Raymond Moody
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Raymond A. Moody Jr. (born June 30, 1944) is an American
philosopher A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term ''philosopher'' comes from the grc, φιλόσοφος, , translit=philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek th ...
,
psychiatrist A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in psychiatry, the branch of medicine devoted to the diagnosis, prevention, study, and treatment of mental disorders. Psychiatrists are physicians and evaluate patients to determine whether their sy ...
,
physician A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...
and author, most widely known for his books about
afterlife The afterlife (also referred to as life after death) is a purported existence in which the essential part of an individual's identity or their stream of consciousness continues to live after the death of their physical body. The surviving ess ...
and
near-death experience A near-death experience (NDE) is a profound personal experience associated with death or impending death which researchers claim share similar characteristics. When positive, such experiences may encompass a variety of sensations including detac ...
s (NDE), a term that he coined in 1975 in his best-selling book '' Life After Life''. His research purports to explore what happens when a person dies. He has widely published his views on what he terms near-death-experience psychology.


Early life and education

Moody was born in
Porterdale, Georgia Porterdale is a town in Newton County, Georgia, the United States. The population was 1,429 at the 2010 census. History Porterdale was incorporated on March 10, 1917, and was named after Oliver S. Porter, a local mill owner. Geography Porterdale ...
, the son of an
agnostic Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, of the divine or the supernatural is unknown or unknowable. (page 56 in 1967 edition) Another definition provided is the view that "human reason is incapable of providing sufficient ...
surgeon. He earned a BA (1966), an
M.A. A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Tho ...
(1967) and a PhD (1969) in philosophy from the
University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia. Founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson, the university is ranked among the top academic institutions in the United S ...
. He also obtained a PhD in psychology from the
University of West Georgia The University of West Georgia is a public university in Carrollton, Georgia. The university offers a satellite campus in Newnan, Georgia, select classes at its Douglasville Center, and off-campus Museum Studies classes at the Atlanta History Ce ...
, then known as West Georgia College, where he later became a professor in the topic. In 1976, he received an M.D. from the
Medical College of Georgia The Medical College of Georgia (often referred to as MCG) is the flagship medical school of the University System of Georgia, the state's only public medical school, and one of the top 10 largest medical schools in the United States. Established ...
.


Career


Early career

After obtaining his M.D., Moody worked as a
forensic psychiatrist Forensic psychiatry is a subspeciality of psychiatry and is related to criminology. It encompasses the interface between law and psychiatry. According to the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, it is defined as "a subspecialty of psychiat ...
in a maximum-security Georgia state hospital. In 1998, Moody was appointed Chair in Consciousness Studies at the
University of Nevada, Las Vegas The University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) is a public land-grant research university in Paradise, Nevada. The campus is about east of the Las Vegas Strip. It was formerly part of the University of Nevada from 1957 to 1969. It includes the S ...
.


Near-death research

While an undergraduate at the University of Virginia in 1965, Moody encountered psychiatrist, Dr. George Ritchie, who told Moody about an incident in which he believed he had journeyed into the afterlife while dead for nearly nine minutes at the age of 20 (which Ritchie would later recount in his book, ''Return From Tomorrow'', published in 1978). Moody began documenting similar accounts by other people who had experienced clinical death and discovered that many of these experienced shared common features, such as the feeling of being out of one’s body, the sensation of traveling through a tunnel, encountering dead relatives, and encountering a bright light. In 1975, Moody published many of these experiences in his book, ''Life After Life'', in which he coined the term "near-death experience." In an interview with Jeffrey Mishlove, Moody shared his personal conclusions about his research into near-death experiences:


Later research

Inspired by the Greek
psychomanteum In parapsychology and spiritualism, a psychomanteum is a small, enclosed area set up with a comfortable chair, dim lighting, and a mirror angled so as not to reflect anything but darkness intended to communicate with spirits of the dead. History T ...
s where the ancient Greeks would go to consult the apparitions of the dead (which Moody had read about in classic Greek texts that he encountered while a student at the University of Virginia), Moody built a psychomanteum in Alabama, which he calls the Dr.
John Dee John Dee (13 July 1527 – 1608 or 1609) was an English mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, teacher, occultist, and alchemist. He was the court astronomer for, and advisor to, Elizabeth I, and spent much of his time on alchemy, divinatio ...
Theater of the Mind. By staring into a mirror in a dimly lit room, Moody claims that people are able to summon visions of spiritual apparitions ''(see mirror gazing)''. Moody has also researched
past life regression Past life regression is a method that uses hypnosis to recover what practitioners believe are memories of past lives or incarnations. The practice is widely considered discredited and unscientific by medical practitioners, and experts generally re ...
and believes that he personally has had nine
past lives Reincarnation, also known as rebirth or transmigration, is the philosophical or religious concept that the non-physical essence of a living being begins a new life in a different physical form or body after biological death. Resurrection is ...
.


Criticism of Moody's near-death research

Barry Beyerstein Barry L Beyerstein (May 19, 1947 – June 25, 2007) was a scientific skeptic and professor of psychology at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia. Beyerstein's research explored brain mechanisms of perception and consciousness, th ...
, a professor of psychology, has written that Moody's alleged evidence for an
afterlife The afterlife (also referred to as life after death) is a purported existence in which the essential part of an individual's identity or their stream of consciousness continues to live after the death of their physical body. The surviving ess ...
is flawed, both logically and empirically. The psychologist
James Alcock James E. Alcock (born 24 December 1942) is a Canadian educator. He has been a Professor of Psychology at York University (Canada) since 1973. Alcock is a noted critic of parapsychology and is a Fellow and Member of the Executive Council for the C ...
has noted that Moody "...appears to ignore a great deal of the scientific literature dealing with hallucinatory experiences in general, just as he quickly glosses over the very real limitations of his research method." Moody has been described as a "strong personal believer" in the
paranormal Paranormal events are purported phenomena described in popular culture, folk, and other non-scientific bodies of knowledge, whose existence within these contexts is described as being beyond the scope of normal scientific understanding. Nota ...
. His methods have drawn criticism from the scientific community as many of the personal reports he collected on NDEs were given by the patients themselves, months and even years after the event.
Terence Hines Terence Hines (born 22 March 1951) is a professor of psychology at Pace University, New York, and adjunct professor of neurology at the New York Medical College; he is also a science writer. Hines has a BA from Duke University, and an MA and P ...
commented "such reports are hardly sufficient to argue for the reality of an afterlife." The philosopher
Paul Kurtz Paul Kurtz (December 21, 1925 – October 20, 2012) was an American scientific skeptic and Secular humanism, secular humanist. He has been called "the father of secular humanism". He was Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University at Buff ...
has written that Moody's evidence for the NDE is based on personal interviews and anecdotal accounts and there has been no statistical analysis of his data. There also is the question of interpreting such data as has been published assuming that the factual matter is objectively correct; according to Kurtz, "there is no reliable evidence that people who report such experiences have died and returned, or that consciousness exists separate from the brain or body." The philosopher
Robert Todd Carroll Robert Todd Carroll (May 18, 1945 – August 25, 2016) was an American author, philosopher and academic, best known for The Skeptic's Dictionary. He described himself as a naturalist, an atheist, a materialist, a metaphysical libertarian, and ...
has written that a characteristic of Moody's work is the omission of cases that do not fit his hypothesis, confirming the aspect of
cherry picking Cherry picking, suppressing evidence, or the fallacy of incomplete evidence is the act of pointing to individual cases or data that seem to confirm a particular position while ignoring a significant portion of related and similar cases or data th ...
. Carroll writes that what Moody describes as a typical NDE may be due to brain states triggered by
cardiac arrest Cardiac arrest is when the heart suddenly and unexpectedly stops beating. It is a medical emergency that, without immediate medical intervention, will result in sudden cardiac death within minutes. Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and possib ...
and
anesthesia Anesthesia is a state of controlled, temporary loss of sensation or awareness that is induced for medical or veterinary purposes. It may include some or all of analgesia (relief from or prevention of pain), paralysis (muscle relaxation), ...
. Moody believes NDEs are evidence for an afterlife but Carroll states they can be explained by
neurochemistry Neurochemistry is the study of chemicals, including neurotransmitters and other molecules such as psychopharmaceuticals and neuropeptides, that control and influence the physiology of the nervous system. This particular field within neuroscience ...
and are the result of a "dying, demented or drugged brain."


Personal life

Moody claims to have had a near-death experience in 1991 when he attempted suicide (which he talks about in this book ''Paranormal'') which he says was the result of an undiagnosed thyroid condition which affected his mental state. In an interview in 1993, Moody stated he was placed in a mental hospital by his family for his work with mirror gazing.Sharon Barbell, , ''14850 Magazine'', November 1993. Archived on 2011-07-07.


Bibliography

* Raymond Moody, '' Life After Life: the investigation of a phenomenon – survival of bodily death'', San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 2001. . * Raymond Moody, ''Reflections on Life After Life'', Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 1977. . * Raymond Moody and Paul Perry, ''The Light Beyond'', New York, NY: Bantam Books, 1988. . * Raymond Moody and Paul Perry, ''Life Before Life: Regression into Past Lives'', Pan Books, 1991 . * Raymond Moody and Paul Perry, ''Glimpses of Eternity: Sharing a loved one's passage from this life to the next'', New York, NY: Guideposts, 2010. . * Raymond Moody and Paul Perry, ''Paranormal: My Life in Pursuit of the Afterlife'', New York, NY: HarperOne, 2013. . * Raymond Moody and Paul Perry, ''Reunions: visionary encounters with departed loved ones'', New York, NY: Villard Books, 1993. . * Raymond Moody and Dianne Arcangel, ''Life After Loss: conquering grief and finding hope'', San Francisco : HarperSanFrancisco, 2001. . * Raymond Moody and Paul Perry, ''Coming Back: a psychiatrist explores past life journeys'', New York, NY: Bantam Books, 1991. . * Raymond Moody, ''Laugh after laugh: the healing power of humor'', Jacksonville, FL: Headwaters Press, 1978. . * Raymond Moody, ''The Last Laugh: a new philosophy of near-death experiences, apparitions, and the paranormal'', Charlottesville, VA: Hampton Roads Pub., 1999. . * Raymond Moody, ''Elvis After Life: Unusual psychic experiences surrounding the death of a superstar'', New York, NY: Mass Market Paperback, Bantam Books, July 1, 1989. . * Raymond D. Moody, ''Making Sense of Nonsense: The Logical Bridge Between Science & Spirituality'', Woodbury, Minnesota - Llewellyn 2020 Paperback * Raymond Moody, ''God Is Bigger Than the Bible, we are God's stories'', Independently published, March 2021


References


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Moody, Raymond 1944 births Living people American psychologists American spiritual writers New Age writers Parapsychologists University of Nevada, Las Vegas faculty University of Virginia alumni Near-death experience researchers People from Newton County, Georgia