sounds like every other fantasy movie ever made

neat to think about but so far from reality it doesnt bear much consideration as a REAL possibility TBH

when i was a child and believed things I was told at face value, aka "faith" aka "believe what I tell you and dont ask questions" it made sense, but when i advanced my critical thinking and logic abilities I realized it makes no sense at all.

I also learned that 100% of the time the people who say "believe what I tell you and dont ask questions" do so because they are either wrong or bad people and being manipulative. I havnt met 1 person who wasnt. So organized religion especially Christianity doesnt sit well with me.

The whole thing just seems like its parents telling their children to just listen to them and their experience and do what they tell you. But I grew up and realized my parents didnt know best, they only preached based on their perceptions, which is what religion is, mans perceptions of the things he doesnt understand. (the more you understand the less religion makes sense, and eventually fades away, those who it doesnt fade away never learn or stay willingly ignorant to facts presented to them)

You don't have to believe me. Just be a good person, and I'll see you on the other side.

There's really only 2 possibilities. Either nothing happens and you experience the same thing you experienced for the billions of years before you were born, which is nothing. Or you get reincarnated. There's a theory that there's an infinite number of alternate universes, so it's possible life is just an endless cycle of being born, death, and being born again.

I've struggle with this too OP. Gift of childhood indoctrination.



Fairly thorough rundown. Most of the heaven/hell stuff doesn't make sense to me. It is so human centric- as in what is described is very physical in nature and the values are the sorts of things that humans value or fear.



Quoted because I think this is most likely to help OP.



Where I'm standing. FWIW I love the idea of a "nice house in the sky" and being reunited with the people you love. And I don't find reincarnation to be a comforting concept.

Re: reality I've listened to non-spiritual/religious people speak on how limited human perceptions are relative to what we can sense using machines and instruments. One theorizes that it would be maladaptive for humans to clearly perceive the full and true nature of reality as we only NEED to perceive the specific information that allows us to stay alive and procreate. So in short if we all sat around blissed out on psychedelics communing with the universe then we might all just starve or be eaten and likely wouldn't be successful at parenting.



I'm not so sure that their consciousness IS scrambled, though their cognition is. It is a miserable tragic decline. Personally I've had a couple of experiences with people who are near the end of that road and felt that they were still in there in some way even if all that they could express was emotion.



That doesn't sound a bit appealing. I think the worst might be just continuously looping through the same life over and over with no hope of breaking free or changing.

When I was younger I had the sense that I existed someplace else before here...maybe just fetus things. When my daughter was a toddler she once said "next time I'll be the mama".

And when I was going through my recent divorce I toyed with the idea of changing my name. The name I was going to use as a new first name was my paternal grandmother's middle name.

After my mom died and I went through her collected papers [6 filing cabinet drawers] I found some letters which were written between my mother's father and one of his brothers.

In one of the letters the brother recounted the tragic death of a younger sibling of theirs who had been run over and killed when playing while they were all walking somewhere.

Same name.

Serious.

I'd be more concerned if after you die you wake right back up to more of this BS except you are now a 5'2 pajeet

You'd be Better Unborn I guess.

Imagine this, your parents are taking you to potty train and they just take you out to the middle of the street and make you squat.

Curry everything.

How do you know? Oh wait, you don't.

The correct answer is, "we don't know."

I just don’t see how we can come from nothing, exist, and then go back to nothing

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservation_of_mass

The laws of physics contradict this theory. To suggest that we go back to nothing when we die suggests matter is being destroyed. Is consciousness not a form of matter? People who die have been found to weigh 21 grams less on death.

Before we are human, we are sperm. Before we are sperm, we are protein. It’s once we go back further than that that the grey area lies.

I suspect we get recycled into the Universe and come out somewhere else

The problem with consciousness is that it is not matter. "How the color red looks", has no physical description. You could never study physics and optics and biology enough to know what it looks like, unless you had experienced it.

Sorry to tell you, but the chances of any of us even being born are astronomical & once you are gone that is it-doesn't matter if you were the nicest person ever or Hitler, there is no afterlife.

You can look at it another way: The odds of you being you, and being here, are so unbelievably astronomical that you're here because everything that's possible, in every dimension, will happen.

It's infinite dimension theory, or the multiverse, and in my smooth-brained opinion, is likely true.

If your physical brain is what makes you, you, then given infinite universes, that physical makeup, with the rules of our universe, will return, an infinite amount of times.

Scary to think, but you've probably been here before, same situation, same everything, an infinite amount of times.

Perhaps God is a lonely one...He fools Himself into thinking He's regular people, not to mention all of the animals.As if He is His own Cartesian Evil Genius, who with eternity eventually gets around to being even you...reading this sentence.

I suppose He would be sort of a thrill seeker...because He (you) would get around to experiencing all of the horrible fates that lots of people meet.

But it's not all bad. There's lots of good things, as well.

In any case, if experiences are qualia and constitute knowledge...if there was an omniscient being it would have to be you. As you possess unique knowledge of the things you see and feel.

You can look at it another way: The odds of you being you, and being here, are so unbelievably astronomical that you're here because everything that's possible, in every dimension, will happen.

It's infinite dimension theory, or the multiverse, and in my smooth-brained opinion, is likely true.

If your physical brain is what makes you, you, then given infinite universes, that physical makeup, with the rules of our universe, will return, an infinite amount of times.

Scary to think, but you've probably been here before, same situation, same everything, an infinite amount of times.

I did some bad things when I was younger (lived like a scumbag). I find that letting go of religion helps only up until my mind starts doubting that I could be wrong. How do you get over the unknown? (which could last an eternity). It feels like past actions had replaced the identity of who I used to be. Anyone relate to this chit?

If you’re trying to melt my brain, it’s working

Time doesn't exist as we think it does, its literally just a way for humans to cope. Saying we have experienced something "an infinite amount of times" is looking at it wrong. MINUS time, we are experiencing EVERYTHING at once at an infinite speed.

everything we have created, every word, every concept, is just our perception of a reality we dont truly understand, if it even is reality and we arent in a simulation and our "true selves" are something we also cant comprehend

Hmmm interesting to think about. But one thing I find crazy is math is tied into hebrew and Hebrew/math is tied into the bible. I'm not sure how that is possible unless the creator deemed it to be so, thus making language part of the universe like math.

https://www.google.com/search?q=book...client=gws-wiz

^ find that PDF for free and read, crazy material to think about.

And people who die always say that the experience of the afterlife seems much more real than this earthly experience

How can they say that if they died?