Thoughts about death

[FieldsofWildflowers]

Just curious but what are everyone's thoughts about death? Do you believe we continue to live in a spiritual body, reincarnation, or just oblivion?

 

[EvisceratedJester]

You die and that's it. That's why I yearn for it. I want to be nothing.

 

[Seele]

Reflecting deeply, I understand that death is simply the "non-being," just as humanity did not exist before birth. Happiness or pain, heaven and hell, seem to me concepts that make no sense. To experience them, one must have a nervous system and a brain. It's as if we are personifying something that, in reality, has no properties to be anything literal.

When people speak of heaven, it seems to me a form of consolation for death, due to the very finiteness of life. Hell, on the other hand, appears as a consolation for the punishment of all the miseries and injustices that occur in the world. The fear of death comes from the fact that we only know and experience life. Therefore, what we don't know, we fear. Additionally, we confuse the process of dying with death itself.

Death, then, is the literal "void," the "emptiness," but if we consider that only by living can we experience pain and suffering, then death, by freeing us from these experiences, gains a positive value. Similarly, never having been born could be seen as a way of not experiencing anything, which also endows that "non-being" with a positive value.


To be, or not to be, that is the question.

 

[TANETS]

i am honestly not sure. im split between reincarnation and oblivion. i wouldnt mind being reincarnated... not any time soon though.

 

[dontlook]

I want there to be more after death, but I don't believe that.

I believe that our consciousness is the culmination of our brains and internal chemistry working together to create us. Disrupt the machine and you disrupt consciousness.

Before we were born was nothingness; most people can't even remember their first handful of years.

Once we slip away, I think that's it. We may not even realize it's happened. Like falling asleep, it's just nothing all at once. We only realize that it was nothing if we wake up again and have that context

 

[FieldsofWildflowers]

i am honestly not sure. im split between reincarnation and oblivion. i wouldnt mind being reincarnated... not any time soon though.

I'm leaning towards reincarnation. I like living but not with my current health problems.

I want there to be more after death, but I don't believe that.

I believe that our consciousness is the culmination of our brains and internal chemistry working together to create us. Disrupt the machine and you disrupt consciousness.

Before we were born was nothingness; most people can't even remember their first handful of years.

Once we slip away, I think that's it. We may not even realize it's happened. Like falling asleep, it's just nothing all at once. We only realize that it was nothing if we wake up again and have that context

I don't think we know we are dead...sometimes I think we just wake up in a different body.

I want there to be more after death, but I don't believe that.

I believe that our consciousness is the culmination of our brains and internal chemistry working together to create us. Disrupt the machine and you disrupt consciousness.

Before we were born was nothingness; most people can't even remember their first handful of years.

Once we slip away, I think that's it. We may not even realize it's happened. Like falling asleep, it's just nothing all at once. We only realize that it was nothing if we wake up again and have that context

Lots of people hope it's nothing but out of body experiences seems like there more.

 

[FuneralCry]

Nothing, I believe death to simply be the absence of everything where all is gone and forgotten about which is all I personally wish for, in an existence so cruel and futile that just causes so much suffering all for the sake of it, non-existence truly is all I see as desirable, the only relief for me could lie in being permanently unconscious. I only hope to never suffer ever again, I'd always prefer to painlessly cease existing than prolong all the suffering this existence causes just to be tormented by old age, existence to me truly does feel like the most terrible, tragic mistake, I'd never wish to be burdened with this existence.

 

[pthnrdnojvsc]

Imo a human is only cells , a machine , a bug . Can a laptop fly centipede robot or chatgpt have an afterlife? No neither can a human.

I'm glad this horror this brain ( me) I'm imprisoned in will cease to exist forever after Death

A brain that can suffer unbearable pain.

 

[Seele]

Imo a human is only cells , a machine , a bug . Can a laptop fly or chatgpt have an afterlife? No neither can a human.

I'm glad this horror this brain ( me) I'm imprisoned in will cease to exist forever after Death

A brain that can suffer unbearable pain.

I understand your point. In this case, searching for meaning in the afterlife is like looking for numbers in a turned-off calculator

 

[charcoalcat]

Rationality and science tells us that there is nothing after death; only the void. Hence the term "call of the void" experienced by people who feel the urge to jump at high places.

But a small part of me still hold that belief that after death our consciousness will elevate to become part of the universal mind, or universal consciousness.

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

There was a miniseries 'Childhood's End' that portrayed the concept.

 

[ijustwishtodie]

Death is just permanent non existence and that's exactly I want to die as early as possible. So many people are scared of permanent non existence because they can't comprehend it or they're too scared to never be able to indulge in random life things like music or movies but, for me, permanent non existence is beauty and is perfection. I honestly used to think that perfection was impossible to achieve as there will always be a flaw but, no, perfection is permanent non existence

 

[curiouscvnt]

I want there to be more after death, but I don't believe that.

I believe that our consciousness is the culmination of our brains and internal chemistry working together to create us. Disrupt the machine and you disrupt consciousness.

Before we were born was nothingness; most people can't even remember their first handful of years.

Once we slip away, I think that's it. We may not even realize it's happened. Like falling asleep, it's just nothing all at once. We only realize that it was nothing if we wake up again and have that context

Given my understanding of humanity's (scientific) understanding of reality, yeah, cessation of consciousness means obliteration of it on every level. And that, to me, has a peace to it.
But when I consider that humanity's understanding can be based on science which always has qualifiers and limits, and that humanity has come up with what modern science would dispel as highly improbable, mainly security-blanket-like explanations for consciousness, life, death, etc., I feel much more open to the possibility that death is not the end of existence as we currently understand it, but may even retain some qualities accessible to our level of understanding or experience.

I really like your last line there, dontlook. About maybe not even realizing that death has happened (from 1st person pov). I realize that in the transition between life and death, it is also our individual identity that may be totally blurred -- or at least that such a perception of individualism lost might be part of the experience of conceptualizing death as a living person.

 

[legoshi]

Just curious but what are everyone's thoughts about death? Do you believe we continue to live in a spiritual body, reincarnation, or just oblivion?

I really have no ideal and struggle with this. I really want it to be over when we die. I don't want to exist anymore in any form.