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bjones
Skeptic Friend
Australia
82 Posts |
 Posted - 08/25/2001 : 18:03:25 [Permalink]
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How do we enter into this life without using supernatural means? Why did we happen to be born a certain place and time? I strongly doubt we entered into this world through supernatural means. Most biologists will tell we used perfectly natural means to come into this world.
When we look closely at the word reincarnation you notice the prefix “re” which denotes again; anew; once more,. It is especially referring to our current so called incarnation. But is our life truly an incarnation? Because if it is not than how can we have a reincarnation of something that never existed in the first place. Some people give incarnation any credence if they subscribe to some form of dualism like it is some supernatural spirit of your self that is incarnated inside your physical body, and for those who subscribe to this dualistic doctrine believe the spirit can separate from the body like a great white fart and transmigrate to another new one, and occasionally people who claim to be in touch with this other side with get in touch with one of these “great white farts” mid way through their journey of transmigration.
The problem with dualism, what is the glue that makes stay inside your body made of, and in the huge vastness of the cosmos how did it find its way to your body on the tiny little blue dot called Earth. I am personally of the view that the self is made of data and not some supernatural spirit. Data that is isolated through space and time inside your brain like a supercomputer that has not been linked up to the internet. But when you die you simply forget that you have ever been born in the first place, so subjectively you have never been born at all. It would be rather like some great cosmic reset button has been spontaneously pressed with out any Divine intervention at all.
I have spoken of a lot of uncertainty here but there is one thing I am more certain of. When you die your philosophy or religion dies with you.
quote:
In order to make reincarnation plausible you have to preserve the personality and memories of people after they have died, and pass these on to other people before they are born. How could that be done without resorting to supernatural means--ie ghosts and spirits?
We know that personality and memory reside in the brain. People who suffer brain damage often exhibit personality changes and memory loss or dysfunction--stroke victims often have trouble with memory, as do those whose brains are afflicted with the hardened plaque characterizing Alzheimer's Disease.
Conversely, a human's brain begins as a few cells in an embryo. What physical mechanism could possibly preserve a mind after it's host brain has died and disintegrated, and then insert it into a brain residing in the womb of a woman?
Can't do it with light rays. Can't do it with electrons. Can't do it with magnetism, or neutrinos, or the weak force, or gravity. There is no known force or material which preserves the mind after death. That is why I dismiss reincarnation as superstition--it can only happen with smoke and mirrors!
"Even Einstein put his foot in it sometimes"
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Grove
New Member
USA
9 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2001 : 18:47:09 [Permalink]
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Yeah, it's the same with me...Besides being mathematically impossible (where do all the extra souls come from?). It falls back on the ol religious saying about having faith in order to believe...Which I of course can't believe in something on faith alone...
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bjones
Skeptic Friend
Australia
82 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2001 : 19:07:54 [Permalink]
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quote:
Yeah, it's the same with me...Besides being mathematically impossible (where do all the extra souls come from?). It falls back on the ol religious saying about having faith in order to believe...Which I of course can't believe in something on faith alone...
?Why would it not be mathematically impossible to be born in the first place?
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13477 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2001 : 19:46:10 [Permalink]
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quote:
Does anyone here really think there is a one-and-however-many-species-of-living-organic-forms-there-are chance at being born as a certain species?
I don't. Not really. I was afraid that odds thing might be taken too literaly... 
The Evil Skeptic
Uncertainty may make you uncomfortable. Certainty makes you ridiculous. |
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PhDreamer
SFN Regular
USA
925 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2001 : 22:15:03 [Permalink]
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I think the lack realization that many of us know what it "feels like" to be dead is remarkable. I have been completely unconscious twice, both times on purpose. The second time (reconstructive knee surgery), about 3.5 years ago, I recall the procedure that took over 4 hours felt like it could have been 4 minutes. There was no sense of elapsed time while unconscious, no remembered dreams (which I rarely do anyway), no sense of having dreamt at all (which I almost always do). The only other times I have had blackout-like experiences were sleep-sessions after imbibing large amounts of fermented grain extract. Ironic that alcohol can bring you closer to death in a mere 12 hour period.
This signature does not exist. |
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bjones
Skeptic Friend
Australia
82 Posts |
Posted - 08/26/2001 : 01:45:29 [Permalink]
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quote:
I think the lack realization that many of us know what it "feels like" to be dead is remarkable. I have been completely unconscious twice, both times on purpose. The second time (reconstructive knee surgery), about 3.5 years ago, I recall the procedure that took over 4 hours felt like it could have been 4 minutes. There was no sense of elapsed time while unconscious, no remembered dreams (which I rarely do anyway), no sense of having dreamt at all (which I almost always do). The only other times I have had blackout-like experiences were sleep-sessions after imbibing large amounts of fermented grain extract. Ironic that alcohol can bring you closer to death in a mere 12 hour period.
This signature does not exist.
So we are only aware of the interval of time in with we are conscious like there is for example 14 billion years of time between the big bang and time we were born and we were not the slightest bit aware of one second of it
Bob
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Remember when you die your philosophy dies with you
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bjones
Skeptic Friend
Australia
82 Posts |
Posted - 08/27/2001 : 17:41:01 [Permalink]
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I suggest that we are what is physically possible. It is simply not physically possible to be born as a person in the open virgin landscape Mars as the environmental conditions are mush too hostile for any such life forms, and you would really have to be born wearing a spacesuit. Could you imagine what the birth scenes would be like “don't worry dear, the helmet and the oxygen cylinder is out, just give another push and bubby will be out ” pleads the midwife “Oops I just cut the oxygen supply hose, I thought that was the umbilical cord” and the midmife's and mother's space helmet fogs up in despair. So to state that we can be reborn as a person on Mars is far less rational than stating that we can possibly be reborn as a person on Earth. You can never be reborn/reincarnated on the open virgin landscape Mars because you can never be born there in the first place.
Bob
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Remember when you die your philosophy dies with you
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Dog_Ed
Skeptic Friend
USA
126 Posts |
Posted - 08/28/2001 : 16:36:18 [Permalink]
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[wild speculation]
I've often thought that the (assumed) inability of self-conscious beings to imagine a world without their consciousness in it might be the original basis for the concept of an immortal soul. For example, imagine the site of your home as it may look 200 years from now--be quite detailed about the vegetation, the buildings, and so forth. Now from what viewpoint did you imagine the scene? (I'm usually about 20 meters up in the air and off to one side.) I don't think it's possible to imagine a scene in the future (or the past) without giving yourself a viewpoint, awarding yourself a sort of existence.
Is it possible that this simple illusion of immortality gave rise to all religious metaphysics dealing with the existence of a soul? Well, now that we know it's just a silly illusion we can simply walk away from all religion, right?
[/wild speculation]
"Even Einstein put his foot in it sometimes"
Edited by - Dog_Ed on 08/28/2001 16:38:33
Edited by - Dog_Ed on 08/28/2001 16:40:30 |
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@tomic
Administrator
USA
4607 Posts |
Posted - 08/28/2001 : 17:10:32 [Permalink]
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quote:
I suggest that we are what is physically possible. It is simply not physically possible to be born as a person in the open virgin landscape Mars as the environmental conditions are mush too hostile for any such life forms, and you would really have to be born wearing a spacesuit.
One tiny little point you seem to be missing. OK, not so tiny a point. More like a Mt. Everest of a point. People are born were their mothers are. If your mother had been born on Mars and then subsequently grown up there and made wild whoopee with your father there then, yes, you would be born on Mars. I suppose your mother could also have made wild whoopee on the way to Mars or even been artificially impregnated on the way to Mars or even on Mars but I think you get the idea. You could also be born under a dome or something like that...as long as your mother's there, too. My point has nothing to do about artificial environment, though. Your mother could be a Martian and I don't mean an immigrant !
I would need to see even the smallest scrap of proof relating to rebirth to give this idea much though. I'm sorry but reincarnation is just a notion.
@tomic
Gravity, not just a good idea...it's the law! |
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bjones
Skeptic Friend
Australia
82 Posts |
Posted - 08/29/2001 : 05:59:19 [Permalink]
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Has one ever considered that number of ways of not existing than existing. There are billion of other men your mother could of met in the world, but lucky for you, she met the one that made you possible to exist. Is your life contingent on the chance encounter between these two people? Or do you have billions of natural fall back options if those parents provide you with your one and only slim chance at life. I suspect that we exist in this world because there is an enormous number of failed attempts to exist and it is only the odd successful attempt in which you are consciously aware. You are totally oblivious to billions of failed attempts.
I have a theory (but it is only a theory) that may be a major conundrum for the Catholic Church. We do not start to exist at conception as they preach to us, but may start much later, much much later in fact. Just think of your earliest memory you will find if you are like most of us will stop short at around 2 years(mine is 2 years 1 month). Now why so sure? Well I looked through an old house that I moved from on my second birthday and to be perfectly honest, I could not remember one brick of it, yet I could remember vividly a trip to the zoo to celebrate my big sister's 7th birthday when I was exactly a month older. I was also had gone to exactly the same zoo on my second birthday but remembered absolutely nothing of that. That outing to the zoo on my sister's birthday is when my life began 2 years 1 month, as far as I am concerned. And if I happened to be killed before that age than I may as well of never existed.
I cannot prove nor disprove that if I was killed before the age of 2 yr 1 m there may well be billions of parallel backups to emulate my sense of self and consciousness somewhere else. All young developing brains may well be emulating the same processes in the beginning be we get that phase transition into individuality. This would of cause make is far more probable to exist in the first place.
But as I stated earlier. It is only a theory, with the Catholic Church, it is crumbling dogma.
And one more final word If our earliest memories cut out at around two years then I feel it is down right ludicrous to suggest that one can remember a previous life.
Bob
Remember: When you die your philosophy dies with you
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Dog_Ed
Skeptic Friend
USA
126 Posts |
Posted - 08/29/2001 : 15:52:09 [Permalink]
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bjones: "There are billion of other men your mother could of met in the world, but lucky for you, she met the one that made you possible to exist. Is your life contingent on the chance encounter between these two people?"
Now hold on a minnit, bubba. The above premise only makes sense if there is a 'you' which exists prior to your own birth. From my perspective, that creates the nonsense statement "Lucky for you she met the one that made it possible for [the you that existed before you existed] to exist."
In other words, to even pose the above scenario you have to postulate the existence of a platonic object, a self, that exists before birth, and presumeably could exist after death. If self is a construction of mind, and mind is seated firmly in the physical brain and composed of memories, ideas, and the active process of thought, then there was no 'self' before a particular brain existed just as a particular traffic jam at 31st and Main did not exist before the streets themselves were laid.
In fact, a good argument could be made that the self I was at 30 years of age is not the same person I am now (certainly my personality has developed, and my opinions and ideas as well), and only the temporal illusion of memory and the physical record of my body tricks the transient patterns that form my mind into believing it existed as a single, coherent self throughout this time.
"Even Einstein put his foot in it sometimes" |
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bjones
Skeptic Friend
Australia
82 Posts |
Posted - 08/29/2001 : 16:26:27 [Permalink]
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quote:
bjones: "There are billion of other men your mother could of met in the world, but lucky for you, she met the one that made you possible to exist. Is your life contingent on the chance encounter between these two people?"
Now hold on a minnit, bubba. The above premise only makes sense if there is a 'you' which exists prior to your own birth. From my perspective, that creates the nonsense statement "Lucky for you she met the one that made it possible for [the you that existed before you existed] to exist."
In other words, to even pose the above scenario you have to postulate the existence of a platonic object, a self, that exists before birth, and presumeably could exist after death. If self is a construction of mind, and mind is seated firmly in the physical brain and composed of memories, ideas, and the active process of thought, then there was no 'self' before a particular brain existed just as a particular traffic jam at 31st and Main did not exist before the streets themselves were laid.
In fact, a good argument could be made that the self I was at 30 years of age is not the same person I am now (certainly my personality has developed, and my opinions and ideas as well), and only the temporal illusion of memory and the physical record of my body tricks the transient patterns that form my mind into believing it existed as a single, coherent self throughout this time.
"Even Einstein put his foot in it sometimes"
You raised some interesting points but I feel what ever the answer is, we will never know as it is allways in the realms of wild speculation. Here is a bit more of this wild speculation. Without consciousness, time is just another vector as it is only through consciousness is there any concept of a past present and future. So who's to say that your "previous" existence was not a livetime that was lived in the future and with all memories obliterted this live will seem to you like another "once off" event and any questions you may a asked about the afterlife will too be destroyed and will just go unanswered.
If this life is proven to be the only possible life we can live which too may well be the case, then then our questions will also go unanswered. So the question of any afterlife is rather meanlingless in my view because it can never be answered. I do draw the line a ghosts and heavenly spirit beings
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