The Final Destination

[CyberHyperPhoenix]

The Final Destination

Many different descriptions about the afterlife/ Heaven in many different ways. Some like The Bible describe heaven as being a place we go to after we die. It is described as a Utopia, a place of perfection where none shall starve, thirst, get sick, etc.

Meanwhile for some other religious texts, Heaven may be described differently, while some others don't believe in any after life at all.

So basically, what do you guys think? Do you think there is life after death? Or do you think we just disappear forever after we die?

As a christian, I'm really curious to see your guys' different opinions and perspectives on this.
Put your thoughts below and discuss!

 

[Claire Diviner]

From a personal point of view, I believe consciousness and life in general to be arbitrary. For all I know, I could have had a consciousness hundreds of years ago and not know it. I don't want to say that "reincarnation" by the strictest definition exist, but my feelings (not necessarily a fact) lean towards that idea, but am cautious to not support said idea outright, since nothing is concrete in anything that happens to us after death.

In the end, the wheels on the bus go 'round and 'round, and if there is no afterlife in any form, then it will not bother me because A: I'd be dead, and B: My lack of existence before my birth was of no inconvenience to me, so I would assume my lack of existence in the physical sense after death will follow the same principle. If there really is a life after death in some form, then I win anyway, even if I am cast into the lake of flames in Hell, since at least I know I'll keep living in some form.

At the end of the day, there currently is no way to determine what happens to our minds (what makes us us) after we die. The only ones who know for sure are those who have already died, and as the old saying goes, "Dead men tell no tales".

 

[Lichi]

I wish there'd be something after life on earth, but my dry, scientific consciousness says that once you're done, you're done. After your brain stops working, there is no personality left, no spirit or soul to live on, nothing that is able of perception. Humans are biochemical machines, and they will one day break down.

I'd like there to be more, be it being 'reborn' as somebody else, living in 'heaven' or whatever. I sort of like living and would not want it to stop. My personal favourite would be being reborn as somebody else and get another chance at living again. The christian concept of heaven is less appealing to me, as it sounds like 'live here in happiness for all eternity', what sounds quite boring tbh. The mix of light and shadow, happiness and struggle in real life is what makes it interesting. It's hard to appreciate the good when you don't experience the bad.

 

[SilentBob]

Unless someone can come back from the dead and tell us it's impossible to know.

As for now, when you die it's going to be exactly like before you were born. Nothingness.

 

[FirestormNeos]

That movie was godawful. How it got so many sequels is beyond me.

Wait, not that Final Destination? Oh, okay... NO ITEMS, FOX ONLY!

No? Not that one either? You're no fun.

On-topic, I'm not sure what happens after the show's over, but it better not be a black void of nothingness or some other non-afterlife thing. We're the actors of a movie, not the movie itself, and actors do not stay suspended on the movie set even after they're done shooting. They aren't tied up and locked in the building for eternity.

Also, if the Final Destination is pretty much being forced to watch the Final Destination movie for eternity... I'm going to do everything in my power to store my consious in a computer so the grim reaper does not get the opportunity of subjecting me to such a nauseating experience.

 

[Sucumbio]

Unless someone can come back from the dead and tell us it's impossible to know.

Technically Jesus did this. 2000+ years later, there are still PLENTY of people who don't believe this is true. So the question remains, IF someone did come back from the dead, who would believe them?

OP: I believe that the Earth's magnetic nature serves as a central nervous system for the planet. I believe that all living matter on the planet is therefore connected - electromagnetically - to the earth. I further believe that when biological matter dies, and in our case or minds cease to function, that the electrical energy within life, and us, "goes to ground." Therefore, death, is nothing more than returning from whence we came, a stream of electromagnetism from deep within the earth's core. The only question I've ever asked myself, is if this stream has a consciousness, perhaps one that we can tap into during our dreams for instance. And if so... does this consciousness have a will, and so, a purpose.

 

[Claire Diviner]

Technically Jesus did this. 2000+ years later, there are still PLENTY of people who don't believe this is true. So the question remains, IF someone did come back from the dead, who would believe them?

There have been documented cases of people being clinically "dead" dead, just to come to life through what many would call a miraculous recovery. Where do they fall in that matter?

The only question I've ever asked myself, is if this stream has a consciousness, perhaps one that we can tap into during our dreams for instance. And if so... does this consciousness have a will, and so, a purpose.

It's a bit reminiscent to the Lifestream in "Final Fantasy VII", no?

 

[erico9001]

It's a good question. If there is actually something after death then NOBODY knows. That's why there are so many different interpretations. It's always something a person creating a religion wants to address. People are uncomfortable with dying, so a religion can do well through offering to people that they do not die.

There have been documented cases of people being clinically "dead" dead, just to come to life through what many would call a miraculous recovery. Where do they fall in that matter?

Clinical death counts when the blood stops flowing, but the brain still functions for time after that. They are not actually dead dead.

 

[Sehnsucht]

Everything is Absurd.

The notion of an afterlife seems fairly intuitive, at a glance. We have a conscious experience, so we can conceive of having an experience without being in "this" body.

I've come to find this rather unintuitive, in time. In this reality of ours, we have an information processor in the form of our brain. The questions that emerge from this are A) how our "mind" could exist without a processor, and B) if our mind can exist without our brain, then what function does the brain serve.

I suppose one might say the brain is the interface, that which allows the "immaterial" mind to experience the "material" world. But this would require a more fundamental medium that allows the "material" and "immaterial" to interact. All interactions need a medium; it's the definition of interaction to have two or more elements come together in some fashion. A shame that of all the theologies I've encountered, none seem to describe the working of this necessary ontic mechanism, let alone its existence.

Also, that many theologies romanticize post-life experience strikes me as surreal, at the very least. It frames this life as a glorified waiting room for What Comes Next, be it a singular destination (your Heavens and Hells) or the next waypoint (your Threads of Reincarnation). That's some Twilight Zone weirdness. It's as though people are thinking we're living in the Matrix. What is it about self-awareness that entails doubting the veracity of your experience? It's an interesting idea to tinker with.

But I ramble. I don't know where I've been before (if I've been anywhere before), nor do I know where I'm going (if I'm going anywhere). There is only ever the present moment. If the present should subsist as my experience radically shifts from this life to Something New, then I suppose I'll have only to adjust, much as one comes from nothing and has to slowly adjust to This Life, having been thrown into it without any prior experiential context.

As the above deliberations imply, though, naturalist models make more sense to me, in terms of accounting for the details of my experience. As such, armchair forecasts suggest that conscious experience ceases upon the cessation of all biological function in the organism. Being averse to pain, I'm more concerned about the potential agonies and distresses of the act of dying, far more so than entering a state of oblivion where I experience nothing (for there would be no "I" to have experiences at all).

So there's stuff to ponder, I suppose.

 

[Sucumbio]

There have been documented cases of people being clinically "dead" dead, just to come to life through what many would call a miraculous recovery. Where do they fall in that matter?

Yes, clinical death is indeed a point of much debate, and thus why "legal death" is not actually the same as "clinical death." It's kinda fascinating, if not morbid, lol. But what's really key is that recently, clinical death has been determined to be a multi-stage occurrence, which ends in legal death (from which no one returns.) I would say that it is at this time, the final stage of death, that the body's final remnants of electrical energy are lost. Also according to the article it is important to note that typically the parts of the brain that are responsible for consciousness begin to permanently fail (die) within a very short window of time, compared to other organs (though temperature control has been used to widen this window).

It's a bit reminiscent to the Lifestream in "Final Fantasy VII", no?

Ha! I've never actually played it, though I feel I should as everyone and their uncle proclaimed it to be "the best FF ever!" My fav is 12. Not the point, of course. But yeah, I read up on it and indeed it is a very similar concept. I also recall a similar concept to the FF Movie, The Spirits Within. Gaia Lore is full of similarities to this sort of thing. I like to think that there is some scientific basis to the idea... I believe the key to be electricity, magnetism, the Earth's core, and the Magnetosphere.

 

[pinkdeaf1]

Ha! I've never actually played it, though I feel I should as everyone and their uncle proclaimed it to be "the best FF ever!" My fav is 12. Not the point, of course. But yeah, I read up on it and indeed it is a very similar concept. I also recall a similar concept to the FF Movie, The Spirits Within. Gaia Lore is full of similarities to this sort of thing. I like to think that there is some scientific basis to the idea... I believe the key to be electricity, magnetism, the Earth's core, and the Magnetosphere.

If the Earth has it's own lifestream, then would it also be possible that other planets would have their own lifestream? And if that is so, then we are all stranded on this Earthly lifestream, with no hope of escape or freedom. Then again, stars also have their own system of electric flow and magnetism, and stars only burn until they fizzle out as a white dwarf or go supernova. Then I guess that lifestream gets scattered until it gets caught up in some other magnetic field. An interesting idea. I like it. Might be the basis of some cool sci-fi story, maybe?

And now I am reminded of the Scientologist's creation theory (ridiculous as it is).

 

[Sucumbio]

I've considered the possibility of life leaving earth, however i believe that unless enough life leaves at the same time and plops down on another planet with a compatible magnetosphere, death in space would result in scattering of electrical energy so much so that it would be forever lost, except in an infinitely small percentage chance, since the universe is so infinitely big. Then again if death occured within the solar system , it may find its way home.

 

[Sehnsucht]

I've considered the possibility of life leaving earth, however i believe that unless enough life leaves at the same time and plops down on another planet with a compatible magnetosphere, death in space would result in scattering of electrical energy so much so that it would be forever lost, except in an infinitely small percentage chance, since the universe is so infinitely big. Then again if death occured within the solar system , it may find its way home.

They'll have to build ships with Soul Basins to recapture EM energy in the event of death during interstellar transit.

In other words, you should get to work on the space opera just waiting to bloom from your musings.

 

[Sucumbio]

Word. Haha or like, a ship that's fueled by death, since it'd take eons to reach ones destination. It could be a functioning archology with death receptors that reuse everything down to the atom, but the dramatic foil would be people being born with the memories if past crew mates...

Wait that's too much like aeon flux :{