Can you imagine not being? What do you think happens to us?

Question

I cannot imagine not being connected to life on earth. I am not religeous, I am not spiritual.

Answer 1

Sartre claims that, ironic as it seems, non-being is 'real.' But that's not exactly what you are asking.

From that point of view, which I don't accept, think to yourself: what was I like before I was born? You can not, and that is your answer.

Answer 2

This is not a very uncommon feeling among humans, far from it. It is very human to think or feel like this. If I may speak for all human beings, then I would say that we all have a sense of excellence innate to our nature. We have intuitive feelings of being more than what we know we are. We all feel that we are on a journey towards some mysterious but original destination. We interpret this sometimes in our fantasies. We dream, write science fiction, study religion, and find ourselves immersed into mystical and parapsychological investigations. Is it all in vain, is this all but meaningless?

The important fact is that the very places, that we want to leave behind to fly off to somewhere magical, are the places where our dreams grow. My sincere suggestion, therefore, would be that it is better for you to stay on the earth where you can find time, leisure, mind and heart to think about all the worlds in the world. This is an opportunity. Stay put, and don't go anywhere!!

Answer 3

I'm not religeous myself but I believe in something. Put it in basics the only thing that seperates us from a dead person is our life force. I like to beleive nature gives us this life force to rent, when the shell we use to hold the life force is done she takes it back ready for the next customer. I reckon it all gets mixed up and that's why once in a while someone believes they were someone else in another life.

There is an order to things, what tells the trees to start growing in spring? or where on the body your leg should grow? We are already mapped out. You are connected to the earth in life and death.
I can't believe that after growing something slowly from seed that life just ends abruptly, it doesn't start abruptly!
Remember every action has an equal and negative reaction, then the same has to be in life.

Babbled on enough now...back to reality, life sucks!

Answer 4

Interesting question...

It is impossible to imagine 'nothing' (Try it - the nearest you'll probably be able to get is imagining total blackness, or whiteness, or grey. Which is still 'something', even if it's not specific)

So for me, we can never reach a state of 'not being' - our consciousness, which is more developed than any other life form, cannot concieve of 'nothingness' - of non-existence - , so I do not believe that that consciousness can ever cease to exist.

There is a theory that suggests that all matter is made up of energy vibrating at different wavelengths - perhaps when we 'die' the matter which forms our consciousness changes wavelengths to exist in a different way, or time, or parallel existence?

Answer 5

You cannot magine not being connected to life on earth I guess because like most of us that is all you know.

Really you don't need to think beyond that. All of your concious life you will be connected to life on earth.

No one knows for certain what happens when we die. Different religions believe in different things - these are only beliefs. They don't know for certain, regardless of what they preach. They may say it is the word of God. There is nothing to prove it is the word of God, or who God really is. The religions rely on blind faith for their continued existance.

Just enjoy life - live it to the full. Make yourself and as many others as you can happy. Do no harm to anyone. We all die one day, when you do, die with a clear concience.

If there is an afterlife, worry about that when you are in it.

Answer 6

After you're dead your body rots away. But your soul is still alive. It waits in its own dimension for its time to come again. While it is waiting it has to give an accounting for its deeds in life. What you sowed is what you reap. If you did good you get a better start in your new life. If you did bad that will come back to you in your next life. When a baby is born, the soul goes into its body.

The soul is the man himself. Or the woman.

This started from the beginning time, the souls existed before they had bodies. And it will go on for ever. When there are no more bodies, the souls will have to stay in their own space, until there are more bodies for them to go into.

Answer 7

I'm not religious either. _If_ there's anything following on, I'll have to take it - whatever. I'm about to undergo heart surgery - I might find out sooner than I wish. Fear = Nil.

I've done nothing in this life that any "right-thinking" god would find wrong, that I've not already been punished for in this life.

More philosophically, the molecules that make us up will almost certainly exist for nearly all eternity. Would we not become bored with earthly corporeal eternity?

Answer 8

Yahoo questions is as close as I can imagine to not being.

Seriously, though. No one can imagine the end of their own conciousness. I believe this is one reason why mankind created created the various forms of god with promise of an afterlife.

Answer 9

I can imagine a state of not being from this conscious view-point, but I can't imagine the actual state of not-being.

What is it like to be no longer there?

Answer 10

Not really. It seems like such a scary topic. Its like when I think of death; I get scared beyone belief. I believe in Heaven; but don't necessarily believe I am going there. Some believe you just die... and thats it. Thats very strange to accept as well.