Thread: Death

Still... Belisarius has an excellent point. Credibility can be validated and IS validated by "consistency" of experiences. Whether or not it is "regurgitated" is a seperate issue.

I just don't have enough faith to believe in something 100% when there's no proof[/b]

Or maybe you just can't HANDLE the proof.

You have fun feeling like an idiot when you don't go to heaven or whatever. Instead you sort of just sit there dead.[/b]

It could also be considered presumptuous that the Universe revolvles around us.[/b]

Just because someone believes in an afterlife does not mean they also think that \"the universe revolves around us.\"

But I find the idea so outrageously moronic that I am prepared to burn in hell for all eternity if I am wrong[/b]

Talk about moronic...

as ridiculous as saying that Gone With The Wind is a record of a true story because some of the places in it actually exist and it makes some true statements about reality[/b]

Not truly. Gone with the Wind was intended fiction, both by the writer and the reader... thus to say \"it is ridiculous as\" is a ridiculous analogy.

the basic difference between me and any theist is that I refuse to \"choose\" beliefs[/b]

I did not choose to believe in God. He chose me to believe in him. Whether I believ in him or not makes no difference to who he IS. There is a MAJOR difference between the \"belief\" referred to and faith. (One would not really be able to know this without first having such faith). Faith is a gift and does not change other than being strengthened or weakened. In other words since faith is a gift from God, it cannot be lost. Belief, on the other hand, can be said to be only mental assention (not true faith) which changes with outward circumstances or knowledge.

I believe any culture gives birth to religion because they do not have the answers and cannot cope with the ultimant question. Death[/b]

It is a DIFFERENT way of coping with death, not an inferior way as you imply.

Many paths must be wandered for the Lost soul

A soul that can be coveted by the blanket of the
Divine rests well.[/b]

For someone who claims to disagree with religions, those statements appear to me to be pretty religious...

People who think there is an afterlife dont realize that science can explain what happenes.[/b]

Please.

Kaniaz, you have to understand that almost noone chooses their beliefs, and that kind of belief is inauthentic and wrong. Beliefs are arrived at through reasoning, or through intuition(or indoctrination) and then rationalized. People don't say,"Hey, that belief looks like it will make me feel good, I'm going to take it!"

Originally posted by Belisarius
Kaniaz, you have to understand that almost noone chooses their beliefs, and that kind of belief is inauthentic and wrong. Beliefs are arrived at through reasoning, or through intuition(or indoctrination) and then rationalized. People don't say,\"Hey, that belief looks like it will make me feel good, I'm going to take it!\"

Er? What kind of belief? Sorry if I seem stupid, but you've just lost me.

Originally posted by Belisarius
People don't say,\"Hey, that belief looks like it will make me feel good, I'm going to take it!\"

People definitely do say that, although not always conciously and purposefully/

Uhhh I want to go back to one of the topics.
I don’t think we just “stop” when we die. It just doesn’t feel right because, for ex,
**This is just my opinion of dreams.**
After a normal dream, you wake up in the morning and recall what happened. And so your dream is recorded in your memory. But while you’re dreaming (not lucid dreams. I can’t do those stuff yet so I don’t know how it’s like) you don’t know what’s happening, so things that are happening in your dreams are not really happening until you wake up and remember them. Like when I’ve just won a sword fight with George Washington in a dream, that didn’t happen until I wake up and remember it.
So what’s happening right now, like me typing up this sentence, wouldn’t be happening if I just stop in the future. I must have a future where I’d be looking back to my life after I’m dead.

i am thinking about this subject for a very long time, but i do not have any conclusions about it, however, i do think that there must be something else after death

why would we be created or made or produced (?who knows? maybe we are produced, maybe not ) to die, stop existing and just fade away... or something...

interresting

Originally posted by tryagain

After a normal dream, you wake up in the morning and recall what happened. And so your dream is recorded in your memory. But while you’re dreaming (not lucid dreams. I can’t do those stuff yet so I don’t know how it’s like) you don’t know what’s happening, so things that are happening in your dreams are not really happening until you wake up and remember them.

By default if you are "remembering" something, then it ALREADY happened. You seem to be saying that things don't "happen" until you recall them to conscious memory - that would be like manufacturing or creating false memories. In other words, the things that occur in normal (non-Lucid) dreams DO happen before you remembered them, otherwise you would not be able to "remember" them. This also lends to the fact that things are occurring in your mind (imagination, reasoning, etc.) always, albeit they are happening on levels that you are not conscious of. If you don't remember them, that just means that for some reason you cannot recall them to CONSCIOUS MEMORY even though they may still exist in your subconscious. There is a difference between consciously remembering and subconscious memories that cannot be accessed.

I think the point that he was making is that he can't concieve of time going beyond him without him being able to observe at least something.

yeah, that' almost exactly what I was saying but I couldn't put it into words

Originally posted by Belisarius+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Belisarius)</div>

<!--QuoteBegin-Kaniaz

Just because people's experiences are \"consistent\" doesn't give so much as an ounce of credibilty to it.

Science relies completely on the consistency of people's experiences, do you give science so much as an ounce of credibility?[/b]

(I know this wasn't my post but I feel like replying to it anyways)
Just because people's experiences are consistent doesn't mean the only possible conclusion is the existence of NDEs. These experiences could very well be a side effect of your brain functions shutting down combined with a generous release of endorphins following major trauma.

I know enough to know that I am not afraid to die.

As Peter Pan said... "To die would be a great adventure..."

Originally posted by Phosphoros

These experiences could very well be a side effect of your brain functions shutting down combined with a generous release of endorphins following major trauma.

That's all good for a surface-oriented "explanation" yet scientific explanations cannot even touch spiritual explanations... "theoretical" or not.
Theoretically it could be explained as "JUST" or only those things or it could be those things AND MORE.

Who needs science? I know for a fact that when I die the invisible pink unicorn will come for me and take me to the wonderful land of endless cotton candy!

Just the fact that you have an organized thought process is a miracle. Proof: The natural order of things is chaos. Example: rust, erosion, spoilage and decay of all kinds. But life fights on for survival and to be creative.

I think death is a release from one part of life into another. Somewhere, memory of these past lives is stored, or none of us would remember our previous lives. 8)

This is probably a dead thread by now but,.... (oh and previously I just felt like being an ass, it happens. )


As far as proof goes, there is proof, it's just not accepted. I would have to do some serious digging in my library to find exact excepts so I'm not even going to try but,

There have been documented cases of people dying on the operating table that were brought back and later were describing events (what people said, what they did, things in the room) that happend. These people were clinicaly dead (no brain waves), and despite the fact that they were unconscious when they were brought in and then died, they knew what happened and thier stories were corroborated by everyone present.

I have heard of stories of children speaking forign and even dead languages as well. Kids that are like 4 or 5 that could barely speak there own language fluently!

There have been numerous stories of people who say they remembered past lives and had the details corroborated by third parties. Details that sometimes took years of exstensive digging in dusty archives, archives that the ones making the claim had no access to.

There is plenty of truth out there, but it just gets brushed of the table because it's too fantastic for people to believe.

For people who believe that there is no afterlife, that it just ends, you have my pitty. what a bleak outlook on life. why not end your life now, what difference would it make? When you reply, "Oh no. I don't whant to do that!", ask yourself why. If then you reply, "Well, I want to leave something of myself behined.", understand that in your veiw it will all end anyway. So, what's the point? I think deep down we all know there is more to us then just our flesh and bones wether we are willing to admit that or not. If you believe for a fact it all ends, then why keep going?

Originally posted by willthepathfinder+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(willthepathfinder)</div>

For people who believe that there is no afterlife, that it just ends, you have my pitty.[/b]

And you have mine.

<!--QuoteBegin-willthepathfinder
why not end your life now, what difference would it make? When you reply, \"Oh no. I don't whant to do that!\", ask yourself why.

When you realize that this is all you get, it matters that much more. You understand that every moment could be your last, the phrase \"live like you were dying\" really means something. I could ask you the same question, if you beleive that afterlife is so awesome, why not just kill yourself and skip to the good stuff? Quit wasting my time telling me how to live my life.

Also, the most basic human instinct is to survive. It's kinda hard to avoid that.

Originally posted by willthepathfinder
So, what's the point? I think deep down we all know there is more to us then just our flesh and bones wether we are willing to admit that or not.

I think deep down we all know that we are nothing more than flesh and bones. That scares the shit out of most people, so what do they do? Deny it of course. And voila! We get religion, afterlife....all that mumbo jumbo.

The reason is that it is IMPOSSIBLE for the human brain to comprehend "nothingness". When people who think they can comprehend it think of "nothingness" they think of nothing but black. But then that would not be "nothingness" because black is "something"! So they immediately think of white, but then that is also "something"! ...Then the brain explodes!


Someone recently gave me their idea of life and death: They think that when we die we are reborn, and what we did in this life will determine what happens in the next. Karma, basically. So if you were rich and a bastard in this life, you will be reborn poor and helpless in the next one. Obviously your memory of the previous life is wiped.

Therin lies my problem. I asked that, if we cannot remember our previous lives that we are being punished, or praised for, then there would be no point in the punishment or praise, because we can never learn from our mistakes. Surely it would be more worthwhile putting the rich bastard directly into the poor and helpless position with the memory of his past life, so that he can learn from his mistakes?

To this she answered that we only forget on one level of our memories. That there is a deeper level of memory that still remembers this old life and IS learning.

This is where my imagination kicked in: What if this were true? It seems very similar to our dreams. We don't normally remember everything that we do in waking life in our dreams. But when we become lucid, our waking consciousness is combined into our dream life. So if we can tap into this other life by becoming lucid (ie. through a WILD - staying conscious through the transition from awake to asleep), what if we could stay conscious from this life to the next? Then ultimately we will bring all our memories and experiences to our next life and basically live forever like this!

...just a thought!

WS

bradybaker wrote:

I could ask you the same question, if you beleive that afterlife is so awesome, why not just kill yourself and skip to the good stuff? Quit wasting my time telling me how to live my life. [/b]

I thought you might like to tear into that one. Who said the afterlife was the good stuff? This life now is the good stuff. This is our opportunity to learn the lessons of cause and effect.

I don't remember telling anyone how to live thier lives either. I asked a question, not issue a command.

I really have no use for religion either, it's never been able to answer my questions for me and I don't like having an ideology crammed down my throat. I'm the last person who would force my views on anyone else. We all have our own path to fallow.

I love reading your posts bradybaker, your rational and stick to your guns, but damb your defensive!

Or mebbe jes' stubborn...

pitty

Originally posted by willthepathfinder+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(willthepathfinder)</div>

This life now is the good stuff.[/b]

Agreed. Just because I don't think there's anything else to look forward to doesn't mean I don't want to be here.

<!--QuoteBegin-willthepathfinder
but damb your defensive!

I suppose. I had just finshed a ten hour night shift when I wrote that though, so I wasn't in the best of moods to begin with.

I'll try to calm it down a bit next time.

i have personal poof of rencarnation..
Wen a family friend lets call her "A" was pregnant her oldest child at the time was about 3.
Her oldest child came up to her and told her "I used to have a different mum......" and continued to tell her his past life story. Bearing in mind that the child talking normaly could not come up with a well structured sentance let alonle a whole "story" of his past life i believe this is good evidence for reencarnation. "A" is also very normal woman and would not lie .

:yumdumdoodledum: Though that might count as poof for YOU, it's still hearsay. Youth are often very naive and easily convinced that fantasy and reality are the same in my experience...