FWIW, I happen to agree that the existence of an afterlife is a fact. Not that it’s true - but that it’s a claim that can be either proven or disproven (at least, in principle).
I can remember very clearly the day (or week, or month, or year, whatever) when I realized what it was that Christ offers to us. I had just as hard a time accepting it as you appear to be having. It had nothing to do with any logical difficulties or metaphysical squabbles, it was simply because it seemed too wonderful, too good, too “exactly what I wanted” for it to be true. We live in such a cynical, glum, resigned world that even something naturally joyful is regarded with suspicion. We are trained to live in a climate of temporal despair and are almost comfortable doing so. This makes the transition to immortal hope a difficult one. Every time the thought “it is too good to be true” pops into your head you should fight it off with the thought “Christ is too good not to be true.”
Each of us has a feeling of being “I” which doesnt change no matter who we think we are or how we change personally. And one of the things in personality that does change, and can change in radical ways, is the depth and breadth of what we understan little words such as I, God, and Life to mean. For instance, a finer distinction can be made by saying, eg, that living is what life does. So living is an activity, while life is what allows living to happen. So then we have life as an abstract that is continuous, and individuals, gazzilons of them, who live as an aspect of life as aprinciple. So in a sense, there is no begining or end to life or living, only to what appears as an individual instance of being alive.
Your two opinions seem to contradict each other. If it is a fact, something that can be proven or disproven, why would anyone have to “take it on faith?”
I am Catholic. ALL the answers are inside, as Christ lives in me. Also in you. Some people are satisfied with having someone give them answers. They trust the authority of a church or a book. Some find the answers inside, and then supplement their understanding through Church and Book. Or some combination of processes.
Because the key words here were, “in principle.” Either there is an eternal life, or there isn’t. That we are in no position to know the answer to this question does not mean that the question does not have an answer. If eternal life is real, anyone currently dead knows that it’s real. If it’s not, anyone currently dead “knows” that too (if they were in any position to “know” anything).
Interesting choice of words here - “If someone wants to believe…” I agree - if you want to believe, especially in something like having a life that never has to end, there are lots of people and sources willing to tell you that. It seems to me that that anyone who starts their research wanting to reach a particular conclusion is leaving themselves wide open for confirmation bias.
I’m taking your points out-of-order. Below, you wrote something that clearly illustrates your bias on this topic:
You state as fact: “we are in no position to know the answer to this question.” You have decided for some reason, no one can know. Everything you follow with is based on this premise. Yet, you cannot substantiate your own assertion that:
About bias. You said:
But then hardly any research would get done. Research is usually sparked by an idea, an hypothesis one seeks to validate or disprove. For instance, someone notices the consistency of the iridium layer at the KT boundary and says, “Hey! What if a huge meteor strike caused this?” Then they go and look for evidence of huge meteor strikes. Believe me, they were convinced before they started. You can read about it.
Really? No one on earth, in all the billions has the authority of experience or derived authority or any other kind to speak on this topic? Why would you say that? How many have you interviewed?
It is, and it continues to be. Nobody alive can know for a fact that life is eternal. They can wish it to be true. They can believe it with deep conviction. But, it seems that, in addition to be an unfalsifiable claim, it cannot be known by any living person. This seems self-evident to me. Despite my skepticism, it might turn out to be true. But the claim seems to preclude any living human being from knowing it’s true.
Sorry, but this is not comparing like with like. Noticing evidence of an element and suggesting a hypothesis for why it’s there is not the same as wanting to believe that a meteor hit the earth, and then trying to find supporting evidence for it.
I have another one for you, and it goes even farther than saying nobody can know that eternal life is a fact. I presume to assert, baldly, and without ambiguity, that there are no four-legged creatures living on the surface of the moon. I insist that this is not only a fact, but a TRUE fact as well.
Not true. I’m saying that, in general, starting any investigation with the desire to prove a particular claim is true, is usually a bad recipe for learning anything. “Seek and ye shall find” - that’s basically true. If you want something to be true badly enough, it’s only a matter of seeking the evidence that supports it until you’ve found it.
thank you but i’m a shut in and cannot get around.
Luke (NAB) 4:
Emphasis mine. Jesus came to set you free. One does not need to mobile to be free.
Oh, God Bless you, itullian, I am sorry to hear that. I hope you will give the nearest parish a call then. Nearly every Catholic parish I know has a special ministry to people who are shut in, recovering from surgery or, in the case of parish members wanting Holy Eucharist, they have special ministers who will come by. Please think about calling someone and feel free to ask your questions.
And yet, I do. So now we have a situation where you believe something without evidence and in believing that reject claims to the contrary because you believe something with no evidence. You haven’t even advanced an argument to bolster your opinion. You just say so.
But things that seem self-evident are quite often not factual at all. It seemed evident to a great many people that the sun revolved around the earth. Obviously it must. Only it does not.
And again, many people know it’s true. So why would it seem to you impossible that we do?
Oh, but they did. Because they aren’t computers, they were guys getting laughed at, they were nobodies in the supercompetitive cut-throat world of science and if they could find the evidence it meant publication in major journals, Science - Nature, it meant fame, fortune and an unending string of government grants. A huge, sexy theory to explain a great mystery of science. It meant the same thing we are talking about:* immortality*.
Do you now why you believe that? Can you give reasons of already-proven fact to substantiate your assertion? You can make any assertions you like, the point is, you made one with nothing to back it up. At all. You just think it must be true.
And yet, serious inquiry has been in progress for some time. So, yes, I am saying you have provided no logical construct, no basis in previously established facts, nothing but your own feelings about the topic, to assert your “fact”" that no one living in Time can know that life is eternal. .
And some of them are quite good interview subjects.
We also have people who claim, insist, they do not dream and never have. What does one person remembering and another not remembering have to do with what the one who remembers, remembers?
And this is bad because…?
Correct. This is the most important thing anyone ever learns. If someone is seeking, he (or she) will be led. Not my job to try and tell folks how to proceed. People get to their destination in their own way. OP needs to go seek and see what he finds in his own way.
Given your interests, this sounds a bit facetious. Read Gulf by RA Heinlein. It’s pretty clear that who you are is a matter of what you think. What you are, on the other hand, is a matter of discovery, perhaps aided in the begining stages by a religion. But ultimately, Julie Mae is right on: “vamos a ver:” Let’s go see! You have to find out for yourself according to your best conscience. There’s even a book that sets out specific tools for thinking critically in terms of comparative religion, or anything else, for that matter. It is a good skill to have if you are human and have your own best interest at heart, or that of others. Love yourself enough to see where the Love stems from. Life, Love, God and death are certainly not what we think they are.
I usually cry out louder that you !!!
The statement in bold beautifully describes what’s known as prior probability. This is how confident you are that a hypothesis is true prior to considering any evidence in its favor. We have numerous priors for all kinds of positions. These priors determine how strong a piece of evidence must be in order to convince us of a position. If you have a very low prior for a hypothesis, you’ll need very strong evidence to convince you. Likewise, if you have a very high prior, you won’t need very strong evidence to persuade you.
Yes, this is very well stated. I might add that the framing of the question may also be the cause of conflict in that it may be incomplete in that it limits the itself to an incomplete dynamic. What I mean is that a person of a Christian faith has accepted or is dealing from a position within a limited paradigem, cliams that that particular religion is a sufficient and complete explanation of things aside. And perhaps that is the range of predisposition you cite?
I believe there is a book called “Life after Life.” Kinda depends of what definition you are ascribing to the word in which instance. People tend to identify living as something to do with physical bodies and call that life. If we define life as the existence of the self-aware person, then there is life after life. Also during. I think some people believe before, also.