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July 20, 2024 17 mins

Guest host Connie Willis and Dr. Leo Ruickbie discuss his research into consciousness studies, the evidence that consciousness survives after the death of the physical body, and how Scrooge's encounters with the ghosts of Christmas form his views on the afterlife.

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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now here's a highlight from Coast to Coast AM on iHeartRadio.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
We are talking with doctor Leo Rukby.

Speaker 3 (00:08):
He is uh.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
He specializes in controversial areas of human belief and experience,
sometimes called exceptional human experiences, you know, basically all the
things that we love to talk about here on Coast
to Coast AM. So he had won third prize in
the Bigelow Institute for Consciousness Studies essay contests that's on
the best evidence for life after death and you know

(00:33):
how how to congratulations By the way, that's a big deal.
How many people actually entered an essay for that?

Speaker 3 (00:42):
Oh? Yeah, right, I think it was something like thirteen
hundred initial applications, So because it was like a two
phase thing, so you have to actually apply for permission
to kate posenet. Because they had some criteria to I

(01:03):
mean just just kind of like screen out people who were,
you know, just really trying to hand that is, you
know that, so one of them was, for example, you
had to have a minimum of five years demonstrable involvement
in research in this field. So you know that to

(01:24):
screen out people like you know, a journalist, people they
can write well on any sort of subject, but are
not necessarily you know, experts in any of them. And
I think that was that was a pretty wise move
because otherwise people have had straight up thirteen hundred used
to wade through kind of fifted this year quantity and

(01:46):
the final number I think it was two hundred and
something that actually submitted essays, and they had a panel
of judges, seven judges who have course, they had to
read all of those essays, and I understand that's a
pretty grueling process four months in the summer of that

(02:07):
year to wait through all of this stuff and then
of course you know, discuss it amongst themselves and work out,
you know, which ones they were gonna champion, which ones
they were going to have been essentially, I mean, no
disrespect to people's work, but you know, they had to
come down with a with a choice, so it was

(02:28):
it was it was a very unusual process because you know,
of course this kind of competitions like this aren't usually
held with regard to this subject. So it was great
they wrote them ald and you know, this story was
featured in the New York Times and all this kind
of stuff, so it really got the kind of press

(02:51):
coverage that the subject used to get you know, way
back in the day we mentioned the Society Prosycutic Research
when they they held just one of their regular meetings,
it would get reported in the Times newspaper of London.
They would report on that, right, but they certainly don't anymore.
So it was great to see you know, our subject

(03:13):
back in the headlines. And and for good reasons. You
know that it was an exciting contest as a serious contest,
and the judges themselves were I mean they were all
top notch and you know, really honored to be judged
by them. They are really some some reputable names there.

Speaker 2 (03:35):
Did you feel that the judges were diverse enough to
where you know, they would be open to something that
wasn't so scientific? But or was that the plan? It
had to be scientific?

Speaker 3 (03:50):
Well, I mean that was when the criteria was for
the actual etsy writing. Once you got past the first
hurdle that you had to present the best possible evidence
and it had to be beyond a reasonable diet. You
had that, you know, that legal bar that you had
to get over, so you very truly had to make

(04:11):
a case that other people were then going to judge,
so it needed to be strong in those terms, and
and that that points you towards presenting scientific evidence, because
that's that's the strongest form of evidence that we have.
So I think in terms of where these people were

(04:32):
judges themselves were coming from, they're you know, they're all
subject matter experts and they needed to be. You couldn't
have had this just judged by you know, people from
completely different fields or whatever. It wouldn't have been appropriate
and it would have produced, you know, the proper result.

(04:52):
So it was. It was all carefully planned and executed,
and you know, it was just amazing to you know,
you can come, Sarge and just this incredible experience.

Speaker 2 (05:04):
I know, congratulations. I think that's great. Now, tell me
how did how did all that come about? With Robert Bigelow. He,
I mean, he's a great friend here of Coast to
coast am he we definitely spotlighted the contests, I believe
as he started it and then as it wrapped up
to George Knapp of course is a great friend as

(05:27):
well as George Norri and then I've recently got to
meet him and that's how I met you through that
not all that long ago in Vegas at his at
the headquarters and but I met him years and years
and years and years and years ago, and it was
soon after my dad had passed away, and I had

(05:48):
actually called him and got in contact with him to
talk about an alien type situation. He was He loved
Bud Hopkins as well and was working with Bud Hopkins.
And I knew Bud, but more so David Jacobs, and
so I was talking. I want to talk to him
about that, and for some reason the conversation went to

(06:09):
life after death and this was a long time ago,
which was weird because that's really kind of his thing,
isn't it. That's that is? Is that his biggest question?
And how did is that? How all this came about?

Speaker 3 (06:22):
Well, I think it's one of it's one of the
biggest questions, isn't it. And it's kind of pivotal to
everything else, this question because it comes down to consciousness.
You know what really what is consciousness? And does it survive?
Because it's the sort of life after death? I mean,
what is what is life? What is death? We don't

(06:43):
you know here, We've got this problem with consciousness, which
is its just it seems to be central to everything,
including you know, UFO phenomena, and you know, other aspects
of the paranormal and so on. So I think this
is this is always you know, they say, it's one
of the fundamental questions that we all think. And so

(07:04):
it was just perfect to have the opportunity to come
to terms with that, you know, and get to grips
of him, because I think when I started off writing,
I was very skeptical and it's and it's been an
issue that I'd just been kind of like flip flopping
on for for years, and we could just never get

(07:24):
off the fence because I would read, you know, one
piece of research which would be absolutely convincing, you think, wow,
that that seems to settle it, and then you would
read something else that would demolish it, and you'd be
just back to square one again. And so this, for me,
he gave me the opportunity to sit down and think, Okay,
I'm you know, I don't actually really believe in life

(07:48):
after death, but now I'm gonna you know, we've got
the chance here. Because you know, the prize money was
quite substantial, so it was a definite big carrot.

Speaker 2 (07:58):
What was they how much did you win? What was
the top prize?

Speaker 3 (08:04):
The top prize was what was it again? It was
half a million?

Speaker 2 (08:09):
And what did third get? A brand new car?

Speaker 3 (08:13):
Car?

Speaker 2 (08:15):
What did you get?

Speaker 3 (08:16):
I think you know that. The third prize was I
got to come on the show and talk to you.

Speaker 2 (08:20):
So that was, Oh, well, we could look it up.
So it's not like, you know, I'm asking you something
too private, is it? I mean I think I could
look it up here.

Speaker 3 (08:28):
Oh you can't. Yeah, you can find it on the website.
It just you know, I'm British.

Speaker 2 (08:32):
I want to talk about I know you Brits. Oh
my gosh, come here, smack.

Speaker 3 (08:39):
Terrible. Yeah, you're gonna.

Speaker 2 (08:43):
Make me look it up. Come on. Well, congratulations for
what you got. But wait a minute, but you said
something you what.

Speaker 3 (08:55):
What got as much as I did?

Speaker 2 (09:00):
Oh I'm sure, absolutely absolutely, But you said something that
caught my attention. You don't even believe in life after death.

Speaker 3 (09:08):
Yeah, so that at the start of the project, and
then this this was the chance to really say, Okay,
now I'm gonna I'm gonna sit down and I'm going
to work it out for myself. Is the evidence actually
convincing or not? And if at the end of the day,
I still came away as a kind of like a

(09:29):
non believer, I would at least have kind of closed
that subject for myself, you know, and I wouldn't be
in this eral flip flopping state. So it was absolutely
just worked it from a personal point of view to
undertake that, to answer that question, or to take on
that question. And and I find myself, you know, in

(09:51):
a position that I that I kind of describe at
the beginning of the book, so at the beginning of
the essay, and weirdly, and I have to explain how
I ended up structuring it and all the rest of it,
because yes, please, yes, it was accidentally picked up a
couple I think I kind of quote online or something
like that, and it accidentally led me to Charles Dickens

(10:14):
Christmas Carol of all things. I loved it.

Speaker 2 (10:18):
I loved it, and that's where I started reading. I'm like, oh,
this is great. It's God rest you merry gentlemen. You know,
it's Scrooge, it's Evenezia. It's all great, so great, So
I'm glad you did that.

Speaker 3 (10:30):
So one of the things about Scrooge, I mean, Scrooge
is always seen as you know, the miser figure. I
mean that, you know, he's the byword for that. But
why I ended up calling the Scrooge paradox. It's got
nothing to do with money, but it's got to do
with belief from personal experience, because at the beginning of
the story, Scrooge meets the ghost of his former partner

(10:55):
who comes back to essentially warm and that these spirits,
you know, the three spirits of Christmas, are going to
come to him and and show them what's wort in
the world. And at the beginning of the story, Screwge
has this conversation with the ghost which is just priceless,
and he said, you know, I don't believe in you.

(11:16):
I think the ghost is quite taken aback. You know,
why why don't you believe in them? And screws the
answer is basically, well, you know, you could be you
could be caused by indigestion, for example, so essentially that
you could be some sort of sigment of my imagination
that's caused by some kind of imbalance in my system essentially.

(11:38):
But but Dickens used this far more you know, humorous
way of talking about indigestion, and Scrooge ends up saying
that there's far more of the gravy than the grave
about you to this ghost, which you know causes them
to shrine terribly. And and I think that's the key thing,

(11:59):
is that we very often doubt our own experiences because
we've grown up in a materialistic society, you know, and we're
taught scientific materialism, and we're told about to believe in
these things and to rather look for psychological explanations. So

(12:22):
I thought, wow, that is actually me, you know, so
at the beginning of the essay, and then to take
on board Dickens and the Christmas Carol that I thought
he's describing me, and it also describes a lot of
other people because the convincing factor and a lot of
a lot of this is personal experience. So people who

(12:44):
have not had a personal experience will very often remain
doubtful in the face of the evidence. And I men,
people who have had an experience will remain doubtful. So
I've had experiences, but I'd ended up, you know, arguing
with them like Scrooge, and and I thought, wow, this
really this explains a lot, in just in psychological terms,

(13:05):
about how we've faced these these strange things in our lives.
And so that you know that that was a way
in which I was able to just see where I
was in in the in the bigger picture, and realized that,
you know, I was I was doing something that Charles

(13:26):
Dieting had described, you know, way back in the Victorian period,
and building on that. I mean, of course, you know Scrooge,
he starts off he's not believing in the ghost, but
he very soon does believe in in the ghosts of
the as the ghost of Christmas thrown up and torment

(13:47):
him with you know, had visions of his fate and
so on. And that that opportunity, you know, to kind
of face my own denial of the experiences and to
look at the evidence, to set the evidence yes, and
then to come away at the end of the process
and think, you know, yes, or did something to it.

(14:11):
And I had convinced myself. And I think that that
it's probably one of the things that you know, helped
me get the position that I did in the context,
because that kind of wrestling was going on in my essay.
But a lot of people go through themselves, and I

(14:33):
think the odd thing is that one of the explanations
for belief in life after death that you often come
across is that people find it comforting. You ever heard that, Yeah,
because it's comforting. You want to believe in it, you believe,
you want to believe in it. They want to say something, Well,
that was absolutely the opposite. I was fine with the
idea of annihilation and then oblivion.

Speaker 2 (14:57):
You've always been that sick dude though we we all
known it. You've just been that guy. You know, you're
that guy. And if you didn't know, we thought that,
we all thought that. No, no, no.

Speaker 3 (15:08):
No, you know, just this idea that you know, you've
kind of you've had your life and then you just
you switch off and that's it. And I was okay
with that, and it's it's it's slightly more terrifying to
think that it's going to go on.

Speaker 2 (15:25):
Going on, especially if you're not happy it's going to
keep going on.

Speaker 3 (15:30):
Yeah, so I'm gonna be.

Speaker 2 (15:32):
Unhappy for the rest of my eternity. Oh my gosh, No,
I understand what you're saying. Well, you know what, there's
a lot of people absolutely afraid because they don't because
of just blackness or just darkness. You know, they're absolutely.

Speaker 3 (15:49):
Yeah, that's true, and I think that this is this
is what do you know. One of the beneficial things
come out of this context is it's not just you know,
say in the Ditual Winners or whatever. But we've we've
put all of the essays together and you know, we've
got them on the website of course you can download

(16:09):
them all for free, and we've also published them all
as a wonderful Box said, and just bringing all of
that work together is it's just kind of like a
sledgehammer on the on the nut of doubt because there's
there's the evidence is so overwhelming. You know, if you
if you sit down and read every single essay, I

(16:35):
don't see how you could still maintain that it's all
some sort of delusion, that it's all you know, misinterpretation
or look forethinking or any of these explanations, because we
do have very astonishing evidence and and armfuls of it.

Speaker 1 (16:57):
You know.

Speaker 3 (16:57):
That's the thing. It's not just the old case here
and there, but we've got so much and from so
many different areas.

Speaker 1 (17:04):
Listen to more Coast to Coast AM every weeknight at
one am Eastern and go to Coast to cooastam dot
com for more

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