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[Olaf]

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Belief in the after life is so strong and prevalent in people because people wish to continue living. They don't want to die. They 'imagine' a world were no one ever dies, so that they can live/cope with he finite world and all the relationships they have created in it.

The afterlife is almost an instinct. It is the imaginary realm of life extension. Before, when life was, short, cruel and brutal, and people dropped like participles of dust on a table, it was hard to accept life as it was, a cruel kind of disease, but now that we have greater technologies for life extension, it is clear that the afterlife was merely the wish for life extension.

Afterlife = life 'after' I have died. The wish for an after life = the desire for life extension = the desire to continue living, and continue the relationships we have had.

Bring on cryocenic immortality. The question is - Are you pro-death or pro-life?

It's all about pros and cons - prostitutes and convicts. Those who prostitute life to suits their own needs and those who have convictions about the way life should be, and put it into practice.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HaHavhQllDI

Thoughts?

[Father Luke]

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Yeah, but do you believe, Olaf, or do you not believe. That is the question.

[Olaf]

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Believe in what? Believe the world exists and other people and everything within it - Yes! 'The world is all that is the case' Wittgenstein.

Do you believe or not - the rhetorical bind of the Christian Evangelist.

Do I have faith? - Yes. In what - in life...that is shall continue...that we may live lives more dangerous and creative.

Do you believe Jesus Christ is our Saviour, Father Luke? 

[redperil]

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Is there an afterlife? Well, I haven't found out yet.

“It is convenient that there be gods, and, as it is convenient, let us believe there are.” - Ovid

I believe in a higher being, which has often seen me ridiculed (especially given the socialist/Marxist circles I have walked in), but I am against the idea of an organised religion. But no, I don't believe JC is our saviour, that of course would be David Cameron......heh heh

Anyway, I need to go and bury some dinosaur bones to confuse the annual evangelical 'proof of creation treasure hunt'

[Ġakbu]

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We never experience our own death, only the death of others. Afterlife? Well, it's only curiosity and ego that makes me wish for it to exist, but I doubt it - if there is a being, a God, as someone once said (and also here), he has a lot to answer for: futility is the key to life, and futility is anti-life, so there you go.

[redperil]

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I don't think it much matters if your spiritual beliefs are kept on a personal level, it's when you start imposing them on others that the problems begin.

I'm going to donate my body to an all girls college, just in case I get to come back as a ghost.

[Ġakbu]

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That's the superficial side of the issue I think, the human being stupid and imposing his 'beliefs', whatever they are, on others and so on and so forth. Quite glad that the Catholic Church is getting a good bashing at the moment. If there is a being-God, he's surely not a Christian God, I am opposed to that notion; but then again, what really concerns me is what kind of being it/he/she would be, and not whether it exists or not - same with afterlife, if it's the Christian-kind with fluffy-puffy angels and nasty warm-ish demons, then I think that most (meaning few) of us would rather not have it.

Girls college. I shall donate my body to a Swansea pub, get to meet Dylan drunk as a ghost reading poetry if I come back as a ghost.

[Olaf]

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Redperilynecklace, I to believe in some totality, the energy of life or some poor metaphor like that. Life itself is God. Has to be.

Gakbu - I agree. 'Must of us what not have it.' Sums up the general attitude well.


What do you lot make but of the idea that the majority of believers create the idea of the after life because psychologically it helps us overcome death. And that in some real sense, belief in the after life is literally, the psychological desire to extend human life.

I think that's quite an insight. People used to die much younger and in many ways we are living longer. Children born now, may well live to be well over 100 years old, and we may start to be able to replace body parts and re-invent the human body. OK, all a bit far in the future, but not unreasonable....the question is will belief in the afterlife be over taken by belief in life extension??

[redperil]

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Mortality is probably a key driver in why people believe in an afterlife, but I don't think it's the sole reason. Indoctrination into a belief system; the difficulty in comprehending nothingness; personal unexplained experiences people have, or hear about; the fact some animals seem to act like humans; are all other possible reasons.

I don't think the afterlife as a theory will disappear as long as we have a finite existence.

[Father Luke]

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The whole thing smacks of death and Freud dismissed this with what he called the
unconscious death urge.

Eros and Thanatos—Freud identifies two drives that both coincide and conflict
within the individual and among individuals.  Eros is the drive of life, love,
creativity, and sexuality, self-satisfaction, and species preservation.  Thanatos,
from the Greek word for "death" is the drive of aggression, sadism, destruction,
violence, and death.  At the conclusion of C&D, Freud notes (in 1930-31) that human
beings, following Thanatos, have invented the tools to completely exterminate
themselves; in turn, Eros is expected to "make an effort to assert himself in the
struggle with an equally immortal adversary. But who can foresee with what success
and with what result?"

Here: http://www.geneseo.edu/~easton/humanities/Freud.htm

If you break the cycle of life and death you have just one more freedom.
Death is a grave mistake, is the in-joke among the imortalists.

For imortalists see Leonard Orr.

- -
Okay,
Father Luke

[Olaf]

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O yeah, read of the life and death instincts, love and hatred, in disrespect. Interesting that was have made it possible to destroy ourselves with nuclear weapons, with chemical and biological weapons. Does that mean hatred is winning? Or is it love that keeps us from using them?

Or would love get rid of them completely?

So, I know you're not a believer any more, but can I have it in writing Father? Is Jesus still your saviour?

The transhumanist movement is quite intereating. I've been reading about it off and on for years no. Life extension, articial intelligence, the singularity, mind bending stuff, science fiction moving into science realism. The future is going to be one horrifically interesting thing...will we stay alive? I'm counting on it.

[Nick]

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  possible to destroy ourselves with nuclear weapons, with chemical and biological weapons. Does that mean hatred is winning? Or is it love that keeps us from using them?

Now this observation/question has enough pith to be worthy of its own thread.



Regarding the afterlife question: I'm dying to know the answer.

[Father Luke]

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I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it through not dying. - Woody Allen

For the record, I'm an immortalist. I plan on living in increasing health, vitality, and youthfulness forever.

[astronacht]

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Interesting that was have made it possible to destroy ourselves with nuclear weapons, with chemical and biological weapons. Does that mean hatred is winning? Or is it love that keeps us from using them?

This is probably my favorite thing that you've ever said.
 

[Olaf]

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Interesting that was have made it possible to destroy ourselves with nuclear weapons, with chemical and biological weapons. Does that mean hatred is winning? Or is it love that keeps us from using them?

This is probably my favorite thing that you've ever said.
 

And, I still didn't manage to type it correctly. For posterity:

Interesting that we have made it possible to destory ourselves with nuclear, chemical and biological weapons. Does that mean hatred is winning, or is it love that keeps us from using them?

I've said so much. It took me so long to get there. Haha!

I'm a bit of an immoralist myself. And over recent months I've made good progress, in my small life, of cutting out the booze and the drugs. So I might yet write coherently...

After life there's more life.