What do you think happens when we die?

[Mike88]

When you start thinking about your own mortality the time has come to make radical changes in your life. I haven't a clue about the age and finances of the original poster but I'm a firm believer in giving up work and doing something different with your life. I gave up work at an early age and so did my wife. We bought a campervan and spent 6 months of every year for eight years touring Europe, living on or near remote beaches and when in France and Germany on aires provided by the equivalent of our local government. I'm not suggesting for a minute that others do the same but it is the kind of radical change of lifestyle that I had in mind.

One thing I have learned in my life is that there is little point in accumulating money for the sake of it. You can't take it with you and if you give it away your estate is taxed heavily. Of course not everyone can make the same radical change in their lifestyle but the thought must surely have occurred to others as they get older.

[ReformedCharacter]

So what is God?

You'll have to find that out for yourself, or not as the case may be.

RC

He/she/it is whatever you want God to be. The beauty of the god concept is that no one can prove you wrong.

You're free to believe in whatever you want but whether those beliefs are of any use to you is another matter. If, to you, the 'beauty' of the God concept is that no one can prove you wrong suggests that you are more interested in winning arguments or debates. Good luck with that.

RC

[bluedonkey]

So what is God?

You'll have to find that out for yourself, or not as the case may be.

RC

He/she/it is whatever you want God to be. The beauty of the god concept is that no one can prove you wrong.

You're free to believe in whatever you want but whether those beliefs are of any use to you is another matter. If, to you, the 'beauty' of the God concept is that no one can prove you wrong suggests that you are more interested in winning arguments or debates. Good luck with that.

RC

I was speaking as an atheist!

[pje16]

In my teens I was involved in a serious road traffic accident. For a few weeks I was kept heavily sedated. I don't remember any of it up until the point where they brought me round (I had some wild dreams but I think they were all during the waking up process as they scaled back the sedation).

Anyway, I often ponder how other folks lives would have turned out if that had been 'it' for me.

And I often think that I can't remember anything until some days before the day i 'died' - in other words I don't recall the exact point of 'death'.

Snorvey - the guy with 9 lives

[ReformedCharacter]

So what is God?

You'll have to find that out for yourself, or not as the case may be.

RC

He/she/it is whatever you want God to be. The beauty of the god concept is that no one can prove you wrong.

You're free to believe in whatever you want but whether those beliefs are of any use to you is another matter. If, to you, the 'beauty' of the God concept is that no one can prove you wrong suggests that you are more interested in winning arguments or debates. Good luck with that.

RC

I was speaking as an atheist!

I didn't assume otherwise.

RC

[monabri]

In some ways, I equate death with sleep.

I fall asleep at night and I am "dead to the world".

Luckily, so far, I have awoken every morning, and barring dreaming, I might as well have been dead in the sense that I was totally unaware of anything and everything.

I've always assumed death will be like this. It's just how one gets there which could be the worry. Sudden and painless, or long and drawn out, with plenty of time to ponder such things...

Yes, my pov as well. Rather than thinking of what happens next - decomposition imv - the related issue that I find more relevant is dealing with my own mortality.

Yes, it's the endgame that's the worry!

[scrumpyjack]

I'm quite sure there isn't a god nor do 'souls' exist, but of course you can't prove a negative, just as in Bertrand Russell's comments about not being able to prove there isn't a large tea pot orbiting Mars or whatever.

I went to a Cathedral School so I guess that inoculated me! If you say there is a soul with some sort of eternal existence where do you draw the line on living creatures or does a bacteria have a 'soul'. re Religions my view has always been that they are a convenient label for what we humans do not understand. So when man did not understand the wind, or the sun there was a Wind god or a Sun god. As science advanced the concept of god evolved as well. But there are heaven knows (whoops!) how many religions on earth each believing they are the only true religion - crazy that the adherents can't see the problem with that.

But people should be free to believe whatever they like, as long as it doesn't infringe on other people's right to think differently. Unfortunately religion has usually not accepted that principle with very negative results. For that reason I do think religion and all that goes with it is on balance not a force for good. I say that even though my lovely daughter is a firm believer and is married to a Vicar. We stay off the subject of religion of course!

[Midsmartin]

The idea of a soul makes no sense to me. All the evidence says that our brain is all there is. Taking pharmaceuticals, damage to our brain from disease or injury or normal ageing all change our memories, personalities and cognitive powers. Our ability to talk, feel, taste, or experience emotions all seem to go along with our physical brain. Our personalities, our very selves, changes over time. There is no clear reason to think there is anything else. We have no examples of a consciousness without a brain. Would our soul continue as we are at the state of death - would our soul have dementia, aching legs, be grumpy and dislike rap music? Would our soul be the "pure'" me as at birth.. but that is me without memories, language, and all the things that make me "me" - not really me at all.

What would my soul do into infinity? Billions upon billions of years watching the death of our planet, solar system and eventually the heat death of the universe into infinite blackness while I reflect on my distant childhood regrets sounds horrendous. No thanks. No re-runs of Taskmaster, no chocolate, no pubs. All the things I enjoy require a physical body - cycling on a May morning, playing an instrument badly, a country pub.

The time to believe that a thing is true is when there is good evidence to support it. And so I see no reason to believe in souls, gods, or indeed anything supernatural. I'm willing to change my mind of there is convincing evidence.

"You can't disprove it" is the common response. That's true, I can't. But that isn't how it works. If it was reasonable to believe anything that can not be disproved then we must also believe in the Incan sun god, Zeus, the invisible goblin in my shed, and a myriad of other things.

I would only have to hypothesise any untestable idea (eg the invisible goblin in my shed), and we would be compelled to believe it to be true because I cant' disprove it.

God is only really proposed to explain why something exists rather than nothing at all. But god does not solve this problem, because we still have to explain why a god exists rather than nothing at all. Religious people dismiss this problem with a wave. . "ah, but god is eternal". Is it? How can you tell? Isn't this a claim that the theist just invented with no evidence? We can't even demonstrate there is a god, let alone its lifespan. Is it even possible for a god to exist? Is it possible for anything to exist outside space/time? Someone needs to demonstrate a supernatural realm where it is possible for events to occur and that we can investigate.

God (and our souls I suppose) would be complex objects. The only process we know of so far that can bring about such thinking objects is evolution by natural selection (or possibly AI, built be creatures that have undergone natural selection). So any god would, to the best of my knowledge, have had to have evolved from a breeding population of deities subject to mutation, death and natural selection.

[scrumpyjack]

But people should be free to believe whatever they like, as long as it doesn't infringe on other people's right to think differently.

That's the problem though. Religion often infringes on other peoples right to think differently from a very early age - almost always before we actually have the capacity/knowlege to think differently.

Exactly, which is one reason I said on balance religion was a negative force for humanity.

[AsleepInYorkshire]

When she was 9 years old my daughter took me and Mum by surprise. She had put together a PowerPoint presentation to show how she would care for and look after a hamster. She'd read about how long they live for and how to look after them. She had identified which breed she wanted and why. It was compelling, honest and extremely thoughtful. We spent time choosing a cage. We discussed how hamsters like to burrow so we decided we should get a cage which could hold a deep amount of wood chippings and we also discussed that we should get a large cage to give the hamster a large space in which to live.Here's the cage we settled upon. Her first dwarf Russian hamster (Popcorn) lived for just over two years which was good as the average age is 18 months. During that time she cleaned him out regularly, bought him treats and put him in a roller ball so he could run around the room. Her level of care and attention was excellent. When he died she was, naturally very upset. We sat down and had a little chat. I told her that Popcorn had lived to be a very old man in hamster years and had lived in palatial comfort, was very well cared for and didn't live in fear of being eaten by other animals I said perhaps Popcorn had been in heaven before he died. Perhaps his heaven was here on earth. We buried Popcorn in the garden.

She had a second Russian dwarf hamster (Minnie). She surpassed Popcorn and lived for about 28 months and was cared for in the same way as he was. She has two gerbils now and they are ruined. They too have a very large cage with an incredibly deep amount of paper chippings to burrow in. The have tunnels to run through and get small amounts of fresh fruit and vegetables. Gerbils can overeat so their food needs to be monitored. The have a sand bath, a wheel, burrow boxes, chews and other little toys.

Recently my Mum passed away and my daughter was, obviously, upset. She often says she misses her Grandma and she spends time looking after Grandma's dog. On what would have been her Grandma's birthday she visited her grave with some flowers.

I don't know what her beliefs are regarding heaven or death. It's not my place to ask or to influence her. I had to plan for Popcorn's ultimate demise before we got him. Hopefully, that allowed my daughter to cope with his death and maybe she was able to reconcile that with, wherever he is now, his time before his death, which was everything a hamster would want and more.

She has dealt with her Grandma's death stoically and in a mature way. Whilst I know she was very upset she did say that she wouldn't take any time off school. "My Grandma would want me to miss her and I do", she said, "but she wouldn't want me to miss school too".

AiY(D)

[pje16]

A lovely post AiY
your daughter has been very well brought up and will grow to be a loving and caring person
she will be a tribute to you

[bluedonkey]

But people should be free to believe whatever they like, as long as it doesn't infringe on other people's right to think differently.

That's the problem though. Religion often infringes on other peoples right to think differently from a very early age - almost always before we actually have the capacity/knowlege to think differently.

Exactly, which is one reason I said on balance religion was a negative force for humanity.

Agreed. Organised religion also tends to be a means of controlling others by those in religious authority.

[Itsallaguess]

What would my soul do into infinity?

Billions upon billions of years watching the death of our planet, solar system and eventually the heat death of the universe into infinite blackness

I often find myself recalling something I heard on the radio many years ago, where it was suggested that gravity is God pulling the Devil back to Him.

Even as a non-religious person, I do sometimes find myself appreciating the sheer overwhelming eon-busting poetry of that particular idea...

Other times, I wonder if that sort of time period would be long enough for Harry Maguire to be a good defender...

If there really is a God, he's sure got a glint in his eye...

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

[scrumpyjack]

I often find myself recalling something I heard on the radio many years ago, where it was suggested that gravity is God pulling the Devil back to Him.

Even as a non-religious person, I do sometimes find myself appreciating the sheer overwhelming eon-busting poetry of that particular idea...

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

Note that 'God' is always assumed to be male! Shows how primitive the concept is.

[ReformedCharacter]

Note that 'God' is always assumed to be male! Shows how primitive the concept is.

Not all religions have a male God, nor - depending on your definition - do all religions have a God or Gods.

RC

[CliffEdge]

So what is God?

You'll have to find that out for yourself, or not as the case may be.

RC

So you don't know what it is you know?
It is worth reading a bit of discussion on Thomas Aquinas and the problems with God if you can find it. But I'm straying off topic so won't continue.
If I said I can walk across the ceiling upside down would you believe me?
Probably not, but if you saw me do it once you might believe I could do it again.
Same with life as far as I'm concerned, if I can do it once (and I've no idea how) I think it's likely I can and will do it again (and I've no idea how). It's not wishful thinking, just logical.

[ReformedCharacter]

So what is God?

You'll have to find that out for yourself, or not as the case may be.

RC

So you don't know what it is you know?

No. I just said that you would have to find out for yourself.

RC

[CliffEdge]

So what is God?

You'll have to find that out for yourself, or not as the case may be.

RC

So you don't know what it is you know?

No. I just said that you would have to find out for yourself.

RC

It would be easier if you just told me what you know, assuming you believe that your God is the one true God. If you don't believe that, well it's a free country still, just about, so you can believe whatever you like.

[ReformedCharacter]

So what is God?

You'll have to find that out for yourself, or not as the case may be.

RC

So you don't know what it is you know?

No. I just said that you would have to find out for yourself.

RC

It would be easier if you just told me what you know, assuming you believe that your God is the one true God. If you don't believe that, well it's a free country still, just about, so you can believe whatever you like.

It isn't my job to make anything easy for you. I think you are after an argument rather than actually trying to find something out. I don't think I've mentioned 'my God' let alone a 'one true God'. I think you are letting your prejudices get the better of you. As I said, if you want to know about God you will have to find out for yourself, nothing I can tell you will help with that.

RC

[Midsmartin]

"if you want to know about God you will have to find out for yourself"

In most other fields we are able to present evidence to each other when we discuss the nature of things. We don't usually just have to find out for ourself. If there is a God, then this should still apply. There should be evidence that can be put forward to one another, particularly if it's a god who wants us to know he exists.

So either God does not exist, or s/he does but wishes to hide from us. If there is a deity, there is I suppose no reason to assume that it gives a damn whether we believe in it, or to assume it benevolent, or rational, or consistent.