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Subject: Time and Immortality (part 6)
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Date: Thu, 3-Nov-83 18:31:57 EST
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Posted: Thu Nov  3 18:31:57 1983
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		   (c) Copyright 1983 by Henry Friedman
	(Copying for personal use by users of net is authorized.)

			   The Perpetual Moment

       This chapter will more fully explore an important aspect	 of
       our  immortality,  i.e.,	 the permanence	in spacetime of	our
       present lives.  The remaining chapters in this  series  will
       then  complete the overall concept by developing	a thesis of
       continued existence in the future, based	upon psychic  iden-
       tification through time.	 The goal of this series is to show
       that, even though science may lead us to	reject	the  tradi-
       tional  (religious)  idea  of a separate	duality	of mind	and
       body, we	need not conclude that death means personal annihi-
       lation.

       The intent is, in effect, to *redefine* the traditional idea
       of  "the	 soul"	for  the  21st	century	(or, at	least, that
       aspect of the word "soul" that means a vehicle of our immor-
       tality).	  Another way of looking at such a conclusion would
       be to say that the idea of a "soul" would be  invalid  in  a
       literal	sense,	but valid when used as a figurative, short-
       hand construction for the newly emerging	concept.

       Enough  information  about  the	nature	of  time  has  been
       presented  to  this  point  to  serve  as a foundation for a
       fuller understanding.  You will recall the  main	 conclusion
       of  the	previous  chapter:  the	ever-moving instant of time
       that we call "now" is only  special  because  our  conscious
       awareness  makes	 it  so; that apart from that awareness, no
       instant,	whether	past or	future,	would be any more  signifi-
       cant as to its time than	any other instant.

       Also introduced was the idea of a "virtual wave"	 of  aware-
       ness  that  flows  through  time.   All	of  us who view	one
       another as being	"of the	same time," who	 view  the  present
       and  past  from	the same frame of reference with respect to
       time, are, as it	were, carried along on the same	crest of  a
       single  wave  of	consciousness flowing through time.  And it
       was stressed that nothing mystical was intended in the usage
       of  the	word  "consciousness."	 For the neurophysiological
       brain  states  that  underlie  our  consciousness  are  also
       arrayed in spacetime -- every bit as much a part	of physical
       reality as are the various stages of change of any  physical
       object (such as trees and planets).  But	our awareness is as
       if it rippled across the	static movie film of time, bringing
       to life the movie of flowing time.

       With the	above perspective on time as background, let us	now
       explore	the  profound implications these ideas have for	the
       question	of "survival after death."

       The everyday reality of flowing time makes it seem that	the
       wave  of	 consciousness	of "our	time" is the *only* wave of
       consciousness there is.	Mass media, books, and history pro-
       fessors	reinforce that commonsense impression whenever they
       speak of	"historical events." We	believe	that what  we  view
       as the past is the *absolute past* of the universe, and what
       we view as the future is	the *absolute future*,	experienced
       by  none.  It seems incredible that there could be people in
       the future -- as	far ahead as we	care to	 project  (assuming
       we  haven't  yet	 annihilated  our-selves  and  the universe
       hasn't yet annihilated it-self) -- who are  experiencing	 as
       their  "now"  what  to us has not yet happened, and who view
       our present as the dead past.

       Yet, if this were not true, and there  were  only  a  single
       wave of consciousness passing through time, then	the picture
       of time that has	been painted here would	be false.  In  that
       case, there *would* be something	unique about the particular
       moving point of time that we call "now":	 for  none  of	the
       other  arbitrary	 "nows"	in the past or future would contain
       any consciousness.  And all the	remainder  of  spacetime --
	other than our "now" --	would be like the lifeless portions
       of a movie film that are	either ahead of	or behind the aper-
       ture  of	the projector.	The entire movie of spacetime would
       then be like a very long	film that is shown *only once*.

		   (Chapter to be continued in Part 7.)