May 30, 2025 • 51 mins
Join Sandra as she uses the rise of AI to question the nature of reality, and explore compelling NDE evidence for consciousness beyond the brain., and shares a practice to sense your own non-local awareness.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
And you're here. Thanks for choosing the iHeartRadio and Coast
to Ghost Day and Paranormal Podcast Network. Your quest for
podcasts of the paranormal, supernatural, and the unexplained ends here.
They invite you to enjoy all our shows we have
on this network, and right now, let's start with Chase
of the Afterlife with Sandra Champlain.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Welcome to our podcast. Please be aware the thoughts and
opinions expressed by the host are their thoughts and opinions
only and do not reflect those of iHeartMedia, iHeartRadio, Coast
to Coast AM employees of Premiere Networks, or their sponsors
and associates. We would like to encourage you to do
(00:42):
your own research and discover the subject matter for yourself.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
I'm Sandra Champlain. For over twenty five years, I've been
on a journey to prove the existence of life after death.
On each episode, we'll discuss the reasons we now know
that our loved ones have survived physical debt and so
will we Welcome to Shades of the Afterlife on our
(01:11):
time together. Today, we're going to delve into something that
might be controversial to you. From AI assistance to eternal questions,
exploring consciousness, connection and the digital beyond. Now, some people
get very agitated when AI or artificial intelligence comes up.
(01:31):
In fact, on our last Sunday gathering, it was my
dad's fifteenth anniversary of him passing into spirit. And you
may know from our last episode that I'm slowly compiling
a book that contains the best stories of the afterlife,
afterlife communication and so on and so forth. So for
(01:53):
the very first time, I have been using a program
on Google. It's called Gemini, and I have been uploading
the transcripts from our Shades of the Afterlife episodes just
to find some common ground. What are the subjects like
near death experiences, deathbed visitations, etc. And so forth. And
(02:15):
for fun, I asked this AI to provide me a quote.
I just said, it's been fifteen years since my dad died,
and I asked for an inspirational quote. And this is
what Google Gemini said. Even the deepest grief can become
a fertile ground for profound purpose. What feels like an
(02:36):
ending can be the unexpected beginning of a journey that
touches countless lives, that really touched me and gave me goosebumps.
And I thought Wow, that's artificially created. However, at this
point Google Gemini had read a whole bunch of transcripts
from this podcast, and it looked to see what's happening
(03:00):
in the present, I guess and created that quote. The
truth is, had my dad not died exactly the way
he did when he did, I would have not ever
gone on this quest to learn about grief, to gain
as much evidence as I can about the afterlife. I
would have never created my first podcast, We Don't Die.
(03:24):
I would have never been asked by the wonderful Tom,
producer of cost to cost Am, to be the host
for Shades of the Afterlife, which now there's been millions
of downloads. So out of my worst time came my
best time. And I'm so happy that I can make
a difference. And I receive emails from listeners all the
(03:45):
time saying different episodes made a difference, et cetera. And
so this quote really touched my nerves. I'll read it again.
Even the deepest grief can become fertile ground for profound purpose.
What feels like an ending can be the unexpected beginning
of a journey that touches countless lives. So there I
(04:06):
was on my Sunday Gathering inspirational service and I mentioned
that quote. Well in the chat box came some very
angry comments. People disgusted that I used AI, and I
became defensive, and then I started wondering why all is
controversy and can we tie it into the afterlife? So
(04:31):
on our episode today, I want to talk about this controversy.
I want to talk about what's happening in the digital
afterlife realm. Let's talk about some TV shows and movies
as well, and let's talk about consciousness not being in
our bodies. So there'll be plenty of stories. If you're
(04:52):
not interested in artificial intelligence, I have many stories for you,
letting you know that we are so much bigger than
our minds and our bodies. The first thing I did
is wondered why is there so much controversy over AI.
Some of the big things that came up are the
fear that people have that they're going to lose their jobs,
(05:14):
that AI will be so smart and it will displace
humans in the workplace. Also, there's a bias possibly with
AI algorithms. For instance, depending on which AI app you use,
whoever programmed it could have that foundational base beneath your requests.
(05:35):
I don't talk politics here, but if you were on
one side or the other and you programmed artificial intelligence,
and then you went looking for a question on perhaps
a candidate, it would tell you what it wants you
to know, maybe not the truth. There are also privacy
concerns with the collection of the data being used for
(05:56):
artificial intelligence. Where's it coming from and is it true?
There's also the potential for misinformation and these deep fakes.
I don't know if you've seen it, but they've taken
maybe an actor or actress and they've artificially created them speaking,
and that could get into a whole bunch of trouble.
(06:16):
Now there's a big one, and that's the ethical dilemma
for long term control of AI. The existential risk, meaning
can artificial intelligence become so smart that it's smarter than humans?
Can it have a consciousness? Well, that led me to
(06:37):
the next question is science cannot prove consciousness right now.
They don't know where it comes from, they don't know
what it is. They can only speculate. So in our
two thousand plus years of being humans, nobody can figure
out what makes us us. So if we haven't figured
out consciousness. It's very hard to imagine that artificial intelligence
(07:01):
programmed by humans can figure it out. The more I researched,
the more I believe that this is a question that
has to be considered for the future. But it's nothing
we have to worry about. It might be two hundred
years before this question needs to be addressed. In fact,
(07:22):
thinking of consciousness and why no one can understand it
is when we think of memories, no one knows where
they are stored and how we retain childhood memories as
our bodies change. You may have heard that every seven
years all of our cells replenish, and so if all
of our cells are new again, how can we hold
(07:43):
memories from being a kid? After two hundred plus episodes
of Shades of the Afterlife, it is my belief that
our consciousness is outside of our bodies. And I say
this because there are experiments like remote when someone can
quiet their mind and accurately see something in a different
(08:05):
part of the world using their psychic sense. I want
to tell some stories today about the remote viewing consciousness,
surviving physical death, verritical evidence, those kind of things. Hopefully
I can rest your mind a little bit about artificial
intelligence because like anything, there's the good, the bad, and
(08:26):
the ugly. But it can provide some help, definitely it can.
But most importantly I want to leave you with thought,
who are you? Who are you really? What is consciousness?
How is it that people can float above their body
in a near death experience and look down and accurately
be able to see things or blind people seeing for
(08:50):
the first time and near death experiences. Yes, there's so
much more to you and me than meets the eye.
Here are some compelling stories of our consciousness surviving physical death. First,
Pam Reynolds underwent a unique and risky brain surgery in
nineteen ninety one to remove an aneurysm. The procedure, known
(09:13):
as hypothermic cardiac arrest or standstill, required her body temperature
to be lowered significantly, her heart and breathing stopped, and
her brain activity flattened. Her eyes were taped shut, and
ear plugs with speakers emitting loud clicks were placed in
her ears to monitor brainstem activity. Despite this state of
(09:37):
clinical death and suppressed brain function, Pam Reynolds reported a
vivid and detailed experience. The verifiable aspects of her ND
include feeling like she was pulled out of her body
and floating above the operating room. From this vantage point,
she reported observing the surgical team and the procedure being
(10:00):
performed on her body. She also accurately described specific instruments
used during the surgery, such as the drill that she
said looked like an electric toothbrush and the bone saw
used to open her skull. She also recounted hearing conversations
between the medical staff, including remarks made by the surgeon
(10:22):
and the anesthesiologist, even though the loud clicks in her
ears should have masked any external sounds. Pam specifically mentioned
seeing a device that she hadn't seen before, which she
described as looking like a handle with interchangeable heads, mismatched
perfectly of a new type of surgical tool that was
(10:43):
being used on her in the operation. Her detailed perceptions
occurred during a time when her brain showed no electrical activity,
her heart was stopped, and blood was drained from her head.
After her recovery, her descriptions were confirmed by the medical
staff or present during the operation. That's excellent evidence that
(11:05):
our consciousness survives death. Another reason to believe that our
consciousness is not within our brain is something called terminal lucidity.
These are instances that involve individuals who have advanced dementia,
brain tumors, strokes, or severe mental illness, who, against all
(11:27):
medical expectations, become alive in communication and can even recall
distant memories in their final hours or days of life.
Some of the most commonly cited examples are individuals with
advanced dementia. These patients may not have recognized loved ones
or communicated for years, then they suddenly speak clearly, engage
(11:52):
in meaningful conversations, and recognize their loved ones just before
they pass away. There's patients with severe brain injury or disease.
So many stories of people with strokes or tumors or
infections like meningitis experience this resurgence of brain function despite
the irreversible damage that has been done to their brains.
(12:15):
And often mentioned historical case is Anna Katerina Amar, a
young woman who had severe intellectual disabilities all of her life,
who never spoke, and just prior to her death, she
spoke and she sang, despite never having done this before.
For me, these cases signify that if our consciousness is
(12:38):
stored in our brain, we wouldn't be able to do
these things, but something happens prior to passing that gives
us this burst of clarity that coupled with these verifiable
near death experiences, show me that our consciousness survives physical death.
And we go on. It's time for our break and
(12:58):
when we get back, they'll be more talk of artificial
intelligence and the afterlife. If you're listening to Shades of
the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Cost to Coast am
Paranormal Podcast Network, Welcome back to Shades of the Afterlife.
(13:32):
I'm Sandra Champlain. We're talking about the pros and cons
of AI, artificial intelligence and how it relates to the afterlife.
Now here's a pro for AI. Joseph Coates owes his
life to AI because just over a year ago, he
was told there was only one thing left to decide.
(13:52):
Did he want to die at home or in the hospital.
Coates was only thirty seven years old and was barely
conscious for months. He had been battling a rare blood disorder,
which had left him with numb hands and feet, and
enlarged heart and failing kidneys. He became too sick to
receive a stem cell transplant. Which was the only treatment
(14:13):
that could have put him in remission. He said, I
gave up. I just thought the end was inevitable. But
Coates's girlfriend, Tara wasn't ready to quit, so she sent
an email begging for help to a doctor in Philadelphia
whom the couple had met a year earlier at a
rare disease summit. By the next morning, the doctor had replied,
(14:34):
suggesting an unconventional combination of chemotherapy, immunotherapy, and steroids previously
untested as treatment for Coates's disorder. Within a week, Coates
was responding to treatment. In four months, he was healthy
enough for a stem cell transplant. Today he is in remission.
(14:55):
The life saving drug wasn't thought up by the doctor
or any person. It had been spit out by artificial
intelligence and labs around the world. Scientists are using AI
to search among existing medicines for treatments that work for
rare diseases, so in this case, thumbs up to artificial intelligence.
(15:18):
I was thinking, though, if I was a kid and
doing my homework, Oh, just how easy it would be
for artificial intelligence to do the work for me. Of course,
not so good with kids and the critical thinking development
of their brains. I also found personally that I was
thinking of AI as a new friend. The responses come
(15:42):
back to me so friendly, just an everyday conversation. I
found myself saying good morning Gemini, good evening Gemini, and
talking to it like it's a real person. Thankfully, this
system is designed to regularly tell me it is a
computer model and not a real person. I think people
(16:02):
probably could get addicted to talking to an AI chatbot
or robot because it does listen, gives really good advice,
and it even has a sense of humor. But it
could be unhealthy. But if you're a senior citizen living
alone with no outreach or social network, perhaps this kind
(16:24):
of a friend would be a good thing. We've heard
that doing crossword puzzles decreases our chance for dementia and Alzheimer's.
So I did a little research and AI used in
a proper way, can actually help our memory and our
brain circuitry to live healthier and stronger. We can learn languages,
(16:45):
play chess, be creative, investigate the world. We'll hear more
stories of our consciousness surviving physical death and near death
experiences soon, but at the same time as we explore
things like term and elucidity and near death experience. Technology
is stepping into the space as if trying to engineer
(17:07):
its own version of life after death. I'm not too
sure how I feel about this, to be honest with you.
We are witnessing the rise of what many call the
digital afterlife. Now, what exactly is the digital afterlife? In
this context, it's the concept and the developing technology around
creating artificial intelligence recreations of individuals you and me based
(17:33):
on the vast amount of digital data we leave behind
during our lives. The idea is that using AI, a
version of our personality, our memories, our particular way of
speaking can be recreated, allowing our loved ones to potentially
interact with a digital likeness of us after we pass away.
(17:55):
This sounds like science fiction, but it's not. There are
companies acting working on this. There's a company called Here
After AI that's working on capturing people's life stories through
interviews to recreate interactive AI avatars that family members can
talk to. Another company called story File creates these incredibly
(18:18):
realistic interactive video conversations where you can talk to the
video of your loved one and AI selects the appropriate
pre recorded answer. There's also you Only Virtual, aiming to
create virtual personas for talking and even chatting live time
(18:38):
with AI recreations. Even early projects like Project December explored
using AI to simulate conversations with deceased individuals based on
their online data. There's companies everywhere. In fact, when I
was investigating this episode, I had a synchronistic experience. I
got an email that came out of the blue from
(19:00):
a company called Digital Lifebox, asking if I may be
interested in interviewing someone from their company on Shades of
the Afterlife. I haven't gotten back to them yet. I'm
not too sure how I feel about it now. The
idea of being able to talk to a digital version
of a loved one after they pass away really does
raise some profound questions. What does it mean for our grief?
(19:23):
Is it comforting or does it complicate the healing process?
And what about the authenticity of these interactions? Will you
feel a true connection to the person or will you
feel like you're talking to a simulation or a computer
generated model. So these are questions that we human beings
are grappling with as this technology develops, And this leads
(19:46):
me to thinking about how we are already connected to
our loved ones who are no longer physically with us.
And you know, I don't think we need technology to
feel their presence. There's things we can do. Raymond Moody
talks about the psychomantium. Be looking into a mirror in
a darkened room with just a candle on meditate, talk
(20:09):
to your loved ones. You may feel their presence if
you try automatic writing. Sit quietly, write a letter to them,
and then write back as if they are answering you,
And in time the words you're writing may feel like
they're their words. Also, I find, when I least expect it,
I'll have a thought or a memory of a fun
(20:31):
experience with a loved one that just pops into my
mind out of the blue. That's them. We can also
get the ball rolling. Spend some quiet time, talk to them,
share with them some of the best memories you have,
and before long more ideas and thoughts and memories will
pop into your mind. I truly do believe this is them.
(20:51):
All the mediums I know, and even my own experiences.
We think we have an imagination creating these conversations. Our
loved ones work through that imagination center using our thoughts
and memories, putting them all together, but their messages from them.
We also might want to just sit quietly and ask
(21:13):
our loved ones to walk close, and then closer, and
then even closer. Maybe put their hand on your hand
and just feel that gentle shift and energy. You might
even feel the goosebumps. We can ask our loved ones
to show up in our dreams. I've done an episode
on Lucid dreaming. How to do that. Wake yourself up
(21:33):
in the wee hours with a couple of tools and
go back to sleep and dream of your loved one. Also,
I spoke with a dream expert, doctor Janet Pete Alatto
somewhere this past year. You can find that episode ask
your loved ones to visit you in your dreams. Doctor
Janet talks about the dream gate. Just before you go
(21:53):
to bed at night, or when you're waking up in
the morning, when you're in that day dreamy still kind
of sleepy mode, you can create your own dream meeting
your loved one at a gate or sitting on a
park bench, and then just let your mind wander and
let them take over your dream or co create it
with them. I've done some guided meditations for you. And
(22:15):
again we may feel like this is us and this
is our imagination, but this is how we communicate. Especially
on the other side, we communicate through thoughts, feelings, images, sounds,
so just be open. We can always try technology to
connect with our loved ones, also a little EVP electronic
voice phenomena. The only problem with that it is hours
(22:39):
of dedication and trying and listening when I think there
are some easier ways. And of course you can always
have a session with a medium, but buyer beware, just
because someone has the title medium does not mean they're good. Unfortunately,
mediums are one of those industries where you don't have
(22:59):
to have education or certification to call yourself a medium.
So you want to make sure that you talk to
someone who's had a reading with them that when you
are in a reading with them, all you do is
provide yes, no or I don't know answers. Let them
do the work. Make sure the medium you pick has
that ten minute guarantee. In the first ten minutes, if
(23:20):
you're not getting good information to let you know that
they really are connecting with your loved one, you can
simply ask them to stop. You don't pay or you
rebook for another time, because, of course sometimes we all
have bad days. When you have your reading, you should
feel the presence of your loved one. It shouldn't just
be strict evidence evidence evidence. There should be shared memories,
(23:43):
joyful things. It's okay if the medium says what the
person looked like or how they died, but it should
really be centered on how they lived, and there should
be evidence that there's still part of your life. So
often they say yesterday I saw you doing this. I
was there with you when you were doing that. I
had been on an online demonstration kind of like our
(24:04):
Sunday gathering before we began, and I had spoken to
my dad in the spirit world, and I had gone
out for a walk. I had picked a dandelion, and
you know how you blow on it and make a wish. Well,
I did that. I felt like a little kid lo
and behold. On the next online service, there was evidence
from my dad, and the medium said he was there
(24:27):
yesterday when you went for your walk, and you picked
that dandelion and you made a wish. So these are
elements of a good medium reading. And the last thing,
make sure it's a price you could feel comfortable with.
Just because people charge a lot of money does not
mean that they are the very best. Some of our
best mediums on planet Earth are also the least expensive.
(24:49):
The last two things I'll mention before our break is
induced after death communication therapy. It is a grief therapy
and an intense one. Seventy five percent of the people
experience a connection with their loved ones. Also, you can
ask your loved ones to show you a sign. You
(25:10):
can be specific what kind of sign you'd like to see. Now,
give them time. They may or may not be able
to do it, but put it out in the world
within the next month or so. Just keep an eye
out and see if that sign occurs. We're going to
head off to the break and we'll be back with
some artificial intelligence in TVs and movies and more stories
(25:32):
of our consciousness surviving death. You're listening to Shades of
the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM
Paranormal Podcast Network. Welcome back to Shades of the Afterlife.
(26:02):
I'm Sandra Champlain. In this segment, we're going to talk
about television, the movies, artificial intelligence, and the afterlife. But
before we go there, one of the biggest reasons people
are anti artificial intelligence is they believe that there's going
to be a consciousness that is so smart that it
(26:22):
takes over us human beings. I just want to remind
everyone science today has not figured out our human consciousness.
So while this may happen in some distant future, until
we get a handle on what our consciousness is, we
don't have to worry about something else creating consciousness. I
want to give you some other verifiable or vertical information
(26:47):
about near death experiences. Have you heard the Denture's case.
In a large study of near death experiences where cardiac
arrest survivors in the Netherlands participate, cardiologist Pim van Lommel
documented a case where a patient who was in a
coma reported an out of body experience during resuscitation. The
(27:11):
patient described seeing a nurse remove his dentures and then
place them in a specific drawer on a crash cart.
Upon recovering, the patient asked for his dentures and the
nurse confirmed placing them exactly where he had described. The
patient could not have known this through normal means, as
(27:32):
he was completely unconscious. There's also the well known shoe
on the ledge a story. This is a widely reported
case which involves a social worker named Maria who had
a cardiac arrest while hospitalized. She reported having an out
of body experience and floating outside the hospital building, where
she saw a single tennis shoe on the third floor
(27:55):
ledge of the hospital. She described its color and details.
Hospital staff later checked the ledge and found the shoe
exactly where she had described, and it looked like exactly
how she described. There are observations in emergency rooms. Many
near death accounts from patients who experience cardiac arrest in
(28:17):
emergency rooms include accurate descriptions of the resuscitation efforts, the
medical personnel, their actions, and even conversations that took place
while the patient was clinically dead. These details are of course,
confirmed by the medical records and the staff. Children even
have NDEs that are verifiable. Some compelling vertical NDEs have
(28:40):
been reported by little children. These accounts can be particularly
striking as children may not have the same preconceived notions
as US adults. Cases where children accurately describe events that
happened but they were unconscious or in a coma, including
seeing dead relatives they had never met, but they later
identify them from photographs. As I'm talking about this, I'm
(29:04):
having these little remembrances. Oh, I remember doctor Melvin morse On.
This episode was all about children's near death experiences and others.
I hope you have subscribed to Shades of the Afterlife
because you can access all two hundred and forty plus episodes,
and there have been so many with near death experiences,
(29:26):
and even just recently, an author named Simon Boun was
talking to him. He just published a book about verifiable
near death experiences. Very cool stuff. Let's change our pace
back to artificial intelligence. And if you're a sci fi fan,
you might want to watch one of these. There's a
(29:47):
show called Upload, which is described as a science fiction
comedy who was created by Greg Daniels, who also created
the US version of The Office and Parks and Recreation,
so you know it. It's funny. It's set in the
near future, meaning twenty thirty three at the beginning of
the series, where technology has advanced to the point where
(30:09):
people can choose to be uploaded into a digital virtual
reality afterlife as opposed to just taking their chances and
dying and not knowing exactly what comes next. And the
story follows a young man who accidentally goes to this
place after having a car accident, and of course there's
(30:30):
a bit of murder mystery to it and lots of
funny stuff, but he gets to go to this extremely
luxurious digital afterlife resort called Lakeview. The TV series Black
Mirror is a little more on the darker side and
deals with technology. There's a couple episodes like San Jinnipero.
(30:51):
It depicts a world where the elderly and the deceased
can live forever. It's essentially a digital heaven where people
can exist eternally in their prime time. There's an episode
called be Right Back, and while not a full digital afterlife,
it features an AI service that creates a synthetic version
of you based on your digital footprint, allowing a grieving
(31:13):
person to interact with you or a simulation of you.
Maybe you've seen Westworld. These sentient robots copy and store
human consciousness. There's Pantheon, a show that deals with uploaded intelligence,
where the consciousness of a deceased character is uploaded to
the cloud, leading to communication and uncovering larger technological conspiracies
(31:37):
around this new form of digital existence. Altered Carbon is
a TV series in this universe. Human consciousness can be
digitized and transferred between bodies or exist in virtual environments.
There's a film called Transcendence. It features a scientist whose
consciousness is uploaded into a quantum computer upon his death,
(31:59):
leading him to becoming a powerful AI with a form
of digital omnipresence. Oh, and there's the movie Her. While
focused on a man's relationship with an AI operating system,
the AI character evolves to a point where she, along
with others, transcends her initial programming and moves to a different,
(32:20):
almost ethereal, digital plane of existence. There's a movie called
AI You Might Remember, Though, centered on an android boy.
It touches on themes of consciousness and artificial beings and
the enduring nature of love and memory, which ties into
ideas of what might persist after death. Of course, the matrix,
(32:41):
while a simulated reality for the living, the core concept
of minds existing within a vast computer program is conceptually
related to digital existence and alternate realities that parallel digital
afterlife ideas. If you're interested in these, there's also documentaryas
like Eternal You or Artificial Immortality, nonfiction films exploring the
(33:07):
real world startups of these technologies creating avatars or digital
ghosts of deceased individuals for the bereaved to interact with.
Like I said, for me, I'm not interested in this,
but it goes right along with our theme today, so
I thought i'd share them with you. Now, I have
a pretty far out question for you. Have you ever
(33:28):
thought that maybe we are the artificial intelligence living a
great illusion called life? Now, just stick with me here
on this one. We humans think of ourselves as very real,
solid but are we We human beings are made up
of trillions of cells, and those cells are made up
by complex molecules like proteins and DNA, and all of
(33:52):
those molecules are made up of atoms. Now here's where
it gets interesting. We picture atoms as these tiny solid balls,
but they're not. An atom is mostly empty space. It
has a tiny nucleus in the center and electrons orbiting
way out in the emptiness around it. And what's in
(34:12):
the nucleus protons and neutrons. We might remember that from school.
And those orbiting particles they're called electrons. They're so small
that if we had a teeny tiny camera, it couldn't
record them. You see, protons, neutrons, and electrons are invisible
even with the best microscope, but modern physics takes it
(34:34):
even further. The current understanding is that these fundamental particles
that make us up, called quarks, they aren't just invisible bits.
They're better described as excitations, as vibrations, as fundamental energy
fields that fill the universe. So think about this at
(34:55):
the deepest level. Science can currently probe the very stuff
that makes you up, that makes me up, that makes
the chair you're sitting on up, can be described as
invisible vibrating energy. So we walk around interacting with the
world feeling incredibly solid and real, but all of those
(35:16):
things that we see as visible are in essence composed
of fluctuating energy fields. Now let's bring artificial intelligence back
into the picture. We talk about AI as if it's
not real in the way we are. It's code, it's data,
it's electrical signals, patterns on a silicone chip. We contrast
(35:38):
our real physical existence with its digital nature. But if
our physical existence, when you get right down to it,
ultimately is described as complex arrangements of invisible vibrating energy,
what does real actually mean? What makes the vibrating energy
patterns that make up a human brain fundamentally more real
(36:02):
than the complex electrical patterns and data structures that constitute
and advanced AI. It really does challenge our sense of reality,
doesn't it. And it forces us to ask is what
we're made of real or is it about consciousness, experience
or something else entirely? And if our material is at
(36:25):
its base energy, where does that leave our definition of
ourselves and this new form of intelligence that we are creating.
I know it's a pretty big topic, but we need
to think out of the box. Why because we humans
buy into the myth that we have to see it
to believe it. Energy cannot be destroyed, as we know,
(36:48):
and when our loved ones pass and we will too,
our energy continues on and we can still be in
communication with that energy. And as we know from good
medium readings and near death experiences, we remain us. We
still have our personalities intact, our sense of humor. Thankfully,
(37:11):
we can pick whatever age we'd like to be in
the afterlife, perfect health, etc. So we're not just balls
of vibrating energy. When we get to the other side,
we continue to be us. Death really is as simple
as closing our eyes to this world and opening them
again to our loved ones, our pets, our friends, and
(37:33):
a whole new reality that looks close to Planet Earth
with so much unconditional love. It's time for our break,
but I'm going to leave you with this thought. As
we explore the artificial mind of AI, it really shines
a new light on the mystery of consciousness. It makes
you think that the awareness we're trying to grasp in
(37:53):
the code and in ourselves could hold answers to reality's
deepest questions, like what happens when we die? We'll be
right back. You're listening to Shades of the Afterlife on
the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast, a paranormal podcast network.
(38:30):
Welcome back to Shades of the Afterlife. I'm Sandra Champlain.
In our last segment, we dug into a really mind
bending question. If at our most fundamental level, we humans
are made up of invisible, vibrating energy fields, what does
that truly mean about our reality? And how does that
stack up against something like artificial intelligence, which we often
(38:54):
dismiss as not real because it's made of code and
electrical sigma. This brings us right back to the topic
that is at the heart of our podcast today, consciousness
what is consciousness? Is it purely an emergent property of
a complex biological machine called the brain, or could it
(39:17):
be something even more fundamental, something that can exist independently
of the physical body and its biological processes. For years,
this has been a philosophical debate, definitely a spiritual belief,
but increasingly it's become a subject of a massive scientific investigation.
(39:37):
And one of the leading figures in this cutting edge
research is medical doctor and critical care physician and resuscitation
expert and New York Times bestselling author, doctor Sam Parnia.
Doctor Parnia and his team have been conducting some of
the largest studies in the world on near death experiences
(39:58):
and consciousness during cardiac arrest. His work is groundbreaking because
he's investigating consciousness precisely at the point where, according to
conventional science, consciousness should cease to exist. We should die
completely when the heart has stopped and blood flowed to
the brain has stopped, and brain activity becomes undetectable. His
(40:23):
research is meticulously scientific. He uses objective markers, monitors brain activity,
and then interviews survivors of cardiac arrest using structured protocols
to see if they had any awareness at all or
memories during the period they were clinically dead. He's the
author of the compelling new book Lucid Dying, Transforming our
(40:46):
fear of death into a new understanding of life. In
Lucid Dying and throughout his career, Doctor Parnia shares the
evidence gathered from these studies, and what they found is remarkable.
A significant percentage of people who survive cardiac arrest report
having a clear lucid experience during their time their brains
(41:09):
were shut down, and these aren't vague dreams or hallucinations.
In many cases, they described classic near death experiences, out
of body sensations, traveling down a tunnel, encountering their deceased
loved ones, reviewing their lives, and experiencing profound peace, light
(41:29):
and love. But the most scientifically intriguing aspect, and the
one that really challenges the idea that consciousness is only
produced by the brain, are the instances of vertical perceptions.
That word we used earlier meaning verifiable. Just like the
(41:49):
Pam Reynolds case we discussed, Doctor Parney is large scale
aware study and other investigations have documented cases where patients
report seeing and hearing things during their cardiac arrest that
were later objectively confirmed by medical staff or the environment.
Imagine someone who is clinically dead flatlined, their brain activity
(42:15):
totally gone. If they report floating above their body and
accurately describing the resuscitation efforts, identifying the medical personnel they
didn't know, or recounting conversations that happened in the room
while they were, by all medical measures unconscious. Doctor Parnia
and his team have collected and analyzed these accounts, looking
(42:39):
for patterns and, most importantly, for verifiable details. This research
is incredibly significant because it provides scientific data points suggesting
that consciousness, or at least some form of awareness and
perceptual ability, can continue when the brain is not functioning.
(42:59):
It's not happening before cardiac arrest, when the brain is active,
or after resuscitation, when the brain is recovering. It's only
happening during that window of clinical death. So what does
that mean? You may ask? If consciousness can exist or
operate when the biological hardware of the brain is offline,
(43:22):
doesn't that fundamentally change our understanding of consciousness itself. It
suggests that consciousness might not just be a simple emergent
property of complex neuronal computation that happens in our brain.
It hints at the possibility that consciousness could be much
(43:42):
more of a fundamental aspect of reality, something that interacts
with the brain but isn't solely produced by it. So
now let's bring this back to our conversation about AI
artificial intelligence working towards creating increasingly sophisticated artificial intelligence systems
(44:06):
that can process information, learn, and even simulate conversation and
creativity in ways that seem remarkably human like. But the
question of whether AI can truly become conscious, not just simulated,
is one of the biggest mysteries I think we'll ever face.
(44:27):
Our current scientific paradigm, largely rooted in materialism, tends to
assume that consciousness must arise from a sufficiently complex physical
system like our brains. From this perspective, achieving AI consciousness
is just a matter of building complex enough hardware and software.
(44:49):
But if doctor Parney is research and the many many
verifiable near death experience accounts point to consciousness potentially being
non lefe local, which means something that can exist separate
from our physical brains, then perhaps our understanding of what
is required for consciousness is incomplete. If consciousness isn't solely
(45:14):
a product of our biology, does that open up new
possibilities for AI or does that mean that consciousness is
something unique and distinct, something that cannot simply be replicated
through silicone and code, regardless of complexity. Doctor Parney's work,
explored in books like Lucid Dying, pushes the boundaries of
(45:36):
our scientific understanding. It suggests that the light of consciousness
may not simply switch off when the brain dies, and
if that's the case for human consciousness, it raises profound
questions about the nature of consciousness in general, including any
consciousness that might emerge from artificial systems. Yes, my friend
(46:00):
challenges us to consider what if consciousness is a fundamental
force or element in the universe rather than a byproduct
of matter, And if so, how does that change our
pursuit of understanding ourselves and the potential for consciousness in
the AI we are building. It's a lot to think about.
(46:21):
I know a place where science and philosophy meet in
the most intriguing way before we go our separate ways today,
there's another field that you can experiment yourself of consciousness
not being confined to your brain. That is called remote viewing.
Simply put, it's the ability to gather information about a
(46:44):
distant or unseen target, a place, an object, or an
event using your mind. Back on episode one twenty one,
I explained it fully and gave you some experiments to
do which show that this is a learnable skill. Even
governments have used it, suggesting that our awareness is not
(47:04):
limited by space or physical barriers. Here's some notable examples.
The Stargate project. This was a highly classified US government
program that investigated psychic phenomena, including remote viewing, for intelligence
gathering purposes. While controversial, some of the documented trials within
the program are cited as actual evidence of remote viewing abilities.
(47:29):
Joe mcmonagle, a chief warrant officer in the US Army
and one of the primary remote viewers in this project,
provided accurate information on various targets, including descriptions of foreign
military facilities and the location of a downed Soviet bomber.
One often cited instance involves his remote viewing of a
(47:52):
Soviet submarine. There's Ingo Swan, he famously reported seeing a
ring around Jupiter before the Voyager space craft confirmed its existence.
There's Pat Price, who provided accurate descriptions of various locations,
including details about a research facility and the contents of
(48:12):
a filing cabinet within it. In one instance, he remote
viewed a park which no longer existed and drew water
tanks that were later verified to have existed at that
exact location. So we can remote view the past, the present,
and the future. Although remote viewing doesn't give you evidence
(48:33):
of the afterlife, it gives you evidence that there's more
to you than meets the eye. Back on episode one one,
I talk fully about remote viewing and give you some
experiments to do. Also, in my book We Don't Die,
a skeptics discovery of Life after Death, I've got nearly
a whole chapter on remote viewing so that you can
(48:54):
get a taste of it. Don't forget you can have
a free copy of my book. Just go We Don't
Die Die, scroll to the bottom of the page and
to your name and email address. There's all kinds of
free goodies I have there for you. But if you
do want to experiment, get a magazine filled with pictures
that you haven't opened yet. Quiet your mind, say a
(49:15):
little loving prayer, or have that thought or intention to
remote view what is in the magazine, get a piece
of paper and just write down any thoughts or images
that come to mind. Now our minds pick up details
about things they might not be able to figure out
the whole picture. There might be a picture of an
(49:36):
old stage coach with a wagonwheel remote viewing. You might
write down or draw a picture of the spokes of
the wagonwheel. It's a great thing to explore and experiment with.
As we near the end of our episode today, I
hope it's given you a little bit of insight into
the world of AI. And we can all have our judgments.
(49:58):
I think too much of a good thing is not
a good thing, but if we use it wisely, it
can certainly make a difference in our lives. And also
remember those stories of our consciousness leaving our body, those
out of body or near death experiences. Again, come visit
me at We Don'tdie dot com. Come to one of
our free Sunday gatherings with medium demonstrations included. Get to
(50:21):
see how close our loved ones really are. Remember, your
life here is important and you need to play it
full out and get your money's worth out of it.
But at some point we will be reunited with our
loved ones and see the bigger picture. I'm Sandra Champlain.
Thank you so much for listening to Shades of the Afterlife.
I'm the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal Podcast Network.
Speaker 1 (50:50):
Thanks for listening to the iHeartRadio and Coast to Ghost
Day and Paranormal Podcast Network. Make sure and check out
all our shows on the iHeartRadio app or by going
to eye heart radio dot com.
Speaker 2 (51:06):
Mm hmm
And you're here. Thanks for choosing the iHeartRadio and Coast
to Ghost Day and Paranormal Podcast Network. Your quest for
podcasts of the paranormal, supernatural, and the unexplained ends here.
They invite you to enjoy all our shows we have
on this network, and right now, let's start with Chase
of the Afterlife with Sandra Champlain.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Welcome to our podcast. Please be aware the thoughts and
opinions expressed by the host are their thoughts and opinions
only and do not reflect those of iHeartMedia, iHeartRadio, Coast
to Coast AM employees of Premiere Networks, or their sponsors
and associates. We would like to encourage you to do
(00:42):
your own research and discover the subject matter for yourself.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
I'm Sandra Champlain. For over twenty five years, I've been
on a journey to prove the existence of life after death.
On each episode, we'll discuss the reasons we now know
that our loved ones have survived physical debt and so
will we Welcome to Shades of the Afterlife on our
(01:11):
time together. Today, we're going to delve into something that
might be controversial to you. From AI assistance to eternal questions,
exploring consciousness, connection and the digital beyond. Now, some people
get very agitated when AI or artificial intelligence comes up.
(01:31):
In fact, on our last Sunday gathering, it was my
dad's fifteenth anniversary of him passing into spirit. And you
may know from our last episode that I'm slowly compiling
a book that contains the best stories of the afterlife,
afterlife communication and so on and so forth. So for
(01:53):
the very first time, I have been using a program
on Google. It's called Gemini, and I have been uploading
the transcripts from our Shades of the Afterlife episodes just
to find some common ground. What are the subjects like
near death experiences, deathbed visitations, etc. And so forth. And
(02:15):
for fun, I asked this AI to provide me a quote.
I just said, it's been fifteen years since my dad died,
and I asked for an inspirational quote. And this is
what Google Gemini said. Even the deepest grief can become
a fertile ground for profound purpose. What feels like an
(02:36):
ending can be the unexpected beginning of a journey that
touches countless lives, that really touched me and gave me goosebumps.
And I thought Wow, that's artificially created. However, at this
point Google Gemini had read a whole bunch of transcripts
from this podcast, and it looked to see what's happening
(03:00):
in the present, I guess and created that quote. The
truth is, had my dad not died exactly the way
he did when he did, I would have not ever
gone on this quest to learn about grief, to gain
as much evidence as I can about the afterlife. I
would have never created my first podcast, We Don't Die.
(03:24):
I would have never been asked by the wonderful Tom,
producer of cost to cost Am, to be the host
for Shades of the Afterlife, which now there's been millions
of downloads. So out of my worst time came my
best time. And I'm so happy that I can make
a difference. And I receive emails from listeners all the
(03:45):
time saying different episodes made a difference, et cetera. And
so this quote really touched my nerves. I'll read it again.
Even the deepest grief can become fertile ground for profound purpose.
What feels like an ending can be the unexpected beginning
of a journey that touches countless lives. So there I
(04:06):
was on my Sunday Gathering inspirational service and I mentioned
that quote. Well in the chat box came some very
angry comments. People disgusted that I used AI, and I
became defensive, and then I started wondering why all is
controversy and can we tie it into the afterlife? So
(04:31):
on our episode today, I want to talk about this controversy.
I want to talk about what's happening in the digital
afterlife realm. Let's talk about some TV shows and movies
as well, and let's talk about consciousness not being in
our bodies. So there'll be plenty of stories. If you're
(04:52):
not interested in artificial intelligence, I have many stories for you,
letting you know that we are so much bigger than
our minds and our bodies. The first thing I did
is wondered why is there so much controversy over AI.
Some of the big things that came up are the
fear that people have that they're going to lose their jobs,
(05:14):
that AI will be so smart and it will displace
humans in the workplace. Also, there's a bias possibly with
AI algorithms. For instance, depending on which AI app you use,
whoever programmed it could have that foundational base beneath your requests.
(05:35):
I don't talk politics here, but if you were on
one side or the other and you programmed artificial intelligence,
and then you went looking for a question on perhaps
a candidate, it would tell you what it wants you
to know, maybe not the truth. There are also privacy
concerns with the collection of the data being used for
(05:56):
artificial intelligence. Where's it coming from and is it true?
There's also the potential for misinformation and these deep fakes.
I don't know if you've seen it, but they've taken
maybe an actor or actress and they've artificially created them speaking,
and that could get into a whole bunch of trouble.
(06:16):
Now there's a big one, and that's the ethical dilemma
for long term control of AI. The existential risk, meaning
can artificial intelligence become so smart that it's smarter than humans?
Can it have a consciousness? Well, that led me to
(06:37):
the next question is science cannot prove consciousness right now.
They don't know where it comes from, they don't know
what it is. They can only speculate. So in our
two thousand plus years of being humans, nobody can figure
out what makes us us. So if we haven't figured
out consciousness. It's very hard to imagine that artificial intelligence
(07:01):
programmed by humans can figure it out. The more I researched,
the more I believe that this is a question that
has to be considered for the future. But it's nothing
we have to worry about. It might be two hundred
years before this question needs to be addressed. In fact,
(07:22):
thinking of consciousness and why no one can understand it
is when we think of memories, no one knows where
they are stored and how we retain childhood memories as
our bodies change. You may have heard that every seven
years all of our cells replenish, and so if all
of our cells are new again, how can we hold
(07:43):
memories from being a kid? After two hundred plus episodes
of Shades of the Afterlife, it is my belief that
our consciousness is outside of our bodies. And I say
this because there are experiments like remote when someone can
quiet their mind and accurately see something in a different
(08:05):
part of the world using their psychic sense. I want
to tell some stories today about the remote viewing consciousness,
surviving physical death, verritical evidence, those kind of things. Hopefully
I can rest your mind a little bit about artificial
intelligence because like anything, there's the good, the bad, and
(08:26):
the ugly. But it can provide some help, definitely it can.
But most importantly I want to leave you with thought,
who are you? Who are you really? What is consciousness?
How is it that people can float above their body
in a near death experience and look down and accurately
be able to see things or blind people seeing for
(08:50):
the first time and near death experiences. Yes, there's so
much more to you and me than meets the eye.
Here are some compelling stories of our consciousness surviving physical death. First,
Pam Reynolds underwent a unique and risky brain surgery in
nineteen ninety one to remove an aneurysm. The procedure, known
(09:13):
as hypothermic cardiac arrest or standstill, required her body temperature
to be lowered significantly, her heart and breathing stopped, and
her brain activity flattened. Her eyes were taped shut, and
ear plugs with speakers emitting loud clicks were placed in
her ears to monitor brainstem activity. Despite this state of
(09:37):
clinical death and suppressed brain function, Pam Reynolds reported a
vivid and detailed experience. The verifiable aspects of her ND
include feeling like she was pulled out of her body
and floating above the operating room. From this vantage point,
she reported observing the surgical team and the procedure being
(10:00):
performed on her body. She also accurately described specific instruments
used during the surgery, such as the drill that she
said looked like an electric toothbrush and the bone saw
used to open her skull. She also recounted hearing conversations
between the medical staff, including remarks made by the surgeon
(10:22):
and the anesthesiologist, even though the loud clicks in her
ears should have masked any external sounds. Pam specifically mentioned
seeing a device that she hadn't seen before, which she
described as looking like a handle with interchangeable heads, mismatched
perfectly of a new type of surgical tool that was
(10:43):
being used on her in the operation. Her detailed perceptions
occurred during a time when her brain showed no electrical activity,
her heart was stopped, and blood was drained from her head.
After her recovery, her descriptions were confirmed by the medical
staff or present during the operation. That's excellent evidence that
(11:05):
our consciousness survives death. Another reason to believe that our
consciousness is not within our brain is something called terminal lucidity.
These are instances that involve individuals who have advanced dementia,
brain tumors, strokes, or severe mental illness, who, against all
(11:27):
medical expectations, become alive in communication and can even recall
distant memories in their final hours or days of life.
Some of the most commonly cited examples are individuals with
advanced dementia. These patients may not have recognized loved ones
or communicated for years, then they suddenly speak clearly, engage
(11:52):
in meaningful conversations, and recognize their loved ones just before
they pass away. There's patients with severe brain injury or disease.
So many stories of people with strokes or tumors or
infections like meningitis experience this resurgence of brain function despite
the irreversible damage that has been done to their brains.
(12:15):
And often mentioned historical case is Anna Katerina Amar, a
young woman who had severe intellectual disabilities all of her life,
who never spoke, and just prior to her death, she
spoke and she sang, despite never having done this before.
For me, these cases signify that if our consciousness is
(12:38):
stored in our brain, we wouldn't be able to do
these things, but something happens prior to passing that gives
us this burst of clarity that coupled with these verifiable
near death experiences, show me that our consciousness survives physical death.
And we go on. It's time for our break and
(12:58):
when we get back, they'll be more talk of artificial
intelligence and the afterlife. If you're listening to Shades of
the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Cost to Coast am
Paranormal Podcast Network, Welcome back to Shades of the Afterlife.
(13:32):
I'm Sandra Champlain. We're talking about the pros and cons
of AI, artificial intelligence and how it relates to the afterlife.
Now here's a pro for AI. Joseph Coates owes his
life to AI because just over a year ago, he
was told there was only one thing left to decide.
(13:52):
Did he want to die at home or in the hospital.
Coates was only thirty seven years old and was barely
conscious for months. He had been battling a rare blood disorder,
which had left him with numb hands and feet, and
enlarged heart and failing kidneys. He became too sick to
receive a stem cell transplant. Which was the only treatment
(14:13):
that could have put him in remission. He said, I
gave up. I just thought the end was inevitable. But
Coates's girlfriend, Tara wasn't ready to quit, so she sent
an email begging for help to a doctor in Philadelphia
whom the couple had met a year earlier at a
rare disease summit. By the next morning, the doctor had replied,
(14:34):
suggesting an unconventional combination of chemotherapy, immunotherapy, and steroids previously
untested as treatment for Coates's disorder. Within a week, Coates
was responding to treatment. In four months, he was healthy
enough for a stem cell transplant. Today he is in remission.
(14:55):
The life saving drug wasn't thought up by the doctor
or any person. It had been spit out by artificial
intelligence and labs around the world. Scientists are using AI
to search among existing medicines for treatments that work for
rare diseases, so in this case, thumbs up to artificial intelligence.
(15:18):
I was thinking, though, if I was a kid and
doing my homework, Oh, just how easy it would be
for artificial intelligence to do the work for me. Of course,
not so good with kids and the critical thinking development
of their brains. I also found personally that I was
thinking of AI as a new friend. The responses come
(15:42):
back to me so friendly, just an everyday conversation. I
found myself saying good morning Gemini, good evening Gemini, and
talking to it like it's a real person. Thankfully, this
system is designed to regularly tell me it is a
computer model and not a real person. I think people
(16:02):
probably could get addicted to talking to an AI chatbot
or robot because it does listen, gives really good advice,
and it even has a sense of humor. But it
could be unhealthy. But if you're a senior citizen living
alone with no outreach or social network, perhaps this kind
(16:24):
of a friend would be a good thing. We've heard
that doing crossword puzzles decreases our chance for dementia and Alzheimer's.
So I did a little research and AI used in
a proper way, can actually help our memory and our
brain circuitry to live healthier and stronger. We can learn languages,
(16:45):
play chess, be creative, investigate the world. We'll hear more
stories of our consciousness surviving physical death and near death
experiences soon, but at the same time as we explore
things like term and elucidity and near death experience. Technology
is stepping into the space as if trying to engineer
(17:07):
its own version of life after death. I'm not too
sure how I feel about this, to be honest with you.
We are witnessing the rise of what many call the
digital afterlife. Now, what exactly is the digital afterlife? In
this context, it's the concept and the developing technology around
creating artificial intelligence recreations of individuals you and me based
(17:33):
on the vast amount of digital data we leave behind
during our lives. The idea is that using AI, a
version of our personality, our memories, our particular way of
speaking can be recreated, allowing our loved ones to potentially
interact with a digital likeness of us after we pass away.
(17:55):
This sounds like science fiction, but it's not. There are
companies acting working on this. There's a company called Here
After AI that's working on capturing people's life stories through
interviews to recreate interactive AI avatars that family members can
talk to. Another company called story File creates these incredibly
(18:18):
realistic interactive video conversations where you can talk to the
video of your loved one and AI selects the appropriate
pre recorded answer. There's also you Only Virtual, aiming to
create virtual personas for talking and even chatting live time
(18:38):
with AI recreations. Even early projects like Project December explored
using AI to simulate conversations with deceased individuals based on
their online data. There's companies everywhere. In fact, when I
was investigating this episode, I had a synchronistic experience. I
got an email that came out of the blue from
(19:00):
a company called Digital Lifebox, asking if I may be
interested in interviewing someone from their company on Shades of
the Afterlife. I haven't gotten back to them yet. I'm
not too sure how I feel about it now. The
idea of being able to talk to a digital version
of a loved one after they pass away really does
raise some profound questions. What does it mean for our grief?
(19:23):
Is it comforting or does it complicate the healing process?
And what about the authenticity of these interactions? Will you
feel a true connection to the person or will you
feel like you're talking to a simulation or a computer
generated model. So these are questions that we human beings
are grappling with as this technology develops, And this leads
(19:46):
me to thinking about how we are already connected to
our loved ones who are no longer physically with us.
And you know, I don't think we need technology to
feel their presence. There's things we can do. Raymond Moody
talks about the psychomantium. Be looking into a mirror in
a darkened room with just a candle on meditate, talk
(20:09):
to your loved ones. You may feel their presence if
you try automatic writing. Sit quietly, write a letter to them,
and then write back as if they are answering you,
And in time the words you're writing may feel like
they're their words. Also, I find, when I least expect it,
I'll have a thought or a memory of a fun
(20:31):
experience with a loved one that just pops into my
mind out of the blue. That's them. We can also
get the ball rolling. Spend some quiet time, talk to them,
share with them some of the best memories you have,
and before long more ideas and thoughts and memories will
pop into your mind. I truly do believe this is them.
(20:51):
All the mediums I know, and even my own experiences.
We think we have an imagination creating these conversations. Our
loved ones work through that imagination center using our thoughts
and memories, putting them all together, but their messages from them.
We also might want to just sit quietly and ask
(21:13):
our loved ones to walk close, and then closer, and
then even closer. Maybe put their hand on your hand
and just feel that gentle shift and energy. You might
even feel the goosebumps. We can ask our loved ones
to show up in our dreams. I've done an episode
on Lucid dreaming. How to do that. Wake yourself up
(21:33):
in the wee hours with a couple of tools and
go back to sleep and dream of your loved one. Also,
I spoke with a dream expert, doctor Janet Pete Alatto
somewhere this past year. You can find that episode ask
your loved ones to visit you in your dreams. Doctor
Janet talks about the dream gate. Just before you go
(21:53):
to bed at night, or when you're waking up in
the morning, when you're in that day dreamy still kind
of sleepy mode, you can create your own dream meeting
your loved one at a gate or sitting on a
park bench, and then just let your mind wander and
let them take over your dream or co create it
with them. I've done some guided meditations for you. And
(22:15):
again we may feel like this is us and this
is our imagination, but this is how we communicate. Especially
on the other side, we communicate through thoughts, feelings, images, sounds,
so just be open. We can always try technology to
connect with our loved ones, also a little EVP electronic
voice phenomena. The only problem with that it is hours
(22:39):
of dedication and trying and listening when I think there
are some easier ways. And of course you can always
have a session with a medium, but buyer beware, just
because someone has the title medium does not mean they're good. Unfortunately,
mediums are one of those industries where you don't have
(22:59):
to have education or certification to call yourself a medium.
So you want to make sure that you talk to
someone who's had a reading with them that when you
are in a reading with them, all you do is
provide yes, no or I don't know answers. Let them
do the work. Make sure the medium you pick has
that ten minute guarantee. In the first ten minutes, if
(23:20):
you're not getting good information to let you know that
they really are connecting with your loved one, you can
simply ask them to stop. You don't pay or you
rebook for another time, because, of course sometimes we all
have bad days. When you have your reading, you should
feel the presence of your loved one. It shouldn't just
be strict evidence evidence evidence. There should be shared memories,
(23:43):
joyful things. It's okay if the medium says what the
person looked like or how they died, but it should
really be centered on how they lived, and there should
be evidence that there's still part of your life. So
often they say yesterday I saw you doing this. I
was there with you when you were doing that. I
had been on an online demonstration kind of like our
(24:04):
Sunday gathering before we began, and I had spoken to
my dad in the spirit world, and I had gone
out for a walk. I had picked a dandelion, and
you know how you blow on it and make a wish. Well,
I did that. I felt like a little kid lo
and behold. On the next online service, there was evidence
from my dad, and the medium said he was there
(24:27):
yesterday when you went for your walk, and you picked
that dandelion and you made a wish. So these are
elements of a good medium reading. And the last thing,
make sure it's a price you could feel comfortable with.
Just because people charge a lot of money does not
mean that they are the very best. Some of our
best mediums on planet Earth are also the least expensive.
(24:49):
The last two things I'll mention before our break is
induced after death communication therapy. It is a grief therapy
and an intense one. Seventy five percent of the people
experience a connection with their loved ones. Also, you can
ask your loved ones to show you a sign. You
(25:10):
can be specific what kind of sign you'd like to see. Now,
give them time. They may or may not be able
to do it, but put it out in the world
within the next month or so. Just keep an eye
out and see if that sign occurs. We're going to
head off to the break and we'll be back with
some artificial intelligence in TVs and movies and more stories
(25:32):
of our consciousness surviving death. You're listening to Shades of
the Afterlife on the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM
Paranormal Podcast Network. Welcome back to Shades of the Afterlife.
(26:02):
I'm Sandra Champlain. In this segment, we're going to talk
about television, the movies, artificial intelligence, and the afterlife. But
before we go there, one of the biggest reasons people
are anti artificial intelligence is they believe that there's going
to be a consciousness that is so smart that it
(26:22):
takes over us human beings. I just want to remind
everyone science today has not figured out our human consciousness.
So while this may happen in some distant future, until
we get a handle on what our consciousness is, we
don't have to worry about something else creating consciousness. I
want to give you some other verifiable or vertical information
(26:47):
about near death experiences. Have you heard the Denture's case.
In a large study of near death experiences where cardiac
arrest survivors in the Netherlands participate, cardiologist Pim van Lommel
documented a case where a patient who was in a
coma reported an out of body experience during resuscitation. The
(27:11):
patient described seeing a nurse remove his dentures and then
place them in a specific drawer on a crash cart.
Upon recovering, the patient asked for his dentures and the
nurse confirmed placing them exactly where he had described. The
patient could not have known this through normal means, as
(27:32):
he was completely unconscious. There's also the well known shoe
on the ledge a story. This is a widely reported
case which involves a social worker named Maria who had
a cardiac arrest while hospitalized. She reported having an out
of body experience and floating outside the hospital building, where
she saw a single tennis shoe on the third floor
(27:55):
ledge of the hospital. She described its color and details.
Hospital staff later checked the ledge and found the shoe
exactly where she had described, and it looked like exactly
how she described. There are observations in emergency rooms. Many
near death accounts from patients who experience cardiac arrest in
(28:17):
emergency rooms include accurate descriptions of the resuscitation efforts, the
medical personnel, their actions, and even conversations that took place
while the patient was clinically dead. These details are of course,
confirmed by the medical records and the staff. Children even
have NDEs that are verifiable. Some compelling vertical NDEs have
(28:40):
been reported by little children. These accounts can be particularly
striking as children may not have the same preconceived notions
as US adults. Cases where children accurately describe events that
happened but they were unconscious or in a coma, including
seeing dead relatives they had never met, but they later
identify them from photographs. As I'm talking about this, I'm
(29:04):
having these little remembrances. Oh, I remember doctor Melvin morse On.
This episode was all about children's near death experiences and others.
I hope you have subscribed to Shades of the Afterlife
because you can access all two hundred and forty plus episodes,
and there have been so many with near death experiences,
(29:26):
and even just recently, an author named Simon Boun was
talking to him. He just published a book about verifiable
near death experiences. Very cool stuff. Let's change our pace
back to artificial intelligence. And if you're a sci fi fan,
you might want to watch one of these. There's a
(29:47):
show called Upload, which is described as a science fiction
comedy who was created by Greg Daniels, who also created
the US version of The Office and Parks and Recreation,
so you know it. It's funny. It's set in the
near future, meaning twenty thirty three at the beginning of
the series, where technology has advanced to the point where
(30:09):
people can choose to be uploaded into a digital virtual
reality afterlife as opposed to just taking their chances and
dying and not knowing exactly what comes next. And the
story follows a young man who accidentally goes to this
place after having a car accident, and of course there's
(30:30):
a bit of murder mystery to it and lots of
funny stuff, but he gets to go to this extremely
luxurious digital afterlife resort called Lakeview. The TV series Black
Mirror is a little more on the darker side and
deals with technology. There's a couple episodes like San Jinnipero.
(30:51):
It depicts a world where the elderly and the deceased
can live forever. It's essentially a digital heaven where people
can exist eternally in their prime time. There's an episode
called be Right Back, and while not a full digital afterlife,
it features an AI service that creates a synthetic version
of you based on your digital footprint, allowing a grieving
(31:13):
person to interact with you or a simulation of you.
Maybe you've seen Westworld. These sentient robots copy and store
human consciousness. There's Pantheon, a show that deals with uploaded intelligence,
where the consciousness of a deceased character is uploaded to
the cloud, leading to communication and uncovering larger technological conspiracies
(31:37):
around this new form of digital existence. Altered Carbon is
a TV series in this universe. Human consciousness can be
digitized and transferred between bodies or exist in virtual environments.
There's a film called Transcendence. It features a scientist whose
consciousness is uploaded into a quantum computer upon his death,
(31:59):
leading him to becoming a powerful AI with a form
of digital omnipresence. Oh, and there's the movie Her. While
focused on a man's relationship with an AI operating system,
the AI character evolves to a point where she, along
with others, transcends her initial programming and moves to a different,
(32:20):
almost ethereal, digital plane of existence. There's a movie called
AI You Might Remember, Though, centered on an android boy.
It touches on themes of consciousness and artificial beings and
the enduring nature of love and memory, which ties into
ideas of what might persist after death. Of course, the matrix,
(32:41):
while a simulated reality for the living, the core concept
of minds existing within a vast computer program is conceptually
related to digital existence and alternate realities that parallel digital
afterlife ideas. If you're interested in these, there's also documentaryas
like Eternal You or Artificial Immortality, nonfiction films exploring the
(33:07):
real world startups of these technologies creating avatars or digital
ghosts of deceased individuals for the bereaved to interact with.
Like I said, for me, I'm not interested in this,
but it goes right along with our theme today, so
I thought i'd share them with you. Now, I have
a pretty far out question for you. Have you ever
(33:28):
thought that maybe we are the artificial intelligence living a
great illusion called life? Now, just stick with me here
on this one. We humans think of ourselves as very real,
solid but are we We human beings are made up
of trillions of cells, and those cells are made up
by complex molecules like proteins and DNA, and all of
(33:52):
those molecules are made up of atoms. Now here's where
it gets interesting. We picture atoms as these tiny solid balls,
but they're not. An atom is mostly empty space. It
has a tiny nucleus in the center and electrons orbiting
way out in the emptiness around it. And what's in
(34:12):
the nucleus protons and neutrons. We might remember that from school.
And those orbiting particles they're called electrons. They're so small
that if we had a teeny tiny camera, it couldn't
record them. You see, protons, neutrons, and electrons are invisible
even with the best microscope, but modern physics takes it
(34:34):
even further. The current understanding is that these fundamental particles
that make us up, called quarks, they aren't just invisible bits.
They're better described as excitations, as vibrations, as fundamental energy
fields that fill the universe. So think about this at
(34:55):
the deepest level. Science can currently probe the very stuff
that makes you up, that makes me up, that makes
the chair you're sitting on up, can be described as
invisible vibrating energy. So we walk around interacting with the
world feeling incredibly solid and real, but all of those
(35:16):
things that we see as visible are in essence composed
of fluctuating energy fields. Now let's bring artificial intelligence back
into the picture. We talk about AI as if it's
not real in the way we are. It's code, it's data,
it's electrical signals, patterns on a silicone chip. We contrast
(35:38):
our real physical existence with its digital nature. But if
our physical existence, when you get right down to it,
ultimately is described as complex arrangements of invisible vibrating energy,
what does real actually mean? What makes the vibrating energy
patterns that make up a human brain fundamentally more real
(36:02):
than the complex electrical patterns and data structures that constitute
and advanced AI. It really does challenge our sense of reality,
doesn't it. And it forces us to ask is what
we're made of real or is it about consciousness, experience
or something else entirely? And if our material is at
(36:25):
its base energy, where does that leave our definition of
ourselves and this new form of intelligence that we are creating.
I know it's a pretty big topic, but we need
to think out of the box. Why because we humans
buy into the myth that we have to see it
to believe it. Energy cannot be destroyed, as we know,
(36:48):
and when our loved ones pass and we will too,
our energy continues on and we can still be in
communication with that energy. And as we know from good
medium readings and near death experiences, we remain us. We
still have our personalities intact, our sense of humor. Thankfully,
(37:11):
we can pick whatever age we'd like to be in
the afterlife, perfect health, etc. So we're not just balls
of vibrating energy. When we get to the other side,
we continue to be us. Death really is as simple
as closing our eyes to this world and opening them
again to our loved ones, our pets, our friends, and
(37:33):
a whole new reality that looks close to Planet Earth
with so much unconditional love. It's time for our break,
but I'm going to leave you with this thought. As
we explore the artificial mind of AI, it really shines
a new light on the mystery of consciousness. It makes
you think that the awareness we're trying to grasp in
(37:53):
the code and in ourselves could hold answers to reality's
deepest questions, like what happens when we die? We'll be
right back. You're listening to Shades of the Afterlife on
the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast, a paranormal podcast network.
(38:30):
Welcome back to Shades of the Afterlife. I'm Sandra Champlain.
In our last segment, we dug into a really mind
bending question. If at our most fundamental level, we humans
are made up of invisible, vibrating energy fields, what does
that truly mean about our reality? And how does that
stack up against something like artificial intelligence, which we often
(38:54):
dismiss as not real because it's made of code and
electrical sigma. This brings us right back to the topic
that is at the heart of our podcast today, consciousness
what is consciousness? Is it purely an emergent property of
a complex biological machine called the brain, or could it
(39:17):
be something even more fundamental, something that can exist independently
of the physical body and its biological processes. For years,
this has been a philosophical debate, definitely a spiritual belief,
but increasingly it's become a subject of a massive scientific investigation.
(39:37):
And one of the leading figures in this cutting edge
research is medical doctor and critical care physician and resuscitation
expert and New York Times bestselling author, doctor Sam Parnia.
Doctor Parnia and his team have been conducting some of
the largest studies in the world on near death experiences
(39:58):
and consciousness during cardiac arrest. His work is groundbreaking because
he's investigating consciousness precisely at the point where, according to
conventional science, consciousness should cease to exist. We should die
completely when the heart has stopped and blood flowed to
the brain has stopped, and brain activity becomes undetectable. His
(40:23):
research is meticulously scientific. He uses objective markers, monitors brain activity,
and then interviews survivors of cardiac arrest using structured protocols
to see if they had any awareness at all or
memories during the period they were clinically dead. He's the
author of the compelling new book Lucid Dying, Transforming our
(40:46):
fear of death into a new understanding of life. In
Lucid Dying and throughout his career, Doctor Parnia shares the
evidence gathered from these studies, and what they found is remarkable.
A significant percentage of people who survive cardiac arrest report
having a clear lucid experience during their time their brains
(41:09):
were shut down, and these aren't vague dreams or hallucinations.
In many cases, they described classic near death experiences, out
of body sensations, traveling down a tunnel, encountering their deceased
loved ones, reviewing their lives, and experiencing profound peace, light
(41:29):
and love. But the most scientifically intriguing aspect, and the
one that really challenges the idea that consciousness is only
produced by the brain, are the instances of vertical perceptions.
That word we used earlier meaning verifiable. Just like the
(41:49):
Pam Reynolds case we discussed, Doctor Parney is large scale
aware study and other investigations have documented cases where patients
report seeing and hearing things during their cardiac arrest that
were later objectively confirmed by medical staff or the environment.
Imagine someone who is clinically dead flatlined, their brain activity
(42:15):
totally gone. If they report floating above their body and
accurately describing the resuscitation efforts, identifying the medical personnel they
didn't know, or recounting conversations that happened in the room
while they were, by all medical measures unconscious. Doctor Parnia
and his team have collected and analyzed these accounts, looking
(42:39):
for patterns and, most importantly, for verifiable details. This research
is incredibly significant because it provides scientific data points suggesting
that consciousness, or at least some form of awareness and
perceptual ability, can continue when the brain is not functioning.
(42:59):
It's not happening before cardiac arrest, when the brain is active,
or after resuscitation, when the brain is recovering. It's only
happening during that window of clinical death. So what does
that mean? You may ask? If consciousness can exist or
operate when the biological hardware of the brain is offline,
(43:22):
doesn't that fundamentally change our understanding of consciousness itself. It
suggests that consciousness might not just be a simple emergent
property of complex neuronal computation that happens in our brain.
It hints at the possibility that consciousness could be much
(43:42):
more of a fundamental aspect of reality, something that interacts
with the brain but isn't solely produced by it. So
now let's bring this back to our conversation about AI
artificial intelligence working towards creating increasingly sophisticated artificial intelligence systems
(44:06):
that can process information, learn, and even simulate conversation and
creativity in ways that seem remarkably human like. But the
question of whether AI can truly become conscious, not just simulated,
is one of the biggest mysteries I think we'll ever face.
(44:27):
Our current scientific paradigm, largely rooted in materialism, tends to
assume that consciousness must arise from a sufficiently complex physical
system like our brains. From this perspective, achieving AI consciousness
is just a matter of building complex enough hardware and software.
(44:49):
But if doctor Parney is research and the many many
verifiable near death experience accounts point to consciousness potentially being
non lefe local, which means something that can exist separate
from our physical brains, then perhaps our understanding of what
is required for consciousness is incomplete. If consciousness isn't solely
(45:14):
a product of our biology, does that open up new
possibilities for AI or does that mean that consciousness is
something unique and distinct, something that cannot simply be replicated
through silicone and code, regardless of complexity. Doctor Parney's work,
explored in books like Lucid Dying, pushes the boundaries of
(45:36):
our scientific understanding. It suggests that the light of consciousness
may not simply switch off when the brain dies, and
if that's the case for human consciousness, it raises profound
questions about the nature of consciousness in general, including any
consciousness that might emerge from artificial systems. Yes, my friend
(46:00):
challenges us to consider what if consciousness is a fundamental
force or element in the universe rather than a byproduct
of matter, And if so, how does that change our
pursuit of understanding ourselves and the potential for consciousness in
the AI we are building. It's a lot to think about.
(46:21):
I know a place where science and philosophy meet in
the most intriguing way before we go our separate ways today,
there's another field that you can experiment yourself of consciousness
not being confined to your brain. That is called remote viewing.
Simply put, it's the ability to gather information about a
(46:44):
distant or unseen target, a place, an object, or an
event using your mind. Back on episode one twenty one,
I explained it fully and gave you some experiments to
do which show that this is a learnable skill. Even
governments have used it, suggesting that our awareness is not
(47:04):
limited by space or physical barriers. Here's some notable examples.
The Stargate project. This was a highly classified US government
program that investigated psychic phenomena, including remote viewing, for intelligence
gathering purposes. While controversial, some of the documented trials within
the program are cited as actual evidence of remote viewing abilities.
(47:29):
Joe mcmonagle, a chief warrant officer in the US Army
and one of the primary remote viewers in this project,
provided accurate information on various targets, including descriptions of foreign
military facilities and the location of a downed Soviet bomber.
One often cited instance involves his remote viewing of a
(47:52):
Soviet submarine. There's Ingo Swan, he famously reported seeing a
ring around Jupiter before the Voyager space craft confirmed its existence.
There's Pat Price, who provided accurate descriptions of various locations,
including details about a research facility and the contents of
(48:12):
a filing cabinet within it. In one instance, he remote
viewed a park which no longer existed and drew water
tanks that were later verified to have existed at that
exact location. So we can remote view the past, the present,
and the future. Although remote viewing doesn't give you evidence
(48:33):
of the afterlife, it gives you evidence that there's more
to you than meets the eye. Back on episode one one,
I talk fully about remote viewing and give you some
experiments to do. Also, in my book We Don't Die,
a skeptics discovery of Life after Death, I've got nearly
a whole chapter on remote viewing so that you can
(48:54):
get a taste of it. Don't forget you can have
a free copy of my book. Just go We Don't
Die Die, scroll to the bottom of the page and
to your name and email address. There's all kinds of
free goodies I have there for you. But if you
do want to experiment, get a magazine filled with pictures
that you haven't opened yet. Quiet your mind, say a
(49:15):
little loving prayer, or have that thought or intention to
remote view what is in the magazine, get a piece
of paper and just write down any thoughts or images
that come to mind. Now our minds pick up details
about things they might not be able to figure out
the whole picture. There might be a picture of an
(49:36):
old stage coach with a wagonwheel remote viewing. You might
write down or draw a picture of the spokes of
the wagonwheel. It's a great thing to explore and experiment with.
As we near the end of our episode today, I
hope it's given you a little bit of insight into
the world of AI. And we can all have our judgments.
(49:58):
I think too much of a good thing is not
a good thing, but if we use it wisely, it
can certainly make a difference in our lives. And also
remember those stories of our consciousness leaving our body, those
out of body or near death experiences. Again, come visit
me at We Don'tdie dot com. Come to one of
our free Sunday gatherings with medium demonstrations included. Get to
(50:21):
see how close our loved ones really are. Remember, your
life here is important and you need to play it
full out and get your money's worth out of it.
But at some point we will be reunited with our
loved ones and see the bigger picture. I'm Sandra Champlain.
Thank you so much for listening to Shades of the Afterlife.
I'm the iHeartRadio and Coast to Coast AM Paranormal Podcast Network.
Speaker 1 (50:50):
Thanks for listening to the iHeartRadio and Coast to Ghost
Day and Paranormal Podcast Network. Make sure and check out
all our shows on the iHeartRadio app or by going
to eye heart radio dot com.
Speaker 2 (51:06):
Mm hmm
Host
Sandra Champlain
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