The Final Choice

<p>Note: This revised edition was first published under the title <em>The Final Choice: Playing the Survival Game.</em></p><p>These are dangerous times and history seems to be accelerating—toward what? It’s starting to look like a big crash. No not a <em>clash</em> of civilizations but civilization itself <em>crashing</em>.</p><p>There are world trends propelling us towards doomsday: the lunacy of nuclear brinkmanship the inexorable march toward climate catastrophe the savage economic inequality that reigns over a suffering Earth—none of these bode well for the future. The more pronounced these trends the greater the need to take stock of our options.</p><p>This book looks at consciousness facing the threat of annihilation. Beyond politics it examines some forgotten forces at our disposal in the quest for transcendence. It attempts to sketch a mythology of transcendence based on the raw materials of human experience ordinary and extraordinary.</p><p>The <em>meaning</em> of death changes from culture to culture and is evolving as we speak. The modern near-death experience <em>transforms </em>the meaning of death into something quite different from the mainline view of death as the extinction of consciousness. </p><p>Near-death phenomena imply new dimensions of meaning—and as well a new dimension of existence. It opens the door into an expanded world of consciousness upending scientific physicalism. The NDE is a discovery as revolutionary in psychology as quantum mechanics was in physics. In both cases we have an enigma a window to alternate realities and metaphysical shock therapy.</p><p><em>The Final Choice</em> goes behind the surface-meaning of death. The search leads to the re-discovery of the ancient philosopher Heraclitus who said that no matter how far you search you will never find the boundaries of Mind.</p><p>Facing the looming collapse of world civilization the question of a possible global near-death experience arises. Major world-trends today force us to reflect on these awesome possibilities.</p><p> </p><p> </p>