Life after death is impossible

[George-ananda]

The arguments:​

1. Biological Perspective: life is a result of complex biological processes, death marks the irreversible cessation of these processes. Once the brain stops functioning, consciousness and self-awareness cannot persist.
2. Neurological Evidence: near-death experiences are explained by the brain's response to trauma or lack of oxygen, rather than evidence of an afterlife. These experiences can often be replicated through stimulation of certain brain regions.
3. Conservation of Energy: consciousness is a product of physical processes, and the law of conservation of energy dictates that energy cannot be created or destroyed but only transformed. Consciousness cannot exist independently beyond the body's death.
4. Lack of Empirical Evidence: the absence of robust empirical evidence that supports the existence of an afterlife. Claims of encounters with departed souls or supernatural phenomena lack scientific verifiability.
5. Evolutionary Perspective: belief in an afterlife may have evolutionary advantages in promoting social cohesion and cooperation, but this doesn't necessarily mean an afterlife truly exists.
6. Occam's Razor: This principle suggests that simpler explanations are more likely to be correct than complex ones. Since life after death introduces complex metaphysical concepts, it's considered less likely than explanations rooted in natural processes.
7. Cultural Influences: beliefs in an afterlife are an artifact of culture and groupthink which can cloud objectivity and critical thinking when evaluating the evidence.
8. Mind-Body Relationship: Consciousness arises from the interactions of neurons and brain chemistry. Without these physical processes, consciousness cannot persist.

Impossible?? I am a believer in life after death beyond reasonable doubt from the evidence (such as Afterlife Evidence).

I believe the whole argument above is based on the false assumption that we are just physical matter. Certainly, there is no life after death given the assumptions of materialism.

My belief is that we are a physical body with interpenetrating higher realms of matter (astral, mental, causal) not directly detectable by the gross physical plane. And consciousness is not created by the physical but is the fundamental constituent of reality.

 

[PureX]

We know what we know. We follow the examinable evidence. We check out the possibilities. We form a conclusion and quite often act on it.

And we damn well better remember that what we think we know is always suspect. This seems to be what you want to forget.

What we don't know we try to find out.

We don't even know what to look for, or how to look for it.

But what we don't know is never a license to invent things to fill the gaps, ...

Of course it is. That's exactly how we invent new things to look for and new way of looking for them. And occasionally that works, and we find something we didn't know existed before. Imagination is a crucial part of human inquisition.

If they're derived from existing evidence we can check our hypotheses, of course.

"Evidence" can mislead us as often as it can enlighten. Stop worshipping evidence as if it some sort of magical truth serum. It's not

Absence of evidence is different to exploring hypotheses to explain partial or ambiguous or insufficient evidence. You can't just make things up because they appeal to you and then offer them as statements about reality.

No one is offering them as statements about reality. They are being offered as real possibilities that you want to insist are not possible, based on nothing but your own bias. Not very "scientific" of you, is it.

No, it's much simpler than that. 'Natural' means 'being an aspect of nature' where 'nature' means the world external to the self.

Yes, except that we have no idea what exists external to the self, and we have no way of finding out. Because we can never be or erceive anything "external the self". Perception is conception, and we cannot separate them.

If you can't find it in nature, the only other place you can look for it is as an idea, a concept, a notion, a thing imagined in an individual brain.

Ideas are as 'natural' as anything else in 'nature', it. You can't seem to grasp that we are part of the natural world, and everything we think and do is an expression of that world.

 

[blü 2]

And we damn well better remember that what we think we know is always suspect. This seems to be what you want to forget.

On the contrary, it's something that scientific method (and I) take into consideration at all points. Scientific method proceeds by empiricism and induction, so none of its conclusions is ever absolute ─ nothing protects a scientific conclusion from the possibility of unknown unknowns. Or as Brian Cox put it, a law of physics is a statement about physics that hasn't been refuted yet.

Notwithstanding which, science actually does things, discovers new materials, how to make quick-recharge batteries, puts rovers on Mars, churns out Covid vaccines at very short notice, on and on.

I'll refrain from listing a number of contrasts that occur to me.

We don't even know what to look for, or how to look for it.

Given what we know, from there we know what we want and need to know. When we find that out, we'll know a different set of what we want and need to know. On and on.

"Evidence" can mislead us as often as it can enlighten. Stop worshipping evidence as if it some sort of magical truth serum. It's not.

I reject your implicit claim here that you're entitled to make meaningful statements about reality without evidence.

No one is offering them as statements about reality. They are being offered as real possibilities that you want to insist are not possible, based on nothing but your own bias. Not very "scientific" of you, is it.

Then they're statements about concepts with no real referent, about wishes and dreams. If you find the examinable evidence, that can change, but until then ...

Yes, except that we have no idea what exists external to the self

You're joking, surely? You have no idea that your parents, your air, your food, your shelter, your society, your parking space, your local mayor, your shopping mall, your romantic partner, your police station, RF, blü 2, exist in the world external to you?

Garn.

 

[Sgt. Pepper]

Impossible?? I am a believer in life after death beyond reasonable doubt from the evidence (such as Afterlife Evidence).

I believe the whole argument above is based on the false assumption that we are just physical matter. Certainly, there is no life after death given the assumptions of materialism.

My belief is that we are a physical body with interpenetrating higher realms of matter (astral, mental, causal) not directly detectable by the gross physical plane. And consciousness is not created by the physical but is the fundamental constituent of reality.

Well said, and I agree with what you have said. I'd like to add the following sources that my friend @Trailblazer shared:

Private Dowding

The Afterlife Revealed

 

[George-ananda]

Well said, and I agree with what you have said. I'd like to add the following sources that my friend @Trailblazer shared:

Private Dowding

The Afterlife Revealed

Thank you for that sharing.

The materialist thinkers like to dismiss information that they can't get a handle on scientifically. In my opinion, the quantity, quality and consistency from the so-called 'paranormal' is overwhelming and dooms the materialist model of what we are.

 

[Muffled]

I believe our God is the God of the impossible. I used to think it was impossible for me to see things that aren't there except for mirages but it happened anyway.

 

[Muffled]

Yes, life after death is quite literally impossible, but existence is not.

Humbly,
Hermit

I believe I would still call it life, simply in a different form.

 

[Muffled]

Very true, the atoms of your body exist after death, in fact the exist for eternity. They are re-used to help existence continue to be existence.

I believe, however, those atoms can't think and a spirit can.

 

[ChristineM]

I believe, however, those atoms can't think and a spirit can.

I can provide evidence of atoms , can you provide evidence of spirit?

 

[PureX]

On the contrary, it's something that scientific method (and I) take into consideration at all points. Scientific method proceeds by empiricism and induction, so none of its conclusions is ever absolute ─ nothing protects a scientific conclusion from the possibility of unknown unknowns. Or as Brian Cox put it, a law of physics is a statement about physics that hasn't been refuted yet.

I'm pretty sure that's what I've been saying. Yet I'm pretty sure you believe that there can be no "life after death". And that's why I'm puzzled. Because there is no way for you or anyone else to know that to be so. And why believe things to be so that we can't know to be so? Isn't that what you are objecting to? Claiming things to be so that we can't know to be so?

Like claiing that there can be no 'efterlife' when it fact we have no idea if there can be or not.

Notwithstanding which, science actually does things, discovers new materials, how to make quick-recharge batteries, puts rovers on Mars, churns out Covid vaccines at very short notice, on and on.

Yeah, engaging in religion actually does things for people, to. And so does engaging in philosophy. And certainly so does engaing with the arts. But we can also deceive ourselves using these methodologies, too. And harm ourselves and each other with them, as well. And in fact, we do so quite often.

Given what we know, from there we know what we want and need to know. When we find that out, we'll know a different set of what we want and need to know. On and on.

Interestingly, though, it's what we DON'T know that provides us with our greatest gifts. That wonder and imagination that you are always so quick to right off as childish nonsense is how we find and hold onto meaning and purpose in life, and make it worth our struggle to survive. Science may give us the physical tools, but it's our imagination in the face of endless possibility that drives us to use them.

I reject your implicit claim here that you're entitled to make meaningful statements about reality without evidence.

Since this response makes no sense to me, I will simply repeat my assertion ... "Evidence" can mislead us as often as it can enlighten us. So stop worshipping evidence as if it were some sort of magical truth serum. It's not.

Then they're statements about concepts with no real referent, about wishes and dreams.

Oh, so they have a significant reference after all ...

You're joking, surely? You have no idea that your parents, your air, your food, your shelter, your society, your parking space, your local mayor, your shopping mall, your romantic partner, your police station, RF, blü 2, exist in the world external to you?

What does it mean for something to exist, or not exist? And I don't mean what it means in your mind for it to exist. I mean how does it exist apart from your idea of it existing?

 

[Alien826]

Like claiing that there can be no 'efterlife' when it fact we have no idea if there can be or not.

I wouldn't say we have no idea at all. First, it's easy to show that the physical body doesn't survive death. The process of decomposition is well documented. So, we are left with survival in some kind of "spiritual" way which requires the existence of a whole undiscovered area of reality before we even start to investigate survival in that form. So how would you rate the likelihood of conscious survival after death?

Allowing a small possibility, which I'll allow, doesn't equate to "no idea".

 

[PureX]

I wouldn't say we have no idea at all. First, it's easy to show that the physical body doesn't survive death. The process of decomposition is well documented. So, we are left with survival in some kind of "spiritual" way which requires the existence of a whole undiscovered area of reality before we even start to investigate survival in that form. So how would you rate the likelihood of conscious survival after death?

The likelihood is unknown. Because the possibility itself is unknown. And unknown does not mean "probably not". Nor does it indicate "probably not". It means and indicates "unknown". Yet you seem to be presuming it means "unlikely", anyway. And that is illogical.

Allowing a small possibility, which I'll allow, doesn't equate to "no idea".

"Big and small" are just descriptions of a blind bias. The possibility is "unknown" and therefor so is the likelihood. There is no "big", or "small" possibility, or greater or lesser likelihood. It's all unknown.

 

[Sgt. Pepper]

Thank you for that sharing.

The materialist thinkers like to dismiss information that they can't get a handle on scientifically. In my opinion, the quantity, quality and consistency from the so-called 'paranormal' is overwhelming and dooms the materialist model of what we are.

You're welcome. Personally, I don't need any kind of informational material to establish that there is an afterlife because my forty-four years of personal experience confirm it for me. I've spent the last sixteen years of my life actively participating in direct communication and interaction with spirits, as well as researching, studying, and documenting evidence to confirm that there is an afterlife. Others may choose not to believe in it because they believe there is insufficient evidence, but I believe otherwise. I believe that it would be dishonest of me to deny it after all that I've personally experienced in my life.

 

[blü 2]

I'm pretty sure that's what I've been saying. Yet I'm pretty sure you believe that there can be no "life after death". And that's why I'm puzzled. Because there is no way for you or anyone else to know that to be so. And why believe things to be so that we can't know to be so? Isn't that what you are objecting to? Claiming things to be so that we can't know to be so?

I'll find life after death credible as an aspect of reality when there's hard evidence of it.

Meanwhile, there's no credible and demonstrable physical system (and no alternative-to-physical system that is not imaginary) to make it a possibility.

The idea looks far far more like an extension of the self-preservation instinct, the ego, and unexamined acculturation.

Yeah, engaging in religion actually does things for people, to. And so does engaging in philosophy. And certainly so does engaing with the arts. But we can also deceive ourselves using these methodologies, too. And harm ourselves and each other with them, as well. And in fact, we do so quite often.

There are various theories about why we haven't found a culture free of supernatural beliefs. The one that attracts me starts by pointing to the human survival instinct to instantly devise a setting to account for unexplained events. Children do this very soon after birth, before they've learnt to speak, and we do it all our lives. (Though I no longer own a dog, I'm a dog person, and it interests me that the domestication of dogs is part of that story.)

That we find a very great range of supernatural beliefs demonstrates that they're generated by humans rather than derived from observation of any actual external phenomena.

It's also interesting to follow the evolution of gods through history. Yahweh begins as a member of the Semitic Canaanite pantheon, apparently has a consort Asherah, gets a divorce, becomes a henotheistic deity, after the Babylonian captivity becomes the sole deity, in the 1st century splits into the god of the Jews and the god of Jesus, the god of Jesus becomes triune, splits into East and West, in the West splits into Catholic and Protestant, and the Protestant god splits happily ever after. In other words, this is a history of social ideas, not a study of real beings.

Interestingly, though, it's what we DON'T know that provides us with our greatest gifts.

Science is methodical, and out to maximize objectivity in following the clues to what we might know but don't. I see evidence that religions do a lot of useful things, but not that.

That wonder and imagination that you are always so quick to right off as childish nonsense is how we find and hold onto meaning and purpose in life,

Goodness, how many times do I have to tell you I grew up on ghost stories and science fiction? I have nothing against wonder and imagination. I simply distinguish it carefully from objective reality, where there are no ghosts and no Martians.

What does it mean for something to exist, or not exist? And I don't mean what it means in your mind for it to exist. I mean how does it exist apart from your idea of it existing?

If a thing has objective existence, it exists in nature, the world external to the self,which we know about through our senses. That can be a very simple test eg where's my notebook? or a seriously complex one eg where's my Higgs boson?

 

[idea]

When our brain is gone, so are we.

1. Alzheimer's Disease: This progressive neurodegenerative disorder primarily affects memory and other cognitive functions, leading to difficulties in thinking, reasoning, and decision-making.
2. Frontotemporal Dementia: This type of dementia primarily damages the frontal and temporal lobes of the brain, resulting in changes in behavior, personality, and language, which can affect thinking processes.
3. Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI): A severe blow or jolt to the head can cause cognitive impairments, such as problems with attention, memory, and executive functions.
4. Stroke: A stroke can damage brain tissue, leading to cognitive deficits such as impaired thinking, difficulty with language, and problems with memory and reasoning.
5. Parkinson's Disease: While known for its motor symptoms, Parkinson's disease can also affect cognition. It can result in slower thinking, difficulty with multitasking, and impaired executive functions.
6. Schizophrenia: This psychiatric disorder can affect thought processes, leading to symptoms like disorganized thinking, hallucinations, and delusions.
7. Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD): ADHD can affect a person's ability to focus, sustain attention, and control impulses, which can impact thought processes, especially in tasks requiring concentration.
8. Huntington's Disease: A genetic disorder that causes progressive brain damage, leading to cognitive impairments, including difficulties with reasoning and memory.
9. Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease: This rare and fatal brain disorder can result in rapid cognitive decline, causing problems with thinking and memory.
10. Vascular Cognitive Impairment: This condition arises from problems with blood circulation in the brain, leading to cognitive deficits. It often occurs as a result of multiple small strokes.
11. Aphasia: Various types of aphasia, such as Broca's aphasia and Wernicke's aphasia, can impair language and thought processes due to damage to specific language centers in the brain.

 

[Alien826]

The likelihood is unknown. Because the possibility itself is unknown. And unknown does not mean "probably not". Nor does it indicate "probably not". It means and indicates "unknown". Yet you seem to be presuming it means "unlikely", anyway. And that is illogical.

If there is no reason to believe that something exists, then the reasonable assumption is that it doesn't exist. That may be disproved by subsequent evidence of course.

"Big and small" are just descriptions of a blind bias. The possibility is "unknown" and therefor so is the likelihood. There is no "big", or "small" possibility, or greater or lesser likelihood. It's all unknown.

Am I biased when I say that it is very unlikely that unicorns exist?

 

[blü 2]

Am I biased when I say that it is very unlikely that unicorns exist?

A-unicornist! Blasphemer! Shame, shame!

 

[Brian2]

When our brain is gone, so are we.

1. Alzheimer's Disease: This progressive neurodegenerative disorder primarily affects memory and other cognitive functions, leading to difficulties in thinking, reasoning, and decision-making.
2. Frontotemporal Dementia: This type of dementia primarily damages the frontal and temporal lobes of the brain, resulting in changes in behavior, personality, and language, which can affect thinking processes.
3. Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI): A severe blow or jolt to the head can cause cognitive impairments, such as problems with attention, memory, and executive functions.
4. Stroke: A stroke can damage brain tissue, leading to cognitive deficits such as impaired thinking, difficulty with language, and problems with memory and reasoning.
5. Parkinson's Disease: While known for its motor symptoms, Parkinson's disease can also affect cognition. It can result in slower thinking, difficulty with multitasking, and impaired executive functions.
6. Schizophrenia: This psychiatric disorder can affect thought processes, leading to symptoms like disorganized thinking, hallucinations, and delusions.
7. Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD): ADHD can affect a person's ability to focus, sustain attention, and control impulses, which can impact thought processes, especially in tasks requiring concentration.
8. Huntington's Disease: A genetic disorder that causes progressive brain damage, leading to cognitive impairments, including difficulties with reasoning and memory.
9. Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease: This rare and fatal brain disorder can result in rapid cognitive decline, causing problems with thinking and memory.
10. Vascular Cognitive Impairment: This condition arises from problems with blood circulation in the brain, leading to cognitive deficits. It often occurs as a result of multiple small strokes.
11. Aphasia: Various types of aphasia, such as Broca's aphasia and Wernicke's aphasia, can impair language and thought processes due to damage to specific language centers in the brain.

Yes we are humans and consist of a body and spirit. The spirit is joined to the body and experiences the world through the body.
If the body is broken the spirit is not automatically able to experience the world as if the body is not broken.

 

[PureX]

If there is no reason to believe that something exists, then the reasonable assumption is that it doesn't exist.

That is patenty false. If there is no reason to believe something exists, there is no reason to believe anything in regards to it's existence, including that it does not exist. Believing things based on ignorance is illogical, and I would add; dishonest.

That may be disproved by subsequent evidence of course.

Evidence can and does mislead us as often as it enlightens us. Evidence is not a magic elixir for discerning truth. Nothing is. Which is why skepticism is always called for. Even when the evidence appears overwhelming.

Am I biased when I say that it is very unlikely that unicorns exist?

Not only biased, but quite wrong. You are assuming that to "exist" must mean only what you are choosing it to mean. Unicorns exist as ideas, images, and objects; many millions of them, in fact. Turns out that in this instance, "existence" includes far more than you were aware of. As it true for us all.

 

[PureX]

I'll find life after death credible as an aspect of reality when there's hard evidence of it.

I have presented you with the evidence of logical reasoning in favor of skepticism. And yet because you are a "true believer" in your own illogical materialist position, you have ignored it. So I see no reason to waste any more time, here.