To worship the dead

Can anything be done to the dead, for the dead, with the dead? Apparently the Buddhists think they can. One can buy paper money, paper Mercedes, paper mansions and burn these things and the dead could receive them. I remember the elaborate funerals of rich people while I was going to college in Singapore. The vigil lasts for days and the relatives would be camped with the deceased just as long. There was a huge procession of people coming and going until the actual day of the funeral, then the professional mourners come, the funeral band play, the Buddhist priests started their chants and they burn all kinds of funeral paraphernalia to send off with the dead. It was an expensive and elaborate affair.