iamonkara

Hidden in your reply is an assumption that a scientific and reproducible method cannot be applied to spiritual quest. Hypothesis, experimentation and inference are basic steps in a scientific investigation but proving a hypothesis correct/wrong also depends on the instrument used e.g. if one doesn't use microscope one cannot directly show presence of bacterial cells. Similarly to prove that a state of thoughtlessness and beyond exists one cannot use the tools of thoughts, one has to observe by pure attention (without distracting thoughts) the state between 2 successive thoughts as a starting point.

History is full evidence that true scientists have many a times revised their initial assumptions in the quest of truth.

Within your own self. The first layer of "within" can be easily understood. In between 2 successive thoughts is a state of "no thoughts". Can we like a scientist hypothesize that we are more than the thoughts? To prove or disprove it we need to observe/experience this state of thoughtlessness, initially they are just few milliseconds long but with practice will be seconds and minutes in length.

And remember if we are always observing through the filter of our thoughts then we are changing the thing being observed - just like in quantum physics "act of observing affected what is observed".

The deceased is not depressed. But mourners are mostly depressed because of

a) attachment (constant association of our attention to anything) to impermanence of life, b) regrets and guilt.

If the mourner itself was truly liberated while living then they wouldn't be depressed because they would know from experience that death is nothing but a switch to a different dimension for consciousness to operate in. That dimension is far less limiting than this physical dimension. And the way to that dimension (and higher ones) is only through Meditation and natural death, the latter comes as a shock to the unrealized one and then its too late for any preparedness.

It is one of the commonest of mistakes to consider that the limit of our power of perception is also the limit of all there is to perceive.

-- C. W. LEADBEATER, Man Visible and Invisible

That's a pursuit in the wrong direction.....

Hidden underneath the quest for immortality is the eternal quest of freedom from all known and unknown bounds. Unfortunately enough, this quest, when expressed from the confines of the apparatus called "mind" shows up as ego which is limiting, self serving and divisive. To experience the real singularity and immortality one needs an instrument which at its very core is limitless and that my friend is "consciousness". The reason current scientists have not been able to understand the limitless and eternal nature of consciousness is their fundamental assumption which is "matter gives rise to consciousness". Unless this assumption is turned around to "consciousness gives rise to matter" until then this quest for immortality will remain just that, a quest and never a realized goal.

At an individual level, we don't have to wait for the Ray's or Singularity of the world, this quest can be completed by each and everyone of us, by focusing our attention within. Attention is the expression of our consciousness in our physical being, and by focusing it within we can break free from the limitations of our 5 senses and the endless maze of thoughts. It is at point of liberation we will realize that we are all immortal beings who where focused in the limited dimensions created by the illusory mind and are all interconnected by the inherent Singularity of cosmic/unity consciousness.

Meditation or focusing within is the first step towards a successful quest of Singularity and Immortality.