# GQ as GD: Facts vs. opinions re: the afterlife and other unprovable stuff **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 3, 2010, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876 "2010-12-03T23:30:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 19
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/361 "2010-12-10T04:41:29Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Well, of course you have to mind your body, but its not that much of a problem! If you’re going to be gone for an extended absence, just leave it safely situated, not vulnerable to the weather, or perverts. Michael Valentine Smith!!! God I just realized that the other person you remind me of, after Twain, is Jubal Harshaw! ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/362 "2010-12-10T04:49:33Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > The most obvious and compelling reason the possibility of an afterlife calls for more consideration than dragons in the garage or vampires is the fact that the vast, vast, VAST majority of human beings who are now living and who have ever lived believe in some version or degree of it, while the same cannot be said of fairies, dragons, or vampires. You don’t actually believe this is any kind of significant point, do you? Popular beliefs don’t mean jack shit. For most of human history, people believed that the sun and moon were gods. People are fucking stupid. _Ad populum_ arguments are as fallacious as it gets. Your afterlife woo remains just as impossible and ridiculous no matter how many colored fonts you use. Magical fairy spirits that live in the body and continue on their merry, fairy way after the death of the body do not deserve a _moment_ more consideration than flying spaghetti monsters, wood nymphs, dragons, hobbits, hobgoblins or Godzilla. Beliefs are not evidence. a trillion people believing something carries no more weight than one person believing it or nobody believing it. Zero times a trillion is still zero. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/363 "2010-12-10T04:51:27Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > Lobo… if you need to cling to the fantasy that you’re arguing with someone trying to sell you the afterlife, I realize now it would probably be downright cruel to continue to try and interfere. Trying to argue for the mere possibility of smurfs is just as asinine as arguing for their outright existence. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/364 "2010-12-10T04:55:42Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > Lobo… if you need to cling to the fantasy that you’re arguing with someone trying to sell you the afterlife, I realize now it would probably be downright cruel to continue to try and interfere. > > Peace. You aren’t arguing for the afterlife? You are arguing that the afterlife gets special status and different burdens of evidence than other equally or less likely things. Why are you stacking the deck against everything else in the universe with a singularly vapid standard of evidence for the afterlife if you aren’t rooting for it? There is no way to reconcile a logical view of the world with exempting your pet items from the normal requirements of evidence. You’ve also clearly demonstrated that you don’t understand that the number of people who believe something has no bearing on how true it is. Your arguments are mush. ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/365 "2010-12-10T05:23:24Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > In fact, the “emergent property” stuff is actually classified as [philosophy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergentism)! Bravo! I was wondering when I would (finally) enter the debate with you. Thanks, btw, for sticking up for me back there. I will never, ever, forget it. Thank you. Anyway… some posts back I was asking questions about emergence. Few posters knew what I was getting at. In fact, one poster gave a link to [emergence](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence) not emergent_ism_. I didn’t give a link to emergence or emergentism because I knew _someone_ would give a link to both. It took all these posts for the OP to give the link to [emergentism](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergentism) when the time came. Indeed, Stoid, was correct in posting “To prevent any wasted time (HA! HA! GOOD LUCK) I do not know whether there is an afterlife.” > [@not\_alice](#): > > No such proof can exist without a clear definition of the terms. Define the term “afterlife” without woo, THEN come back and ask for a proof about it. **Kozmik** defines [woo](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergentism). \ > [@Lobohan](#): > > Not totally true. She seems to be fooling AHunter3 and Kozmik. You’ve got it all wrong. **Stoid** and **me** are fooling everyone except **woodstockbirdybird** 😃 > [@woodstockbirdybird](#): > > Why should I? You understand perfectly what I’m saying, and since I’m responding to **Kozmik** ’s philosophical inquiries with logical answers, I feel no need to. Show me any scientist, anywhere, who disagrees with the idea that we wouldn’t exist if there was no universe, **or neurobiologists who have concluded that consciousness exists independent of living beings** , and I’ll give your nitpicking some consideration. That is the crux of the debate. There is a YouTube video which cites a [Discovery Magazine article](http://discovermagazine.com/2007/aug/unsolved-brain-mysteries). I took good notes. Before watching the video, please do not write off the YouTube channel as bullshit. Consider as a starting point that the poster of this YouTube series is posting a YouTube video in response to a Discovery Magazine article. Futher consider also that _Discovery Magazine_, like _The New York Times_, can be regarded as a reliable source. Finally, consider that the YouTube poster is responding directly to a reliable source. [Here](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYwAPF0mh-U) is the YouTube video. Here are my notes: #10 What is consciousness? comparing the mind to a computer, AI “No one assumes that the computer knows what it is doing” No one assumes that the cosmos knows what it is doing, creating consciousness. “Physical structure of the brain is responsible for the non-physical function of the mind.” function of consciousness ? structure of the cosmos ? #7 How is time represented in the brain? not at a uniform rate #6 What is intelligence? intelligence factors = mental faculties #2 How are memories stored and retrieved? Indeed facinating. Other videos on the subject. [Wilder Penfield](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilder_Penfield): "conclusion: “memories are not stored in the brain” ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/366 "2010-12-10T05:30:06Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > You aren’t arguing for the afterlife? Of course not, and you well know it. Unless… _you are not actually capable of reading_? Oh my god, THAT explains it! :smack: someone must be reading this thread to you and _ **deliberately skipping huge chunks of it** _ to make you look like a shmuck by sending you off ranting that someone’s trying to sell you the idea of an afterlife! That’s _very_ mean of them…hey **Lobo’s reader** : that’s messed up. He’s trusting you to be honest with him and you’ve been hiding the truth! Now bring him up to speed on what I’ve really said so he can stop freaking out about his imaginary afterlife-boosting opponent! Shame on you! Tsk…:mad: ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/367 "2010-12-10T05:41:07Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > Of course not, and you well know it. > > Unless… _you are not actually capable of reading_? > > Oh my god, THAT explains it! :smack: someone must be reading this thread to you and _ **deliberately skipping huge chunks of it** _ to make you look like a shmuck by sending you off ranting that someone’s trying to sell you the idea of an afterlife! > > That’s _very_ mean of them…hey **Lobo’s reader** : that’s messed up. He’s trusting you to be honest with him and you’ve been hiding the truth! Now bring him up to speed on what I’ve really said so he can stop freaking out about his imaginary afterlife-boosting opponent! Shame on you! Tsk…:mad: So instead of addressing the rest of my post where I substantiate that quote you simply are going to try to deflect because you don’t want to look silly? Protip: Don’t hold silly, illogical ideas. ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/368 "2010-12-10T05:42:51Z")
> [@Nicest\_of\_the\_Damned](#): > > You are asking for a scientific definition of something you claim scientists have said is impossible. If they think it’s impossible they probably don’t have an acceptable scientific definition. _I_ didn’t say that. I have asked for definitions from the get-go, and Stoid has been on me for that via PM too. What I said is that it is not fair to say that something is untestable without defining it. I bet if people wanted to define “afterlife” or “conscious” in a way that is testable, they could, but I also bet they know what the results will be of such testing, and fear that more than they fear the mockery from pitching woo and stonewalling defining key terms. So why don’t YOU take a crack at starting us towards a consensus of what “afterlife” means in a scientific realm before we (well, some of us :)) say that science has nothing to say about it? You don’t need a perfect definition, just what you think might be scientific (e.g. testable) and still have the sense you want it to have. We can all refine it and come to a common understading from there. Then we can put the lie to the idea that it is not testable, and that even if it is, it will be found to be something “scientific”. But let’s start by coming up together with a definition you are willing to live with and which you think is testable by science, then I and others will try to refine it with you, OK? What could be the harm? ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/369 "2010-12-10T05:52:58Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > So instead of addressing the rest of my post Lobo’s Reader: that poor man thinks he’s offered some kind of substantive response to my arguments when you’ve prevented him from knowing what they are! How can you let him continue appear so disconnected from reality? Expecting his posts full of fantasies to be “addressed” when he has no idea that he has a mountain of information in front of him regarding issues he doesn’t even know are being talked about because you’ve left him so far in the dark? I hope he did something really awful to you to deserve this mistreatment. He’s going to be really embarrassed if he ever gets a chance to see everything you left out…come to think of it, maybe you shouldn’t bring him up to speed, might be kinder to leave him in the dark rather than let him see how much he’s missed… ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/370 "2010-12-10T05:56:09Z")
> [@Kozmik](#): > > **Kozmik** defines [woo](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergentism). > \ Wait, dont’ nab my bow, dude…I linked to that. Or did you link to it before this? Fascinatin’ stuff, all of it. Although there’s certainly something to be said for the notion that this is all what is meant by navel-gazing… ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 6:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/371 "2010-12-10T06:13:54Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > Lobo’s Reader: that poor man thinks he’s offered some kind of substantive response to my arguments Your arguments are nothing but woo and bullshit. Your premise is in the title to this thread, and for 8 pages now I have been asking you to define your terms while you bob and weave. You at least found some cut and paste stuff on science terms (even though you showed you misunderstood them). When are you going to show YOUR readers the same respect and at least cut and paste a definition of afterlife that you think we can subject to testing that it is unprovable, and which makes sense to both you and us? I predict NEVER, because there is no such definition, and you know it. ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 6:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/372 "2010-12-10T06:23:42Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > Wait, dont’ nab my bow, dude…I linked to that. Or did you link to it before this? That’s just it. I deliberately didn’t give a link. I knew other posters would… Re-read and think about [my post](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13234816&postcount=365). Sarcastic irony. I just didn’t want Lobo’s reader to nab your bow. Did you watch the YouTube video? ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 7:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/373 "2010-12-10T07:15:37Z")
Yes, I watched. I didn’t watch to the end because it wasn’t grabbing me as particularly earth shattering. I reviewed the discovery article. I spent a lot of time reading and researching the whole topic, that’s why I ended up back at the beginning: we don’t know for sure. I was a little surprised to learn exactly where the “emergent property” came out of, though. Hardly hard science of anything at all, but a very interesting and thoughtful examination of the question. The “Mind/Body Question”. I knew if I put up the thread that Dopers would one way or another lead me to more information. But I figured if the definitive answer regarding the mind/body question had already come, we would know by now. (One of the best things I learned was the term mind/body question… good shorthand for a very broad and complex category of philosophy and science) ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/374 "2010-12-10T07:39:01Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > But I figured if the definitive answer regarding the mind/body question had already come, we would know by now. That right there is the poster statement for representing the state of shitty science understanding in America. I weep for all of us, that a grown, apparently educated woman has such a poor understanding, and more importantly how representative that understanding sadly is. ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/375 "2010-12-10T07:45:19Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > I didn’t watch to the end because it wasn’t grabbing me as particularly earth shattering. You should watch the entire YouTube video and all the other YouTube videos posted by Sarah in the [series](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IIxrcDcB5s&p=CD196312B2D9D0AE). I’m actually glad you said you didn’t watch to the end… because I doubt if any other posters would even click on the link! Let alone watch. ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 8:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/376 "2010-12-10T08:16:15Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > I spent a lot of time reading and researching the whole topic, that’s why I ended up back at the beginning: we don’t know for sure. I was a little surprised to learn exactly where the “emergent property” came out of, though. Hardly hard science of anything at all, but a very interesting and thoughtful examination of the question. The “Mind/Body Question”. Some people begin or end with [psychology](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_brain). Others with [politics](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_House). I began with politics. ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 8:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/377 "2010-12-10T08:41:13Z")
Now you’re going a bit link crazy… 🙂 I didn’t find her all that interesting. If you can tell me what you find so compelling I might give it another go, but so far there was nothing in the video I watched that enticed me to watch any more. She was posing the quesitons, saying "We don’t know…but what we DO know… and filling in information that wasn’t particularly new. What do you find so gripping? ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 11:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/378 "2010-12-10T11:06:14Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > Now you’re going a bit link crazy… 🙂 …only because most everyone else is freakin’ lazy! And [that](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13214975&postcount=87) is what you call Kozmik irony. 😃 😃 😃 > [@Stoid](#): > > If you can tell me what you find so compelling I might give it another go, but so far there was nothing in the video I watched that enticed me to watch any more. Can’t entice you? Darn. How about I intrique you: > [@Stoid](#): > > She was posing the quesitons, saying "We don’t know…but what we DO know… and filling in information that wasn’t particularly new. What do you find so gripping? What is consensus reality? We don’t know…but what we DO know is that > [@](#): > > children have sometimes been described or viewed as “inexperience[d] with consensus reality,” although with the expectation that they will come into line with it as they mature. - Wikipedia article on [Consensus reality](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consensus_reality#cite_ref-5) (but if Wikipedia or YouTube is unacceptable to all you reality enforcers, there is a reference to the quote in a reliable, academic source) > [@not\_alice](#): > > Could you simply look up a definition you like of the terms we are asking about and present a link, so we can all be educated as to what is in your mind? [Educated](http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/educated)? Don’t you mean [enlightened](http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/enlightened)? :rolleyes: > [@not\_alice](#): > > That right there is the poster statement for representing the state of shitty science understanding in America. I weep for all of us, that a grown, apparently educated woman has such a poor understanding, and more importantly how representative that understanding sadly is. That was uncalled for. :mad: ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/379 "2010-12-10T22:32:20Z")
[QUOTE=AHunter3] I am capable of (and tempted to) go farther. [/quote] > [@Stoid](#): > > \ yes yes! Please continue! > [@Light\_of\_Marduk](#): > > That would be nice. I’m almost passively absorbing what you’re saying, as I find it presented in a very (mentally) palatable way. [QUOTE=Paul McCartney] You’re such a lovely audience, we’d like to take you home with us, we’d love to take you home [/quote] 🙂 very well! It is difficult to imagine what “being conscious” would mean to us if we did not have any kind of exterior context (a surrounding “not-us” world) to relate to. We’d still have our body which would provide something to experience, but even the body is sufficiently outward-directed in its senses that the sensory input would be attenuated quite a bit. (For the moment, ignore problems like “lack of atmosphere is going to cause you far greater problems than that, dude”). I previously wrote about the individual sense of self and the plural sense of self, pointing out that both are valid ways of being and comprehending self. And noting that that is perhaps useful when considering whether the self can survive after the (individual) death. I ended on the quoted bit about being tempted to go further. The “further” would be another sense of self, more extensive yet, something that is to plural what plural is to singular in some meaningful way of speaking. And of course throughout this thread many contributors have been talking about the cosmos, the universe, and ourselves as being part of it (not merely “in” it) and consciousness as being a characteristic of it (not necessarily merely in the sense of “well, WE possess consciousness and now that WE exist it’s a characteristic of the universe”), so we’re pretty much thinking in the same direction. An all-encompassing sense of self that includes everything that is. [QUOTE=Attributed to I am that which is] “I am that which is” [/quote] If it is difficult imagining conscousness without any contrasting other, it is probably yet more difficult to get a handle on exactly what consciousness would be if the passage of time were not something that one experienced _as_ a consciousness. And although the equations of our physics don’t (and can’t) tell us that the universe as a whole does not experience the passage of time, they do at least suggest that time has a very different relationship to the universe as a whole than it does to you or me or even the local group of galaxies. Rather than existing in space and being something that passes through time, the universe includes all of spacetime as an aspect of itself. Where there is conscousness there may be intent, and there may perhaps be some kind of self-directed activity, but that also quickly looks like it would have to be conceptualized quite differently. For us (even the plural us), such formulations take the form of noun, verb. “I think”, or “We go”. The noun is the being, possessing all those noun-y qualities like objecthood, while the verb is a process. But when dealing with the entirety I don’t see it that way. Noun and verb become one and the same; _the_ dance is _to_ dance. The process is the noun. If this isn’t immediately self-evident, give it a moment or two. All the various local processes including the little processes that in their oscillation and reverberations create and maintain the nouns (material, matter) are little local bits and pieces of the overall process-noun; the universe is _being_ and _doing_ “galaxy”. And doing you, and I. You are an activity in which the universe is locally engaged. You are a verb. ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876/380 "2010-12-10T23:19:31Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > 🙂 very well! > > It is difficult to imagine what “being conscious” would mean to us if we did not have any kind of exterior context (a surrounding “not-us” world) to relate to. We’d still have our body which would provide something to experience, but even the body is sufficiently outward-directed in its senses that the sensory input would be attenuated quite a bit. (For the moment, ignore problems like “lack of atmosphere is going to cause you far greater problems than that, dude”). It is the body / no body issue that leads me to the assertion that the only place for evil to exist is in the physical world. Which is a wonderful exercise all in itself… The rest I must take some time to fully grok before I share any possible comment, except to say I love this: > [@](#): > > You are an activity in which the universe is locally engaged. You are a verb. I may make it my motto. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876.md?page=18) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gq-as-gd-facts-vs-opinions-re-the-afterlife-and-other-unprovable-stuff/562876.md?page=20)