Life After Death

[Publius]

I always have a problem understanding what people mean by 'spirit'. Are they referring to the electrical signals pinging around your brain that makeup consciousness & self awareness? I've don't see what ring fences these particular electrical signals over any others. Why are they special? Do computers go through some supernatural rebirth when they're turned off? Electrical signals are physical, not spiritual.

[Neil]

Electrical signals are physical, not spiritual. Exactly... But surely your 'spirit' is your personality, self consciousness and self awareness, which are all just a bunch of electrical signals firing around your brain.

[JDFP]

Honestly, I've never understood this obsession with people and death. I find it to be a bit unhealthy to be honest in focusing or dwelling upon it in any degree. Why does it matter one way or another what happens to you after you die? If there's an afterlife, great, if there isn't, who cares? I'll still live on through my poetry I've written for others to share with ('cause I have no interest in having children at all). It certainly has no bearing on me in being a Christian or not being a Christian - or whether I believe or don't believe in God - or how I live in my life in any way. I just don't get why this matters so much to people. j.p.

[AcesandEights]

Exactly... But surely your 'spirit' is your personality, self consciousness and self awareness, which are all just a bunch of electrical signals firing around your brain. Well, to be fair, if a deist or eternalist is looking at the brain as just a way of tuning into, or perhaps just connecting with and interpreting the 'soul' it makes sense. And if you're going to believe in such things, well, that just makes as much sense as anything else, I'd think. Remember, the term "seat of consciousness" as referring to the brain? -- -------- Post added at 10:04 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:02 AM ---------- Honestly, I've never understood this obsession with people and death. I find it to be a bit unhealthy to be honest in focusing or dwelling upon it in any degree. Why does it matter one way or another what happens to you after you die? Though individuals and cultures approach it differently and have varying degrees of comfort with the idea of death, attempts to cope and come to terms with death is at the very heart of humanity. It makes perfect sense to me.

[JDFP]

Though individuals and cultures approach it differently and have varying degrees of comfort with the idea of death, attempts to cope and come to terms with death is at the very heart of humanity. It makes perfect sense to me. Well, Aces, I knew I was weird but I must be really weird in that case - because the thought of it or what happens after I die never seemed important for consideration at all to me. As something that will invariably happen one day I guess it's fine with me to leave it up in the air as one of those: "Well, I guess I'll find out one day!" type of things. No use in dwelling on something you have no control over. j.p.

[EvilNed]

Death is fascinating. It is, and always will be, the final frontier. If we ever conquer death, then we are truly gods I suppose. Impossible, you say? Not so, says I!

[JDFP]

Death is fascinating. It is, and always will be, the final frontier. If we ever conquer death, then we are truly gods I suppose. Impossible, you say? Not so, says I! Ah, The Coming Singularity! Even if you could, why would you want to? Who and why would someone want to live forever? Death is natural - it's just a fact of life like taxes and dealing with crazy women. j.p.

[Neil]

Death is fascinating. It is, and always will be, the final frontier. If we ever conquer death, then we are truly gods I suppose. Impossible, you say? Not so, says I! Oh at some point I imagine with genetic engineering we could tell our bodies to stay 20 or 30 for ever... Then things would get interesting/messy!

[EvilNed]

Ah, The Coming Singularity! Even if you could, why would you want to? Who and why would someone want to live forever? Death is natural - it's just a fact of life like taxes and dealing with crazy women. j.p. And natural is always good?

[JDFP]

And natural is always good? I'd prefer natural as opposed to unnatural. Things are usually the way they are for a reason - at least I believe this even though others may disagree. I think we've addressed the whole Singularity issue elsewhere, but if it took me to become "Other" than I am now to live a bit longer I just wouldn't be interested. I'm not afraid of death, though I don't look forward to the dying part. j.p.

[Legion2213]

That was dumb. I voted yes to life after death when I meant no. Anyways, would be kinda nice to be proved wrong and all that, but I think it will be the same as before you are born and you just won't be around anymore. -- -------- Post added at 09:00 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:57 PM ---------- Oh at some point I imagine with genetic engineering we could tell our bodies to stay 20 or 30 for ever... Then things would get interesting/messy! That would be completely brilliant...if you did eventually get bored/depressed after a few centuries, you could probably "start the clock" again and carry on ageing naturally if thats what you wanted. Alway interesting to wonder just how the brain would cope in such a situation though, would it be able to contain a thousand years worth of memories and knowledge? Not mention the emotional and psychological implications. Yeah, that would be damn interesting to find out first hand!

[EvilNed]

I'd prefer natural as opposed to unnatural. Things are usually the way they are for a reason - at least I believe this even though others may disagree. I think we've addressed the whole Singularity issue elsewhere, but if it took me to become "Other" than I am now to live a bit longer I just wouldn't be interested. I'm not afraid of death, though I don't look forward to the dying part. j.p. I'm not afraid of death either. But I prefer living rather than being nothing. In life I'm something. Rotting with the worms I'm nothing. Given the choice, most people would go for extended life. Also, I'm not so sure things are a way for a "reason". What reason is that?

[JDFP]

I'm not afraid of death either. But I prefer living rather than being nothing. In life I'm something. Rotting with the worms I'm nothing. Given the choice, most people would go for extended life. Also, I'm not so sure things are a way for a "reason". What reason is that? Just my personal thoughts below... Nature and nurture and the overall environmental factors. Things that are intended to survive survive and things that are not intended to survive do not. It's not because of "God made it that way", in my opinion, though others can argue that. I don't mind to do a few things like exercise or take pills or try to stop drinking as damn much as I do (which I should) to live a little longer - and I probably wouldn't mind doing chemotherapy if I was dying from cancer - but there's a distinction between living a little longer through doing some things v. living a little longer through downloading myself into a computer program (the former items I'm still technically me - the latter I don't think I am) - I consider this to be a big distinction - others may not. I'm not condemning people who feel this way though - it's up to them - I'm just saying it's not for me. I think there comes a time and place to where if you fundamentally change too much you're no longer You even if you're still technically "you". It's making a presumption to say that you'll be nothing after death. It would be a presumption for me to say you will be something after death - the fact is we don't know for sure - and as I've said many times on this thread it just doesn't really matter to me one way or another. I'm here for the time and then gone to whatever, if anything at all, happens next. But whether something does or does not happen next is a non-issue for me so I have no interest in discussing the merits of whether there is or isn't an after 'now'. I'm not against extending life because of some pseudo-religious indoctrination (i.e. "playing God") - if someone wants to do that all the more power to them and I don't care as long as they don't infringe on my individuality - I'm just against it for myself personally due to what I consider ethical concerns as I see them (i.e. becoming Other from myself - losing my essence). I don't know if any of this makes a damn bit of sense - but it does to me at least. Hopefully others can see through my crazy too and understand what I'm saying here even if they may disagree. It's a good discussion though, Ned, certainlly better than the moot question as to whether there is or is not an afterlife which seems pointless to discuss to me. EDIT: I'm sure a lot of people would go for living in some capacity or another as opposed to death - but I don't know that you could argue "most". I think a great deal of it has to do with how much your 'selfness' (i.e. essence as I call it) changes. Perhaps I'm just prematurely old (or at least very old fashioned) at 31 in feeling the way I do about these things - but I don't know that "most" people would be willing to download themselves into a program or change their very nature just to continue "living" in some capacity. j.p.

[Mike70]

Also, I'm not so sure things are a way for a "reason". What reason is that? i'd agree. i deny that anything happens for any metaphysical/spiritual/religious/supernatural etc. reason. things are determined by causality. for example, you get cancer because you've smoked, been exposed to something harmful or have bad genes, etc. you don't get it as some sort of punishment for things you've done wrong. the "just world" idea in which bad things happen to people because of actions they've taken is among the most childish conceits a person can engage in.

[EvilNed]

I agree that a discussion of the afterlife is pointless. Because the burden of proof lies on religion and until somebody steps up and offers some, it's quite clear to me that we were put here on this planet for no reason whatsoever. Now I don't see a reason for why life is limited. Not for a being such as humans anyway, or any other sentient being. I see nothing in nature that logically demands it to be so. And "It's always been that way" is simply not a good enough argument to me, because heck, there are a lot of things that "have always been that way" that aren't that great. Nature might be all around us and holding the key to our survival and evolution on many aspects. But to never question it is for me folly. That's like eating every single berry in the woods and not expecting some of them to be poisonous.