In any field of intellectual inquiry that involves research, the merits of theories must stand the test of time in at least 2 ways:
(1) The claims of researchers must be independently replicated by researchers outside the vested interest groups who made the original claims.
(2) The theories must continually prove their heuristic value as new light is continually shed on the key questions and verifiable knowledge continually expands.

In both respects, astral research has failed miserably.  (a) The expected unmistakable levels of verification have not been produced.  The impressive details provided by Spiricom (e.g the .social security number of the deceased engineer) have been called into question by doubts about the integrity of the data.  Nor has Spiricom ben replicated by neutral researchers.  Deceased engineer, Ed Carter, has not fulfilled his promise to help Bruce develop an afterlife communication device.  To date, no such device has been produced and we are left with the vagaries of EVPs.

In Charles Tart's OBE research, Miss Z's astral reading of a 5-digit number posted near the ceiling, while she was strapped down have not been replicated by Miss Z or any other OBE subject.  This is significant because the possibility of Miss Z cheating was demonstrated.  Astral visits to the Hall of Knowledge in Focus 27 should have produced astounding breakthroughs in knowledge, but have instead only produced reinforcement of dubious standard New Age beliefs.  Claims of access to the Akashic records have similarly not been backed up with the expected verifications. 

Indeed, the simplest imaginable expected verifications  cannot be reproduced: e. g. Astral explorer A visits discarnate soul S and asks for a piece of highly specific information about the afterlife.  Then Astral explorer B agrees to visit S and inquire about the detail communicated to A.  And so on.  The fact that such a rudimentary advancement in astral knowledge cannot be achieved warrants skepticism on the part of the honest inquirer.  Apparently, what starts with the imagination almost never transcends the imagination and achieves contacts with invisible worlds shared by discarnate beings. 

Emanuel Swedenborg is the shining exception to this appalling lack of quality verifications, but he lived in the 18th century and his insights need to be replicated by modern adepts.  As long as clashing belief systems muddy the waters of astral research, the jury must remain out on the question of genuine contact with the deceased.  NDEs can be more impressive, but are generally too brief to expand our field of astral knowledge.  No one would be more delighted than I if these problems could be remedied and afterlife research could at least be a fruitful discipline of ever expanding knowledge.

Don