Full Description
The untold story of an iconoclastic scientist: a psychiatrist who dedicated his career to documenting consciousness after death.
While Ian Stevenson (1918-2007) was an academic psychiatrist with a serious demeanor, right down to his three-piece suits and wingtip shoes, he made his name researching an unusual topic for a behavioral scientist: the afterlife. For over four decades, Stevenson traveled the globe investigating cases of reincarnation, apparitions, possessions, and near-death experiences. At the time of his death, Stevenson was widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in parapsychology, a field devoted to psychic phenomena and paranormal experiences.
Set against the colorful backdrop of parapsychology's rise and fall, from Victorian séances to modern media spectacles, The Incredible Afterlives of Dr. Stevenson captures Stevenson's relentless quest for evidence of consciousness beyond the grave. Jesse Bering, himself a psychologist, interweaves Stevenson's research with vivid stories of the larger-than-life characters who shaped his path—from Eileen Garrett, the fearless medium, to Chester Carlson, the inventor of Xerox photocopying and Stevenson's unlikely patron. Through never-before-seen letters and candid interviews with Stevenson's surviving family members, readers glimpse the inner turmoil of a scientist struggling to balance his revolutionary ideas with the skepticism of his academic peers as well as those closest to him. Along the way, Bering, a researcher whose own trailblazing work on the psychology of afterlife beliefs had led him to believe it was all just an illusion, is forced to rethink his own worldview. Are psychic phenomena examples of our living brains giving credence to the absurd? Or tantalizing glimmers of life after death?
Equal parts scientific detective story and intimate biography, The Incredible Afterlives of Dr. Stevenson shines a light on a significant figure whose life and work have not yet been fully explored. Bering boldly confronts readers with the complicated legacy of a man who many see as a Galileo-like rebel with groundbreaking ideas, ones that still have the power to upend everything we know about what it means to be human.
Contents
Preface
Part 1. Deep Thoughts
1. An Earnest and Deadly Serious Man
2. Talking It Out
3. Roots and Trips
4. Virginia Creepers
5. A Level-Headed Absurdity
Part 2. Watershed
6. "Uncomfortable Facts"
7. Enter Eileen
8. A Good Friend in Washington
9. Ian Finds Himself in India
10. The Benefactor
Part 3. Double Lives
11. Life Leaves Scars
12. Pressure Points
13. Every Body Needs Some Body
14. What Dreams May Come
15. Math Problems
16. "Quite Proper Fields for Investigation"
Part 4. From Beyond
17. Keeping Spirits Alive
18. Bad German
19. She Told Him So
20. Voices Carry
21. Dead Minds
Part 5. Riding a Tiger
22. Parting Gifts
23. Life Goes On
24. Margaret
25. Sum of His Parts
Epilogue: Ian and the Psychophore
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index
