Religion and Science
4. Religion and the Life Hereafter
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relevance of dreams, the facts of which have come
to light only after recent scientific research. Even
more interesting are quite other manifestations of
the human spirit, the recent facts and figures of
which give strong indications of the existence of
extra-sensory perception and of the objects of this
perception.
The first institution to conduct research in this field
was established in England in 1882. It still exists
today under the name of “Society for Psychical
Research.” It began its work on a large scale in 1889
by contacting 17,000 people who were asked
whether—when they believed themselves com-
pletely awake—they had ever had a vivid
impression of seeing, or being touched by a living
being (who was not actually there) or inanimate
object which moved apparently of its own volition
or of hearing a voice which, so far as they could
discover, was not due to any external physical
cause. Many other countries followed suit and, by
means of various experiments and demonstrations,
it was shown that even after bodily death, the
human personality survives in some mysterious
form.
