of his life devoted to the study of children who have spoken about putative past lives. Generally, Stevenson documented the child's statements and then attempted to identify the deceased person the child identifies with. Where possible Stephenson attempted to verify the facts of the deceased person's life that match the child's memory.^[11][12] During interviews and when reviewing documents, Stevenson searched for alternate ways to account for the testimony given: that the child came upon the information in some normal way, that the witnesses were deluded or engaged in fraud, that the correlations were the result of coincidence or misunderstanding. But in many cases, Stevenson concluded that no normal explanation sufficed.^[13] In summing up his investigations of 2500 cases of children who appeared to remember past lives, Stevenson has said:^[14]

“

My conclusion so far is that reincarnation is not the only explanation for these cases, but that it is the best explanation we have for the stronger cases, by which I mean those in which a child makes a considerable number (say 20 or 30) of correct statements about another person who lives in a family that lives quite remote from his own and with which his family has had no prior contacts.

”

Stevenson has also attempted to match birthmarks and birth defects on living persons (both adults and children) to wounds and scars on persons who died before the living person was born.^[15] He stated that the birthmarks were "often unusual in shape or size and are often puckered or raised rather than simply being flat. Some can be quite dramatic and unusual in appearance."^[16] Data for scars and wounds are collected from medical records such as autopsy photographs. ^[17]

Considering the degree to which the childhood memory investigations and the birthmark investigations support a belief in reincarnation, Stevenson has concluded:

“

the evidence is not flawless and it certainly does not compel such a belief. Even the best of it is open to alternative interpretations, and one can only censure those who say there is no evidence whatever.[18][19]

”

Reception to the University of Virginia work has been mixed. In 1977, the Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases devoted most of one issue to Stevenson's work and the journal's editor described Stevenson as "a methodical, careful, even cautious investigator."^[13] Other reviews of this work have been more critical. For example, theologians Jonathan Edelman and William Bernet argue that the investigations of Stevenson and Tucker, while an interesting basis for further research, provide no conclusive evidence for the existence of past lives and that the work suffers from methodological problems.^[20] In Stevenson's obituary in the New York Times Margalit Fox wrote:^[5]

“

Spurned by most academic scientists, Dr. Stevenson was to his supporters a misunderstood genius, bravely pushing the boundaries of science. To his detractors, he was earnest, dogged but ultimately misguided, led astray by gullibility, wishful thinking and a tendency to see science where others saw superstition.

”

The philosopher Paul Edwards and the journalist Richard Rockley,^[12] have separately analyzed some of Stevenson's published cases. Rockley's article raised the concern that many of Stevenson's cases occur in countries with a cultural belief in reincarnation. Rockley's point is echoed by James Randi, who also notes that, in these societies, a child from a poor family may have an incentive to claim to be the reincarnation of a person from a rich family, since this can lead to the adoption of the poor child by the rich family. Randi argues that such an incentive could lead to fraudulent reincarnation claims.^[21][22]

[edit] Research based on hypnotic regression

The second major field of research requires the direct intervention of the researcher, who places subjects in a hypnotic trance in order to elicit past life stories. The advantage of this procedure is that almost anyone can provide testimony about reincarnation, not just the rare children who speak of past lives. The disadvantages of the procedure are that, first, the testimony of subjects is immediately suspect, because hypnosis is known to sometimes produce false memories, and second, that the events described are invariably so long ago, so patchily described, and so poorly documented in the historical record that no objective comparison can be made between the events described and actual events. Nevertheless, because so many hypnotic subjects spontaneously remember past lives, some psychologists have become convinced of the legitimacy of the phenomenon.^[23]

On the other hand, it is common experience that human memory may be unreliable to some degree, whether by failing to remember at all or by remembering incorrectly. Confabulated evidence has been raised as a particular concern in reincarnation research that employs hypnosis.^[24][25] Some research suggests that the expectations of the experimenter can influence if the subject of hypnosis defines recovered memories as fantasies or reality.^[26] Other research suggests that religious and cultural expectations can have a strong influence on the memories of past lives produced by confabulation under hypnosis.^[27]

Peter Ramster, a psychotherapist based in Sydney, has used trance and hypnosis that induced a number of patients to make claims about past lives. Four of these patients, housewives who had never left Australia and who, under trance, had come up with all sorts of details, and names of people and places, were taken to Western European countries where they said they had been living in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. Prior to their arrival in 1981, Ramster and local historians searched archives, looking for and finding the names given in Australia. Similarly, villages and hamlets mentioned under hypnosis were found on old maps. Some of these settlements no longer existed, but Ramster states that some of the names given were correct.^[28][29]

Ramster believes that the most convincing case was that of Gwen McDonald, who said she had been "Rose Duncan" in Somerset, England, at the end of the 18th century. Ramster states that under hypnosis in Sydney she described various details in England that appeared correct when subsequently researched: the location of stepping stones, the location of houses that no longer exist, names of villages and people. According to Ramster, all of these were found in historical records. Ramster writes: "Short of some other explanation to the contrary, I have personally come to believe in the truth of both life after death and reincarnation."^[29] The investigation of the McDonald case was witnessed throughout by Dr. Basil Cottle of Bristol University and a 90-minute television documentary describing Ramster's 1981 investigation was made.^[30]

Ramster's research has been almost completely ignored by the scientific community. Stevenson even criticised the work, writing that "nearly all such hypnotically evoked 'previous personalities' are entirely imaginary just as are the contents of most dreams", and warns that hypnotically induced regression can cause psychological problems in some subjects. Nevertheless, he was "in favor of serious research with hypnotic regression."^[31]

[edit] Criticism

The most obvious objection to reincarnation is that there is no evidence of a physical process by which a personality could survive death and travel to another body,^[32] and researchers such as Stevenson recognize this limitation.^[13] Another fundamental objection is that most people simply do not remember previous lives, although it is possible that only some, but not all, people reincarnate, or that the conditions necessary for remembering a past life are specific enough to narrow the population which can do this. For instance, the vast majority of cases investigated at the University of Virginia involved people who had met some sort of violent or untimely death.^[11][33]

Critics suggest that claims of reincarnation originate from selective thinking, confabulation, and the psychological phenomena of false memories. At least the first of these three claims has not been proved broadly among those who remember past lives. The second concern, the possibility of confabulation (by the children, their parents/relatives, or the researcher), is a scenario that is difficult to disprove. Skeptics note that many of the reincarnation research studies are based on anecdotal evidence provided by the child or family, and also note that it is difficult to prove or disprove the veracity of anecdotal claim.

[edit] Research on reincarnation beliefs

As well as the research described above that tries to test if reincarnation exists, another branch of psychology examines the prevalence of these beliefs in the population, which personality traits are most common in these people, as well as searching for any psychological problems that are associated with the belief in reincarnation. Where these ideas are a cause of distress, such as in the case of a young boy who was haunted by what he thought were memories of a past life, therapy has been tried that included psychotherapy and medication.^[34]

One 1999 study by Walter and Waterhouse reviewed the previous data on the level of reincarnation belief and performed a set of thirty in-depth interviews in Britain among people who did not belong to a religion advocating reincarnation.^[35] The authors reported that surveys have found about one fifth to one quarter of Europeans have some level of belief in reincarnation, with similar results found in the USA. In the interviewed group this group the belief in the existence of this phenomenon appeared independent of their age, or the type of religion that these people belonged to, with most being Christians. The beliefs of this group also did not appear to contain any more than usual of "new age" ideas (broadly defined) and the authors interpreted their ideas on reincarnation as "one way of tackling issues of suffering", but noted that this seemed to have little effect on their private lives.

Waterhouse also published a detailed discussion of beliefs expressed in the interviews.^[36] She noted that although most people "hold their belief in reincarnation quite lightly" and were unclear on the details of their ideas, personal experiences such as past-life memories and near-death experiences had influenced most believers, although only a few had direct experience of these phenomena. Waterhouse analyzed the influences of second-hand accounts of reincarnation, writing that most of the people in the survey had heard other people's accounts of past-lives from regression hypnosis and dreams and found these fascinating, feeling that there "must be something in it" if other people were having such experiences.

Other researchers, examining the traditional belief in reincarnation in Nigeria, noted that the disease sickle cell anaemia might have contributed to this belief. The recurrence of this genetic disorder within families may have led people to conclude that the child involved is a malevolent spirit called a Ogbanje, which is chronically ill and repeatedly reincarnated within its target family.^[37][38]

In the US population, two studies have indicated that these beliefs are more common in survivors of violent psychological trauma and people suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder.^[39][40] However, these ideas do not appear to be associated with improved outcomes from such traumas.^[41] Indeed, one study noted that these ideas are "associated with more ill health and greater levels of trauma and suffering." and proposed that they are a coping mechanism to deal with past trauma.^[39] However, a general review of the association between post-traumatic stress and spirituality and religion noted that this association does not show in which direction the relationship operates, postulating the existence of "negative religious coping" that could involve feelings of punishment and abandonment.^[42]

[edit] See also

• Children's Past Lives
• Life Before Life
• Society for Psychical Research
• Xenoglossy
• Arthur Flowerdew

[edit] References

[edit] Bibliography

[edit] External links

• Division of Perceptual Studies, University of Virginia
• Peter Ramster, Australian reincarnation researcher
• Ian Stevenson, Reincarnation Research (WebCite archive)
• Reincarnation, from the Skeptic's Dictionary
• Skeptical Review of "Children Who Remember Previous Lives"

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