WARNING: Kind of a downer thread!

[Delano]

How cool are you with the whole mortality thing?

For the record, I hate it. I'd probably be like the Richard Nixon head on "Futurama" if that would work to keep me around. I love the experiences this world provides, and for all that to suddenly cease to exist (for me, for all intents and purposes, with me, along with any frame of reference) is totally depressing. And the thought of no longer being with my kids, or that my kids will someday end up the same...(sigh)

That's the one drawback of atheism/agnosticism- nothing uplifiting about it. I envy the believers, but I find myself completely unable to believe, because it runs completely contrary to all rational thought and logic.

Sometimes, I think I'd just like to have some quack hypnotize me to believe fervently in an afterlife. I'm sure that it would be very comforting.


I realize that this is not a constructive train of thought, but it is one that occurs to me every so often since I passed thirty a few years back...

[LabMonkey]

1. Highlander

I want to live forever unless I get my head lopped off by another immortal.

Seriously,

Death sucks. But without it, life would be worthless.
Death gives life worth. Im not religous. I expect that
its the big zippo, doughnut, nada. There is no evidence
to convince me yet of any conciousness after brain death.
Dont worry about it so, worrying will not solve it or make
you feel better. Make a difference in the people around you.
Remember those you loved that are gone. They live in you that
way. When your on your death bed, its not the things you did
that you regret, its the things you didnt do. Its cliche, but
its true. Live.
And dont bag on those who believe in something either.
They need it. Just like we need proof or science. They need
what they believe. Maybe its a defense mechanism, an emotional
buffer, A survival tool to give meaning to things rather then
go crazy. A comfort in bad times. Your right, I envy that too
in a certain way. But I find ways to make things work for me
without supernatural beliefs. Dispite all the strife religion
causes, im pretty sure its just a part of why were so sucessful a species. Were curious, we dont like mysteries. We want answers, explanations. Ive always thought that someday when supernatural
beliefs start to fade, maybe people will realize we have to get
it right in this world. Oh well, star trek isnt here yet. Someday.
Definately someday.

[Oggy]

2. Pretty close to my view on life

we live on through those still alive.

[wickerwoman]

3. We get one life and one planet.

If more people would accept this, maybe they would be less quick to fuck both of them up.

[LabMonkey]

9. Pale Blue Dot

I know one day we will have the ability to travel to other
worlds, until then...........

Carl Sagan..........

http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/pale_blue_dot.html


... Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there - on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors, so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light.

Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

[xchrom]

4. i'm a believer -- but i think this life is pretty cool

not anxious to trade it in.

[MrSlayer]

5. Other: I don't believe in afterlife nor am I afraid of death.

All men are equal when their memory fades. The way to immortality is to never be forgotten for good or for ill.

[NoPasaran]

6. I'm looking forward to nonexistence

I'm not in a big hurry mind you but I'm cool with it.

[johnnie]

7. I believe in reincarnation..

...although I have no first hand experience with it.
As for an afterlife, I am 100% sure it exists. I have had too many experiences in my own life and also information that others have personally shared with me to think otherwise.
I don't push my beliefs on others because I believe we all learn and grow at our own speed. I used to fear death as a child and early teen, but because of certain events in my life, I accept death as life and I have no fear. Also because of these experiences I have learned to accept life on it's terms and I find myself much happier and content on many levels.
It really does sadden me when I see so much worry, pain and suffering in the world and with people I know and love. Living isn't all that hard, people make it that way for themselves.

[Throckmorton]

8. I no longer fear death,

After April's death, it all became a lot less frightening to me.

We are all going to die, and what happens after that is anyones guess. As for me, having truely seen the process, I just can't get to worked up about it anymore.