Do you believe in God?

[Dotini]

Which brings an interesting concept and question: can the eternal paradise of heaven actually represent conditions you would consider hell, or would heaven be your own personal paradise even if that represented what others would consider evil and depraved?

The perennial philosopher might say there is no heaven or hell for scoundrels. Rotten apples like Hitler or Stalin might need several more lives to make it through the Pearly Gate.

 

[Famine]

The perennial philosopher might say there is no heaven or hell for scoundrels. Rotten apples like Hitler or Stalin might need several more lives to make it through the Pearly Gate.

On the basis that it's not who you are underneath but what you do that defines you, could someone live a blameless, pious, charitable, kind, thoughtful life on Earth safe in the knowledge they can - without harming a soul in life - club puppies and bugger children for all eternity in the afterlife?

 

[TenEightyOne]

So, if you led a pious and righteous life you go to heaven when you die, right?

Probably, but no man is without sin, really it's true repenters who get the Golden Ticket.

Not your physical self but your soul, your mind, your personality as it is right now, right?

Your awareness of self, yes.

My question is, how long does this last? For how long?

No time. Zero time. Eternity. It's all the same thing. Eternity is not a linear state because time can't exist in it.

My point is, the human mind is not meant for this kind of longevity

It's stasis so there's no longevity to it.

Imagine the timespan of a whole healthy life, that is around 90 years.
Now imagine, if you even remotely can, imagine a 100.000 years of existing. That's way back in the stone age, when mammoths and saber-tooth tigers were around. What do you do with this time? How can you exist for that long without going utterly insane?

Society ceases to exist, there is no insanity. And there's no time, it's eternity. It's a nanosecond of feeling that is there, and you stay in that nanosecond.

Isn't the scientific version of death much more merciful? Just ceasing to exist altogether means no chance of eternal suffering.

Yes, and it's the correct one. The other one is bollocks.

The only way out would be reincarnation with a memory swipe, a clean slate beginning in intervals.

We are reincarnated, just not as consciousnesses. There's a probability that any of the particles we consume for sustenance and therefore the continuously regenerating particles of our bodies have been a part of another person at another time.

 

[Rallywagon]

We are reincarnated, just not as consciousnesses. There's a probability that any of the particles we consume for sustenance and therefore the continuously regenerating particles of our bodies have been a part of another person at another time.

I wonder if that's how I just caught the rotavirus....

 

[Dotini]

So, if you led a pious and righteous life you go to heaven when you die, right? That's basically a beautiful place of peace and no wrongdoings where you meet your ancestors and god himself, right? Not your physical self but your soul, your mind, your personality as it is right now, right?

No. When you reunite with god, you lose your ego, your sense of self.

 

[Dotini]

Midshipmen at the United States Naval Academy Chapel. Not all Mids worship God; some worship His Enemy (Anna Clopet/ Corbis Documentary / Getty Images Plus)

The matter of Satanists meeting at the US Naval Academy raises the broader question of the limits of tolerance in a liberal society. Is Satanism a religion like every other?
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/satanism-at-the-us-naval-academy/

 

[TheGeologist]

May I ask a question that is closely related to the topic? There is no other place I could ask the question without derailing the topic hard.

First of all, I consider myself an agnostic, and the question is aimed at those who do believe in the classic Christian or Islamic ''heaven''. It is not my intention to make the question sound sarcastic or disrespectful.

So, if you led a pious and righteous life you go to heaven when you die, right? That's basically a beautiful place of peace and no wrongdoings where you meet your ancestors and god himself, right? Not your physical self but your soul, your mind, your personality as it is right now, right?

My question is, how long does this last? For how long?

I ask because the question of time is important for me, how long do I stay at that place? 100.000 years, a million years or even forever?

My point is, the human mind is not meant for this kind of longevity. Imagine the timespan of a whole healthy life, that is around 90 years.
Now imagine, if you even remotely can, imagine a 100.000 years of existing. That's way back in the stone age, when mammoths and saber-tooth tigers were around. What do you do with this time? How can you exist for that long without going utterly insane? If you do things over and over and over again, or imagine over and over again, even the biggest pleasures turn into absolute horror, and it does not take long to do or imagine everything you ever wanted before it is rinse and repeat. And this does not take even a quarter of an eternity.

When people say they wanted to exist forever (In whatever form) they have never truly thought about the time that is actually involved with that, it would quickly turn into a never ending nightmare of despair with absolutely no way out. That's the idea of hell, isn't it?

Isn't the scientific version of death much more merciful? Just ceasing to exist altogether means no chance of eternal suffering.

The only way out would be reincarnation with a memory swipe, a clean slate beginning in intervals.

I've never considered this. This is actually horrific to think about.

Do people in heaven supposedly know what's going on down on Earth? I mean I guess it'd be cool to see the Earth evolve over a Geological Eon before its inevitably destroyed by our sun. But if we're on a human time scale, then I'm probably gonna to go mental after like a year of doing nothing lol.

It just makes much more sense to me that when you die, you die. Your timeline ends.

 

[Michael88]

No. When you reunite with god, you lose your ego, your sense of self.

But ego is a huge part of me, without it I'm no longer me and I do not go to heaven, just some parts of me. I'm the sum of my parts, take one away and I am no longer fully me.-

Also another question that occurred to me is, when you go to classic Christian / Muslim heaven, at which age are you ''frozen in time''? I mean, the human mind changes and evolves over the course of a lifetime due to regenerative errors and structural changes caused by environmental factors and lastly your experiences, your 70 year old is vastly different than your 20 year old, but neither one is strictly superior. (As long as you don't have Alzheimers of course) Views change, attitudes do, even personality. Going back in time, your 20 year old self would probably find your 70 year old future self dumb and old and strict, and your 70 year old self would find the 20 year old self naive, inexperienced and dumb.
Do you get to pick one?

Do people in heaven supposedly know what's going on down on Earth? I mean I guess it'd be cool to see the Earth evolve over a Geological Eon before its inevitably destroyed by our sun. But if we're on a human time scale, then I'm probably gonna to go mental after like a year of doing nothing lol

Imagine you watching your loved ones and future generations of your family suffer and make obviously wrong decisions with you unable to interfere on their behalf. That alone would ruin my time in heaven.

 

[Scaff]

Midshipmen at the United States Naval Academy Chapel. Not all Mids worship God; some worship His Enemy (Anna Clopet/ Corbis Documentary / Getty Images Plus)

The matter of Satanists meeting at the US Naval Academy raises the broader question of the limits of tolerance in a liberal society. Is Satanism a religion like every other?
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/satanism-at-the-us-naval-academy/

It's not 'satanists' its 'The Satanic Temple', a quite significant difference and not a religion.

 

[FoRiZon]

It's not 'satanists' its 'The Satanic Temple', a quite significant difference and not a religion.

Plus I'm not very confident with that kind of source he provided.

 

[TheGeologist]

Imagine you watching your loved ones and future generations of your family suffer and make obviously wrong decisions with you unable to interfere on their behalf. That alone would ruin my time in heaven.

I feel like I would grow detached from the family as generations go on. Like once there are family members that I had never met, would I really care? Would I care about my future great great great great great great great great grandchild?

 

[Dotini]

But ego is a huge part of me, without it I'm no longer me and I do not go to heaven, just some parts of me. I'm the sum of my parts, take one away and I am no longer fully me.-

Also another question that occurred to me is, when you go to classic Christian / Muslim heaven, at which age are you ''frozen in time''? I mean, the human mind changes and evolves over the course of a lifetime due to regenerative errors and structural changes caused by environmental factors and lastly your experiences, your 70 year old is vastly different than your 20 year old, but neither one is strictly superior. (As long as you don't have Alzheimers of course) Views change, attitudes do, even personality. Going back in time, your 20 year old self would probably find your 70 year old future self dumb and old and strict, and your 70 year old self would find the 20 year old self naive, inexperienced and dumb.
Do you get to pick one?

Imagine you watching your loved ones and future generations of your family suffer and make obviously wrong decisions with you unable to interfere on their behalf. That alone would ruin my time in heaven.

You ask a number of questions, some of which might be partially addressed by reference to the literature on the NDE, or near death experience. You may wish to refer to this literature.

Your question on time travel is an interesting one. When you reunite with god consciousness, you are in a state that is outside of time and matter. So at least you are not frozen in one particular time and place. Who knows what potential may then exist for experiencing other places and times?

 

[ryzno]

Imagine you watching your loved ones and future generations of your family suffer and make obviously wrong decisions with you unable to interfere on their behalf.

Isn't that what angels are for?

 

[Michael88]

You ask a number of questions, some of which might be partially addressed by reference to the literature on the NDE, or near death experience. You may wish to refer to this literature.

Your question on time travel is an interesting one. When you reunite with god consciousness, you are in a state that is outside of time and matter. So at least you are not frozen in one particular time and place. Who knows what potential may then exist for experiencing other places and times?

Consciousness is created by the nervous system in my brain, it is not part of a bigger system. What we call consciousness is an evolutionary thing that helps complex large organic lifeforms to be more aware of their surroundings and themselves which obviously greatly helps survival. That's pretty much it, no god, no bigger part, its an organically created sub-system.

As for near death experiences, I actually had them. Well, I didn't have them, and that's my point.

After a severe illness I collapsed and my heart stopped, only ventricular fibrillation was left. Lack of oxygen in my head made me collapse on the floor like a sack of potatoes, and I was down for 5 minutes, 15 minutes later when the paramedics arrived I woke up and then collapsed a second time.
And let me tell you, when I collapsed and my brain shut down completely there was nothing, no space, no time, no experiences not even black. It was nothing. It j

When that happened I was talking to a friend of mine, suddenly said friend screamed at me, slapped me and shook me, I thought he was making fun and I wanted to continue the conversation, but then I realized I was on the floor, bleeding from my head. He told me I was unconscious for 5 minutes, hit the table while falling. Same thing happened when the paramedics arrived. If they had not told me I lost consciousness I would have never known. When my brain stopped working entirely I ended. This happened one more time a year later, exact same thing.

So according to my experiences, when the brain stops working due to system failure or damage, everything ends. There was no light, no darkness, no me, no god with the voice of Morgan Freeman explaining stuff or pretty much anything else.

Isn't that what angles are for?

I would have needed divine intervention several times in the past 5 years. If my closest ancestors could see me, they either don't care or they can't interact, and the angels are busy elsewhere too.

 

[Famine]

Isn't that what angles are for?

Acute response, no doubt from reflex. However for those of us who've experienced suffering and incorrect decisions without a visitation from on high, a trifle obtuse, right?

 

[UKMikey]

Acute response, no doubt from reflex. However for those of us who've experienced suffering and incorrect decisions without a visitation from on high, a trifle obtuse, right?

I'm worried this explanation is becoming a little protracted.

 

[Dotini]

Isn't that what angles are for?

Angels, sometimes called aliens, are (from wiki):

benevolent celestial beings who act as intermediaries between God (or Heaven) and humanity.[1][2] Other roles of angels include protecting and guiding human beings, and carrying out tasks on behalf of God.[3] Abrahamic religions often organize angels into hierarchies, although such rankings may vary between sects in each religion. Such angels may receive specific names (such as Gabriel or Michael) or titles (such as seraph or archangel). People have also extended the use of the term "angel" to various notions of spirits or figures found in other religious traditions. The theological study of angels is known as "angelology". Angels expelled from Heaven are referred to as fallen angelsas distinct from the heavenly host.

If we take the view that angels are carrying out tasks on behalf of god, and assume that our universe is a matrix created from consciousness, then angels can be seen as technicians or janitors maintaining the wiring and plumbing of our holographic reality.

The following was published as military news in Popular Mechanics, a very mainstream outlet with longstanding connections to government and industry, and to debunking conspiracy theories:

vision of a figure descending from the sky could have come from a shared, human experience or observation. When religion is a lens to explain the universe, unexplainable phenomena can become religion.

https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/a29189536/ufo-sightings/
https://exonews.org/angels-airships-and-aliens-the-3500-year-history-of-ufo-sightings/

 

[TenEightyOne]

If we take the view that angels are carrying out tasks on behalf of god

What if we don't?

 

[Dotini]

What if we don't?

No biggy. You will not be judged, cast out or held apostate by any dogma or authority that I acknowledge. Jump in with both feet. Your experience is valuable.

 

[Imari]

Angels, sometimes called aliens...

Angels and aliens are pretty distinct concepts. I don't see the value in conflating them.

 

[JKgo]

Angels and aliens are pretty distinct concepts. I don't see the value in conflating them.

...I almost pasted a picture of an Angel from Neon Genesis Evangelion here, but thought that was inappropriate for this discussion for some reason, so I shall refrain.

 

[FoRiZon]

Atheists, explain this!

 

[mustafur]

Atheists, explain this!

The comments are Top Tier lol.

 

[TenEightyOne]

Atheists, explain this!

Explain what? Why somebody would post a weird children's cartoon?

 

[Rallywagon]

Explain what? Why somebody would post a weird children's cartoon?

I know sometimes jokes and sarcasm can be hard to read on the interweebz, but surely you didnt miss it in that post...

 

[TenEightyOne]

I know sometimes jokes and sarcasm can be hard to read on the interweebz, but surely you didnt miss it in that post...

I'm sorry to say that I did and still do.

 

[Rallywagon]

I'm sorry to say that I did and still do.

Well ok then

 

[BobK]

I'm sorry to say that I did and still do.

As did I.

 

[2_FAST_4_U]

As I previously mentioned I am a true believer who has seen much in life, so here's a news flash for y'all with a little old wisdom... I know of at least 900+ people that voted who are headed to hell if they don't repent and change their vote before they get old like me and then pass away. Sadly, at my age I'll be looking down on them sooner or later.

 

[Kevstah2004]

Believe in yourself an the rest will follow, the biggest downfall in human existence is doubt, don’t waste time contemplating or thinking, just do it.

All Religions are fake and where created as a coping mechanism to trick the subconscious into being able to justify ones life actions.