Thread: I just can't get my head around nonexistence after death

Originally Posted by Ginsan

Cold you please tell me more about those dream Yogi, can a master dream Yogi really be conscious for 8 sleeping hours?

Yes, an accomplished sleep yogi can remain self-aware throughout his night's sleep. Dream yoga is a little different, but it is the first step toward sleep yoga, so it's worth checking out. You might start at Sivason's Dream Yoga class right here at DV, as that will give you a good picture of the state of mind necessary.

A sleep yogi's ultimate goal, though, is to prepare himself for the transition from life to the afterlife through death. A fundamental tenet of sleep yoga is that mastering self-awareness throughout a night's sleep is excellent practice for maintaining it through the process of death and entry to the afterlife. There is of course much more to it, but this isn't quite the right place for discussion (or I'm just feeling real lazy right now). You might get yourself a copy of The Tibetan Yogas Of Dream And Sleep, by Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche, which offers a nice, if simplistic, outline of the practice.

Dayum that's crazy. So they also feel the transitions of sleep stages?

Yes. They feel them, witness them, and learn to ignore the physical aspects of those transitions.

I don't know if I would like it though, staying conscious 24/7, seems pretty tiring doesn't it?

It is pretty tiring, and I don't imagine even the sleep yogis manage more than occasional bursts of constant self-awareness. Remember that they are not actually attempting to stay permanently self-aware, but rather are preparing their minds to stay conscious during all phases of death. There's no need to do it constantly, only to know that you can do it when the time comes.

Though what you said about your afterlife being decided by your expectation was just plain weird.

It is. But if you equate the afterlife to dreams -- meaning that you create the grand schemata for your afterlife universe, just like you create the schemata for your dreams -- then it sort of makes sense. And where else to equate the afterlife to dreams than a DV, thread, right? The movie What Dreams May Come does a nice job portraying this concept, BTW.

Since you expressed that bizarre and insulting opinion, I will be blunt. I think this discussion is way over your head, if you are not trolling. However, I will try again to help you. If you die and have no consciousness, you are unconscious. The result is not "nothing," aside from what you experience. The universe still exists.

If you see my opinon as merely bizarre and insulting. Then I would like to give you a hint, that you might not grasped the points of what I was trying to say. Sure, go blunt as much as you need to. It's good that you trying to help me since you think im a bit lost, even if there might be some irony hiding in you help. Before you help me out to much here, lets take a look about what kind of statement you make here. You claim:

If you die and have no consciousness, you are unconscious. The result is not "nothing,".

By using the word unconscious to describe death by, then you are actually suggestion that there is some kind of potential to have experience in death. And that isn't really your belief about death if I have understood you correct, right? I dont think that you are either dumb or a troll, but it seems like you doesn't know the difference between consciousness and nothingness. So let make this clear. Unconsciousness IS still consciousness, but in a unaware state. And Nothing is not a state of being Unconscious. So if you belives that death will be the end of you. Then dont even mention being unconscious as death. Because as you see. The idea of "being", follows with what is unconscious.

I did not start this thread. The original poster asked the question, and you got confused about what the issue even is. Don't point fingers. Just educate yourself.

You are now officially on troll watch.

I have never claimed that you did start this thread or even mentioned it. Im confused about some things that you claim, yes. But I believe that you're not aware enough to see that you happen to be confusing in various things you say. You say that I should not point fingers. So what is it that makes you more suitable to do so your self then? So should I educate myself about your rules then, or what?

Good idea! Keep them eyes open then troll guard, so you dont happen to troll yourself to much.

Sageous, great post! I'll start wrecking my brain on it because right now I'm busy playing Sentry Knight on Armorgames

And gab, why don't you join the discussion?

If this thread dies, I personally would find that preferable to the hell of its continued existence. So that's +1 nonexistence.

Originally Posted by DreamyBear

If you see my opinon as merely bizarre and insulting. Then I would like to give you a hint, that you might not grasped the points of what I was trying to say. Sure, go blunt as much as you need to. It's good that you trying to help me since you think im a bit lost, even if there might be some irony hiding in you help. Before you help me out to much here, lets take a look about what kind of statement you make here. You claim: By using the word unconscious to describe death by, then you are actually suggestion that there is some kind of potential to have experience in death. And that isn't really your belief about death if I have understood you correct, right? I dont think that you are either dumb or a troll, but it seems like you doesn't know the difference between consciousness and nothingness. So let make this clear. Unconsciousness IS still consciousness, but in a unaware state. And Nothing is not a state of being Unconscious. So if you belives that death will be the end of you. Then dont even mention being unconscious as death. Because as you see. The idea of "being", follows with what is unconscious.

I have never claimed that you did start this thread or even mentioned it. Im confused about some things that you claim, yes. But I believe that you're not aware enough to see that you happen to be confusing in various things you say. You say that I should not point fingers. So what is it that makes you more suitable to do so your self then? So should I educate myself about your rules then, or what?

Good idea! Keep them eyes open then troll guard, so you dont happen to troll yourself to much.

"Unconscious means "not conscious." If a person is in a bad wreck and falls out of the car and ends up lying on the highway, the paramedics will try to determine if he is conscious. In doing so, they are trying to determine if he is even alive. If he is not conscious, for whatever reason, including death, he is "unconscious."

https://www.google.com/#q=unconsciou...ition&safe=off

un·con·scious
ˌənˈkänSHəs/
adjective
adjective: unconscious

1.
not conscious.

Unconscious | Define Unconscious at Dictionary.com

unconscious
  Use Unconscious in a sentence
un·con·scious
[uhn-kon-shuhs] Show IPA
adjective
1.
not conscious; without awareness, sensation, or cognition.

Unconscious - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary

Full Definition of UNCONSCIOUS
1
a : not knowing or perceiving : not aware
b : free from self-awareness

unconscious - definition of unconscious by the Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus and Encyclopedia.

un·con·scious (ŭn-kŏn′shəs)

unconscious (ʌnˈkɒnʃəs Pronunciation for unconscious )
Definitions
adjective

lacking normal sensory awareness of the environment; insensible

Collins English Dictionary | Always Free Online

adj.
1. Lacking awareness and the capacity for sensory perception; not conscious.

Those first definitions plus my discussions about eternal nonconsciousness were what I thought would be indications that I am talking about unconsciousness at death being an eternal state of not having consciousness.

Are we on the same page now?

UM, dictionary definitions and semantics do not apply to discussions as nuanced as this one. We know, very well, that unconscious connotes a different meaning than non-existence. For example, the unconscious is the aspect of the mind we are not consciously aware of which still aids the faculties of life. The unconscious part of the mind stands apart from reason and cognition but remains subject to neurological association and the accumulation of past conditioning. For one example of the nuance, when a person is put into a state of hypnosis, the hypnotist bypasses the client's conscious awareness and directly manipulates their unconscious awareness. In this scenario, one is unconscious but still aware, likewise perception and life are not necessarily intertwined, and an unconscious person is not necessarily dead.

That is definition 2 or 3 in the dictionary links I posted. We are obviously not discussing that.

This thread has turned into a Monty Python sketch.

Then I've succeeded. Or did you expect me to take a thread essentially labeled "conceptualizing non-conceptuality" seriously?

Sageous, I think you're thinking of the line by Edgar Allen Poe 'Sleep - those little slices of death'. Or maybe the film noir title The Big Sleep. Hell, I don't know, there are a lot of them… but its getting late, time to go die a little.

^^ I may well have been thinking that -- Poe's last words, of course, and not Chandler -- though not consciously. I've run across the concept of going to sleep associated with briefly dying (and being reborn upon waking) in so many places over the years, from psychology (especially with kids) to literature, to philosophy, and to late-night drunken conversations, that it's all a blur now. I actually said it so readily because I had thought the concept (and phrase) was downright archetypical. Silly me; I must be getting old.

Oddly, an arguably irrelavent line from literature was wandering throught my head as I wrote the post. It was from Hamlet, as he considered suicide:

"To sleep, perchance to Dream; Aye, there's the rub.
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come."

Dreams are product of your brain. It means that in the first place you need to have this physical machine called ''brain''. It is the same with the consciousness. When you die, your brain will be disassembled - since you cannot destroy the matter, it will become smoke, ash or part of the land. Let's do analogy on a car for example. Try to disassemble it and the car won't able to go. Brain won't able to sense, dreams, consciousness, think, memory, just nothing. It is that simple. Why are the most people so so so much cocky about their limited existence???

Originally Posted by Nfri

Try to disassemble it and the car won't able to go.

Does that mean that the car is just temporarily ungoing, or is there nothing? Would it be better if the car rode while on fire forever?

"Unconscious means "not conscious." If a person is in a bad wreck and falls out of the car and ends up lying on the highway, the paramedics will try to determine if he is conscious. In doing so, they are trying to determine if he is even alive. If he is not conscious, for whatever reason, including death, he is "unconscious."

No, this example could only work out if you happen to believe in some kind of "after life", since you still talking about unconsciousness as a state of death.

Those first definitions plus my discussions about eternal nonconsciousness were what I thought would be indications that I am talking about unconsciousness at death being an eternal state of not having consciousness.

Are we on the same page now?

If you dont happen to believe that there are some continuation beyond death, then dont talk about death as some kind of state of eternal unconscoiusness then. A dictionary will obviously not help you, but merely confuse you further right now as it seems. Go back and take a closer look about what I said before, and at Orginal posters good explanation as well.

So unfortunatley for now, we are still not on the same page, no. Maybe not even in the same book.

Originally Posted by Universal Mind

Does that mean that the car is just temporarily ungoing, or is there nothing?

In the car case, yes, it can be temporarily ungoing, until somebody who knows how assemble it back to functional state. It can be the same apply to the brain, the only problem is that assemble brain back to its proper funcion is very complicated and no one knows how to do it yet. The main idea behind this is that brain is physical machine that produce physical activity - dreams and stuff... When it is disassembled it just can't work, therefore you don't exist. The only thing that remains of you are parts of your disassmbled body and your blueprints of your activities you done in your life, but that does not make you happy or anything since you don't exist anymore.

Would it be better if the car rode while on fire forever?

Yes it would I guess, but this is not how the world works.

Originally Posted by DreamyBear

No, this example could only work out if you happen to believe in some kind of "after life", since you still talking about unconsciousness as a state of death.

If you dont happen to believe that there are some continuation beyond death, then dont talk about death as some kind of state of eternal unconscoiusness then. A dictionary will obviously not help you, but merely confuse you further right now as it seems. Go back and take a closer look about what I said before, and at Orginal posters good explanation as well.

So unfortunatley for now, we are still not on the same page, no. Maybe not even in the same book.

Oh, I didn't clear that up at all. Here, watch this:



What I was saying wasn't working, so... hope and change.

Oh, I didn't clear that up at all. Here, watch this

Now you make things vey clear indeed, your obviously the biggest troll.

If you have trouble accepting non existence after death, perhaps it is because it is not the truth, and part of you realizes that. I find that at times my mind objects to certain ideas, and then when I find another idea it rings true intuitively. Sometimes I do not have the logic to back it up. Consider that our logic is finite and we do not have all the evidence. Does this mean that we cannot have an opinion or preliminary expectation on things we do not sufficiently understand? For what happens after death we do not know for certain until we die, but we can decide to have expectations. And as Sageous pointed out if the expectation of an afterlife is not true, then we will not be there to care anyways.

Originally Posted by DreamyBear

Now you make things vey clear indeed, your obviously the biggest troll.

Fight fire with fire.

* you're

If you have trouble accepting non existence after death, perhaps it is because it is not the truth, and part of you realizes that. I find that at times my mind objects to certain ideas, and then when I find another idea it rings true intuitively. Sometimes I do not have the logic to back it up. Consider that our logic is finite and we do not have all the evidence. Does this mean that we cannot have an opinion or preliminary expectation on things we do not sufficiently understand? For what happens after death we do not know for certain until we die, but we can decide to have expectations. And as Sageous pointed out if the expectation of an afterlife is not true, then we will not be there to care anyways.

I guess that this is somewhat partly directed at me. Just to make this clear, I believe more in that our consciousness will continue after death. So all this other useless conversation I've been a part of, that is merely attempts to clear some confusion of the misuse of the word unconsciousness. So there could be the potential of some interesting discussion about ideas of a life after death, instead.

Fight fire with fire.

* you're

Im not fighthing anything. But if you are to proud to try to understand what I've been saying, then keep doing what you doing if you believe that it will do you any good.

Originally Posted by DreamyBear

Im not fighthing anything. But if you are to proud to try to understand what I've been saying, then keep doing what you doing if you believe that it will do you any good.

How many internet trolls does it take to screw in a light bulb?

None. Their mothers change the basement light bulb for them.

How many internet trolls does it take to screw in a light bulb?

None. Their mothers change the basement light bulb for them.

Well, nice talking to you. Im out.

Originally Posted by DreamyBear

Well, nice talking to you. Im out.

Out of the basement?

Not gonna point fingers, but that wasn't very nice now was it?

Classic troll move to accuse other people of trolling. I would know.