Reply to tim wood
Are you saying I should attempt to come into contact with the divine? I’d be open to trying but I’m not sure how to go about it. Also what do you mean by available evidence?
Reply to tim wood
I agree that those people are all dead. Can you prove that their consciousnesses are not still present at some level or at some place? There is no proof that there is no afterlife.
Well, obviously, but this essentially says nothing useful. There's no proof that there is no undiscovered species of mammal in Brazil, and there's equally no proof that there's no 800 pound gorilla in the core of the moon. Nevertheless, the former is fairly reasonable to believe; the latter is ridiculous. If I were to justify a belief that there's an undiscovered species somewhere in Brazil, but my only reason for believing it was that you can't prove it's not true, then I may as well believe in the 800 pound gorilla in the center of the moon.
Likewise, if there's a good reason to believe in the afterlife, then it can't possibly be the same reason to believe there's an 800 pound gorilla in the moon's core.
Reply to tim wood
I see what you’re saying. So for right now the only evidence is that we die and there is no evidence pointing to anything after that. This does discount religions though...?
There is only what it is like to be something. A world that isn't aware of itself at all is equal to a world that doesn't exist.
So long as there is any life after death, there is an afterlife. Who is to say "our" life is by any means coherent as a piece rather than continuous with the whole universe.
Reply to TheDarkElf No, this isn't about religion. I'm not religious, but I do think there is plenty of testimonial evidence that supports the idea of an afterlife. If you have the time read all of my posts.
Reply to A Seagull
I don’t believe in an afterlife, I don’t really know what I believe at this point, I’m just asking questions and trying to come to some sort of conclusion. So thanks for sharing your opinions.
Have you found some proof that shows that there is no afterlife?
Generally speaking, isn’t this one of the logical entailments of physicalism? But since neither can physicalism as metaphysics be proven with infallible certainty – the fallibilist in me questions if any metaphysics can – my own take is that what occurs subsequent to death is a fundamental unknown. Make peace with this unknown – everything from it possibly resulting in non-being to it resulting in any of the many hypotheses of an afterlife which various cultures have proposed – and the living of life will unfold without this issue of death being any form of problem.
For example, if I live my life virtuously and death results in my non-being, I won’t be bothered by anything subsequent to death, for I will not in any way be – so why not endeavor to cultivate virtue as best as I can while I’m here? There are pleasures to it that cannot be obtained via vice. If, however, I live my life virtuously and (here contemplating a worst case scenario) am placed into some Hell that’s eternally divided from Heaven after death, I will be there on account of having a clear conscious. Consequently, to hell with Heaven, then: I’d only want to be where those who made an effort to have a clear conscious go, future demons though we all are (and to be an angel in such topsy-turvy Heaven would be an absolute nightmare for me). The resulting conclusion: live life more virtually than not and one won’t be bothered by what occurs after death, regardless of what might actually occur.
That said, my own sense of trust has it that it will likely neither be non-being nor a Heaven/Hell divide. But it’s still and unknown to me in terms of what will be. To each their own beliefs.
Reply to javra
I like your outlook on this, hopefully I can become comfortable with not being sure what after-death looks like one day. Because an issue with your lifestyle of living more virtuously than not is, what if the hindu religion is in fact true. In that case because you didn't pay proper respects to the proper deities you go to hell (for example) and you could have prevented it and in fact been reincarnated into a better life if you had just said a few prayers or something. Or if the christian worldview is correct, in that case because you didn't accept christ into your heart you don't make it into heaven.
All this to say you have essentially covered all of this with your statements that you would rather be in hell anyway instead of a heaven which you feel like you didn't earn, (is that right?) and that you can be happy with your own efforts to be living virtuously.
All this to say you have essentially covered all of this with your statements that you would rather be in hell anyway instead of a heaven which you feel like you didn't earn, (is that right?)
Well, I wouldn't use the term "earned". If some Heaven is filled with brown-nosers who don't give a damn about what is right and what is wrong ... um, they really wouldn't want me there anyway; if it would be eternal (as in no actualization of non-being) I'd likely be causing eternal trouble for them. Besides, I'd much rather be with those that maintained a sense of integrity. So if Hell is filled with those who have, I'd then have earned that which I'd want - in this Cartesian-like hypothetical, to be in Hell. :cool:
We know what happens to ourselves after death and have the cadaver farms to prove it. We rot. But we can choose to do so in a dignified manner, for instance through burial or cremation. One can even donate himself to science if he chooses to.
Well, there is no 'walking' after legs stop moving.
And no 'symphony' after the orchestra stops playing and disbands.
And not a shred of corroborable evidence of 'minding' (i.e. mental activity, which includes 'self/emotional awareness' 'personal identity via memory-continuity' etc) after the brain (i.e. CNS) irreparably decomposes.
:chin:
Life after - independent of - life?
After all, 'life' is an ecology-nested, processional activity: living - an event, not a thing. So the question of "afterlife" incoherently assumes ... living after? - independent of? - living. :roll:
"After death"?
Death is neither a destination nor a threshold to a 'beyond'. Death is the cessation of living which fundamentally drives the living to postpone dying as long as possible (i.e. at minimum, long enough to reproduce). A candle's flame doesn't go anywhere else when it burns or gets blown out. Having no 'religious beliefs' or 'occult illuminations', I expect to rot and fertilize oblivion.
neonspectraltoastApril 18, 2020 at 21:59#4031100 likes
We're all aware of the subconscious, but for some reason seem to think there's not much we're not aware of. Become aware of more, and you'll have your answers.
neonspectraltoastApril 18, 2020 at 22:18#4031140 likes
I believe we are causes with effects, and those effects can't be entirely extrapolated from the cause. The identity is a dynamic thing, and exists in the subconscious world of everyone's being. Yes, I believe in an afterlife, because I believe no one lives a lie, which is what we're all doing.
Eventually we do experience a higher truth than the one we perceive in our waking hours. And the dead live on in the memory. If I have dreams of my dead mother, for instance, this is her maintaining to have an effect on me. How could it be any other way? I did not create my mother. I did not just imagine my mother.
So, all of us will continue to be causes that have effects long after our deaths. The unspoken truth of each of us will linger on in the subconscious, and communicate with the living, whether this be in revealing dreams or just in that subconscious world we aren't aware of when awake.
It's what @180 Proof said. When people talk of an afterlife, what they are describing is more life, only incoherent, magical life, the only basis of which is the imagination. (Real) life is this. Look around. Unreal/imaginary life is what is left when you exclude this. And the afterlife is one of many imaginaries. To say personal experience is evidence for it (as per @Sam26) is no more coherent than saying my memory of my dream is evidence my dream really happened. Of course, it's trivially easy to refute the reality of a dream when anyone can attest to you lying in bed when it allegedly occurred. But those claiming NDEs suggest an afterlife inure themselves from this criticism by creating a fantastic reality to which the only possible witnesses are precisely those who cannot possibly be witness to anything, i.e. the dead. Nice racket. So, it's merely intellectual feebleness to posit an afterlife, but it's intellectual dishonesty to pretend there is any evidence for it.
neonspectraltoastApril 19, 2020 at 02:30#4032060 likes
There is more basis the more aware you are. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, people are too caught up in their lives - their future happiness - to glimpse the unseen.
We are living in a world dominated by practical people with no imagination, and that is not a good thing. Trust me, you don't know everything.
And the afterlife is one of many imaginaries. To say personal experience is evidence for it (as per Sam26) is no more coherent than saying my memory of my dream is evidence my dream really happened.
This is what someone would say who never examined the evidence. First, dreams, hallucinations, or delusions don't describe real events as do NDEs. One can verify the accuracy of NDE testimonial evidence by talking to doctors, nurses, and family members who can verify or corroborate the evidence. This kind of response also shows a particular bias, because they don't respond to the arguments, they just give their uneducated opinions.
And yet none of this affects the hypothetical of reincarnations. For instance, some CNS gets produced in the far future whose nurture in the formative years results in an ego whose attributes – wants, aversions, metaphysical beliefs, and the like – present the same persona you hold in this lifetime.
I’m not saying this is a sure deal, and there is the issue of working memory not here playing a role between lifetimes, but the scenario doesn’t get nullified by life being an emergent process. Or even by physicalism’s tenets, for that matter. What it pivots upon is what one is to make of the notion of personal identity.
So, it's merely intellectual feebleness to posit an afterlife
No need to disparage. As it turns out, were death to be the instant cessation of all worry, strife, and pain via the obtainment of non-being, committing suicide would be the only rational thing to do for an overwhelming number of humans on this Earth. Why? Because they are in extreme pain and don’t want any. Do you then hold suicidal individuals – and suicidal murderers to boot – to be endowed with superior intellectual prowess? "No" is an easy answer; but why not, rationally speaking, if death actually is the obtained non-being of self?
No, it's the imaginatively disabled that see the distinction between the imagination and reality as somehow an unacceptable limit. Those of us who embrace the imagination, artistically and otherwise, find life enough.
Reply to Baden That death is the obtainment of non-being is a false premise? I don't think that's what you intend. So spell out the false premise to my question.
I admittedly think about the possibility of an afterlife a lot (religious upbringing detritus), but if anything, I think what keeps me thinking of it, other than left over religious feeling, is a problem of nihilism. I can't get away from the sense that, for any moral statement to be meaningful, it requires an antecedent. And if the antecedent is argued to exist within the same physical world in which it's object exists (i.e. an argument from someone who denies an afterlife), then the moral statement itself breaks down. So for a moral statement to obtain, there needs to be a framework that's supraphysical, which suggests "life beyond life", if you will. Life beyond the birth-and-death experience that lasts 70 years, if one is lucky (or unlucky).
In other words, there's a lot of political screeds around here from folks who don't believe in an afterlife. What i don't understand is...why are these political issues morally problematic to you if you believe you'll die in x amount of years, and devolve into a state of nothingness? Why waste your energy windbagging about the latest horrible politician if, when you die, it's all meaningless?
So it's a nihilistic problem. Am I missing something? If not, how do we avoid nihilism and reject the possibility of an afterlife at the same time?
PS - also, I feel like a common sentiment from you non-afterlifers is the concept of "furthering the race"; "my life ends, but I make the lives of children better". So what? Who cares? Do you actually care? It feels like religious posturing.
Life is a good in itself, dude, as is moral behavior. What's nihilistic is to reject life because you can't have more. In this case, infinitely more. Or to reject moral behavior because there is no ultimate reward.
I want to embrace the sentiment of "life is a good in itself", but this is exactly what I'm talking about when I say "religious posturing". Life is hell for a lot of people. But sometimes, the people who's lives are a living hell seem to understand life the best. This seems like a complexity that can't be solved with a yes/no answer to the question of whether life continues after death. To the say the f'ing least, you know?
You haven't addressed the problem I'm trying to illustrate about whether a moral claim can work without a metaphysical antecedent, as far as I can see.
Yeah, it is exactly nihilistic to reject life because you can't have more, considering nihilism as meaning life is meaningless. If there's no "more", there's no antecedent, then there's no meaning, as I was trying to illustrate (probably didn't do it well). But your tone suggests that this is selfish; that it's selfish to want more than life. Under what grounds is it selfish? (or did I misread you?)
And no, for me, it's not about "ultimate reward". I can't give two shits about reward. What I want is for moral behavior to obtain concretely; beyond the criminal act, beyond the penitentiary, beyond the rehabilitation... it needs to mean something other than what it means in the blow-by-blow moment of our lizard brains. If it's going to mean anything at all. Off the top of my head...
"I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
For a guarantee."
I'll not finished talking. The above is just where I'm coming from. You've already rejected meaning and morality when you need to search for some ultimate grounding to "make it real for you". Cart before horse.
Reply to TheDarkElf NOTHING. Just my opinion. You might like to read Heaven and Hell: A History of the Afterlife by Bart D. Ehrman. He explains how heaven and hell came to acquire their peculiar characteristics over a period of time. Back in the day (3000 years ago, say) the Jews thought that when you died you were dead. Nothing more.
It's a message preached in the Church Without Christ, where the blind don't see, the lame don't walk, and the dead stay dead. Wise Blood, by Flannery O'Connor.
No, but you've started talking a lot more flippantly than you used to. Hop all's good in your hood...
You're summarizing an interpretation of my ideas rather than addressing them here, which is fine, I guess. But I won't amass more troops against your summarizations of your interpretations of my ideas.
I'm trying to get to where we're going to end up anyway. I reject the premise that it's ultimately possible to verify that moral claims objectively obtain. And I don't think it matters. In fact, I think that is what is playing politics with morality. Apologies, if I came across as flippant.
I reject the premise that it's ultimately possible to verify that moral claims objectively obtain.
Ah, here we are. I...don't, I think. Yes, I definitely don't reject that.
How does "it not being possible to verify that moral claims objectively obtain" not matter? I think I can sense where we're going, but I'm asking in good faith, ready for the ride (but I know it's also a beaten horse; skip if you want).
All I'm getting at is...I can't even summarize it in a sentence, I guess.
Lemme try this: It's flippant to deny the possibility of life after death.
And Jeff is cool but over-rated. Typical 27 club shit. (And clearly I'm aware you didn't actually think that posting some stupid Jeff Buckley lyrics would make me say "oh yeah, exactly! That's exactly what I meant!")
Side-note: I don't want to disrespect those who are in extreme pain (though they represent a minority and not the "overwhelming majority" as javra claimed) and employ coping mechanisms to deal with it. That's a rational strategy. Though to a degree surface-level; there's a certain level of deliberate self-deception involved probably. Anyway, I'd jump on that bus too if I needed to.
How does "it not being possible to verify that moral claims objectively obtain" not matter?
Because moral behavior is good in itself. The way to verify that is to experience it. If you experience it, then it obtains. Looking for some objective guarantee is futile and self-defeating.
Lemme try this: It's flippant to deny the possibility of life after death.
My position, more precisely, is to deny that there is any reason, evidential or otherwise, to believe in life after death and that the concept is inherently contradictory.
My position, more precisely, is to deny that there is any reason, evidential or otherwise, to believe in life after death.
I've had experiences to say otherwise, so I think the conversation ends here, properly speaking, via our two approaches. But I'm more than happy to carry on.
Side-note: I don't want to disrespect those who are in extreme pain (though they represent a minority and not the "overwhelming majority" as javra claimed) and employ coping mechanisms to deal with it. That's a rational strategy. Though to a degree surface-level; there's a certain level of deliberate self-deception involved probably. Anyway, I'd jump on that bus too if I needed to.
I'm just re-reading this, and is the suggestion here that religious feeling is a coping mechanism for "extreme pain" (whatever that is)? Or am I mis-reading that?
I've been quite drawn to Buddhism all my adult life. And contrary to popular opinion Buddhism teaches that there are hells - more than one! - into which beings are reborn due to their karma, where they remain for aeons of kalpas (= a very long time, Indian astronomers conceived of aeons in quite realistic terms).
Actually there are six realms into which beings are (constantly) reborn - hell realms, animal realms, hungry-ghost realms, 'demi-god' realms and heavenly realms. (None of these realms constitute Nirv??a which utterly transcends all realms, although in popular religion, Nirv??a is frequently imagined to be a kind of heaven.)
So what do I make of this? I don't claim to know, but I have a conviction that 'identity overflows physicality', as it were - that there is both a 'before' and an 'after' of the book-ends of this physical birth. This doesn't mean that the person I am now continues in another life. But whomever or whatever inhabits those other realms, they too are beings and they are born with an inherited past and what they do will propagate states of being into the future. I'm very vague on detail but I think something like Sheldrake's 'morphic resonance' could provide an explanatory medium (see here for example.)
If you read into the early Buddhist texts very little is said about it in detail; it's simply the assumed cultural background and the Buddha is, among other things, 'lokavidu', that is, 'knower of worlds'. This means he is able to foresee where beings are bound, but he too is generally extremely reticent about the details. (Early Buddhism, on the whole, is noticeably lacking in 'believe it or else' kinds of dialogue.)
In later buddhist iconography, the 'six realms' are graphically depicted in for instance the Tibetan Bhavachakra paintings (meaning literally 'wheel of becoming'. In classical Indian culture, travelling panditas would carry one of these with them and then hang them in the hall as the subject for lectures on the fate of the soul.)
As an inhabitant of modern culture, I don't want to interpret myth literally, but I also don't want to relegate it to the domain of 'mere mythology'. I'm sure that heaven and hell are more than 'mere' myth, although again, vague about the details (although also convinced enough to worry about them). But I also understand that rejection of such notions is one of the cardinal beliefs of secular culture, and so this forum is probably not the place to thrash it out.
I'm on board with the vagueness, but also, why not thrash it out here? What better place to play devil's advocate and challenge the boring, typical notions? I'll unleash the devil's scourge any day.
MerkwurdichliebeApril 19, 2020 at 06:04#4032820 likes
Reply to Noble Dust I've had some extremely acrimonious exchanges in the past about these subjects, so I'm cautious.
Anyway - I think there is truth in the Buddhist teachings of 'bardos' which are the realms of being that the recently-deceased traverse (see for example this book although I found it so challenging I ended up donating it :fear: . )
Something stuck with me, which is that beings in those between states will instinctively follow or attach themselves to things they're drawn to, which are very much a result of the habits they've formed. So if you're drawn to the wrong things, you end up manifesting in bad states of being - meaning that habits will have disproportionately large consequences in such a situation.
I've been quite drawn to Buddhism all my adult life. And contrary to popular opinion Buddhism teaches that there are hells - more than one! - into which beings are reborn due to their karma, where they remain for aeons of kalpas (= a very long time, Indian astronomers conceived of aeons in quite realistic terms).
Actually there are six realms into which beings are (constantly) reborn - hell realms, animal realms, hungry-ghost realms, 'demi-god' realms and heavenly realms. (None of these realms constitute Nirv??a which utterly transcends all realms, although in popular religion, Nirv??a is frequently imagined to be a kind of heaven.)
So what do I make of this? I don't claim to know, but I have a conviction that 'identity overflows physicality', as it were - that there is both a 'before' and an 'after' of the book-ends of this physical birth. This doesn't mean that the person I am now continues in another life. But whomever or whatever inhabits those other realms, they too are beings and they are born with an inherited past and what they do will propagate states of being into the future. I'm very vague on detail but I think something like Sheldrake's 'morphic resonance' could provide an explanatory medium (see here for example.)
If you read into the early Buddhist texts very little is said about it in detail; it's simply the assumed cultural background and the Buddha is, among other things, 'lokavidu', that is, 'knower of worlds'. This means he is able to foresee where beings are bound, but he too is generally extremely reticent about the details. (Early Buddhism, on the whole, is noticeably lacking in 'believe it or else' kinds of dialogue.)
In later buddhist iconography, the 'six realms' are graphically depicted in for instance the Tibetan Bhavachakra paintings (meaning literally 'wheel of becoming'. In classical Indian culture, travelling panditas would carry one of these with them and then hang them in the hall as the subject for lectures on the fate of the soul.)
As an inhabitant of modern culture, I don't want to interpret myth literally, but I also don't want to relegate it to the domain of 'mere mythology'. I'm sure that heaven and hell are more than 'mere' myth, although again, vague about the details (although also convinced enough to worry about them). But I also understand that rejection of such notions is one of the cardinal beliefs of secular culture, and so this forum is probably not the place to thrash it out.
Thank god. My favorite living filosofer is back. Did you achieve your goal? 20,000 words was it? In that case, I can leave. If not....
Reply to Merkwurdichliebe Dammit, still at it. Yesterday, I went to the trouble of methodically purging all browser history pertaining to Philosophy forum, but old habits die hard. I'll probably get reborn in some cyber-hell comprising constant circular arguments. :confused:
MerkwurdichliebeApril 19, 2020 at 06:18#4032880 likes
Word, I'm cautiously with eternal return in the sense of reincarnation, maybe..?? Not sure what you mean otherwise. At least from what you quoted.
Eternal return is not necessarily reincarnation. Reincarnation implies some sense of externelly accumulated progress. That would mean each lifetime would be unique unto itself, a butterfly effect, as it were. Eternal return is identical in every aspect, externally speaking...but insofar as the existing one is concerned, internally speaking, that is infinite in all possibility. I can explain more if you need explanation.
I've had some extremely acrimonious exchanges in the past about these subjects, so I'm cautious.
I've had acrimonious exchanges about lots of things here, which doesn't detract me from posting, but maybe it should? Or maybe not. I'd rather cut my teeth right in, when I feel the urge, and bandage the wounds later.
Bardos I only know as a phrase from reading about the Tibetan Book of The Dead (I think?). Which interests me for sure. I haven't gone there, but have been attracted to it.
Something stuck with me, which is that beings in those between states will instinctively follow or attach themselves to things they're drawn to, which are very much a result of the habits they've formed. So if you're drawn to the wrong things, end up manifesting in bad states of being - meaning that habits will have disproportionately large consequences in such a situation.
Oof, I hesitate to be too specific (now I get what you mean about being cautious) but this is exactly what Robert Monroe talks about in his "Journey's Outside The Body" series of books. Which, if you "there's-no-life-outside-the-body-LMAO" strong bois can fathom, is actually an extremely logical and scientific description of OBE's that are something similar to @Sam26's descriptions of NDE's.
Dammit, still at it. Yesterday, I went to the trouble of methodically purging all browser history pertaining to Philosophy forum, but old habits die hard. I'll probably get reborn in some cyber-hell comprising constant circular arguments. :confused:
You are already here, slowly becoming what you are, and slowly becoming aware of where you are...simultaneously. It never ends, know what I mean. :wink:
But, don't quit. Finish the 20,000. And send me some of your philosophy writing rather than deleting it. I always love the Wayfarer wisdom.
Yeah, that was not a cogent explanation, so I would need one, in order to respond.
Well, you did not specify that you required a cogent explanation. And in all reality, I'm really not qualified to offer anything cogent, whatsoever. So sorry.
Lol, a cogent argument is assumed. But that's totally fine, I'd be happy to hear a "non-cogent" argument if you have one to give. I'd probably respond in a similarly non-cogent manner. Non-cogency is sort of my speciality...
MerkwurdichliebeApril 19, 2020 at 06:38#4032990 likes
I'd be happy to hear a "non-cogent" argument if you have one to give. I'd probably respond in a similarly non-cogent manner. Non-cogency is sort of my speciality...
Now you are putting me in a corner, I feel the pressure of producing a non-cogent argument, so if you insist further I will try my best. Until then, I will say that I look forward to seeing your specialization in the artform of non-cogent argument.
MerkwurdichliebeApril 19, 2020 at 06:46#4033030 likes
No, fuck the mods, in this instance. i.e. @Baden@jamalrob@StreetlightX@Hanover, etc. Fuck them for moving a thread that deals with universal problems to the lounge where no one will see it, and it will happily die. Fuck that shit.
MerkwurdichliebeApril 19, 2020 at 06:54#4033050 likes
No, fuck the mods, in this instance. i.e. Baden @jamalrob @StreetlightX @Hanover, etc. Fuck them for moving a thread that deals with universal problems to the lounge where no one will see it, and it will happily die. Fuck that shit.
I mean, why do they get such special treatment....fuck everyone equally. If anything, fuck me most... know what I mean? And fuck "universal problems" most, those create more trouble than they're worth...its masturbation at best.
MerkwurdichliebeApril 19, 2020 at 06:57#4033070 likes
But give me a bit, I will explain more about eternal return, at least how I interpret it. Standby...
Reply to Baden It was me. It's possible I was a little hasty in moving it, because I didn't really look at the responses, basing my decision mainly on the OP. But still, I don't think it's a philosophical question so I'm not too regretful about my decision.
Reply to jamalrob
If by this you mean most of the other discussions I've started have been on the lounge that doesn't seem to be a legitimate enough reason to move something. I have really enjoyed people really diving into the question I posed and I feel like questions relating to the afterlife and death are a religious philosophical topic, not a random dicussion.
I'll debate anyone who wants to, on the subject of whether there is evidence that consciousness survives death. I'll debate them formally in the debate thread with a moderator.
I say turn the whole place into a lounge. Cigarettes, beers, a jukebox, live music on the weekends; casual philosophical conversations that sometimes explode into deep revelations...
I feel like even within the same religions there is a large discrepancy between peoples views on afterlife and I'd love to hear some thoughts.
If you retain sufficient consciousness that you no longer need a body to support it, and can learn to see without eyes, and to communicate via telepathy, you may have the option to remain in your "soul-level" disincorporated state while learning enough to be of useful service.
Otherwise, whatever passes in you for consciousness will gradually fade, for lack of suitable support mechanisms, whereupon you may be reincorporated in another body to try again. Or, you may be left in a not-self-aware state (a.k.a. death) indefinitely.
I hope that whichever state we end up in is a function of choices and actions from our life experience, but suspect that much of our fate is randomly determined.
That would depend upon the particular "soul state," would it not? But whatever state one finds oneself in, or betwixt, an agreed-upon definition of time is a necessary precursor to any sensible answer to your question.
Personally, I do not believe that time exists as a physical dimension, although it is certainly an oft-useful mathematical tool. I've solved many practical physics problems involving "t" or its derivatives, because they can be interpreted in terms of our actual experiences and measurement methods.
You might consider an alternative question-- what physical events must transpire in order for a "soul" to change its state of consciousness?
I'll debate anyone who wants to, on the subject of whether there is evidence that consciousness survives death. I'll debate them formally in the debate thread with a moderator.
Evidence for independent consciousness abounds, but the history of honest investigation indicates that evidence is unimportant in the absence of a reasonable and verifiable paradigm into which the evidence fits. Thomas Kuhn explains this in fine philosophical detail, in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.
For example, despite numerous reports of ball lightening and its seemingly inexplicable behavior, the sightings were dismissed as the delusions of incompetent or lying observers-- until physicists investigating nuclear fusion possibilities developed mathematical theories describing plasmas. Their theories clearly applied to ball lightening. Suddenly, people who reported ball lightening were not written off.
I would naturally enjoy debating competent interlocutors on the possibility of a useful consciousness paradigm, but that is not possible on this forum without the exclusion of unqualified interference.
For example, despite numerous reports of ball lightening and its seemingly inexplicable behavior, the sightings were dismissed as the delusions of incompetent or lying observers-- until physicists investigating nuclear fusion possibilities developed mathematical theories describing plasmas. Their theories clearly applied to ball lightening. Suddenly, people who reported ball lightening were not written off.
The problem seems to be, as I've mentioned before in other threads, is that people seem to think that unless science proves X, then we can't know X. My claim is based on knowledge acquired in other ways. For example, I don't need science to tell me that the orange juice I drank this morning is sweet, I've tasted it, or that there is an oak tree in my back yard, I've seen it. And there are other ways that we come to have knowledge, for instance, much of what we know is based on testimonial evidence. While it is true that testimonial evidence can be very unreliable, it can also be very strong. I've put forth my argument in the thread https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/1980/evidence-of-consciousness-surviving-the-body/p18
The problem seems to be, as I've mentioned before in other threads, is that people seem to think that unless science proves X, then we can't know X. My claim is based on knowledge acquired in other ways. For example, I don't need science to tell me that the orange juice I drank this morning is sweet, I've tasted it, or that there is an oak tree in my back yard, I've seen it. And there are other ways that we come to have knowledge, for instance, much of what we know is based on testimonial evidence. While it is true that testimonial evidence can be very unreliable, it can also be very strong. I've put forth my argument in the thread https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/1980/evidence-of-consciousness-surviving-the-body/p18
Sam,
Evidently I've failed, once again, to competently express the concept I tried to convey. Unfortunately, I do not know of a better explanation. Should you choose to reread what I said and figure out what I meant about the relationship between proofs and paradigms, let's see if we might have a constructive discussion. T. Kuhn would provide a more definitive, and certainly more credible explanation of such concepts. --GL
I have a secular take on the notion of an afterlife which happily bends the rules of its accepted meaning.
Every action a person takes in their life irreversibly changes the informational configuration of the universe with consequences which are presumed to have a permanent physical effect until the end of time. The physical link is due to the way information can only change from one state to another at the cost of some finite quantity of energy. A most exaggerated example is the way we still discuss the works of dead philosophers; from the perspective of the infosphere they're neither prelife nor afterlife. This certainly also applies to ordinary people but is much harder to illustrate. Surreal but not supernatural.
By the above account an afterlife can be demythologized into a intergenerational reservoir of information. If this is begging the question, it may suit our purposes to merely define information as a medium of exchange for now, which, at least for most of us, is constantly demonstrated by digital technology.
Comments (107)
Are you saying I should attempt to come into contact with the divine? I’d be open to trying but I’m not sure how to go about it. Also what do you mean by available evidence?
Views on an afterlife, beyond those of no afterlife, are all lies.
I agree that those people are all dead. Can you prove that their consciousnesses are not still present at some level or at some place? There is no proof that there is no afterlife.
How are you able to be so sure in your opinion? Have you found some proof that shows that there is no afterlife?
Well, obviously, but this essentially says nothing useful. There's no proof that there is no undiscovered species of mammal in Brazil, and there's equally no proof that there's no 800 pound gorilla in the core of the moon. Nevertheless, the former is fairly reasonable to believe; the latter is ridiculous. If I were to justify a belief that there's an undiscovered species somewhere in Brazil, but my only reason for believing it was that you can't prove it's not true, then I may as well believe in the 800 pound gorilla in the center of the moon.
Likewise, if there's a good reason to believe in the afterlife, then it can't possibly be the same reason to believe there's an 800 pound gorilla in the moon's core.
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/1980/evidence-of-consciousness-surviving-the-body/p1
I see what you’re saying. So for right now the only evidence is that we die and there is no evidence pointing to anything after that. This does discount religions though...?
This makes sense, yeah. This is not taking into account a religious aspect though?
This is a great post, the testimonial idea definitely holds a lot of stock. Are you thinking about them in a specific case or religion?
So long as there is any life after death, there is an afterlife. Who is to say "our" life is by any means coherent as a piece rather than continuous with the whole universe.
I don't need a proof. There is no evidence beyond warped hearsay.
But believe what you want. If it makes you happy to believe in an afterlife, I have no problem with that.
I don’t believe in an afterlife, I don’t really know what I believe at this point, I’m just asking questions and trying to come to some sort of conclusion. So thanks for sharing your opinions.
Generally speaking, isn’t this one of the logical entailments of physicalism? But since neither can physicalism as metaphysics be proven with infallible certainty – the fallibilist in me questions if any metaphysics can – my own take is that what occurs subsequent to death is a fundamental unknown. Make peace with this unknown – everything from it possibly resulting in non-being to it resulting in any of the many hypotheses of an afterlife which various cultures have proposed – and the living of life will unfold without this issue of death being any form of problem.
For example, if I live my life virtuously and death results in my non-being, I won’t be bothered by anything subsequent to death, for I will not in any way be – so why not endeavor to cultivate virtue as best as I can while I’m here? There are pleasures to it that cannot be obtained via vice. If, however, I live my life virtuously and (here contemplating a worst case scenario) am placed into some Hell that’s eternally divided from Heaven after death, I will be there on account of having a clear conscious. Consequently, to hell with Heaven, then: I’d only want to be where those who made an effort to have a clear conscious go, future demons though we all are (and to be an angel in such topsy-turvy Heaven would be an absolute nightmare for me). The resulting conclusion: live life more virtually than not and one won’t be bothered by what occurs after death, regardless of what might actually occur.
That said, my own sense of trust has it that it will likely neither be non-being nor a Heaven/Hell divide. But it’s still and unknown to me in terms of what will be. To each their own beliefs.
I like your outlook on this, hopefully I can become comfortable with not being sure what after-death looks like one day. Because an issue with your lifestyle of living more virtuously than not is, what if the hindu religion is in fact true. In that case because you didn't pay proper respects to the proper deities you go to hell (for example) and you could have prevented it and in fact been reincarnated into a better life if you had just said a few prayers or something. Or if the christian worldview is correct, in that case because you didn't accept christ into your heart you don't make it into heaven.
All this to say you have essentially covered all of this with your statements that you would rather be in hell anyway instead of a heaven which you feel like you didn't earn, (is that right?) and that you can be happy with your own efforts to be living virtuously.
Well, I wouldn't use the term "earned". If some Heaven is filled with brown-nosers who don't give a damn about what is right and what is wrong ... um, they really wouldn't want me there anyway; if it would be eternal (as in no actualization of non-being) I'd likely be causing eternal trouble for them. Besides, I'd much rather be with those that maintained a sense of integrity. So if Hell is filled with those who have, I'd then have earned that which I'd want - in this Cartesian-like hypothetical, to be in Hell. :cool:
Quoting TheDarkElf
That's about it.
fair enough
Ahahaha so true
We know what happens to ourselves after death and have the cadaver farms to prove it. We rot. But we can choose to do so in a dignified manner, for instance through burial or cremation. One can even donate himself to science if he chooses to.
Very true, what do you plan to do after you die?
I’ll leave that to the living.
Fair enough yeah
Surprise me! (as said by Bob Hope on being asked where he would like to be buried.)
After life.
Well, there is no 'walking' after legs stop moving.
And no 'symphony' after the orchestra stops playing and disbands.
And not a shred of corroborable evidence of 'minding' (i.e. mental activity, which includes 'self/emotional awareness' 'personal identity via memory-continuity' etc) after the brain (i.e. CNS) irreparably decomposes.
:chin:
Life after - independent of - life?
After all, 'life' is an ecology-nested, processional activity: living - an event, not a thing. So the question of "afterlife" incoherently assumes ... living after? - independent of? - living. :roll:
"After death"?
Death is neither a destination nor a threshold to a 'beyond'. Death is the cessation of living which fundamentally drives the living to postpone dying as long as possible (i.e. at minimum, long enough to reproduce). A candle's flame doesn't go anywhere else when it burns or gets blown out. Having no 'religious beliefs' or 'occult illuminations', I expect to rot and fertilize oblivion.
Eventually we do experience a higher truth than the one we perceive in our waking hours. And the dead live on in the memory. If I have dreams of my dead mother, for instance, this is her maintaining to have an effect on me. How could it be any other way? I did not create my mother. I did not just imagine my mother.
So, all of us will continue to be causes that have effects long after our deaths. The unspoken truth of each of us will linger on in the subconscious, and communicate with the living, whether this be in revealing dreams or just in that subconscious world we aren't aware of when awake.
hahah
This is beautiful, thanks for sharing.
nice analogies, I like your firm opinions too
We are living in a world dominated by practical people with no imagination, and that is not a good thing. Trust me, you don't know everything.
This is what someone would say who never examined the evidence. First, dreams, hallucinations, or delusions don't describe real events as do NDEs. One can verify the accuracy of NDE testimonial evidence by talking to doctors, nurses, and family members who can verify or corroborate the evidence. This kind of response also shows a particular bias, because they don't respond to the arguments, they just give their uneducated opinions.
And yet none of this affects the hypothetical of reincarnations. For instance, some CNS gets produced in the far future whose nurture in the formative years results in an ego whose attributes – wants, aversions, metaphysical beliefs, and the like – present the same persona you hold in this lifetime.
I’m not saying this is a sure deal, and there is the issue of working memory not here playing a role between lifetimes, but the scenario doesn’t get nullified by life being an emergent process. Or even by physicalism’s tenets, for that matter. What it pivots upon is what one is to make of the notion of personal identity.
Quoting Baden
No need to disparage. As it turns out, were death to be the instant cessation of all worry, strife, and pain via the obtainment of non-being, committing suicide would be the only rational thing to do for an overwhelming number of humans on this Earth. Why? Because they are in extreme pain and don’t want any. Do you then hold suicidal individuals – and suicidal murderers to boot – to be endowed with superior intellectual prowess? "No" is an easy answer; but why not, rationally speaking, if death actually is the obtained non-being of self?
Bunch of non-sequiturs and red herrings.
Here's the claim: There is no evidence for an afterlife.
Here's the way to refute it: Show me the evidence.
Intellectual honesty would have addressed my question.
No, it's the imaginatively disabled that see the distinction between the imagination and reality as somehow an unacceptable limit. Those of us who embrace the imagination, artistically and otherwise, find life enough.
Your question is based on a false premise and just isn't worth answering. Really, read what you wrote. Think about it.
No, you work out which part of your post is nonsense. It's not worth my time.
What are you replying to?
yea, ditto
I admittedly think about the possibility of an afterlife a lot (religious upbringing detritus), but if anything, I think what keeps me thinking of it, other than left over religious feeling, is a problem of nihilism. I can't get away from the sense that, for any moral statement to be meaningful, it requires an antecedent. And if the antecedent is argued to exist within the same physical world in which it's object exists (i.e. an argument from someone who denies an afterlife), then the moral statement itself breaks down. So for a moral statement to obtain, there needs to be a framework that's supraphysical, which suggests "life beyond life", if you will. Life beyond the birth-and-death experience that lasts 70 years, if one is lucky (or unlucky).
In other words, there's a lot of political screeds around here from folks who don't believe in an afterlife. What i don't understand is...why are these political issues morally problematic to you if you believe you'll die in x amount of years, and devolve into a state of nothingness? Why waste your energy windbagging about the latest horrible politician if, when you die, it's all meaningless?
So it's a nihilistic problem. Am I missing something? If not, how do we avoid nihilism and reject the possibility of an afterlife at the same time?
PS - also, I feel like a common sentiment from you non-afterlifers is the concept of "furthering the race"; "my life ends, but I make the lives of children better". So what? Who cares? Do you actually care? It feels like religious posturing.
Life is a good in itself, dude, as is moral behavior. What's nihilistic is to reject life because you can't have more. In this case, infinitely more. Or to reject moral behavior because there is no ultimate reward.
I want to embrace the sentiment of "life is a good in itself", but this is exactly what I'm talking about when I say "religious posturing". Life is hell for a lot of people. But sometimes, the people who's lives are a living hell seem to understand life the best. This seems like a complexity that can't be solved with a yes/no answer to the question of whether life continues after death. To the say the f'ing least, you know?
You haven't addressed the problem I'm trying to illustrate about whether a moral claim can work without a metaphysical antecedent, as far as I can see.
Yeah, it is exactly nihilistic to reject life because you can't have more, considering nihilism as meaning life is meaningless. If there's no "more", there's no antecedent, then there's no meaning, as I was trying to illustrate (probably didn't do it well). But your tone suggests that this is selfish; that it's selfish to want more than life. Under what grounds is it selfish? (or did I misread you?)
And no, for me, it's not about "ultimate reward". I can't give two shits about reward. What I want is for moral behavior to obtain concretely; beyond the criminal act, beyond the penitentiary, beyond the rehabilitation... it needs to mean something other than what it means in the blow-by-blow moment of our lizard brains. If it's going to mean anything at all. Off the top of my head...
You like Jeff Buckley?
"I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
I can't help from looking outside for a guarantee
For a guarantee."
:meh: Damn, I remember the days when we used to have some discussions.
I'll not finished talking. The above is just where I'm coming from. You've already rejected meaning and morality when you need to search for some ultimate grounding to "make it real for you". Cart before horse.
It's a message preached in the Church Without Christ, where the blind don't see, the lame don't walk, and the dead stay dead. Wise Blood, by Flannery O'Connor.
No, but you've started talking a lot more flippantly than you used to. Hop all's good in your hood...
You're summarizing an interpretation of my ideas rather than addressing them here, which is fine, I guess. But I won't amass more troops against your summarizations of your interpretations of my ideas.
I'm trying to get to where we're going to end up anyway. I reject the premise that it's ultimately possible to verify that moral claims objectively obtain. And I don't think it matters. In fact, I think that is what is playing politics with morality. Apologies, if I came across as flippant.
Ah, here we are. I...don't, I think. Yes, I definitely don't reject that.
How does "it not being possible to verify that moral claims objectively obtain" not matter? I think I can sense where we're going, but I'm asking in good faith, ready for the ride (but I know it's also a beaten horse; skip if you want).
All I'm getting at is...I can't even summarize it in a sentence, I guess.
Lemme try this: It's flippant to deny the possibility of life after death.
And Jeff is cool but over-rated. Typical 27 club shit. (And clearly I'm aware you didn't actually think that posting some stupid Jeff Buckley lyrics would make me say "oh yeah, exactly! That's exactly what I meant!")
Quoting Noble Dust
Because moral behavior is good in itself. The way to verify that is to experience it. If you experience it, then it obtains. Looking for some objective guarantee is futile and self-defeating.
Quoting Noble Dust
My position, more precisely, is to deny that there is any reason, evidential or otherwise, to believe in life after death and that the concept is inherently contradictory.
Quoting Noble Dust
The flippancy must be catching.
I don't think that's enough. Moral behavior obtains emotionally, ultimately. But emotions are fleeting. Experience is tied to emotion.
Quoting Baden
I've had experiences to say otherwise, so I think the conversation ends here, properly speaking, via our two approaches. But I'm more than happy to carry on.
Quoting Baden
Didn't mean to be flippant about his passing, my bad. Thought it wasn't too soon...
I'm just re-reading this, and is the suggestion here that religious feeling is a coping mechanism for "extreme pain" (whatever that is)? Or am I mis-reading that?
Actually there are six realms into which beings are (constantly) reborn - hell realms, animal realms, hungry-ghost realms, 'demi-god' realms and heavenly realms. (None of these realms constitute Nirv??a which utterly transcends all realms, although in popular religion, Nirv??a is frequently imagined to be a kind of heaven.)
So what do I make of this? I don't claim to know, but I have a conviction that 'identity overflows physicality', as it were - that there is both a 'before' and an 'after' of the book-ends of this physical birth. This doesn't mean that the person I am now continues in another life. But whomever or whatever inhabits those other realms, they too are beings and they are born with an inherited past and what they do will propagate states of being into the future. I'm very vague on detail but I think something like Sheldrake's 'morphic resonance' could provide an explanatory medium (see here for example.)
If you read into the early Buddhist texts very little is said about it in detail; it's simply the assumed cultural background and the Buddha is, among other things, 'lokavidu', that is, 'knower of worlds'. This means he is able to foresee where beings are bound, but he too is generally extremely reticent about the details. (Early Buddhism, on the whole, is noticeably lacking in 'believe it or else' kinds of dialogue.)
In later buddhist iconography, the 'six realms' are graphically depicted in for instance the Tibetan Bhavachakra paintings (meaning literally 'wheel of becoming'. In classical Indian culture, travelling panditas would carry one of these with them and then hang them in the hall as the subject for lectures on the fate of the soul.)
As an inhabitant of modern culture, I don't want to interpret myth literally, but I also don't want to relegate it to the domain of 'mere mythology'. I'm sure that heaven and hell are more than 'mere' myth, although again, vague about the details (although also convinced enough to worry about them). But I also understand that rejection of such notions is one of the cardinal beliefs of secular culture, and so this forum is probably not the place to thrash it out.
Sorry, it's 6am, my COVID lockdown bedtime. I'll get back to this tomorrow.
I'm on board with the vagueness, but also, why not thrash it out here? What better place to play devil's advocate and challenge the boring, typical notions? I'll unleash the devil's scourge any day.
Eternal Return. Absolutely!!!
Discovered by Kierkegaard, popularized by Nietzsche.
Anyway - I think there is truth in the Buddhist teachings of 'bardos' which are the realms of being that the recently-deceased traverse (see for example this book although I found it so challenging I ended up donating it :fear: . )
Something stuck with me, which is that beings in those between states will instinctively follow or attach themselves to things they're drawn to, which are very much a result of the habits they've formed. So if you're drawn to the wrong things, you end up manifesting in bad states of being - meaning that habits will have disproportionately large consequences in such a situation.
Word, I'm cautiously with eternal return in the sense of reincarnation, maybe..?? Not sure what you mean otherwise. At least from what you quoted.
Thank god. My favorite living filosofer is back. Did you achieve your goal? 20,000 words was it? In that case, I can leave. If not....
Eternal return is not necessarily reincarnation. Reincarnation implies some sense of externelly accumulated progress. That would mean each lifetime would be unique unto itself, a butterfly effect, as it were. Eternal return is identical in every aspect, externally speaking...but insofar as the existing one is concerned, internally speaking, that is infinite in all possibility. I can explain more if you need explanation.
I've had acrimonious exchanges about lots of things here, which doesn't detract me from posting, but maybe it should? Or maybe not. I'd rather cut my teeth right in, when I feel the urge, and bandage the wounds later.
Bardos I only know as a phrase from reading about the Tibetan Book of The Dead (I think?). Which interests me for sure. I haven't gone there, but have been attracted to it.
Quoting Wayfarer
Oof, I hesitate to be too specific (now I get what you mean about being cautious) but this is exactly what Robert Monroe talks about in his "Journey's Outside The Body" series of books. Which, if you "there's-no-life-outside-the-body-LMAO" strong bois can fathom, is actually an extremely logical and scientific description of OBE's that are something similar to @Sam26's descriptions of NDE's.
Yeah, that was not a cogent explanation, so I would need one, in order to respond.
You are already here, slowly becoming what you are, and slowly becoming aware of where you are...simultaneously. It never ends, know what I mean. :wink:
But, don't quit. Finish the 20,000. And send me some of your philosophy writing rather than deleting it. I always love the Wayfarer wisdom.
What a fucking disgrace to philosophy.
Well, you did not specify that you required a cogent explanation. And in all reality, I'm really not qualified to offer anything cogent, whatsoever. So sorry.
Lol, a cogent argument is assumed. But that's totally fine, I'd be happy to hear a "non-cogent" argument if you have one to give. I'd probably respond in a similarly non-cogent manner. Non-cogency is sort of my speciality...
Chill out dude. The lounge is the only place any real philosophy happens on TPF. It's an honor
Not at all; as the mods well know, the lounge is where threads go to die. Hell, everyone knows that.
Now you are putting me in a corner, I feel the pressure of producing a non-cogent argument, so if you insist further I will try my best. Until then, I will say that I look forward to seeing your specialization in the artform of non-cogent argument.
Fuck what everyone knows
No, fuck the mods, in this instance. i.e. @Baden @jamalrob @StreetlightX @Hanover, etc. Fuck them for moving a thread that deals with universal problems to the lounge where no one will see it, and it will happily die. Fuck that shit.
I mean, why do they get such special treatment....fuck everyone equally. If anything, fuck me most... know what I mean? And fuck "universal problems" most, those create more trouble than they're worth...its masturbation at best.
Word, I'm just waiting here in the lounge, where no one else will hear what you have to say. :ok:
I don't know who moved it. You could start a feedback thread if you object.
@Noble Dust
Fair call. @Noble Dust Everyone involved in the conversation knows where it is. I don't see a big problem.
If by this you mean most of the other discussions I've started have been on the lounge that doesn't seem to be a legitimate enough reason to move something. I have really enjoyed people really diving into the question I posed and I feel like questions relating to the afterlife and death are a religious philosophical topic, not a random dicussion.
I overreacted, sorry. Disagree, but apologies for getting carried away there.
:up:
I say turn the whole place into a lounge. Cigarettes, beers, a jukebox, live music on the weekends; casual philosophical conversations that sometimes explode into deep revelations...
If you retain sufficient consciousness that you no longer need a body to support it, and can learn to see without eyes, and to communicate via telepathy, you may have the option to remain in your "soul-level" disincorporated state while learning enough to be of useful service.
Otherwise, whatever passes in you for consciousness will gradually fade, for lack of suitable support mechanisms, whereupon you may be reincorporated in another body to try again. Or, you may be left in a not-self-aware state (a.k.a. death) indefinitely.
I hope that whichever state we end up in is a function of choices and actions from our life experience, but suspect that much of our fate is randomly determined.
How long could one remain in this 'soul state' for? And it sounds like you believe fate to be set out before us?
That would depend upon the particular "soul state," would it not? But whatever state one finds oneself in, or betwixt, an agreed-upon definition of time is a necessary precursor to any sensible answer to your question.
Personally, I do not believe that time exists as a physical dimension, although it is certainly an oft-useful mathematical tool. I've solved many practical physics problems involving "t" or its derivatives, because they can be interpreted in terms of our actual experiences and measurement methods.
You might consider an alternative question-- what physical events must transpire in order for a "soul" to change its state of consciousness?
Evidence for independent consciousness abounds, but the history of honest investigation indicates that evidence is unimportant in the absence of a reasonable and verifiable paradigm into which the evidence fits. Thomas Kuhn explains this in fine philosophical detail, in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.
For example, despite numerous reports of ball lightening and its seemingly inexplicable behavior, the sightings were dismissed as the delusions of incompetent or lying observers-- until physicists investigating nuclear fusion possibilities developed mathematical theories describing plasmas. Their theories clearly applied to ball lightening. Suddenly, people who reported ball lightening were not written off.
I would naturally enjoy debating competent interlocutors on the possibility of a useful consciousness paradigm, but that is not possible on this forum without the exclusion of unqualified interference.
The problem seems to be, as I've mentioned before in other threads, is that people seem to think that unless science proves X, then we can't know X. My claim is based on knowledge acquired in other ways. For example, I don't need science to tell me that the orange juice I drank this morning is sweet, I've tasted it, or that there is an oak tree in my back yard, I've seen it. And there are other ways that we come to have knowledge, for instance, much of what we know is based on testimonial evidence. While it is true that testimonial evidence can be very unreliable, it can also be very strong. I've put forth my argument in the thread https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/1980/evidence-of-consciousness-surviving-the-body/p18
"Retain" how - without a body (i.e. CNS which has irreversibly decomposed)?
How do you/we even conceptualize a "consciousness"-threshold that's indicative of a "sufficient" level?
... like triangles without sides? or walking without legs? or breathing air without lungs? or ???
Any corroborable public evidence you can cite that indicates that "telepathy" is a thing and not just ... woo?
If "you" are dead, then "you" and "your" and "options" cease (i.e. don't obtain).
Quoting Greylorn Ell
Great googly moogly! :scream: Do tell: produce, or point to this, (more-than-anecdotal) "evidence".
Sam,
Evidently I've failed, once again, to competently express the concept I tried to convey. Unfortunately, I do not know of a better explanation. Should you choose to reread what I said and figure out what I meant about the relationship between proofs and paradigms, let's see if we might have a constructive discussion. T. Kuhn would provide a more definitive, and certainly more credible explanation of such concepts. --GL
Every action a person takes in their life irreversibly changes the informational configuration of the universe with consequences which are presumed to have a permanent physical effect until the end of time. The physical link is due to the way information can only change from one state to another at the cost of some finite quantity of energy. A most exaggerated example is the way we still discuss the works of dead philosophers; from the perspective of the infosphere they're neither prelife nor afterlife. This certainly also applies to ordinary people but is much harder to illustrate. Surreal but not supernatural.
By the above account an afterlife can be demythologized into a intergenerational reservoir of information. If this is begging the question, it may suit our purposes to merely define information as a medium of exchange for now, which, at least for most of us, is constantly demonstrated by digital technology.