One Step Forward – One Step Back: The lead article by Professor Steven Pinker in the January 29 issue of TIME Magazine, which claims a readership of 19 million, is devoted to “The Mystery of Consciousness.” Pinker teaches Psychology at Harvard University. In one offensive paragraph of the article he dismisses the possibility that consciousness could be located outside of the brain. He writes, “... When the physiological activity of the brain ceases, as far as anyone can, tell the person’s consciousness goes out of existence. Attempts to contact the souls of the dead (a pursuit of serious scientists a century ago) turned out only cheap magic tricks, and near death experiences are not the eyewitness reports of a soul parting company from the body but symptoms of oxygen starvation in the eyes and brain. In September, a team of Swiss neuroscientists reported that they could turn out-of-body experiences on and off by stimulating the part of the brain in which vision and bodily sensations converge.”

Victor Zammit, author of the book, A Lawyer Presents the Case for an Afterlife, responded by giving the professor a $500,000 challenge. He writes, “I will donate half a million dollars to his department if he can show that what we are doing—communicating with afterlife entities in materialization experiments—is not coming from the afterlife dimension—from existing minds outside the physical brain. Also, he has to rebut the empirical psi evidence validating communicating with inter-dimensional entities.”

New Book on 19^th Century Psychic Researchers: Deborah Blum is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author who has turned her attention to the pioneers of paranormal research and the mediums that they researched. Her new book, Ghost Hunters: William James and the Search for Scientific Proof of Life After Death, is receiving good reviews. Reviewer Michael Tymn said, “If five stars were not the limit, I’d give this book a more perfect 10! … Blum examines the work of the psychical researchers with respect, objectivity and understanding. She apparently spent three years researching the subject. I thought I knew the subject pretty well from over 10 years of study, but I learned a lot from this book. As I consumed the book over mochas at Starbucks, I delighted in my initial false assumptions and continually marveled at the accuracy and detail of the stories as well as at Blum’s prolific writing.

Global Warming Uniting Science and Evangelical Christians: Some leading scientists and evangelical Christian leaders have agreed to put aside their impassioned differences over the origin of life and work together to fight global warming. Representatives met early this year in Georgia and agreed on the need for urgent action. The group was organized by the National Association of Evangelicals, which has led an environmental Christian movement in the United States, and the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School. “We believe that the protection of life on Earth is a profound moral imperative. We agree not only that reckless human activity has imperiled the Earth, especially the unsustainable and short-sighted lifestyles and public policies of our own nation, but also that we share a profound moral obligation to work together to call our nation, and other nations, to the kind of dramatic change urgently required in our day,” the new coalition said in a statement sent to Bush, the leaders of the House and Senate and potential presidential candidates. “Whether God created the Earth in a millisecond or whether it evolved over billions of years, the issue we agree on is that it needs to be cared for today,” said Rich Cizik, vice president of government relations for the National Association of Evangelicals, which represents 45,000 churches.

An Opportunity to Learn: The International Spiritualist Federation is hosting their Fraternal Week Convention, September 8 – 15, in Rochester, New York at the Crown Plaza Hotel. Attendees will be offered 15 hours of development classes in trance, mental mediumship, physical mediumship or spiritual healing. Lectures and Seminars during the week include, Electronic Voice Phenomena, Remote Viewing, Trance Presentation and other topics. Demonstrations in mediumship will take place each evening and there are two session each day to receive spiritual healing. We will be presenting Electronic Voice Phenomena and hope to see you there! For information see www.theisf.com