Whats after death?

[Jax]

Energy, have you not seen the documentary called the MATRIX?

[mushymanrob]

Energy, have you not seen the documentary called the MATRIX?

 

no!

[Methuselah]

Actually there's no guarantee that what we see in front of us actually exists. It exists as far as we're concerned but (if we're being pernickety).....

Most of time, party conference season excepted, that'll do for me...

[mike Meehan]

From my personal viewpoint I believe that there is such a thing as a supreme intelligence  controlling our universe and the contents therein, though I would suggest that the various religions know very little more than the rest of us which is virtually 'zilch' - for them, especially in former times and even today in the less enlightened areas of the world these religions were a very good tool in controlling the masses and through the ages 'the message' was distorted to for political reasons - however, I believe that contained within them is a kernel of truth, so in my view we should not throw out the baby with the bathwater. 

 

The same also goes for many of these so called psychics, who for a fee will get in touch with a bereaved's departed relations or and - or with their help and magic rituals people will be able to win countless millions on games of chance and live happily ever after  - there appears to be no limit to the depths of cynicism some people will go - but just as there are a lot of bad uns about, it is my belief that there are some genuine 'seers' about - although there is no proof per se, there are anecdotal stories around which tend to lend some credence to their activities. 

 

We speak of afterlife and thought immediately to heaven and hell but my own thoughts are that there is no such thing as described in the religious texts - our heaven's  and hell's are what we make personally through our conduct and behaviour in this world. 

 

As I explained in an earlier post, I believe that our earthly lives are to enable us to learn and by degrees, sometimes 3 steps forwards and 2 steps backwards and sometimes the reverse, we gradually evolve into more rounded and better beings.

 

In this context I will mention the eastern belief of 'Karma' - this is a sort of balancing act where good activities make for advancement and bad activities the opposite - being human it is impossible for us to remain good all the time, so many lives will contain good and bad karma and we will also learn be being put into 'deprived' situations, perhaps with disabilities to learn how to experience and handle them. This is where the cycle of re-birth comes in because it will enable people who have suffered in a former life to have more empathy with those less fortunate and thereby progress, whilst those who have led lives of selfishness, cruelty and greed etc will end up in a future life of being on the other side in their former victims shoes so to speak, so that in the end this would turn out to be a universal justice where in the long term nobody would be able to get away with anything and it also gives an explanation for the suffering we see in the world today.

 

Maybe I think this way because my initial experiences of this life were as a Catholic, then when my parents divorced I was sent to live with my grand parents, who were Methodist and on Sundays was required to attend that church and Sunday school, whilst during the week I attended a C of E junior school, where we had lessons according to that discipline, therefore my thinking overall was not restricted to one creed or discipline.

 

Strangely enough I do see atheists welded to their thoughts to such an extent that this could be a religion in its own right. For myself I will freely admit that I am agnostic - I do not know but just formulate ideas from reading and my experiences of life.

 

I do see 'thought' as a form of energy which cannot be destroyed and it certainly affects us in my experience and may well be the reason why, say some buildings have a more soothing and happy atmosphere than others and why the old pubs appear to have a pleasant congenial atmosphere, whilst more recently built pubs appear to have no atmosphere at all.

 

Let's face it, everybody has a dream and who's to say which dreams are right and which are wrong, so long as they do not infringe on other peoples' wellbeing?

 

I along with, most probably everyone else on the planet, have very little knowledge, which to date is virtually unknowable but I am an optimist and believe that by degrees with our increasing research into hitherto unknown fields mankind will slowly start to uncover answers to the questions we have been asking since the dawn of time.

Edited September 12, 2013 by mike Meehan

[laserguy]

From my personal viewpoint I believe that there is such a thing as a supreme intelligence  controlling our universe and the contents therein....

 

 Me too - in fact I'm convinced of it, and that 'God' is something other than what has hitherto been loosely defined as. Sorry can't put it better than that - shockingly tired after zero kip since yesterday and now off to work...

[Jax]

I am more a Pagan/Spiritual person and as such think more along those lines, they we came/belong/go to, kind of things.  And people find that odd in someone of a technical ilk such as I am, I think it quite normal and it fits modern thinking IMHO.

 

 

Do not do the god fearing as I think if he/she cared and did then the sick would be cured and the poor would be cared and given, and what about war? how many are started in the name of god?

[knocker]

From my personal viewpoint I believe that there is such a thing as a supreme intelligence  controlling our universe and the contents therein,

 

Not called Boris by any chance?

[mike Meehan]

Not called Boris by any chance?

Knocker I would have expected better than that from you.

[davehsug]

Knocker I would have expected better than that from you.

If you look at the evidence though?

[knocker]

“We are going to die, and that makes us the lucky ones. Most people are never going to die because they are never going to be born. The potential people who could have been here in my place but who will in fact never see the light of day outnumber the sand grains of Arabia. Certainly those unborn ghosts include greater poets than Keats, scientists greater than Newton. We know this because the set of possible people allowed by our DNA so massively exceeds the set of actual people. In the teeth of these stupefying odds it is you and I, in our ordinariness, that are here.We privileged few, who won the lottery of birth against all odds, how dare we whine at our inevitable return to that prior state from which the vast majority have never stirred?â€

 

Guess who.

[davehsug]

“We are going to die, and that makes us the lucky ones. Most people are never going to die because they are never going to be born. The potential people who could have been here in my place but who will in fact never see the light of day outnumber the sand grains of Arabia. Certainly those unborn ghosts include greater poets than Keats, scientists greater than Newton. We know this because the set of possible people allowed by our DNA so massively exceeds the set of actual people. In the teeth of these stupefying odds it is you and I, in our ordinariness, that are here.We privileged few, who won the lottery of birth against all odds, how dare we whine at our inevitable return to that prior state from which the vast majority have never stirred?â€

 

Guess who.

Must be Lord Boris?

[knocker]

Must be Lord Boris?

 

Sorry Dave. Misled you. Lord Dawkins.

[laserguy]

I thought knocker meant Boris Karloff - that quote sounded all a bit Gothic to me...

[mushymanrob]

actually im with mike on the 'supreme intelligence' theory of 'god'.

 

the god i do not believe in is the one found in any religion. but we do live on a planet that is full of interesting complex and diverse life. whatever universal code allows for this is possibly 'god'. the chances of us being alone in the universe must be millions to one against, and i believe other life forms on other planets will have evolved along the same lines that life has on earth.

 

is that a design  deliberately by intelligence? or is it just another universal law of nature/physics (like the speed of light, or gravity) that allows things to evolve in a certain way under the right conditions?

 

either way it doesnt really give any indication that there is a life after death, which sadly looks unlikely.

[Methuselah]

I believe in neither life-after-death nor Intelligent Design...

[laserguy]

I believe in neither life-after-death nor Intelligent Design...

 

I believe in life before death, and Intelligent Design sounds like some corny advertising slogan for a car.

[Gray-Wolf]

From my own 'experience' , and near 30 years of trying to come to some kind of understanding of that 'moment' I find myself content to accept my inability to even mouth the first syllables of the first word I'd need use to describe the shadow of the moment as I witnessed it.

 

When I look at the cutting edge of science , our attempts to push back our understanding beyond the 'big bang' I can appreciate why I am so impotent. We are so insignificant in our capabilities and mere children in our understandings that we should accept that some things are beyond our grasp. We should also not be so foolish as to deny the possibility of things beyond our understanding just because we cannot perceive the 'proofs' that we seek ( in a way that we can accept and embrace?).

 

I am content to accept that what is after death 'Is' and leave it at that. 

 

EDIT: One part of what I know I can 'understand' and that is every single thought and deed is witnessed and that we will 'face' ourself, at the end, as we 'download' our living (for whatever reason) and that experiencing this purgatory ( for that is what it was for me even with only 20 odd years of living to run through at that time)  has kept me on my 'straight and narrow' ever since.

 

I never wish to feel as I felt then ever again even for a split second, never mind the eternity ( time is just not what we experience it as!) I suffered the last time I was there.

 

No matter how difficult it is always do your 'right thing' ( even if this appears 'wrong' to others?). There is no escaping/blagging when you are your own judge (that is the most perfect 'you' that you ,here, are the slenderest splinter of).

[laserguy]

 

 

EDIT: One part of what I know I can 'understand' and that is every single thought and deed is witnessed and that we will 'face' ourself, at the end, as we 'download' our living....

 

 

 

 

Oh boy, I'm in big trouble! But ye I know where you're coming from, and there's only a very tiny number of us who've been to the brink and can speak ( or not,as the case may be) about that moment. Everyone else can scoff and speculate to their heart's content - I really don't much care.

[mushymanrob]

thinking on... what could we possibly take with us to the afterlife? we are here, in the physical world... what use would a knowlege of the weather, a love of curry or wine, fav tv shows, everything that defines who we are as an individual... we would be nothing, as these things belong to this world, our identity is fixed here.

[Methuselah]

Downloading 'lives' into digital for raises the question: how many EDL members can you get into one ZX81!

[BornFromTheVoid]

I used to think that most religions involved a few people catching a glimpse of the reality of the universe and being unable to interpret what they saw correctly, hence, despite the many differences, there are many similarities between all religions. That included life after death, many religions, spiritualists, etc., have differring, but in some ways, similar views of what occurs when we shuffle off this mortal coil.

After a while, I came to the realisation that most religions have similarities, not because they all had different interpretations the same "truth", but because they're all completely made up by man. And so the popular views of heaven, nirvana, the afterlife are all entirely made up.

 

So now I'm one of those that's 99% sure that when we die, that's it, game over. But 1% also says, that almost anything is possible.

 

 

I wanna be cremated! But anyway, re near-death experiences/afterlife etc... in a coma ten years ago I came so close to death that the doctors had given up on me and they told my family as much. I vividly remember a nightmare/vision or whatever where I was floating on the ocean. In the near distance was a whirlpool. I was acutely aware of my heartbeat which was very,very gradually getting slower - the whole thing seemed to last forever. As it slowed, the whirlpool drew closer, but smaller and tighter. As my heartbeat slowed to what seemed to be minutes between each beat, I was constantly telling myself that the next one would be the last and I would be dead. Amidst the mad spectacle of this flashed images of my family,my baby son who I was convinced I'd never see again and a million snapshots of my life. Utter despair, hopelessness and resignation and a sadness and melancholy that defies any description. The whirpool was eventually upon me after I'd been waiting the longest interval yet for my next heartbeat. The hearbeat I'd been waiting for never came,as I was suddenly in the sucking maw of the whirlpool. Just as I was about to cross the 'event horizon' as in a black hole the grim reaper himself exploded from the centre of the whirlpool with scythe poised. Which does not bode well for when my time's up for real!! Next thing I knew, which must have been weeks later, was coming round with tubes inserted all over the place. Whether that qualifies as a genuine NDE or just the effects of huge amounts of morphine and god knows what other drugs, I can't say...

 

 

Sounds like a bad Salvia trip! Could make for an interesting painting though.

[Jax]

Downloading 'lives' into digital for raises the question: how many EDL members can you get into one ZX81!

1k = 1024bytes = 8192 bits....

 

 

...be jesus!  we could get them all in there and still load a game with the space left over!

[laserguy]

 

 

 

Sounds like a bad Salvia trip! Could make for an interesting painting though.

 

I once witnessed a guy experience just such a thing... and I have to agree with you most strongly! After watching such a sight I was too timid to have a go myself so can't say how it ranks compared to my NDE!

[mushymanrob]

I used to think that most religions involved a few people catching a glimpse of the reality of the universe and being unable to interpret what they saw correctly, hence, despite the many differences, there are many similarities between all religions. That included life after death, many religions, spiritualists, etc., have differring, but in some ways, similar views of what occurs when we shuffle off this mortal coil.

After a while, I came to the realisation that most religions have similarities, not because they all had different interpretations the same "truth", but because they're all completely made up by man. And so the popular views of heaven, nirvana, the afterlife are all entirely made up.

 

So now I'm one of those that's 99% sure that when we die, that's it, game over. But 1% also says, that almost anything is possible.

 

 

 

 

Sounds like a bad Salvia trip! Could make for an interesting painting though.

 

well said sir... actually that sums up my experiences, i was looking for something, to see if it was there. i tried religion and hippy style pagan spirituality, but ultimately there was little (if any) substance behind the theory. pity though..

 

(never had a bad salvia trip, nor shrooms for that matter, theyve all been great! lol)

Edited September 22, 2013 by mushymanrob

[laserguy]

 

(never had a bad salvia trip, nor shrooms for that matter, theyve all been great! lol)

 

 

Dunno about salvia, but have experienced everything the ol' psilocybe has to offer. Went one trip too far when things got seriously,seriously weird and heavy and never touched 'em again. Could relate a million tales but those who've never dabbled wouldn't have a hope in hell of understanding. Am I right?? It would be the same trying to explain to you how it felt to stare over the precipice of death - though what insight that,or the wildest mushroom trip gives to the 'afterlife' I can't say. I'm still here...!