Why are we told that a blue jay is not “really” blue, that the colour is no more than the way its feathers refract light, there is no blue pigment? One might as well say that a rainbow is not “really” multi-coloured because it contains no pigment, is no more than the refraction of light.

Similarly, we need not believe there is no life after death just because the body disintegrates into its constituent molecules like a building collapsing into dust. Maybe life is no more dependent upon the body than colour is dependent upon pigment. Perhaps life is a kind of refraction of a fundamental quality of the universe, as colour is a way that we see light?

Written after seeing a dead blue jay beside the road, 29.10.23