What happens when we die?

Stacksofwacks

Government buildings wrote: »

Just wondering why you quoted atheistic writers. Did you not read anything by believers?
Anyway, my point is reading and research is pointless. You, and only you decide to believe or not. You don't believe, fine. You do believe, fine.

If you can recommend any I will check them out, but only ones who use reason and facts and not a preacher...I think research is a healthy thing, to be informed, challenge your own beliefs etc

Government buildings

But Stack, I don't think reading anyone, believer or not, is of any good. They can only give opinions, because ultimately it is a mystery.

You have to make up your own mind, because there are no facts to go on.

I hope I didn't insult you when I say that unbelievers don't deserve an afterlife. What I mean is there is no afterlife for them because they have rejected it. Your decision is fully respected. If you believe, it exists, if you don't, it doesn't.

After all, what a non believer is saying is that there is no afterlife. Fair enough.

Stacksofwacks

Government buildings wrote: »

But Stack, I don't think reading anyone, believer or not, is of any good. They can only give opinions, because ultimately it is a mystery.

You have to make up your own mind, because there are no facts to go on.

I hope I didn't insult you when I say that unbelievers don't deserve an afterlife. What I mean is there is no afterlife for them because they have rejected it. Your decision is fully respected. If you believe, it exists, if you don't, it doesn't.

After all, what a non believer is saying is that there is no afterlife. Fair enough.

Fair enough, will wrap it up there so. Thanks for the discussion and happy new year. btw no I wasn't insulted

growleaves

Stacksofwacks wrote: »

If you can recommend any I will check them out, but only ones who use reason and facts and not a preacher...I think research is a healthy thing, to be informed, challenge your own beliefs etc

If you don't mind, I'm going to give my own recommendation.

IMO the strongest Christian apologist is Blaise Pascal. Read the Pensées.

Though if you have unshakable prior belief that atheism is definitely true it probably won't convert you. Pascal is writing for a reader who is (potentially) very open to any metaphysical belief and sometimes he is giving advice for someone who wants to become a Christian but has difficulty believing in it.

R. Dawkins is not great. Most of his arguments were debated over in more detail by pagan and Christians scholars in the 2nd and 3rd centuries. He seems not to be familiar with the full history of debates around God of which he is writing about.

David Bentley Hart wrote a good book in response to Dawkins called Atheist Delusions. It is short and it just hits on various mistaken assumptions and corrects them.

Stacksofwacks

growleaves wrote: »

If you don't mind, I'm going to give my own recommendation.

IMO the strongest Christian apologist is Blaise Pascal. Read the Pensées.

Though if you have unshakable prior belief that atheism is definitely true it probably won't convert you. Pascal is writing for a reader who is (potentially) very open to any metaphysical belief and sometimes he is giving advice for someone who wants to become a Christian but has difficulty believing in it.

R. Dawkins is not great. Most of his arguments were debatd over in more detail by pagan and Christians scholars in the 2nd and 3rd centuries. He seems not to be familiar with the full history of debates around God of which he is writing about.

David Bentley Hart wrote a good book in response to Dawkins called Atheist Delusions. It is short and it just hits on various mistaken assumptions and corrects them.

Thanks I will look into those, unlikely to change my position as you said but would be interesting to read..kudos

o1s1n

Government buildings wrote: »

You have to make up your own mind, because there are no facts to go on.
.

There are facts to go on though, hence science. We understand the world around us, which allows us amazing things such as electricity, medicine and exploration into space.

Scientific reasoning is all we have which is based on facts.

Everything else is 'belief' and is not grounded in anything tangible.

Government buildings

o1s1n wrote: »

There are facts to go on though, hence science. We understand the world around us, which allows us amazing things such as electricity, medicine and exploration into space.

Scientific reasoning is all we have which is based on facts.

Everything else is 'belief' and is not grounded in anything tangible.

What I mean is there no facts regarding an afterlife. It is all based on belief .

growleaves

o1s1n wrote: »

There are facts to go on though, hence science. We understand the world around us, which allows us amazing things such as electricity, medicine and exploration into space.

Scientific reasoning is all we have which is based on facts.

Everything else is 'belief' and is not grounded in anything tangible.

I disagree.

Say we have an ordinary person who loves their mother. That love is non-material but it exists. It can't be measured physically, you can't land a space shuttle on it but it is an intrinsic part of the universe and the nature of existence. It is real.

So we have something that is definitely real and exists which is totally outside the purview of science (which is an examination of the material world only, by any definition). Then we have to decide how we reckon with that knowledge.

o1s1n

Government buildings wrote: »

What I mean is there no facts regarding an afterlife. It is all based on belief .

There are facts about the afterlife though - the fact that there is none. There have been no facts to state otherwise.

If someone communicated with us from said afterlife then the facts would change. (You'd think by now of all the billions of people who lived before us, at least one of them might have said hello)

So yes you're just left with belief as you said really. Nice to hope there is something but I'll always just view it as wishful thinking/fear of eternal non existence.

o1s1n

growleaves wrote: »

I disagree.

Say we have an ordinary person who loves their mother. That love is non-material but it exists. It can't be measured physically, you can't land a space shuttle on it but it is an intrinsic part of the universe and the nature of existence. It is real.

So we have something that is definitely real and exists which is totally outside the purview of science (which is an examination of the material world only, by any definition). Then we have to decide how we reckon with that knowledge.

Love and emotion are simply constructs of chemicals within our brain.

Remove certain parts of your brain and that love and emotion can change or vanish altogether.

The fact that you can do that proves is not an immaterial eternal entity which transcends the human body. It literally is the human body.

growleaves

o1s1n wrote: »

Facts would change. (You'd think by now of all the billions of people who lived before us, at least one of them might have said hello)

But some people have 'said hello'. I've read accounts of it.

In practice any communication from the dead is interpreted as a delusion/hallucination/hoax etc. It is inherently discounted by people who have decided in advance that anything spiritual is not real.

Lots of people could witness a miracle personally and they would go to their doctor and ask for a prescription for anti-psychotics.

o1s1n

growleaves wrote: »

But some people have 'said hello'. I've read accounts of it.

In practice any communication from the dead is interpreted as a delusion/hallucination/hoax etc. It is inherently discounted by people who have decided in advance that anything spiritual is not real.

Lots of people could witness a miracle personally and they would go to their doctor and ask for a prescription for anti-psychotics.

I've read accounts of fairies dancing at the ends of gardens, it doesn't make it real

I get what you're saying, I suppose my point being that If the afterlife were real and the dead actually could say hello, then we'd have millions and potentially billions of documented cases of this happening. Actual physically recorded cases on video, in photographs, on tape etc.Makes me wonder why the dead aren't conversing with me daily.

As I always bring up in these instances, the James Randi 1 million dollar prize to prove the paranormal exists went completely unclaimed in all the years it was available.

AllForIt

Car99 wrote: »

Eventually the human plague on earth will die out and if there is anything left life and evolution will go on without human interference.

This is nonsense. Human life is as much a part of life as frog spawn. I don't know why anyone would think human life is something separate from all other life on earth.

If humans destroyed life on earth, say though nuclear war or by some other means, that mean life destroyed itself.

growleaves

o1s1n wrote: »

I've read accounts of fairies dancing at the ends of gardens, it doesn't make it real

I get what you're saying, I suppose my point being that If the afterlife were real and the dead actually could say hello, then we'd have millions and potentially billions of documented cases of this happening. Actual physically recorded cases on video, in photographs, on tape etc.Makes me wonder why the dead aren't conversing with me daily.

As I always bring up in these instances, the James Randi 1 million dollar prize to prove the paranormal exists went completely unclaimed in all the years it was available.

I don't know too much about Randi but I'm guessing he's using materialist assumptions. I don't think we can expect the dead to shoot a music video for us.

Life is about living so I'm not seeking out the dead all the time. I've met dead people in my dreams. But again if we say that dreams are not real - just psychological processing - then our assumptions have ruled another piece of evidence as inadmissible.

Ultimately our fundamental prior assumptions about the nature of reality decides for us what counts as evidence and what doesn't. So you are actually making the decision about what is true before you've heard the evidence, effectively.

Anyway I'll leave it there. Goodnight.

85603

dr eben alexander. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nhah5WdWRCk
dr jill bolte taylor. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyyjU8fzEYU
worlds largest study on brain activity finds activity continues beyond clinical deth. dr parnia.

non-local consciousness is to be considered a serious possibility.

I actually died and came back myself, just after princes creep solo at cochela.

fryup

I have it on good authority that this is what happens when you snuff it...

Everything turns to white, you're dressed in white, you find yourself in an elevator lit in white light....you travel upwards for about a minute and *bing* you reach the top floor i.e. Heaven.

The elevator doors slide open and you are met by a famous celebrity like Bob Marley for instance who then proceeds to show you around the place, he shows you your sleeping quarters, the washroom, cooking facilities etc

He then shows you the main dining area which is like one big gigantic canteen there you'll will see other celebrities hanging out havin a laugh, playing cards shooting pool etc

So basically Heaven is like one massive YMCA hostel, nothing to get too excited about....oh and btw if you're sleeping in a bunk bed make sure you choose the bottom one cause its a pain climbing down everytime you want to go to the loo.

Humberto Salazar

I'll not go into a long opinion on this, but simply ask why are we here, go through all the drama of life, at a certain specific time in history, and then die to go to nothing?

begbysback

Green Mile wrote: »

Just like there is nothing before you are born, the same is for when you die.

So in the beginning there was nothing, then there was something, then nothing again, so something is again possible, therefore not nothing.

the beer revolu

I do not accept that I can just choose to believe or not.
My belief or lack of it is a product of every experience of my life. I can't just choose to believe or not believe in the way that I can choose to sit or stand.

The_Brood

The poll results go along way in explaining why society is more divided (though pretty unanimous on this issue it seems), selfish, and hostile toward one another than ever.

If one truly and honestly believes everyone is on one, eternal journey together, that plants the seeds for a much greater harmony and altruism.

myshirt

Frederick emails to say he has 4 children, he's the proud father of a new baby boy, and his daughter Susan (5) has just started school. He just bought a new house with a view of the sea, and enjoys walks in the evening, and after death Frederick believes there is Nothing.

The Tetrarch

When I die and they lay me to rest
Gonna go to the place that's the best
When I lay me down to die
Goin' up to the spirit in the sky

Government buildings

As the Lord says "Thou art dust, and onto dust thou shalt return".

Humberto Salazar

Sierra Necroma wrote: »

Because that's just the way life is. We are the result of atoms bouncing around until life was made theough the process of evolution. So yes, we more than likely go to nothing just like we were nothing before we were born.

That reasoning assaults my value of logic. There must be more. I believe there is.

saabsaab

Our perceived Universe came from something or nothing. Unless you can accept that the default is not nothingness but somethingness.

fryup

Heaven sounds like my idea of hell....think about it... surrounded by do gooders like Cliff Richard, Alan Titchmarsh, Mary Whitehouse etc like one big episode of Songs of Praise that never ends aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!! :eek:

funkey_monkey

If we can't acknowledge/identity what we were before we were born into this world why would there be something that we would be aware/conscious of afterwards?

JasonStatham

Are there people trying to cryogenically freeze their body or their brain?

Could people clone themselves before they die? Imagine that... like telling yourself you're gonna have to do life again...but here's all my experience so do it better.

Valresnick

JasonStatham wrote: »

Are there people trying to cryogenically freeze their body or their brain?

Could people clone themselves before they die? Imagine that... like telling yourself you're gonna have to do life again...but here's all my experience so do it better.

The way the world is going you could be freezing yourself to wake up in hell. In answer to the OP’s post. I’m tired, the world today is awful, I hope when I go it’s just black and there is no more. If there is a heaven it’s probably a corrupt polluted kip by now. Humans are a failed species.

Strumms

Government buildings wrote: »

No one can prove there is an afterlife.
No one can prove there isn't an afterlife.

And nobody ever will prove it. Nobody has ever survived death.