The 14th Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists, accepted the offer of Russian experts to conduct an experiment designed to confirm or refute the theory of reincarnation - that the human soul is immortal and indefinitely reborn.
This was told by the domestic neurobiologist Konstantin Anokhin, who met with the Dalai Lama last summer in India. Russian scientists, psychologists and philosophers, as well as prominent Buddhist clerics will participate in the research.
One of the fundamental Buddhist theses says that consciousness comes to a person from past lives. However, official science does not agree with this - it claims that personality consciousness appears during the development of the fetal brain. If the researcher succeeds in documenting the case of the transfer of consciousness from a previous life, then this will undoubtedly be the greatest sensation. History knows many cases when people remembered their past lives, but science, nevertheless, did not recognize such revelations, since they did not rely on experimental data. Now Russian scientists have a real chance to officially register reincarnation in the course of a rigorous scientific experiment. Or experimentally disprove it.
It should be noted that His Holiness has always treated people of science with great respect. He himself is interested in astronomy, quantum physics, cognitive neuroscience and many other disciplines. The 14th Dalai Lama even publicly declared that if science succeeds in proving the falsity of Buddhist claims, then Buddhists will be obliged to renounce their faith. As you might guess, such evidence has not yet been obtained.
Will Russian scientists be able to convince a Buddhist spiritual leader that he is wrong? Or, on the contrary, will they once and for all confirm the main postulate of the popular religious and philosophical doctrine? But it is even more interesting to observe academic science, how will it behave if reincarnation is proven?..
Daniil Myslinsky