--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Stu" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "authfriend" <jstein@> wrote: <snip> > > The real question here is why you can't seem to > > grasp that I'm not espousing any particular > > afterlife model (there are many more than two, > > BTW), or even the belief that there *is* an > > afterlife. > > Two posts ago I suggested you were agnostic on > the subject.
And then in this recent one you demanded that I tell you which afterlife belief was correct! Let it go > Judy - I am not arguing about your beliefs. Then stop attributing beliefs to me, please. > snip > > > > There is no more evidence *against* an afterlife > > than there is *for* an afterlife. > > Thats not true. There are plenty simple exercises > you can do at home to test the theory of reincarnation. > Here is one for example: > > Imagine one of your past lives. Remember a detail from it. > Do some research to see if that detail has any validity. This isn't evidence against afterlife or reincarnation, Stu. > In my posts I have suggested some other simple exercises. Which aren't evidence against afterlife or reincarnation either. There is no > reason to believe if reincarnation was important and > natural as death that it should be so hidden from people. Sure there is. If it happens, it happens after you die. We don't know what happens after you die. What other natural human > processes have this hidden agenda? Why would it take a > shaman to tell us about these cycles? We don't know whether we simply cease to exist after death either. Why not, since death is a natural human process? > > > The point is culture develops and decorates the > > > innate psychological building blocks of religious > > > beliefs. > > > > And of materialist beliefs as well. > > Empiricism does not fully constitute belief systems. Not fully, but its most basic tenet is a belief. > Just because our brain is hard wired to desire an > afterlife doesn't mean it exists. There is no > observable evidence for such a thing. However > there is plenty of evidence that without a brain > we loose consciousness. That's not evidence for what happens after you die. For all we know, the consciousness that inhabited the brain we've lost is swirling around on some other plane. We know the brainless (dead) body doesn't exhibit consciousness, but that's it. <snip> > > To pretend to certainty either way is foolish. We > > simply don't know, and there's no way to find out > > (or not find out, depending) for sure except to die. > > Not true. Because reincarnation suggests we have > already been through these cycles. The death in > this life would constitute just one more we have > already experienced. How many cycles do I need > to go through before I am convinced this is the > way of the world? Non sequitur. That's conjecture, not evidence against. > In fact as TMers who have been meditating for as > many years as us (I am going past 30 years now) I > should be sufficiently ready to shuck off samsara. > My death may be the one that ends the cycle - it > would prove nothing. Non sequitur. I'm not arguing against your belief that there's no afterlife. I'm just saying your arguments for any kind of certainty are very weak.
