Random Thoughts

[Random Nonsense]

Im feeling a bit crap at the moment, when i feel this way i start thinking about stuff...

At the moment im wondering what its gonna be like when i die.... im pretty sure i know what will happen, i feel like trying to explain it to you guys as you all seem pretty bright!

The only way i can even attempt to explain it is to tell u how i got to the conclusion.........

a few years back, i got thinking, i was wondering why i was me, alive now, in this place and not some chinese guy in the 12th centuary or whatever... then i wondered why im not someone else in this time...... how is it everyone else is conscious and seeing everything from their own view yet i am me? since we all know everyone else is actually conscious and seeing stuff from there perspective no matter where, i got thinking maybe we are all one and the same? a collective consciousness in a way, but you can only see one small fraction at a time...... and can never be aware of any other part of it. This is the hard bit to explain here! so what about when u die? the best way i can describe my belief is a form of re-incarnation, but not... u die thats it, no more you, but you "become" another person, it would be as if u had been them your entire life, having memory's of their life, in fact it would be as if you were always them!

Ok thats as close as i can get using a language, it usually comes out even more of a garbled mess than that! I would like to know what all you guys reckon to that! and also any of your own thoughts on this subject.

[Phiber]

ya shouldnt be worrying about dieing AFAIK everybody dies..... so you arent loosing anything or something

btw- live you life as far as you can....
dieing is inevitable....

[dimmreaper]

You and I believe differently, but that's OK . . . .

[WyrmMaster]

You know, iv thought the same thing, about why im me and no some guy in china 600 years ago or something.

And give your name this thread is appropratily titled.

[Pinky]

There's a whole science devoted to this...

I kinda think along similar lines, but maybe not as literally... we share the same Chi/life force, but we choose how to direct this force (freewill)... but to say we're all "the same" would indicate we are nothing and someone at the same time, which isn't possible of course... so either we are nothing, like a dream, or we are spirits or life force or soul or being or machines or whatever moving towards an unknown goal.

[Random Nonsense]

more replies than i thought, and phiber dieing doesnt worry me one bit! hell im kinda looking foreward to it!

jeff, mind me asking what u believe? as this really is one of my favorite subjects

Pinky im never sure whether we really have free will, everything could well be pre-ordained... we wouldnt know!

[Pinky]

Originally posted by Random Nonsense
Pinky im never sure whether we really have free will, everything could well be pre-ordained... we wouldnt know!

If it were pre-ordained life would be a waste of time.

[Random Nonsense]

Originally posted by Pinky


If it were pre-ordained life would be a waste of time.

Who's to say it isnt? personally i think life is pointless, ok well not pointless but has no more meaning to it than the life of an ant, or even a tree. i can accept this no problem, i dont go around shooting people cos i think they have the same worth as an ant, because that is a little silly, i usually avoid squishing ants

i think pre-ordained was poor use of words by me actually, as someone would have to ordain what we do! the way i look at it is that everything could have already happened and we merely live through it!

i often get the feeling i cant help what happens around me, and if i ever seem to change something, i cant be sure i could have chosen another alternative...... so it woulda gone this way no matter what

[Pinky]

My spirit (and not my mind) tells me I'm alive and worth more than an ant, though I can understand and relate to the idea of everything entwined/synchronicity...

If viewed from a solely philosophical vantage, life can be broken down into a series of events, and if those events don't go your way, then pyschology will take over and you'd think things were already stacked against you... my perception of my own life is not the basis for existence, I need to view the world around me to see the grace, enormity, and majesty of life.

[Daniel ~]

My basic thoughts on death as follows:

1. Dead is dead, in which case I'll not be there to be concerned about it":O}

2. Death is rebirth, in which case a Dylan quote sums up my feelings:
"I'm just waiting to find out what price
I have to pay to keep from going through all these things twice"

3. Heaven and Hell scenario:
"It does not matter to the Holy Sage weather death comes early or late. He does his duty, waits out his allotted time and thus secures his fate."

[Random Nonsense]

Originally posted by Pinky
My spirit (and not my mind) tells me I'm alive and worth more than an ant, though I can understand and relate to the idea of everything entwined/synchronicity...

in my opinion, since both humans and ants are here for the same thing, we are technically worth the same, the fact that humans have feelings etc, and can care for others probably raises us a couple of notche. as to your spirit telling u you are worth more, i know what you mean, but i dont really agree..... dont really want to go into why i dont agree as some people might not like it

[Pinky]

Originally posted by Random Nonsense
as to your spirit telling u you are worth more, i know what you mean, but i dont really agree..... dont really want to go into why i dont agree as some people might not like it

I have been called a born-again atheist before, so have at it . Discussion doesn't get very far without sharing what you feel freely, unless this is alkl worthless and a waste of time since we are both alive when typing this...

[Kaitain]

These two links might be of interest to you:

http://www.connected.telegraph.co.uk...nmain1012.html

http://skepdic.com/nde.html

The first one I read, since the headline for it (in Electronic Telegraph) grabbed my attention. As an atheist, my interest is piqued when national papers see fit to print something that appears to be as ludicrous as "life after death". The second is the opinion as presented in the Skeptic's Dictionary.

In relation to both articles, I believe that the "researchers" in former have forgotten that the brain is stimulated by both electrical and chemical effects, and an EEG won't show chemical activity.

But I digress.

My own opinion is that humans do not have a soul. We are conscious as a direct result of the processing power of our brains, but our "mind" and our brain are not separable entities. When our brain dies, the unique interchange of chemical and electrical signals in a unique framework cease, and all that is left is meat. There is no "mystic" energy which gives us consciousness, or leaves us upon death. We are just meat.

It's a stark thought, but somehow the thought that death is like sleeping for eternity is more comforting than the thought of having to cope with the entire of humanity for eternity in some "great beyond". Worse is the thought of being judged, when the only instruction manuals are the deranged ravings of millenium-old primitives.

£0.02

[Pinky]

Maybe I need to clarify that I believe in a higher power/god (now) after some life experiences... I know that irks some, but I can't deny what I know almost as fact but cannot prove to you...

Anyone here seen the movie Contact? I have had much the same type of spiritual change in my life. ("If we're alone, it seems like an aweful waste of space.")

I see this going in the direction of belief/non-belief, in which case our musing really don't matter since it's perceptions/feelings/beliefs we have no power to convince one-another of.

[Random Nonsense]

Throughout my life i have never once seen anything that makes me think there is a "god or higher power". although i know people who say they have seen miracles etc, im not in a position to question what they saw. Add to this everyone sees things differently, if i was present and witnessed this same event i would more than likely explain it in a different way. To them it WAS a miracle, i dont question that at all. only thing that botheres me about some people who have strong religeous beliefs is the insistance that everyone should share them.


so far im really impressed no one has gone into "im right your wrong" mode! keep it up guys!

pinky mind me asking what prompted this spiritual change? no problem if its too personal to share here!

[Pinky]

Originally posted by Random Nonsense
pinky mind me asking what prompted this spiritual change? no problem if its too personal to share here!

Several near death experiences, not to mention the fact I am roaming the earth .

so far im really impressed no one has gone into "im right your wrong" mode! keep it up guys!

What's the sense? Who am I to judge when I used to believe the same thing? The only point I would make is that I'm happier and more serene in my current spiritual state than before. Does that mean I am soft, naive, or stupid? NO! Means I know my place in the hierarchy of things (some call that Humility).

[dimmreaper]

Originally posted by Random Nonsense
jeff, mind me asking what u believe? as this really is one of my favorite subjects

Not really . . .

I believe that for each new life there is a new spirit or sole(not made of energy or matter as we know them). I believe that once the life of that sole expires, that sole leaves this world, and that sole moves on to the next world(AKA "the after life"). I constantly find myself asking what the next world is, and honestly am not sure. Heaven sounds nice, but boring. Hell sounds awful, and boring. Another world much like ours wouldn't be that great either IMHO. Presently I'm thinking that we all might just go to hell, despite religion, faith, or how good of a person we are. It seems like we always get the shaft in this life, so why not the next?

Why do I think we are here? How did we get here? I think a cruel creator made us and the rest of the universe for his own amusement. Why else any being would want to create such foolish creatures is beyond me. There is not enough evidence for me to entirely support the theory of evolution, but if evolution did take place on any level it may have been a tool of creation(AKA "Theistical Evolutionism").

[Random Nonsense]

jeff u just made me think of something! what if we are already dead and this IS the afterlife? so is there an after afterlife?

[cloasters]

As a boy I was shoved into the dreadful embrace of the Catholic church for three years. The first two of these years were spent in the Dickensian nightmare of a Catholic boarding school. This elicited a powerful reaction from me. Too many truly twisted people become the foot soldiers of the Catholic Real Estate Holding Corporation, International. Cruelty gives kids an attitude, so I learned to hate all things Catholic and Christian and have cherished this antipathy for decades.

I was a dedicated agnostic/atheist most of my life. When the beginning of genuine old phartedness claims you, death becomes more real. And the attractiveness of belief in at least some kind of organizing thread to the universe becomes strong. Belief in what I think of as the Great Spirit claims me from time to time. I probably don't understand many Native American's concept of the Great Spirit very well.

Yet I do understand the concept of a God as seen by the Desert Religions. And reject this nasty old man, wholeheartedly.

The need for belief in a power greater than ourselves that doesn't simply hold a gun to our heads and steal our money is strong for most humans. When "religion" is simply another political construct with the purpose of controlling people it is ugly. Grafting such beastly institutions on to people's need for spirituality is the very definition of sin, IMO.

An afterlife? There certainly isn't any proof of this. "Heaven" and "hell" are right here, right now.

[Pinky]

Well said cloasters, I agree 100%

I think it's crucial for people to differentiate religion from spirituality... I learned (2) things that changed my perception of religion:

1 - Religion is for people afraid of going to hell. Spirituality is for people who've already been there.

2 - God is too big to fit into any one religion.