Explaining Death - Page 4

We don't know really anything about death. We know what can cause it, but we don't know for real what comes after it. So what can you say? You can't pretend like you know about death, and if I had to explain to a child what death was, I wouldn't. Maybe just something like "he/she's gone and not coming back, where they've gone, nobody knows, but we'll never see them again." and you could explain that this happens after everyone's life is over and they've lived out their time on earth.

Or, if the child asks "where is he/she?" you could just simply say. "I don't know. But we won't see him/her again."

Whoah woah woah woah *bleep*ing woah.

Exactly how many people here have *bleep*ing died?

There is no logical reason the universe exists either. There will always be mysteries in life that we as humans will not understand, but If you fall into that same category of "everything just happened", then you actually don't have any place in a legitimate discussion with those that study and research further, because for you, "everything just happened and there is no reason to believe what you cannot see."

There, you set yourself in one place, while others keep an open mind to realize we harness the tools to continue further in discovery and hope that one day new discoveries are made to benefit mankind. Like evolution, we are still evolving, but the one thing that keeps mankind moving along, is not resting on one belief, but taking it further to discover, expand, and become more intelligent.

If everyone believed the universe was just a random order of chaos, and no one cared, we wouldn't be where we are today.

quote Jak66

There is no logical reason the universe exists either. There will always be mysteries in life that we as humans will not understand, but If you fall into that same category of "everything just happened", then you actually don't have any place in a legitimate discussion with those that study and research further, because for you, "everything just happened and there is no reason to believe what you cannot see."

There, you set yourself in one place, while others keep an open mind to realize we were given the tools to continue further in discovery and hope that one day new discoveries are made to benefit mankind. Like evolution, we are still evolving, but the one thing that keeps mankind moving along, is not resting on one belief, but taking it further to discover, expand, and become more intelligent.

If everyone believed the universe was just a random order of chaos, and no one cared, we wouldn't be where we are today.

So much BS so little time. Science has investigated and proven many things that can't be seen, take Quantum Mechanics for example. Another example, Einstein predicted black holes using nothing but mathematics long before they where detectable, and we still can't actually see them today, just measure them by their effect on things around them. So yes, even within scientific naturalism there are reasons to believe things that you cannot see.

quote Jak66

If everyone believed the universe was just a random order of chaos, and no one cared, we wouldn't be where we are today.

I'm not to sure what this is even about, scientific naturalism which I'm fairly sure DG subscribes to dose not say the universe is random order of chaos or that no ones cares, quite the opposite, it says the universe is governed by unchanging laws that we can come to understand through the scientific method.

I don't know why you would say there's no logical reason the universe exists, the truth is we don't know how or why the universe exists so trying to make extrapolations about the logic of it is pretty pointless. I guess you point was DG was doing the same thing with life after death, but it seems he was just applying something like Occam's razor to say given what we currently know about physical brains and their link to conciousness it seems very illogical to think that conciousness could be sustained without a physical brain. Further more it's very illogical for us to even have physical brains if they are completely unnecessary for conciousness.

It would mean we have these huge lumps of grey matter in our head that are consumption hungry, make out heads so big we can kill our mothers in child birth, can kill us or render us permanently incapacitated and/or mentally/physically damaged but don't actually offer any function or use at all. Occam's razor says something is up with the logic there.

I would simply tell them the person that died in question would be basically going to sleep for a very long time. I wouldn't dive any deeper than that.

And that's why honesty is the best policy in my opinion. You stop being aware of anything. You do not dream. The atoms that make up your body are recycled into other lifeforms eventually.

Of course you'll need to explain atoms.

Death is not unfortunate,it's only be gone

DG

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The existence of a soul simply does not make sense. There is no reason to have a body if you can see, hear, think etc without one.

I could debate philosophy for a lifetime. It's a slightly narrow perspective to be able to look, objectively, at death and come out with only one conclusion, rather than a range of possibilities. Frankly, in my opinion, it makes even less sense to exist with no purpose other than simply existing.

But, for a moment, I can indulge you: Perhaps, if there is a God, we are given bodies as a means to carry out the actions that our souls desire to. Physically, it seems as though it would be a virtual impossibility for an incorporeal life form to carry out the very actions that supposedly determine whether or not we are heaven or hell bound.

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Thus "you stop existing" is way more likely than the religious alternative.

It needn't even be a matter of religion vs. science. Maybe there is no God at all, but souls are, indeed, a reality. In this scenario, would it not be a possibility for an individual to exist beyond the point of a bodily death, in spite of there being no reward for it? Science, as of now, still has an infantile understanding of the universe. We are discovering particles that we never were aware of, so perhaps there is far more pertaining to the spirit that we are currently blind to.

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I don't believe in encouraging people to believe falsehoods.

It is not perpetuating the belief in a falsehood, and to encourage someone with a very limited understanding of life and death to believe that there is nothing more is a good way to forever dampen a young spirit. These aren't 'people' we're talking about in the typical sense. They would, obviously, be young children who are impressionable and would be won over by the simplest argument from an adult mind. Allow them to come to their own realizations and to ask their own questions, and sometimes you need to bite the bullet and accept that there is no correct belief except for the one that works for the individual that holds it.

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You could say "There's no way of knowing since nobody ever returns from death" but encouraging some random theory a kid comes up with based on absolutely nothing doesn't seem right.

Typically, the child's formulated concept of death is not the child's own. It is generally the teachings they have grown up with, especially in a religious household. To instill atheistic views in the child of a religious family would be, in and of itself, an unfeeling action. As well, to conflict with the child's ideology is to impose your will on one who is unable to properly reason out what they are being told. It is ultimately the responsibility of the parent to aid a child in understanding the process of death, to the best of their ability, so I would not take much issue if it is your own child you'd raise with a somewhat disillusioned view of life and death. But, it seems as though it's easier on kids if they are reared with some whimsy and wonder, rather than the dull, calculated point of view that "If science hasn't proven it, it doesn't exist."