I’m not sure either since it’s such an abstract concept. My personal definition would be something having a consciousness and an awareness of itself and its surroundings. But would that mean that AIs could have souls if they get advanced enough?
How would the world react to proof of life/no life after death?
- Thread starter Aragorn
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People would be twice as scared of dying because they'd face judgment.
People would be twice as scared of dying because they'd know chaos awaits.
Anyone whose religion is wrong would be twice as scared of dying.
People would be twice as scared of dying because they'd know oblivion awaits.
The soul is whatever special thing about you is not dependent on the physical neurons to exist.
Maybe we should invent a religion based on The Good Place. It’d at least get people to behave better.
Maybe we should invent a religion based on The Good Place. It’d at least get people to behave better.
Why would anyone fear oblivion? Nirvana or extinction is the goal of Buddhists, isn't it? Being dragged before a judgemental supreme being without the benefit of defence counsel seems far worse - either flutter around His holy light like demented moths singing his praises for eternity or suffer agonising torment for eternity.
Being nothing is way scarier than eternal torture.
Has anyone read His Dark Materials trilogy by Phillip Pullman? The first book The Golden Compass was made into a movie. Phillip Pullman is an atheist which reflects on his books. His thoughts about organized religion, the afterlife and the concept of the soul, which is the theme of the trilogy, is really interesting.
Really? Should one fear going to sleep in case one doesn't wake up? How would one know one's sensorium had ceased to function? One was nothing for about 13.7 billion years -- one is conscious for a few tens of years -- then one is nothing for many billion years in a dreamless sleep.
Perhaps one is resurrected to live similar short lives through eternal return as state transitions play out again and again. One can imagine living similar lives but not remember them.
Perhaps one lives many similar lives in parallel worlds. Again one can imagine these timelines might exist but they are not accessible. You survive much longer in some than in others. The probability of infinite life in any is infinitely small as entropy and/or dark energy rule eventually. In any case, one is limited by the finiteness of one's physicality.
Even if one is subject to eternal torture, the physical mind can only remember a finite amount -- it would be pointlessly inefficient to make the punishment infinite.
Yes, although I don't think Pullman's cosmogony is intended to be taken any more seriously than that of traditional religion but I'm glad people such as he, Hitchens and Dawkins stir things up for those with closed minds.
By the way, Pullman has just been named to be knighted next year. Also "The Golden Compass" is called "Northern Lights" this side of the pond although the film wasn't.
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Nothing is scarier than eternal torture. That's the reason why it was concocted.
"God is love" is the biggest lie.
ETA: Random, probably impossible to verify, thought for today -- the only reason that eukaryotic then multicellular life then man evolved was by Darwinian natural selection assisted by Hugh Everett's multiworld interpretation of quantum mechanics filtering to allow comic introspection by an "intelligent observer". The vast proportion of real, as opposed to virtual, universes are probably bereft of life more complicated than archaea or bacteria.
ETA: Random, probably impossible to verify, thought for today -- the only reason that eukaryotic then multicellular life then man evolved was by Darwinian natural selection assisted by Hugh Everett's multiworld interpretation of quantum mechanics filtering to allow comic introspection by an "intelligent observer". The vast proportion of real, as opposed to virtual, universes are probably bereft of life more complicated than archaea or bacteria.
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Proof that their is life after death would still be scary because it would invite questions as to what it is like in this afterlife. Who is in charge and what will be expected of you. Also how will you change because of this transformation. Also personally I still want to be able to watch movies and listen to music and stuff like that. I don't want to sit around with a fig leaf covering my wang as a tend to my garden as Angels play a Harp in the background. Talk about getting bored really fast. Then you realize you got a eternity of this stuff. You think watching the clock at work waiting for the workday to end is hard to endure imagine what this new life might be like. In 1 day you will be begging for to chance to watch even 30 minutes of one of those Adam Sandler Netflix movies just to break the tedium.
Jason
Jason
I think you're expected to be servicing your 70 complementary virgins or eating cool bunches of grapes (depending on the translation) when you're not singing head-banging hosannas unto the Lord. Netflix, but not chill, might be available in the other place. However, none of the content you desire will be available.
The idea of oblivion after dying doesn’t feel so scary to me. As long as my atoms gets reused somewhere in the universe I would still exist in some way.
I don’t buy in to any of the religions descriptions of the afterlife, but I do have a certain spirituality about my personality, so I do believe something. The thing about death and the afterlife that I struggle with is how I will experience it.
Oblivion doesn’t scare me, I just can’t comprehen it. I can envision a universe without me, but I can’t envision not being. So, I fall back on things like reincarnation, nonlocalised consciouness, metaphysics by default, and whatever else fills in the gaps.
The pearly gates, harps, seven levels of hell, and all that. Meh.
Would proof of an afterlife also come with the other answer? The meaning of life, the universe and everything? My feeling is, with quantum weirdness, wave form collapse and all that, is that the state of the universe that we inhabit, of all the infinitely possible states, is somehow dependent on a conscious observer consensus, and a deeper knowledge would disrupt that consensus. Maybe that’s why thinking about it too much leads to insanity, to protect the consensus, and to stop the stars going out.
Oblivion doesn’t scare me, I just can’t comprehen it. I can envision a universe without me, but I can’t envision not being. So, I fall back on things like reincarnation, nonlocalised consciouness, metaphysics by default, and whatever else fills in the gaps.
The pearly gates, harps, seven levels of hell, and all that. Meh.
Would proof of an afterlife also come with the other answer? The meaning of life, the universe and everything? My feeling is, with quantum weirdness, wave form collapse and all that, is that the state of the universe that we inhabit, of all the infinitely possible states, is somehow dependent on a conscious observer consensus, and a deeper knowledge would disrupt that consensus. Maybe that’s why thinking about it too much leads to insanity, to protect the consensus, and to stop the stars going out.
No you wouldn't. Your atoms and molecules are not YOU. That's the point. Oblivion is the end of YOU. It is the end of consciousness, the end of awareness, the end of existence. There is no you when everything that makes up you is scattered to the ends of the universe. And it's easy to say that idea isn't frightening when you're hale and hearty enough to sit in front of a computer screen typing. If you're on your deathbed, and add to the certainty that you're going to die the certainty that absolutely nothing comes afterward, I'm certain everyone who faces that reality will be just human enough to have it scare the piss out of them. I stand by what I wrote.
The purpose of afterlife myths is to lessen the fear of dying by telling the living that death isn't the end of life. There's a next life, and to sweeten the pot that next life is usually some version of paradise. The trick is it's not paradise if you can't experience it, so Oblivion can't be paradise because there is no experience. At all. It's Oblivion.
In fact, the biggest flaw with the OP's original question is that none of the options indicates a paradise anyone would want to commit suicide to be in. That's why I gave the answers I gave. "There is a God." Great, but is it the old testamant wrathful God or the New testament loving god? Is he petty or is he indifferent? Is it a he or a she? Is she pissed that so many of us assumed she was guy for literally thousands of years? "There is no God." Really? Then what in the actual hell is out there? What the hell will it do to me when I die and end up in its domain? "Your religion is wrong." Then who's religion is right? Will I go to its version of hell for going to the worng house of worship? Is its God or heirarchy of gods merciful or angry and jealous? And we just discussed oblivion. All four options actually increase the anxiety involved with death if you think about it.
So, I'm glad you're not afraid of oblivion. Just don't think about too hard if you find yourself at death's door.
You are probably right about the oblivion issue. If I were at deaths door I would likely feel different about it. But at the moment I find it interesting to contemplate different viewpoints on a philosophical level. I didn’t quote your post because I disagreed with you, I mainly found it interesting to talk about. In my experience there are seldom a right or wrong way to see things in this kind of discussion. There are only different viewpoints and opinions. Your viewpoint is equally valid as mine. And a viewpoint can change depending on the situation one find oneself in.
Subjectively, I am much nearer to death's door than I suspect are many posters here. I suffer constant medical and age-related pain and I do not fear oblivion. However, I suspect that Hugh Everett's interpretation of QM was at least partially correct and I will continue to experience consciousness for much longer than I expect. I just hope medical advances will relieve my suffering until Hilbert/Fock/WTF space gives up on me.
What I do find increasingly peculiar is the apparent rewriting of my timeline, which has resulted in historic events seemingly having happened differently to what I recall and people being still alive whom I thought died years ago. I would ascribe this experience to age-related dementia but perhaps overexposure to science fiction makes me somewhat paranoid.
What I do find increasingly peculiar is the apparent rewriting of my timeline, which has resulted in historic events seemingly having happened differently to what I recall and people being still alive whom I thought died years ago. I would ascribe this experience to age-related dementia but perhaps overexposure to science fiction makes me somewhat paranoid.
What is that saying about fearing dying more than death? The act of going from being alive one second and dead the next is something I think everyone fears. Also sometimes the idea of a infinite amount of time going on without you in it can be something that bothers you if you think to hard about it but I also think people are able to push those thoughts out of mind from time to time to a point where the fear doesn't overwhelm you to a point where you can not think rationally or examine the meaning of life or existence and stuff like that without falling back on a God or religion as a crutch.
Speaking if rewriting the timeline one thing something like Youtube has done is sort of make history not feel so old. It's weird to think of the 90's being 30 years ago when you can watch any 90's show or sports event at will. FInd some old tv adds on youtube. Or news stories. The blending of the past and present seems never more closer than it does today. Sometimes I can see myself watching a movie with lets say Tom Hanks in and then you see 80's TOm Hanks in something like "Big" but then turn on something like "Mr Banks" and it's like 30 years of his life passes for you in the 10 minutes or so to switch to the different movie. Or how old tv characters never get old. Buffy Summers is going to be a eternal teenager or young adult for my entire life even if the actress keeps aging like all humans.
Jason
Speaking if rewriting the timeline one thing something like Youtube has done is sort of make history not feel so old. It's weird to think of the 90's being 30 years ago when you can watch any 90's show or sports event at will. FInd some old tv adds on youtube. Or news stories. The blending of the past and present seems never more closer than it does today. Sometimes I can see myself watching a movie with lets say Tom Hanks in and then you see 80's TOm Hanks in something like "Big" but then turn on something like "Mr Banks" and it's like 30 years of his life passes for you in the 10 minutes or so to switch to the different movie. Or how old tv characters never get old. Buffy Summers is going to be a eternal teenager or young adult for my entire life even if the actress keeps aging like all humans.
Jason
My first thought upon hearing that an afterlife existed would probably be "how do I escape it?" Nothing sounds more tedious to me than eternal existence. I'd get so BORED.
Upon learning that a deity existed, well... I've already concluded that any Deity who allows the world to exist in this state MUST be a dick, so...
Upon learning that a deity existed, well... I've already concluded that any Deity who allows the world to exist in this state MUST be a dick, so...
If one were subsumed into some sort of universal consciousness outside of space and time, I guess it could have access to every sentient being's memories in every possible cosmos and perhaps be able experience every aspect of reality through them. Perhaps like some sort of extreme trainspotter in Hilbert/Fock/WTF space -- some sort of ultimate pantheistic solipsistic entity.