Afterlife?

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Message 1539176 - Posted: 10 Jul 2014, 16:08:54 UTC

Afterlife? Ummmmm?
Must not conflict resolve by suggesting that someone should go sit on an ice pick...
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Message 1539182 - Posted: 10 Jul 2014, 16:23:26 UTC

Isn't science amazing? They managed to save her life by freezing her and pumping all her blood out of her body.

Killing a Patient to Save His Life

Fascinating stuff.
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Message 1539190 - Posted: 10 Jul 2014, 16:35:24 UTC - in response to Message 1539176.  

Afterlife? Ummmmm?


Read some books about out of body experiences. Quite interesting but one must not lose his or her head in it. A lot of wacko's on this world who try to drive people crazy with stories like that. I'm not saying out of body experiences don't exist but after being practically dead myself 3 years ago, I grew a very sceptical view on the matter.
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Message 1539221 - Posted: 10 Jul 2014, 17:18:46 UTC

There is something to this but what? It probably wouldn't be ethical to perform experiments on healthy people to test this. Some operating room have signs placed on top of cabinets that are only visible from the ceiling. If one reports floating out of their body they are asked if they saw anything on top of the cabinets. So far no one has.
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Message 1539383 - Posted: 10 Jul 2014, 22:16:10 UTC - in response to Message 1539221.  



A small-town father must find the courage and conviction to share his son's extraordinary, life-changing experience with the world.

Very good movie. Based on a true story. Got me thinking.
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Message 1539791 - Posted: 11 Jul 2014, 13:56:29 UTC
Last modified: 11 Jul 2014, 14:03:33 UTC

The scientific NDE studies performed over the past decades indicate that heightened mental functions can be experienced independently of the body at a time when brain activity is greatly impaired or seemingly absent (such as during cardiac arrest).


This bit is stupid. Just because your heart stops pumping doesn't mean your brain stops working. The brain requires electricity to 'think' and that can continue for a while when the hearth has stopped already.

NDE do nothing to challenge the mainstream neuroscientific discourse. All they do at best is show that there are still a lot of things we do not know about the brain, it does not mean that we must have a soul or something because how else to explain NDE's.

Of course, the whole article is coming from a scientist who has some issues with credibility. As in, his whole non materialistic neuroscience is just trash.
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Message 1539830 - Posted: 11 Jul 2014, 15:39:47 UTC - in response to Message 1539791.  

The scientific NDE studies performed over the past decades indicate that heightened mental functions can be experienced independently of the body at a time when brain activity is greatly impaired or seemingly absent (such as during cardiac arrest).


This bit is stupid. Just because your heart stops pumping doesn't mean your brain stops working. The brain requires electricity to 'think' and that can continue for a while when the hearth has stopped already.

NDE do nothing to challenge the mainstream neuroscientific discourse. All they do at best is show that there are still a lot of things we do not know about the brain, it does not mean that we must have a soul or something because how else to explain NDE's.

Of course, the whole article is coming from a scientist who has some issues with credibility. As in, his whole non materialistic neuroscience is just trash.

There are other issues with the credibility of this story. Apparently she wasn't "dead" for as long as she claimed.
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Message 1539837 - Posted: 11 Jul 2014, 15:49:59 UTC

We all must admit that we are not our corporal bodies. Organ transplant proves this.

John 3:6 - That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
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Message 1539855 - Posted: 11 Jul 2014, 16:27:49 UTC

One of my main conflicts with religion, christianity in particular, is the belief in an afterlife. And now with most scientists in the field of studying the universe determining there is no forever the concept looses more credibility. But the recent discovery that what we see out there is less than 25% of everything meaning there is now much more of what we don't know than what we do know maybe a doorway has opened up making possible a new concept of what, if anything, happens to our consciousness after we die. Even though I believe in the teachings of Jesus regarding our behavior toward each other and to that extent I could be regarded as a christian I still think that once we are dead we are gone forever except for whatever legacy we leave behind with our descendents.
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Message 1539987 - Posted: 11 Jul 2014, 21:13:50 UTC - in response to Message 1539837.  
Last modified: 11 Jul 2014, 21:15:51 UTC

We all must admit that we are not our corporal bodies. Organ transplant proves this.

John 3:6 - That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.


+1 We are all born in the flesh and spirit, so will we die in the flesh but live on in the spirit.
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Message 1540188 - Posted: 12 Jul 2014, 6:46:40 UTC

Let me see, you say that all the suffering in this life will get me a better place in the next life, I am suffering so sign me up.

Hey wait a minute how do you know there is a next life? O someone told you and what else were they selling?
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Message 1540284 - Posted: 12 Jul 2014, 11:22:19 UTC
Last modified: 12 Jul 2014, 11:23:43 UTC

Here is what I see.
When a person is born, they start a change that will continue over their entire life. When they are young, they think one way, and that thinking changes as they age. There is no root "You", but a representation based on your particular stage of life, and countless environmental and chemical factors.

When a person uses an antidepressant, their way of thinking changes.

When a person drinks coffee, or alcohol, their thinking changes.

When a person takes a hallucinogen, their very essence changes.

When someone survives a brain injury, or a stoke, the person is forever changed.

If a piece of the brain is removed, that particular functionality is forever lost.

However, if you cut the whole head off and the person dies, then the soul floats up to heaven like nothing ever happened..... That just makes no sense to me at all.

The brain is not something that just does all your thinking. It is you. You can transplant many organs, but if it were possible to do a brain transplant, "You" would be lost, and the person whose brain was the donor would continue in your body.

However unlikely, I could see the possibility, in keeping a living head connected to machines for some lengthy period of time, and it would still be a "You", although the though processes would be a result of environmental and chemical stimuli.

In some cases, when a person is near death, chemicals are going wild in the brain, causing neurons to fire is unusual ways. When a person's brain actually dies, there is no more person.

What is being dead like?
Exactly what it was like the billions of years before the person was born.
I was completely unaware of the formation of the universe, or even this planet.
When I am gone, I haven't seen the slightest bit of evidence to suggest that I will ever have known that I was once alive.

Steve
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Message 1540291 - Posted: 12 Jul 2014, 12:12:01 UTC - in response to Message 1540284.  

Here is what I see.
When a person is born, they start a change that will continue over their entire life. When they are young, they think one way, and that thinking changes as they age. There is no root "You", but a representation based on your particular stage of life, and countless environmental and chemical factors.

When a person uses an antidepressant, their way of thinking changes.

When a person drinks coffee, or alcohol, their thinking changes.

When a person takes a hallucinogen, their very essence changes.

When someone survives a brain injury, or a stoke, the person is forever changed.

If a piece of the brain is removed, that particular functionality is forever lost.

However, if you cut the whole head off and the person dies, then the soul floats up to heaven like nothing ever happened..... That just makes no sense to me at all.

The brain is not something that just does all your thinking. It is you. You can transplant many organs, but if it were possible to do a brain transplant, "You" would be lost, and the person whose brain was the donor would continue in your body.

However unlikely, I could see the possibility, in keeping a living head connected to machines for some lengthy period of time, and it would still be a "You", although the though processes would be a result of environmental and chemical stimuli.

In some cases, when a person is near death, chemicals are going wild in the brain, causing neurons to fire is unusual ways. When a person's brain actually dies, there is no more person.

What is being dead like?
Exactly what it was like the billions of years before the person was born.
I was completely unaware of the formation of the universe, or even this planet.
When I am gone, I haven't seen the slightest bit of evidence to suggest that I will ever have known that I was once alive.

Steve


+10
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Message 1540293 - Posted: 12 Jul 2014, 12:20:07 UTC - in response to Message 1540188.  

Let me see, you say that all the suffering in this life will get me a better place in the next life, I am suffering so sign me up.

Hey wait a minute how do you know there is a next life? O someone told you and what else were they selling?


+10 also. That is how our leaders since people started living together in communities have controlled the behavior of most humans. Promise them that if they don't steal or murder or break a few other rules they will get their rewards after they die. What a scam. Probably the biggest one ever perpetrated. But I guess most people need that little carrot dangling in front of them to stay in their good behavior. I don't need some promise of a future reward to realise that we have to get along together in this world. Maybe this is also why some people don't seem to care much about how we care for this planet as they think it is just a waypoint on the way to a perfect environment. Maybe if more people understood that this is their final destination they would take better care of the place.
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Message 1540299 - Posted: 12 Jul 2014, 12:32:18 UTC

what SciManStev said

What Bob Dewoody said


Completely agree :)

(Hi SciManStev! Hi Bob!)
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Message 1540314 - Posted: 12 Jul 2014, 13:03:07 UTC - in response to Message 1540293.  

+10 also. That is how our leaders since people started living together in communities have controlled the behavior of most humans. Promise them that if they don't steal or murder or break a few other rules they will get their rewards after they die. What a scam. Probably the biggest one ever perpetrated. But I guess most people need that little carrot dangling in front of them to stay in their good behavior. I don't need some promise of a future reward to realise that we have to get along together in this world. Maybe this is also why some people don't seem to care much about how we care for this planet as they think it is just a waypoint on the way to a perfect environment. Maybe if more people understood that this is their final destination they would take better care of the place.

Well I can see how believing in the afterlife is a compelling thing to do. I mean, aside from the promise of seeing your friends and parents and other loved ones back in this peaceful place.

It also works as a way to cope with the sheer injustice and unfairness of the universe. Basically your life on this planet is entirely determined by luck. We have people who win the genetic lottery and are born from privileged parents in a privileged environment and we have people that are born in crack houses or warzones and have to deal with absolute poverty, starvation, illness, war, injustice and oppression. Its nice to know that you are one of the lucky people on who the forces of the universe have smiled and blessed with relative wealth and happiness, but its a lot harder to accept that the vast majority of people are not that lucky. If you believe in an afterlife then at least you can still find some peace in the idea that while those people are screwed in this life, once they die they go to a better place, rather than having just this one chance at life and if they were born unlucky than too bad for them.

Of course, if you do follow this reasoning you have to be on guard that your belief in the afterlife does not turn into an excuse for apathy towards other peoples suffering. No matter how good the afterlife might be and no matter how convinced you are that people go there, it should never stop you from trying to make this world a better place.
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Message 1540325 - Posted: 12 Jul 2014, 13:42:47 UTC - in response to Message 1540284.  

When I am gone, I haven't seen the slightest bit of evidence to suggest that I will ever have known that I was once alive.
Why are we here. You don't know any more than any man who ever lived why. We are here though and that is pretty amazing IMHO. If it gives some comfort to think their dead child is in heaven instead of being a nothing so what?
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Message 1540340 - Posted: 12 Jul 2014, 14:27:57 UTC - in response to Message 1540325.  
Last modified: 12 Jul 2014, 14:48:01 UTC

When I am gone, I haven't seen the slightest bit of evidence to suggest that I will ever have known that I was once alive.
Why are we here. You don't know any more than any man who ever lived why. We are here though and that is pretty amazing IMHO. If it gives some comfort to think their dead child is in heaven instead of being a nothing so what?


I absolutely agree on the comfort issue Batterup, definitely, but that was very much part of ancient beliefs and cultures, and as such did little or no harm to the peace of mind of those who grieved. Specifically relating to the death of a child, many African tribes coped with high infant mortality with beliefs that the child's spirit had visited them only briefly, to prepare for it's next birth which would then bring great happiness to the family. Unfortunately with the arrival of missionaries, those beliefs were torn down and replaced with a distant carrot and a very large stick. And in the case of Roman Catholicism and their claims about Limbo, parent's then had to watch their babies die and be told there was absolutely no way they could ever be reunited in heaven. :(

Don't know if anyone is familiar with the work of Chinua Achebe - but his book Things Fall Apart is a tragic illustration of what religion did to a continent and it's people. :/
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Message 1540347 - Posted: 12 Jul 2014, 14:37:47 UTC - in response to Message 1540340.  

Don't know if anyone is familiar with the work of Chinua Achebe - but his book Things Fall Apart is a tragic illustration of what religion did to a continent and it's people. :/
The problem with religion comes when it is forced on others. The founding fathers of the US of A knew this and made a supreme law against it. I lived in a place when in the bathroom one could hear the "call to prayer" from a Mosk. I cold sit and finish my business and not get up and answer the call. God bless America.
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Message 1540387 - Posted: 12 Jul 2014, 15:31:53 UTC - in response to Message 1540325.  

When I am gone, I haven't seen the slightest bit of evidence to suggest that I will ever have known that I was once alive.
Why are we here. You don't know any more than any man who ever lived why. We are here though and that is pretty amazing IMHO. If it gives some comfort to think their dead child is in heaven instead of being a nothing so what?

It is not my intent to remove the comfort some feel for lost ones. If it brings them comfort, then I agree it is not a problem.

The why are we here question does have an answer. This is my interpretation.

If you roll 10 million dice, one number will come up. Hence the formation of the universe.

If you roll 10 million dice in that universe, one number will come up, but it is still within that universe. Hence the formation of the Milky Way.

If you roll 10 million more dice within that galaxy, one number will come up, but is in a section of the galaxy without an excess of radiation. Hence the local group of stars.

If you keep going you will get to earth, a planet the right size, not to close nor to far from our sun. Hence surface water can exist.

A few more steps into it, and each roll of 10 million dice provides a number, but contained within the constraints of the previous rolls. Meaning a roll of the dice will not have me being born on Venus.

This works, over time to contain where or how the randomness occurs. If you take it to its end game, then roll the billions of dice when we were conceived. With the billions of sperm involved, some may have been in the right place, some might have not. Dad may have Oooed, and Mom may have Awed, at a particular time that rolled the dice once again, but after all is said and done, one number will come up, within the constraints for human DNA.

Why are we here?
I see it as the result of random chance, acting over billions of years, confining and restraining where and how the results of those chances occur.

In a way, it is like the electron orbit of an atom. We don't know where it is at any given moment, but we know it is within the electron shell.

Steve
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