Death

[bigscott]

thats a hard one to answer since i was suppose to die and beat the docs odds -- i knew i was dying ! i was scared at first but the odd thing is after a while i felt peaceful .. i remember being on a gurney being tranfered to a different hospital looking up at the fall sky and thinking this is the last time i will see it -

whats funny is how the doctors and nurses act when they know your dying . they wont tell you but you can feel it . they wont make eye contact etc etc

its a give away when they send in the priest lol but knew it anyway -- they pumped sooooo much morphine into me so i was comfortable -- soon as the doc looked at the nurse and said triple his morphine i knew they felt i wasnt going to make it and thats when i gave in and felt peaceful - its hard to explain !!

oh and what almost killed me was meningitis [sp]

[the art of war]

thats a hard one to answer since i was suppose to die and beat the docs odds -- i knew i was dying ! i was scared at first but the odd thing is after a while i felt peaceful .. i remember being on a gurney being tranfered to a different hospital looking up at the fall sky and thinking this is the last time i will see it -

whats funny is how the doctors and nurses act when they know your dying . they wont tell you but you can feel it . they wont make eye contact etc etc

its a give away when they send in the priest lol but knew it anyway -- they pumped sooooo much morphine into me so i was comfortable -- soon as the doc looked at the nurse and said triple his morphine i knew they felt i wasnt going to make it and thats when i gave in and felt peaceful - its hard to explain !!

oh and what almost killed me was meningitis [sp]

I totally agree w/you bro - when u are told you know that their isn't much bright light left it makes gave me relief also. Although it's nice to be here :hibb:

[FitnessBrat]

Scared...to....death....of dying - and even old age at this point in my life.

[redsquirrel]

I'm scared. It's mostly fear of the ultimate unknown in this case. I also don't want to die a horrible death. I'm terrified of drowning or burning to death,...mostly I would prefer not to suffer.

I do believe there is an afterlife...I just don't know if it involves Heaven or Hell. I don't know if what I've done in the past, or haven't done will determine which place I go. But, I'd rather be safe than sorry. I don't think that humans, being such complex and intelligent beings are just gone.

Don't laugh, but I watch that Paranormal State on A&E. There is no doubt proof of ghosts or some sort of souls that carry on. Crazy as this may sound, usually the ghosts haunting the place have done something bad. I guess, that could be Hell. You think you're alive, but you're really dead. But, where do the do-gooders go?

[Bouncer]

I don't think that humans, being such complex and intelligent beings are just gone.

Whales, dolphins, elephants, and other intelligent creatures just die but humans fly off to magic land or go live in fire pits. :retard:

This is what sort of pisses me off about religion and humans in general. Who do we think we are? Why do we think we are so special. Other creatures can do many things that we cannot do. We define intelligence on our terms. Look at all the harm the human species has brought to this planet. You think if you could talk to the planet and say "do you think the human species are wise creatures" that the earth would say "why yes, they are just dandy!" lol.

We are no more important then any other creature. We are part of this world. What happens to a fly will happen to us. We don't have some magical connection to fairy land that other creatures don't. It blows my mind how otherwise smart people are so warped when it comes to this kind of reality.

[ROCKETW19]

Whales, dolphins, elephants, and other intelligent creatures just die but humans fly off to magic land or go live in fire pits. :retard:

LO, also we were not always this smart. Just think back 10 years and the advances we made in that super short time.

But to stay on topic we probably shouldnt talk about after life cuzz it will end up bad,lol.

[redsquirrel]

Whales, dolphins, elephants, and other intelligent creatures just die but humans fly off to magic land or go live in fire pits. :retard:

We don't have some magical connection to fairy land that other creatures don't. It blows my mind how otherwise smart people are so warped when it comes to this kind of reality.

1- how do you know intelligent creatures don't go fly off to magic land

2- as I said, I'd rather be safe than sorry, so I am a Christian. That being said, I find it very interesting that just about every religion has about the same "beginning of time/religion" story, just different variations. (Adam & Eve in the Garden of Eden)

3- this was a discussion, right? Why does it sound like you are insulting me? And, the last time I checked- none of us really know what happens.

[Bouncer]

1- how do you know intelligent creatures don't go fly off to magic land

2- as I said, I'd rather be safe than sorry, so I am a Christian. That being said, I find it very interesting that just about every religion has about the same "beginning of time/religion" story, just different variations. (Adam & Eve in the Garden of Eden)

3- this was a discussion, right? Why does it sound like you are insulting me? And, the last time I checked- none of us really know what happens.

1: because i am a realist.

2: all religion does have the same roots. it took different paths as time went on. all created for one reason, to have power and control over others.

3: not insulting you, insulting religion in general i guess. what makes your god any more real then the Sun God of the ancient Egyptians, or the Greek gods like Zeus, etc... I dont understand how people can be so blinded by it all. cant you guys see that that through out the time of man we have always created something "magical". ancient mariners would describe water monsters with mythical powers, the romans would hear thunder and say "thats god slamming things" the list goes on an on, these things were all created by the human imagination.

[blm]

Interesting/Entertaining read in the news today along the above debatable topic...


Richard Dawkins has been right all along, of course—at least in one important respect. Evolution has indeed dealt a blow to the idea of a benign creator, literally conceived. It tells us that there is no Intelligence controlling the cosmos, and that life itself is the result of a blind process of natural selection, in which innumerable species failed to survive. The fossil record reveals a natural history of pain, death and racial extinction, so if there was a divine plan, it was cruel, callously prodigal and wasteful. Human beings were not the pinnacle of a purposeful creation; like everything else, they evolved by trial and error and God had no direct hand in their making. No wonder so many fundamentalist Christians find their faith shaken to the core.

Richard Dawkins argues that evolution leaves God with nothing to do But Darwin may have done religion—and God—a favor by revealing a flaw in modern Western faith. Despite our scientific and technological brilliance, our understanding of God is often remarkably undeveloped—even primitive. In the past, many of the most influential Jewish, Christian and Muslim thinkers understood that what we call "God" is merely a symbol that points beyond itself to an indescribable transcendence, whose existence cannot be proved but is only intuited by means of spiritual exercises and a compassionate lifestyle that enable us to cultivate new capacities of mind and heart.

But by the end of the 17th century, instead of looking through the symbol to "the God beyond God," Christians were transforming it into hard fact. Sir Isaac Newton had claimed that his cosmic system proved beyond doubt the existence of an intelligent, omniscient and omnipotent creator, who was obviously "very well skilled in Mechanicks and Geometry." Enthralled by the prospect of such cast-iron certainty, churchmen started to develop a scientifically-based theology that eventually made Newton's Mechanick and, later, William Paley's Intelligent Designer essential to Western Christianity.

But the Great Mechanick was little more than an idol, the kind of human projection that theology, at its best, was supposed to avoid. God had been essential to Newtonian physics but it was not long before other scientists were able to dispense with the God-hypothesis and, finally, Darwin showed that there could be no proof for God's existence. This would not have been a disaster had not Christians become so dependent upon their scientific religion that they had lost the older habits of thought and were left without other resource.

Symbolism was essential to premodern religion, because it was only possible to speak about the ultimate reality—God, Tao, Brahman or Nirvana—analogically, since it lay beyond the reach of words. Jews and Christians both developed audaciously innovative and figurative methods of reading the Bible, and every statement of the Quran is called an ayah ("parable"). St Augustine (354-430), a major authority for both Catholics and Protestants, insisted that if a biblical text contradicted reputable science, it must be interpreted allegorically. This remained standard practice in the West until the 17th century, when in an effort to emulate the exact scientific method, Christians began to read scripture with a literalness that is without parallel in religious history.

Most cultures believed that there were two recognized ways of arriving at truth. The Greeks called them mythos and logos. Both were essential and neither was superior to the other; they were not in conflict but complementary, each with its own sphere of competence. Logos ("reason") was the pragmatic mode of thought that enabled us to function effectively in the world and had, therefore, to correspond accurately to external reality. But it could not assuage human grief or find ultimate meaning in life's struggle. For that people turned to mythos, stories that made no pretensions to historical accuracy but should rather be seen as an early form of psychology; if translated into ritual or ethical action, a good myth showed you how to cope with mortality, discover an inner source of strength, and endure pain and sorrow with serenity.

In the ancient world, a cosmology was not regarded as factual but was primarily therapeutic; it was recited when people needed an infusion of that mysterious power that had—somehow—brought something out of primal nothingness: at a sickbed, a coronation or during a political crisis. Some cosmologies taught people how to unlock their own creativity, others made them aware of the struggle required to maintain social and political order. The Genesis creation hymn, written during the Israelites' exile in Babylonia in the 6th century BC, was a gentle polemic against Babylonian religion. Its vision of an ordered universe where everything had its place was probably consoling to a displaced people, though—as we can see in the Bible—some of the exiles preferred a more aggressive cosmology.

There can never be a definitive version of a myth, because it refers to the more imponderable aspects of life. To remain effective, it must respond to contemporary circumstance. In the 16th century, when Jews were being expelled from one region of Europe after another, the mystic Isaac Luria constructed an entirely new creation myth that bore no resemblance to the Genesis story. But instead of being reviled for contradicting the Bible, it inspired a mass-movement among Jews, because it was such a telling description of the arbitrary world they now lived in; backed up with special rituals, it also helped them face up to their pain and discover a source of strength.

Religion was not supposed to provide explanations that lay within the competence of reason but to help us live creatively with realities for which there are no easy solutions and find an interior haven of peace; today, however, many have opted for unsustainable certainty instead. But can we respond religiously to evolutionary theory? Can we use it to recover a more authentic notion of God?

Darwin made it clear once again that—as Maimonides, Avicenna, Aquinas and Eckhart had already pointed out—we cannot regard God simply as a divine personality, who single-handedly created the world. This could direct our attention away from the idols of certainty and back to the "God beyond God." The best theology is a spiritual exercise, akin to poetry. Religion is not an exact science but a kind of art form that, like music or painting, introduces us to a mode of knowledge that is different from the purely rational and which cannot easily be put into words. At its best, it holds us in an attitude of wonder, which is, perhaps, not unlike the awe that Mr. Dawkins experiences—and has helped me to appreciate —when he contemplates the marvels of natural selection.

But what of the pain and waste that Darwin unveiled? All the major traditions insist that the faithful meditate on the ubiquitous suffering that is an inescapable part of life; because, if we do not acknowledge this uncomfortable fact, the compassion that lies at the heart of faith is impossible. The almost unbearable spectacle of the myriad species passing painfully into oblivion is not unlike some classic Buddhist meditations on the First Noble Truth ("Existence is suffering"), the indispensable prerequisite for the transcendent enlightenment that some call Nirvana—and others call God.

—Ms. Armstrong is the author of numerous books on theology and religious affairs. The latest, "The Case for God," will be published by Knopf later this month.
Richard Dawkins argues that evolution leaves God with nothing to do
Before 1859 it would have seemed natural to agree with the Reverend William Paley, in "Natural Theology," that the creation of life was God's greatest work. Especially (vanity might add) human life. Today we'd amend the statement: Evolution is the universe's greatest work. Evolution is the creator of life, and life is arguably the most surprising and most beautiful production that the laws of physics have ever generated. Evolution, to quote a T-shirt sent me by an anonymous well-wisher, is the greatest show on earth, the only game in town.

Indeed, evolution is probably the greatest show in the entire universe. Most scientists' hunch is that there are independently evolved life forms dotted around planetary islands throughout the universe—though sadly too thinly scattered to encounter one another. And if there is life elsewhere, it is something stronger than a hunch to say that it will turn out to be Darwinian life. The argument in favor of alien life's existing at all is weaker than the argument that—if it exists at all—it will be Darwinian life. But it is also possible that we really are alone in the universe, in which case Earth, with its greatest show, is the most remarkable planet in the universe.

What is so special about life? It never violates the laws of physics. Nothing does (if anything did, physicists would just have to formulate new laws—it's happened often enough in the history of science). But although life never violates the laws of physics, it pushes them into unexpected avenues that stagger the imagination. If we didn't know about life we wouldn't believe it was possible—except, of course, that there'd then be nobody around to do the disbelieving!

The laws of physics, before Darwinian evolution bursts out from their midst, can make rocks and sand, gas clouds and stars, whirlpools and waves, whirlpool-shaped galaxies and light that travels as waves while behaving like particles. It is an interesting, fascinating and, in many ways, deeply mysterious universe. But now, enter life. Look, through the eyes of a physicist, at a bounding kangaroo, a swooping bat, a leaping dolphin, a soaring Coast Redwood. There never was a rock that bounded like a kangaroo, never a pebble that crawled like a beetle seeking a mate, never a sand grain that swam like a water flea. Not once do any of these creatures disobey one jot or tittle of the laws of physics. Far from violating the laws of thermodynamics (as is often ignorantly alleged) they are relentlessly driven by them. Far from violating the laws of motion, animals exploit them to their advantage as they walk, run, dodge and jink, leap and fly, pounce on prey or spring to safety.

Never once are the laws of physics violated, yet life emerges into uncharted territory. And how is the trick done? The answer is a process that, although variable in its wondrous detail, is sufficiently uniform to deserve one single name: Darwinian evolution, the nonrandom survival of randomly varying coded information. We know, as certainly as we know anything in science, that this is the process that has generated life on our own planet. And my bet, as I said, is that the same process is in operation wherever life may be found, anywhere in the universe.

What if the greatest show on earth is not the greatest show in the universe? What if there are life forms on other planets that have evolved so far beyond our level of intelligence and creativity that we should regard them as gods, were we ever so fortunate (or unfortunate?) as to meet them? Would they indeed be gods? Wouldn't we be tempted to fall on our knees and worship them, as a medieval peasant might if suddenly confronted with such miracles as a Boeing 747, a mobile telephone or Google Earth? But, however god-like the aliens might seem, they would not be gods, and for one very important reason. They did not create the universe; it created them, just as it created us. Making the universe is the one thing no intelligence, however superhuman, could do, because an intelligence is complex—statistically improbable —and therefore had to emerge, by gradual degrees, from simpler beginnings: from a lifeless universe—the miracle-free zone that is physics.

To midwife such emergence is the singular achievement of Darwinian evolution. It starts with primeval simplicity and fosters, by slow, explicable degrees, the emergence of complexity: seemingly limitless complexity—certainly up to our human level of complexity and very probably way beyond. There may be worlds on which superhuman life thrives, superhuman to a level that our imaginations cannot grasp. But superhuman does not mean supernatural. Darwinian evolution is the only process we know that is ultimately capable of generating anything as complicated as creative intelligences. Once it has done so, of course, those intelligences can create other complex things: works of art and music, advanced technology, computers, the Internet and who knows what in the future? Darwinian evolution may not be the only such generative process in the universe. There may be other "cranes" (Daniel Dennett's term, which he opposes to "skyhooks") that we have not yet discovered or imagined. But, however wonderful and however different from Darwinian evolution those putative cranes may be, they cannot be magic. They will share with Darwinian evolution the facility to raise up complexity, as an emergent property, out of simplicity, while never violating natural law.

Where does that leave God? The kindest thing to say is that it leaves him with nothing to do, and no achievements that might attract our praise, our worship or our fear. Evolution is God's redundancy notice, his pink slip. But we have to go further. A complex creative intelligence with nothing to do is not just redundant. A divine designer is all but ruled out by the consideration that he must at least as complex as the entities he was wheeled out to explain. God is not dead. He was never alive in the first place.

Now, there is a certain class of sophisticated modern theologian who will say something like this: "Good heavens, of course we are not so naive or simplistic as to care whether God exists. Existence is such a 19th-century preoccupation! It doesn't matter whether God exists in a scientific sense. What matters is whether he exists for you or for me. If God is real for you, who cares whether science has made him redundant? Such arrogance! Such elitism."

Well, if that's what floats your canoe, you'll be paddling it up a very lonely creek. The mainstream belief of the world's peoples is very clear. They believe in God, and that means they believe he exists in objective reality, just as surely as the Rock of Gibraltar exists. If sophisticated theologians or postmodern relativists think they are rescuing God from the redundancy scrap-heap by downplaying the importance of existence, they should think again. Tell the congregation of a church or mosque that existence is too vulgar an attribute to fasten onto their God, and they will brand you an atheist. They'll be right.

[NewbieChris]

What about the afterlife? I mean the concept of eternity is somewhat weird and scary. Forever, doesn't seem possible. I mean, it just doesn't make sense. everything we know has a beginning and end. Scary shit to me, I hate thinking about it, but for some reason I like to ponder the unknown.

Now I'm gonna go crank one out because I need to enjoy the pleasantries of life, not think about disconcerting shit like this. :D

[blm]

I mean, it just doesn't make sense. everything we know has a beginning and end.

Law of Conservation of Energy states that energy cannot be created nor destroyed. So the energy (our being) goes somewhere once it leaves the body (when our physical being dies), right? Where does it go and what form does it take on?

[Bouncer]

Law of Conservation of Energy states that energy cannot be created nor destroyed. So the energy (our being) goes somewhere once it leaves the body (when our physical being dies), right? Where does it go and what form does it take on?

and to bring your great insight into perspective.

a gnat = energy. :retard:

[blm]

and to bring your great insight into perspective.

a gnat = energy. :retard:

Exactly. So we know what curtus' energy transferred into...

[FrankTheTank55]

soon as the doc looked at the nurse and said triple his morphine i knew they felt i wasnt going to make it and thats when i gave in and felt peaceful - its hard to explain !!

I think the triple dose of Morphine is what gave you that peaceful feeling.....:)

[FrankTheTank55]

Im not afraid of death, I think when your dead your dead. You wont even know your dead. But I am bothered by my family being sad and missing me.