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Is the afterlife arbitrary?

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2 hours ago, OfficerBacon said:
19 hours ago, dream_weaver said:

You mean the concept of consciousness transference hypothesized by Severinian? 

yes

Do you hold there is no difference between the concept of consciousness and a concept of consciousness transference?

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  • 5 months later...

Some prominent Objectivists were open to the possibility.

'Most members of my survey panel believe that the human soul passes into complete non-existence after death. This is the hypothesis one would expect from the atheist perspective. But a few respondents expressed a slightly more agnostic view about the human afterlife. Chris Matthew Sciabarra says: "Who knows? I've not experienced it yet." Nathaniel Branden replies: "What happens? Well, I really don't know, do I? But I'm inclined to believe it's pure non-existence."

Barbara Branden confesses: "I would love to believe in reincarnation, so I could come back and live again and again and again, as long as it was as a human being like myself. But since there are so many contradictions in the idea of reincarnation, I suppose I'll have to do without it. And I would love to believe in an afterlife, so that I would once again be with the people I love who have died. But apparently I'll have to do without that, too. Yet, since energy is not destroyed, perhaps one's soul is not utterly destroyed; perhaps it continues to exist in some form; it is so wondrous a possession that it seems wasteful of reality to allow the soul to cease to exist. But that would be of no use to me unless the form in which it continues to exist remains myself. So perhaps the best answer is, 'Who knows?'" '

Rand herself stated that she would instantly commit suicide if she believed in the afterlife, in order to see her dead husband. But keeping in mind that that's based on the idea that your memories, personality, etc follows. That's not necessarily what we're talking about. Just your qualia. 


https://www.atlassociety.org/post/dying-of-the-light

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  • 3 weeks later...

(click on photo)

'all along'.jpg

That is a poem I wrote last autumn. I think it is true. All people live under this shadow, which at some level they know. Long ago I came to think one way of looking at people is as walking philosophies. So in getting to know someone it is sensible to ask to oneself What philosophy is here being walked? I don't mean What philosophical heritage is here being walked? but what particular set of philosophical theses are here in this person, especially in their practices. Now I add for myself of each one How are they dealing with the fact of absolute mortality?

Edited by Boydstun
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