The Last Flame: Exploring Consciousness at Death

This book explores several scientific ideas about consciousness. Not just neural correlations, but ideas about the role of the observer in relation to reality, the possible connection between quantum physics and the mind, and the tenuous nature of time - which implies that death, itself, may not exist.

Presented as a barrage of thoughts and memories, it includes several ideas about the nature of consciousness, memory, and reality itself.

I encourage the reader to interpret the entire book as either one flash of thought, or as a rapid sequence of thoughts.

Except for the opening and closing paragraphs, this is a non-fiction book.

I explored these ideas and much more in a lifetime of conversations with my now-deceased brother. These random but deep conversations only intensified when he began treatments for the cancer that eventually killed him. I would often visit him the day after a chemo or radiation treatment, when he felt the worst, to try to distract him from his own reality.

Now that he is no longer with us, I have no one to discuss these strange topics with, so I decided to write down a few of them.

Storytelling is a central aspect of human life. Why not death, too?