Life after death
Discussion
A500leroy said:
Can anyone explain why we are breathing anyway, i know you say reproduction but some of us are gay so whats the point of us, and after
all the reproductions in millions of years whats the ultimate purpose of humans anyway?
There is no point to humans, nor any other animals. Life finds a way to take advantage of the environment it is is in and those animals who are better able to take advantage thrive at the expense of other species. Having some people who are gay in a small prehistoric community and therefore unlikely to have children of their own might have been beneficial to the whole community as they’re able to contribute more as they wouldn’t have families to support. all the reproductions in millions of years whats the ultimate purpose of humans anyway?
4Q said:
There is no point to humans, nor any other animals. Life finds a way to take advantage of the environment it is is in and those animals who are better able to take advantage thrive at the expense of other species. Having some people who are gay in a small prehistoric community and therefore unlikely to have children of their own might have been beneficial to the whole community as they’re able to contribute more as they wouldn’t have families to support.
Homosexuality may not have a positive benefit but it is probably fair to say it doesn’t negatively impact human communities, otherwise there would likely have been evolutionary pressure against it. Whatever the position it doesn’t justify discrimination. Esceptico said:
Do bacteria have life after death? How about other single cell organisms? Humans have evolved from single cell organisms - so at what point did our forefathers “evolve” life after death? And how? And for what purpose? The whole idea of life after death is bizarre when examined rationally.
But reality and existence can't really be thought of rationally. Think of the weirdness of quantum mechanics. Consider that we can only see/hear/sense a tiny slice of what is there, and who knows what else we can't detect. This could be just one plane of reality, we only see and understand things on the most basic of levels, just enough to survive infact, but that doesn't mean that what we experience is all the universe is. Your train of thought would have fitted very well before the arrival of quantum mechanics, but now the only thing we know for certain is that we know f
k all 
Esceptico said:
The whole idea of life after death is bizarre when examined rationally.
Worth listening or reading to the historian Bart Ehrman.Early Christianity didn't have a concept of Heaven in the clouds. When you died, you died. It was thought that Jesus would return at the end of times to judge the living and the dead; some would go to hell, the rest would be resurrected if dead and would live in paradise on Earth.
Olivera said:
Worth listening or reading to the historian Bart Ehrman.
Early Christianity didn't have a concept of Heaven in the clouds. When you died, you died. It was thought that Jesus would return at the end of times to judge the living and the dead; some would go to hell, the rest would be resurrected if dead and would live in paradise on Earth.
Ah yes, Christianity. The go to for scientific answersEarly Christianity didn't have a concept of Heaven in the clouds. When you died, you died. It was thought that Jesus would return at the end of times to judge the living and the dead; some would go to hell, the rest would be resurrected if dead and would live in paradise on Earth.
hucumber said:
But reality and existence can't really be thought of rationally. Think of the weirdness of quantum mechanics. Consider that we can only see/hear/sense a tiny slice of what is there, and who knows what else we can't detect. This could be just one plane of reality, we only see and understand things on the most basic of levels, just enough to survive infact, but that doesn't mean that what we experience is all the universe is. Your train of thought would have fitted very well before the arrival of quantum mechanics, but now the only thing we know for certain is that we know fk all
The approach above drives me nuts. Yes quantum mechanics is weird and no we don’t know everything about reality but that doesn’t open the flood gates to any and all crackpot idea. However weird quantum mechanics may be it is consistent with observed reality. Anything new we find also has to fit into our existing knowledge of reality and be consistent with tried and tested laws. At macroscopic scales the weirdness of quantum mechanics disappears - when you are waiting for a bus to turn up you don’t have to think about the probability of it being in this town or perhaps the next one. It follows a well defined path through observable time and space and no practical problems you can ask about the bus and its journey will depend on quantum mechanics. k all Esceptico said:
The approach above drives me nuts. Yes quantum mechanics is weird and no we don’t know everything about reality but that doesn’t open the flood gates to any and all crackpot idea. However weird quantum mechanics may be it is consistent with observed reality. Anything new we find also has to fit into our existing knowledge of reality and be consistent with tried and tested laws. At macroscopic scales the weirdness of quantum mechanics disappears - when you are waiting for a bus to turn up you don’t have to think about the probability of it being in this town or perhaps the next one. It follows a well defined path through observable time and space and no practical problems you can ask about the bus and its journey will depend on quantum mechanics.
Thats not really my point. At one time classical physics was all we had, and people thought we knew everything about the reality in which we live, then something new came along. I personally find it very arrogant to now assume we understand and know everything. Just because we don't know what happens to the 'soul' when we die, doesn't mean that the only answer is nothingFrom first hand experience having dabbled in death numerous times, twelve cardiac arrests, a few instances of flatlining during two of them and being defibrillated back (I've got a defib/pacemaker residing in my chest), I'd say;
I've never seen any white light, no looking down on ones self, no nothing. Just a short period empty blackness.
When I've been jolted back and come round, I have no recollection of the event after that brief period of empty blackness.
I've never seen any white light, no looking down on ones self, no nothing. Just a short period empty blackness.
When I've been jolted back and come round, I have no recollection of the event after that brief period of empty blackness.
RDMcG said:
There is a rational view to deal with what happens after death, and it was a broadcast by Aaron Freeman on NPR in the US; it has always struck me a very human way to deal with the reality of death:
"You want a physicist to speak at your funeral. You want the physicist to talk to your grieving family about the conservation of energy, so they will understand that your energy has not died. You want the physicist to remind your sobbing mother about the first law of thermodynamics; that no energy gets created in the universe, and none is destroyed. You want your mother to know that all your energy, every vibration, every Btu of heat, every wave of every particle that was her beloved child remains with her in this world. You want the physicist to tell your weeping father that amid energies of the cosmos, you gave as good as you got.
And at one point you'd hope that the physicist would step down from the pulpit and walk to your brokenhearted spouse there in the pew and tell him/her that all the photons that ever bounced off your face, all the particles whose paths were interrupted by your smile, by the touch of your hair, hundreds of trillions of particles, have raced off like children, their ways forever changed by you. And as your widow rocks in the arms of a loving family, may the physicist let him/her know that all the photons that bounced from you were gathered in the particle detectors that are her/his eyes, that those photons created within her/him constellations of electromagnetically charged neurons whose energy will go on forever.
And the physicist will remind the congregation of how much of all our energy is given off as heat. There may be a few fanning themselves with their programs as he says it. And he will tell them that the warmth that flowed through you in life is still here, still part of all that we are, even as we who mourn continue the heat of our own lives.
And you'll want the physicist to explain to those who loved you that they need not have faith; indeed, they should not have faith. Let them know that they can measure, that scientists have measured precisely the conservation of energy and found it accurate, verifiable and consistent across space and time. You can hope your family will examine the evidence and satisfy themselves that the science is sound and that they'll be comforted to know your energy's still around. According to the law of the conservation of energy, not a bit of you is gone; you're just less orderly.
Amen. "
I think this is such a lovely way of saying that you persist after death, but in a different way"You want a physicist to speak at your funeral. You want the physicist to talk to your grieving family about the conservation of energy, so they will understand that your energy has not died. You want the physicist to remind your sobbing mother about the first law of thermodynamics; that no energy gets created in the universe, and none is destroyed. You want your mother to know that all your energy, every vibration, every Btu of heat, every wave of every particle that was her beloved child remains with her in this world. You want the physicist to tell your weeping father that amid energies of the cosmos, you gave as good as you got.
And at one point you'd hope that the physicist would step down from the pulpit and walk to your brokenhearted spouse there in the pew and tell him/her that all the photons that ever bounced off your face, all the particles whose paths were interrupted by your smile, by the touch of your hair, hundreds of trillions of particles, have raced off like children, their ways forever changed by you. And as your widow rocks in the arms of a loving family, may the physicist let him/her know that all the photons that bounced from you were gathered in the particle detectors that are her/his eyes, that those photons created within her/him constellations of electromagnetically charged neurons whose energy will go on forever.
And the physicist will remind the congregation of how much of all our energy is given off as heat. There may be a few fanning themselves with their programs as he says it. And he will tell them that the warmth that flowed through you in life is still here, still part of all that we are, even as we who mourn continue the heat of our own lives.
And you'll want the physicist to explain to those who loved you that they need not have faith; indeed, they should not have faith. Let them know that they can measure, that scientists have measured precisely the conservation of energy and found it accurate, verifiable and consistent across space and time. You can hope your family will examine the evidence and satisfy themselves that the science is sound and that they'll be comforted to know your energy's still around. According to the law of the conservation of energy, not a bit of you is gone; you're just less orderly.
Amen. "
I may have come back from the dead. It’s a bit technical.
I went into hospital for a biopsy. It was a straightforward op but required a full anaesthetic. I woke in intensive care, with two nurses and a doctor around me, beeping machines connected to me, and an intense pain in my chest. I found later two of my ribs had separated from my chest bone.
I later had a discussion with two anaesthetists, and I assumed the younger (and slipshod one) was ‘mine’. He said that my pulse had rocketed to over 180, stayed there for a while, then increased. That was bad enough, but then it stopped. For several minutes. This was worse. The crash pad was called but they managed to restart my heart without using it, presumably when the ribs were in the way.
I asked, ‘Are you telling me I died on the operating table?’
The older person said, ‘It depends what you mean by died. It is very much a technical term.’ So it isn’t clear, this death thing.
I’ve distrusted doctors ever since my Aunt Doll went into hospital for one thing and died of another, yet no one seemed in the least bit surprised. I’ve extended that to anaesthetists now.
I went into hospital for a biopsy. It was a straightforward op but required a full anaesthetic. I woke in intensive care, with two nurses and a doctor around me, beeping machines connected to me, and an intense pain in my chest. I found later two of my ribs had separated from my chest bone.
I later had a discussion with two anaesthetists, and I assumed the younger (and slipshod one) was ‘mine’. He said that my pulse had rocketed to over 180, stayed there for a while, then increased. That was bad enough, but then it stopped. For several minutes. This was worse. The crash pad was called but they managed to restart my heart without using it, presumably when the ribs were in the way.
I asked, ‘Are you telling me I died on the operating table?’
The older person said, ‘It depends what you mean by died. It is very much a technical term.’ So it isn’t clear, this death thing.
I’ve distrusted doctors ever since my Aunt Doll went into hospital for one thing and died of another, yet no one seemed in the least bit surprised. I’ve extended that to anaesthetists now.
colin_p said:
From first hand experience having dabbled in death numerous times, twelve cardiac arrests, a few instances of flatlining during two of them and being defibrillated back (I've got a defib/pacemaker residing in my chest), I'd say;
I've never seen any white light, no looking down on ones self, no nothing. Just a short period empty blackness.
When I've been jolted back and come round, I have no recollection of the event after that brief period of empty blackness.
Thats not actually proper dead though, you can't bring actual dead back to lifeI've never seen any white light, no looking down on ones self, no nothing. Just a short period empty blackness.
When I've been jolted back and come round, I have no recollection of the event after that brief period of empty blackness.
bmwmike said:
Derek Smith said:
hucumber said:
Thats not actually proper dead though, you can't bring actual dead back to life
What's your definition of dead?https://youtu.be/Bmyx9qJkeQQ
M5-911 said:
bmwmike said:
Derek Smith said:
hucumber said:
Thats not actually proper dead though, you can't bring actual dead back to life
What's your definition of dead?https://youtu.be/Bmyx9qJkeQQ
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