Reincarnation: Religion or Mind Trick?

There are lots of theories about what happens after we die, and one of the most interesting theories is the one of reincarnation.

The theory says that once we die, our souls will inhabit other bodies, from different times and places of the world. There are many people who support this theory, probably the most famous one being Dalai Lama. Proving that the theory is real is impossible from a scientific point of view, as it is a known fact that religion and science do not collaborate with too much ease. The only way in which the theory would be proven, would be if one of the persons would claim that he has been a person who disappeared. If he was that person he could provide information about the place where he/she was taken, and so on. Of course, this possibility is absurd, and there are very few people who believe that such a thing would happen. Millions of people believe in reincarnation, but very few of them remember about their past lives. It is said that such a thing can not be achieved, until with rare exceptions. It is said that the task of remembering about your previous life can be achieved through “past life regression”, which is a pretty debatable psychotherapy technique. One of the most famous cases of people remembering about their past lives is the one of Bridey Murphy.

Virginia Tighe, a woman from Colorado, said that in her past life she was Bridey Murphy, a 19^th century woman who lived in Ireland. She was hypnotized by Morey Bernstein, and that is when she made the claim. While she was under hypnosis, she started talking with an Irish accent, and she told stories about the place where she lived in the 1800s. She stated that she was born on December 20, 1789, and that she spent all of her life in Cork, Ireland. She remembered the dates of her marriage, and death as well. The case became famous world wide, as the woman never visited Ireland, and the information she had was impossible to obtain. This happened in 1952, when they did not have internet, and other possibilities of obtaining information in seconds. She wrote a book about her past experience, and the woman from Ireland became famous world wide. However, it was soon discovered that most of the things she said were lies. The investigators traveled to Ireland, and as they suspected, may of the things which Tighe told, were not true. For starters, a Bridey Murphy never existed in Cork during the period mentioned by Tighe. There were no records about her, about her husband, and so on. It was discovered that everything was a lie, a plan created by Tighe and Bernstein, who wanted to get rich fast. Their flaw was the fact that they did not bother to check if the stories told by Tighe coincide with the real events which took place in Ireland. The investigators discovered the fact that when Tighe was a child, she had a neighbor called Bridie Murphy, who was from Ireland. Her neighbor told her numerous stories about her birthplace, describing her, the settings, the customs, and so on.

It is believed that Tighe based her stories on the ones which she got from Bridie. It is believed that this is the reason why she was able to speak with an Irish accent. There were people who believed that Tighe was not involved in the plan, and that she did not intend to cheat the people. They believed that in her mind, she really lived during those times in Ireland. She told herself this story numerous times, until she ended up believing in it. It has been discovered that while we are under hypnosis, we are able to tell stories about places we have never been, and about times during which we did not exist. In most of the cases the psychologists are the ones to blame, as they lead their patients to this path of believing in the things which they tell. This is the same reason why there are so many people who have claimed that they have been abducted by the aliens, or who say that they have seen UFOs on the sky. The scientists say that the idea of reincarnation is not real, and they have the data to prove it. It is said that our souls get to be hosted by various bodies after we die, and that the soul we currently own, belongs to a person who probably died in the future. Well, nowadays there are 6 billion people on this planet, but in the past, around 1800, there were less than 1 billion. In 200 years 5 billion extra souls emerged. Where from? On top of that, there are many people who have stated that they have been the same person in the past. There must be hundreds of people who have stated that they have been Jesus, Hitler, Napoleon, and so on, during their past. Who is telling the truth, and who lies?

There are also many people who claim that they actually are people from the past, but who are trapped in these times, in different bodies. It is very likely that there are many people who are convinced that they are Jesus, or Cleopatra, and so on. It has been discovered that these people who have these beliefs, actually have memory errors. The researchers had a certain number of volunteers, and after they had a hypnotic therapy, they were convinced that they actually had a past life.  It is very interesting that prior to the hypnotic session they did not believe in reincarnation, and they never stated that they lived in the past. It has been discovered that the majority of the people who believe in reincarnation have troubles when it comes to remembering where their memory comes from. For example they remember a certain name, but they can not link it to something. These people are the easiest to trick, have stated various psychologists. Since they can not make the association between their memories and the events, they can be trick into believing whatever the psychologist tells them. Maarten Peters of Maastricht University in The Netherlands, stated that these people often end up believing made up stories, and in certain cases they do not need to be influenced into believing them. The power of suggestion is very strong, and if they tell the same story for tens of hundreds of times, they might end up believing the story.

They can not make the distinction between the things which really happened and the ones which did not happen, and in the end they mix them up. The psychologists have stated that these people who often make up these stories have a very rich imagination. These people are very creative, and in many of the cases their creativity is turned into these various stories which they keep on inventing. It has also been discovered that these people who have trouble making the difference between fact and fiction have higher chances of becoming depressed and of suffering from sleep depravation. Since they are tired in many of the times, they end up inventing even more stories. The psychologists have stated that there is nothing wrong with being creative, but when the person can no longer make this distinction between reality and fiction then there is a problem.