If there is no concrete evidence of an afterlife, why is our culture so obsessed by the notion?

Question

Is the sense of an afterlife 'in built'? Is it nature's trick of making us cope with death? Or is it purely natural because it is true? Do we believe things because we are told to believe them or because we instinctively know it to be a part of the natural order of things?

Answer 1

U will come to know when u r dead that after life exists or not. But there is problem. If there is not an afterlife it will cause no harm.Howerver if it is then what u will do?. Then u will have no choice at that time.

Answer 2

Two reasons. One, we really don't want to think that when we are gone we are gone and neither do the people who loved us and two justice. For most cultures the afterlife is the great equalizers. Only the good, or the enlightened etc. get into the good place and the bad and greedy and such go to hell or don't get an afterlife at all depending on religion. That way even if the evil aren't caught or the good only have bad things happen to them it doesn't matter because in the long run it will all be worth it and everyone will get their just deserts. Our culture which is raised on happy endings and Christian teaching find that thought very comforting, but don't think that humanity's preoccupation with life after death is in any one culture, every religion finds the afterlife important.

Answer 3

People think there's an afterlife because (a) they're afraid of death, (b) they can hardly believe they're going to die and that everything comes to an end because, well, we've never known any different, (c) thinking that 'it goes on' makes them feel closer to their own dead loved ones and satisfies their need to be recognised and missed after they themselves die, (d) having an afterlife suggests that there's a 'parental' being or force that is looking after us, which many people find comforting.

It's not by nature but by the intellect of human beings that has caused people to invent a convoluted method of denying their own mortality.

Also, since people can't come back from genuine death, there is a lot of mystery around the near-death experiences that some people have. It seems to suggest that there's another world which is invisible to the living, which is a destination for those who die. It might not be true, but people use it to support their beliefs that there's something else going on after death.

I wouldn't worry about it too much -- like birth it's something we all go through, and there's nothing you can do about it to influence your experience of it or to prevent it from happening.

Answer 4

1) it's a mistake to assume that because YOU don't have "evidence" of an afterlife, that no-one has evidence
2) our "culture" isn't "obsessed" by the notion of an afterlife. rather, some spend a lot of their time discussing it; others are comfortable with their belief of it's existence (or non-existence) and spend little more time thinking about it; still others, don't concern themselves about it at all
3) a "sense" of an afterlife is specific to each individual, and is not for another to determine whether or not it was "built in"
4) "nature" having "tricks" is subjective
5) having to "cope" with death is subjective
6) believing things are "true" because they are "natural" (and vice versa) is subjective
7) beliveing things "because" we are told to is one of the generational struggles
8) believing in the existence of a "natural order" that we "know" by instinct is subjective
so...
why does it seem that so many people spend so much of their time thinking/talking about in idea that appears to be indeterminable?
answer: riddles are fun to work on and pleasurable to solve
(note: "solving" is subjective)

Answer 5

Humans were originally created to live forever. If Adam & Eve hadn't have sinned, humanity would have stayed perfect & so lived forever. (ROMANS 5:12)

Because of this, God created us with the longing to live forever. Death is unacceptable to us (ECCLESIATES 3:11) Think about it - it would be cruel to create us with a longing to go on living but an ability to fulfill this, wouldn't it?
And we know God is a loving God (1 JOHN 4:8)

This longing we have to live forever is fed by Satan when he lyingly told Eve that she wouldn't die if she ate the fruit (she did).
The idea that somehow something survives the body when we die is an extention of that first lie that Satan told Eve.

The soul is not separate from the body. A person IS a soul
GENESIS 2:7

ECCLESIASTES 9:5 & 10 shows what happens we die

The only hope for a dead person is a resurrection - onto the earth
JOHN 5:28, 29
PSALM 37:11, 29

That is the truth of the scriptures

Answer 6

Whether true or not, I do think it is a natural belief. We and our ancestors have watched the sun die every night and rise again the next morning for centuries, and we've watched the seasons change from fall to winter and back to spring again. Everything in nature follows a pattern of death and rebirth, and one way or the other, it is, I think, innately logical to assume that we do as well.

Answer 7

Because man is so arrogant and full of his own self importance that he feels that he cant possibly just die, like the animals and plants.If religious people felt that THIS was there only chance of life..they wouldnt spend quite so much time starting wars and making people lives a misery with their superstitous nonsense!

Now wouldnt that be great!

Answer 8

If theres no afterlife why do people see ghosts? and why do people think that if someone sees a ghost that they imagined it or wanted to see it? We of this world will never no until we die, yet we judge people who believe themselves to have seen something strange.

Answer 9

It would be quite depressing to know that after this life, that's it. It's nice to believe that there's more to life.

Even me, a non-religious by far, believe in reincarnation because I believe in a soul and a soul is energy and energy cannot simply disappear.

Answer 10

because we are the only ones that are aware of our mortality. Yet man finds it hard to believe that we are but mortal. Thus we invented afterlife.