/sci/ - Science & Math

Nope.

>>3225378
No.

I do however find the concept of my existence eventually being completely forgotten frightening. It makes me non-existent in a sense.

Yes wtf of course, there better be some bullshit religion forgives everyone crap afterward

I am afraid indeed.

Anyone saying they aren't are (1) blatantly lying or (2) haven't thought about it properly.

There is a cure for everything, even death. Someone just has to find it. Maybe im in denial but it provides motivation.

>>3225389
Take a guess at how many people out of all the people that have ever lived are still remembered.

Do you think there is a name that we remember today that will be remembered for all existence?

Do you want that to be you?

>>3225402

Does that compare to all the forgotten people about there?

>>3225394
Or they truly aren't afraid of dying

>>3225394
Well, I'm not lying. Help me think about it properly to instill this fear. Death is a fact of life. Being afraid of a fact of life is similar to running in fear over someone writing "2 + 2 = 4" on a blackboard in front of you.

UNLESS, like you purposed, I haven't thought about it properly (which I very well may not have), so please. Go on.

What is there to be afraid of though?

I'm only afraid of being disappointed split seconds before I die (if I realize that's what's happening) that it's over and there's potentially no more fun time for me.

>>3225410

It's not the thought of death that scares me, anyway. It's the thought of not existing anymore and that means no more consciousness.

Dying in and of itself isn't the scary part. The scary part is what happens afterwards. (Namely, nothing.)


Now, by afraid, I don't mean that I go around thinking about this constantly, being afraid to die wherever I go. Just occasionally, before I go to bed, say, or if I'm taking a walk, it'll hit me: one day I won't exist anymore.

That's sort of creepy.

>>3225428
>Implying nothing happens after death
>Implying you know this

>>3225431
If you're gonna green text, at least sage so we know you haven't posted anything relevant or on-topic.

>>3225435
It was relevant to the topic fool

>>3225437

Logically (and biologically) speaking, I think asserting that nothing happens after death is a logical assertion unless you subscribe to the delusions of religion.

>>3225446
i.e; you supposedly know and have proof that religion is false and that it is less logical than science, even though you have absoloutely no idea because: "You can never be 100% sure of anything, no matter how hard you try".

Nope.

If you want to experience death, try general anesthesia. I have. The brain is turned off. No dreams, no time. I remember seeing the doctor's masked face, fade to black, wake up in the recovery room. The 45 minutes, or so, of the operation was completely lost to me.

When you die there is no perception of anything. The thing that does the perceiving is dead. It's kind of like before you were born and became self-aware. You don't remember anything before that time and you won't remember anything after you are dead.

if Ray Kurtzweil or whoever comes up with an immortality pill or something like that, great, I'll take it, but I ain't holding my breath waiting for this miracle.

No expectations, no worries, no fear. Bring it on.

(religionfags gonna hate)

>>3225446

Stop listening to the atheists. The only logical thing you can say is that you don't know what happens. You have no proof either way, so you can't claim whether there is or isn't anything. It may not be satisfying, but it is logical.

I for one welcome death as when we will finally know the answer to the biggest mystery of the human condition. In one instant, everyone will know whether the Christians/Buddhists/atheists/etc were right or wrong. You will know the answer to the question of "Why?", and you will know whether there is anything more to the universe.

Also, because you can do nothing about it, don't worry about it. We all have our time in the sun; don't waste it by worrying about what happens after. Nothing can be gained by stressing over something you can't change.

And here's a song lyric to keep you thinking:

"I may simply be a single drop of rain; but I will remain, and I'll be back again"

A statement on spontaneous consciousness evolution, stellar evolution, and matter.

Also, information can't be destroyed. So it's not really like all traces of you will ever be gone.

>>3225502

>>3225502

>>3225502
I literally herped in real

>>3225511

?

>>3225502

YUO CAN'T KNOW!11!!1!

So far, there is no empirical evidence of anything after death; therefore, we can only assume, scientifically speaking, that there is no existence for the individual after death.

However, there are anecdotal data dealing with near death experiences, as well as "paranormal" experiences (i.e. encounters with ghosts) which suggest otherwise.

tl;dr no scientific evidence, but i want to believe

>>3225541
>ghosts
>nde
>implying not proven to be bullshit

perhaps, when i think about it, the fear is masked by a bit of anger. ...but when the anger fades. ah well... there's nothing i can do about my fate. if there is something beyond -and i think there actually is... then it will be there. if there isn't, nothing changes.

i try to do my best to live up to my wishes, and i absolutely try to enjoy every moment i have.


...when the fuck did sci become soc/adv?

>>3225541
>However, there are anecdotal data dealing with near death experiences, as well as "paranormal" experiences (i.e. encounters with ghosts) which suggest otherwise.

NDEs are caused by an overflow of ketamine to the brain. It's one of the brain's mechanism for dealing with pain (after a car crash, say). Too much ketamine will make you hallucinate, and when you then wake up you will be 100% convinced that you have had an NDE, when in reality you've only been in a dreamlike state.

Now, ghosts and shit? Come on, man..

>and there's nothing after it
Not necessarily. You know we might very well live in an universe where time has no ending. We can't tell but we do know that it's tending towards entropy. A timeless universe like that would be in a high-entropy state most of it's time but sometimes there would be low-entropy pockets of varying sizes. One pocket might give birth to a molecule. Another time a few molecules might even assemble to form a microscopic piece of dirt. And another time a whole galaxy exactly like ours might just pop into existence and with it the rest of our known universe. An event like this would be extremely unlikely and rare but time is meaningless when there's no observer.
The scary part is that it's much more likely that our universe just assembled out of nothing instead of being created over time with a big-bang at it's beginning. It would happen endless times in an endless universe.

Nope.

>>3225539

>implying you can know

>>3225473
>>3225502

These guys are dimwits.

>>3225502
>Also, information can't be destroyed. So it's not really like all traces of you will ever be gone.

Absolutely right. As my father used the scientific research of those before him, the scientists who follow him will use his patents and articles in peer reviewed publications to further their own research. He will be "immortal" as long as there is value to what he invented and wrote.

ITT: Brainwashed atheists

I don't understand why all you atheists cling to the notions of "nothing after death".

There is literally no such thing as "nothing" in the universe. The word is actually nonsense, because at no point in space is there nothing. You have no real concept of nothing, or reality at scales where you can start considering the meaning of nothing.

So why do you think this nonexistent, theoretical concept is the governing nature of the universe? That a descent into nothing is the only logical answer to the deepest question?

You can't explain that.

I certainly Hope I'm not reincarnated as another person I'd rather cease to exist

>>3225591
>ITT: Brainwashed atheists
...and religionfags improperly prepared for oblivion.

Scared? Doubtful? Not everyone believes what you do. Doesn't that shake your faith a bit?

>>3225613

Troll or not, consciousness is not a thing.

That's the whole point of death you fool. Consciousness stops existing.

>>3225627
>Consciousness stops existing.
Prove it.

>>3225627

>>consciousness not a thing
>>but it can stop existing

hurr durr hurr durr

>>3225613
You're assuming that our consciousness is "something" on it's own, which it isn't. It's an _effect_ of the physical processes in the brain.

>>3225626

>implying there are only atheists and religionfags and that either give a shit about your unsupported claims

>>3225635
>>3225640

So, you guys are saying that my mind, which is dependent on biological processes that completely stop at the time of death, continues to create a consciousness for me even after all biological processes have stopped?

Now please, tell me, where is the logic in this?

>>3225652

By mind I mean brain, from which all of consciousness arises, or do you disagree with that as well?

IN WHICH CASE, where does consciousness stem from?

>>3225647

Where did my post say anything about consciousness or make the claim that it exists. I'm talking about the nature of reality, and the "argument into nothing" as used by self-claimed logical adherents (who have been brainwashed into thinking that the only answer is to say there is nothing because they think it makes them seem more logical than the unwashed masses they'd like to stand over) and why it makes no logical sense.

>>3225652

I think your argument makes perfect sense.

The one thing that I'm scared of is that the moment I die they create some cool new invention that I always wanted when I was younger, or the third film in a trilogy I've got into is released, if i could come back as a ghost in purely observatory terms I'd probably do that, just to see all the cool shit being done

>>3225649
I support my claims through personal experience. My brain was turned off once. General anesthesia is supposedly the closest one comes to death. There is no perception of anything, including time. Try it. Have a doctor friend put you under. There is nothing. No bright light, no pearly gates, no dreams, no time. When you come out of it, a little groggy, you will remember that the doctor just put you to "sleep" a moment ago. The time that passed for others will be gone to you.

How can the brain perceive anything when it has rotted and is eaten by worms? Answer me that, religionfags.

>>3225678

Unfortunately, everyone is limited to experiencing a ~100 years of human technology. If you were born during the space colony period, you'd yearn to be born during the wormhole period, etc

>>3225687
how do you know you aren't in a dream state, that you can't remember as soon as you wake up.

OP.
There is only two ways:
Death
Immortality*

Be forever conscious, or cease to be.

Sure, the latter bugs me, but you just have to get that you will not be aware that you are not aware.

Pretty simple concept.


*Until Heat death©
(or not?)

>>3225687

Maybe hell is as you described, and you are going straight to it when you die.

Just kidding.

Perhaps you had a singular experience, similar to a person having only slept once and claiming that dreams are creations of the insane and the lying.

Of course, you didn't, but you don't really know that.

And I have gone under general anesthesia before also.

I floated through neon-green intestines that folded into themselves and extended forever.

(I even woke up during the procedure! I mumbled "I'm fine, don't worry, I'm fine" as the dentist drilled into my jaw. It just felt like pressure.)

I don't really know what to make of it, and I wont be altering my world view because of it.

>>3225378

Nope. The best part of my life is the part I spend sub/unconscious.

>>3225716

Wrong. The bible already describes Hell to a degree and it's the infallible word of god.

>>3225727
Wrong. The bible does not describe hell to a degree...the description is approximate - between the melting and boiling points of sulfur.

At least we can all say we didn't dedicate our lives to Jesus or some shit.

But nothing is scary about death because it is not a part of life. When you die, and consciousness has evaporated away, you will not even experience death and what comes after. So the fear you feel from it is simply your subjectivity of the present when you attempt to analyze the future.

>>3225755
I wish more people would dedicate their lives to the human Jesus, though.

>>3225576

Amen brother. I was afraid of death and being forgotten through most of my youth. Later I came to understand that particular things about myself and others will always be remembered. In turn those ideas may be passed on again. Knowing that I am a contributor to the evolution of human knowledge is enough motivation to make the most of my life.

>>3225766
So you can be an atheist two-cell in a one-cell pond?

>>3225784
lol, u have to be kiddin. almost no one will know you ever existed in 50 years after you die and most of the people who knew you dies too. unless you are some kind of an aristotle or galileo, then your name will be at best indexed somewhere. even so, most people (over 95%) don't know who aristotle is, only a tiny minority of the population who thinks it's relevant to their lives.

the more people on the planet, the less will be remembered. for example, in the 19th century there must have been thousands of people working individually to invent the same thing, a few tens of them got closer to the real thing and maybe one or two got into fierce competition for claiming primacy. statistically, this is how it works..

>>3225378
nope, being forced to live eternally would scare me a hell of a lot more.

>>3225886

Hey EK, god here. You are now immortal.

That is all.

>>3225883

Just because you belong to the ignorant-hipster-popsci-entertainment-grocery bagger group doesn't mean everyone else is ignorant of the literally hundreds of thousands of people whose names are remembered in history.

ITT: People claiming that "It doesn't matter that you can't prove it... you can't disprove it so it's just as valid as anything else" Shut up.

Also; No. I have never been afraid of death. And just because I'm not afraid of it, doesn't mean I don't want it to happen. Because in reality, it's the last thing I want to happen. I don't know why some people are afraid of death... for the same reason I don't know why some people are afraid of heights, or spiders... which is we were told these things are dangerous.. if no one ever told people that spiders can kill and hurt you, no one would ever be afraid of them. Ever.

And this is why toddlers aren't afraid and spiders and bugs.. even though when they turn 10 they may be terrified by them. Experiences create fear and society spreads it.

But no one who has experienced death can tell people it's bad obviously. So I think fear around death might have come around from the pain of death.. of people you might have loved, or wanted around, being gone, or them telling you that their in pain right before they die. Everyone has experienced pain.. whether physical pain or mental pain... and anyone who is old enough to question death.. probably has experienced the pain it brings.. or the way the media portrays it as painful 90% of the time.

Naturally no one is afraid of death, and that's because, naturally, no one is afraid of anything until their told it's bad.

>>3225784
I'll give you an example. I have a niece who doesn't know shit about my grandfather. He used to be part of the history of a certain party in my country, but didn't exactly get into history books. Apparently, he was quite smart, used to keep a diary, read the papers, get involved in politics and so on. After I die, there will be no one who knows in person he ever existed or how he was or what he did.

If you look at the rate knowledge is generated, there are like thousands of people around the globe working on a tiny field. A few of them will temporarily dominate the field for a few years, even a few decades if they are exceptional. Very few, if any will get to transcend their field and become known to the general public. One or two will probably be read by a specialist 50 years after they're dead. It's kind of like that. Knowledge generation is already an industry full of ants doing their job.

>>3225927

I don't understand. If your position has no proof for its validity, it is equal to every other position without proof.

Do you disagree with this?
If so cite your sources.

Do you think phobias have rational justifications?
If so cite your sources.

Do you think we have no instinctual behaviors? That we are born "blank slate" and all behavior is learned?
If so cite your sources.

If not, shut the fuck up.

>mfw i had this revelation around 7 years old

>>3225951

What world do you live in? Knowledge isn't "made" by any select group of people. It's made by everyone who puts pen to paper or key to screen.

Just because you think you are the only person who remembers your grandfather doesn't mean no one else does. If he was involved in politics, his name is in thousands of sources. If he kept a diary, there is a first-hand source detailing his existence that anyone can come upon. If he posted on the internet, it is recorded somewhere. If he bullied someone as a child, he might live on in a lesson taught by another grandfather. If he had a crush on a girl, it might be relayed to thousands of people. If he was born in a hospital, it is recorded.

To be honest, it's actually harder to be forgotten and have no trace left of you than otherwise.

>>3225961
>If your position has no proof for its validity, it is equal to every other position without proof.
Yes, exactly my point.. my idea's of what fear is no more valid than anyone else's here. So no, I don't disagree with your first statement.

For the second... Yes I do think phobias have rational justifications.... read my original post.

As for your third... No I don't think people are born -completely- "blank slates"... I believe certain things like morality can always be defined by each individual person... as in.. I think in a society where the norm is to rape and steal, and it always has been; I think it's possible for a person brought up in that society and around it's doings to develop a sense of whats going on is wrong even though no one else thinks like that.

But it's clear newborn babies aren't "blank"... We have "instinctual behavior"s for lots of things... babies who were born 5 minutes ago already know how to walk and swim.. which has been proven.. but they are just to weak to do so at the time. They were not thought how to move their legs in a walking fashion... but they still do. So people aren't blank.

But as this is a deiscussion of fear and things related... by instinctual behavior I assume you mean something like to run from tigers and lions if we saw one or to run from a man with a bloody knife... No I don't think their natural instinctual behavior. At all. Why would anyone run from a tiger or a man with a bloody knife if they didn't know it could hurt them. The only reason people don't run away from trees is they no trees can't hurt them and the only reason I'd run from a man with a bloody knife is because I know he could hurt me. How do I know that if I've not yet had a man with a bloody knife confront me... because society tells me it's dangerous.. from horror movies to stories; these things are how I know men with bloody knives are dangerous.. If no one knew that a knife could hurt people; why would anyone run?

Die now, OP. It's better to die early than to die late. You'll enjoy the bliss of nothingness earlier.

I honestly find the idea of permanency, so often attributed with "heaven" and the "afterlife," to be unnerving. To think that I'll exist eternally is truly horrifying.

I'm afraid, yes. but I also look forward to it as long as it doesn't come too soon. I look forward lying on my deathbed with my wife and family round me and all I'll say is "I've enjoyed our time together".

While I am convinced of our conciousness being a result of brainchemistry (very vague, I know, I'm tired), there is still the question why anything exists if there is no entity outside of our universe.

tl;dr: even if you don't believe in some form of God you have to admit we don't know.

>>3226141
Cont.

"When my husband died, because he was so famous and known for not being a believer, many people would come up to me — it still sometimes happens — and ask me if Carl changed at the end and converted to a belief in an afterlife. They also frequently ask me if I think I will see him again. Carl faced his death with unflagging courage and never sought refuge in illusions. The tragedy was that we knew we would never see each other again. I don't ever expect to be reunited with Carl."

It's that sort of contentment I'm striving for. But first I need to live a good life.

>>3226150
>why anything exists if there is no entity outside of our universe.

While I can't say anything about "outside the universe." I can be fairly it doesn't include me.

>>3226165
So many parts inside of this universe don't include me, it would be silly to assume the outside would. Also the universe is a closed system.

>>3226165
Why do I suddenly have the Truman-show at the size of a whole Universe in mind?

Nontheless, since something exists, I guess it had to start from somewhere. But that's probably an all too human sort of thought.
And then there's still the 'who created the creator' thing.

It's probably better for our sanity to not philosophize around and wait for any facts to change our perception of reality.

On a sidenote, I just opened a beer and drank a green tea and feel fine now. It's good to know that shit matters, at least for me.

>>3226173
It's just the face in the second panel that makes me laugh everytime and makes me post this

Welp, quote time.

PS: Yes I am afraid. You should be too.

"Death is bad," said Harry, discarding wisdom for the sake of clear communication. "Very bad. Extremely bad. Being scared of death is like being scared of a great big monster with poisonous fangs. It actually makes a great deal of sense, and does not, in fact, indicate that you have a psychological problem."

The Headmaster was staring at him as though he'd just turned into a cat.

"Okay," said Harry, "let me put it this way. Do you want to die? Because if so, there's this Muggle thing called a suicide prevention hotline -"

"When it is time," the old wizard said quietly. "Not before. I would never seek to hasten the day, nor seek to refuse it when it comes."

Harry was frowning sternly. "That doesn't sound like you have a very strong will to live, Headmaster!"

"Harry..." The old wizard's voice was starting to sound a little helpless; and he had paced to a spot where his silver beard, unnoticed, had drifted into a crystalline glass goldfish bowl, and was slowly taking on a greenish tinge that crept up the hairs. "I think I may have not made myself clear. Dark Wizards are not eager to live. They fear death. They do not reach up toward the sun's light, but flee the coming of night into infinitely darker caverns of their own making, without moon or stars. It is not life they desire, but immortality; and they are so driven to grasp at it that they will sacrifice their very souls! Do you want to live forever, Harry?"

"Yes, and so do you," said Harry. "I want to live one more day. Tomorrow I will still want to live one more day. Therefore I want to live forever, proof by induction on the positive integers. If you don't want to die, it means you want to live forever. If you don't want to live forever, it means you want to die. You've got to do one or the other... I'm not getting through here, am I."

niggers

>>3226208

The two cultures stared at each other across a vast gap of incommensurability.

"I have lived a hundred and ten years," the old wizard said quietly (taking his beard out of the bowl, and jiggling it to shake out the color). "I have seen and done a great many things, too many of which I wish I had never seen or done. And yet I do not regret being alive, for watching my students grow is a joy that has not begun to wear on me. But I would not wish to live so long that it does! What would you do with eternity, Harry?"

Harry took a deep breath. "Meet all the interesting people in the world, read all the good books and then write something even better, celebrate my first grandchild's tenth birthday party on the Moon, celebrate my first great-great-great grandchild's hundredth birthday party around the Rings of Saturn, learn the deepest and final rules of Nature, understand the nature of consciousness, find out why anything exists in the first place, visit other stars, discover aliens, create aliens, rendezvous with everyone for a party on the other side of the Milky Way once we've explored the whole thing, meet up with everyone else who was born on Old Earth to watch the Sun finally go out, and I used to worry about finding a way to escape this universe before it ran out of negentropy but I'm a lot more hopeful now that I've discovered the so-called laws of physics are just optional guidelines."

"I did not understand much of that," said Dumbledore. "But I must ask if these are things that you truly desire so desperately, or if you only imagine them so as to imagine not being tired, as you run and run from death."

"Life is not a finite list of things that you check off before you're allowed to die," Harry said firmly. "It's life, you just go on living it. If I'm not doing those things it'll be because I've found something better."

>>3226216

Dumbledore sighed. His fingers drummed on a clock; as they touched it, the numerals changed to an indecipherable script, and the hands briefly appeared in different positions. "In the unlikely event that I am permitted to tarry until a hundred and fifty," said the old wizard, "I do not think I would mind. But two hundred years would be entirely too much of a good thing."

"Yes, well," Harry said, his voice a little dry as he thought of his Mum and Dad and their allotted span if Harry didn't do something about it, "I suspect, Headmaster, that if you came from a culture where people were accustomed to living four hundred years, that dying at two hundred would seem just as tragically premature as dying at, say, eighty." Harry's voice went hard, on that last word.

"Perhaps," the old wizard said peacefully. "I would not wish to die before my friends, nor live on after they had all gone. The hardest time is when those you loved the most have gone on before you, and yet others still live, for whose sake you must stay..." Dumbledore's eyes were fixed on Harry, and growing sad. "Do not mourn me too greatly, Harry, when my time comes; I will be with those I have long missed, on our next great adventure."

"Oh!" Harry said in sudden realization. "You believe in an afterlife. I got the impression wizards didn't have religion?"

Toot. Beep. Thud.

"How can you not believe it?" said the Headmaster, looking completely flabbergasted. "Harry, you're a wizard! You've seen ghosts!"

"Ghosts," Harry said, his voice flat. "You mean those things like portraits, stored memories and behaviors with no awareness or life, accidentally impressed into the surrounding material by the burst of magic that accompanies the violent death of a wizard -"

>>3226217

"I've heard that theory," said the Headmaster, his voice growing sharp, "repeated by wizards who mistake cynicism for wisdom, who think that to look down upon others is to elevate themselves. It is one of the silliest ideas I have heard in a hundred and ten years! Yes, ghosts do not learn or grow, because this is not where they belong! Souls are meant to move on, there is no life remaining for them here! And if not ghosts, then what of the Veil? What of the Resurrection Stone?"

"All right," Harry said, trying to keep his voice calm, "I'll hear out your evidence, because that's what a scientist does. But first, Headmaster, let me tell you a little story." Harry's voice was trembling. "You know, when I got here, when I got off the train from King's Cross, I don't mean yesterday but back in September, when I got off the train then, Headmaster, I'd never seen a ghost. I wasn't expecting ghosts. So when I saw them, Headmaster, I did something really dumb. I jumped to conclusions. I, I thought there was an afterlife, I thought no one had ever really died, I thought that everyone the human species had ever lost was really fine after all, I thought that wizards could talk to people who'd passed on, that it just took the right spell to summon them, that wizards could do that, I thought I could meet my parents who died for me, and tell them that I'd heard about their sacrifice and that I'd begun to call them my mother and father -"

"Harry," whispered Dumbledore. Water glittered in the old wizard's eyes. He took a step closer across the office -

>>3226222

"And then," spat Harry, the fury coming fully into his voice, the cold rage at the universe for being like that and at himself for being so stupid, "I asked Hermione and she said that they were just afterimages, burned into the stone of the castle by the death of a wizard, like the silhouettes left on the walls of Hiroshima. And I should have known! I should have known without even having to ask! I shouldn't have believed it even for all of thirty seconds! Because if people had souls there wouldn't be any such thing as brain damage, if your soul could go on speaking after your whole brain was gone, how could damage to the left cerebral hemisphere take away your ability to talk? And Professor McGonagall, when she told me about how my parents had died, she didn't act like they'd just gone away on a long trip to another country, like they'd emigrated to Australia back in the days of sailing ships, which is the way people would act if they actually knew that death was just going somewhere else, if they had hard evidence for an afterlife, instead of making stuff up to console themselves, it would change everything, it wouldn't matter that everyone had lost someone in the war, it would be a little sad but not horrible! And I'd already seen that people in the wizarding world didn't act like that! So I should have known better! And that was when I knew that my parents were really dead and gone forever and ever, that there wasn't anything left of them, that I'd never get a chance to meet them and, and, and the other children thought I was crying because I was scared of ghosts -"

The old wizard's face was horrified, he opened his mouth to speak -

"So tell me, Headmaster! Tell me about the evidence! But don't you dare exaggerate a single tiny bit of it, because if you give me false hope again, and I find out later that you lied or stretched things just a little, I won't ever forgive you for it! What's the Veil?"

>>3226217
>>3226216
>>3226208

Oh god I've been on /v/ way too long this week
I just realized I fully expect this to turn into gay sex any moment

>>3226209
Implying basing faith on chance is sound

>>3226225

(Standard explanation of parts of Harry Potter anyone who has read the books knows about follows)

"You are not fooling me, Harry," said the old wizard; his face looked ancient now, and lined by more than years. "I know why you are truly asking that question. No, I do not read your mind, I do not have to, your hesitation gives you away! You seek the secret of the Dark Lord's immortality in order to use it for yourself!"

"Wrong! I want the secret of the Dark Lord's immortality in order to use it for everyone!"

Tick, crackle, fzzzt...

Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore just stood there and stared at Harry with his mouth gaping open dumbly.

(Harry awarded himself a tally mark for Monday, since he'd managed to blow someone's mind completely before the day was over.)

"And in case it wasn't clear," said Harry, "by everyone I mean all Muggles too, not just all wizards."

"No," said the old wizard, shaking his head. His voice rose. "No, no, no! This is insanity!"

"Bwa ha ha!" said Harry.

The old wizard's face was tight with anger and worry. "Voldemort stole the book from which he gleaned his secret; it was not there when I went to look for it. But this much I know, and this much I will tell you: his immortality was born of a ritual terrible and Dark, blacker than pitchest black! And it was Myrtle, poor sweet Myrtle, who died for it; his immortality took sacrifice, it took murder -"

"Well obviously I'm not going to popularize a method of immortality that requires killing people! That would defeat the entire point!"

There was a startled pause.

Slowly the old wizard's face relaxed out of its anger, though the worry was still there. "You would use no ritual requiring human sacrifice."

>>3226234


"I don't know what you take me for, Headmaster," Harry said coldly, his own anger rising, "but let's not forget that I'm the one who wants people to live! The one who wants to save everyone! You're the one who thinks death is awesome and everyone ought to die!"

"I am at a loss, Harry," said the old wizard. His feet once more began trudging across his strange office. "I know not what to say." He picked up a crystal ball that seemed to hold a hand in flames, looked into it with a sad expression. "Only that I am greatly misunderstood by you... I don't want everyone to die, Harry!"

"You just don't want anyone to be immortal," Harry said with considerable irony. It seemed that elementary logical tautologies like All x: Die(x) = Not Exist x: Not Die(x) were beyond the reasoning abilities of the world's most powerful wizard.

The old wizard nodded. "I am less afraid than I was, but still greatly worried for you, Harry," he said quietly. His hand, a little wizened by time, but still strong, placed the crystal ball firmly back into its stand. "For the fear of death is a bitter thing, an illness of the soul by which people are twisted and warped. Voldemort is not the only Dark Wizard to go down that bleak road, though I fear he has taken it further than any before him."

"And you think you're not afraid of death?" Harry said, not even trying to mask the incredulity in his voice.

The old wizard's face was peaceful. "I am not perfect, Harry, but I think I have accepted my death as part of myself."

>>3226244
(And here comes the actual argument)

"Uh huh," Harry said. "See, there's this little thing called cognitive dissonance, or in plainer English, sour grapes. If people were hit on the heads with truncheons once a month, and no one could do anything about it, pretty soon there'd be all sorts of philosophers, pretending to be wise as you put it, who found all sorts of amazing benefits to being hit on the head with a truncheon once a month. Like, it makes you tougher, or it makes you happier on the days when you're not getting hit with a truncheon. But if you went up to someone who wasn't getting hit, and you asked them if they wanted to start, in exchange for those amazing benefits, they'd say no. And if you didn't have to die, if you came from somewhere that no one had ever even heard of death, and I suggested to you that it would be an amazing wonderful great idea for people to get wrinkled and old and eventually cease to exist, why, you'd have me hauled right off to a lunatic asylum! So why would anyone possibly think any thought so silly as that death is a good thing? Because you're afraid of it, because you don't really want to die, and that thought hurts so much inside you that you have to rationalize it away, do something to numb the pain, so you won't have to think about it -"

"No, Harry," the old wizard said. His face was gentle, his hand trailed through a lighted pool of water that made small musical chimes as his fingers stirred it. "Though I can understand how you must think so."

>>3226247

"Do you want to understand the Dark Wizard?" Harry said, his voice now hard and grim. "Then look within the part of yourself that flees not from death but from the fear of death, that finds that fear so unbearable that it will embrace Death as a friend and cozen up to it, try to become one with the night so that it can think itself master of the abyss. You have taken the most terrible of all evils and called it good! With only a slight twist that same part of yourself would murder innocents, and call it friendship. If you can call death better than life then you can twist your moral compass to point anywhere -"

"I think," said Dumbledore, shaking water droplets from his hand to the sound of tiny tinkling bells, "that you understand Dark Wizards very well, without yet being one yourself." It was said in perfect seriousness, and without accusation. "But your comprehension of me, I fear, is sorely lacking." The old wizard was smiling now, and there was a gentle laughter in his voice.

Harry was trying not to go any colder than he already was; from somewhere there was pouring into his mind a blazing fury of resentment, at Dumbledore's condescension, and all the laughter that wise old fools had ever used in place of argument. "Funny thing, you know, I thought Draco Malfoy was going to be this impossible to talk to, and instead, in his childish innocence, he was a hundred times stronger than you."

A look of puzzlement crossed the old wizard's face. "What do you mean?"

"I mean," Harry said, his voice biting, "that Draco actually took his own beliefs seriously and processed my words instead of throwing them out the window by smiling with gentle superiority. You're so old and wise, you can't even notice anything I'm saying! Not understand, notice!"

>>3226253
"I have listened to you, Harry," said Dumbledore, looking more solemn now, "but to listen is not always to agree. Disagreements aside, what is it that you think I do not comprehend?"

That if you really believed in an afterlife, you'd go down to St. Mungo's and kill Neville's parents, Alice and Frank Longbottom, so they could go on to their next great adventure, instead of letting them linger here in their damaged state -

Harry barely, barely kept himself from saying it out loud.

"All right," Harry said coldly. "I'll answer your original question, then. You asked why Dark Wizards are afraid of death. Pretend, Headmaster, that you really believed in souls. Pretend that anyone could verify the existence of souls at any time, pretend that nobody cried at funerals because they knew their loved ones were still alive. Now can you imagine destroying a soul? Ripping it to shreds so that nothing remains to go on its next great adventure? Can you imagine what a terrible thing that would be, the worst crime that had ever been committed in the history of the universe, which you would do anything to prevent from happening even once? Because that's what Death really is - the annihilation of a soul!"
The old wizard was staring at him, a sad look in his eyes. "I suppose I do understand now," he said quietly.

"Oh?" said Harry. "Understand what?"

"Voldemort," said the old wizard. "I understand him now at last. Because to believe that the world is truly like that, you must believe there is no justice in it, that it is woven of darkness at its core. I asked you why he became a monster, and you could give no reason. And if I could ask him, I suppose, his answer would be: Why not?"

-----------------------------------------------------------
And that's it.

For those who want more, start here: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/1/Harry_Potter_and_the_Methods_of_Rationality

And read for the the next 7 hours.

You'll thank me later.

>>3225378

Not afraid, but not content either. I don't want to stop existing. I don't want anyone else to stop existing, either. I want all of humanity to witness the last star in the Milky Way burning out, I want to be there for the heat death of the universe. That's why I'm dedicating my life to furthering the goals of extropianism and the technological singularity. If all else fails and we don't reach singularity within my lifetime, I've signed up for cryonics, to have my body preserved for a future immortalist civilisation to recover.

Well, yes, I'm terrified.

>>3226261
holy shit this is bad

seriously I'm embarrassed for you for recommending it

>>3226261
this is the only fan fiction worth reading. The associated blog is pretty good.

>>3226300

Trust me, normally I wouldn't touch fanfiction with an eleven foot pole, but this is actually good.

>>3226305

The blog is good, and so are his other stories. I like Three Worlds Collide the best myself, what with the Babyeaters.

>>3226261
lol, harry is trying to disprove an unfalsifiable hypothesis by making an arbitrary assumption

>>3226261
The Harry-Potter context does scare me a bit.
It's interesting, but the argumenting is kinda... strange.

As for the topic; I guess I'm too young and healthy to really be able to say I'm afraid/not afraid to die.

This might sound cheesy, but if my conciousness (if you believe in it) dies with my brain, it's not me who ceases to exist but my tempoary composition of molecules. So in a way, I'm pretty much immortal.

Personally, I the question if conciousness exists is more interesting. And even if it does it's either chaotic or deterministic. Unless you see your soul or whatever fucking with quantum fluctuations. But I must confess I don't know enough to be taken seriously.

>>3226261
>written after the final book
>yfw the harry potter universe objectively has an afterlife and souls are real
>yfw turning harry potter into a terrible mary-sue for the author
>yfw shoving an argument that works in the real world into one where magic is real and everyone who achieves immortality either hates it or becomes a monster
>yfw not rational at all

eh, time is cyclical. we've all died so many times it hardly matters.

>>3226305
>>3226310

I don't want to be an asshole, but... why do you read Harry Potter fanfiction? I imagine that kinda like twilight-fanfiction in terms of quality (could be wrong though)

>>3226320

This is what's called an "AU" or Alternate Universe, where all the rules from the canon books do not neccesarily apply.

>>3226330

For me it was because I found the guy who wrote it's site through his writings and history, and then looked up the part of his site that had "Fiction" on it to see the sci fi he had written, and this was the first thing there.

>>3226332
The funny thing is that they break all known laws of physics by simply using magic, yet use normal argumentation

>Rated T - English - Drama/Humor
I lol'd

>>3226347

Part of the plot is that Harry is trying to figure out the new laws of reality by scientifically experimenting with magic.

>>3226375
Well, I should probably give it a read before I dismiss it completely

...when I have time

The idea of death certainly bothers me as a concept. I can not quite fathom the idea of oblivion but I suppose that its the same as before I was born...I am definately not happy about the prospect of dying. But I do not fear it, I used to. But not anymore.

There is no purpose in concerning myself with something that I can never change.

I did not understand what exhaustion was when I was a young man. I thought that I understood, I knew what it was to work myself to sleep but I had no idea what being tired really meant.
I think that if I was somehow spared from having to die, I would eventually seek it out anyways or I would lose every shred of who I am as time passed.

>mfw I never believed in the afterlife ever.
Never bothered by that fact, though I did/do miss the people that have died in my life also pets

Of course I'm scared. I'm to smart to believe in a afterlife.

>>3225378


Nope OP, im gonna be in heaven with jesus drinking bourbon and fucking bitches.

>>3225394

Don't project your irrational insecurities on us. I've faced death once already in an emergency room. I'm fully aware of the finality of death and know that it will most likely be very unpleasant. I'm not looking forward to it, but I am not afraid.

>>3226506
Your smart enough not to believe in afterlife... yet not smart enough to spell too* correctly...

So there very well may not be an afterlife. However isnt the concept of our existence truly absurd. All you science fags know that..."Matter cannot be created nor destroyed" What is the use in arguing over this shit, do we truly know anything?

>>3226577
Because arguing makes us smart
or rather, feel smart

actually every time i start to think about death i feel relieved
it would be the end of my struggle i know i would be frightened at first but after that nothing will matter
it would be like a beautiful silence