I did get messed up by some anxiety and have these thoughts rolling through my head so I’ll leave it at cosmic horror warning.
spoiler
I’m not religious but I have thoughts about experiencing consciousness and what it is. I say that consciousness is independent of memory because we forget, clearly dependent on our physical body, etc. generally I do say that we don’t know consciousness so maybe it can be reconstructed (in the can’t rule out the possibility way)
So I can see scenarios were my conscious could pop into existence without my memories after I die (as I’m writing this I realized that’s nothing to fear).
I am trying to adopt healthier mindset of looking at everything in life as a quest, new things are a call to action, and that it’s okay if everything I do amounts to little in x number of years (worked out okay for ozymandias, right?).
Im probably just rambling because my life has got boring and monotonous along with actual fear of American politics.
You must log in or register to comment.
Eh… No, but its nice to think about it.
As stated by many others, evidence is required to prove something. However, the stories we tell ourselves are comforting, so I wont fault anyone who does. Up until the point where people start going “My sky-dad could totally beat up your sky-dad”, that can Belgium right off…
I don’t believe in reincarnation, but one thing that isn’t mentioned enough is that there aren’t enough “souls” for everyone to have a reincarnation. If you rewind the clock back, once the original (for the sake of this exercise) 100 people died, the next generation would have 200-300 people already alive due to multiple children, which means they would halve mostly new souls. Fast forward to today, I’d imagine a lot of people would have baby souls.
That argument only works on the specific belief that souls constantly exist on earth though. In various mythologies and religions, there are various other realms where countless numbers of souls exist without inhabiting a human body on earth.
Nope. When I die, there is no longer a me of any sort; just any media and memory that captures some moment of when I still was until those too fade.
I believe in reincarnation just as much as I believe any other theory of an afterlife - that is to say, I don’t.
We don’t know. Nobody knows what happens when we die. That’s ok, and I don’t feel the need to make up a story to explain away the uncertainty.
I think it’s likely that something happens when we die, but it could just as easily be nothingness, the end of existence. I only think it’s likely because I definitely believe that there is SO much that we don’t understand about the universe that it’s more probable than not that SOMETHING happens that we can’t currently fathom, perceive, or understand.
But, right now there’s no real evidence. So I don’t care, and I don’t worry about it.
To our best understanding, everything that lives will die. I don’t know what happens, it might be some form of heaven, it might be reincarnation, it might be transcendence, etc. However, I take comfort in the fact that it’s a shared experience, whatever it is. It’s natural. It’s part of the process.
The universe doesn’t owe us an explanation. Maybe we’ll figure it out, but we haven’t yet, and I’m fine with that.
No but I wonder if hell is being made an insect over and over.
I don’t think insects have a notion of being happy or sad so it wouldn’t be too bad
We live in an infinite universe. As such, it seems hubristic to me to believe that we have, more or less, nature figured out.
I don’t feel compelled to believe in the soul as some strange sort of object that is continuously reincarnated towards a great purpose. But if we consider consciousness as an energy of its own kind, then it should hold true that it cannot be created or destroyed, only change form. This could mean that the consciousness that resides in the body could move between different life forms like a fluid, freely mixing and melding with others, filling a new vessel as necessary.
You’ll maintain a healthy diet with this much salad.
I don’t know if I can believe in a great purpose, is there an end that’s meant to be reached or is it like we find the next step.
Maybe we dream, and works towards it if we achieve it; we dream again. We can enjoy it, be absolutely ambivalent, or even suffer. Maybe I can get back to appreciating the universe unfolding in front of me.
You say forgetting memories is proof or indicative that memory depends on the physical body. But isn’t that true for conscious as well?
Our conscious is inherently bound to our physical being. We see, we feel, we taste, we identify with our body. Our brain allows us to think, and experience, to conceptualize our body, our being, us as an entity.
We cut off fingernails and discard them as no longer part of ourselves. We drive a car and internalize movement as if it were us moving, while not seeing the vehicle as part of ourselves.
Without experiencing and without a body to conceptualize, what would our consciousness be? Without a body and mind where consciousness can arise from experience and thoughts, how could consciousness arise?
Yeah theirs an idea that universal can recreate particles and mass from energy that exists and eventually I guess the universe can recreate the the universe similar to how we know it after some amount of time or make a big bang. I don’t understand that physics but interesting concept.
I would be curious if the was consciousness without matter, maybe a pure energy based being could exist
I say that consciousness is independent of memory because we forget, clearly dependent on our physical body
Some parts remain even after you forget. That is the outcome of your own free decisions, that has formed part of your personality. For example, you like cornflowers because you have decided to like it. So when you forget how cornflowers look, you will still like them when you see them, even without really remembering them. A good part of your personality is formed in that way: you have decided to be that way.
I believe that (most of ?) our personality remains when the current body goes to compost and we enter the next world, either up or down :)
I hope not.
I felt that way too, but then I watched re zero and that changed my mentally. I watch the anime last year
I’m going to make a guess that majority of people looking at this question have grown up in countries with Christian cultural background. Meaning even if they aren’t religious, their more or less subconscious believes about the nature of reality may involve some vague ideas about souls, absolute good and evil and so on. Separate entities in a hierarchical world. From that perspective, reincarnation is never going to sound anything but magical.
But if you drop your belief in you as a separate entity, literally everything is a “reincarnation” of you, if you want to use that word. But it’s not the “you” that you think you are. Reality is prior to your thought about it, as thoughts are just imperfect reflections of reality.
You get a disconnect when you try to take a concept like reincarnation from a thought-framework such as Buddhism, without being REALLY FUCKING INTIMATELY STEEPED IN IT, and then try to fit it into whatever dualistic worldview you’re likely holding in this largely Chisto-capitalistic world that is hell bent on making sure you always feel separate, alone and not enough.
It really is like taking a power plug from the EU and then being surprised it doesn’t fit in the socket in the USA. And then going off about what a stupid design EU has while not ever even considering if the socket is even meant to receive that kind of a plug (because in YOUR opinion, your socket must be perfect in every way and could never ever be questioned).
Get Waking Up by Sam Harris… Or read Adyashanti, Rupert Spira, Loch Kelly, Jayasara, Kiran Trace, Christopher Wallis, many more. It’s all available out there but unfortunately a lot gets dismissed because “nooo muh materialistic worldview that is required for the current capitalistic hellscape that’s slowly destroying our world can’t possibly be wrong”.
Want there to be evidence reincarnation exists . Want there to be research teams dedicated to finding it
It doesn’t fucking matter. Sometimes it feel that the void is actually the best place to be.
It’s peaceful at least. It will cure my anxiety.
Dude, I had bad day. Are you okay?
It’s a long story, but I made this post to cope. I’m feeling better, I’m mixing up my routine. I am getting annoyed when I come across people talking about death.
Yesterday I did help someone that had a pop-up canopy collapse on them under heavy winds.
No.
Do you remember before being born? It’s the same after.
Why would you think that being born is the same as dying?
(hint: it isn’t the same at all)
Not existing before and after is technically the same, please provide any scientific article of it being otherwise, I’m open to that.
One could argue even the development arc of humans is backwards towards the end. The process of dying is not the same as being born, if you mean that.
What kind of scientist are you?
Irrelevant to the case, but as it scientist concepts, research, analysis, deduction and proof is a standard part of my work.
Its typical however to instead answer with proof for a hypothesis to try to slander the opponent, especially nowadays. So there you go.
Luckily I do this conversation for fun and trying to learn more, since this is the way as humans we can grow.
So you tell me. What’s your experience from your last death.
Yeah I can forgot random days of my life so I don’t remember those days. I get the perspective I’m just illustrating a point
If you want to play with that thought in a horrible way you might want to have a look at the episode white Christmas from black mirror.
I think conclusively stating that is a bit much, we don’t know shit about how consciousness works, do how can we know what happens if it ends?
I died and came back and there was nothing, that concludes it for me. Ymmv, of course.
Are you sure? Like what do you mean nothing? Like it all went to black? How do you know you just don’t remember it?
(in order of questions)
Yes I am. Well, like dreamless time-skip sleeping or before being born, nothing. No not even going to black just not and nothing being there, movie cut.
And lastly, I can’t, true. It could also be being influenced by the cocktail of medication you get in that situation which by the way has created a lot of stories to tell afterwards (trips) but not from the time of dying.
NDEs are probably not drug induced… probably
Can you prove that memory is a reliable way to determine reality without referencing memory?
We know memory is unreliable.
What about people who claim past life memories?
As is common amongst Buddhists
Related video: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_4BFX_qhhyk
I am aware. I personally think it’s a load of religious bull, but don’t directly want to offend anyone wanting to believe it.
I also know repatriation (I hope that’s the correctly translated term) which is proven to be planted suggested memories through that very process scientifically as far as I am aware at the current state of science.
I do love reading (eg the game is life) playing with these theories, though!
Proof of the evidence that reparitation is suggested?
Fair request.
I did some research into the topic a year ago due to my situation and came to the stated conclusion.
So I tried to find some scientific research again right now (in a limited time frame of like 10 to 20 minutes, on my mobile).
I first tried in English bot got a lot of hits regarding companies and since my native language is not English I don’t know what that word means in relation to companies and also didn’t want to waste time on that.
So I tried it in German and was flooded by hits which offer that ad a service and as such of course tell you how successful it is. Obviously.
I was not able to find the research I remember within that time, I am sorry.
However in any case you’d be free to believe whatever anyway.
The point of the information I read was however that people coming out of the procedure (sometimes, possibly also accidentally) get memories planted in a well known psychological way and it is a highly untrustworthy procedure.
So that’s why I didn’t do it. I have enough to cope with and don’t need additional fictional issues added to that 😁
And they found that all this does is create false memories?
Indeed. So the brain would create memories from context.
And we’re 100% on this?
So reincarnation is not a thing but what’s to stop “you” from coming back as a new individual? After all, it happened at least once.
If it was real and you could retain memories of past lives, I’m confident we’d have some evidence/proof.
If it exists without memory retention and its just some sort of “soul” concept then it really doesn’t matter since you won’t remember anything for it to be worth worrying about.
The fact that brain injuries can erase memories shows that memory isn’t going to continue when the brain no longer functions.
I have this little pet theory:
What if the memory is simply overwritten? A toddler, having not much experienced much in life may remember some stuff but as soon as new memories are formed the “old” memories are overwritten…
I mean, it at least would explain why my 2 year old has recently run an eerily convincing musket drill and bayonett charge with a stick while i am pretty sure he never has seen something like that on TV…
Ever hear of Dr. Ian Stevenson?
He emphasized that the information he collected was suggestive of reincarnation but “was not flawless and it certainly does not compel such a belief.”
If even the guy who had done the most research on it doesn’t believe in it, why should anyone else?
Don’t cherrypick qoutes
When you see anyone disagreeing with you as hostility, you’ve clearly lost the thread.
Stop trying to twist his words in weird ways that benefit your stance, he very literally said we shouldn’t believe.
I like the idea in Buddhism, that you are precious/valuable from the moment you are born. You already achieved plenty in your past life, which is why you were born as a human. Therefore, there is no need for self-hatred or for pressure to perform.
Not very knowledgeable about Buddhism but is the cycle over once you ‘reach’ humanity or can you just be an awful human being in this incarnation and come back as E. coli the next time?
IIRC, you can still come back as a “lesser” creature next time. Monks and ascetics exist because they’re trying to go up to whatever is above human. I’ve forgotten the details. Nirvana or some kind of god-like state of existence, or reunification with some higher power. This might vary depending on the specific religion.
Of course, there are people who believe that assuming humans are a higher form of life is an arrogant assumption in the first place, which would render all of that null.
Buddhist here. The goal of Buddhism is to escape the cycle of rebirth. Monks and ascetics are generally trying to go out (to nibbana, “extinguishment”) rather than up (to rebirth in one of the heavenly realms), which tends to be a goal of laypeople. Though it depends to some extent on which branch of Buddhism. Even after reaching a heavenly realm and having a godlike existence, eventually (after a very long time) they will die and fall back into a lower realm with more suffering, which is why escaping the cycle is the ultimate goal.
In Buddhism we don’t consider humans a higher form of life than animals or those in the hell realm. All living beings are seen equally, as we all suffer and we all want to be free from suffering. Regarding E. coli, I think most Buddhists would say you can only be reborn into a body with a sufficient nervous system for the brain to support the mind processes required for experience, so bacteria are probably too simple.
But saying “you” are reborn isn’t quite right as there is no self which goes through this process, just the causal process itself links the past and present life.
