All you people who believe in life after death...

That's all very well, and it's hard to disagree with what you've said, But the concept of life and what religious people regard as life after death has a very concrete definition, one that neither of your propositions addresses.

Besides that, I don't agree with your conclusion that it's obvious that nothing survives beyond corporeal death. If it were, religious people wouldn't believe in the idea with such vehemence.

 

Hearsay

 

Walsh,
"the concept of life and what religious people regard as life after death has a very concrete definition"
REALLY? Would you care to fill me in, because I have never heard two different religious people talk about this the same way. It seems to me there are as many ideas about what survives death as there are people. I don't think you could posit a definition that most or even many "religious people" wouldn't have some variation on.

Your attempt to paint "religious people" with one brush is absurd. The view I have expressed above is the predominating worldview of most religious systems of India and the Far East, not to mention a lot of new-age and spiritually-progressive thinkers throughout the West.

There's no statement you can make about "religious people" that holds true.

 

thedope:

If we could object to being born that argument might hold court. ;D

 

As it is, it is second hand.

 

The question isn't what the soul is, but what it isn't.

 

Of course not, but I think you can make certain statements about religious people who believe in life after death.

You can find in common to many religions the idea that besides the corporeal body there is some kind of "essence" of the individual. In contrast to a strict materialism, this essence does not totally depend on the existence of the physical form, and so it, or some part of it, survives after death. Whether you call this the soul or something else isn't really important.

Obviously, such generalizations are going to be incomplete. But still workable for speculative discussion, on a web forum.

 

Monkeyboy:

How?

 

I just made it up.

 

When we die we go to heaven and receive eternal life with Jesus Christ our spirit the real us , we leave our mortal bodies and have no pain and never grow old any more into a state of heavenly dimension, eternal
love with the Father God and Jesus and eternal peace and tranquility , no pain and no sorrow. Except I do not want to go there until I am way over
a hundred years old. Sounds good but not until the time is perfect with the Lord for your good.. Hallelujah!

 

Sure there's life after death, we're all living proof. The secret to your wanting to get wrinkly is your body Nan. It "knows" the way to get there isn't by dying

 

It is possible that personality, if it is a physical entity, may exist in multiple states just as elements may be in a solid liquid or gaseous state.

 

Simultaneously too, though in different people at any one time. The perception of time has a funny way of 'consolidating' consciousness! lol

 

Potential / Possibility persists. Same as in death I suppose.

 

My mother gave birth to my physical body. Not sure that she therefore gave birth to my Being.

 

She did. You do too.

 

So which came first: her, or her being to which she gave birth?

 

I am to see her apart from her being?! lol

Her mother came before her.

 

As one who has had the experience of death, close up and intimate....I can tell you, "everything you are" seems to go.

Christmas day, quite a few years ago, Mum, Grand mother, Kay, and myself, were being driven back, by Step- dad, from South coast, towards Hampshire.
The day had seen us celebrating, with Step fathers, dad, Pom.

Mum was sat front passenger seat, Kay behind her, and I was looking past drivers head, at New forest.

A head I saw a car, headlights blaring. Wasn't much traffic about.

The near, head on collision was calculated,at over 100 mph.

I then became "conscious" similar to awakening.
Without the grogginess.
I was somewhere.....
It was dark....a void.
All of my senses seemed to be with me.
The area was calm, without noise, or vibration.
If I had to measure the time I was there, I'd say about 20-30 seconds.
The "feeling", was a connection to this place.

I then remember waking up, suddenly, and I knew, or was told to keep still.
I could hear the confusion around me, and heard a sudden intake of breath, from my Mum, who had manged to get out of car, and was looking
at me, through side window.
I must have looked a state.

I can then recall, being taken from car, into ambulance.
Luckily, two nurses had been on there way home, and had stopped to assist.

I was then in treatment area, where driver of other car was.
Left in passageway, for what seemed like hours.
Can still feel the surgeons operating on head wound, at time I thought to be oval.
Can also still, "experience" the compound fracture, which had a hole, being "pulled" to reset bone.

Head was wrapped like an Egyptian mummy.

What had actually happened, was that as I had seen the car coming towards us, the impact had forced my head into the "A" post, which holds seat belt.
The buckle had been the main point of impact.
Injuries worse, because of no seat belt.
The scar runs from hairline, to eyebrow, and across.

My shirt front, and trousers were completely covered in blood.

Everyone survived.

:sultan:

 

Glad to hear it.