Is Death An Illusion? Evidence Suggests Death Isn’t the End

reply to post by LesMisanthrope


Physically, he is in the bed... but where is he mentally? That is the question!

Originally posted by MarshMallow_Snake
reply to post by LesMisanthrope

 

Physically, he is in the bed... but where is he mentally? That is the question!

Does it matter? People dream all the time. When you dream you don't go anywhere because the dreams are happening in your head. Him, thus his body, thus his brain, thus his mind stay put.

I agree imagination is powerful. I can imagine I'm on a beach somewhere, but that doesn't mean I'm really there.

death is not the end read the tibetin book of the dead,we r in a continuous and never ending cycle of life and death,atleast i belive that until in 1 of ur lifes u finally become aware and learn of the sacerd teachings of this world and become in tune with urself and all that seems to b around u, then and only then can u hold on to th e very human trate of choice then u may hav the choice to stay in the cycle or continue in2 the void to become 1 with all that there is,was and ever will b in this plain of exsistince an s all others.

reply to post by LesMisanthrope


Everything you perceive is only being experienced from inside your brain. You see things, hear things, touch things, taste things, etc, but only because your brain lets you. You aren't really looking at a rock. Your eyes are looking at a rock then showing the image to your brain so it can directly experience it. Nothing is perceivable outside of your brain. All external stimuli only exists within your brain.

So, the mind may be experienced inside of your brain, yes. However, it could originate somewhere else. So could these dreams.

I love this thread. Even though our bodies don't last forever, life never ends.

Life is stronger than this world and its logic.

String theory postulates the existence of 11 or more dimensions....perhaps death is the end of our 4-dimensional body and the realization that we are always alive in the 7 dimensions that really matter.

In this view, death is simply a transition to alternative dimensions that don't require a body.

The way I think of it is your body and soul is like you setting at your computer. You representing your soul and the computer representing your mind and body. Your computer gets old and slow, some times get viruses, some times breaks down completely. Just because your computer is gone and is no more doesn't mean you are dead as well but you keep on going whether it's getting a new computer or writing off computers all together and doing something else.

Originally posted by LesMisanthrope

Originally posted by disgustingfatbody
Death is NOT the end.

I had a near-death experience. I was dead but not gone. There is more when we die.

Have faith, not necessarily religious. We do go on.

Death is permanent. You did not die. You were merely near death.

Death is the cessation or PERMANENT termination of all biological functions that sustain a living organism. Phenomena which commonly bring about death include old age, predation, malnutrition, disease, suicide, murder and accidents or trauma resulting in terminal injury. All known organisms inevitably experience death.[1] Bodies of living organisms begin to decompose shortly after death.

from Wikipedia (my emphasis)

If you were taking your references from the ancient Egyptian equivalent of Wikipedia you'd not find any word for 'death', nor any definition for this apparent state.Instead, ancient Egyptians didn't die, they were 'westing' - their souls following the path of the setting sun.

Could it be that all '100% certain' definitions of the state under discussion here are shaped entirely by the prevailing culture?

reply to post by ErroneousDylan


So you're saying a brain can exist on its own and perceive without the body? Wouldn't blood and oxygen need to go through the brain in order for that to happen? Wouldn't you need skin to touch? Eyes to see? Ears to hear? A nose to smell? The spine and nervous system can be discarded?

I'd like to see how long someone will last as a brain without a body.

Originally posted by Yonder

Originally posted by LesMisanthrope

Originally posted by disgustingfatbody
Death is NOT the end.

I had a near-death experience. I was dead but not gone. There is more when we die.

Have faith, not necessarily religious. We do go on.

Death is permanent. You did not die. You were merely near death.

Death is the cessation or PERMANENT termination of all biological functions that sustain a living organism. Phenomena which commonly bring about death include old age, predation, malnutrition, disease, suicide, murder and accidents or trauma resulting in terminal injury. All known organisms inevitably experience death.[1] Bodies of living organisms begin to decompose shortly after death.

from Wikipedia (my emphasis)

If you were taking your references from the ancient Egyptian equivalent of Wikipedia you'd not find any word for 'death', nor any definition for this apparent state.Instead, ancient Egyptians didn't die, they were 'westing' - their souls following the path of the setting sun.

Could it be that all '100% certain' definitions of the state under discussion here are shaped entirely by the prevailing culture?

Absolutely.

Show me one case of anything existing after death (outside of a book) as a soul, as ether, or without a body. I might be inclined to agree with the OP.

reply to post by oghamxx


Don't we need our physical brain to process all of these "conscious observations" that are being mentioned in the article? I agree that we could possibly be able to manipulate how we perceive reality, on the CONSCIOUS side... but what happens when everything shuts off. When the power plug is pulled and there is no longer any legos to piece together into new conscious puzzles.

I don't agree with the article or these ideas, because there are no grounds for non-consciousness... and there never will be. There never will be until we ourselves check out of the big hotel. Near death experiences don't even really relate, because our brain's chemicals are still flowing during those last moments before death. I don't think we'll be able to physically prove that non-consciousness doesn't exist while we are physically conscious.

Originally posted by andrewh7

Originally posted by Balkan

That said, your memories, feelings, fears, loves, all of that, is programmed in neuron pathways and synapses in your brain. That part, indeed, dies.

I wouldn't be so sure about that. I am a skeptic, but I've seen some compelling evidence for reincarnation. For myself, I had some strange dreams when I was a young child with adult-like emotional content and experiences I'm not so sure I could have imagined at that age. I also find the phenomena of dreaming/intuitions of loved ones after they have died (within hours/days) to be too common to be coincidence. Again, I've experienced this myself, and it was very intriguing. Do I believe in an afterlife? Souls? Reincarnation? I can't say for certain one way or the other. But I think there is interesting and compelling evidence that something of the consciousness does indeed hang around somehow/someway after the brain has ceased to function.

I have seen some compelling evidence that brain damage affects personality, cognitive reasoning, and memory. Your brain is an organic computer. If I shoot my desktop pc, it will stop working properly. You damage components of your brain, it also won't work properly. If you're claiming your consciousness is independent of your brain, then brain damage shouldn't have any effect whatsoever.

I haven't read further from your post, so dont know if this already has been said by someone else.

But you are misunderstandig something crucial here. If our brain is just a reciever of consciousness, wouldn't it make sense that if those areas of your brain that are suppose to recieve certain parts of your consciousness gets broken, that it would influence your personality here, because your brain is not able to recieve those parts anymore?

Also, consciousness is your awareness... Is is not your personallity.

Damned I just can't help but think there's so many holes in this thought that we have a "soul" and that there's life after death. I'm obviously trying to wrap my head around the notion, so bare with me people....

Explain some things to me, believers:

We know that wild children, IE unsocialized human beings, people who grow up outside of human contact, adapt to their surroundings. We know that they don't develop a "conscience" as we generally recognize it. Instead, they are either entirely psycho, else bond with another species and mimic their behaviors.

How does this fall in line with having a "soul" and innate qualities which form our personality

Or how about this one:

So our personality is the product of socialization, or lack their of during childhood. It's not innate. We have genetic propensities, but they're expressed differently depending on environmental circumstances.

Yes what some are saying in this thread is that "consciousness" contains information that is non-physical, and goes on after life. I'm told that when we are in the "heavens" this information projects an image and personality of when we were in our prime. Does this not seem like a contradiction to anyone else? Our personality is not our own, it is the result of interactions with our surroundings. So how does this information, this soul, this "consciousness" move on?

If our brain is merely what controls our body, then why do we have so much evidence to the contrary? Why do we develop based on our biological makeup, and why would this have something to do with how we are after we leave our body?

Yet another:

If we are here to learn a lesson and have multiple lessons/lifetimes here, why is it that when we leave we have the image of this lifetime? Wouldn't we be some unimaginable conglomeration of all our past lifetimes? Or perhaps some sort of essence which transcends all of them?

I just see too many gaps in reasoning for this "soul" to exist...

i think- only the discriminatory aspect of one's mind dies. Right now you can go towards something and then stop yourself. When one is disembodied i feel that you lose that capability. You operate by tendency. and eventually karmic information or desire still written on the subtle body pulls you towards taking 3d form again

We inherited the information from our parents, friends, bystanders.. etc. which keeps us in a role that we play.. we accept a personality of material things. Each individual reality of every individual is unique.. some live in fear of death but that doesnt mean some havent been touched by the all elusive.. you have to be dead to experience it right. We are kinda like fish in water who dont know whats beyond it.. maybe because our brains isnt capable of doing so.. or because other fish told us there is nothing.. so we live in fear of the unknown. We are born of the energy.. just like a tree.. we are cycle that has gotten to this point through evolution.. so we can be reborn but it doesnt really matter if I will be I again.. but I will share the same energy with everyone else.. so when we take a selfish standpoint and dismiss the world as something out there, rather than within, we let go of the idea that we are one and share the energy of all.. it doesnt go away it just gets transferred.

reply to post by kennyb72


I really enjoyed your comment! The way it was constructed makes you wonder and scratch your head. I personally believe none of us have any clue what happens because we have not reached the "point of no return".

All I can say about this is that the chance that there is more gives me great hope. The idea that there might be a whole new adventure awaiting me is uplifting. Man... I sure hope it's true.

Nice thread. S&F.

This brings to mind the classic thought experiment/question: if a tree falls in a forest, does it make any noise? The quick answer is, of course it does; it just fell! The astute answer is that the tree only makes noise if someone/something is there to hear it. Sound is vibration, and noise is the reception and interpretation of that vibration. It's surprising to learn that the tree only makes noise if someone is there to perceive it. This brings us to the quantum mechanics 2-slit experiment.

The 2-slit experiment forces a single photon to pass through one of two slits in a wall. After it does this, its impact is registered on a sensor wall. After firing many photons at the sensor wall, the recorded pattern is what most people would expect: about a 50/50 spread of impact points, meaning that photons pass through either slits in about equal amounts. Nothing weird there. The strangeness happened when the scientists wanted to repeat the experiment, but since it took a while to fire all the photons (one at a time), they let the experiment run by itself and went to lunch (or went home for the night). When they returned, the pattern on the sensor pad was nothing like the first one. In fact, it was as if photons, left unobserved by scientists, passed through both slits simultaneously. The gist of this discovery is this: when left unobserved by humans, photons were not "forced" to choose either the left or right slit; i.e. the Universe keeps its options open when no one is around to make it pick a slit. The mere presence of a sentient being (humans) during the course of this experiment "forces" the Universe to choose the photon to pass through ONE slit, not both.

This was one of the first peeks into the strange world of alternate realities and multiple universes. Another anomaly is distance and size. Take ANY finite distance. ---You can divide it in half. This division can continue ad infinitum ---endlessly. No matter how small, it can be halved. Therefore, the distance between your finger and your computer screen is infinite, yet somehow we can touch the screen --or seem to feel like we're touching something. What generates that feeling of touch? Our minds.

So, maybe there is something to the thought of LIFE BEING PERCEPTION, and death, perhaps, another stratification of that perception somewhere else?

Good thread, very thought-provoking.

reply to post by oghamxx

Years ago I read about a fish borne 'disease' which reversed your sense of hot and cold. Dangerous as you would gulp a cup of scalding coffee thinking it was cold

I think I'm more interested in this fish-borne disease which reverses our sense of hot and cold. lol. While I could see how a disease might affect our ability to sense hot and cold, our powers of observation, including sight, thus preventing somebody from gulping a hot, steaming cup of coffee!