If you believe in reincarnation...

[ratikala]

namaskaram david ji

Just imagine who we could become as a species if we could retain all our knowledge from one life to the next. Imagine being able to expand on the positive things we accomplish and hopefully not repeating the mistakes of the previous lives.

personaly l belive that we can , or could if we wanted to , ...... it may take a degree of dedication , reflection and meditation , ....

it would however mean working together and listening to oneanother , not something that all human beings are prepaired to do , ....

 

[ratikala]

namaskaram ji

For those who believe in reincarnation, does it at all depress you that all of your wisdom from this life might not be carried over or remembered in the next life?

For example - in this life you believe reincarnation to be true, for whatever reason. You might have thought hard to come to the conclusion of reincarnation. In the next life, you are statistically likely to live a life ignorant of that conclusion. Does this not bother you, that in the next life you may not be as philosophical or as wise as you've become in this life?

it does not depress me , .....my only thoughts on this subject are that if ones wisdom out weighs ones ignorance then ones subsequent birth will reflect that , we do not nececarily have to remember previous births but this does not proclude the imprints of our previous actions traveling with us and influencing the way we behave in subsequent births , nor does it stop those imprints from molding the susequent being , ....

 

[Rick O'Shez]

what makes you so sure that they loose the memories it is more like they loose the capacity to aces them , ...

No, with dementia there is actually a physical deterioration of brain structure, so the memories are no longer there to be accessed. Gone.

 

[ratikala]

No, with dementia there is actually a physical deterioration of brain structure, so the memories are no longer there to be accessed. Gone.

strange , ....wasnt like that with my nana ! momentary memory was gone , but deeper memory remained , ....and as the momentary memory sliped away she came up with some amazingly profound and astute coments and memories , .....

but then you are just looking at the physical grey matter ! ...... do you think all memory resides there ?

yes , ...in the end she forgot our names but it was amazing what she did remember and what she could see .

 

[Rick O'Shez]

but then you are just looking at the physical grey matter ! ...... do you think all memory resides there ?

Where else? I don't know.

I know that with dementia the oldest memories are the last to go, but they do go.

 

[ratikala]

Where else? I don't know.

I know that with dementia the oldest memories are the last to go, but they do go.

do you think the brain is a repository for memory ?

or do you think it might be possible that there are also other forms of memory ?

 

[Rick O'Shez]

do you think the brain is a repository for memory ?
or do you think it might be possible that there are also other forms of memory ?

Anything is possible, but dementia seems to demonstrate that memories are stored in the brain. Certain types of brain injury can cause memory loss too.

 

[ratikala]

namaskaram spiny ji

Anything is possible, but dementia seems to demonstrate that memories are stored in the brain. Certain types of brain injury can cause memory loss too.

lf l may refer back to the OP, .....

@The Sum of Awe

For those who believe in reincarnation, does it at all depress you that all of your wisdom from this life might not be carried over or remembered in the next life?

seeing that the initial question was prehaps on the question of memory on a higher level rather than than memory on a mundane worldly level , (the retention of wisdom and the memory there of) ....remembering birth dates and where one put ones shopping bag is relitively un important , ....here the question raises the point of wisdom , ....where wisdom just refers to aquired knowledge then certainly it will perish with the body , but wisdom gained through experience is a very different matter as where wisdom is put in to practice , therefore determining our actions, this in turn sets a chain of reactions which detirmin our future births , ...

in which case wisdom of an experiencial nature may stay with us and colour our choice of actions in subsequent lives , ....in this case such wisdom spontaniously occurs , it becomes an instinctive reaction , whether one would call that memory of past wisdom or not to me is not so important , it is somthing which is intrinsic to that person , ...thus he does not have to remember past wisdom he becomes it , ..therefore it is not lost .

 

[BSM1]

But where are all these memories stored? What about people who suffer from dementia and physically lose their memories?

Some folks tend to espouse the Akashic Records theory.

 

[Rick O'Shez]

Some folks tend to espouse the Akashic Records theory.

There is also the idea of store-house consciousness ( alaya-vijnana ) in some Buddhist schools.

 

[LuisDantas]

The brain certainly suffers from death, so if reincarnation exists in any form it must be capable of somehow bypassing the biological limitations of the brain anyway.

Some descriptions of reincarnation seem to me to be edging dangerously close to unsupportable claims, with perhaps nothing more than a desire to see some form of inheritance or continuity to sustain them. Others rely heavily on what appears to be claims of paranormal phenomena of inheritance of memories, which are both difficult to clearly demonstrate and IMO of little practical significance even if known to be true.

At the end of the day, the idea of reincarnation sure feels a lot like an emotional appeal with little connection to facts.

 

[Rick O'Shez]

n..in this case such wisdom spontaniously occurs , it becomes an instinctive reaction , whether one would call that memory of past wisdom or not to me is not so important , it is something which is intrinsic to that person , ...thus he does not have to remember past wisdom he becomes it , ..therefore it is not lost .

I think the tricky bit is trying to work out what "intrinsic" would mean in the complete absence of memory. Something like tendencies perhaps, or instinctive ways of responding?

As a thought experiment, imagine waking up one morning with complete amnesia. What would be left of "you"? What would "you" then be like, with no memories?

 

[BSM1]

There is also the idea of store-house consciousness ( alaya-vijnana ) in some Buddhist schools.

Probably pretty much the same thing, I would guess.

 

[ratikala]

namaskaram ji

I think the tricky bit is trying to work out what "intrinsic" would mean in the complete absence of memory. Something like tendencies perhaps, or instinctive ways of responding?

As a thought experiment, imagine waking up one morning with complete amnesia. What would be left of "you"? What would "you" then be like, with no memories?

would be interesting to know if people that suffer from such sudden memory loss instincively know that fire burns an that they should not stick their fingers in it ?

what instincts remain in such cases ???

 

[George-ananda]

But where are all these memories stored? What about people who suffer from dementia and physically lose their memories?

One theory is that memory is not locally stored. The brain gives the ability to retrieve the information. A damaged brain causes damaged memory.

 

[George-ananda]

Anything is possible, but dementia seems to demonstrate that memories are stored in the brain. Certain types of brain injury can cause memory loss too.

Again, the alternate theory is that the information is not stored in the brain, but accessed by the brain. So brain damage causing loss of the ability to access information is consistent with this theory not refutation of it.

 

[ratikala]

namskaram george ananda ji , ...

jai jai , .....much like the telephone lines around here bad weather and general delapidation of old cables cause interferance , ...signal goes gown l canot access my emails , .....dosent mean that they go away , ..they are still out there somewhere , ....

the human brain suffers simmilar internal interferance from its own material preocupation , ..itsimply dulls our awareness

 

[Draka]

Just imagine who we could become as a species if we could retain all our knowledge from one life to the next. Imagine being able to expand on the positive things we accomplish and hopefully not repeating the mistakes of the previous lives.

In other words...Cylons.

Though having all the bad experiences, trauma, deaths and so on to remember would be debilitating.

 

[buddhist]

For those who believe in reincarnation, does it at all depress you that all of your wisdom from this life might not be carried over or remembered in the next life?

For example - in this life you believe reincarnation to be true, for whatever reason. You might have thought hard to come to the conclusion of reincarnation. In the next life, you are statistically likely to live a life ignorant of that conclusion. Does this not bother you, that in the next life you may not be as philosophical or as wise as you've become in this life?

Past life memories (in addition to other spiritual powers) are progressively accessed once someone reaches high levels of meditative jhana (spiritual development). IMO this is to prevent trauma to a spiritually undeveloped child (or adult) who do not have the capacity or wisdom to handle such information or knowledge.

Men and women are supposed to develop spiritually over a lifetime; spiritual powers are meant to grow to compensate for weakening physical energies which come with age.

 

[aoji]

.. does it at all depress you that all of your wisdom from this life might not be carried over or remembered in the next life?

What wisdom? At the moment of death all we really are left with are regrets and desires. I doubt that any of us will remember our "wisdom," if any.

If you end this life believing in reincarnation, then you haven't really gained enough wisdom worth perpetuating.

The same can be said of any belief system, no?

Just imagine who we could become as a species if we could retain all our knowledge from one life to the next. Imagine being able to expand on the positive things we accomplish and hopefully not repeating the mistakes of the previous lives.

"All" our knowledge? Most of what we know is pretty useless, imo. Chances are that what we will remember is what we felt: the ecstasies, the remorse, the anger, the hate, the love, the envies, the jealousies, the compassion, the empathy, the lusts, the guilts, etc. Those feelings are more likely to attach themselves to our "souls" or "spirit" as it finds another body to incarnate in.

Since knowledge is ever evolving old knowledge may become outdated and outmoded. Yes, I have remembered snippets of past lives, but direct knowledge of them seem pretty useless. For instance, I was once face to face with what I assume (not presume) was a past love. I looked at her, she looked at me and we both couldn't move. Our gazes were locked together. People walked by us, in front of us, behind us, and all the while our eyes were locked. After what seemed a long time I looked down and saw that she had a son with her and I was able to break the trance. I had to shake my head lucid because I knew that it was a spell. I could have stopped and talked to her, but what then? We both knew we experienced a kismet moment, but knowing that I may have just met my soul-mate from a past life seemed pointless afterwards. We were from two different worlds... She had her life and I had mine. No, the idea of soul-mates is predicated upon the idea of meeting someone you loved from a past life and now you were both able to get together to resume the past love.

Yes, the scenario you laid out sounds depressing and makes the spiritual progress in this life pointless.

Whether one wants to or not, some spiritual progress is made. It's like saying that life is pointless - it's to late to say that, you're already alive. Yes, it may be regressive progress (negative karma), but our "sins" will hopefully be burnt away in a hell, or bardo later on and then the journey will continue anew. At least that's what I have read.