The issue really is
rather simple and at the same time complicated: IS THERE A SOUL, and if there
is, DO WE SOMEHOW SURVIVE OUR DEMISE IN SOME FORM OR ANOTHER?
Coming to
terms with one’s mortality is a rather awkward and pesky subject, when you have
to deal with it at the time one very close to you ceases to have life in that
shell of bones and flesh, and then you are almost forced to at the very least
think about it.
It is clear to many of us that the need to have some reassurance that
the essence of who and what we are somehow survives our biological life span.
It is the reason for the existence of faith, for the need to explain the
unexplainable and for the fabrication of myths and superstitions. Most of these
take on a form of RELIGIOUS FAITH because the religious organizations have
learned that to exploit these insecurities and these questions that really have
no answer is a very profitable enterprise.
Having said that, I am a firm believer in science; science is defined as
the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of
the structure and behavior of the physical and natural...
a. The observation, identification, description, experimental
investigation, and theoretical
explanation of phenomena.
b. Such activities restricted to a
class of natural phenomena.
c. Such activities applied to an object
of inquiry or study.
2. Methodological activity, discipline,
or study: I've got packing a suitcase down to a science.
3. An activity that appears to require
study and method: the science of purchasing.
4. Knowledge, especially that which is gained
through experience.
I have posted many times opinions that dealt with this subject of immortality
but never have I compiled it altogether in a cohesive essay. I think that the
predominant theme for me is that we as humans are not intelligent enough to
understand the origins of the universe and the nature of the human condition,
let alone the physical aspect of our existence.
It is also clear to me that because man has an enormous ego, he is
unable to deal with his finality, it is unthinkable that there exists the
possibility that the soul or spirit or whatever you want to call our cognitive
abilities does not overrides the physical demise of our bodies. I like to think
otherwise, I want to have some concrete and plausible evidence that it does,
but my limited knowledge tells me otherwise.
I do know this: that “faith” or religious beliefs are not the answer.
Faith is a train of thoughts, a fabricated and illusory set of concepts that
have no basis or any scientific backing. I may want for it to be some kind of place or realm where the essence of what is me somehow transcends death but
that is the extent of it…it comes right down to wishful thinking. I can’t prove
there is or there isn’t an afterlife.
I look at it this way, since man has been on this earth there has been
not one person who has died and return to tell us what lies beyond if anything.
We also know that there is no way in hell that those who have perished can
communicate with the living, to do otherwise is the job of crackpots.
There is no stronger bond than the
one of a mother and her child and we see how time and time again a mother
passes and leaves children behind and there is no interaction or any further
influence by her and the offspring. This tells me that if something beyond
death exists then it is not possible to have any kind of interaction or
physical manifestation. Here are those who “talk to God” and those who “God
talks to them” either are motivated by faith or being delusional.
Since I
discard religious explanations and conjectures as quackery, I rule them out and
it also tells me why some religions (most of them) reject science and
discourage the followers of those religions to learn anything from science or
to believe in it. There is plenty of evidence we find in the fossil deposits
and the paleontology finds that the world is older than 6,000 years and that
dinosaurs didn’t live at the same time than humans did.
Astrology, séances, mediums, fortune tellers, prophets and religion are
in my mind in the same category: PURE UNADULTERATED CRAP.
When my mom passed away, I was agonizing over the course of action
relating to the disposal of her remains. I still carry with me the baggage of
the mindset that there is a need for a mortal body in order to have some kind
of transition into the other realm of spirituality or if heaven exists to that
place…but I also take into consideration that a far more repugnant option is to
have the body consumed by maggots and then again you have millions of people
who die in fires and there is nothing left of their remains. My mom wanted to
be cremated if for no other reason than to spare the very few left in her life
of the grief and the burden of a wake and a funeral, not to speak of the
expenses. She told me that it didn’t matter in her mind since every one of her
friends and siblings were already dead. So we opted for cremation.
I am so jealous of your writing skill. This is a great post and very true. I have given up trying to convince the fanatics they are slaves to an idea. the rat
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