For modern day humanity, it can feel as though the search for eternal life is an everlasting
quest.
There have now been hundreds of sometimes high-cost attempts in a bid to make it so
that this life isn’t all there is.
Experiments and trials aiming to take us to immortality, or to unlock evidence that there
really is an afterlife waiting for us beyond this mortal realm.
Now, though, via one relatively simple idea, do we finally have what we’ve been looking
for?
This is Unveiled, and today we’re taking a closer look at the quantum theory that seemingly
proves you never die.
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What if you knew that you were never going to die?
Of all the what if scenarios out there, it’s one of the most popular.
And it’s never quite as easy as it first appears.
Yes, never dying means you can do pretty much anything you want forever and ever.
But, also, if you never die then really what’s the point in living?
We’ve focussed more on the moral dilemmas in past videos, so be sure to check them out
after this… but today, it’s all about making immortality actually happen.
Over the last decade or so, interest in quantum physics has sky-rocketed.
Scientists have unlocked the world of the very small, and with it have ushered in a
new age for things like energy, computing and medicine.
More than all of that, however, our growing quantum knowledge has fundamentally reshaped
what we think life is.
The theory of Biocentrism, proposed by the US scientist Robert Lanza, principally argues
that rather than the universe creating life…
it's actually life that creates the universe.
What we, in ourselves, call consciousness, was actually there at the beginning of everything…
and it’s just that now, almost fourteen billion years later, consciousness channels
itself through us, human beings.
As such, we’ve come to view life (the universe and everything) through our bodies, processed
by our brains… but really, to some degree, none of that is necessary.
In this model, then, our brains and bodies might be viewed more like sophisticated modems,
catching and translating signals, and converting those into our own life experiences.
But, if the brain and body dies - if the modem is destroyed - then the signals don’t just
disappear, as well.
They remain, and might well be rerouted or recycled into some other host.
In a biocentric reality, life is the signal.
And while we may think that it’s so reliant on our bodies for continuation, it actually
carries on regardless.
It’s life as we don’t know it, but it’s life all the same - so the theory goes.
Lanza’s ideas have divided opinion since they were first put forward in the late 2000s.
For some, biocentrism offers a bridge between philosophical concepts on life and death…
and the physicality of it all.
For others, the theory is still far too vague, with little to no evidence as to what consciousness
really is.
In subsequent discussions and interviews, Lanza has highlighted the famed double-slit
experiment to back biocentrism up.
Via the experiment, scientists can show that light and matter can be either wave or particle,
depending upon whether they are observed.
Consciousness creates the universe, not the other way around.
Supporters also draw on the fine tuning problem for further reasons as to why biocentrism
makes sense.
The fine tuning problem shows that there are so many physical conditions to the universe
that make it just right for life, that it seems impossibly unlikely that we should be
here in a universe that’s so suited to us.
When viewed bio-centrically, though, there is no fine tuning problem… because consciousness
obviously would aim for a reality that works.
According to some, all of this inevitably leads to so-called life after death - to death
being an illusion - because life and consciousness no longer end with our bodies and brains.
Instead, it dissipates out of us as a kind of energy into the rest of the universe (of
its own making) once the vehicle of a body is no more.
Again, biocentrism is sometimes criticized for the vagueness of this aspect.
Although, it’s not as though this is the first attempt to place consciousness (or a
soul) beyond our physical means.
Discussions of that sort go all the way back to René Descartes, at least, in the seventeenth
century and the Age of Enlightenment.
More broadly still, biocentrism suggests that even the underlying principle of time is merely
the product of consciousness inside our current bodies creating a means through which to understand
and remember.
Time - and specifically the arrow of time - is then explained as a tool of our minds,
rather than some kind of higher, immovable quality of the universe.
But finally, Lanza’s biocentrism isn’t the only such idea toward living forever,
either.
The succinctly named quantum immortality model relies on that other underpinning, central
concept of modern theoretical science; the multiverse.
Developed out of Hugh Everett’s Many Worlds Interpretation, the idea is that for every
choice or split that’s ever made… a new branch of reality is formed.
These branches never cross over, but run closely alongside one another, reflecting minor to
major differences as a direct result of whatever caused the split in the first place.
Over the years, science fiction writers have had a lot of fun with the story potential
here, suggesting that huge events could well be determined upon a person’s fleeting decision
to buy an apple or a banana, for example.
But what the multiverse could mean for life after death is something that science fact
has pondered, too.
The basic premise of quantum immortality is that, in a multiverse, there should always
be a split possible through which a person survives.
A re-routing through reality which means that again and again and again… they live rather
than die.
The idea can once more be linked back to key studies like the double-slit experiment, which
apparently suggest that all options are always possible…
until they’re observed and then are not.
Death is still death.
It’s still final, and it’s not as though (even in the multiverse) you could rewind
time to make it not happen.
But, after death, and if you follow the multiverse, it could be that on another level of the model,
in another version of the endless realities, that particular death didn’t happen… and
life still wins out.
The question to combine both biocentrism and quantum immortality is; could consciousness
create not just the universe, but the multiverse, as well?
Can life move between multiverse strands, even if physical bodies cannot?
When we’re gone, will some kind of awareness - a soul, by some definitions - still remain?
And, if that were to be the case, then could we (as we are) ever hope to know or understand
what was happening?
Physically speaking, death is the end of our bodies and our brains.
Our vehicles for life are no more, and so perhaps we could never hope to understand
life in quite the same way again - not unless our consciousness were to end up in another
human being, but that’s a theory for another video!
What’s clear is that, still, nothing is certain.
Biocentrism has divided opinion in recent times, yes, but it cannot truly claim to have
cracked the mystery of life and death, just yet.
The same for quantum immortality, which is much more a thought experiment than a physical
surety.
Again, for modern day humanity, it can feel as though the search for eternal life is an
everlasting quest.
And that’s good and encouraging in some ways… but not so much, in others.
With or without a meaning or explanation for life, we do all at least have a life to lead.
With emotions to feel, roles to fulfill, and experiences to share.
There are some massive and fundamental unknowns still outstanding…
but until that fog eventually lifts, we can all spend our lives looking out for each other,
enjoying the good times, and savoring the things that make us happy.
We might well ponder our quantum condition, but life’s still what we make of it.
And, remember, it could yet be that our consciousness created the universe…
and that’s pretty special, don’t you think?
What do you think?
Is there anything we missed?
Let us know in the comments, check out these other clips from Unveiled, and make sure you
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