Do we die? - scientists doubt

[xmad]

KillaQueen,that's so sad.I'm so sorry for that.

Opposite to nath I love death cuz I cant take losing the ones I love.I mean I hope I'll die before them and I hope there's no life after death.

[KillaQueen]

Originally Posted by xmad

KillaQueen,that's so sad.I'm so sorry for that.

thank you.

Opposite to nath I love death cuz I cant take losing the ones I love.I mean I hope I'll die before them and I hope there's no life after death.

yeah, wanting to die before the ones you love is wanting to take the easy way out. it's also a selfish thought. and i don't mean that with an evil tone. not at all. i guess we're all tempted to say that we want to die first so we don't suffer the loss of our beloved. but this makes me think of something a romanian actor said to his wife at some point: "i love you so much that i hope i die after you." made me think.. anyway, this thread got to such a depressive point.

anyone care to share his/her beliefs on the subject?

[forre]

Originally Posted by KillaQueen

anyone care to share his/her beliefs on the subject?

Personal attitude? We do live as if we were immortal. It's a sort of in our nature or better to say a psychological protection. This way of thinking is a complete bull and we know that but still... Yes, we like fairy tales and they often keep us alive and give us strength to go on even if things look black.

Do I like death? Nope. Do I want to live for ever? Nope. Death is a fact for me. The same fact as it'll be surely -15 and ice in winter. I don't even want to think about it but when the time comes, I make best out of it.

When people die, I often feel peace but anger because they left me. No, I don't want my loved ones to leave me. Yes, a human approach here. It's normal.

[nath]

I wrote what I felt but of course I agree that science is a great thing and has to be delopped and encouraged.
I have a lot of respect for all those men and woman who search when their purpose is the improvement of life.

[KillaQueen]

it would be interesting to know also Amber's opinion on this whole thing. her posts are always so pleasant to read.

[Rachel]

Amber doesn't believe in a soul either

[Khartoun2004]

Originally Posted by KillaQueen

don't say you're narrow minded, because at the end of the day - or better said at the end of life - what you just said is what really matters. in the moment of dying, i think no one stops to analyze the process or the sensations... what they must feel is a huge feeling of loneliness, of longing, of yearning for one more, just one more breath of air.. i have tears in my eyes when posting this because i have witnessed the death of a very dear person to my heart and obviously i still cannot get over it. it was my grandmother. she tried to say something, she was struggling to say it just before it happened, but her words never came out... and i can't imagine what she felt.. really wanting to say something.. maybe to say goodbye.. and she never got to say it.. sorry, i'm just going to stop now.

Offtop:
I'm sorry Killa. That is awful

I Think Killa's post brings up an excellent point. No matter what you believe happens after a person dies, they are dead. Gone from this dimension/plain, what ever you wanna call it and unless Vampires are real, 99.9% of the time, they don't come back. It sucks, believe me I know. I've had to deal with a lot of death in my short life, especially recently. But that's the cycle of Life.

I think we can all agree on that. Further more, it is insinct that drives even the lowest of spieces to struggle for LIFE. Even at the very end, life is the driving force behind every breath, every heart beat... Why care about what happens when you die, now? Does it really matter? When you are gone from this life you are gone from it. Why not focus on extending your current life and the lives of those you love instead of worrying about what everyone is going to do in the next life? Why not worry about it when you are dead?

[xmad]

Originally Posted by Khartoun2004

Why not focus on extending your current life and the lives of those you love instead of worrying about what everyone is going to do in the next life? Why not worry about it when you are dead?

Mankind is curious so wants and needs to discover everything.

[spyretto]

Originally Posted by forre

How do you know that? It's not any fact. Maybe what we call "a soul" is just a bunch of particles those are able to carry certain information and those make our personality. Who knows!

Or even linked to matter itself as according to the rpg metaphysical theory, as the matter adds to the earth's energy ( Gaea )
the spirit itself transmutes into a defensive mechanism that keeps the balance of the earth and protects the living.

[forre]

Originally Posted by xmad

Mankind is curious so wants and needs to discover everything.

Yep, it's in our nature. Another instinct.

[freddie]

First of all we need to seperate 2 things here: brain's reaction to a traumatic events (which might as well contribute to many of the phenomena described - tunnel & light vision for sure... plus some others) and actual philosophic discussion about life after death. Yes, most of the things we experience at death can be explained with a dying brain projecting nice images to us. But is that the ultimate proof there is no life after death? I don't think so. It's just a diversion. IMO we shouldn't really be looking at these side-effect things. If you really want to go about it scientifically there's really not much you can to with the reality as we know it (I totally agree with Killa's agnostic point of view on this... my idea here includes the theory of paralel universes, maybe a universes with different rules of physics (no 4 forces), but in reality it's completely beyond my comprehension.) So first things first: lets forget those damn tunnel vision side effects. LOL (Okay, though I have to admit I'm really curious why people feel at peace and calmed down, with no fear of dying after NDEs... I'm not saying it isn't a side-effect of the brain, but it's still interesting - drugs couldn't really recreate that feeling. Drugs usually lead to severe paranoia, violent nightmare-ish hallucinations and other unpleasent feelings in the long run rather than this soothing feeling people are describing.) Other than that - regarding what's been said already I agree with forre and killa completely.

These are my ... I shouldn't say beliefs... just my best guesses. I guess.

First of all let me point out that I have no evidence for these guesses. It's just my personal view-point on life the universe and everything.™ My beliefs are influenced by reading a few books, philosophic discussions, books on meditation plus various articles and reports. But ultimately it's what I "feel". It's just one of those things, where you feel something's right. Call it 6th sense or whatever.

As I mentioned before I don't believe there are coincidences regarding people we meet (and love) during our life-times. There are clusters of souls that stay together during many life-times and take on different roles, but always in mutual agreement. A cluster can be as small as just a 100 of souls to as big as millions. Reincarnation exists, but it's much more complicated than we could even imagine it to be. Everything needs to fit. A drunkard needs to live his current life so another mate from it's soul-cluster would meet him and would be influenced by his tragedy... now imagine billions of fates meeting up like that in a seemingly coincidental manner). A cluster of souls contains many souls that have been together since the begining of time (their perception of time is still linear, but we'll get to that later). The more lives individual souls of a specific cluster lead on Earth the more experience and knowledge they gain. Which leads towards greater unity of a cluster itself with the universal unity of souls, which exists on yet another level. Maybe this would be what we'd call "God", yet it's just a unity of inteligence, warmth and wisdom... a clusters that have moved on in it's wisdom from eternal cycles of reincarnation and learning to a higher dimension, where time and space no longer exist and where TRUE multidimensional living actually begins. We could call that the actual start of "existance"... without the illusion that time and space are a limited and linear. As I'll mention later this is not actually where souls are heading towards, btu also where they initially came from.

The universe itself in all it's glory - all the billions of galaxies and all the billions of stars those galaxies contain, along with billions of billions of planets that harbour inteligent life - is a fabulous testing ground for individual souls, soul clusters they belong to and soul groups in a wider sense of the word (like the groups of souls that inhabits the planet Earth specifically... as opposed to another group which for instance inhabits a planet revolving around Alpha Centauri). Rocky planets that revolve around the sun are like huge libraries of knowladge where a young restless soul is able to come to terms with who it is, what it's doing and where it's going. It's all about self-development in the purest sense of the word. When a cluster of souls evolves enough and reincarnations become redundant they can either choose to join the great unified entity in a higher dimension or decide (in solidarity with every individual soul inside the cluster), that they still have stuff to learn and take a leap into the great unknown - probably leaving Earth and heading towards another solar system and another planet (preferably with higher life-forms than on the former planet), to venture into another cycle of educational reincarnation process. While there's another cluster somewhere else on a different planet, who decided they learned enough on a planet inhabited with creatures who have the inteligence of early man and decide to look for pastures new, on Earth - thus taking the place of a cluster which just left to "settle" a planet inhabited by creatured of higher inteligence, or towards the great unified entity...

The greatest philosophic dilemma regarding reicarnation was this: since Earth's population is rising gradualy (from around 20-60 million 2000 years ago, to around 5000 million now), one would wonder where all the "new" souls come from to fill in bodies that are being born on Earth. The answer is... Universe is an (almost) endless mass of souls... there are more souls than there are stars, and as we know there are billions of billions of stars. They inhabit countless planets and move around from one solar system to another to start processes of reincarnation cycles. I know it sounds like a terrible logistical problem, but we shouldn't look at this from our limited earthly stand-points. It's all ran by a huge inteligence standing in the background of events - the before mentioned unified entity of higher evolved souls - a place where all of us will inevitably end. But not yet at death...

When we die, we just go back to our basic cluster - where other peers greet us and eagerly await to share the experience and knowledge we gained in the we just ended. After a soul spends a certain undefined amount of time in the astral world it's time to reincarnate into another life again. It's never a decision forced upon a soul. It always decides on it's own when the rest is over and it's time to go back again - I'd imagine it's quite a traumatic experience for a soul to leave it's bellowed cluster where it feels loved and protected, to go back to a vicious place called Earth, where it'd as well be surrounded by incarnated members of it's own cluster, but they'd artificially appear as complete strangers to them in the new life to come.

So basically I'd say there are 3 levels of reality:
1) our reality - physical world, time is linear, space is defined and limits us greatly...
2) reality of souls and their respective soul clusters - another dimension, but pretty similar to ours, time is linear, but runs differently from the one in our reality, space is defined but doesn't limit souls... this reality seems to be very closely connected to the universe we live in and it's just plausable it follows the basic rules of physics as well (at least the law of 4 forces, which probably define both dimensions)
3) reality of the great unity of highly evolved souls - no time, no space...or rather... all the time in the world. In this dimension everything is happening NOW... the past and the future are all part of the present - everything that did happen is happening now and everything that will happen is happening now as well... the only thing that still glues this dimension to the other two is the basic rule of 4 physical forces - they apparently represent tapistry of which the whole existence is made of. Other than that, this dimension seems to share little similarity to other two and requires a really enlightened soul-cluster to actually enter this realm, since a young and inexperienced souls would have problems comprehending it's wonderous nature.

Where did the souls initially come from? This is just an educated guess, but I'd say at certain point in time (or should I say at all points in time), the before mentioned unity of highly evolves souls, which was once probably just one super-inteligent entity decided to split into many pieces like a jig-saw puzzle and some pieces willingly submerged into lower dimensions in which they're limited by space and time, just so each piece of this giant puzzle would find it's way back to the original unity - while learning something in the process in the "lower" dimensions. This would actually be the initial reason for teh great collective unity to split - natural urge for knowledge and understanding. And what better training-ground to learn about itself than lower dimensions, like the realm of the souls and realm of the actual physical universe? So one migth ask then, where did the initial unified inteligence come from. The answer is... it's just been there forever. Don't forget the realm of the unified inteligence knows no time. The time in this dimension is always "forever" - all the moments happen at once and in every place of it's existence (no space limits). It's hard to really explain these mysterious, eternal properties of this dimension. Not even our souls (who already have - in Earthly terms - endless inteligence) can really grasp the wonders of it fully. Of course I wouldn't rule out there are more unified entities like this. Dosens, thousands, millions, billions? Each of those could submerge it's pieces into the great unknown of the dimensions limited by time and space... possibilities are absolutely fabulous and completely endless. But I'll tell you this much...

On a very bright night look up to the skies full of stars... notice that endless sea of twinkles emerging from the darkness of be background. Doesn't it feel like the universe is absolutely packed with all sorts of life all over the place? Doesn't it feel like it's like a busy metropolis bustling with activity? And futhermore don't you get that calming feeling like there's there some sorts of an unimaginable inteligence behind it? Something outrageously spectacuar and grand? I do.

[marina]

We have to die. That’s clear. And Earth will die , as a separate planet , when the sun becomes a red giant . In five billion years or so. It will swallow the Earth , with Mercury and Venus , and throw them out in a halo of gas , and the gas may condense into stars again……..but all the time , we’ll be losing energy .
In the end , the whole universe will run down.... It will expand too far, it will thin to nothing , nothing but endless dark and cold.
But there’s another possibility. Astronomers say so , and we can hope…....At some point of expansion , the universe will rush together again . Over billion of years , time will run backwards , until all matter shrinks to a singularity . And then the Big Bang will happen again and everything will emerge again , utterly different but still in motion . And in some sense we shall still be there ( forre , and nath , and Amber , and freddie , Killa ,and Rachel and fudge…..) and I , as energy , completely transformed.
We were stardust once. We could be stars again.
Somehow we shall shine for other living things . Others will look for a meaning in us.

Shameless rip-off from wonderful Maggie Gee *Light Years*

[spyretto]

I'd imagine it's quite a traumatic experience for a soul to leave it's bellowed cluster where it feels loved and protected, to go back to a vicious place called Earth, where it'd as well be surrounded by incarnated members of it's own cluster, but they'd artificially appear as complete strangers to them in the new life to come.

Why just Earth? If there are other species in other populated planets our souls can reincarnate into I don't see why I should limit ourselves. I could be an orc, an elf or a dwarf, extraterrestrial in any case!

[freddie]

Originally Posted by marina

We have to die. That’s clear. And Earth will die , as a separate planet , when the sun becomes a red giant . In five billion years or so. It will swallow the Earth , with Mercury and Venus , and throw them out in a halo of gas , and the gas may condense into stars again……..but all the time , we’ll be losing energy .
In the end , the whole universe will run down.... It will expand too far, it will thin to nothing , nothing but endless dark and cold.
But there’s another possibility. Astronomers say so , and we can hope…....At some point of expansion , the universe will rush together again . Over billion of years , time will run backwards , until all matter shrinks to a singularity . And then the Big Bang will happen again and everything will emerge again , utterly different but still in motion . And in some sense we shall still be there ( forre , and nath , and Amber , and freddie , Killa ,and Rachel and fudge…..) and I , as energy , completely transformed.
We were stardust once. We could be stars again.
Somehow we shall shine for other living things . Others will look for a meaning in us.

Shameless rip-off from wonderful Maggie Gee *Light Years*

There are still those 2 theories about our universe, yes. Endless expanssion untill there's nothing left but fundamental bits and radiation floating around empty space, or a reversal of the expanssion we're been experiencing for the last 15 bilion years and merger of all the material of the Universe into one single point in time and space. This second idea could be named the theory of a self-maintained universe. I'd mean the energy in THIS universe is ever present and works in constant cycles.
But we can't forget one fact, when we're talking about these two theories: they limit themselves on this universe and this dimension inside this one particular universe. There are no reasons currently that would deny existence of countless other universes and countless dimensions within them. Our particular universe, along with it's 4 fundamental forces and defined (linear) time and space is just one layer of reality. The only one we can comprehend as mortal creatures.

Originally Posted by spyretto

[i] Why just Earth? If there are other species in other populated planets our souls can reincarnate into I don't see why I should limit ourselves. I could be an orc, an elf or a dwarf, extraterrestrial in any case!

Of course. I only mentioned Earth as an example. As I said IMO, souls move from solar system to solar system, but only in cluster, with mutual agreement of every individual within a cluster.


In response to Nath and all of you who say that life after death is not really LIFE as we know it anymore and you'd miss the touching, kissing, holding people you love etc. I completely understand you. It's not a very appealing thought to me either - I'd never want to lose my earhly self, if it was on me to decide. But at the same instance I recognize a possibility of something grander out there. Something beyond my comprehension, yet just as satisfying as hugging someone we love. We don't really like change - at least not up to an extent of our physical body being gone. We can't imagine interaction without touching and feeling with our physical selves. I'd say our view-point is limited to what we know and feel comfortable with. Like caged animals, who've never experienced the wild... or rather in our case - have experienced it but have since forgotten temporarily.
The way I figure things: all the emotions we feel here on earth, that manifest themselves through our central nervous system are a manifestation of our REAL emotions, we feel as a soul - the nervous system and the brain is mimicking and trying to convey what the soul feels in it's pure form - when not trapped inside a body in one of the reincarnation cycles. But the problem is - what we feel through our physical bodies is just a good proximity of feelings in their pure original form. I'd imagine that what a soul feels is basically the same, yet thousand times more intense. Some people who narrowly escaped death reported experiencing emotions like that in their pure form - reports like that are imo the most interestin of all NDEs. These people said they only realized how true love feels when they were completely submerged and bathed with love of all it's soul peers, who they're close to in the astral world and only learned about the true horror of sorrow and regret when they actually felt everything they've done wrong to people in their life-times. On this point I actually agree with the article that the bad part of death is actually us self-evaluating ourselves in agony of guilt and pain that can last for quite a while. If anyone read Jean Paul Sartre's Behind Closed Doors - there's an interesting thought expressed in that novel - Hell doesn't consist of chains, eternal fires, sulphur lakes and Lucifer trying to stick a hot chilly pepper inside your orifice of choice. Every person creates a hell of its own. Hell is people we hurt, fears we never overcame and short-comings we have as human beings.

[nath]

Freddie.....I think I "know" what you mean more than you imagine about the "superiority" of the intensity of the "Soul" compared to physical things.....more than you could never imagine...

Just to Love everybody isn't my cup of tea...Bad here I know.....

Originally Posted by freddie

These people said they only realized how true love feels when they were completely submerged and bathed with love of all it's soul peers, who they're close to in the astral world and only learned about the true horror of sorrow and regret when they actually felt everything they've done wrong to people in their life-times.

Just a thought which crossed my mind here....no provocation at all....
Do you realize that ....if we didn't know you.....what you wrote above is just so close to .....religious words..... I'm serious...not the way the Religion was exploited and used for personal proficts...but the Original Essence, Meaning, Message of Religion?...

By the way I don't like Sartre and I absolutely DISLIKE him as a person....

[freddie]

Originally Posted by nath

Just a thought which crossed my mind here....no provocation at all....
Do you realize that ....if we didn't know you.....what you wrote above is just so close to .....religious words..... I'm serious...not the way the Religion was exploited and used for personal proficts...but the Original Essence, Meaning, Message of Religion?...

Exactly right. The essence of many religions from the start was something in the proximity of those words, but got scewed somewhere along the line, obviously to be exploited for personal gain. BUt even if you look beyond the exploitation of religious worldwide... I think even deeply religions people use those words as a sort of kitch a statement - something disposable and shallow. Just like svastika (as an ancient good luck charm and symbol of the sun) got ruined by the Nazis. That's what I call inadvertent exploitation. In the long run it made it into something corny and ridiculous. But imo that's just because it's impossible to explain with words - in the end it comes out like a bad babblefish translation. It takes "another language" to get it. Do I get it myself? No way. I only see subtle glances, while I can't even begin to comprehend what's behind them.

[forre]

I don't think Universe is as complicated as we might imagine. Why to have several dimensions? What's the purpose of having several instead of one? Why to dig through super-booper force that rules everything in the Universe including our souls? Albert spoke about cosmic Constanta which balances everything. Sounds pretty sane to me. If not that but definitely a pleasant theory. Nothing ever dies. It's just one structure is being transformed into another. One condition into another one.

[freddie]

I don't think we can comprehend some things that happen around us - we're limited creatures, yet space is by it's definition unlimited... our own limitations makes infinite dimensions uncomprehendable to our brain. Same with time - we're swiming in this ocean of linear time, and can't even imagine it as anything else then an eternal constant. Eternity? Beyond our comprehension. Don't get me wrong though. It's only complicated to US. In the grand scheme of things it's probably all very simple and I don't doubt the ultimate meaning of existance is very straight forward and ordinary.

[forre]

freddie, We are learning and learning fast. 600 years ago people thought Earth was flat. It's just an example. 600 years is nothing in comparison with the age of human evolution. I'd say nothing about our limits of comprehension. We were smart enough to comprehend that there's something else than us only. Existence of religions is the best proof of it. Of course, it's all conclusive but still...

[xmad]

Originally Posted by forre

We are learning and learning fast. 600 years ago people thought Earth was flat.

I agree with that.

How can we talk about our limitations when we are not aware of our abilities?
We're limiting ourself by accepting so many things.accepting is the worst and the easiest way.