There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.
There is another which states that this has already happened.
- Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
Due to the endless variety of its religious experience and belief, homo sapiens should be defined as the religious animal.
(An aside: Do our closest relatives, other apes, also have religious experiences? Troops of chimpanzees apparently express silent awe when standing before giant waterfalls. So, maybe religious experience is a natural phenomenon throughout the animal kingdom and not unique to us at all. And religious experience is not all that we have in common with other apes: Chimps Are People, Too.)
Here are some sites exploring this most fundamental and motivating aspect of spirituality.
Fortean Times Magazine about strange phenomena - includes many articles and links.
Is Prayer Good For Your Health? Prayer for healing. What, if anything, does it accomplish? Is it actually dangerous?
Kundalini FAQ An introduction to the spiritual force described in yoga literature.
The Lucidity Institute Lots of info about lucid dreaming. See, also, Lucid Dreaming FAQ, an introduction to lucid dreaming.
Near-Death Experiences Links to believers and skeptics.
Out-of-Body Experience Recreated Scientists have found a way to trigger an out-of-body experience in volunteers. Also, The Science of Out-of-Body Experiences "...the studies relate to humankind's most enduring question: what makes us ourselves in the first place? 'I'm not really interested in out-of-body experiences,' says Henrik Ehrsson, one of the study's authors and an assistant professor at the Karolinska Institutet in Sweden. 'I'm really interested in in-body experiences: how the brain keeps and updates a model of the world and the body. To have a perception of your own body is the foundation of self-consciousness.'"
Remote Viewing FAQ, Q&A, Manuals. Also, see the writings of Ingo Swann, who designed the remote viewing methodology.
Rupert Sheldrake Online Controversial scientist offers his vision of a living, developing universe with its own inherent memory - best known for his theory of Morphic Fields and Morphic Resonance.
Teleportation: How Close Are We? "...in principle at least, it is perfectly feasible to teleport humans without violating any of the fundamental laws of physics."
The Varieties of Religious Experience The William James classic in HTML format. Browse it, use it as a reference, or read it in its entirety. You can also download the entire book in either TXT or ZIP format at Project Gutenberg.
Using Tumo An article about how the writer learned the Tibetan meditation technique for generating body heat for surviving in the cold.
Zen Buddhism WWW Virtual Library Central source of information about the elusive satori (enlightenment) experience.
