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THE SURVIVAL OF HUMAN CONSCIOUSNESS: ESSAYS ON THE POSSIBILITY OF LIFE AFTER DEATH edited by Lance Storm and Michael A. Thalbourne. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2006. Pp. vii + 311. $45.00 (paperback). ISBN 0-7864-2772-8.
The Survival of Human Consciousness is a puzzling book. The quality of its chapters differs greatly, two of them are reprints from years-old sources, and there are crucial omissions. Let me start with the last. Despite Stephen Braude's acclaimed and thoughtful addition to the literature (2003) , neither he nor the members of the two labs carrying out programmatic research on mediumship (e.g., Beischel & Schwartz, 2007; Roy & Robertson, 2004) have contributing chapters. There is only a passing reference to such recent research in Bill Roll's chapter (p. 157). Braude is mentioned elsewhere, especially in a contentious and not especially clear (more on that later) final chapter by co-editor Lance Storm. I also wish that a well-informed and well-intentioned skeptic (such as Dodds in 1934) would have provided a counterpoint to many of the interpretations in the book.
After a brief foreword (by James Houran) and preface (by the editors), the book is divided into sections: "Historical," "Theoretical and Experimental," "Evidential Issues," and "Conclusions." The book starts on a very wrong footing with a chapter by Keith Chandler exploring beliefs in the afterlife from the Neanderthals to our times, all in 22 pages! I do not know if anyone could do justice to the history of humans' attitudes toward death in this span, but Chandler definitely cannot. Part of the problem can be seen in the list of references, 22 items including three books by Chandler himself, all published by a "vanity" press. In the notes about the contributors, there is a reference to his "graduate studies" (unspecified) and his being an "independent scholar," but no actual description of his field of expertise. Rather than providing a clear overview, his chapter rambles around his sympathies (e.g., Shakespeare's Hamlet, Jane Fonda) and antipathies (e.g., physical fitness, Becker's important treatise on denying death). He makes outrageous statements, such as denying that Paul Tillich, arguably the most important theologian of the twentieth century, would know anything about spirituality, all of them supported only by his opinion, not by a literature review, research, or careful...