What Happens When You Die?

[godnotgod]

A stone is a stone whatever you call it. You just put a different name on the same object.Sorry you aren't making any sense. I call Mount Rushmore Mount Rushmore and it doesn't matter if every conscious being in the universe dropped dead and there was no consciousness left in the universe Mount Rushmore would still be there until weather eroded it down.

Actually, it would not be there; consciousness is needed to know it as 'Mt. Rushmore'.

From a higher perspective, it never existed in the first place, just as a cloud comes and goes, not originally existing, and having no permanent existence. Again, it is only a point of flux you are attaching to and calling it 'something'. There are no separate 'things' in the uni-verse. All such 'things' are interconnected with the One, and are mental concepts only when seen as separate entities. 'Mt. Rushmore' is nothing more than an illusion in flux held in place as 'real' via your consciousness. It is no more real than a child forming animal shapes out of soap bubbles.

Because of the impermanence and interdependence of all 'things', we call all such things 'empty'. This is expressed as follows:

'Form is emptiness;
emptiness is form'

To get in touch with the true nature of Reality, one must go beyond the facade of playfullness that is the phenomenal world.

 

[godnotgod]

Why must we assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind? Let us call the first sentence A and the second sentence E. Can you fill in B, C and D and explain the logical reasoning?

Is it possible for the force in question to exist without consciousness?

 

[ArtieE]

Actually, it would not be there; consciousness is needed to know it as 'Mt. Rushmore'.

The faces and the stones would be there no matter what whoever might choose to call it.

From a higher perspective, it never existed in the first place, just as a cloud comes and goes, not originally existing, and having no permanent existence. Again, it is only a point of flux you are attaching to and calling it 'something'. There are no separate 'things' in the uni-verse. All such 'things' are interconnected with the One, and are mental concepts only when seen as separate entities. 'Mt. Rushmore' is nothing more than an illusion in flux held in place as 'real' via your consciousness. It is no more real than a child forming animal shapes out of soap bubbles.

I still don't understand why the stones we know as Mt Rushmore should cease to exist if every conscious being dropped dead?

 

[godnotgod]

The faces and the stones would be there no matter what whoever might choose to call it.I still don't understand why the stones we know as Mt Rushmore should cease to exist if every conscious being dropped dead?

How do you recognize faces as 'faces', stones as 'stones', and Mt. Rushmore as 'Mt. Rushmore'?

 

[Thief]

How do you recognize faces as 'faces', stones as 'stones', and Mt. Rushmore as 'Mt. Rushmore'?

The same way God recognized the devil in the gathering....
when the sons of God assembled to present themselves.

See the book of Job.

 

[godnotgod]

The same way God recognized the devil in the gathering....
when the sons of God assembled to present themselves.

See the book of Job.

The only 'devil' is the one in your head, but you fail to recognize him as you, yourself.

Read Carl Jung and his descriptions of Persona and Shadow so you can understand what is really going on.

BTW, if you really do come face to face with the devil, don't be alarmed; just compliment him on the excellent quality of his illusion. Otherwise, you will hurt his feelings beyond your imagination.

 

[ArtieE]

How do you recognize faces as 'faces', stones as 'stones', and Mt. Rushmore as 'Mt. Rushmore'?

What does it matter what they are recognized as? The particular collection of atoms would exist anyway. If you became the last conscious being in the universe you wouldn't suddenly cease to exist just because nobody recognized you as such? Do you believe that when you died as the last conscious being all septillion suns and all collections of atoms in the universe would disappear? I think you might be overestimating your importance...

 

[godnotgod]

What does it matter what they are recognized as? The particular collection of atoms would exist anyway. If you became the last conscious being in the universe you wouldn't suddenly cease to exist just because nobody recognized you as such? Do you believe that when you died as the last conscious being all septillion suns and all collections of atoms in the universe would disappear? I think you might be overestimating your importance...

I did not ask WHAT they are recognized AS, but HOW.

The particular collection of atoms may or may not exist, but if they did, they would be meaningless until a conscious being's recognition of them took place. If an alien, he would notice them, but not recognize them, because he would have had no prior experience of them. You, on the other hand, contain the key of recognition within your memory banks to decipher 'Mt. Rushmore' for what it is. Therefore, 'Mt. Rushmore' does not exist as Mt. Rushmore until consciousness is applied.

Having said that, Quantum Mechanics does indeed suggest that what we see as physicality and differentiated form does not actually exist as such until observed.

 

[Warren Clark]

But don't you see? The answers to the questions we seek do not lie in the realm of the rational mind; of the brain. Did you recall Kaku's comment toward the end of the video?:


"Nature is smarter than we are"

...implying a pathway of knowledge different than that of the rational/logical/analytical mind. Mathematics and physics are the tools of the rational mind, but, as you can see from this video, seem to have reached their limits in trying to provide the explanations we seek.

Everything in nature is logical whether or not you have noticed.
Nature itself grows in fractals and mathematical equations.
Everything in nature has a pattern.
We just have to find the pattern that answers some of our unanswered questions.
Jumping into something as far fetched as mysticism is illogical.
Thats like trying to solve a jigsaw puzzle and when you can't figure it out you stop working with the pieces and start using cooking ingredients to solve it.
It has nothing to do with the question at hand.

Imagine if there was a critical over load at a nuclear plant.
Would you want a scientist to figure out how to shut it down or would you rather them stand on their head reciting the ABCs?

 

[Runewolf1973]

Everything in nature is logical whether or not you have noticed.
Nature itself grows in fractals and mathematical equations.
Everything in nature has a pattern.
We just have to find the pattern that answers some of our unanswered questions.
Jumping into something as far fetched as mysticism is illogical.
Thats like trying to solve a jigsaw puzzle and when you can't figure it out you stop working with the pieces and start using cooking ingredients to solve it.
It has nothing to do with the question at hand.

Imagine if there was a critical over load at a nuclear plant.
Would you want a scientist to figure out how to shut it down or would you rather them stand on their head reciting the ABCs?

Good post! I agree with you that everything in nature has a pattern.

It seems that everything in nature tends to follow a cyclic pattern. Also, everything that happens in nature, even those things that science can not explain, happens because it is natural for it to do so. There are many things in the natural world that are simply beyond any explanation, so people tend to attribute supernatural status to it...gods, demons, ghosts, etc... Honestly, even as an Animist, I do not believe in anything "supernatural", only natural forces. To me this whole life and death thing is merely another one of those natural patterns and it would only make sense that this too is a cyclic thing which means that life and then death is not an end, but rather a transformation and a continuation.

Science seems to have hard time explaining what "consciousness" is when really the answer is very simple and they already have that answer... "For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction." The same holds true for the energy/matter that makes up our brains. The billions of synapses that fire off in our brains that cause this "consciousness" is simply that...billions of complex actions and reactions. It is all just energy changing form, acting and reacting to other energy around it. Because this action/reaction is a part of what energy does, that which we call consciousness is never destroyed, even at "death", it only changes form, just in the same way that energy can neither be created, nor destroyed, it only changes form. Those actions/reactions do not "cease to exist", they merely change form.

Sorry if this sounds very simplistic, but that's just how I see it. If everything that exists is composed of energy, then there is truly no "supernatural", there is only the naturally existing energy of the Universe. We may not fully understand how all of it works and there may be forms of energy that science may have not discovered yet, but really, it all boils down to being energy, nothing more. I am not saying that ghosts don't exist, nor can I prove in any way that they do. What I am saying is that if they DO exist, then there is a perfectly natural explanation for it, we just haven't found it yet. If it turns out that ghosts do exist, then they exist because it is natural for them to, not "supernatural".
As you probably figured out already, my way of understanding physics is from a philosophical standpoint. Always sucked at the math part, lol.

 

[godnotgod]

Everything in nature is logical whether or not you have noticed.
Nature itself grows in fractals and mathematical equations.
Everything in nature has a pattern.
We just have to find the pattern that answers some of our unanswered questions.
Jumping into something as far fetched as mysticism is illogical.
Thats like trying to solve a jigsaw puzzle and when you can't figure it out you stop working with the pieces and start using cooking ingredients to solve it.
It has nothing to do with the question at hand.

Imagine if there was a critical over load at a nuclear plant.
Would you want a scientist to figure out how to shut it down or would you rather them stand on their head reciting the ABCs?

You imply that mystical knowledge is inept when you don't know what you are talking about. You are looking at it from the point of view of analysis and logic when it is a knowledge outside those realms.

The fact that critical errors occur at nuclear power plants is an indication of the failure of the logic and reason that designed them.

But you are missing a crucial point: a nuclear power plant is deliberately designed via the intellect with a specific purpose in mind; the fractals in nature do not come into existence in the same manner, nor for any specific purpose. In fact, there is no purpose to the universe at all. Power plants are made; the universe is grown. The fact that the universe is purposeless should tell you that its true nature is not based on logic and reason. It is based on creative play. All one need do is look directly into the face of nature to see that the intelligence responsible for this world is one of great variety; of a profound sense of creative play.

What you fail to understand is that there are no errors in mystical knowledge, because there is no thought involved. In other words, the knowledge is direct from the source. It is pure and unadulterated by the machinations of mind.

The problem with objective analysis is that it assumes that nature is some sort of mechanical apparatus or process, that has no conscious intellect. The error you are making is that you think it is a logical system simply because its outward appearance and behaviors can be approached with some degree of logic. But for all the logic science has come up with over the centuries, it has failed utterly to answer the most crucial question of all:

what is the nature of reality?

The mystics have already nailed that one, centuries ago, and their answer is consistent from one area of the globe to the next; from one historical time-frame to another. It does not vary. It is consistent because it is outside of Time, outside of history.

That nature exhibits patterns should point to the idea that there is intelligence behind the patterns.

That you yourself are an intelligent being that has emerged from nature should also tell you something about that from which you emerged. The universe grew you.

Quantum Physics should have educated you to the undeniable fact that classical systems of logic and reason have now been overturned. The true nature of reality is non-logical; non-rational.

More patterns will not give you the desired answers you seek. You think there is something to figure out, when there is nothing to figure out. The more you try, the further away from the real answers you will get. Science cannot give us the answer to the question about the true nature of reality, because it's basic approach is to dissect nature and reduce it. One may as well put it into a jar with formaldehyde in some lab. It is a dead knowledge because it is based on dead facts held in memory, and memory is always from the past. Science does not understand the vibrant, living, and intelligent nature of the universe.

 

[Thief]

The only 'devil' is the one in your head, but you fail to recognize him as you, yourself.

Read Carl Jung and his descriptions of Persona and Shadow so you can understand what is really going on.

BTW, if you really do come face to face with the devil, don't be alarmed; just compliment him on the excellent quality of his illusion. Otherwise, you will hurt his feelings beyond your imagination.

As if the 'devil' and 'I' are separate?......yeah.

I see you still flip-flop on every notion in mid-stream of typing.

Still insist there is no... 'you' and 'I'... even as you speak of such things?

 

[godnotgod]

As if the 'devil' and 'I' are separate?......yeah.

I see you still flip-flop on every notion in mid-stream of typing.

Still insist there is no... 'you' and 'I'... even as you speak of such things?

Oh, there is definitely a 'you' and 'I', but it is pure illusion, self-concocted and perpetuated.

You see? Your projection of 'devil' and 'I' are so cleverly concocted and maintained that you firmly believe them to be real, in precisely the same manner the prisoners in Plato's Cave firmly believed the shadows cast upon the cave walls represented reality.

 

[Thief]

Oh, there is definitely a 'you' and 'I', but it is pure illusion, self-concocted and perpetuated.

You see? Your projection of 'devil' and 'I' are so cleverly concocted and maintained that you firmly believe them to be real, in precisely the same manner the prisoners in Plato's Cave firmly believed the shadows cast upon the cave walls represented reality.

Seems a universal notion.
Past present and future.

Your discussion cannot take it away.

 

[godnotgod]

Seems a universal notion.
Past present and future.

Your discussion cannot take it away.

Again, you misunderstand: past, present, and future are all in the now, in the context of what Yeshu is saying. The spiritual life is never in the dead historical past or the imagined future. It is always in this living, eternal moment. In other words, all things 'past, present and future' are occurring right now.

"Before Abraham WAS, I AM"

In other words, "I have always been, as I am outside of history. My inner life is Unborn, and Deathless"

 

[godnotgod]

Jumping into something as far fetched as mysticism is illogical.
Thats like trying to solve a jigsaw puzzle and when you can't figure it out you stop working with the pieces and start using cooking ingredients to solve it.
It has nothing to do with the question at hand.

Solving a jigsaw puzzle cannot be equated with understanding the nature of the universe. Maybe the 'answer' you seek cannot be found via the thinking, discriminating mind, but rather by intuitive insight.

You assume that there is something to 'solve', when that premise may not necessarily be the case.

 

[Thief]

Again, you misunderstand: past, present, and future are all in the now, in the context of what Yeshu is saying. The spiritual life is never in the dead historical past or the imagined future. It is always in this living, eternal moment. In other words, all things 'past, present and future' are occurring right now.

"Before Abraham WAS, I AM"

In other words, "I have always been, as I am outside of history. My inner life is Unborn, and Deathless"

And linear.

All is linear.
One item leads to another...hence....past, present, and future.

Your denial is hopeless...shallow....and futile.

 

[InsurgoInsurgiInsurrect]

You are the universe and have always been here, Unborn and Deathless. You just don't remember, that's all.

You didn't say much but you don't make much sense to me. (Probably my fault so I will try to state how I am interpreting this)

I am not the universe.

I have not always been here. I am not even sure the parts that make me a human... that is the star dust I am probably made from has always been here... really I don't think we know that. We have an age for the universe but what does that even mean.

I can assure you I was not always here... I can assure you I was born and though I have not died yet I will die eventually. All these words mean things. I don't remember is quite loaded based on your assumption I have always been and always will be right... What does "I" even mean and then in that sense what does remember mean according to your deathless and unborn example?

 

[atanu]

And linear.

All is linear.
One item leads to another...hence....past, present, and future.

Your denial is hopeless...shallow....and futile.

To whom?

 

[Thief]

To whom?

And you would make denial of linear existence?

And when you die?........