At the beginning of the 2021. the American entrepreneur Robert Bigelow, owner of the Bigelow Aerospace, offered a 1 million USD reward for the best evidence of the afterlife. In the end of 2021. the best essays offering that evidence were picked by the judges, all from the parapsychology community. The best essay was written by the parapsychologist Jeffrey Mishlove who got the reward worth of 500.000 USD. However, due to a high number od “high quality” work, Bigelow decided to reward writers of more than 20 essays and the prize money amounted to 1,8 million USD. More info can be found here: https://www.bigelowinstitute.org/index.php
As for the evidence presented in the essays, I didn’t have time to read all of them in detail. However, in the first reward essay written by Mishlove there are cases mentioned as the Scole sittings, the Watseka wonder, Leonora Piper… plus several personal accounts that are hard to verify at all. I got an impression that this essay lacks any critical evaluation even though many of the mentioned cases were fully or partially explained/debunked.
The essay of Leo Ruickbie was the most balanced one as the author says “As someone involved in research in this field, scientifically investigating alleged hauntings and mediums, amongst other things, the experiences I have had that could be interpreted as encounters with spirits, I have explained away as random coincidence, even trickery, or due to psychological factors”.
Bigelow is emerged into the field of paranormal for decades. He is probably best known for his Skinwalker ranch in Utah where “strange” things happen. He also financed some afterlife research programmes probably because he lost his son at young age. Bigelow Chair of Consciousness Studies at the University of Nevada Las Vegas had a programme worth of 3,7 million USD. Charles T. Tart and Raymond Moody became the first two chairs, but Mr. Bigelow shut down the program after several years. “Sadly, we just couldn’t make enough progress in research aspects,” Bigelow said. More info can be found in this NY times comment: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/21/s...ter-death.html
As for the evidence presented in the essays, I didn’t have time to read all of them in detail. However, in the first reward essay written by Mishlove there are cases mentioned as the Scole sittings, the Watseka wonder, Leonora Piper… plus several personal accounts that are hard to verify at all. I got an impression that this essay lacks any critical evaluation even though many of the mentioned cases were fully or partially explained/debunked.
The essay of Leo Ruickbie was the most balanced one as the author says “As someone involved in research in this field, scientifically investigating alleged hauntings and mediums, amongst other things, the experiences I have had that could be interpreted as encounters with spirits, I have explained away as random coincidence, even trickery, or due to psychological factors”.
Bigelow is emerged into the field of paranormal for decades. He is probably best known for his Skinwalker ranch in Utah where “strange” things happen. He also financed some afterlife research programmes probably because he lost his son at young age. Bigelow Chair of Consciousness Studies at the University of Nevada Las Vegas had a programme worth of 3,7 million USD. Charles T. Tart and Raymond Moody became the first two chairs, but Mr. Bigelow shut down the program after several years. “Sadly, we just couldn’t make enough progress in research aspects,” Bigelow said. More info can be found in this NY times comment: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/21/s...ter-death.html
via International Skeptics Forum https://ift.tt/HYE5GDc
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