Welcome to Unexplained Extra with me, Richard McLean Smith.

For the weeks in between episodes, we look at the stories that for one reason or other

didn't make it into the show.

In last week's episode, come talk to me.

We looked at the work of Friedrich Jürgensen, who in 1958, while trying to record bird

song in his garden, inadvertently recorded a mysterious human voice.

Though Jürgensen assumed this to be a simple radio transmission, similar voices later

caught on tape, led him ultimately to believe he had found a way to receive communications

from the dead.

As explored in season 3's episode 8 extra, some consider Jürgensen's recordings to be

early examples of instrumental transcommunication, the apparent capturing of the voices of the

dead on electronic devices.

For me, Jürgensen's story is particularly fascinating because unlike many others who

have carried out similar paranormal endeavours, Jürgensen had not set out to prove anything

in particular, nor was he trying to validate any religious belief.

It is also, of course, teasingly compelling, since like many people, I would like nothing

more than to see irrefutable proof of a life after death.

Humans have long speculated on the concept of an afterlife, whether we believe in it through

a genuine religious conviction, or whether we consider it merely an invention to dilute

the fear of death, or as a means to shape morality.

However, it is only fairly recently that we have attempted to study the possibility of

it scientifically.

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