Life after death

[Gabe911]

is there proof?

[Xanth]

Nope.

Just our subjective experiences. 

[personalreality]

how do you define life?

do you mean life with conscious awareness like a human has?  probably not.

but, awareness is the animating force and energy is never destroyed, only transformed.  so you are eternal.

[Gabe911]

im talkingabout life with a conscience awareness

[kailaurius]

You are aware of yourself now.  Are you not? 

[Gabe911]

so youre saying that my awareness of myself now is proof of awareness after death?

[blis]

Proof of life after death? Could you even really prove the existence life before death? I mean how do you know any of this is actually happening? Sure it seems like its happening but how do you prove you/we're not just the figment of someone else's imagination. I think therefore I am? How do I know that its really me thats thinking?

The fact that "I" will continue to be after my body's demise seems as obvious to me as the fact that I currently exist. I doubt either could ever really be proven by scientific means though.

[Xanth]

Hold on a second... I'm gonna go kill myself... then come back... oh wait.  >_<

But seriously...
It's a question that honestly can not, or at least, won't be able to be answered for a very long time.
Human beings hold too many beliefs to the contrary.  Any "proof" someone can come up with, isn't going to actually convince anyone who doesn't already want to believe.

The only thing you can do is have your own experiences to prove it to yourself... that's the ONLY way.

What we do here on the Astral Pulse is give you those tools to do just that.  BUT, the catch is that you have to WANT to prove it to yourself. 

[kailaurius]

so youre saying that my awareness of myself now is proof of awareness after death?

Death? 

Human beings hold too many beliefs to the contrary.  Any "proof" someone can come up with, isn't going to actually convince anyone who doesn't already want to believe.

The only thing you can do is have your own experiences to prove it to yourself... that's the ONLY way.

What we do here on the Astral Pulse is give you those tools to do just that.  BUT, the catch is that you have to WANT to prove it to yourself. 

Agreed.   

[Killa Rican]

It's just an eternal Cycle.

Supposedly there was "Nothing" before we were born and then we were something. Supposedly there's "Nothing" after we die and it repeats itself. Infinitely.

I'm pretty confident of Life After Death in one form or another.

[EscapeVelocity]

I'm not sure there are any guarantees. It doesn't have to be an eternal cycle according to Thomas Campbell, even a 'just short of eternal' cycle or 'slightly less than an infinite' universe is still really long or really big.

Are we granted this chance at awareness or did we earn it somehow? Is there a minimum requirement to maintain it, expand it, develop it? And if we fail, does our awareness get subsumed back into our soulgroup or some cosmic soup of awareness?

These are some of the questions that people like Gurdjieff and Castaneda had very definite opinions on. Even Buddhism points at the necessity of creating a body of Light to transcend Death (or so I understand).

Just some thoughts.

[kailaurius]

One thing is absolutely certain.  Other than curiosity or just a passing fancy, there is nothing to be concerned or worried about regarding the continuation of life or the conscious awareness of ourselves as an individual as well as a collective within this physical realm and beyond, unless one chooses to worry about such matters, which there is nothing wrong with that either.  Everyone has there own path to follow, their own journey to experience.  Another absolute certainty is that we all will eventually realise what life is all about whether we want to or not.  It is inevitable.  How long it takes is entirely up to the individual.  There is no race in this game of life, and there is no deadline to meet.  Even if I tell you life never ends, and was able to present the most empirical evidence backing up this claim, like all other truths, you have no choice but to realise this truth for yourself.  Personally I'm not sure what difference it would make if there was proof of "life after death" or not.  Even if one found out there was no life after death, what could they do about it?  Fall down into a rage of panic to the point of insanity?  It wouldn't make any difference.  Maybe that's why some scientists try to find out how to prolong life to the point of immortality, which I can't even tell you how silly that notion sounds to me.  That would be exactly like wanting to stay in kindergarten for the rest of your life.  But again, there is nothing wrong with however an individual chooses to experience life.  If pursuing physical immortality is what makes scientists happy then they should by all means continue doing what makes them happy.  If pursuing proof of life after death, or proof in anything for that matter, makes an individual happy in their life then they should go for it.  But if they're only seeking proof to set their mind at ease because of the fear of the unknown then really all they're doing is creating unnecessary stress in their life.  Personally I find life much more enjoyable and pleasant just focusing on the present moment, going with the flow, and just let everything else take care of itself.  But that's just me. 

[Xanth]

One thing is absolutely certain.  Other than curiosity or just a passing fancy, there is nothing to be concerned or worried about regarding the continuation of life or the conscious awareness of ourselves as an individual as well as a collective within this physical realm and beyond, unless one chooses to worry about such matters, which there is nothing wrong with that either.

True.

Either we cease to exist when we die... in which case, you won't really give a crap cause you won't exist.
OR
We live on in some form of consciousness. 

Either way, it's a win/win scenario. 

[Killa Rican]

I agree Kail and Xanth. The thing is though, the 20 years i spent on this planet i feel so far blessed and fortunate to never experience a family or friend death, or anyone else close to me. I cant imagine the pain of going through that but ofcourse eventually i would have to be prepared to deal with it as well.

Of course none of us would give a crap about ourselves "Not Existing." Hypothetically. But if you lose someone close to you you dont want to think for the rest of your life and lost hope of never having to experience that person EVER again. It brings Despair.

Think back to the earliest memory of your life. You just suddenly exist. Even after we die, it can just be a repeat of the same thing. Just not of how we know or see ourselves right now I'm assuming.

[Xanth]

I agree Kail and Xanth. The thing is though, the 20 years i spent on this planet i feel so far blessed and fortunate to never experience a family or friend death, or anyone else close to me. I cant imagine the pain of going through that but ofcourse eventually i would have to be prepared to deal with it as well.

It's just always important to put it into perspective of your experiences.  You KNOW they're not really dying, you know they *ARE* moving onto bigger and better things... so what's to be sad about? 

Other people might not understand that... and they only see the fact that they'll never "physically" see this person again.  But we know better. 

[majour ka]

Scientist now agree that the brain is the receiver of conciousness...contrary to what they previously believed, that it was the creator of conciousness..this goes a long way to understanding what spiritualists for example have always "known"...that we are a deathless spirit..and that physical life is only one dimension of existence.

Good mediums offer proof of the eternal soul every day...and the spirit world have told us that the existence of the spirit world will eventually be proved.

In all fairness if life ended here, what would be the point of any of it....

Regards M

[personalreality]

can you show me where scientists agree on that?

i mean, i would absolutely love to see the research.  i believe that anyway, but I have yet to meet a scientist who will wholeheartedly agree.  i'm a psych student so i get to talk to a lot of researchers and they have never agreed with me on that point.  it's even difficult to talk about memory being a non-local phenomena.  they are open to the idea, but clam up a bit when we talk about it.

[CFTraveler]

I was going to say the same thing- for one scientist that comes up with the idea the brain is an interface between mind(consciousness) and body, three or four come up with studies trying to support that it is the originator, and that we are nothing but biorobots.

[Xanth]

They do rather enjoy contradicting each other, don't they?  LoL

Sometimes I wonder how we got to be as technologically advanced as we are now.  LoL

[CFTraveler]

Technology is what us geeks do with science.  Or I should say ex-geek, since I haven't done anything technological in ages.

[Erik7Edison]

There is nothing more important to us as living beings than that we have something we can describe as a soul that continues to exist after physical death and is everlasting. Dont anyone feel it?

[WASD]

Either we cease to exist when we die... in which case, you won't really give a crap cause you won't exist.
OR
We live on in some form of consciousness. 

Either way, it's a win/win scenario. 

That is a very good way to look at it

I have heard about a culture that celebrates when someone die and everyone is happy because they are moving onto the "next plane" or whatever they called it.

[Xanth]

That is a very good way to look at it

I have heard about a culture that celebrates when someone die and everyone is happy because they are moving onto the "next plane" or whatever they called it.

Our culture (westerns) actually celebrate as well.  It's a wake.  The party after the funeral.
It's where you're supposed to be celebrating the life of the individual, sharing all the wonderful stories about them and just being happy that they had their life in the first place.

I'm never upset at funerals because I know exactly where people go when they die. 

[kurtykurt42]

After thousands of hours of research, my expert opinion is... I don't know what the hell happens when we die. Unfortunately, our species is quite primitive and perhaps if people would spend as much time studying science and engineering as they do praying to their gods, we might actually make some progress.

[Stillwater]

I have heard about a culture that celebrates when someone die and everyone is happy because they are moving onto the "next plane" or whatever they called it.

Well, I think a major part of it is also separation. The idea that heretofore, you could easily share space, presence and experiences with the person, and now, at there very least, if you believe they still exist, they are orders of magnitude more innaccessible. You can't really ask them how they are feeling, ask them about their life, or touch them. People are also attached to the physical form of their loved ones; people identify the existence and identity of the person with their body, and to think of that as lost and destroyed seems like a loss of identity on some level. I mean think of your mother, but lacking her face- it seems like an incomplete notion somehow.

After thousands of hours of research, my expert opinion is... I don't know what the hell happens when we die. Unfortunately, our species is quite primitive and perhaps if people would spend as much time studying science and engineering as they do praying to their gods, we might actually make some progress.

Maybe, but I am not sure empirical science is the only way to learn anything. We might end up learning just as much by "experiencing", or intuiting. It is very possible that future technology might interface with consciousness