"There was once a man who said:

'God must think it exceedingly odd
if He finds that this tree continues to be
when there is no one about in the quad.'

And the reply:

'Dear Sir: Your astonishment is odd.
I am always about in the quad.
And that's why the tree will continue to be
because it's observed by
Yours faithfully,
GOD.' " - Monsignor Ronald Knox

Most people believe that life continues in some fashion after death. Some people have merely a vague sense of what to expect, others have a very complex image of what happens. Some believe in Heaven and Hell, others only in Heaven, or the Happy Hunting Grounds, or Nirvana, or Valhalla or some other variation. As complex and detailed as these images may be, and as convoluted as the system of rules may be that supposedly enables one to get to experience them, they are still simply beliefs – not empirical truth, however vehemently the beliefs are expressed.

Our ideas about life after death are many and varied, and although some claim to be able to pierce the veil and see beyond, communicating with those who have died and those who have never lived, the information they provide is often conflicting and incomplete.

Why is this? Our other five senses are highly developed, enabling us to detect light waves, sound waves, changes in air density, temperature, and so on. Yet our ability to see what lies beyond the physical world confounds us, frustrates us and eludes us. Yet enough of the ‘beyond’ seeps through to our consciousness that we continue to believe in its existence, and despite differences in how that belief is expressed, there are commonalities that suggest an absolute truth – not just our own perceptions – lies waiting to be revealed to us. Two of these commonalities are:

a)       Some kind of Supreme Being that watches us (or watches over us, depending on your point of view)

b)       Levels, or Planes of Existence.

Many theological models have a concept of multiple planes of existence, frequently with man at the bottom and a Supreme Being at the top.

The Qabbalah, for example, holds that whereas the Sephiroth (Sphere of Being, for the sake of simplicity) Kether is the Oneness of all things, Malkuth (the tenth Sephiroth) represents the Physical Universe with all its diversity of experience. In between lie different levels of consciousness.

Another example is the Correllian belief system which posits seven planes of existence. These are, from lowest to highest:  Physical->Emotional->Mental->Astral->The Soul->The Monad->Oneness.

Note that the higher the plane, the less diversity of individuality exists. In Oneness (like Kether) all is one; God and Goddess are joined. There is no positive and no negative. In the Monad there are two opposing parts: Light and Dark, Form and Force, God and Goddess, Positive and Negative, Male and Female. At the level of Souls, we find individual souls that may share many physical existences and so on. In the Qabbalah, this is the realm of the Microcosm, of Tiphareth and the Sephira from Chesed to Yesod, within which entities that have dominion might exist. Here we would find the Archangels Raphael, Gabriel, Michael, Uriel. We would find the God of War in Geburah, The Goddess of Love in Netzach. The Native Americans would place their Animal Spirits here.

The Lowest level, the Physical plane of Malkuth, represents the greatest diversity of perception, for it is here that you will find humanity, animals, plants and all the life of the Universe.

It is believed by many that one can perceive the planes below one’s current level far easily than one can perceive the planes above. This makes logical sense, since on the Physical plane, our ability to see multiple points of view is very limited, except in the abstract sense. If a person were actually to view things from multiple points of view at once, staring out of the eyes of several people at the same time, their brain would probably go into shock!

So we view things from an individual point of view, because that is what we are designed to do. In the planes above however, the process of seeing things from several perspectives becomes easier. A soul that occupies several bodies at once can do so because it does not have to worry about the details (eating, drinking, driving, talking, dreaming etc) of living those individual lives.

It follows, interestingly enough, that any entities in the realm above us would have similar problems perceiving the plane above their own, although their likely belief in, or understanding of the concept would be greater since they would have the evidence of two planes (ours and theirs) rather than just their own.

Another important point to bear in mind is that as we progress up through the levels of existence, the concept of the first person (whether it is singular or plural) remains intact. So you remain ‘You’ after you die – there may just be more of ‘You’.

Ok, so this makes for some interesting brain candy perhaps, but how much of it has any basis in reality? Science it seems, may hold some answers to these religious questions, if we’re brave enough to explore.

In 1927, the German physicist Werner Heisenberg proved that it is not possible to determine simultaneously and with accuracy the position and velocity of an electron. Before a measurement is taken only an approximate calculation of the electron's position and momentum can be made. He showed that if an experimenter attempts to measure the position of an electron, the act of measurement change its velocity and therefore its momentum. On the other hand, if the experimenter attempts to measure its velocity, the measurement will change its position. Light waves produced in the process of measurement by the measuring instrument affect the electron. This fundamental reality, called the principle of indeterminacy or Uncertainty Principle, implies that the properties of particles do not manifest themselves until they are observed.

In the 1950s, theoretical physicist Hugh Everett III was able to solve a particular problem in quantum physics when the existence of other worlds was introduced into the equations. Basically the ‘Other Worlds’ theory suggests that whenever an event has the possibility of different outcomes, all of those outcomes are played out in real time in alternate Universes. Twenty years later, Bryce S. De Witt and John A. Wheeler, showed that there must be other observers in the Universe who bring about the properties of matter at larger scales.

Their model reveals that nothing in the Universe could exist without intelligent observers; order is brought about by the way the observations are coordinated by all observers.

In other words, things in the Universe appear different from one another because we are here to differentiate between them. But since some of us are color blind, and others have poor eyesight, and none of us can really see beyond the next hill, cheeseburger or paycheck, what stops the Universe collapsing into a chaotic mess of perceptual disagreements?

Well, this same model also reveals that there must be some kind of coordination of observations, and that this must include all the observations made at any time everywhere in the Universe.

The inference is an Ultimate Observer, who has immediate and simultaneous awareness of every point of perception and is able to bring all those points of awareness into one single cohesive reality. Mathematically speaking, the last observation of this Ultimate Observer determines which probability occurs, which points of view are valid and what actually happens.

Quantum Physics, therefore, appears to be saying that there is some entity out there that sees everything, knows everything and does everything, and at some level decides what reality should look like. Sound familiar?

As in the poem, this Ultimate Observer allows all things to continue to exist, by ensuring that when a tree falls in a forest it does make a sound, when a distant star explodes we see the light hundreds or thousands of years after the event. The concept of the Ultimate Observer means that the various laws of Physics are obeyed and that Universal Constants remain constant.

So, why can’t we see beyond our current existence? Because we can only perceive what our brain can allow us to perceive. Personal faith allows us to fill in the gaps that our current level of understanding does not provide, although Quantum physics and our studies of the Universe are closing those gaps for us at what seems to be a rapidly increasing rate. The current trajectory of those revelations suggests that there will come a time when we can truly understanding who the Ultimate Observer is, but if you’ve stayed with me this far you’ve probably already figured out that, as you climb back up the ladder of existence from being one human, to the Spirit of many, through the aspects of an emotion or action to the simple energy of positive and negative, in the end the Ultimate Observer – is You.

Catweasel is Priest of the Correllian Tradition and a Ceremonial Magician in the Golden Dawn. You may contact him at catweasel@pagannews.com.