Question for the week-end.

[fshrink]

Why would someone need to know what happens after his/her death?

[Az]

1. Doubt is one of the leading causes of stress

Psych 101 teaches us that where there is a small amount of uncertainty our mind creates a tremendous amount of stress trying to resolve the issue. If we are very certain of a thing, then no matter how calamatous it may be we can deal with it. But should there be little information and a number of possible outcomes our mind will create an extrodinary amount of uncertainty and stress.

Death is the great unknown journey. Many may claim otherwise but no one has truly died and come back to tell the tale.

We have a natural drive to survive. Some may be able to accept death as an outcome but no one looks forward to it in the short term. Everyone deals with death as a long term consideration.

But sometimes life forces us to deal with things we would rather take as a remote issue. Loved ones are killed. We are told our life is being cut short. We suddenly have to deal with death. Often our attachment to our loved ones is so great we cannot fathom the idea of them being gone. Our own identity is the universe as we know it. How does something like that simply wink out? These are questions that some may demand answers to other than accepting none existance.

Identity continues as one of the great mysteries of our world. Even with our advanced science and understanding the very nature of existance remains just out of our reach. As we do not understand how such a thing can exist it is equally a mystery to explain how it can suddenly stop existing. Sure to us it would seem that when the body dies the mind goes with it. But others philosophies do not tie the mind to the body.

In the end our mind's are naturally inquisitive. Death along with many other aspects of our nature remain mysterious. Not all answers we offer are objective and detached. Many offer what we hope the nature of the universe is. That our identity persists is one of the most consistant hopes among cultures. It is little wonder that so many hold to their hopes of survival.

[fshrink]

3. There's no doubt about death.

My question was more about the need of creating an after. Since nearly everybody agrees that there's no physical intervention possible after death, why the need? To hallucinate a better world? In which case, it amounts to acknowledging, albeit implicitly, that one's life is shitty and that there's nothing to do about it. Note that "life after death" is not necessarily a religious position... Religions just use it as a vector.

[Az]

5. Different reasons and paths

First off, no doubt? You and I may have a sense of what life is but not everyone else is as informed. The hows and whys of life are immense mysteries to many. And some beliefs include the notion that their bodies will be reunited with their spirits in the next life. So intervention is very possible within the constructs if not reality.

As to the utility of such a belief. It is very useful for a developing social construct. Creating the notion of an afterlife in which a soul of spirit survives creates a means to usurp our own self preservation instincts for it's own purpose. Since our natural inclination is to save ourself by redifining our sense of self as something not necissarily associated with our body it redirects our tendencies to propogate it's nature.

This of course is not a conscious action on the part of religion. Rather it is simply a methodology that has proven very succesful and therefore is dominant to some extent within such evolutionary social constructs. By creating this tandem notion of soul and afterlife people become invested in not only believing such a thing but also propogating it. Once connected to the god concept a structure of authority combines with this particular carrot and a primary impetus of promoting the god concept further is created.

[politicat]

2. My bigger question is why do we wonder less about where we were

before birth than we do about where we go after death.

Same concept, but the former gets nearly no airplay.

And if you're talking about physical remains, I'd say that has more to do with the (correct, in my mind) idea that our bodies are our sole possessions, and dealing with the body is rather like making out the will and disposing of the family possessions. One more bit of stuff that has to be cleaned up, and most of us don't like to leave messes for others.

[fshrink]

4. Because of what I propose above. eom