# Theory of reincarnation - credible or not and why? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 19, 2006, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712 "2006-01-19T20:43:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/21 "2006-01-20T13:09:12Z")
> [@Wesley Clark](#): > > I don’t think it is credible for a few reasons. > > 1. Most conceptions ended in early death. In [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=352592) it was found that even with competent nutrition and prenatal care about 30% of conceptions do not make it to a full term healthy birth. In the olden days it was probably closer to 40-50% with no prenatal care and bad nutrition. Combine that with the fact that through much of human history only about 50% of kids made it to the age of 6 and you have the fact that only 1/4th of conceptions actually lead to a child being born and growing up. There isn’t much karma to work out if you die when you are in the womb or die at age 3. That is a hard question. Why do innocents suffer, especially very young children? One thing that was pointed out to me is that events don’t just affect the individual they also affect all those involved. Perhaps that particular soul was destined to die young in order to balance Karma for the adults involved rather than it’s own. > [@](#): > > 1. The population keeps growing. About 9.5% of all humans that have ever lived currently are alive today (50 billionish have lived, 6 billion are alive now). There are as many people in Indonesia (240 million) as there were on the entire planet when Jesus was born (about 250 million). > > [http://www.geocities.com/dtmcbride/reference/population-world.html](http://www.geocities.com/dtmcbride/reference/population-world.html) > > So souls are coming out of nowhere to make up this population deficit. Simply… So what? Wasn’t that true from day one? If we imagine souls as eternal spiritual beings then waiting a few centuries or even a billion years per **SM** s post, to be incarnated or reincarnated doesn’t really matter in a realm that is timeless. It only seems importent to we who measure time. > [@](#): > > 1. Good and evil are social constructs. You may say ‘what causes pain is evil’ but even that is a social construct as people who victimize evil people (someone who harasses a child molester for example) is not really considered to be an evil person by society at large even though they are causing pain. Someone who flies over Northern Iraq and drops chemical weapons on the Kurds inherits negative Karma but a farmer who flies over a field and sprays pesticide (pesticide and chemical weapons are almost identical chemically) to kill the bugs does not. Who is to say which is worse, because good and evil are constantly changing. In 200 years and in some cultures killing an insect is no different than killing a human. There is no universal system of good and evil. Good and evil are largely dependent on our social and individual identities which are largely cultural. I certainly don’t think it’s about good and evil or what causes pain in their relative sense. I see it as positive and negative energy and balance. It’s about the true intent of our choices and the ripples that each choice causes. IMHO Love and truth are the positives, and fear and dishonesty are the negatives. Moment to Moment we choose , positive or negative, and those choices affect our lives and the lives of those around us. Some effect is small as a butterfly’s beating wings affects the weather, but other choices are more significant and have far reaching effects. The cumulative effect of our choices sets the parameters for our next incarnation. > [@](#): > > 1. Nobody remembers their past lives. How can you make amends for something you don’t understand? If I did something in 1559 I don’t remember it. Because you still are choosing, positive or negative. “To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction” If you chose a negative in a past life an opportunity of similar equity will occur in this one and you will choose again. Suppose you chose the negative energy of anger and vengence rather than forgiveness. In this life there might be an act of anger and vengence against you and you must choose to continue the cycle of anger and violence or forgive and diffuse it with positive energy. > [@](#): > > 1. The level of effort required to survive has consistenly gone down the last 100+ years. Someone born today in a poor household has it better than someone born into a rich household 100 years ago. The same will apply 100 years from now when the world’s population is around 11 billion. Toil and suffering as a whole are going down globally and will continue to do so. Many diseases have been conquered, half of the world’s governments are liberal democracies, gross human rights abuses that were common 50-100 years ago in places like China, Japan, the USSR, Turkey or Germany (to name a few) are now constrained to a handful of small third world countries. Could this mean that in general we are more spiritually evolved than we were a few hundred years ago and more souls are choosing the positive which alters the balance of the world. > [@](#): > > 1. If God created the potential for suffering God cannot be benevolent. It doesn’t matter if God doesn’t force us to suffer. If He made it possible, he isn’t benevolent. If I start a fire I make it possible for people to warm themselves, cook their food, and see in the dark {and sing Kumbaya} There’s also the potential for them to burn themselves. Does that mean I’m not benevolent? > [@](#): > > In my view there is no spiritual or higher reason for chance occurences like suffering or birth. Some people are born to poor parents just because they were born to poor parents. A child born to poor parents in 2059 will be much better off than a child born to upper class parents in 1986. Material wealth is just as much a test as poverty although a different kind of test. You can also be born to rich emotionally derranged parents or poor, loving, supportive and kind parents. There are lots of parameters and degrees of subtlty ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/22 "2006-01-20T13:22:51Z")
> [@wisernow](#): > > That’s the question. What is the credibility of the theory of reincarnation? My take is that it appears valid. That is the only theory that IMO somewhat satisfactorily explains why people have so much divergence in the quality of their lives, why some are born poor and others rich, why some have to toil very just to make ends meet while others get to spend a life of comfort and luxury with minimum input, why some suffer pain and agony and others live healthy lives. I would suggest ‘Shit Happens’ is a more elegantly simple hypothesis to explain these variables. Don’t necessarily subscribe to it myself, but you know… Occam’s Razor and all that… ---
**Author:** ![wayward](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a87d85/32.png) [@wayward](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wayward)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/23 "2006-01-20T14:57:44Z")
If God’s not watching us, who’s counting the Karma? You seem to be suggesting that the existence of Karma and reincarnation would somehow absolve God of the responsibility for any suffering in the world. How, then, is it decided who suffers and who doesn’t? Either God set up some sort of metaphysical ‘judging machine’ before He retired, in which case He is judging us indirectly, or you propose some fundamental law of physics which can tell the difference between good and evil. And that sounds like a God to me. You also seem have a problem with conceiving of things happening without a reason. Imagine a population of people born with new souls, each into identical circumstances in terms of health and wealth. If you want to look at it this way, a sort of karma will affect these people on the scale of their own lifetimes. Any bad deed against another person, deliberate or accidental, will result in grudges. Good deeds willl result in friendships. Despite how they started out, these people will become individuals and social imbalances are likely to form. Add in the random effects of accidents, diseases and a million other factors and you can see that some people simply have to be better off than others, because complete equality is just unstable. Future generations will be affected by this original imbalance, and eventually we end up with some living in complete poverty and others living in luxury, all because of the luck of the draw. I actually think that ‘Shit Happens’ is quite a profound and beautiful explanation for the universe as a whole. The fact that we even exist, along with all the amazing things in the world and the rest of the universe, just because this is the most stable arrangement of the particles that exploded out of nowhere all those billions of years ago is just mind-boggling. I admit that it’s possible that there is a God behind it all somewhere, but if there is then He’s done a great job making it look like it could have happened Just Because. Am I amazed by God’s work or by patterns that are bound to arise somewhere in a chaotic system? Either way, it’s just as amazing. ---
**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:** [January 20, 2006, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/24 "2006-01-20T16:43:57Z")
What, exactly, is supposed to get reincarnated? I mean physically, what material object is supposedly moving from body to body? What is a “soul?” What is it made of? Where is it in the body? Does a soul have consciousness? Does it have memories? If so, then what do we need a brain for? Does a soul have senses? Can it see and hear? If so, how? Theer is no evidence that consciousness is anything more than the product of complex electro-chemical reactions in the brain or that any kind of consciousness can survive once the brain is gone. The brain is like a light bulb and consciousness is like the light it produces. Once the bulb is broken, the light disappears. It doesn’t travel to another bulb. As to why some people have shitty lives, no explanation is required. There is no reason to believe that the universe must be fair or just. ---
**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:** [January 20, 2006, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/25 "2006-01-20T18:45:38Z")
Perhaps in a previous life my [[color=white]posts](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=7014616&postcount=7) were not invisible?[/color] ---
**Author:** ![wisernow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/13edae/32.png) [@wisernow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wisernow)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/26 "2006-01-20T18:48:02Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > The world is unjust, people are often poor, wronged, disabled, etc, etc, etc… by no fault of their own, while evil bastards live a long life of pleasure and luxury. That’s the way it is. What we think is “unjust” may not be actually so. It is only our perception. We perceive it as “unjust’ because of our desires. The issue of desires and its affects are also a part of the karmic theory. If I was to be able to rid myself of desires, nothing would appear unjust to me. The “evil bastards” who lead a life of luxury will more than likely be repaid for their actions in their next life. > [@clairobscur](#): > > And even if reincarnation existed, why would you assume that somehow it would be just? Why good people couldn’t be reincarnated as children of congolese beggars and Hitler as Bill Gates? . The premise is that the process of reincarnation was set up by God, and if that is supposedly true then it is expected to be just. > [@Der Trihs](#): > > You can’t punish or reward something that’s gone. It would be like executing me for mass murder because some of my atoms were once part of Stalin. Your view of “self” is perhaps that of yourself as a mass of atoms. The theory however is about the soul and assumes that the soul is never “gone”. It continues to survive. The suffering you have in this life is partially owing to actions in the past life. > [@Der Trihs](#): > > After all, your victims deserve what happens to them - due to crimes in a former life. You don’t need to feel compassion for anyone; if someone is poor or sick or crippled, it’s their fault. Compassion for someone sick or crippled is independent of the cause IMO. Compassion is for a person in pain irrespective of what caused it > [@wayward](#): > > If God’s not watching us, who’s counting the Karma? Karma, as I have been given to understand, is a three fold equation and an ongoing calculation. The first consists of unfinished results of your actions in past lives. This assumes that all your actions performed during a particular lifetime will not necessarily have karmic payback during that lifetime itself. Consider it something like a “carry over”. This “carry over” appears in the current life as desires that eventually lead to spiritual suffering or enhancement, and that is the payback for the first part. The amount however is changeable depending on one’s ability to channel or control desires. The second is the result set that has already been worked out for actions in past lives. This appears in the current life as fate, something that is predetermined and cannot be altered, because one cannot know it in advance. This therefore is a fixed return decided ahead of birth. The third is the result set we are in the process of building in the present and that will affect us in the future. Coming to your question above, as you can see, the result sets of karma are determined by your actions. God cannot, or does not do anything to change the result set itself. The +ves and –ves remain as a part of the result set. God perhaps, only determines which of the result set will be manifested and in which order and in which life time hopefully in a way that helps an indivual in spiritual evolution. > [@wayward](#): > > Any bad deed against another person, deliberate or accidental, will result in grudges. Good deeds willl result in friendships. Despite how they started out, these people will become individuals and social imbalances are likely to form. While it may be a hypothetical and perhaps even a utopian idea, but if each and every individual in a population was to sincerely believe that bad deeds result in bad karma, there would be no one committing bad deeds. It is only because the members of a population have different beliefs, that they try to take advantage. In their minds they think they can “get away” with it. I also liked **cosmosdan’s** post. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/27 "2006-01-20T20:21:15Z")
Friends adopted some kids who were a real mess. Bad karma? More likely that their mother was an alcoholic. How does reincarnation account for that? The real reason reincarnation is not credible is that every woman who says she remembers her past lives used to be Cleopatra. That lady must have had a very crowded head. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/28 "2006-01-20T20:51:43Z")
> [@wisernow](#): > > The premise is that the process of reincarnation was set up by God, and if that is supposedly true then it is expected to be just. > Your view of “self” is perhaps that of yourself as a mass of atoms. The theory however is about the soul and assumes that the soul is never “gone”. It continues to survive. The suffering you have in this life is partially owing to actions in the past life. As long as you realize that these are underlying, unprovable assumptions you’re making. For example, you’re assuming there’s a God, you’re assuming that God is just, you’re assuming there’s a “soul” that survives death, and you’re assuming that it’s apparently unjust that some people have more advantages than others. There’s nothing wrong with making these assumptions, even though I don’t think I agree with any of them. You just need to realize, though, that those are assumptions you’re making, and that someone who doesn’t share those assumptions might not be convinced by your argument. > [@](#): > > While it may be a hypothetical and perhaps even a utopian idea, but if each and every individual in a population was to sincerely believe that bad deeds result in bad karma, there would be no one committing bad deeds. It is only because the members of a population have different beliefs, that they try to take advantage. In their minds they think they can “get away” with it. That statement is manifestly false, though. If a belief in karma is enough to prevent someone from committing any bad deeds, then it would follow that neither Hindus or Buddhists, both of whom believe in the doctrine of “karma” would ever do anything wrong or bad. But we know that that’s not true…that both Hindus and Buddhists do bad deeds. The doctrine of karma doesn’t seem to prevent bad deeds by Hindus and Buddhists any more than the doctrine of everlasting hell in Christianily prevents bad deeds by Christians. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/29 "2006-01-20T20:58:29Z")
I believe at the moment of death, the meaning of all existence will become clear and a profound and infinite understanding bestowed. And then you come back as a squirrel and forget all that in the daily struggle to scrounge pizza crusts from garbage cans. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/30 "2006-01-20T22:30:27Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#): > > That is a hard question. Why do innocents suffer, especially very young children? > One thing that was pointed out to me is that events don’t just affect the individual they also affect all those involved. Perhaps that particular soul was destined to die young in order to balance Karma for the adults involved rather than it’s own. The real question was what value is reincarnation if 75% of people don’t live long enough to actually become cognitively competent enough to do good or bad? Even if you feel that the soul doesn’t enter the body until birth historically only about 50% of children made it to the age of 6. There isn’t much karma to work out that way. [http://www.fff.org/freedom/0993d.asp](http://www.fff.org/freedom/0993d.asp) Edward Gibbon, the 18th-century historian, explained that his father, also named Edward, named many of his sons Edward in hopes that at least one would survive to carry on his name. His concern was justified. Edward the historian was the only survivor of seven children. Oliver Cromwell was the only child of ten to reach adulthood. Queen Anne of England had seventeen children, none of whom survived her. It was not uncommon for women in the Scottish highlands to bear twenty children and only two survive, Adam Smith wrote in The Wealth of Nations. Most 17th-century women were pregnant from puberty to death and often saw none of their children live to adulthood. Children realized that their lives were marginal, since death was always at hand. Few knew a grandparent, and many had lost one or both parents and many siblings. Childhood diseases would quite possibly carry them off before age 15. > [@cosmosdan](#): > > Simply… So what? Wasn’t that true from day one? If we imagine souls as eternal spiritual beings then waiting a few centuries or even a billion years per **SM** s post, to be incarnated or reincarnated doesn’t really matter in a realm that is timeless. It only seems importent to we who measure time. It still puts a damper on reincarnation. If over the course of the next 200 years there end up being an extra 30 billion people born (which is feasable) then that means that almost half of all humans that have ever lived live between now and then. So reincarnation doesn’t make sense mathematically unless those people all lived only one or two lives. There isn’t much reincarnating going on. If you go for 1000 years and assume human population increases even higher than 95%+ of all humans who ever live on the planet between the evolution of homo sapiens and the year 3000 will have lived between now and 3000. > [@cosmosdan](#): > > I certainly don’t think it’s about good and evil or what causes pain in their relative sense. I see it as positive and negative energy and balance. It’s about the true intent of our choices and the ripples that each choice causes. IMHO Love and truth are the positives, and fear and dishonesty are the negatives. Moment to Moment we choose , positive or negative, and those choices affect our lives and the lives of those around us. Some effect is small as a butterfly’s beating wings affects the weather, but other choices are more significant and have far reaching effects. The cumulative effect of our choices sets the parameters for our next incarnation. But sadly even those are not universally accepted. I agree that our actions have consequences on a larger scale in a way that we don’t understand (meaning there is some kind of ripple effect) but not everyone really feels that fear is negative. Religion has instilled fear for years. People just don’t know what constitutes good or evil as it is always changing. Ask Bin Ladin about the moral consequences of fear and how it relates him to God or Good and evil. > [@cosmosdan](#): > > Because you still are choosing, positive or negative. “To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction” If you chose a negative in a past life an opportunity of similar equity will occur in this one and you will choose again. Suppose you chose the negative energy of anger and vengence rather than forgiveness. In this life there might be an act of anger and vengence against you and you must choose to continue the cycle of anger and violence or forgive and diffuse it with positive energy. This is possible, but it is pretty impotent as dictators amass endless karma that they could never work out. There are a handful of people who do a good deal of the evil in human history. According to RJ Rummel there were 180 million people murdered by their governments in the 20th century. 120 million of them were in the USSR, Nazi territory or Communist China. Stalin alone (because the deaths ended when he died) was responsible for most of those deaths, as were a handful of bureaucrats and figureheads in Germany and China. So even if karma is real most people are not negative on any meaningful scale. On a small scale, yes. But alot of the evil that occurs in human life is due to a handful of politicans. So Karma is impotent as someone who murders 50 million people and causes endless suffering for those people will amass endless karma but those 50 million will only have to deal with things like stealing eggs or yelling at a family member. > [@cosmosdan](#): > > Could this mean that in general we are more spiritually evolved than we were a few hundred years ago and more souls are choosing the positive which alters the balance of the world. It is more because we are more scientific, more literate. The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak more or less. Humans don’t want to suffer and they don’t want other humans or other life forms to suffer but only now do we actually have the tools to avoid suffering. We didn’t have the agricultural technology to fight famine that we have now. We didn’t have the communications tools we have now or the transportation tools or the medicine. If humans are given science by and large they will use it to help themselves and others. But we didn’t have it back then. > [@cosmosdan](#): > > If I start a fire I make it possible for people to warm themselves, cook their food, and see in the dark {and sing Kumbaya} There’s also the potential for them to burn themselves. Does that mean I’m not benevolent? If you have a choice between creating a fire that can burn people and a heat lamp that cannot burn people and you are aware that you could get all the benefits of fire without the suffering but create one anyway then no you are not benevolent. You are either impotent, inept, amoral or evil. If God had the option of creating a world without suffering but still created it he/she is not benevolent. The ends do not justify the means. > [@cosmosdan](#): > > Material wealth is just as much a test as poverty although a different kind of test. You can also be born to rich emotionally derranged parents or poor, loving, supportive and kind parents. There are lots of parameters and degrees of subtlty Human rights are also going up globally. There is more money, more food and less cruelty now than there was 200 years ago. It will only get better. It won’t be due to karma it will be due to the scientific method and humans taking control of their destinies. ---
**Author:** ![Trust](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b38774/32.png) [@Trust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trust)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/31 "2006-01-20T22:34:02Z")
It’s a non-issue. If it’s true, then it’s true and you get some more shots at life. If it’s not true, then you just wasted away your single chance at life and allowed some people to rationalize mistreating others. ---
**Author:** ![Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/58956e/32.png) [@Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hoodoo_Ulove)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/32 "2006-01-20T22:42:02Z")
> [@Wesley Clark](#): > > . . . there were 180 million people murdered by their governments in the 20th century. . . There is . . less cruelty now than there was 200 years ago. It will only get better. More evidence needed here, **Wes**. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/33 "2006-01-20T22:52:56Z")
> [@Hoodoo Ulove](#): > > More evidence needed here, **Wes**. What kind of evidence? I’m not sure how to prove it, it seems basic like asking to prove that the sky is blue. Then again this is based on western viewpoint and I don’t know what India or China were like 200 years ago. But I do know India and China have tried to abolish several forms of oppression like the caste system or domestic violence. 50% of the world’s countries today are liberal democracies, meaning they live in countries with a large assortment of representative government and human rights Only 17% of the world’s population suffers from chronic malnutrition compared to around (as a guess) 60% or more back then. Physical abuse is far less acceptable now than it was 200 years ago, slavery is less common Government oppression that was common 50-100 years ago is now isolated to smaller developing nations like Myanmar or North Korea. Even the governments that used to be the biggest oppressors are now fighting for the oppressed. Germany promotes human rights internationally and has a good record domestically. Japan has a good domestic record and although not promoting international rights still gives about 0.2% of GDP to humanitarian aid. Russia’s domestic human rights are much improved compared to a generation ago. Labor rights are better than they were as are child abuse and domestic violence laws. Police corruption and abuse are not as common. [http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/20TH.HTM](http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/20TH.HTM) 169 million. My mistake. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/34 "2006-01-20T22:55:48Z")
> [@Wesley Clark](#): > > It still puts a damper on reincarnation. If over the course of the next 200 years there end up being an extra 30 billion people born (which is feasable) then that means that almost half of all humans that have ever lived live between now and then. So reincarnation doesn’t make sense mathematically unless those people all lived only one or two lives. There isn’t much reincarnating going on. If you go for 1000 years and assume human population increases even higher than 95%+ of all humans who ever live on the planet between the evolution of homo sapiens and the year 3000 will have lived between now and 3000. There is a story (in F&SF, mid-60s I believe) about babies being born without souls, since there were more people alive than the sum of those alive before that point, and the number of sould got exhausted. Anyhow, however many souls there were originally (and when did humans start getting souls - or did good cockroach souls move in), soon after there would need to be a lot more. Do bacteria have souls? Virii? Prions? ---
**Author:** ![Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/58956e/32.png) [@Hoodoo\_Ulove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hoodoo_Ulove)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/35 "2006-01-20T23:06:43Z")
**Wes** , I was specifically addressing the issue of cruelty, and cruelty on an industrial scale. Maybe I’m older than you, but I have trouble saying that what happened a few decades ago is definitely in the past. The fact that widespread lip service is paid to human rights doesn’t get me all that excited. I am reminded of the period before the first world war when a new era of liberalism and humanity seemed to be coming in. I’d sure like to think you’re right. ---
**Author:** ![Tevildo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9bd4f/32.png) [@Tevildo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tevildo)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/36 "2006-01-20T23:23:39Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Do bacteria have souls? Virii? Prions? OT, but this is one of my hot buttons. [VIRUSES!!!](http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/faq/plural-of-virus.html) ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2006, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/37 "2006-01-20T23:56:00Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > What, exactly, is supposed to get reincarnated? I mean physically, what material object is supposedly moving from body to body? What is a “soul?” What is it made of? Where is it in the body? Does a soul have consciousness? Does it have memories? If so, then what do we need a brain for? Does a soul have senses? Can it see and hear? If so, how? Furthermore, if the individual I am now had previous lives and will have future lives, yet I do not remember past lives, nor will I remember this or previous lives in the future ones, in exactly what sense is it ‘me’ that’s being transferred from one place to another? I’m the same ‘me’ that saw my mother running toward me, across the sandy beach in Kyrenia on my fourth birthday because _I remember being the person who saw the event_; I can say _ **I** was there_. A soul that travels forward to another life, shedding everything that defined the individual is no more meaningful an entity than a molecule of water sneezed out by Napoleon and absorbed by me through my umbilical cord in the womb. I have inherited just as many of Napoleon’s properties and attributes along with that water molecule, as I have from the soul that came from my hypothetical past life; that is to say: none at all. ---
**Author:** ![jawdirk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/df705f/32.png) [@jawdirk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jawdirk)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2006, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/38 "2006-01-21T00:12:32Z")
[QUOTE=Wesley Clark] It still puts a damper on reincarnation. If over the course of the next 200 years there end up being an extra 30 billion people born (which is feasable) then that means that almost half of all humans that have ever lived live between now and then. So reincarnation doesn’t make sense mathematically. [QUOTE] Suppose that there are a tremendous number of souls but most don’t reside in humans. Suppose that good acts lead to an abundance of happy humans, and so the proliferation of humans is evidence that souls have been creating good karma. Certainly that makes sense, mathematically. It seems very small minded to me to deny that reincarnation is a possibility. Consider an extended analogy between reincarnation and a multi-player online game: The designers of the game (God) attempt to create rules (Karma) that rewards players (souls) for controlling their characters (humans) in a way that makes the game more fun (good karma). When the designers succeed (and God has), the online game flurishes, and more people join, the server space is increased, and more characters appear. Now, when a character dies, all of its game statistics are erased forever (all memories and the physical body are gone) but the player still has out-of-game status: knowledge of the game, friendships and alliances with other players (karmic status). If the player takes on a new character, even if that character begins weak, the player will hardly be on equal footing with the other weak characters controlled by newbie players. Of course, there will always be some characters that deny the existence of the players in all in-game communication, because their players prefer to immerse themselves in the extended lie of the online gaming experience. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2006, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/39 "2006-01-21T01:16:07Z")
> [@wisernow](#): > > What we think is “unjust” may not be actually so. It is only our perception. We perceive it as “unjust’ because of our desires. The issue of desires and its affects are also a part of the karmic theory. If I was to be able to rid myself of desires, nothing would appear unjust to me. You’d also be mentally disabled to the point of being inert. Without desires, you’d just sit where you were put and starve. I also fail to see how not caring about the consequences makes the unjust just. It just makes the uncaring ones sociopaths; it doesn’t make them just. > [@wisernow](#): > > The “evil bastards” who lead a life of luxury will more than likely be repaid for their actions in their next life. How does that follow ? After all, if they are living in luxury, aren’t they being rewarded by karma ? If they hurt others, are not their victims’ suffering the punishment of karma ? Which brings up one of my problems with karma. If the suffering/rewards of others are ordained by karma, how can anyone do anything deserving of reward or punishment, anyway ? > [@wisernow](#): > > The premise is that the process of reincarnation was set up by God, and if that is supposedly true then it is expected to be just. Why ? I find an evil or amoral god more plausible than a nice one. > [@wisernow](#): > > Your view of “self” is perhaps that of yourself as a mass of atoms. The theory however is about the soul and assumes that the soul is never “gone”. It continues to survive. The suffering you have in this life is partially owing to actions in the past life. If my soul doesn’t contain memories or anything else that constitutes my personality, then it’s not “me”, just something attached to me. Sort of a supernatural label. Let’s grant for a moment that souls exist. If I invent a magic soulkilling gun and shoot you with it, will it harm you in any detectable way ? Will you even notice ? If reincarnation is true, does it even matter ? If your memories don’t survive, what’s the difference between reincarnation and soullessness ? > [@wisernow](#): > > Compassion for someone sick or crippled is independent of the cause IMO. Compassion is for a person in pain irrespective of what caused it That’s simply not true. If a lunatic chops your hands off, I’ll feel very sorry for you. If you blow your hands off while constructing a bomb to kill your spouse, I’ll feel amused. I certainly won’t feel compassion. > [@wisernow](#): > > The second is the result set that has already been worked out for actions in past lives. This appears in the current life as fate, something that is predetermined and cannot be altered, because one cannot know it in advance. This therefore is a fixed return decided ahead of birth. Which makes it unjust; I can’t affect it, predict it, and I don’t deserve it, given that the “old me” is destroyed. > [@wisernow](#): > > While it may be a hypothetical and perhaps even a utopian idea, but if each and every individual in a population was to sincerely believe that bad deeds result in bad karma, there would be no one committing bad deeds. It is only because the members of a population have different beliefs, that they try to take advantage. In their minds they think they can “get away” with it. No, they’ll say “this person is less well off than I am because of crimes in his past life; if I hurt him further, I am but the instrument of karma. He deserves it.” > [@Voyager](#): > > There is a story (in F&SF, mid-60s I believe) about babies being born without souls, since there were more people alive than the sum of those alive before that point, and the number of sould got exhausted. > > Anyhow, however many souls there were originally (and when did humans start getting souls - or did good cockroach souls move in), soon after there would need to be a lot more. Do bacteria have souls? Virii? Prions? I remember another SF story claiming that the human population explosion was due to the souls released in an alien nuclear war, which is why the younger generation were so weird - they’re _aliens_ !! 🙂 Another claimed that the new human souls were coming from animals; the general decline in animal population being balanced by a rise in the human one. This explains why there’s so much violence - they’re _animals_ ! 🙂 > [@jawdirk](#): > > Suppose that there are a tremendous number of souls but most don’t reside in humans. Suppose that good acts lead to an abundance of happy humans, and so the proliferation of humans is evidence that souls have been creating good karma. Certainly that makes sense, mathematically. Only if being human is better than being a bodiless soul. You could just as easily argue there are so many humans because more and more souls are being punished by being sent here. Besides, we already know why there are so many people; we breed faster than we die, that’s all. There’s no need to bring souls into it. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2006, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712/40 "2006-01-21T20:24:16Z")
> [@jawdirk](#): > > Suppose that there are a tremendous number of souls but most don’t reside in humans. Suppose that good acts lead to an abundance of happy humans, and so the proliferation of humans is evidence that souls have been creating good karma. Certainly that makes sense, mathematically. > > It seems very small minded to me to deny that reincarnation is a possibility. Consider an extended analogy between reincarnation and a multi-player online game: > > The designers of the game (God) attempt to create rules (Karma) that rewards players (souls) for controlling their characters (humans) in a way that makes the game more fun (good karma). When the designers succeed (and God has), the online game flurishes, and more people join, the server space is increased, and more characters appear. Now, when a character dies, all of its game statistics are erased forever (all memories and the physical body are gone) but the player still has out-of-game status: knowledge of the game, friendships and alliances with other players (karmic status). If the player takes on a new character, even if that character begins weak, the player will hardly be on equal footing with the other weak characters controlled by newbie players. > > Of course, there will always be some characters that deny the existence of the players in all in-game communication, because their players prefer to immerse themselves in the extended lie of the online gaming experience. The reason there are so many humans isn’t because of karma, it is because of medical and agricultural science (and probably several other forms of knowledge and science too like transportation, communication, etc). But by and large agriculture and medicine are why there are so many more people now than there were. Child mortality is about 0.5% in the developed world today, compared to 50% of yesterday. As of 1999 it was only 8.2% of children who died under the age of 5 It had nothing to do with karma. [http://www.child-survival.org/progress.html](http://www.child-survival.org/progress.html) I’m not saying reincarnation isn’t possible, just that I don’t subscribe to it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/theory-of-reincarnation-credible-or-not-and-why/340712.md?page=3)