Death

[Strawman]

Recently I have been thinking a lot about death. More specifically the question "what happens when we die?". Of course there are a multitude of religion based answers for this question like you go to heaven or hell, you are reincarnated, etc. And always when I think about death, I always wonder what it feels like to be dead. If my being really completely ceases to exist. Obviously when you die your body is dead, but what about your "soul"(as some people call it)? Its just its kind of impossible for me to imagine not being able to think or feel, not being conscious. And so I tend to come to the conclusion that it is impossible for someone to just not exist. Which I guess that aligns with the major religions. But recently I have become convinced that hell does not exist. And that heaven does exists, only people don't go there when they die. So, once again, if people don't go to heaven or hell when they die, what does happen?

The best guess I can come up with, even though I am a Christian, is a sort of reincarnation. But not the sort of reincarnation where your soul is just like inside another person. More of like my entire being would cease and my soul would no longer exist and I would be completely dead. And instead, I would be a new person, a new individual person who isn't me, but who I would be. I'll go ahead and say this person would be a completely new life created by God, but their consciousness would be me, who isn't actually me, but them. If that makes sense. Its really hard to explain. So I guess question/discussion topic 1 would be: Without thinking in just a strictly religious way, what do you think happens when you die? What really seems possible?

Anyways, so also as I think about death I think about time and place of death. Personally I really want to die young. I'm kind of terrified of the future, college, getting a job, all the stresses and unknowns of life, growing old and having everyone I know die while I live on, all alone. It just doesn't sound pleasant to me. I guess I kind of see death as...not really an escape from the world, but a way to get away from it I guess. Of course I don't condone suicide, but personally death seems like something to look forward to a little. I know a lot of people are afraid of death which just seems strange to me. So question/discussion topic 2: Is death good/bad? Should you be afraid of it? Are you afraid of it?

And lastly, the way someone dies(This thought won't be very long haha). Obviously there are many ways that someone can die. Personally I don' want to die of old age, it just doesn't seem like the way I would die. I see myself dying in either a car wreck or from some health problem, like cancer. I can't really say why, but whenever I think about death those are just the two most probably methods that pop into my head. So question/discussion topic 3: Do you ever feel like you might know how you're going to die or how you want to die?

*I'll go ahead and apologize for typos, probable bad grammar, and lack of some punctuation(apostrophes mostly). Oh and sorry for the wall of text.*

[Rewjeo]

Well, I always felt as though the basics of Buddhism as the Buddha taught it seemed like the way I would most like the world to be, but then I could never really come to accept any religion's idea of an afterlife. I just can't really imagine one really existing. Which is a really depressing thought, as it means, to me, that when someone dies, they're gone. And yet, when death impacts me most, I do seem to imagine the conciousness of that person still being aware of the world, and I do talk to them.

For a long time I was absolutely terrified of death when I thought of it. Strange, considering I'm amongst the younger members here. Recently, though, my bio teacher explained death in a way that really appealed to the logical part of my mind- organisms die because it opens up the world for the new generations. Well, that's not exactly how he put it, but that's the way I've chosen to look at death. He actually said something more like "We die so that we aren't competing with our offspring."

I find it ironic that I found a topic on death at this time, when death has been so prevalent in my life recently.

[Defeatist Elitist]

When you die you're gone forever. Everything that was your consciousness ceases to exist. You will no longer think or feel, because "you" will no longer exist. Call it terrifying, call it unimaginable, but it's what will happen to everyone inevitably. Best to come to terms with it now and not waste your time alive.

Also souls don't exist.

As for why things die, from a sheer logical perspective, things die because it is inevitable. Nothing can exist infinitely, because there is infinite time for something to happen that will end it.

For the second part, I don't think death is bad. It's simply a part of life. Pretty much the only constant part. As for if I'm afraid, I would be lying if I said I wasn't terrified of dying, but I've lived with it since I was fairly young and really it doesn't phase me anymore. It's just something I've learned to deal with.

I would like to die when I tire of life, though I really doubt I will live long enough to become tired with living.

Edited February 9, 2011 by ZXValaRevan

[eclipse]

Due to. . .something I'd rather not talk about, I don't fear death. I believe that beyond life lies absolute peace (but I have no way to prove this).

[Aleph]

Well let's see we're a bunch of cells right

I don't really get the whole one consciousness for multiple lifeforms thing so I'm thinking what we call ourselves is an illusion that results as a side effect from all of those not so visible lifeforms cooperating. You say you can't not thinking or existing, but you sleep almost daily. I on the other hand wonder how I can even think to begin with. What is this strange feeling called thinking and why am I able to feel it? Whatever in the fuck?

That said dying is probably a lot like being asleep without the waking up part. It's cliche but it makes sense. You can't hate it or like it because you can't anything when you're dead. It's the dying part that sucks. Being dead doesn't anything in particular, suck or otherwise. Having had a troublesome experience with anesthesia I can say that dying is probably the most disgusting thing there will ever be to do or feel. Have fun with that!

The closest thing to reincarnation would be your decomposition being recycled through ingestion by other lifeforms. This would explain any supposedly reincarnated people having no memory of a past life - their pieces are others' pieces are everyone elses' pieces are everywhere at once.

Is dying good? Not for you, unless there's something to do after you're dead (I'm leaning toward no here). It's terrible and horrendous and I have no idea what you're on about if you disagree. That said dying might be rather beneficial to others. Think of the children!

I had this strange idea the other day. Things don't tend to last eternally right? As infinitely far away as it is, the time at which forever expires is drawing ever nearer. Since all the time we spend unconscious is condensed into a singularity of inexistence, whose to say you don't wake up in another life immediately after dying from your own perspective? Without necessarily having any ties to your previous life, of course. That would be entirely useless information though as far-fetched as it is I kind of found some intrigue in considering it.

To conclude let's take that idea a bit further.

You die and you become Schrodinger's corpse. You're either dead forever or you are revived when technology advances to the point where it is capable of not only reviving the dead (haha, what would that entail? We can't even begin to guess at this point I'd say) but recovering the decomposed and reviving them as well, even supposing their remnants have been far scattered (for that to even work might require our consciousnesses to even be entities such that they need to be recovered, but not necessarily their complements (think Ghost in the Shell - you save the conscience and put it in any old body and the person is alive again), which I've already suggested they might not even be).

This would be like, given the above, the whole dying and then immediately waking up thing in the event that indeed such technology is produced. If quantum theory is anything to go by there'd have to be at least one universe where this would be the case (hence, Schrodinger's corpse). Maybe you die and immediately wake up in Heaven. Maybe Heaven is man made. Maybe quantum theory is entirely false, or at least enough for none of this to be plausible. Presuming a "version" of you (continuing with the string business) would wake up, it'd make sense if your conscience was always one of the "yous" that awakens. In fact, for all we know, all deaths are simply visible only to us, and the people who have died are actually in some other world - if we accept quantum theory is it not conceivable that there is always a universe in which you are alive? Then isn't it also conceivable that you can't die, because you're always alive somewhere? Especially if your conscience is perhaps always occupying a plane where you are indeed alive? Maybe from our own perspectives we can't die and just have no way of knowing.

This doesn't touch on the unprovable yet not disprovable possibility that none of you even exist, and I don't just mean in the "single entity/not an illusion created by cooperating cells" sense.

[Geriba]

I love how nonchalantly everyone here (other than the OP, of course) is taking the issue of death. If it's not your greatest fear without question, then you're not appreciating life enough. Death is nothingness personified: you cease to be. Even more baffling is that none of you appear to be religious, which is at least a source of quiet comfort and spiritual purpose; subscribing to scientific reductionism should only make death all the more startling.

Due to. . .something I'd rather not talk about, I don't fear death. I believe that beyond life lies absolute peace (but I have no way to prove this).

Don't talk about what happened if you're not comfortable, but can you explain (if not prove) why what you believe could be true? How can "peace" exist in a place of utter absence?

Edited February 9, 2011 by Jaffar7

[eclipse]

Don't talk about what happened if you're not comfortable, but can you explain (if not prove) why what you believe could be true? How can "peace" exist in a place of utter absence?

It's impossible to prove whether I'm correct or not, so that's why I don't talk about it.

[Hash Jar]

Thinking of death makes me sick to my stomach. It aches me that it's inevitable. I wish the only way to die was getting old... it wouldn't be so scary then.

[BEST TRYNDAMERE PLAYER]

I'm just going to guess death is when you go into eternal slumber, just without the dreaming bit because your brain ceases to function as well after some point.

Although I'm more towards hoping that we "reincarnate" into a new life with no recollection of our past life whatsoever, but I doubt that.

[Celice]

People hoping to be reincarnated or otherwise not expelled from self-aware consciousness an existence I'm guessing are very lucky--an end to being solves a lot of issues which only come out of existence, actually.

I work all day, and get half-drunk at night.

Waking at four to soundless dark, I stare.

In time the curtain-edges will grow light.

Till then I see what's really always there:

Unresting death, a whole day nearer now,

Making all thought impossible but how

And where and when I shall myself die.

Arid interrogation: yet the dread

Of dying, and being dead,

Flashes afresh to hold and horrify.

The mind blanks at the glare. Not in remorse

- The good not done, the love not given, time

Torn off unused - nor wretchedly because

An only life can take so long to climb

Clear of its wrong beginnings, and may never;

But at the total emptiness for ever,

The sure extinction that we travel to

And shall be lost in always. Not to be here,

Not to be anywhere,

And soon; nothing more terrible, nothing more true.

This is a special way of being afraid

No trick dispels. Religion used to try,

That vast, moth-eaten musical brocade

Created to pretend we never die,

And specious stuff that says No rational being

Can fear a thing it will not feel, not seeing

That this is what we fear - no sight, no sound,

No touch or taste or smell, nothing to think with,

Nothing to love or link with,

The anasthetic from which none come round.

And so it stays just on the edge of vision,

A small, unfocused blur, a standing chill

That slows each impulse down to indecision.

Most things may never happen: this one will,

And realisation of it rages out

In furnace-fear when we are caught without

People or drink. Courage is no good:

It means not scaring others. Being brave

Lets no one off the grave.

Death is no different whined at than withstood.

Slowly light strengthens, and the room takes shape.

It stands plain as a wardrobe, what we know,

Have always known, know that we can't escape,

Yet can't accept. One side will have to go.

Meanwhile telephones crouch, getting ready to ring

In locked-up offices, and all the uncaring

Intricate rented world begins to rouse.

The sky is white as clay, with no sun.

Work has to be done.

Postmen like doctors go from house to house.

[Geriba]

Thinking of death makes me sick to my stomach. It aches me that it's inevitable. I wish the only way to die was getting old... it wouldn't be so scary then.

So what's scary for you isn't ceasing to be, but rather the pain involved with death? Hypothetical question: would you rather live a painful life, or die a painless death?

[Phoenix Wright]

I'm not sure what happens after death, as I cannot assert either direction. However, I can say that I fear death, and that is the only thing that I am truly afraid of. Enough to the point that when the thought crosses, I get somewhat depressed and reject the thought of dying. I...want to do something grand (preferably in physics) before I die, however, realistically I won't. That is the sad and scary thing for me. A death that is insignificant. But my "dream" is not all greed, as I do want it to be something that furthers mankind.

[Zanarkin]

So I guess question/discussion topic 1 would be: Without thinking in just a strictly religious way, what do you think happens when you die? What really seems possible?

What happens when you are asleep, and yet not dreaming? No consciousness no sense of self, no thought crosses the mind. Could this be any different than death? In this perspective does the thought of ceasing to exist seem more possible. I don't know, but part of me says you stop thinking, stop being what makes you, and what allows you to know you exist. The other part still beliefs in the afterlife, whether it be in heaven, hell, or wondering the earth itself.

So question/discussion topic 2: Is death good/bad? Should you be afraid of it? Are you afraid of it?

To be honest, i find death somewhat weird and i cannot see it as good or bad. Is it necessary? Is it pointless? I don't know, but i do know i'm afraid of it, from the deepest part within my mind, i'm afraid of it. To stop being terrifies me, scares me, and yet i never give too much thought about it, and act as if it doesn't. I see it as necessary, yet i don't know why and until now i've never questioned such a thing. I dream of being immortal but that is not possible, it'll never be... Perhaps its because of this ambition of mine i've never thought of death in such a way...

So question/discussion topic 3: Do you ever feel like you might know how you're going to die or how you want to die?

I've never felt like i know how i would die, but i do know i would like to die as I sleep. To just fall asleep and never wake up, that'd be the way for me, go to sleep without expecting death and not knowing as i'm about to die, or right before dieing.

@Celice: Nice Poem

Edited February 10, 2011 by SlayerX

[Celice]

I've never felt like i know how i would die, but i do know i would like to die as I sleep. To just fall asleep and never wake up, that'd be the way for me, go to sleep without expecting death and not knowing as i'm about to die, or right before dieing.

A good friend and professor once answered this: he said a lot of people want to go in their sleep, out of mind, so they don't realize what they're leaving. He said he wants to die slowly surrounded by those his beloved.

Edited February 10, 2011 by Celice

[Zanarkin]

A good friend and professor once answered this: he said a lot of people want to go in their sleep, out of mind, so they don't realize what they're leaving. He said he wants to die slowly surrounded by those his beloved.

I'm not a fan of goodbyes, if i leave i leave, and I tell as little people as i can about it. Perhaps bitter cold, perhaps immature, but for some reason i never tend to say goodbye, after all i always feel, i'll see that person someday else... I suppose even for death i still hold that idea, even if when i think from another perspective i think it sounds ridiculous.

[Aleph]

I love how nonchalantly everyone here (other than the OP, of course) is taking the issue of death. If it's not your greatest fear without question, then you're not appreciating life enough. Death is nothingness personified: you cease to be. Even more baffling is that none of you appear to be religious, which is at least a source of quiet comfort and spiritual purpose; subscribing to scientific reductionism should only make death all the more startling.

Someone didn't read my post correctly! As it was one of a mere 3, your generalization is most definitely targeting it and is also inaccurate.

So what's scary for you isn't ceasing to be, but rather the pain involved with death? Hypothetical question: would you rather live a painful life, or die a painless death?

That depends on just how painful the life is and whether the pain will end if I tough it out.

As for a preferred way to die, I see no reason on mulling over that the same way I don't see any reason for voting between two corrupt politicians.

Edited February 10, 2011 by Obviam

[Geriba]

That depends on just how painful the life is and whether the pain will end if I tough it out.

As for a preferred way to die, I see no reason on mulling over that the same way I don't see any reason for voting between two corrupt politicians.

So there's some arbitrary threshold where the pain gets to a point where life is no longer worth living? You can see why I'm skeptical of people like you appreciating life.

[Freohr Datia]

1 would be: Without thinking in just a strictly religious way, what do you think happens when you die? What really seems possible?

2: Is death good/bad? Should you be afraid of it? Are you afraid of it?

3: Do you ever feel like you might know how you're going to die or how you want to die?

1. I have recently gone from religion to no religion... so I've been considering this very much lately. I think that nothing will happen. I'll just be gone. It is a very weird thing to think about because no feeling at all for all the rest of eternity is so hard to imagine.

2. I think death's necessary to give room for others. Of course I still don't like it. But I'm also afraid of the thought of living forever just because that itself would also be hard to imagine. I almost think it'd make me go crazy. So for me it'd be like this: I'd love to be able to have a longer life, but only enough to make me satisfied. But this also makes me want to stay alive until I'm old. By then I think I'd be ready to die because by then I'd have experienced very much. I want to at least do that before I disappear, even though after I die I think I won't remember or acknowledge this. I just wouldn't want it cut so short with hardly any amazing experiences. It's very hard on me when I think of this one person who I knew who killed himself. Back when he did this I believed in a heaven and hoped he wouldn't go to hell because of what he did (and I think hell is impossible too), but now that I've switched just thinking that he lived so shortly is horrible. I really liked him too so it makes me even more sad and scared.

As for heaven, I think that if it truly does exist, it's not where people say it is. Maybe the stuff that people say that supposedly they know from God were not meant to be taken literally? I don't know, but I think the heaven people imagine is impossible.

I seriously doubt reincarnation is possible.

3. I have absolutely no idea what will happen to me. I don't think I'd hardly be capable of this. And as I said earlier, I'd like to die when I'm older and have experienced what as much of what there is to experience as I can.

[Death']

"Its just its kind of impossible for me to imagine not being able to think or feel, not being conscious."

you've done it before!!

Think about the billions of years before you were born... mmhm, that's what it's like to be dead.

[Phoenix Wright]

"Its just its kind of impossible for me to imagine not being able to think or feel, not being conscious."

you've done it before!!

Think about the billions of years before you were born... mmhm, that's what it's like to be dead.

OBJECTION!

It is impossible to be conscious, yet also be non-existent.

[Celice]

as far as it's observable...!

[Death']

OBJECTION!

It is impossible to be conscious, yet also be non-existent.

I guess that means when you're dead you're not conscious anymore? hahaha

[Phoenix Wright]

I guess that means when you're dead you're not conscious anymore? hahaha

I said it's impossible to be conscious and non-existent. I didn't say you're dead when you sleep. :/

[Geriba]

"Its just its kind of impossible for me to imagine not being able to think or feel, not being conscious."

you've done it before!!

Think about the billions of years before you were born... mmhm, that's what it's like to be dead.

Phoenix is right. None of us can even begin to comprehend non-existence. The best we have are empty metaphors like "sleep" and "being at peace."

[Meteor]

1) The only conceivable thing I can imagine is nothingness. My unfunctioning brain could no longer process or retain data, and my consciousness would deteriorate with it.

2) Because of death there is natural selection, and being a highly evolved organism, I would say I definitely have benefited from the existence of death. In that sense it is a good thing. It is the price we all must pay for our brief time alive, and I'd rather be alive than have nothing.

3) Because I live in a first world country, I am guessing I will die from an incurable medical affliction, or an act of negligence. I will also probably have the luxury of optionally ending my life prematurely if I were somehow debilitated and/or suffering.