Customer Reviews

Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife

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People frequently confuse a breezy style, humor and ability to entertain with being superficial. While Mary Roach's latest book isn't quite as compelling as "Stiff" it's an enjoyable journey one step beyond. When Roach is serious (which pops up between very funny quips)she asks some important questions about the afterlife, our perception of it, ghosts and reincarnation. Perhaps it's the subtitle that disappoints people but having read "Stiff" I knew what to expect. If you come to this book ignoring the subtitle (this skeptical humorist tackles the afterlife and science although more about that later with a sense of humor but doesn't quantify the afterlife with science herself).

Roach asks some penetrating questions with humor. For example, she discusses an author that discusses reincarnation, birthmarks and how a pregnant woman can see the corpse of someone. The soul of the slain man turns up in her child. Also, she discusses a pretty creative idea--emotional imprinting from an event that can leave birthmarks on the skin of the unborn creating a duplicate of a birthmark from the person whose soul has flown into the unborn child. She goes on a journey to investigate a family that claims their child has memories from a previous life and while going as an unbiased observer using humor and logic to deflate some of these unusual claims.

Yet she's always hopeful. She relates the story of a computer that is used for near death experiences. She discusses Professor Bruce Greyson's experiment in near death experiences using a computer with images that can only be seen if you were hovering below the ceiling. Patients that have had defibrillators put in have their hearts stopped to see if their defibrillators are working (they should restart the patient's heart). Many people claim to have seen the attempt to revive them floating above their body. If that's the case they should be able to see the computer screen and tell Greyson what images are on it. She also takes a look at cases involving ghosts and other related areas.

Roach focuses on the scientific approaches taken by various people to try and verify the afterlife's existence. This isn't a "science vs. faith" argument. Instead, this is an attempt to see if the scientific approach works or not in these various experiments. Roach asks some practical and hard questions about these various experiments, theories and researchers. The subject is more elusive here than in "Stiff" for obvious reasons. This isn't a book about faith. Roach is trying to find some solid basis for faith in the afterlife and that is going to continue to be challenging.

Roach discusses in her afterword that she starts all of her books in complete ignorence of the subject. Does that provide her with a sense of the impartial attitude that journalists need to write material like this? I'm not sure but it does allow errors, holes and mistakes to occur. It also means that she really doesn't have a whole lot to prove. Regardless of whether "Spook" is as balanced and informed as it should be Roach asks some provocative questions and tries to find answers. You may not be enlightened but you will be entertained and the questions that Roach asks are always interesting. While the answers don't always hold up to scrutiny Roach's journey to discovery is always entertaining.

I can see where Ms. Roach probably found herself a bit cornered while exploring the subject of life after death. First, she doesn't want to turn this book into a sprawling tome that explores the meaning of human existence. She also doesn't want to go down the long road of exploring every spiritual quest ever taken on by humanity. Then there are considerations regarding strongly held religious feelings; you don't want to step on the wrong toes. So, I think Ms. Roach took the right approach to the book in exploring a few areas of possible interest, looking at them as objectively as possible and seeing if anything raises an eyebrow.

So, the shortcomings of "Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife" may not be so much the fault of the author. If you've ever watched a Bigfoot documentary, you know that you're going to be disappointed if you expect some hunter to emerge from the woods with an eight foot tall ape-man on a leash. Also, you know that the blurry footage is a guy in a gorilla suit, no matter how much you'd like to believe otherwise. These documentaries always jazz up the footage with a little editing and some scary music. That's because simply showing how unrealistic it is to believe in Bigfoot after all this time doesn't make for entertaining viewing. They're taking advantage of us because we want to be taken advantage of, just a little.

Mary Roach respects us more than that and gives us what she can. Unfortunately, it doesn't make for very entertaining reading. The one thing that was really missing for me was that feeling of "Aha!". I understood that Ms. Roach couldn't take on everything regarding the subject but I wished it had been a little wider in scope. I would've liked a little more philosophical exploration and perhaps a bit of sociological and psychological examination regarding our views on death. I'm not suggesting Roach should have done an Elizabeth Kubler Ross examination on the process of dying or re-written "Being and Nothingness", but something to chew on in those areas wouldn't have been bad.

I think there might have been a little more to touch on regarding the subject other than debunking soul weighers and psychic mediums. For instance, the culturally independent archetypes that we all share, or the discoveries in physics, mathematics, biology and philosophy that entice us to believe that there may be a God or at least a design. Then again, this book isn't called "Science tackles God", its called "Science tackles the Afterlife", but the discussion of one seems to so inevitably tie into the other, which once again leads to the complications I mentioned above.

I can't let the author completely off the hook, though. "Spook" pales in comparison to Carl Sagan's "The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark", a book that deals with similar subject matter, and more, in a more thought provoking manner. I also have a new rule regarding review snippets claiming a book to be "Hillarious!"; they are never "Hillarious!". I think "Hillarious!" is book-critic speak for "the author makes occasional off-the-cuff comments." Then again, Roach didn't need to re-write "The Demon Haunted World" and I don't get the impression that she would claim herself to be "hillarious!" Perhaps my greatest criticism of Roach's approach is that she sacrifices some of the exploration previously mentioned for long, detailed accountings of her research. I think she could have convinced the reader that she thoroughly explored the subject without giving us so much detail. She may have mistaken our enthusiasm for her own when it came to the minutiae of her subject. The few inset diagrams and photos never seem to get to the heart of what we want drawn out. Maybe she could have even stepped on a toe or two. Also, I don't know that science tackles the afterlife so much in "Spook" as does a healthy skepiticism. This is another trap; you really can't "prove" a negative.

"Tackling the afterlife" may look like a wellspring to a writer looking for a subject, but it turns into a blind alley. I can't say that its entirely the author's fault, and I wouldn't dismiss other work from Mary Roach, but "Spook" never really finds its footing. I don't think that anyone expects to find the truth of our human destiny in this book, but they won't find much else, either. Inviting as this book may seem, both skeptics and those looking for something more than life has to offer will be disappointed.

If you're tuned in to her boisterous, quirky sense of humor, you'll find Mary Roach's book will take you on a sprightly voyage around the earthly borders of the afterlife. Don't expect any serious examination of whether there is or can be any real evidence of something beyond those borders, and you'll enjoy the excursion.

Building on the success of _Stiff_, her well-received survey on the world of corpses, our author advanced to the obvious next stage. She set out to write a book about secular investigations into the hereafter, beginning from a state of utter ignorance and friendly skepticism. She lets us look over her shoulder as she pokes around rather randomly into reincarnation research in India, the vaginal and gastric origins of ectoplasm, the accuracy of industrial scales used to weigh the soul, near death experiences, tape recordings of the long-dead in Donner Pass, and testimony from a ghost once allowed into evidence by a North Carolina court. She has a great deal of fun, much of it gossipy, some of it delightedly gross. The list of eminent men and women who have tried to cage and measure spirits is long. (I had no idea that Alexander Graham Bell's Mr. Watson was a devotee of spirit voices plucked from the ether.)

Ms Roach is game for pretty much anything, enrolling for example in a school for mediums. Skepticism wins almost every round, though never too decisively, which might spoil the party. The most interesting research is into possible correlations between hauntings and (1) infrasound or (2) EMF, each of which can induce a sense of uncanniness in a certain percentage of the population.

In sum, you will learn nothing substantial from the book, but it's not intended to resolve any serious questions. It's an entertaining, anecdote packed ramble through some of the fringe science community's haunted attics, under the aegis of a tour guide whose chatty, brassy style will turn off some tourists and enchant many others.

For me, this book was okay. The source of my disatisfaction is what caused one reviewer here to give the book 5 stars. The writing was beautiful, but never said much. I almost wonder if Roach was afraid to go any deeper than a superficial analysis, like she was holding back or holding out.

The information introduced is googleable and, in that sense, the book really doesn't add to the topic. It's a basic primer, that leaves you wanting more.

I also would have liked pictures. At one point, I fanned through the book hoping there would be pictures to go with the prose. There weren't and I really feel this book would've benefited from some visual aids.

The book is okay. The writing is beautiful, Roach has a gift for prose, but in this case, not for the subject.

Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife. Mary Roach

Spook provides a light-hearted look at the current status of research into the existence and survivability of the soul. Mary Roach calls it "a book for people who would like very much to believe in a soul and in an afterlife for it to hang around in, but who have trouble accepting these things on faith." At the end of the book, she admits that she began this project "from a state of near absolute ignorance." This is one of the book's most endearing features, since the reader gets a glimpse of how Ms. Roach goes about researching a topic.

The book does not end up with a definitive answer. If science had proof for or against the afterlife, it would have been big news. So this is an exploration of the current state of the research. The author claims that she does not approach the topic as a debunking skeptic, but she does throw in a lot of humorous asides in an attempt to amuse as well as explore.

Chapter One, "You Again," is about reincarnation. Ms. Roach goes to India for a week to visit Kirti S. Rawat, director of the International Center for Survival. Her purpose is to accompany him as he examines a claimed case of reincarnation. She meets the child, his family, and the family of the deceased man that the child claims to be. She also runs into cultural differences in a society where many people believe in reincarnation and don't need scientific proof.

The second chapter is a historic discussion on past research by people who believed there was a soul. Questions such as whether the soul came from the sperm or the ovum, or whether it entered the fetus at some point in its development are reviewed. Also looked at are those who searched for the exact bodily organ that contained soul.

"How to Weigh a Soul" is the third chapter. It explores the research done to see if the soul has weight. If so, can a drop in weight at death be proof of the existence of the soul leaving? The famous experiment by Duncan Macdougall that determined the soul weighs 21 grams is reviewed as well as other more recent attempts. The fourth chapter goes on to look at the attempts to photograph or capture an image of the soul as it leaves the body.

The next couple of chapters delve into the claims of mediums who say they can establish communication with departed spirits. Chapter 5 is a history of the attempts by mediums to produce ectoplasm, a physical manifestation of spirit energy. Chapter 6 then goes on to look at current research with gifted mediums at the VERITAS Research Program of the University of Arizona conducted by Gary Schwartz. This is followed by the author taking a Fundamentals of Mediumship course at Arthur Findlay College in England.

Chapter 8 "Can You Hear Me Now?" looks into attempts to use technology to establish communication with dead souls. EVP (Electronic Voice Phenomena) on tape recorders and radio static is the current trend, but Ms. Roach also looks into the history of this field.

Chapter 9 begins a section where Ms. Roach looks to see if physical phenomena, rather than spirits, may cause the feelings of contact with the beyond. First she visits Dr. Michael Persinger at the Consciousness Research Lab at Laurentian University in Sudbury Ontario. He is studying the ability of complex electromagnetic fields to produce hallucinations that might resemble contact with the dead. Chapter 10 looks into whether low frequency sound waves (10 - 20 hertz) could do the same thing. Ms. Roach visits Vic Tandy who teaches at Coventry University whose research is in this area.

Chapter 11 is my personal favorite. It deals with a 1925 North Carolina ghost who appeared to his son to tell him where to find the most recent version of his will. The case went to court and the new will was accepted by the family. Both the old and new wills were on file in the courthouse, and Ms. Roach brings in the president of the American Society of Questioned Document Examiners. Although the family decided to accept the new will, it turns out to be a poor quality forgery. Yet the story of family intrigue is so interesting that the chapter left me wanting someone to write more about this case.

The last chapter looks into what Mary Roach feels is the most promising of the current research to prove the existence of the soul. Based on the reports of people who have had Near Death Experiences (NDEs) who claim they felt themselves rising out of their bodies and looking down on the room they are in, this research places an object that can only be seen from the ceiling in rooms where people might possibly experience an NDE. Interviews are then conducted to see if they experienced an NDE and saw the object. This research is being conducted by Bruce Greyson at the University of Virginia.

The books ends with a 13 page bibliography that goes chapter by chapter through the resources Mary Roach used for the book. Some may criticize her for attempting to write such a book without being an expert in the field. I find that her newness to the topic gives her a fresh unbiased perspective. However, I feel that she attempts to cover her inexperience with humor that sometimes detracts from the work. If you can endure the jokes, the information provided is well presented.

Having told us all about what happens to people's bodies after death in the funny and informative book -Stiff_, Mary Roach has gone beyond, to tell us what happens to their souls. Well, not exactly; there are lots of opinions on the matter, not necessarily religious ones, and she investigates the more-or-less scientific explanations in _Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife_ (W. W. Norton). And just because she has a fine sense of the absurd, she is quite at home writing about, and even visiting, the nutters who do not like our ignorance of the regions beyond death and have made it their mission to clear everything up. That they do not quite succeed is not at all surprising. There may be little scientific evidence of the actual existence of souls, and anyway, as supernatural entities they would not be fit subjects for scientific investigation. Humans have spent thousands of years wondering about what happens after death, and most religions have something to say upon the subject, but when we got to the scientific age it was time to start asking about the issue scientifically. A lot of silliness has ensued, much of it has amused Roach, and she has unflaggingly communicated her amusement to us in wisecracking prose that is just the right tone for such a subject.

Perhaps the most famous scientific investigation of the soul was the one that discovered it weighed 21 grams, an amount that has even been turned into a movie title. Actually, Dr. Duncan Macdougall, a surgeon, reported the soul to weigh three-fourths of an ounce, but as Roach says, "Who's going to go see a movie called _Point Seven Five Ounces_?" In 1901, Macdougall weighed a patient at expiration and found the expected weight drop; it did not seem to bother him that he was confusing the issues about souls by making them material substances. Such research is not dead; Roach interviews Gerry Nahum, a medical school professor, who wants to weigh and do other thermodynamic research on souls, but is having trouble getting funding, even from the Catholic Church. Spiritualism is here, of course, and Roach even goes to a weekend school for spiritualists in England. She gets advice on readings that sounds like the basics for making a television career as a medium: "Stick with the everyday. Try to be general because there's a better likelihood you'll be right." And she finds herself looking at her partner's clothes and accessories for clues. She comes away, though, with the realization that mediums are not intentionally duping their clients, but have duped themselves into thinking they are channeling information from paranormal sources, and they profit from eager and uncritical subjects. Overall, she is disappointed with what the dead are able to tell us. They ought to be bursting to tell us all about the afterlife that has been the subject of our curiosity ever since we understood what death was. Roach wants to know: "Hey, where are you now? What do you do all day? What's it feel like being dead? Can you see me? Even when I'm on the toilet? Would you cut that out?" We don't get good answers, and we don't good advice on stock tips. One spook informed us that the afterlife was just like Florida without the humidity, and that fat people are thin there.

Roach goes to India to investigate those who are researching the return of spirits to new bodies, in a chapter delightfully titled "You Again: A Visit to the Reincarnation Nation." Beware if you are a rogue Brahman, as the pertinent scriptures say you may reincarnate as "the ghost Ulkamukha, an eater of vomit." She comes across people who feel that spirits are communicating with them by means of anomalies in their computers' spell-checkers, and find that explanation "less far-fetched than a software glitch." She goes to the Donner Camp Picnic Ground (which is a real place) with researchers who think that electronic gadgets might pick up the voices of the cannibalized dead. There are indeed sounds recorded on the outing, but their significance is uncertain: the enthusiast with her heard, "I need more milk," while she herself heard "a rapid, metallic `gobba-lobba-ob.'" She is a generous interviewer, wide-eyed but not credulous. In fact, she applies a sensible skepticism to all her research, but comes to the conclusion that such a stance isn't much fun; when she jokes, "The debunkers are probably right, but they're no fun to visit a graveyard with," she is merely confirming that science is going to have little to say in affirmation of the issue, but we will keep wondering. It's a fine end to a book that has a huge amount of arcane knowledge and good humor in it. Where else, after all, are you going to find out that Elizabeth Taylor reported a near-death experience, but was pushed out of the spirit world and back to Earth by her husband Mike Todd who had gone before her. Roach adds, "Whether this was done for her benefit or his is not clear."

A potentially interesting book is ruined by Ms. Roaches condescension towards her subject, all in the name of getting laughs. Granted, I am as skeptical as she, but that doesn't mean that I am not capable of viewing a particular 19th century scientist's views in historical context - and allowing for how comparably little information he had at his disposal - before relegating him to a list of "nutters". It just happens one too many times in her book to be able to stomach; she's like an adult making fun of a first-grader for getting a math problem wrong. By being so quick with her put-downs, she quickly undermines her own premise that she is going into her investigation with an open mind. It doesn't help that the bulk of her research seems to have been acquired from Google searches ("If you go to such-and-such website..." or "A Google search shows that..." seems to pop up on every other page). If anyone can find this same stuff out with the click of a mouse, why do we need Ms. Roach's wisecracking attitude to navigate us through it?

My husband and I heard the interview with Mary Roach on NPR independently of each other. It was the first time either one of us felt compelled to buy a book immediately. We were going by a book store that night so popped in and purchased it (after much searching with staff help). Spook was not disappointing! Roach's witty but irreverent style of writing is most entertaining. She tackles, from a very unscientific position, science's search for the soul, ghosts, spiritual mediums, reincarnation, out-of-body experiences and the like. I laughed the whole time I was reading it and not until the last line do we find out if she is a believer or skeptic. I am going to recommend this to my book club even. I've already recommended it to a number of friends.

After finishing Spook, I went out and bought her book, Stiff. I enjoyed learning about what happens to cadavers but I don't think my book club would be as keen on it. It maybe a touch gory for some.

I certainly look forward to Roach's next book. My hope is that she writes about consciousness next!

Whatever the topic or format, Ms. Roach brings to her work a wonderfully wry sense of irony. This book is no exception; it will keep you laughing and leave you wondering how we humans survive our own bizarre preoccupations and ambitions. Ms. Roach also has a unique gift of compassion and empathy, seasoned with rigorous skepticism, and is apparently completely without pretense. She gets quickly to the heart of any matter without ever losing heart or rubbing the noses of fools in their own folly.

This book is similar in format to her first book, Stiff; it is comprised of a series of chapters in which Ms. Roach looks over someone's shoulder as that person goes about business. In Stiff, we learned of the many ways cadavers are used; in Spook, we learn of attempts to validate the existence and nature of the soul, or some entity that endures beyond a single body's mortal life. While the subjects in Stiff were mostly to be admired for pursuing valuable science no matter how revolting, the subjects in this book are often far afield anything most readers would call science or, in some cases, reality. To appreciate the work of the denizens of Spook, one must value the subjects for their hearts and aspirations instead of appreciating their scientific contributions.

In Stiff, each chapter brought us to a new and different question of scientific process and ethics. In every new setting, a remarkable wealth of collateral information, fascinating asides, and thoughtful consideration illuminated the purpose and value of some individual's unique and arcane pursuit. Spook is similarly packed with information, all of it delightful and surprising. Due to the nature of the topic, the author's research took her to a far broader set of disciplines than just science and ethics. This is truly a work of cultural history and psychology as well as a study of how people use and abuse scientific methods.

Whether your background and affinities lean towards or away from science, this book will entertain and inform you. It is a delightful consideration of, and example of, the human capacity to explore, connect, hope, dream and laugh.

Primed with the same avid, irreverent curiosity that took her to operating rooms, crash tests and anatomy labs in her first book, "Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers," Roach now explores what, if anything, happens to the spirits of the departed.

From elaborate scales for measuring the weight of dying consumptives' departing souls to computerized validation of near-death experiences, scientists have devised experiments to detect evidence of the afterlife. The result is, if possible, even funnier than "Stiff," although not as satisfyingly informative. Given the nature of the quest, how could it be?

Roach talks to the families of reincarnated laborers in India, attends medium school in England, helps out with a group effort to commune with the cannibalistic Donner party in California, and subjects her head to low frequency sound waves in an attempt to view a ghost for herself.

Along the way, she comes to realize that conviction is mostly a matter of interpretation. After attending the school for budding psychics she reflects that she was wrong in her view of all mediums as charlatans. "I believe that they believe, honestly and with conviction, that they are getting information from paranormal sources. It's just a different interpretation of facts. Mediums and the people who believe in them tend to, as the song goes, accentuate the positive. I tend to do the opposite. Maybe they're right. Maybe I am."

As she accompanies Dr. Rawat, a retired Indian philosophy professor, on an interview for his study of reincarnation, he explains that the child in question, Aishwary, is typical. At about three he began talking about people from a previous life. Most of the investigated cases are children who begin referring to their past life between 2 and 4 and forget it all by age 5. Aishwary's family believes him to be the reincarnation of a factory worker who lived several villages away and was accidentally electrocuted. Sudden, violent death is another typical factor in remembered lives.

The interviews with the boy and his enthusiastic family and the enthusiastic family of the "previous personality" are inconclusive. Everyone's too enthusiastic. The best subjects, the researchers agree, would come from a culture with no belief in reincarnation. But in those cultures, of course, the child's ramblings would be dismissed as imaginary.

Roach moves on to soul weighing, which has a long, if not illustrious history. Its current practitioner is an obstetrics professor at Duke University who is also a quantum physicist and thinks of "the consciousness" as information content, which has an accepted energy equivalent. Says Roach: "Earlier in our talk he prefaced the line `Quite a few people look at microtubules as what can be considered almost like an abacus for molecular calculation at a subcellular level' with the phrase `As I'm sure you're aware.' "

Roach's ability to capture the personalities of her subjects ranks up there with her own insatiable curiosity and sharp-witted humor. And while she delivers numerous facts uncovered in her research - did you know, for instance, that tooth fillings really can pick up radio waves - there isn't room for some of the irresistible tangential stuff, so the narrative is thickly sprinkled with footnotes.

Such as this one, picked up in her research on near-death experiences: "A celebrity website reports that Elizabeth Taylor saw [ex-husband] Mike Todd during her near-death experience. `He pushed me back to my life,' she is quoted as saying. Whether this was done for her benefit or his was not clear."

But before she gets to the near-death experiences - her personal favorite for "a speck of evidence that people leave their bodies when they die" - she explores ghost phenomena and comes up with some rather alarming findings for those who live in old houses and think they have ghosts. Electromagnetic fields. Bad, overworked, substandard old wiring can generate them. The EMFs can lower melatonin levels in the brain and (melatonin being an anti-convulsive) leave inhabitants prone to tiny micro seizures and subtle hallucinations. So those who pride themselves on a certain spooky sensibility may simply be more susceptible to micro seizures.

Roach leaves her project as she began it - skeptical. But, she says, more open to the possibility of something more. Roach is a delightful companion and guide on a journey that takes in charlatans and true believers as well as scientists willing to risk a dash or more of ridicule for the sake of knowledge. Funny, lively and packed with information, Roach's book is as entertaining as it is thought provoking.

--Portsmouth Herald