# Does the theory of "death is like before you're born" also 100% support reincarnation? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 17, 2017, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650 "2017-04-17T18:31:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![mikecurtis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mikecurtis/32/3284_2.png) [@mikecurtis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mikecurtis)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650/81 "2017-04-19T21:20:24Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > That’s the [Courtier’s Reply](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courtier%27s_Reply). please elaborate mc ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650/82 "2017-04-19T21:40:38Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > That’s the [Courtier’s Reply](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courtier%27s_Reply). It is also an appeal to numbers logical fallacy. ---
**Author:** ![mikecurtis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mikecurtis/32/3284_2.png) [@mikecurtis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mikecurtis)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650/83 "2017-04-19T21:56:07Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > It is also an appeal to numbers logical fallacy. i never said it was true because so many people believe it. i was pointing out to **czarcasm** that he was dismissing as foolish something that many believe. if you or he dont believe in reincarnation or whatever else, thats your prerogative. i merely point out that you two are not giving others the same consideration. what is being discussed here is not form the mouths of “people being below average in intelligence.” mc ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650/84 "2017-04-19T22:08:01Z")
That’s true. Many very intelligent people nevertheless believe foolish things. Some of us have been here a long time. We’ve had many threads examining the evidence for and against reincarnation. Many of us have also spent quite a bit of our lives investigating and examining the evidence for spiritual, supernatural, and paranormal claims. The consensus here is that the evidence for reincarnation is very far from sufficient for belief, and in fact the evidence against it is overwhelming. A belief in something that goes against the available evidence is a foolish belief, even if the people holding that belief are intelligent and hold out it of ignorance, cultural baggage, poor epistemology, or any number of reasonable but fallacious lines of reasoning. ETA: That’s the point of the “Courtier’s Reply.” It doesn’t matter how many people believe something or even how smart, sophisticated, and eloquent they are. It only matters what the evidence is, and how they got from the evidence to their conclusions. (Evidence can be loosely defined as “valid reasons for believing something.” If you have no evidence, you have no reason to believe it. If you have insufficient evidence, you have insufficient reason to believe it.) ---
**Author:** ![Canadjun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/76d3ee/32.png) [@Canadjun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Canadjun)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650/85 "2017-04-19T22:16:08Z")
> [@buddha\_david](#): > > Technically speaking, only 50% of people are below average intelligence. And that’s very unlikely to change. 50% of people are below **median** intelligence. ---
**Author:** ![mikecurtis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mikecurtis/32/3284_2.png) [@mikecurtis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mikecurtis)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650/86 "2017-04-19T22:30:57Z")
> [@Alan\_Smithee](#): > > The consensus here is that the evidence for reincarnation is very far from sufficient for belief, and in fact the evidence against it is overwhelming. . . .A belief in something that goes against the available evidence is a foolish belief, i agree there is no solid evidence for what we are talking about, but there also is no solid evidence against it either despite your claim. if this were a discussion in GQ or GD then you might have a case for calling it an incorrect belief. but here in _ **IMHO** _ the fact that it has been believed by billions of people for thousands of years should hold some weight. we’re not discussing antivax, or young earth theories that have actual scientific evidence to consider. we’re talking about spiritual beliefs, for which the only evidence is what you “believe” to be true. all i’m saying is; if you choose not to believe something for which there is no scientific evidence, then good for you. you may very well be right. but, please dont dismiss as foolish or silly those who do choose to believe (or may just wish to debate). you may very well be wrong. mc ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650/87 "2017-04-19T22:49:32Z")
> [@mikecurtis](#): > > if you or he dont believe in reincarnation or whatever else, thats your prerogative. i merely point out that you two are not giving others the same consideration. In other words, [Teach the controversy!](https://www.google.com/search?q=Teach+the+controversy&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiVm92UzbHTAhUOxGMKHcjFD2EQ_AUICCgB) ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2017, 6:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650/88 "2017-04-20T06:13:50Z")
> [@mikecurtis](#): > > i never said it was true because so many people believe it. i was pointing out to **czarcasm** that he was dismissing as foolish something that many believe. Ever had the flu? Curious word, that. What is it, “influenza”? What does that mean? Thing I heard was that “influenza” is shorthand for “influence of the stars”. Which is to say, it was _believed_ that the flu was a sort of astrological effect. That is just a tiny example of the sort of thing that lots of people have believed. Very many of those things have proven to be nonsensical. We have a complete non-mystical model for the “soul”, which grants it no special properties. So far, there is nothing else to go on, other than vaporware. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2017, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650/89 "2017-04-20T14:45:24Z")
> [@mikecurtis](#): > > … if you or he dont believe in reincarnation or whatever else, thats your prerogative. … The OP asks a specific question and the answer, whatever you believe, is that no, a belief that “death is like before you are born” does not “100% support reincarnation.” It does not logically follow that in any way. It could be _consistent_ with a belief in reincarnation and it is consistent with a belief that there is no ghost in the machine, with those who believe that we are simply “not” when we do not exist. It is also consistent with many other belief systems of everlasting souls or existence that do not include reincarnation. It would, for example, be also consistent with a belief our souls are like water and a drop is placed into the vessel of our minds as we are born (or at conception, or at 40 days …) and when we die that drop goes back to be mixed into the ocean of collective nonliving soul-fluid, no longer having any individuality and while part of a metaphorical water cycle no single drop or special snowflake ever being the same. Why not? An individual wanting to believe in reincarnation, or heaven-hell, or collective souls water cycle, as a personal belief system is fine by me, but the clear difficulty the OP formulator has is in not being able to grasp that something can be “not” and that nonexistence is not existence in some other form somewhere else floating about or being held somewhere. Even mocking an insistence that what we “are” _has to_ go somewhere is not dismissing a belief that they do as “foolish” … it is calling the “has to” part, and the inability to understand that “off” means “off”, that “not” means simply “not”, as foolish. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2017, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650/90 "2017-04-20T14:53:50Z")
> [@mikecurtis](#): > > i never said it was true because so many people believe it. i was pointing out to **czarcasm** that he was dismissing as foolish something that many believe. I didn’t say that his definition of “non-existence” was foolish-I said it was _wrong_…and I challenge you to show that many others believe in his bizarre definition of “non-existence”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-theory-of-death-is-like-before-youre-born-also-100-support-reincarnation/784650.md?page=4)