Why are we afraid of death?

[tomndebb]

@InterestedObserver

lekatt, give it up. Most here are simply not open to considering the possibility of anything other than the simplistic, so-called “scientific” take on reality.

On the contrary. I have a deep belief in the spiritual.

@InterestedObserver

They are just beating up on you and nothing you can say will convince them. You are wasting your time.

OTOH, I am simply offended by people who are willing to claim some higher morality who then spend a lot of time being condescending to others, who make broad attacks on a “science” that does not exist, and who refuse to ever actually examine their own beliefs, simply repeating their own beliefs–even to the point of inventing claims for science that it has never made–and who make no effort to see the more limited statements that have been produced by actual science.

Some actual evidence that lekatt has ever examined anything outside his own limited belief system would go a long way toward building some respect for him.
It will never happen.

[lekatt]

@Red_Barchetta

To be fair, it’s not a matter of demanding, it’s a matter of believing. What lekatt wants or “demands” has nothing to do with this.

I remember back in school when a Christian acquaintance of mine rhetorically asked “Would you rather come from an all-knowing being or from some monkeys that throw their own poo?” It was a stupid question then, as what I (or more accurately, him) wishes to be true isn’t proof of anything. As such, I feel we should extend the same courtesy to lekatt that I wish my acquaintance had to me.

Thanks for the post, respect should be extended to all on this board. However, like understanding and love, respect has to be held within before it can be freely given. You can’t give to others what you don’t hold for yourself.

[monavis]

@lekatt

There has been a lot of evidence shown by NDE researchers. That is why this subject is so controveraisl. But you won’t find the research on skeptical sites. You have to go to the research itself. It don’t matter to me what people believe, only reality counts.

Evidence isn’t proof! Just hopeful conjecture as I see it. To each his own!!

[Czarcasm]

@lekatt

Thanks for the post, respect should be extended to all on this board. However, like understanding and love, respect has to be held within before it can be freely given. You can’t give to others what you don’t hold for yourself.

There is a world of difference between respecting the right to have an opinion, and respecting the opinion itself.

[lekatt]

@Czarcasm

There is a world of difference between respecting the right to have an opinion, and respecting the opinion itself.

I don’t think an opinion worries about respect either way.

[begbert2]

@lekatt

I don’t think an opinion worries about respect either way.

Then why do you bother to defend it?

[tomndebb]

@Red_Barchetta

As such, I feel we should extend the same courtesy to lekatt that I wish my acquaintance had to me.

Despite the fact that lekatt has never extended that sort of courtesy to anyone on this board with whom he has disagreed?

That’s a nice ideal. It is not very realistic from a human perspective.

[Red_Barchetta]

@tomndebb

Despite the fact that lekatt has never extended that sort of courtesy to anyone on this board with whom he has disagreed?

That’s a nice ideal. It is not very realistic from a human perspective.

I didn’t read all of his posts, bur two wrongs don’t make a right.

I don’t see what at all is unrealistic about it.

[Czarcasm]

@Red_Barchetta

I didn’t read all of his posts, bur two wrongs don’t make a right.

I don’t see what at all is unrealistic about it.

How about this, then.
When he first posted, he was accorded the same amount of respect as any other poster. That respect was his to keep or toss away.

[Red_Barchetta]

@Czarcasm

How about this, then.
When he first posted, he was accorded the same amount of respect as any other poster. That respect was his to keep or toss away.

Acting respectfully is not the same as respecting someone. The latter isn’t required for the former.

The same, of course, would apply to lekatt too–it’s just that your post stood out and thus I responded.

[Drew_Kit]

I believe death is not the end, and that is one reason I’ve never killed myself as I don’t see any improvement to my troubles. I fear life. I fear pain, as intense pain distracts my ability to think. I fear brain stem injury, being self-aware and reliant on others who I am unable to communicate with and who are unaware I’m aware. I know that my perception of time varies, that minutes can stretch to hours.

Kurt Vonnegut had a nice analogy that our bodies are like radios playing a symphony. The radio may break but the symphony is still being broadcast.

Buddhists think fear of death is fear of impermanence. I’d recommend the OP to keep addressing their fear of death, and would recommend the work of Thich Naht Hanh, a Vietnamese poet-monk who was recommended for the Nobel Peace Prize by Martin Luther King.

[thinker53]

@ivan_astikov

Go on, tell me what mind-blowingly clever experiments those clever folks have come up with to determine this, then?

exactly

[thinker53]

@Drew_Kit

I believe death is not the end, and that is one reason I’ve never killed myself as I don’t see any improvement to my troubles. I fear life. I fear pain, as intense pain distracts my ability to think. I fear brain stem injury, being self-aware and reliant on others who I am unable to communicate with and who are unaware I’m aware. I know that my perception of time varies, that minutes can stretch to hours.

Kurt Vonnegut had a nice analogy that our bodies are like radios playing a symphony. The radio may break but the symphony is still being broadcast.

Buddhists think fear of death is fear of impermanence. I’d recommend the OP to keep addressing their fear of death, and would recommend the work of Thich Naht Hanh, a Vietnamese poet-monk who was recommended for the Nobel Peace Prize by Martin Luther King.

This is well-said. I think Buddhism philosophy comes closest to explaining both my life experiences and my fears about death.

[taffygirl]

I think we’re talking about two different things here. There’s the instinctive fear of death, which does indeed serve as a means of keeping most of us from jumping from the 44th floor just to see what it feels like. Then there’s the fear of obliteration, of not existing. As far as we can tell, this seems to be only a human fear–dolphins and chimps aren’t discussing it.

Reading the posts here, it seems obvious that not everyone has the capacity to fully comprehend what obliteration means. I think most people are in a state of denial–not necessarily a bad thing. When people who don’t believe in an afterlife say they don’t fear death, I think what they really mean is they don’t choose to think about obliteration. The logic here is that it’s pointless to think about something (olbiteration) which, when it happens, you won’t be around to experience. When people fear dying (as opposed to death), they’re generally either afraid of the pain or afraid of the fear that hits when they finally face that obliteration.

A lot of all this gets obscured in religious vs. nonreligious finger-pointing.

I believe the ability to have religious beliefs depends on the brain. Some people can’t comprehend abstract math because that portion of their brains (or the dendrites therein) is not sufficiently developed. They may be extremely bright in other areas. Some people, religious or not, can’t reason abstractly. And some of the people who have a highly developed capacity for logic and don’t have that capacity for religious beliefs see religious beliefs as the absence of logic.

I’m humble enough to keep an open mind. And I think a fear of death can be healthy in that it can push us towards asking important questions, as the OP is doing.

[Brown_Eyed_Girl]

@Todderbob

Because things not afraid of death don’t tend to live long enough to procreate.

I’m sure the four children of Evil Knievel would beg to differ.

[begbert2]

@taffygirl

I think we’re talking about two different things here. There’s the instinctive fear of death, which does indeed serve as a means of keeping most of us from jumping from the 44th floor just to see what it feels like. Then there’s the fear of obliteration, of not existing. As far as we can tell, this seems to be only a human fear–dolphins and chimps aren’t discussing it.

Reading the posts here, it seems obvious that not everyone has the capacity to fully comprehend what obliteration means. I think most people are in a state of denial–not necessarily a bad thing. When people who don’t believe in an afterlife say they don’t fear death, I think what they really mean is they don’t choose to think about obliteration. The logic here is that it’s pointless to think about something (olbiteration) which, when it happens, you won’t be around to experience. When people fear dying (as opposed to death), they’re generally either afraid of the pain or afraid of the fear that hits when they finally face that obliteration.

A lot of all this gets obscured in religious vs. nonreligious finger-pointing.

I believe the ability to have religious beliefs depends on the brain. Some people can’t comprehend abstract math because that portion of their brains (or the dendrites therein) is not sufficiently developed. They may be extremely bright in other areas. Some people, religious or not, can’t reason abstractly. And some of the people who have a highly developed capacity for logic and don’t have that capacity for religious beliefs see religious beliefs as the absence of logic.

I’m humble enough to keep an open mind. And I think a fear of death can be healthy in that it can push us towards asking important questions, as the OP is doing.

Excuse me? Not being afraid of ‘obliteration’ means I haven’t thought about it? Hardly! I am of the opinion that people who are afraid of ‘obliteration’ haven’t thought it out. Probably because they’re afraid to.

By the way, I put “obliteration” in scare quotes because it’s the wrong term - obliteration is the transition from the state of existence to the state of nonexistence. Which is to say the moment of death, which virtually everyone has said they fear because it will very likely involve pain. The better term for what we don’t fear is “nonexistence”, the state we’ll be in after we die.

Okay, now that we’ve established that I’ve thought plenty about nonexistence, I have to ask, what conclusion has your thoughts yeilded to you? You seem to think that nonexistence will be a bad state to be in. I’m wondering how you arrived at that conclusion, given that it’s literally impossible for us to be unhappy about our own nonexistent state. Or at least that’s what I’ve concluded after my lengthy introspection on the subject; where do your conclusions differ?

[Captain_Midnight]

I am scared of death because it is a mystery to me. This is how religions were invented, to try to explain what happens to someone after they die. This is actually the centerpiece of belief.

Atheists believe in non existance. They seem content with that, however to me, this is more scary than ending up in hell. I just cannot fathom or understand not existing anymore. How does one “not exist”? It is easy to look at a dead animal or even another dead person and say that, but for me, I just wrap my head around it. An atheist would explain it like this,“Were you around in the year 1900.” No. “Well, you will be in the same state of existance in 2100.”

2.) There is an afterlife, with a heaven and more fearfully, a HELL. There might be a God, with a sense of right and wrong. Since God does not reveal Itself to mortal man, all we have is the different religions to go by, and try like the devil to choose the right path. And no, all religions do not lead to God. Religions contridict each other and were written by men to influence and control the masses.

Personally, I believe in God, but thinks that religion, any religion, any church is wrong and doesn’t know what they are talking about. People who go to church are mostly fools who are led about by a minister and a congregation, who are mostly too lazy or too stupid to look up the “scriptures” themselves.

3.) Hopefully, once a person dies, they will awaken to another reality, or be reborn. However, there is no evidence of this at all.Personally, I like Buddhism. I doubt that Buddhism is the “right way”, but it does teach a lot about everyday living and why shit is the way it is.

Lastly, the word “faith”. I really dislike this word. Faith means to believe in something that cannot be seen or defined. For me to believe it, I need to see it, hold it in my hand, know it is real. Since no one knows what happens after death, only faith can be trusted. “I don’t know if this is true, but I believe it is true because it is so comforting to me to know.”

[Czarcasm]

How does one “not exist”? Easy-every time you go to sleep and not remember dreaming, not remember the interval between nodding off and waking up, you do not “exist” as a conscious entity, and yet most people do not fear that they will not wake up in the morning because they believe that they will wake up in the morning. That is what I believe every time I shut my eyes, and if what I believe doesn’t happen one day I’ll never know about it, will I?

[begbert2]

@Captain_Midnight

An atheist would explain it like this,“Were you around in the year 1900.” No. “Well, you will be in the same state of existance in 2100.”

What’s wrong with this explanation? Granted it’s less easy to relate to personal experience than dreamless sleep, but it seems reasonably decent to me nonetheless.

[Captain_Midnight]

It is difficult and scary to just “not exist”. Forever and ever. Makes life just not worth it. Makes one mission in life to do what ever they want. I just cannot accept that.

I cannot envision myself dying. I know it will happen, and I dred the day it does, and the second it does, beings will be doing everyday things. When I gasp my last breath of air, someone will be buying groceries, paying bills, fucking, smoking some kind of dope, committing a crime, watching reruns of a sitcom.

The reaper can call someone anytime. Michael Jackson died and it came out of the blue . Other people die out of the blue of “unknown causes”.

Since we all have so little time, enjoy your life. Enjoy it. It makes me so mad that a few people have so much money and resources that they get to live a full and enriching existance, while so many of us piss away our existance wearing a fucking tie working for some shitass or his corporation and have to worry about existance until lack thereof. Motherfuckers. I dont want to go like that. I want to live, breathe and enjoy. I want to travel, experience and learn. Why do 1% of humanity get this priviledge while the rest of us get fucked in the ass to make someone else an extra dollar. Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit.

Alcohol, dope, sex, gambling and television were invented to blur people to their own petty, boring and worthless existance.