Experiments Suggest Life Not One-Time Deal

HUFFINGTON POST– We think we die and rot into the ground, and thus must squeeze everything in before it’s too late. If life — yours, mine — is a just a one-time deal, then we’re as likely to be screwed as pampered. But experiments suggest this view of the world may be wrong.

The results of quantum physics confirm that observations can’t be predicted absolutely. Instead, there’s a range of possible observations each with a different probability. One mainstream explanation, the “many-worlds” interpretation, states that there are an infinite number of universes (the “multiverse”). Everything that can possibly happen occurs in some universe. The old mechanical — “we’re just a bunch of atoms” −- view of life loses its grip in these scenarios.

Biocentrism extends this idea, suggesting that life is a flowering and adventure that transcends our ordinary linear way of thinking. Although our individual bodies are destined to self-destruct, the “me” feeling is just energy operating in the brain. But this energy doesn’t go away at death. One of the surest principles of science is that energy never dies; it can neither be created nor destroyed. When we die, we do so not in the random billiard ball matrix but in the inescapable life matrix. Life has a non-linear dimensionality −- it’s like a perennial flower that returns to bloom in the multiverse.

A series of landmark experiments show that measurements an observer makes can influence events that have already happened in the past. One experiment (Science 315, 966, 2007) confirmed that flipping a switch could retroactively change a result that had happened before the switch was flipped. Regardless of the choice you, the observer, make, it’ll be you who will experience the outcomes −- the universes −- that will result.

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Should We Give Cancer Patients ‘Magic Mushrooms’?

ATLANTIC WIRE– According to a new study, psilocybin, the active ingredient in “magic mushrooms” has a beneficial psychological impact on terminal cancer patients. Researchers in Los Angeles found that the hallucinogen reduced anxiety and depression, giving patients peace in their final days.

The experiment involved 12 subjects with advanced-stage cancer between the ages of 36 and 58. While some are skeptical of the pilot study, others are hailing a new era of psilocybin testing.

  • Here’s How They Did the Study, writes Rosemary Black at The New York Daily News: “The patients had two sessions apiece. In one, they received psilocybin and in the other, they got a placebo. The patients and doctors were able to tell which drug was administered about 80% of the time. For the study, which was reported in the Archives of General Psychiatry, the patients got a fairly low dose of the drug. In addition to feeling less anxious, they reported needing fewer narcotic pain relievers.”

  • A Huge Success, writes Claire McCormack at Time: “The results demonstrated a substantial improvement in symptoms of anxiety and at six months recorded a statistically significant improvement on one depression scale. This outcome indicates that the study may be the first step in restoring the drug’s flawed reputation from the 1960s and 1970s when it was widely abused for non-medical reasons.”

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