As regarding the state of the dead, I have found the four separate published, peer-reviewed, controlled, long-term studies, in fouyr separate hospitals, of patients revived from clinical death to be the most compelling evidence.
All four studies showed statistically identical results in the frequency of such experiences (about 20% of people have them), and all four studies reported comparable and identifiably sequenced experiences by each patient.
This is very strong empirical evidence, from the very threshhold of death, of a very large number of patients, which has been tested through four separate comparable tests with statistically the same results. That is very powerful positive scientific evidence for the existence of consciousness after death. For some (about a fifth of the people). For four-fifths of people, there were no memories, whether or not there were experiences.
Ok, I have to stop or I'll get fired.
If we're going to bring up New York,...let's let Hillary bury the dead. ;^(