Death.. Then what?

[Lingus]

I can't really listen to that at the moment as I'm at work, but initially I'll point back to my earlier comment that the brain does weird things when the body is dead. Something that the brain controls is the perception of time. I'm not sure where the whole "90 minutes" comes in, but if the guy was dead for 90 minutes, that's a fluke that actually does happen sometimes. There are reported cases where people have been technically dead for hours, and then when they wake up they have no brain damage.

In any case, the point is, all near death experiences can be explained. There is no reason to take them as proof of god or heavan or an afterlife.

To be truthfully honest, I don't think the typical view of heavan would appeal to me. I wouldn't want to do ANYTHING for an eternity. Anything would become mind numbingly, psychopathically boring eventually. Even existence itself. At some point I would probably just want to not exist.

[Chaos]

To be truthfully honest, I don't think the typical view of heavan would appeal to me. I wouldn't want to do ANYTHING for an eternity. Anything would become mind numbingly, psychopathically boring eventually. Even existence itself. At some point I would probably just want to not exist.

This is EXACTLY the mindset I have.

[Scotty]

Ditto....

Unless there are boobies...

And beer...

They never get old!

[Lingus]

Nah. Imagine. The coolest thing you can possibly think of (in Scott's case, boobs and beer) and then having that shoved in your face for so infinitely long that it becomes something that you would kill to never see again. Sounds more like some versions of hell to me.

Of course, that's all nonsense. I don't think very many people take a literal approach to heavan and hell. But who knows...

[Cactuscat222]

Theoretically, God must feel the same way. I bet he killed himself.

I mean... if you knew EVERYTHING, then what point would there be to be around anymore? You already know EVERYTHING there, it would be absolutely awful to live like that.

[Lingus]

Yea, except that falls apart if you think of "god" not as a thinking entity but rather a force or simply energy. It's not some robed, bearded dude sitting on a throne up in a billowy, cloudy heavan. A higher power would be completely abstract or metaphysical. Nothing in the physical world would represent it.

[Cactuscat222]

That goes without saying. You could believe hes the robed bearded man, or the unimaginable force, or even Xenu :P

That is why when I think of God, I don't think of him as an ultimate omnipotent being. Rather, just one with great power.

[ASD!]

In my opinion, death is more than likely nothing. Imagine blacking out, and not waking up. Pretty much what i think happens, except that death would be no brain function at all, and blacking out uses minor brain functions. But hey, for all i know, each of us has our specific section of Heaven, where our expectations come to fruition. Then of course, there is where most all of us will go to(if  you believe in it)Hell. Eternal damnation, to which our greatest fears will by forced upon us. Mine being ass rape.

I'd like to believe if there was a God, He would take up the image to which each of expects him to be. For example; Scotty's God would be a beer-wielding hotty with huge tits, and mine would be something funny and ironic, like Pikachu.

[Lingus]

My problem with that is that all of those material things like being ass raped or beer wielding hotties all relates to the physical world. When you die, you are no longer a part of the physical world. All of your previous notions were held in your brain. Your fear of being ass raped is because you have an ass and you don't want it being raped. Over time your brain associates ass rape with bad things... If you had no brain, no physical body at all, you wouldn't care about ass rape. You wouldn't care about anything at all. You would have no logical thought, or any thought for that matter. You would simply be (or potentially not). But you certainly would not retain all of the same ideas and notions you had as a living person. If you have a soul, it is most definitely not connected to your brain.

Which brings up another point I've thought about occasionally. How can someone be condemned for doing bad things or being a mean person if that is caused by a chemical imbalance or other malady of the body. There are definitely conditions which will change a persons personality. People who have had tumors or other brain conditions can go from a friendly, nice person to a mean hearted one and will sometimes lose all of their friends. How can they be judged by their actions, or even their intentions, in this case when they are clearly not in control? This is just another reason why I don't believe in the judeo-christian notion of heavan/hell.

[Mr Pwnage]

@Lingus:
Interesting example, though i can't say I have ever feared my anal canal being penetrated by an unlikely penis. You bring up a good point though, most things that make life and thought life revolve around our bodies...pretty much everything. And, our whole thought process is based of our 5 senses, and you lose your senses when you die, so what is there to be concious for?

My theory on it though, is very hard to describe...regarding some sort of heaven. It is my guess that a heaven would be somthing most defaintely be impossible to be sensed by the living...I'll try to describe my point using colors for easy explanation. So, a human without any vision problems is able to see all color, red, blue, yellow, orange, etc... What if there is some color out there, that our eyes can't see but it's there, yet it's impossible for us to even imagine anything about it because our minds are fixed on the idea/thought to what we already know. I'm not talking about mixing a bunch of colors, but one color completely unique of its own, like pure red, that is physically impossible to see. We can't even start to imagine what it will be, because some part of our mind locks us off from thinking it. If that made any sense, but I believe heaven would be in some ways the same to that example.

[Lingus]

Haha, I was just using ASD's comment as an example.

But your example of using colors is good. It would be like us trying to imagine what infrared or ultraviolet actually looks like. We can't because we don't have that perception. That's also a good way of looking at higher dimensions.

[Cactuscat222]

My problem with that is that all of those material things like being ass raped or beer wielding hotties all relates to the physical world. When you die, you are no longer a part of the physical world. All of your previous notions were held in your brain. Your fear of being ass raped is because you have an ass and you don't want it being raped. Over time your brain associates ass rape with bad things... If you had no brain, no physical body at all, you wouldn't care about ass rape. You wouldn't care about anything at all. You would have no logical thought, or any thought for that matter. You would simply be (or potentially not). But you certainly would not retain all of the same ideas and notions you had as a living person. If you have a soul, it is most definitely not connected to your brain.

This is all theory, so I seriously hope you aren't saying that is fact.  ::)

My personal belief would be that we contain all knowledge we had in this world. If you want to go that route, you could argue our souls are 'who we are', and that even with the loss of our physical being, everything we once were would still be retained in our spiritual self.

[Lingus]

My problem with that is that all of those material things like being ass raped or beer wielding hotties all relates to the physical world. When you die, you are no longer a part of the physical world. All of your previous notions were held in your brain. Your fear of being ass raped is because you have an ass and you don't want it being raped. Over time your brain associates ass rape with bad things... If you had no brain, no physical body at all, you wouldn't care about ass rape. You wouldn't care about anything at all. You would have no logical thought, or any thought for that matter. You would simply be (or potentially not). But you certainly would not retain all of the same ideas and notions you had as a living person. If you have a soul, it is most definitely not connected to your brain.

This is all theory, so I seriously hope you aren't saying that is fact.  ::)

My personal belief would be that we contain all knowledge we had in this world. If you want to go that route, you could argue our souls are 'who we are', and that even with the loss of our physical being, everything we once were would still be retained in our spiritual self.

It certainly is not a theory. It is a proven fact that your brain functions cease eventually after your body dies. All of your memories and senses are a product of your brain... not your mind/soul/spirit.

I'm not one to discount a theory, but it's quite far fetched to think that you will retain any product of your physical body, namely memories/thoughts, after you die.

But, think about it. What if when you die you are stuck in your body. All of your senses in tact, but you can't move or anything at all. Eventually your body decays (and in the process you can feel your skin melting off) and you can no longer see/feel/etc but you are still stuck there... That would be scary. Yea, I'll stick with the mind/soul either not existing or not being attached to the body, thank you very much.

What if we had a consiousness without a brain?
[...clipped]

Btw, I didn't mean to skip over your posts Aqua. I specifically didn't read them at first because I didn't feel like arguing with you. I still don't. I know that some people have widely differing views from my own, and it is pretty apparent that you are one of them. I don't have anything wrong with it, I just don't share your beliefs and there's nothing you can really say to convince me otherwise, and I'm pretty sure nothing I would say would convince you otherwise either. So, I figure what's the point of arguing. It's not a bad thing, it just wouldn't make sense to do.

Either way, I am still curious about different belief systems. If you don't mind, what sect of christianity do you follow. If there is a specific one? I'm also very curious about how literal you take things. Do you feel that when you die you walk around in a body or are you disembodied? Does god have a body or would it just be a presense of some sort? What about heaven/hell? How do you perceive them? Are they places or states of mind/soul? I'm not saying you're wrong about any of this, I'm just curious what your beliefs are down to the detailed level like this. I just always wonder when someone has literal interpretations of these things, just how literal are they taking it. It's very different from my completely ambiguous/abstract way of thought.

[Forum]

I can actually remember being born it was all black then i just came into the world. I'm just going to go with going to heaven or hell :(.

[Mr Pwnage]

I can actually remember being born it was all black then i just came into the world. I'm just going to go with going to heaven or hell :(.

Evidently you remember it being black. Also, your going to hell...better start packing now.