quote:

Originally posted by RJT It's funny you post this, because it basically summarizes nicely how I would describe my "spiritual" side. I would definitely describe myself in some sense as a "materialist", or an "atomist", who genuinely believes all that exists is matter and that the only gratification one can expect from an "afterlife" is to return themselves back to the fundamental elements of existence.

It's kinda funny that, based on a similar set of beliefs, our conclusions seem to be so distant from one another.

I too am a materialist, but I can't even expect to go back to "fundamental elements" because I'm just the activity produced by my body - rather than the body itself - so, when I die and the physical processes produced by my body cease to exist... I can't even claim that anything left behind is mine: this body has never been "me", but something by which I've been produced.

It's also why I want my organs to be donated and the rest of my flesh be fed to narwhals.

(Unless I misunderstood you and we actually think alike)

It's also sad to realise how slow my internet connection is... I can't even make ninja edits any more

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Last edited by Lira on Dec-05-2008 at 03:22

quote:

Originally posted by Lira (Unless I misunderstood you and we actually think alike)

This.

I wasn't near as clear or articulate, but that's basically my belief set as well - which I would think is implied by the notion that a sense of self, or "I", is really only created via the regressive loop of the circumstances that brought each of us into existence.

In that sense "I" don't go back to the fundamental elements, but that which makes up the physical part of what I understand as myself does.

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i agree with you two hippies, nicely put. and nice to see you back on the boards occasionally RJT.

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quote:

Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN no, this isn't another one of my religious-bashing threads. i was merely curious: since evolution is irrefutable, and since many theists subscribe to evolution, at what stage did human(monkey)-kind evolve/receive a soul? is it like completing a level of a computer game and being rewarded with a big gun? "hey now monkey, you've grown opposable thumbs! here, have a soul as recognition of your new place in the world"

If religion isn't in this thread then why are we talking about souls?
Some people here believe some of you survives after you snuff it, but without a religious belief and total dependency on evolution as your beliefs, then where would we evolve to have something of us survive death?
And evolution isn't irrefutable.
That's why it is the 'theory' of evolution.

quote:

Originally posted by Halcyon+On+On All of you still exists after you die, you are merely disseminated throughout the environment. In fact, whatever we are made of was present at the very beginning and will be there until the very end.

thats the definition of energy...it's neither created nor destroyed, but simply changes form.

Once the nearest star massive enough goes supernova we will all be spread across space to eventually form new planets and stars which will probably lead to new forms of life. We are all star stuff as I like to say.

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quote:

Originally posted by Zild Once the nearest star massive enough goes supernova we will all be spread across space to eventually form new planets and stars which will probably lead to new forms of life. We are all star stuff as I like to say.

Yeah, i understand what you and the other guys said about the "materials surviving" but the question is not about the destiny of my bodily molecules after death, the question is about the survival of consciousness and/or awareness. To which i clearly think that if there is no brain, there is no consciousness/awareness.


BUT (lol)

I get these crazy sci-fi ideas at times though and i'd like to share them with fellow TA thinkers. Most people associate the "soul" with some form of spiritual being that exists seperate from the body, a kind of "ghost in the shell". They also associate it with ghosts and other paranormal phenomena. IMO, there is no need for a "ghost-soul in a bodily shell" or other crazy spiritual/ethereal stuff in order for cosnciousness to survive after death. Just think that the mind/experience derives from complex neural computations. Synaptic transmissions/neuronal firings (action potentials) work much like computers-they either fire or not fire, 1 or 0 (of course the firings in intermmediate neurons can be continuous and graded rather than absolute but this is not really a problem). This is how your consciounsess and experience is (somehow!) produced. As a result, the brain can be said to be a "Turing Machine" of some sorts, a computer. According to Turing (the pioneer of computational theory) if given enough resources, any Turing machine can "run" (simulate) any other Turing Machine.


So, if God is somehow a computer (yeah i don't take drugs), or the universe has some sort of a computational nature embedded within it and this nature has large (infinite would be better i guess!) computational resources, it would literally re-simulate all the brain-states that you had as a human. I mean something, somewhere, somehow for some bloody reason could "re-simulate" you. This is strangely enough what Christianity describes (and maybe other religions as well? I don't know). Many (christian) people hold the false belief (i believe lol) that when you die your soul survives and it either goes to heaven or hell. As far as i'm concerned this is false. Your soul survives in a neutral/abstract state until the day of the apocalypse (i think) in which "your body is resurrected and you will be judged" by god. The afterlife occurs after the supossed "judgement", and it is granted to only those who are moral at heart.



So this resurrection could actually be a computational resurrection (simulation). I don't really know what morality and/or emotion in general have to do with all these, but maybe it would make sense if you were simulated (for whatever bloody reason)to be actually good. So this god-computer, having all the brain states and their outcomes (minds) of all people (and/or living beings in general) stored in its memory, could compute the positive and negative impacts of one's behaviour on the experiences of others. In simple words, it could compute the number and degree of "good" or "bad" experiences that you have caused (with your behaviour to other human beings or living beings in general-and maybe to yourself) and produces a decision about your "goodness/badness". If your goodness (measured by the experiences of the beings that you have encountered in your life) exceeds a certian criterion then you would be be simulated again (there would be some sort of complex criterions for all these). If the experiences you are associated with are more painful than joyful, then you will not be simulated and hence stay inexistent (hell?). Why all these? Who really knows lol. And its just some crazy idea of mine anyway. I think a physicist (and a priest i think lol) named J. Tipler (or something) described some similar ideas but i haven't red any of his work yet. I think that he is much more specific about similar ideas i described and it is related to the "anthropic cosmological principle", but this is another (complex) story.

These are just some crazy sci-fi ideas i get when i listen to Aphex Twin's Selected Ambient Works and Come to Daddy whilst watching Narwhals mating in the cold oceans, i don't embrace them myself. I also don't do drugs and kids don't forget to stay away from illegal substances

quote:

Originally posted by PETRAN Yeah, i understand what you and the other guys said about the "materials surviving" but the question is not about the destiny of my bodily molecules after death, the question is about the survival of consciousness and/or awareness. To which i clearly think that if there is no brain, there is no consciousness/awareness. BUT (lol) I get these crazy sci-fi ideas at times though and i'd like to share them with fellow TA thinkers. Most people associate the "soul" with some form of spiritual being that exists seperate from the body, a kind of "ghost in the shell". They also associate it with ghosts and other paranormal phenomena. IMO, there is no need for a "ghost-soul in a bodily shell" or other crazy spiritual/ethereal stuff in order for cosnciousness to survive after death. Just think that brain dynamics is based on complex neuronal computations. Synaptic transmissions/neuronal firings (action potentials) work much like computers-they either fire or not fire, 1 or 0 (of course the firings in intermmediate neurons can be continuous and graded rather than absolute but this is not really a problem). This is how your consciounsess and experience is (somehow!) produced. As a result, the brain can be said to be a "Turing Machine" of some sorts, a computer. According to Turing (the pioneer of computational theory) if given enough resources, any Turing machine can "run" (simulate) any other Turing Machine. So, if God is somehow a computer (yeah i don't take drugs), or the universe has some sort of a computational nature embedded within it and this nature has large (infinite would be better i guess!) computational resources, it would literally re-simulate all the brain-states that you had as a human. I mean something, somewhere, somehow for some bloody reason could "re-simulate" you. This is strangely enough what Christianity describes (and maybe other religions as well? I don't know). Many (christian) people hold the false belief that when you die your soul survives and it either goes to heaven or hell. As far as i'm concerned this is false. Your soul survives in a neutral/abstract state until the day of the apocalypse (i think) in which "your body is resurrected and you will be judged" by god. The afterlife occurs after the supossed "judgement", and it is granted to only those who are moral at heart. So this resurrection could actually be a computational resurrection (simulation). I don't really know what morality and/or emotion in general have to do with all these, but maybe it would make sense if you were simulated (for whatever bloody reason)to be actually good. So this god-computer, having all the brain states and their outcomes (minds) of all people (and/or living beings in general) stored in its memory, could compute the positive and negative impacts of one's behaviour on the experiences of others. In simple words, it could compute the number and degree of "good" or "bad" experiences that you have caused (with your behaviour to other human beings or living beings in general-and maybe to yourself) and produces a decision about your "goodness/badness". If your goodness (measured by the experiences of the beings that you have encountered in your life) exceeds a certian criterion then you would be be simulated again (there would be some sort of complex criterions for all these). If the experiences you are associated with are more painful than joyful, then you will not be simulated and hence stay inexistent (hell?). Why all these? Who really knows lol. And its just some crazy idea of mine anyway. I think a physicist (and a priest i think lol) named J. Tipler (or something) described some similar ideas but i haven't red any of his work yet. I think that he is much more specific about similar ideas i described and it is related to the "anthropic cosmological principle", but this is another (complex) story. These are just some crazy sci-fi ideas i get when i listen to Aphex Twin's Selected Ambient Works and Come to Daddy whilst watching Narwhals mating in the cold oceans, i don't embrace them myself. I also don't do drugs and kids don't forget to stay away from illegal substances

Imagine how creative you would become if you did do drugs. You're missing out on life

quote:

Originally posted by KiNeTiC ENeRgY Imagine how creative you would become if you did do drugs. You're missing out on life

I would lose it completely then I would literally be identical to ******** (if im not already with this post )

quote:

Originally posted by Saka And evolution isn't irrefutable. That's why it is the 'theory' of evolution.

oh ffs

A theory has to be potentially "refutable" in order to be scientific. Once you make predictions about contingent events, which is what science does, you open up the possibility that your theory could be refuted if things turn out differently than you expect.

But there's a big gap between "potentially refutable" and "refuted by the evidence we currently possess." Evolution is potentially refutable, but it is not refuted.