The afterlife

Yurt123 · 12-02-2017 8:46pm #1

Out of interest do many of ye think that when we die that that's the end of the road for us or that we're sent to heaven for eternity instead?

As much as I like the idea of eternal life I ain't buying it!

Loveinapril · 12-02-2017 8:49pm

When we die we're dead. It's over. Even as a kid when the concept of living forever in heaven was discussed i didn't like it!

Samuel T. Cogley · 12-02-2017 9:51pm

For me there might be something. Something so fantastical and beyond our comprehension it might not even be considered an afterlife but I do believe there is some continuation after death, even if it's purely in the memory of others.

Infernum · 12-02-2017 9:56pm

If there is indeed an afterlife, it certainly isn't any afterlife described in any religious text.

Samuel T. Cogley · 12-02-2017 9:59pm

Infernum wrote: »

If there is indeed an afterlife, it certainly isn't any afterlife described in any religious text.

I couldn't agree more

and @The_Valeyard - that idea did indeed come from where you think it probably did seeing it as a child for the first time! It might have evolved a bit over the years

fepper · 12-02-2017 10:12pm

Most of current oldest generation do believe in heaven and lived life as best they could with hopefully they'd be rewarded with a place in heaven when they passed on,great conviction really and most of them lived to die with that aim

howamidifferent · 12-02-2017 10:31pm

I believe that in the circle of life we feed and grow on vegetables, fruits, meat and fish. We take our nutrients from these foods. When we die, if buried we rot and return to the various minerals and nutrients we absorbed and give these back to the earth. The earth uses these nutrients and minerals to enrich other plant and animal life. So we live on in the sense that our constituent molecular structure is reused for new life. Not a new version of me but of life made from me.... And I'm cool with that.

Samuel T. Cogley · 12-02-2017 10:38pm

howamidifferent wrote: »

I believe that in the circle of life we feed and grow on vegetables, fruits, meat and fish. We take our nutrients from these foods. When we die, if buried we rot and return to the various minerals and nutrients we absorbed and give these back to the earth. The earth uses these nutrients and minerals to enrich other plant and animal life. So we live on in the sense that our constituent molecular structure is reused for new life. Not a new version of me but of life made from me.... And I'm cool with that.

Even better is you were born in a star, and you'll be a star again.

Yurt123 · 13-02-2017 1:57pm

Does it ever scare anyone of ye when you really think about it though that when your dead that your gone for forever and ever and ever no matter what happens… freaky if you actually give it some real thought

Samuel T. Cogley · 13-02-2017 2:03pm

Yurt123 wrote: »

Does it ever scare anyone of ye when you really think about it though that when your dead that your gone for forever and ever and ever no matter what happens… freaky if you actually give it some real thought

Time is like a companion...

Joking aside, yes and no. But it makes me realise I have to do it now.

Torakx · 14-02-2017 12:34am

On the surface, I don't believe in anything really.
But I have thought about all this and still do all the time. It's one of the things that motivates me.
That idea of having only one shot at life, within the confines/freedom of infinity of nothingness each side of it.
This type of "belief" has utility for me. But that's as far as I need to take it with regards my convictions.

Nietzsche and through him also Jung spoke of the Self with a capital "S", to denote the whole body and mind that is our self.
Science is catching up slowly.
We know now that the type of ecology in our gut can dictate our personality and will/intent, to a large degree.
There are also more bacteria making up our bodies than human cells..
The gut is known as the second brain now.

When you hear Nietzsche or Jung speak of the "Self" instead of the "self", they are speaking of our biological drives which are superior to our cognitive thoughts and ideas.
Bacteria or parasites for example will communicate with the body in order to get what they need. The body gets chemical signals and then informs the brain to create a feeling or sensation or emotion which will represent a rational idea towards that end.
Better to say that the brain and mind are waiting to interpret orders form the body. The creative mind a tool to better create external circumstances that will meet those ends.
The "person" who eventually gets an idea to eat a certain food or do a certain thing, often think that "they" thought of it themselves.
Really these decisions are a lot of the time already made by our bodies.
The mind is just our rational tool for navigation at the core.
We invent thoughts to rationalise our will or base drives bubbling from the body.
I think this also ties in with religion and existentialism too.

With that said, I have to ask now in a rhetorical sense, what do you mean when you say-

when we die that that's the end of the road for us

We and us, might not be what you at first thought.

I do think that when "we" the "Self" dies, we are no more. We are in our persons biological beings(mostly made up of foreign bacteria, so they are us? We are them and us combined?).

I think most likely the mind is a tool that has developed into something very sophisticated out of necessity in our environment.
The religious part of the mind and brain is probably another abstract tool to process and rationalise death, evolved due to having the ability to predict the future and facing our own death we needed to rationalise this to cope and not stick on it cognitively.

I prefer to plan for the worst and hope for the best

Let the thought of having only one life put a fire under my ass.
At the same time, letting the thought of having fun and exploring and laughing at all possible moments lead me to a good experience.
Knowing that when I worry for too long about things I can't effect or change, I dishonour this idea of existence and waste time.
Although, I can fall back on blaming the bacteria, they do outnumber me

Or believe in heaven and sit back and wait for it

RobbingBandit · 14-02-2017 12:40am

Reading so much mythology as a kid Valhala for me sounded cool but I am no warrior so I'd end up on that damn ship made of fingernails.

Yurt123 · 14-02-2017 10:21pm

If you ever think about it we've got a limited time on this planet

We spend 13 years in school where your trapped learning about rubbish that's in no way practical in the real world

When your done school you can either spend another 4 or 5 years studying to get a good job or else you can go straight into working and you'll probably work like a slave for poor pay

Most people whether they admit it or not hate working. They hate the routine of it, the early mornings, dealing with their boss etc. After work you're wrecked tired. Most of your weekend is probably spent watching tv, or else getting drunk or at least planning to get drunk

You get married, have children, realise that's the difficulties and responsibilities of having a family isn't all it's cracked up to be. You do your best to rear your family and probably grow sick of your wife or husband in the process. You've no money coz it's all spent on the family

You work up until around the age of 60 or 70, now you've all this spare time and not enough money to fill your time with worthwhile stuff

We're all like hamsters stuck on a big wheel… life is so short and we only get one shot at it and most people spend their time doing what they think they're suppose to do rather than doing what they want

tac foley · 20-02-2017 10:09pm

1. 'Life is a spark between two eternal darks.'

2. 'Life is a sigh between two secrets.'

3. 'La vie est brève. Un peu d'amour, un peu d'espoir, et puis, bonsoir.'

All true for me.

tac

SirBorbey · 22-02-2017 7:49pm

A teaser:

Every human heart intuitively longs for some kind of answer to 6 deep questions:

1. Is there really a God?
2. Where’d I come from?
3. What determines right or wrong?
4. Why do I sometimes feel badly about my actions?
5. Where do I fit in the flow of history?
6. What will happen to me after I die?* (You're not alone op!)

Charles Darwin, early in his life often referred to "a Creator" as the one responsible for the formation of a limited number of original forms of life. However, by 1871, God had virtually disappeared. He wrote, “We could conceive in some warm little pond, with all sorts of ammonia and phosphoric salts, light, heat and electricity, that a protein compound was chemically formed ready to undergo still more complex changes"...

Torakx · 23-02-2017 12:52am

SirBorbey, I would say that faith could be very important.
It seems that religions a long time ago had a solid purpose for humanity.
One purpose at least was to guide our existential insecurity, to an answer of some kind that allowed us to keep our nerve and to ground our morals for cultures to stand on and grow.
A brace for our spirit under the stress of knowledge and the bright light of materialist advancement("lucifer").

Unfortunately that light got a bit too bright and I think science tried to take more than it was owed too quickly; this might or might not be categorized as atheism...Science trying to step into the area of faith with a counter-position of nihilism. Reactive nihilism, I don't know if that is impressively helpful or impressively insane.
That is one reason I was and still might be a supporter of anarchism.
Any way to level of this capitalist and technical advancement to allow some groundingvia culture and spirituality.
The anarchist way has little need for faith or religion I think though(at least at a large organised scale).
But it is also weakened by the theory that it can not hold up well with organizing a world that is interconnected more and more now.

With all this in mind, I do think that faith is needed once more in some way.
Not to give people hope of another life. I am not sure that will provide them with the right motivation to fully realise and live this life.
Instead as a way to create a foundation for new culture. To stabilize the ignorant in society with a moral framework.

Everything may be just fine as it is. It might be we have to learn these things the hard way as a species.
sometimes I wonder though, if we will make it much further without destroying ourselves. Maybe it has already happened before. Maybe even on other planets "close by".

ps. Just remembered, Jordan Petersons lectures cover this stuff(Free on youtube) using Nietzsche and Jung's philosophies.
His basic idea is that religion was used a s away to organise large groups and nations who had different cultures, but needed to work together.
Religions formed as a way to find similarities in the foundational morals of these cultures and bring them all together under those same principles.
This is what i was trying to say earlier in a very terrible way ...

We need faith founded on common principles, as our species grows and becomes more interconnected.
However, these principles can no longer just come from an old book or solely from the new.
They must come from our cultures commonalities, whatever they may be in principle.
I sometimes think everything is as it should be. Simply because evolutionary wise, organisms seem to adjust in the correct way out of necessity.

FanadMan · 23-02-2017 4:13am

My brutal (but also to my families scorn) but my own honest view. We die, we are buried, we rot and we live on in all the organisms we fed. If we are cremated, our ashy molecules are distributed all over the world and we keep feeding other life. And this has happened for mega-millennia. We came from the stars, we return to them.

Black Swan · 24-02-2017 11:53am

FanadMan wrote: »

My brutal (but also to my families scorn) but my own honest view. We die, we are buried, we rot and we live on in all the organisms we fed. If we are cremated, our ashy molecules are distributed all over the world and we keep feeding other life. And this has happened for mega-millennia. We came from the stars, we return to them.

It would seem that your post was somewhat analogous to the following?

"Death does not concern us, because as long as we exist, death is not here. And when it does come, we no longer exist." And if Greek philosopher Epicurus was correct in claiming this, it agrees with The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám:

"Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend,
Before we too into the Dust descend;
Dust into Dust, and under Dust to lie
Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and--sans End!"

tac foley · 24-02-2017 1:13pm

I think you'll find that Epicurus came a good while before Mr Khayyám, who must surely have read those words..

Black Swan · 24-02-2017 4:52pm

tac foley wrote: »

I think you'll find that Epicurus came a good while before Mr Khayyám, who must surely have read those words..

These are quite common expressions shared by many in philosophy, poetry, etc., whereupon they may or may not cite each other. We could run a long list including a more contemporary expression by Jacques Derrida in The Gift of Death.

NIMAN · 03-05-2017 1:46am

Yurt123 wrote: »

Does it ever scare anyone of ye when you really think about it though that when your dead that your gone for forever and ever and ever no matter what happens? freaky if you actually give it some real thought

I would say most people who do not believe in life after death have given this idea some thought.

I sometimes think, "what if I go to sleep tonight and never wake up". But then, does it matter? I'll be none the wiser!

I often think of being dead as being 'not born' yet. Same thing really.

nozzferrahhtoo · 03-05-2017 10:01am

Yurt123 wrote: »

Out of interest do many of ye think that when we die that that's the end of the road for us or that we're sent to heaven for eternity instead?

I myself do not tend to think in terms of "I think X is true" so much as I think in terms of "I think the majority of the evidence at this time points towards X".

Quite often the evidence is split between more than 1 conclusions however. You find situations where 60% points one way. 40% another and so on.

But the after life is one where we are on slightly firmer ground. While our knowledge of the workings and machinations of human sentience and consciousness is incomplete........ 100% of the data we DO have on it connects it to the brain while 0% of any data at this time suggests any potential disconnect between the two........... let alone any level of survival of the former following the biological death of the latter.

So I see zero evidence suggesting the existence of an after life and plenty of evidence showing the opposite. And when not some, not most, but ALL the evidence points one way and not the other........... I can do nothing but go with the former.

Yurt123 wrote: »

As much as I like the idea of eternal life I ain't buying it!

I can not honestly say myself that I like the idea of an eternal after life at all. Much less the specific after life espoused in religions local to me.

In general I think the idea of an eternal after life cheapens the value of our actual life here in the same way that you would cheapen gold if you flooded the market with 1 million tons of it tomorrow.

Having an eternal after life makes many actions and sacrifices in this life meaningless for example. Take the Christian Fables for example where their "god" character is said to have "given" his only son to us who in turn "sacrificed" himself/itself as a modern day version of a scapegoat for our sins.

Now the immorality of the concept of scapegoating aside......... the Nazarene in question is said to be sitting at the right hand side of his father in a state of eternal bliss and dominion. First and foremost this is hardly the result of a god having "given" us his son....... at best he LENT us his son for an non-existent fraction of eternity. And rather than having "sacrificed" his life for us he can be said at best to have traded up.

In this way the concept of an eternal life makes a mockery of anyone who actually has sacrificed themselves for a person, place or an ideal. And the "given a son" narrative is an outright mockery and insult to any parent who actually has suffered one of humanities greatest emotional turmoils............ that of outliving their own children.

That is just the eternal life in general however. But specific ones like the Christian narrative are even worse. Christopher Hitchens when he knew he was dying but it quite well. He said being told you are about to die is like being at the greatest party in the world, getting a tap on the shoulder, and being told you have to leave and the party will go on without you.

Under the Christian Narrative however he felt it was like being told you can NEVER leave the party, and what is more (in threatening undertones) while you are there the host positively INSISTS you have a good time.

So not only do I see ZERO reason to think there is, or suspect there to be, any after life.......... I see plenty of reasons to be quite glad of the fact too. The transience, rarity and delicacy of life defines its worth and value. And I am happy with the state of affairs.

Sam Kade · 03-05-2017 10:08am

When a reporter asked Clint Eastwood if he believed in an afterlife he said I'm not sure but I'm in no hurry to find out

Pat D. Almighty · 03-05-2017 7:11pm

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

Yurt123 wrote: »

Out of interest do many of ye think that when we die that that's the end of the road for us or that we're sent to heaven for eternity instead?

I myself do not tend to think in terms of "I think X is true" so much as I think in terms of "I think the majority of the evidence at this time points towards X".

Quite often the evidence is split between more than 1 conclusions however. You find situations where 60% points one way. 40% another and so on.

But the after life is one where we are on slightly firmer ground. While our knowledge of the workings and machinations of human sentience and consciousness is incomplete........ 100% of the data we DO have on it connects it to the brain while 0% of any data at this time suggests any potential disconnect between the two........... let alone any level of survival of the former following the biological death of the latter.

So I see zero evidence suggesting the existence of an after life and plenty of evidence showing the opposite. And when not some, not most, but ALL the evidence points one way and not the other........... I can do nothing but go with the former.

Yurt123 wrote: »

As much as I like the idea of eternal life I ain't buying it!

I can not honestly say myself that I like the idea of an eternal after life at all. Much less the specific after life espoused in religions local to me.

In general I think the idea of an eternal after life cheapens the value of our actual life here in the same way that you would cheapen gold if you flooded the market with 1 million tons of it tomorrow.

Having an eternal after life makes many actions and sacrifices in this life meaningless for example. Take the Christian Fables for example where their "god" character is said to have "given" his only son to us who in turn "sacrificed" himself/itself as a modern day version of a scapegoat for our sins.

Now the immorality of the concept of scapegoating aside......... the Nazarene in question is said to be sitting at the right hand side of his father in a state of eternal bliss and dominion. First and foremost this is hardly the result of a god having "given" us his son....... at best he LENT us his son for an non-existent fraction of eternity. And rather than having "sacrificed" his life for us he can be said at best to have traded up.

In this way the concept of an eternal life makes a mockery of anyone who actually has sacrificed themselves for a person, place or an ideal. And the "given a son" narrative is an outright mockery and insult to any parent who actually has suffered one of humanities greatest emotional turmoils............ that of outliving their own children.

That is just the eternal life in general however. But specific ones like the Christian narrative are even worse. Christopher Hitchens when he knew he was dying but it quite well. He said being told you are about to die is like being at the greatest party in the world, getting a tap on the shoulder, and being told you have to leave and the party will go on without you.

Under the Christian Narrative however he felt it was like being told you can NEVER leave the party, and what is more (in threatening undertones) while you are there the host positively INSISTS you have a good time.

So not only do I see ZERO reason to think there is, or suspect there to be, any after life.......... I see plenty of reasons to be quite glad of the fact too. The transience, rarity and delicacy of life defines its worth and value. And I am happy with the state of affairs.

You're in need of a good aul NDE.

nozzferrahhtoo · 04-05-2017 7:47am

Pat D. Almighty wrote: »

You're in need of a good aul NDE.

That is something of a non-reply, no idea what you are talking about here. We are talking about the after life on this thread. NDE is the experience of coming NEAR death (the clue is in the name) so it is hardly applicable.

NDE is as much an experience of the after life as me walking up to a plane in Dublin City Airport and then walking away from it is an experience of a sun holiday in morocco.

That said though, the attempts to link NDE to evidence for an after life have been as desperate as they have been flawed. No aspect of NDE supports any claims of the after life. And pretty much every aspect of NDE can be repeated in controlled situations.

For example one of the most oft cited/references aspect of NDE is OBE, the feeling of being outside ones own body.

Firstly this can be evoked in healthy people, let alone people dying on a table. We can do this in many ways, like drugs or physical stimulation (such as rotary force used to train astronauts). In fact most people reading this post can evoke it themselves at home in simple ways. There is a simple table top way to make you feel like your hand is apart from your own body. And with practice this can be extended to the entire body.

Secondly however it has been tested in controlled studies by peoples biased strongly TOWARDS finding evidence for the after life. Such as Dr. Sam Parnia.

What Parnia and others have done is notice the areas that the majority of OBE reports in hospitals claim to occupy. Such as floating above their own body. They then randomly placed unmissable and highly in-congruent objects in positions only observable by people IN those claimed positions.

Not only did they not get significant results of people reporting having noticed such objects, they got ABSOLUTELY NO positive hits of people reporting seeing those objects. Not. One.

Now I am sure one could claim that people finding themselves outside their body might be a bit distracted so we could expect them to miss such objects, even if they were garishly in-congruent with the environment. But to have absolutely ZERO results of any kind? One has to be forgiven for harboring doubts the people actually are occupying the position they claim to have experienced occupying.

So really your one-liner non-comment does not appear to be applicable or relevant in any way, as well as being quite assumptive about what I have or have not actually experienced in my life. But by all means expound upon it if you think there is some relevance there being missed.

Pat D. Almighty · 05-05-2017 12:55am

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

Pat D. Almighty wrote: »

You're in need of a good aul NDE.

That is something of a non-reply, no idea what you are talking about here. We are talking about the after life on this thread. NDE is the experience of coming NEAR death (the clue is in the name) so it is hardly applicable.

NDE is as much an experience of the after life as me walking up to a plane in Dublin City Airport and then walking away from it is an experience of a sun holiday in morocco.

That said though, the attempts to link NDE to evidence for an after life have been as desperate as they have been flawed. No aspect of NDE supports any claims of the after life. And pretty much every aspect of NDE can be repeated in controlled situations.

For example one of the most oft cited/references aspect of NDE is OBE, the feeling of being outside ones own body.

Firstly this can be evoked in healthy people, let alone people dying on a table. We can do this in many ways, like drugs or physical stimulation (such as rotary force used to train astronauts). In fact most people reading this post can evoke it themselves at home in simple ways. There is a simple table top way to make you feel like your hand is apart from your own body. And with practice this can be extended to the entire body.

Secondly however it has been tested in controlled studies by peoples biased strongly TOWARDS finding evidence for the after life. Such as Dr. Sam Parnia.

What Parnia and others have done is notice the areas that the majority of OBE reports in hospitals claim to occupy. Such as floating above their own body. They then randomly placed unmissable and highly in-congruent objects in positions only observable by people IN those claimed positions.

Not only did they not get significant results of people reporting having noticed such objects, they got ABSOLUTELY NO positive hits of people reporting seeing those objects. Not. One.

Now I am sure one could claim that people finding themselves outside their body might be a bit distracted so we could expect them to miss such objects, even if they were garishly in-congruent with the environment. But to have absolutely ZERO results of any kind? One has to be forgiven for harboring doubts the people actually are occupying the position they claim to have experienced occupying.

So really your one-liner non-comment does not appear to be applicable or relevant in any way, as well as being quite assumptive about what I have or have not actually experienced in my life. But by all means expound upon it if you think there is some relevance there being missed.

Ah sure when you have one, you'll get over yourself.

Black Swan · 05-05-2017 11:40pm

Pat D. Almighty wrote: »

...you'll get over yourself.

MOD: Such comments like the above generates Reports. If you wish to avoid being carded or banned in the future, I strongly recommend that you avoid making comments like these in the future.

Pat D. Almighty · 07-05-2017 4:15am

Black Swan wrote: »

Pat D. Almighty wrote: »

...you'll get over yourself.

MOD: Such comments like the above generates Reports. If you wish to avoid being carded or banned in the future, I strongly recommend that you avoid making comments like these in the future.

Thank you

nozzferrahhtoo · 08-05-2017 7:42am

Pat D. Almighty wrote: »

Ah sure when you have one, you'll get over yourself.

But as I said, "over yourself" is exactly the location it appears people having NDE inspired OBE are not getting. The Parnia Studies have shown that.

I would have been moderately impressed if even ONE report came back of a clinical patient seeing one of the objects during OBE. If even ONE had come back saying "Yes I was floating over the room and did you know there is a large digital read out flashing bright red numbers on that cupboard over there and it reads 54565?" or "I know this sounds mad but while I was floating around the room I kept seeing this large bonsai tree made entirely out of pink dildos hidden over there"

But no, no matter what objects Parnia and his team had left around the rooms........ when they interviewed the people claiming to have had OBE on the clinical table......... not ONE report came back of them having seen the objects in question.

That HAS to be informative at some level. It simply does not appear that when people experience being out of their body and hovering above it in the theater........ that they actually ARE doing so. They just feel they are.

Which coincides with what we already know. We know that we can evoke out of body experiences quite readily using technology, forces and pressures, drugs, or just plain concentration. It is possible for any reader of this post on their own table top to evoke the feeling that someone elses hand, or even a FAKE hand, is actually their own hand. We do this stuff all the time.

But of course I do not mean to talk over you to silence you, so I can but invite you to elaborate on why you think NDE relevant to the thread. Perhaps in a form a little more erudite than you have offered in the previous two posts might be easier for me to parse.

Eire Go Brach · 08-05-2017 7:56am

As an atheist. I always imagined that we are no different than the dead fly on the window sill. But it's also very hard to imagine a love one being like that.
I knew the day would come where I would have to put more thought into it.
"Matter is neither created or destroyed" we live on, through the molecule level. Turning into flowers, others anaimals etc.
But the true after life is the same as every other animal on this planet. Through our kids. Procreation. Basic function of all animals.

Lavinia · 11-06-2017 9:05pm

As someone who experienced death of about 2 and half minutes at the age of 17 - and at the same time someone who has its strongest beliefs rooted in science, I cannot give the straight answer to this.
I certainly was not 'dead' while technically I was, but I am still not convinced that what I experienced was not some form of brain neurons activity.
But it is the strangest thing I ever experienced.
Changed my life, that's for sure.

jk23 · 11-06-2017 9:13pm

That's very interesting, do you mind me asking what happened? How did you feel after you came back to life and reflected on it?

Lavinia wrote: »

As someone who experienced death of about 2 and half minutes at the age of 17 - and at the same time someone who has its strongest beliefs rooted in science, I cannot give the straight answer to this.
I certainly was not 'dead' while technically I was, but I am still not convinced that what I experienced was not some form of brain neurons activity.
But it is the strangest thing I ever experienced.
Changed my life, that's for sure.

Lavinia · 18-06-2017 10:19pm

well i was still 'a child' kind of, so did not know what happened to me but was very scared afterwards..
i did experience things 'from the other side' and decision i had to make to come back was one of the hardest things i ever did..
i had 'unfinished business' i suppose..
not sure i'm comfortable in sharing the details though..

my life changed cause i started searching for the answers afterwards..

NIMAN · 22-06-2017 12:50am

So you believe in life after death obviously?

Lavinia · 22-06-2017 7:44am

Well that is the thing, I should, shouldn't I?
But my mind being very 'scientifically orientated' still has its doubts and tries to find a 'scientific' explanation to what has happened to me.

All I know I was not 'dead' at all, even I 'technically' was, but am wondering if it is possible for brain to has some activity still in those few minutes after 'death'.

At that time I seriously did not know anything about the subject of 'afterlife' or of people's experiences with it, nor was I interested, so there was no possibility of me 'subconsciously' recreating something I knew about.
But was sincerely shocked to find out that lots of people experienced some part of it very similarly, regardless of where they lived or which religion they were born in etc.

I did experience 'the tunnel' journey. It was as if you are in some vacuum-suctioned pipe where it just takes you to that other side, and you cannot turn around or anywhere but 'let' go in that direction.
I did see the 'light' at the end of it. And when I 'stepped' to there...
..all what happened..
,,and how I returned here...

And yet still, I cannot say yes - there is no death - definitely. I can only say well hypothetically yes, there is a probability that this is not the only one of the worlds.

nozzferrahhtoo · 22-06-2017 8:07am

Lavinia wrote: »

All I know I was not 'dead' at all, even I 'technically' was, but am wondering if it is possible for brain to has some activity still in those few minutes after 'death'.

I can help you answer that. And the answer is "yes". And how big a "yes" depends on what kind of "dead" you were.

First take this analogy. If I gave you a device that detects the color red and sent you blindfolded into a room. The device reads nothing at all. So you come back out of the room. What would you say to me on your return. Would it be:

1) There is no RED in that room.
2) There is no COLOR in that room.

Option 2 is ridiculous right? MAYBE there is no color. But you can not tell that from the reading of the device.

Now why the analogy?

In a clinical surgery situation we attach devices to you that detect particular types of brain patterns and activity. When THOSE activities stop, the device gives back a "no activity" reading. But like the color detection device above it is NOT saying there is no activity in the brain. It is JUST saying there is no activity of the type it is scanning for. That is all.

So yes it is absolutely possible for there to be brain activity during your "dead" time (even though you are not dead but "clinically dead" which is a different thing entirely). And there are many articles around to this effect too.

But there is a MASSIVE and VERY problematic assumption at play in the people who have had experiences matching, or similar to, your own. Which is that they assume the experience they had did actually occur DURING the time they were "dead". The problem there being that, subjectively speaking, they are the WORST person in the world to judge when the experience actually occurred.

What is just as, if not much more, likely is that the experience they had actually occurred in the moment leading up to the "dead time" or leading out of it. Especially out of it as when someone is going into that phase we start pumping them with all kinds of physical, chemical and electrical stimuli to revive them. All of which sends cascading flooding signals into the brain and throughout the nervous system.

It is similar to dreaming. Quite a lot of the dreams we remember are not during our sleep phases but during the passage in and out of them. And sometimes a dream that lasted mere seconds can feel like it actually lasted minutes or hours.

Lavinia wrote: »

At that time I seriously did not know anything about the subject of 'afterlife' or of people's experiences with it, nor was I interested, so there was no possibility of me 'subconsciously' recreating something I knew about.

That is something that sounds very very unlikely to me. You might not think you were CONSCIOUSLY aware of such things....... but our society, culture, media, discourse and even our very language is punctuated heavily with such memes and imagery and culture. It is highly unlikely you could spend any quantity of years living in a modern society without assimilating SOME of that.

Take UFO sightings for example. Since Spielberg gave us little grey aliens with big black eyes..... the majority of alien sightings or abduction stories include such aliens in their anecdotal descriptions. EVEN by people who never saw such a movie in their life. Because even though they did not consciously watch any such movie........ the imagery from such movies permeates memes and media and culture all over the place.

Lavinia wrote: »

But was sincerely shocked to find out that lots of people experienced some part of it very similarly, regardless of where they lived or which religion they were born in etc.

Actually that does not shock me at all. The OPPOSITE would shock me. If people were all having the same real world experience (heart failure and brain problems and other stuff) but were coming out of it with DIFFERENT Experiences...... then that would be fantastical and weird and would need explanation.

But the fact is that for all our individuality, we are all pretty much identical at the level of biology and the brain. So a person having an NDE in america and one having an NDE in Pakistan or India should really be having pretty similar experiences over all. Just like if you put diesel into a petrol car built in the US, and into a petrol car built in Japan, they are both going to die in the same way because........ for all their superficial differences..... they are essentially identical inside.

How they render and parse those experiences however tends to be through their local language, culture and religions. And it is from there that some differences occur.

Lavinia · 22-06-2017 8:19am

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

That is something that sounds very very unlikely to me. You might not think you were CONSCIOUSLY aware of such things....... but our society, culture, media, discourse and even our very language is punctuated heavily with such memes and imagery and culture. It is highly unlikely you could spend any quantity of years living in a modern society without assimilating SOME of that.

I am an old woman so at that time there was no internet and we had 2 channels on the telly that I didn't even watch as was quite introverted at the time liked to read novels and study for school, that was my world.
So yes, unlikely, but true, nonetheless.

nozzferrahhtoo · 22-06-2017 8:29am

My mother at 73 and my aunts are also fairly aged woman so I do have some anecdote to draw on related to the old days

But joking aside, even back then the radio, television and media of the day would have been punctuated with it. Depending on where you went to school your curriculum was likely heavily influenced by it (Certainly with the "integrated curriculum" in Ireland for example). The novels you read could not have been devoid of it. The very language we use is heavily etymologically influenced by religious memes.

Short of living in isolation in a cave with no media or entertainment of any type........ you are exposed to a LOT more memes of a religious nature than you are aware of.

It is simply a fact in modern science and social studies that people are exposed to a lot more memes, imagery and narratives than they are aware of. Even in the moment, let alone in their memories of 10, 20, 50 or more years ago in their childhood. The inputs that influence the stories we tell ourselves in our heads are far more diverse than most of us suspect.

But as I said, none of that is really required. It is just an interesting side fact. For your experience to match that of most other people having similar experiences you do not NEED exposure to such memes and culture. You just need the simple fact that your brain is essentially pretty identical to theirs in just about every way. So people having events similar to yours, will quite often report experiences during it similar to yours.

The real shock would be, opposite to what you said, if there was MORE diversity in such experience. Not less. If people getting resuscitated in the same way, from the same kinds of heart failure (for example) in different countries were describing having massively DIFFERENT experiences..... that would be weird. That they all essentially describe the SAME one..... with tunnels and bright lights and so forth, is pretty much what should be expected.

Swampy · 22-06-2017 8:50am

Just going to throw it out there, I believe in an afterlife. I'm not very religious. Not sure what the afterlife would be but I believe that the universe (or even multiverse) is too complex and our life is so pointless if there is no progression from this one. That said maybe we are a experimentation or simulation. Things like the Fibonacci sequence/pattern in nature and space lead me to believe there is some fundamental design to life.

What drives my belief most is that I'm an optimist in life so maybe I just look for the positive which it would be for me.

nozzferrahhtoo · 22-06-2017 8:57am

^ And so what if it is pointless? Just because WE might not like that, that does not mean the universe owes us a point or a reason. It just is what it is perhaps.

I can only talk for myself of course, but I find it would be personally ridiculous to base one truth claim on another, if the other is less a truth claim and more what I WANT to be true about the universe. Simply WANTING There to be a "point" to life is not evidence that there therefore must be an after life.

But I guess people differ in that. Some people believe what they believe because there is a sound basis for the belief. Others select what they believe because they see believing it as being personally positive. I guess I am just not built the latter way myself.

Swampy · 22-06-2017 8:59am

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

I can help you answer that. And the answer is "yes". And how big a "yes" depends on what kind of "dead" you were.

First take this analogy. If I gave you a device that detects the color red and sent you blindfolded into a room. The device reads nothing at all. So you come back out of the room. What would you say to me on your return. Would it be:

1) There is no RED in that room.
2) There is no COLOR in that room.

Option 2 is ridiculous right? MAYBE there is no color. But you can not tell that from the reading of the device.

Now why the analogy?

In a clinical surgery situation we attach devices to you that detect particular types of brain patterns and activity. When THOSE activities stop, the device gives back a "no activity" reading. But like the color detection device above it is NOT saying there is no activity in the brain. It is JUST saying there is no activity of the type it is scanning for. That is all.

So yes it is absolutely possible for there to be brain activity during your "dead" time (even though you are not dead but "clinically dead" which is a different thing entirely). And there are many articles around to this effect too.

But there is a MASSIVE and VERY problematic assumption at play in the people who have had experiences matching, or similar to, your own. Which is that they assume the experience they had did actually occur DURING the time they were "dead". The problem there being that, subjectively speaking, they are the WORST person in the world to judge when the experience actually occurred.

What is just as, if not much more, likely is that the experience they had actually occurred in the moment leading up to the "dead time" or leading out of it. Especially out of it as when someone is going into that phase we start pumping them with all kinds of physical, chemical and electrical stimuli to revive them. All of which sends cascading flooding signals into the brain and throughout the nervous system.

It is similar to dreaming. Quite a lot of the dreams we remember are not during our sleep phases but during the passage in and out of them. And sometimes a dream that lasted mere seconds can feel like it actually lasted minutes or hours.

That is something that sounds very very unlikely to me. You might not think you were CONSCIOUSLY aware of such things....... but our society, culture, media, discourse and even our very language is punctuated heavily with such memes and imagery and culture. It is highly unlikely you could spend any quantity of years living in a modern society without assimilating SOME of that.

Take UFO sightings for example. Since Spielberg gave us little grey aliens with big black eyes..... the majority of alien sightings or abduction stories include such aliens in their anecdotal descriptions. EVEN by people who never saw such a movie in their life. Because even though they did not consciously watch any such movie........ the imagery from such movies permeates memes and media and culture all over the place.

Actually that does not shock me at all. The OPPOSITE would shock me. If people were all having the same real world experience (heart failure and brain problems and other stuff) but were coming out of it with DIFFERENT Experiences...... then that would be fantastical and weird and would need explanation.

But the fact is that for all our individuality, we are all pretty much identical at the level of biology and the brain. So a person having an NDE in america and one having an NDE in Pakistan or India should really be having pretty similar experiences over all. Just like if you put diesel into a petrol car built in the US, and into a petrol car built in Japan, they are both going to die in the same way because........ for all their superficial differences..... they are essentially identical inside.

How they render and parse those experiences however tends to be through their local language, culture and religions. And it is from there that some differences occur.

But you are saying there is a chance. If we all knew for sure that there was life after death maybe people wouldn't have fear of dying and might just go mental.

Swampy · 22-06-2017 9:04am

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

^ And so what if it is pointless? Just because WE might not like that, that does not mean the universe owes us a point or a reason. It just is what it is perhaps.

I can only talk for myself of course, but I find it would be personally ridiculous to base one truth claim on another, if the other is less a truth claim and more what I WANT to be true about the universe. Simply WANTING There to be a "point" to life is not evidence that there therefore must be an after life.

But I guess people differ in that. Some people believe what they believe because there is a sound basis for the belief. Others select what they believe because they see believing it as being personally positive. I guess I am just not built the latter way myself.

I get your point. We are a realtively new species in the scheme of things and have only developed our intellect in much more recent times. I believe that all we can prove or disprove now is not difinitive as there is more we don't know than we do.

nozzferrahhtoo · 22-06-2017 10:28am

Swampy wrote: »

But you are saying there is a chance.

Of course. But there is "a chance" of just about anything you make up right now on the spot being true, no matter how ludicrous it is. So while I would say there is "a chance".... you should not read too much into that. There is a CHASM of difference between saying there is "a chance" something is true and saying there is any credible basis whatsoever of expecting it actually IS true.

Swampy wrote: »

If we all knew for sure that there was life after death maybe people wouldn't have fear of dying and might just go mental.

Perhaps that is why many religions create some variation on hell, or eternal well being. So they can then teach people about a wonderful after life, but mediate it with a narrative that prevents people being too keen to speed their way into getting there.

Swampy wrote: »

I believe that all we can prove or disprove now is not difinitive as there is more we don't know than we do.

There is more we do not know than we do indeed. But the trend so far is that 100% of everything we DO know links consciousness and sentience to a biological brain while nothing, as yet, AT ALL suggests any kind of disconnect between the two of any kind, let alone one surviving the death of the other.

So while it is linguistically true to say we do not know everything..... saying it that way misses out on the trend in what we have learned which is 100% solely and only pointing in one direction so far. A fact that should not be lightly dismissed.

Swampy · 22-06-2017 11:26am

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

So while it is linguistically true to say we do not know everything..... saying it that way misses out on the trend in what we have learned which is 100% solely and only pointing in one direction so far. A fact that should not be lightly dismissed.

The one direction it is pointing in could be predetermined. I love these type of discussions just because there is no wrong or right, everyone just has their own slant. As an optimist I have noting to lose. If there is nothing after death then i'll be none the wiser. But until then I enjoy exploring the possibilities that there might!

nozzferrahhtoo · 22-06-2017 11:31am

Swampy wrote: »

everyone just has their own slant. As an optimist I have noting to lose. If there is nothing after death then i'll be none the wiser. But until then I enjoy exploring the possibilities that there might!

With opinions everyone can have their own slant sure. The old saying is "Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, no one is entitled to their own facts". I have always loved that saying.

As you describe it though, sure there is nothing wrong with that. But I do worry that there are many who allow their belief in an after life...... which there is no reason to think they will ever have.......... take away from their experience of this life......... which they do have.

That is of course tragic. But if someone is living this life to the full AND also harbors some enjoyable exploration of the possibilities of the "next" one, then sure..... go for it.

It always stuck with me what Christopher Hitchens wrote about the Christian after life during the days he knew he was very much about to die, and soon.

He wrote that being told you are going to die is like being at the best party in the world, getting a tap on the shoulder, being told you have to leave..... but the party will go on without you.

But as sad as that sounds, he felt that the Christian Idea of an after life was like being at the party, getting a tap on the shoulder, being told you can NEVER leave..... and what is more (in threatening tones) the host positively INSISTS you have a good time while you are there. Or else.

To me the idea of an after life cheapens the value of our actual life. Similarly it cheapens the idea of things like sacrifice. So I have to admit that while I see no reason AT ALL to think there is actually an after life..... I am parallel to that also quite relieved to find it is so.

Lavinia · 22-06-2017 7:26pm

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

My mother at 73 and my aunts are also fairly aged woman so I do have some anecdote to draw on related to the old days

But joking aside, even back then the radio, television and media of the day would have been punctuated with it. Depending on where you went to school your curriculum was likely heavily influenced by it (Certainly with the "integrated curriculum" in Ireland for example). The novels you read could not have been devoid of it. The very language we use is heavily etymologically influenced by religious memes.

Short of living in isolation in a cave with no media or entertainment of any type........ you are exposed to a LOT more memes of a religious nature than you are aware of.

It is simply a fact in modern science and social studies that people are exposed to a lot more memes, imagery and narratives than they are aware of. Even in the moment, let alone in their memories of 10, 20, 50 or more years ago in their childhood. The inputs that influence the stories we tell ourselves in our heads are far more diverse than most of us suspect.

But as I said, none of that is really required. It is just an interesting side fact. For your experience to match that of most other people having similar experiences you do not NEED exposure to such memes and culture. You just need the simple fact that your brain is essentially pretty identical to theirs in just about every way. So people having events similar to yours, will quite often report experiences during it similar to yours.

The real shock would be, opposite to what you said, if there was MORE diversity in such experience. Not less. If people getting resuscitated in the same way, from the same kinds of heart failure (for example) in different countries were describing having massively DIFFERENT experiences..... that would be weird. That they all essentially describe the SAME one..... with tunnels and bright lights and so forth, is pretty much what should be expected.

I am not from Ireland. Not sure what are you trying to point out, or what is your problem with me saying I didn't know anything about it prior to what happened to me. My parents were not religious and those topics were never discussed in our family. First book i found after long search on it was from the library (there were no phones at that time either, few homes had landlines even) So yea, I'm no going to repeat this the third time.
You can believe it or you don't but please just leave it (if you can, thanks).

(One of the reasons I'm actually really rarely talking about this is exactly this type of response, where someone is trying to convince me that what is white is black or vice versa. I know what I know, and that is enough for me, I tried to share it here as - it seems like someone was actually interested in the topic).

What surprises me is that some people just cannot get their head around it, without accusing other people who did experience something like this that yea, it has to be it was just some kind of 'cheat' in what they are saying, something faulty, they have to discredit these people one way or another, as they simply cannot accept the possibility of it being actually the truth.

Yea, it happened the way I described it. Now get over it so we can move on. Thanks.

nozzferrahhtoo · 23-06-2017 8:08am

Lavinia wrote: »

I am not from Ireland. Not sure what are you trying to point out, or what is your problem with me saying I didn't know anything about it prior to what happened to me.

I am not aware of having any "problem". I am merely stating a straight out fact that our culture, our language, our media, our literature, our art and our entire lives are punctuated by a lot more imagery and memes of a religion nature than most people are aware of. And while someone might THINK They grew up not influenced by any such thing..... I would be genuinely gobsmacked if that were actually so.

I am not sure how stating a mere fact, constitutes having a "problem" exactly?

My own 6 year old yesterday just had a minor revelation around her homework and described it herself, without any prompting from me, with the words "light at the end of the tunnel". That is just the kind of language and imagery that populates our language and our culture.

Lavinia wrote: »

they have to discredit these people one way or another, as they simply cannot accept the possibility of it being actually the truth.

I can not see anyone here "discrediting" you at all. The points I am making are GENERAL points, and not limited to you, or specific to you, in any way whatsoever. It is a GENERAL fact about our species that we grow up pretty unaware (both at the time and retrospectively) of the memes and imagery that we sponge up as we grow and learn.

What I fear is going on here is you are taking mere general facts personally, and then projecting your rage at having done so onto me as if it was somehow my fault. So who, I wonder, is ACTUALLY discrediting who here. Clue: It is not me.

Lavinia wrote: »

Yea, it happened the way I described it. Now get over it so we can move on. Thanks.

As I said though, the only one getting haughty here and who needs to "get over" what is being said.... is not me. I would also point out that no one (to my knowledge anyway) is compelling you to read my posts, let alone reply to them. That is entirely your own choice.

Swampy · 23-06-2017 8:39am

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

To me the idea of an after life cheapens the value of our actual life. Similarly it cheapens the idea of things like sacrifice. So I have to admit that while I see no reason AT ALL to think there is actually an after life..... I am parallel to that also quite relieved to find it is so.

So I disagree with the above because my belief in some sort I afterlife doesn't cheapen the value of this actual life. I intend to live this life to the fullest as well as the next ( if there happens to be one, unless income back as a snail or something. Feck that).

nozzferrahhtoo · 23-06-2017 8:57am

Swampy wrote: »

So I disagree with the above because my belief in some sort I afterlife doesn't cheapen the value of this actual life.

Imagine if you flooded the market tomorrow with 1million tonnes of gold. What would happen to the value of gold world wide?

Much of the value of human life comes from its delicacy, transience and uniqueness. If you removed these attributes there would be a cheapening of the value of human life. What does it even mean in such a context, for example, to stand at a grave side and say "We will never see his like again"?

Let us take for a case study the claims made around the Christian Messiah Figure. The Nazerene was said to have "given his life" as a sacrifice to us while the god figurehead is claimed to have "Given his only begotten son".

But hang on, said son is now said to be living in a state of ETERNAL bliss and dominion at his fathers right hand side.

So what "sacrifice" was made here? What "gift" was "given"? At best it can be said that the son traded up one life for a better one, while the father figure basically LENT us a son, not gave, for a period of time that is functionally insignificant in the face of all eternity.

Their myths might have been somewhat more impressive had this Messiah figure been OFFERED eternal life of bliss and dominion, but to the horror of his loving father instead chose the "True Death" as a sacrifice for his ideals. THEN they might have a collection of fables of some worthy retelling, rather than one that serves as an outright insult to any parent who has been subjected to the horror of watching their child die.

And what of people who HAVE actually GIVEN their life for a person, a place, or an ideal? If in fact they did not lose their life at all, but merely transitioned from one stage of their eternal life to another.... then what worth does their "sacrifice" even have?

Also, as much as some of us might love our family and spouses, and some of us really do love them very deeply indeed............ I genuinely suspect that an ETERNITY spent with them would more than grate after a period.

But to reply directly to your sentence, I am not saying that YOUR belief in an after life cheapens the value of this life. I was not talking about belief at all. I was saying that if there ACTUALLY WAS such a thing, then it would cheapen the value of our current life. Which is a much different statement to make, so you were disagreeing with the wrong thing essentially. Your BELIEF there is 10 millions tonnes of gold in your garden would not affect the value of gold, but if there actually WAS then it may. So I would seperate the fact from the belief in the fact here.

Lavinia · 24-06-2017 8:11pm

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

I am not aware of having any "problem". I am merely stating a straight out fact that our culture, our language, our media, our literature...

World today and 40 years ago are not the same at all..

I am not sure how stating a mere fact, constitutes having a "problem" exactly?

My own 6 year old yesterday just had a minor revelation around her homework and described it herself, without any prompting from me, with the words "light at the end of the tunnel". That is just the kind of language and imagery that populates our language and our culture.

Again, I think it is you who are projecting that since you think life is in one way it has to be the same for anybody else. Why?
Your 6 year old prob had already more access to information than I had at the age of 16.

As I said though, the only one getting haughty here and who needs to "get over" what is being said.... is not me. I would also point out that no one (to my knowledge anyway) is compelling you to read my posts, let alone reply to them. That is entirely your own choice.

Sure, but you are quoting me personally, and then giving statements how what I said must be untrue because even your 6 year old etc.

Maybe you do not see this.
Anyway I have no rage whatsoever, Im just really surprised how - few times in my life I ever actually mentioned this there is always somebody who starts to jump.

Btw I even said that I had doubts myself and Id be probably more 'at peace' had I figured yes I knew about this before, therefore it had to be some brain activity after I was clinically dead.

I was lucky that my mom was a nurse and that both my parents were there at the time resuscitating me, otherwise I'd not be typing here today.

Have a good day.

nozzferrahhtoo · 26-06-2017 8:16am

Lavinia wrote: »

World today and 40 years ago are not the same at all..

Except yes it is. There are many differences sure, especially in terms of our technology. But overall the quantity of changes in 40 years is not as large as you make out. And certainly not large at all in the context SPECIFICALLY of what I am talking about.

Lavinia wrote: »

Again, I think it is you who are projecting that since you think life is in one way it has to be the same for anybody else. Why?

Can you quote me having made any such claim? I think you are now making things up on my behalf, and simply placing them in my mouth.

Lavinia wrote: »

Sure, but you are quoting me personally, and then giving statements how what I said must be untrue because even your 6 year old etc.

Again you are making up things I never said. I am making GENERAL comments and you are simply taking them personally. That is on you, not me. All I am saying is that, whatever your retrospective memory might be of your childhood, we are ALL subject to more imagery and memes and culture than we are aware of........ both at the time, and when looking back on it as an adult.

Lavinia wrote: »

Maybe you do not see this.

Yea, I have had a life long inability to see things that are actually not there. Go figure.

The afterlife

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