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Death can be very difficult to accept. Although it’s inevitable for all of us, no one really wants to think about it, far less dwell on it. So when it does happen, the grief can be overwhelming and some will do almost anything to limit the pain.
For centuries, there have been fortune tellers and spiritual mediums who claim to be able to communicate with the dead. There are also many people who reach out to them to do just that. Some are very intelligent and/or famous, such as Thomas Edison, Mae West, Queen Victoria, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (who created the Sherlock Holmes character), Mary Todd Lincoln, Victoria Woodhull (the first woman to run for president in 1872), and Dan Aykroyd, who not only starred in the movie « Ghostbusters » but came up with the idea for the film and co-wrote the script. Aykroyd had plenty of inspiration. His great-grandfather, Sam Aykroyd, was part of a Spiritualist community in Canada, where he regularly hosted seances in the family’s farmhouse throughout the 1920s and 1930s.
In 2009, Peter Aykroyd (Dan’s father and Sam’s grandson) published a book called « A History of Ghosts, » which documents the general history of Spiritualism as well as the Akykroyd family’s role in the community. Discussing Spiritualism in a May 2020 interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Dan Aykroyd noted, “We believe — and I guess it’s my religion — that you can speak from the other side, and that the consciousness survives.”
I, like Aykroyd, believe that death is not final. My personal belief is that it’s a change of dimension and that communication at times can take place. There have been enough incidents of that type of communication to satisfy me. That knowledge and belief is comforting to me. Grieving a loved one’s physical presence no longer existing is a very real burden for those remaining in this dimension, and anything that can lighten the weight of that grief is probably a good thing, as long as it is kept in perspective.
With the reality of ever-increasing AI exposure in our lives, “Grief Tech” is another emerging sector.
