Andrew Silverman - A Burst of Conscious Light: Near-Death Experiences, the Shroud of Turin, and the Limitless Potential of Humanity

A BURST OF CONSCIOUS LIGHT

In this intriguing book, Andrew Silverman shows that consciousness is fundamental and not merely the product of a brain. Many eminent scientists have been driven to this conclusion by evidence from quantum physics. This is also supported by evidence from near-death experiences (NDEs) in which clear conscious perceptions continue while the brain is not functioning. During NDEs many people experience a very bright light that emanates pure and unconditional love, undivided knowledge, and universal interconnectedness. This groundbreaking book presents cogent scientific evidence that this same light is the fundamental basis for existence itself and that we all contain a spark of this light. A very original book that is based on up-to-date interpretations of modern science. Highly recommended.

PIM VAN LOMMEL, CARDIOLOGIST AND AUTHOR OF CONSCIOUSNESS BEYOND LIFE

The modern scientific view of the world is shifting rapidly due to the converging evidence of a mental universe from quantum physics and neuroscience. Dr. Silvermans brilliant opus represents an important milestone in catalyzing this world awakening, which ultimately will weave science and spirituality together again for the betterment of all humankind!

EBEN ALEXANDER, M.D., NEUROSURGEON AND AUTHOR OF LIVING IN A MINDFUL UNIVERSE, PROOF OF HEAVEN,AND THE MAP OF HEAVEN

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the following people without whom this book would not have been possible:

Danielle for her help in arranging opportunities to discuss the ideas in this book with the public, not least through securing an invitation to be interviewed on Coast to Coast AM.

Danny for his suggestion that I write this book and for being my sounding board and mentor in many ways as well as for creating some excellent illustrations that are included in this book.

My father (David) for his invaluable support and advice.

Nathan for sharing his profound insights, which are not confined to single malt whiskies but also relate to the human condition in general.

Nigel for being the man referred to in chapter 2 who helped me see that the human minds eye must logically be bigger than the physical universe.

Darren for keeping me grounded, Helen for restoring my faith in humanity, and Julian for pointing out that everyone has their own variety of nonsense, which means that sense and truth do not belong exclusively to anyone.

Lauren for inspiring me with her kindness and empathy.

The marvelous team at Inner Traditions for everything.

Barrie Schwortz, an original STuRP member and its official photographer and the founder of shroud.com, kindly gave permission to include his photos of the STuRP teams groundbreaking research.

Dr. Paolo Di Lazzaro, Joe Marino, and Professor Freeman Dyson for their kind help in clarifying some of their original source material which I have cited.

Last but by no means least, I would like to thank my wife, Lily, for her unwavering love and support.

Foreword

Daniel Langsman

T hroughout history, people have described themselves and the world around them by using concepts drawn from their everyday experience. Around the time of the Industrial Revolution, the universe and the human body were believed to be like mechanical clocks. More recently, since the information-technology revolution, many people assume that our minds are merely the product of information being processed by the brain, just like a computer. There is even speculation that our minds could be uploaded to machines so that we might transcend mortality.

Many in the scientific community are now raising concerns about this trend, and research institutes have been set up in the premier seats of learning in the world, including the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, where crucial questions about humanity and its prospects are being discussed by some of the worlds leading intellects. These leading minds, including Professor Stephen Hawking, have suggested that the biggest threat to humanity may not be asteroids, nuclear war, or climate change, but rather the unanticipated effects of technology when combined with artificial intelligence. With evidence centered in reason and empirical science, A Burst of Conscious Light demonstrates how and why the human mind cannot be reduced to data or software. If we fail to consider the warnings such as those from the Oxford and Cambridge teams, then the continued existence of the human race will indeed be in peril.

Scientific research has demonstrated that people have continued to be conscious during cardiac arrestwhen their brain waves were flat and the people were clinically dead. Many scientists and medical doctors are now being forced to the conclusion that our minds may not be the product of our brains and that therefore death may be a comma rather than a full stop. This evidence suggests that the continuation of consciousness beyond death is part of a natural process that has nothing to do with technology. A Burst of Conscious Light suggests how this continuation might work. Dr. Andrew Silverman shows that the clues to this have been around for nearly a hundred years and were glimpsed by the founders of quantum mechanics.

There is also more palpable evidence of such continuation by way of a photographic negative image on a cloth that once wrapped a dead body. The cloth can be traced back to the first century and has in more recent times been known as the Shroud of Turin. The subject was previously obscured by a carbon-dating test carried out in the late 1980s. However, many people seem unaware that a senior scientist from Los Alamos National Laboratory in the United States published a scientific paper demonstrating that the corner of the cloth that was assessed in the carbon dating consisted mostly of much newer material that had been introduced in a sixteenth-century repair. This renders the carbon dating result meaningless.

This book details the nature of the image on the Shroud, citing the peer-reviewed published evidence of scientists based at NASA and Los Alamos. It is evident from the work of forensic pathologists that the cloth once wrapped a recently deceased corpse. Research by scientists at the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy, and Sustainable Economic Development (ENEA) suggests that the image was formed on the cloth by a burst of light that emanated from the body that it wrapped. These scientists have estimated that the formation of the image in this way would have required around thirty-four-thousand-billion watts. This is the equivalent of a nuclear blast between two layers of linen cloth. While religious institutions have made this object a focus of worship, Silverman is at great pains to point out that he instead sees it as a focus for scientific enquiry.

An understanding of light is crucial to an understanding of modern physics. Empirical studies show that light also features prominently in near-death experiences. Scientific research implicates light in the formation of the body image on the Shroud. So far, attempts to understand each of these three fields in isolation have reached dead ends. The role of the consciousness of the observer in quantum mechanics is a minefield for scientists. Again, the nature of consciousness in the presence of a lifeless brain is a conundrum for neuroscientists. The scientific explanation for a momentary burst of light from a corpse to produce the image on the Shroud has remained elusive. Until now.