Is it better to accept your own mortality than to engage in wishful thinking about an 'afterlife'?

Question

It seems to me that if we accept the obvious - that this life is all there is - then it must be much more precious and meaningful than it would be if it was just a brief prelude to an eternal afterlife. Everything we want to achieve or experience, we have to do in this life, or not at all. Is it better to accept this reality, than to live this life in anticipation of another life that you will never have?

Joe: Absolutely right, I would say.

crimmson: I still don't see an advantage in believing in a life that you will never have.

Answer 1

As an adult, I always prefer reality, warts and all, to even the most comforting fantasy. Living in denial is living a lie.

Answer 2

My friend instead of predetermining what the truth is, would it not be best to just accept the truth no matter what it is? I see you went to better and I want to go on to the "best". Your question seems to assume there is no "afterlife".

What is the point, purpose, or reason for mankind to learn an absolute new fact at his death that he learns by experience if it is just a waste of time and effort?

All men learn the experience of dying and of taking the last breath at the point in the sequence of death. Why? What will they do with this new knowledge if there is only mortality and no after that concept? That last learning sure seem like a waste of effort!



.

Answer 3

Maybe there is a life after this for those who believe an not one for those who don't'. I'm not sure either way but to only live like this is the only life that we will enjoy seems to me to be short sided. People who have sense save for tomorrow and live for today. IF you want a good retirement you save so that when you in your sixties and seventies you will be able to live comfortably but you can't be sure that you're going to live that long. So if you have sense you prepare for the next phase of your life while enjoying the one that you're in now. Would anticipating an after life be any different? I have four siblings who never made it to 45 but does that mean that they should not have tried to plan for when they were sixty or seventy years old because they weren't guaranteed to live that long? No most people would say that that would have been short sighted of them well I think that it's the same way with the after life. I'm not sure that there is one but I'm going to prepare for it as if I were sure that I'll get there. I think that it's the best way to live a life where you prepare for what might be in case you make it and if you don't' what have you lost?

Answer 4

it is merely been for the final a hundred years or so as that Christianity started out coaching that there is a heaven or hell and which you merely have a million existence. Christianity has it is foundation interior the Veda, Vedic Hymns, Tao teh King and Buddhism that have existed for a minimum of 2500 years. those prepare which you're an immortal being and that your adventure spans extra advantageous than a million existence. i ask your self why the Ministers and clergymen of right this moment's religions do no longer inform you that. They learn theosophy and theology, do no longer they? Hmmm... could desire to it have something to do with administration? you would be solid as long as there is the possibility of a Hell?

Answer 5

Matt D's answer about "objective" v. "subjective" morality is ludicrous. He presents it as if a deity-based morality is objective and enduring -- when of course, deity-based moral codes vary wildly depending on which deity is being referred to, and when, and where, and by whom.

The Roman Catholic god of Dorothy Day and the Roman Catholic god of Opus Dei are two wildly different deities. And that's just one example from one religion in one century. (And despite their irreconcilable differences, Pope John Paul II put both Day and the downright wicked founder of Opus Dei up for sainthood!)

Take a look at something like sexual morality in the context of the Great Goddess of the Wiccans, Kali of the Hindus, and Virgin Mary of the Catholics. Each of these deities (or, in VM's case, a saint or demi-goddess) is reputed to have very firm, and wildly different, views of appropriate human sexual conduct. How "objective" are such standards? The "objective" reality of ANY religion's moral standards are based on the highly subjective views of its human leaders.

Of course, anyone quoting a muddle-head like Dinesh D'Souza is already drinking at a shallow & cloudy well, intellectually speaking.

The reasons religions (and the governments which support them) push an afterlife is it makes people very easy to control in THIS life. The poor can be bought off with promises that "there'll be pie in the sky by-and-by" -- that the meek will inherit the earth. This makes the poor a lot more passive and a lot more willing to endure their exploitation without rebellion in THIS life -- the only life that they, and the religious and political leaders who oppress them -- will ever have.

Ptui!

Answer 6

I don't think anyone should wait in anticipation, no matter whether they believe in an afterlife or not. If there is an afterlife, you were still put on Earth to live and do something. So I say go and do it! I try not to even bother tinking about whether there's an afterlife or not; I figure I'll see (or not!) when I get there.

Answer 7

What seems obvious to one person, Icarus, may not be so obvious to another. It's all about faith, and what you believe in.

I'm an atheist, so I should have no expectations of an afterlife, but that's not the case. I believe that we have souls, and that we continue on as spirit energy, but I don't believe in heaven or hell. That's not the type of afterlife I see.

I agree that every moment spent on this earth is precious, and should be treasured as such.

Answer 8

I accept my own mortality and do not believe in any afterlife because there's no evidence for it. Maybe I just think too much or has some kind of OCD, but faith and wishful thinking just isn't enough to convince me.

Answer 9

Having lived both ways, the one you propose for 45 years and the Christian way for 3, I choose the latter.
Coming to Christ was a sloooooowwwww path that I am still walking. Now that I know Him, it is so very, very wonderful that I cannot imagine the lose of it, but chose to glory in an eternity of it.
I get everything I can, out of current life, not because of another life, it will be too different- it's purpose is to revel in His glory for ever. I get all from today because I love life, and now He is my partner in it, everyday. I've lived as an adventurer and loved it. My family lives full lives and I encourage that, much beyond the daily grind of most people. But when you bring Jesus into the picture, you open avenues of joy unimaginable otherwise.

Answer 10

No. Subjective morality is a product and an unavoidable problem of atheism.

But that really is the problem with the atheistic worldview. Not that some atheists choose to be immoral, but inherantly it provides no objective foundation for morality whatsoever. Any atheist Ive ever talked to on this subject at length eventually admits that he or she believes that morality is subjective because the bottom line is they are forced to say that morality comes from humans and not a transcendent being. If morality comes from humans, then there is nothing objective about it!

If I tell you that an apple is red, grows on trees, is a type of fruit, and grown in Washington, Ive told you a set of objective statements about an apple. These have nothing to do with how anybody personally feels about apples nor did I have a hand in determining these facts. Now if I tell you I dont like eating apples but my brother does, I didnt really tell you anything about apples, only a set of subjective statements about me and my brother.

So invariably any answer you get from atheists is going to be just that, SUBJECTIVE. They will say "well I believe doing this is good for this reason" and "well I dont believe in that so much." A subjective moral viewpoint tells you so much about the person but it doesnt tell you squat about morality itself nor clearly objectively defines what is RIGHT or WRONG. Therefore what Hitler did wasnt WRONG, you just happen to disagree with it!

Its true you dont have to be Christian in order to hold to good morality. But you do need to be a theist in order to have a proper grounding and understanding of it. Otherwise, choosing good morality to the atheist may as well be as arbitrary as picking MCD's or Burger king, you arent obliged in any objective sense to pick either. Morality becomes a subjective picking and choosing what YOU think is right and wrong and not what is ACTUAL right and wrong.

“Like Stalin and Mao, Hitler illustrates the point made by both Dostoyevsky and earlier John Locke: when God is excluded, then it is not surprising when morality itself is sacrificed in the process and chaos and horror is unleashed on the world. So it has been in our time, and all the elaborate evasions produced by today’s atheists cannot change what their anti-religious kinsmen did, cannot change the grim facts of history.” -Dinesh D'Souza