/lit/ - Literature

>>18900666
Based

>>18900666
Why would I cope with the non-existence of an afterlife? One life is plenty enough for me.

>>18900666
I'm not falling for your tricks Satan.

>>18900666
I cope by being a good person and maintaining a spiritual practice so I experience a pleasant rebirth

Explain the opposite.

>>18900666
Real question is how do you cope with eternal life being determined by this short parody of life we spend erring and wandering absolutely clueless about why and how.

>be nonexistent
>get born for some unknown reason
>almost certain that a return to nonexistence is inevitable
>think that you'll never get born again for some reason
Can someone explain to me the reason for believing that last part? If there is no God, then reincarnation is an inevitability

>>18900721
>>be nonexistent
You blew it on the first green arrow, come on now.

>>18900729
Did he really?

>>18900736
>be glass of water
>be not glass of water
Yes

>>18900740
Is this wet water or dry water?

>>18900745
It's sned fed water

>>18900747
But will I need to purchase a water softener?

>>18900666
The ride never ends, you'll be back here when you kick the bucket.

>>18900751
Well, your soil PH is 8.1, that's why your dad abandoned the farm, so it's really a lost cause.

>>18900769
Shall it ever be found?

>>18900666
Cryonics

>>18900777
It's already here.

>>18900790
Well I'm glad we got that settled.

>>18900721
can YOU explain why you believe in reincarnation as opposed to nothingness?

>>18900823
It makes the most sense. It’s just logical. No, I won’t explain.

>>18900666
If the world is meaningless I might as well just wait it out. The feeling of fun is enjoyable so I may try to get that feeling to happen. The feeling of pain is unenjoyable so I will avoid that for as long as there isn't potential for said pain to make the fun parts better. I don't believe in Heaven cause I don't like making myself willfully insane. The worst part of meaningless is the lack of motivation to do anything annoyingly so I guess religtards have that over me, not like it matters anyway.

>>18900823
You were in nothingness before, you were plucked out of it for some reason you know not, you'll return to nothingness again (probably), why then do you think you won't be plucked out of it again, at some point in the future? Forever is a really long time

>>18900847
If "willful insanity" is actually beneficial and it "doesn't matter anyway" then the only reason you would choose not to believe in heaven is because you want to be worse off than the faithful. Considering that you've chosen to believe something (nothing) that doesn't give you the advantage that belief in God does, clearly it *does* matter.

>>18900666
start with the 'jeets

>>18900823
You don't need reincarnation as traditionally thought.
You just need the very next exact pattern of thought. Could occur in a boltzmann brain. Pure physicalism implies something like that, with all the horrors involved.

>>18900910
You are assuming pain is worse than fun/pleasure, which may make sense in a human context(not fully cause it subjective) but doesnt make any sense in a universal context. Nothing matters is not a choice I can make, I am not desperate or stupid enough to be able to lie to myself that it does matter. Nihilism is freeing in its own way, but the truth is the situation we are all in from a human perspective fucking sucks. But from a universal perspective, meh. "Willful" is the probably the wrong word to use because to deny reality is straight up insanity, which is a little frightening when you consider the amount of religious people.

>>18900682
Easy to say when you aren't on your deathbed.

>>18900977
I don't wanna live forever. Not in heaven. Simple as.

Seriously though, where did the "nothingness" meme come from?
Hasn't anybody thought about this?
There isn't nothingness in your life now. Your conscious experience edits out dreamless sleep and anesthesia. Consciousness doesn't seem to end.

Trust me, I'd love some restful nothingness, but that's not what my subjective experience tells me.

>>18900987
Did you fall for the Cartesian Subject meme?

>>18900882
You are not plucked out of nothingness. To say so implies there is some being within nothingness. The more interesting question to me is how can we know non-existence is real when we we cannot see it. Nothingness is as incomprehensible as an afterlife.

>>18900992
I fell for observation of my brain states and the fact the consciousness may not be substrate dependent.

>>18900983
I think eternal existence is as existentially terrifying as non-existence. In a way an infinite existence is the same as non-existence. But if I had to choose between the two, I would still pick eternity cause I like being alive.

>>18901003
-so the Cartesian Subject meme. If all you trust is the sensible experience of your brain states, then ask yourself how come you don't remember your time in the womb? How come you don't remember your years as a baby? And the vast majority of people don't even remember their toddler years (1-4 y/o). If there really was a consciousness there before the womb, then why do you have no memory of it? And if the crux here is it that can only become an experience so long as it is hosted in flesh, then what makes you think you'll experience anything after death? Or more importantly, if the only thing you trust is your sensible brain state, then how can you assert that it existed at a point where you could not experience it?

>>18901025
It really is. I don't care if it's eternal bliss or whatever, please have the mercy to just let me disappear. I like being alive too, but I sure as shit will have enough at some point.

>>18901032
As statistically unsatisfying as it is, this could just be the first leg; You bring a conscious thing into existence but possibly can't take it out.

>>18900987
>Hasn't anybody thought about this?
Someone has. Nothingness, as seems to be described ITT, would appear to have come out of a bastardized paradigm of science which claims that nothing outside of that which science has proven has any business existing.

>>18900666
Freaky

>>18901060
But that still doesn't solve your question of whether the conscious thing is substrate dependent or not, because if it isn't, then you have to consider what I posted earlier about the issue of missing consciousness.

>>18901084
So basically "Why had this pattern never existed before and just happened to grow organically this time around?"

Couldn't say, I guess its more of an existential fear of being at the origin point.

>>18901103
You fear reincarnation?

Why should I care? I already know I'm going to heaven.

>>18900962
>deny reality
You cannot prove that God does not exist

>>18901119
I fear the ability to never stop subjectively existing.
At least if I die in this body, its over, but if I spend eternity bouncing about boltzmann brains or on some assholes mainframe, that could be an issue. Then there's quantum immortality and David Lewis' Terrifying Corollary.

imho, "nothingness" is a dogmatic statement, some weird atheist religion that accepts we're a computation with none of the consequences.

>>18900666
this is a friendly reminder to all that eternal life is the free gift of God. if you want to receive it, become a Christian, live forever, and be 100% sure of going to heaven after you die, watch this gospel video.

it's really easy to be saved from hell and get to heaven /lit/ so don't miss out on it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Dqw_fJeBD0

>>18901128
Not him, but I've always had a problem with this
>You cannot prove that God does not exist
Just because I can't prove _A_ God (creator) does not exist doesn't mean that YOUR idea of a god, whatever it is, occupies that same unfalsifiable space. Just because "The One" or "The Absolute" occupies an unfalsifiable pedestal, doesn't mean that every single human conception of a deity also occupies it.

>>18901153
So what you're saying is that I can live a life full of sin, but also believe that Jesus is God and died for my sins, and I'll get into heaven?

>>18901153
>it's really easy to be saved from hell and get to heaven
Jesus would seem to suggest otherwise.
For many are called, but few are chosen.
St Matthew 22:14
Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!
Matthew 7:13-14
This is not do discourage but to give clarity.

>>18901149
But "you" won't even be the same "you" after you "hop" into another body. If you believe in pure consciousness, rather than the soul as a material property, and that you have any recollection of your past lives, then what does it matter? Not only will you not know that you reincarnated, but the "you" from last time isn't even the same "you" now, they're two different entities. Cartesian reincarnation is ultimately self-defeating, and it's not something worry about.

>>18901159
No, you have to do good works (follow the 10 Commandments).

>>18901181
But Peter went against the 10 commandments when he denied Jesus three times. Did he not make it into heaven?

>>18901128
You are missing the point. It doesn't matter that I can't disprove God because you cannot prove God. God's existence is irrelevant. If God exists there is absolutely no reason to believe anything you do in reality affects the afterlife. Can you prove why your belief in God will affect your standing when you die. Of course not. We are atoms and ions, no more than a rock or tree or a cloud. There is no reason to believe that in reality any sort of spirituality or God affects this reality. Why should we care about a state of being that has no bearing on reality i.e the afterlife.

>>18901178
>and that you won't have any recollection*

>>18901178
I think that from time to time as well, but there is something pesky about this subjectivity and I don't think we devote to it nearly enough thought.

>>18901192
He repented

>>18901149
You wont exist as yourself anyway, just as consciousness is an assortment of atoms trading charges, you will be broken down and spread out. You will no longer be you, just changing energy. Nothing to worry about

>>18901199
Idk man, I'd say we actually devoted TOO much thought too it, look at the entire field of metaphysics and how many thousand years it spans. Every culture had to ask itself these questions, and everybody came up with their own answers. If you think their answers were unsatisfactory, well, pretty much any answer you could think of has already been put out there. Even this conversation we're having has already been had before. If the corpus of metaphysics won't give you an answer, I don't think anything will, and you should just not lay your shoulders with shit that you know inherently has no one true answer to.

>>18901194
It takes just as much to faith to believe what you profess here as it does to believe in Jesus Christ and the Holy Bible. It is a choice. Choosing the latter will improve your life.

>>18901234
>Choosing the latter will improve your life.
What will Christianity offer me that I don't already have?

>>18901231
That's why I said i base it on observation. Since I realized "I" back in the day, "I" have never once ceased. I've gotten smashed, smoked tons of weed, dabbled in other drugs periodically, been put under ten times, and slept many nights, but there "I" always am, ticking time, accruing experience of the valence both positive and negative.

So if my brain getting rekt enough ends that line, fine, but I'm deeply suspicious of this universe.

>>18901239
In your own words
>The worst part of meaningless is the lack of motivation to do anything
So for you, motivation, a goal, a sense of purpose.

>>18901234
As I said already it is literally not a choice. You have to actually be insane or stupid to genuinely believe in fantasys. Religious people have literally lost there grasp on reality.

>>18901262
>As I said
And you are?

>>18901262
>Religious people have literally lost there grasp on reality.
>we are rocks and trees bro just like nothing bro

>>18901248
It's not directly related to the topic at hand, but my personal suspicions of this universe don't have to do with immortality of consciousness, it's how much we were led to believe that our pattern-seeking instincts are not to be trusted. How I see it, there are three facets to knowledge: Faith, Logic, and Technique. Or in other words: Assertation, Questioning, and Testing. Up until relatively recently, faith told us that there is an objective order in the universe, and it's called [insert deity or deities here], while logic told us "man is a mindful animal in a mindless universe, he can only view the world around him to be as mindful as he is, for he does not know mindlessness. he is a prisoner of his own rationality". But then technique acted as a sort of mediator between faith and logic, by testing reality around us and see what claims hold up and what don't. And as our technique has improved, we were able to surpass the limitations of our sense perception, and come to grasp things about the universe that we didn't know were there, like the full breadth of the light spectrum for example (turns out the light we see, visible light, is actually only a thin slice of the whole thing, and yet even though we can't experience the entirety of the spectrum, we were able to grasp its existence through technique). And it's through this technique that were able to verify that there's an order in the universe, we call it "the laws of physics", and if the universe was truly chaotic and random, then we wouldn't have been able to gather any consistent data on it through technique, but we can, and we do. And even though the humans of old couldn't realise it, they did always have an instinct that there's an order to things, and they called the subject of that instinctual belief "God". And that's how their mythologies developed. Personally, I don't believe in any religion, nor in any human conceptions of a deity, but I know for a fact that this cosmic order exists, and I'm curious about why it exists in the first place.

>>18901283
Same guy but I left and came back so different number

>>18901040
>please have the mercy to just let me disappear
But I think eternity would be the same as disappearing. All our concepts & sense of self come from our temporality & the sensation of being separate/autonomous.

>>18901289
Made of atoms you big idiot

>>18901314
Right, atoms. So what? Why aren't trees and rocks religious?

>>18901302
I look at that like "We once had access to only the phenomenal, but as we used our tools of perception, we accessed... more phenomenal!"

Leaving any ultimate order in mystery, or assuming things like "order, cause, effect, observer, knowledge" mean a damn thing ultimately.

>>18901319
How can you tell they aren't? The Quran, for example, states that everything in the world prays in its own. The trees and stones and rivers pray as you do.

>>18901328
I have the exact opposite attitude, but I already made that clear. It's no longer phenomenal when it's not interfaced with our sense-perception, I think the refinement of technique is truly allowing us to access the-thing-in-itself, and the fact that we're able to study the universe to such a large AND universally standardised extent means that there's truly something under the hood, and it's not merely phenomenal. I've been energised by this revelation so much I'm actually studying mathematics and physics from the ground-up again (even though I already graduated uni) in hopes of studying a course in quantum physics.

>>18901355
And everything you ever find out will be through the lens of human understanding. You really think that's a fine enough instrument to perceive the workings? Wouldn't that make human intellect something exceptional?

>>18900666
I take this question more from a anthropomorphic perspective

As a human being, it is literally my imperative to avoid death at all costs (besides through sacrifice which is a whole different subject), so really there's no point for me to dwell on it in a prepatory way

>>18901369
If the instrument is not getting the job done, we would know, because it would not return reliable, solid data, but it is, then yes, it's fine. It's not perfect mind you, there is no such thing as perfect technique, the road of improvement has no end. This also applies to gaps and shortcomings of intellect. In that sense, we may not reach an ultimate truth, BUT, we will get pretty damn close to the truth (we already have, in fact, in regards to many questions), unlike the claim that we've been basically chasing phenomenal phantoms all along and it's all bullshit.

>>18901409
>, but if it does*

>>18900823
because YOU came from nothingness.

>>18900666
Fuckin' checked

I don't care about death but the bodily effects old age are depressing.

>>18900766
This.