To Aethist...?

Question

Lets be civil about this...and Aethist only because this important to me
Lets not talk about if you believe in God. God is not in this Question.

What of the concept of a human Soul? Scientifically we are nothing but a bunch of chemical reactions when you get down to it.

So does it scare you that your actions now reading and writing this are nothing but chemical reactions? You have no Choice in the matter?

Upon death according to you we just die. We no longer exist are passing will go unnoticed through the sand of time. How do you go on living then if ...
One you know you are nothing in this universe because you are not really reading this you are just reacting to it and
Two you won't ever exist when this is over? On your (rotting bed) because your Not on Death Bed since Death bed implies souls, what will you think to yourself?
You are about to just rot away no one cares because they are nothing but a bunch of chemicals reacting to each other.
Is this really how you exist?

So far the majority is a good group. We have the few parasites that infested the board.
arily666 get a life I am asking a question, not trying to win a Nobel Prize in Literature.

Answer 1

Just a note: no matter what we believe, Reality is what it is. I'm not saying what Reality is but ... we humans (atheists and believers alike) create bunches of beliefs and concepts that we treat as the truth.

Answer 2

There is no soul. The soul is a religious concept. I have every choice in the world, because I have the ability to make choices, being a human with a functioning mind. There is far more to the human body than just "chemical reactions." Everyone is bound to die from the day they are born. Your existential argument fails on so many levels that it's mind-boggling. Death bed does not imply anything at all about souls - it means you're in the bed you're going to die in.
I'm assuming - and I could be wrong - that you're someone of faith. I assume this because you mention souls. No one gets out of this life alive. The sooner you come to terms with that, the sooner you will see you don't need religion. Maybe you should do a bit of simple research on both the word soul and the term death bed before you ask anything else.

Answer 3

The short answer is Yes -- this is really how I exist. There is no evidence for anything that might be called a soul with a separate existence of the corporeal body. Which means that when I'm dead, I'm all gone: that is the end of every part of my existence, except for the genetic and intellectual heritage which I pass on to the next generation. Of course, I am just a bunch of interacting chemicals; given the remarkable complexity of organic chemistry, this is not news. Any system can have properties not held by its separate components.

Although in principle knowing the entire situation as well as one's entire lifetime experience would permit a calculation of what one would do in a particular situation, in practice this is of course impossible and a free will model of existence is reasonable.

Answer 4

FIrst and foremost, do you believe in God because you fear the emptiness of the world without him? Do you fear the repurcussions of losing all that is the basis of your morality? Do you believe because you fear the emptiness of death?

If so then you are of no use to your religion and you should re-examine your life and your definition of faith.

Now as to your other questions:
1. Maybe there is no soul but how does that leave us with just "a bunch of chemical reactions"? This is life as we know it. The sentience that we enjoy and the emotions we feel, cannot be separated from the chemistry that makes it up. And the chemistry allows us to be more than just driftwood at the mercy of where the stream will take us. We decide what to do with our lives. We are not dictated by chemicals. We are our pysical selves.

2. I am not nothing in this universe. With god gone, you and I now god. "God is dead, we have killed him you and I." We take his place as creator of morals, and creators of virtues. A blind follower is afraid to create it himself and needs to create a God who will tell him what to do. And for the most part, he is happy that those prophets of old has done the work for him and they tell him what to do.

3. You think its scary if after you die its all over? Scarier would be if we were stuck in an eternal recurrence. After we die we live our lives again exactly as we lived it the first time.

Whether its eternal recurrence or a simple ending, the emphasis then is the same, that we have only one life to live and hence it would be a shame to waste it.

We are not worshipers of death. We do not live for a life beyond. It is this life itself that is the ultimate good.

And in case you will accuse me hedonism, may I say that the hedonist is also a fool for he misses that their are virtues more satisfying, more life affirming than pleasure.

Answer 5

I've asked that questions before to my atheist friends as well. I don't believe I am just a bunch of chemicals, but if that's correct then the idea of religion is the same just a chemical reaction. We won't be able to do or change anything about it, we will live if the chemical tell us to, and we will die when they stop. To ask how do they go on living implies they have a choice when clearly they do not as far as they believe. If they believe its just a chemical reaction.

Answer 6

yes, although I would not necessarily put it into such dreary and strange words. I would say, "This life is what we have. So make the best of it for yourself, and for the betterment of mankind". See, it is the same thing, I just wrote it in a different tone.

Answer 7

I am an atheist and those things you speak of keep me in constant awe. It is amazing and exciting, not frightening. It is mind warping to contemplate consciousness and a little absurd at the same time.

Answer 8

Somehow that doesn't sound as inviting as someday meeting my long-gone friends and family in some wonderful afterlife. I think I will stick with believing something more comforting.

Answer 9

I'm atheist..
I'm in perpetuel wonder in front of life, it's so incredible!
enough for me, don't need to add a god on this..

Answer 10

"The point of existence is not to find the most powerful thing you can imagine and then grovel before it." [Graham Kendall]