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abcdefg
Guest
I guess this is one of the most disturbing question for atheists,at least for my dad. he’s an atheist, he believes in neither heaven nor hell and he can’t answer it.
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HagiaSophia
Guest
Off the top of my hed I would say they’d feel: surprised.
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Zoot
Guest
Athiesm simply says there is no god. It does not demand that our existence end at physical death.
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RobedWithLight
Guest
I believe our atheist friends would object to that question, because it assumes that you would indeed “feel” something after death, implying that there is “something” else beyond, which is precisely what atheists want Christians to prove beyond reasonable doubt. True atheists, in contrast to the “doubting” agnostics, emphatically deny the idea of life beyond the grave.
Gerry
Gerry
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UnknownCloud
Guest
I debate atheists often and I am hard pressed to find any of them that embrace any kind of ‘life after death’ at all. Atheists naturally assume that if there is no God, or gods for that matter, there is no supernatural at all. The universe is entirely sensual and anything that isn’t is still rationally approachable (like mathematics).
I have found that atheism is a religion of negation - in that, what they cannot perceive sensually or rationally, is non-existent. As believers, we are affirmative, in that, we at least allow the possibility (rationally speaking) of the supernatural.
An atheist would probably maintain that because death is the ‘irreversible ceasing of brain function’, he wouldn’t feel anything at all because his body can no longer experience anything. In the mind of an atheist, death is as permanent as it naturally is.
However, ‘atheists’ come in a variety of colors and shapes - which is to be expected since they often entertain the idea of ‘anything goes’ (except God of course).
I have found that atheism is a religion of negation - in that, what they cannot perceive sensually or rationally, is non-existent. As believers, we are affirmative, in that, we at least allow the possibility (rationally speaking) of the supernatural.
An atheist would probably maintain that because death is the ‘irreversible ceasing of brain function’, he wouldn’t feel anything at all because his body can no longer experience anything. In the mind of an atheist, death is as permanent as it naturally is.
However, ‘atheists’ come in a variety of colors and shapes - which is to be expected since they often entertain the idea of ‘anything goes’ (except God of course).
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Exporter
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There is one poster that was raised Jewish. He then became Agnotic, Athiest , to Jewish, to Wiccan, to Christian( a short time) back to Wiccan.
He lives in Israel. What is his life like…I wonder?
He lives in Israel. What is his life like…I wonder?
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RobedWithLight
Guest
It is impossible to deny the existence of God without likewise denying the existence of an enduring spiritual soul that survives the corruption of the body. Hence, to deny God is to deny the reality of an afterlife.
What is the sense of an “afterlife” without an enduring spiritual soul that would enter that life?
Gerry
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Pug
Guest
I don’t see why the thought of what they might feel after death would be disturbing to a generic atheist. I surmise many just say they die and that is it…cessation. The process of dying would retain some fear, I’m sure. Who wants to experience that, especially if it is slow and painful?
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UnknownCloud
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It is a strange paradox isn’t it? I mean, death is as natural as growth…why do we fear it?
We might say, “well, it is our natural instinct to fear death…survival is the strongest instinct of all, corresponding to ‘survival of the fittest’.”
But…why should natural life resist a natural fate? Do butterflies fear death? Because indeed, once they mate, they’re gone.
We might say, “well, it is our natural instinct to fear death…survival is the strongest instinct of all, corresponding to ‘survival of the fittest’.”
But…why should natural life resist a natural fate? Do butterflies fear death? Because indeed, once they mate, they’re gone.
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Ahimsa
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Imagine a world where your soul survives after bodily death – a world, though, where there is not all-powerful, ever-lasting, all-knowing spiritual entity ready to whack you or reward you in the spiritual realm. Belief in that imagined world would be described as “spiritual atheism”.It is impossible to deny the existence of God without likewise denying the existence of an enduring spiritual soul that survives the corruption of the body. Hence, to deny God is to deny the reality of an afterlife.
What is the sense of an “afterlife” without an enduring spiritual soul that would enter that life?
Gerry
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Contarini
Guest
:It is impossible to deny the existence of God without likewise denying the existence of an enduring spiritual soul that survives the corruption of the body.:
That’s not true. The Jains for instance don’t believe in a monotheistic God, but they believe that souls survive the body. Buddhists are trickier–they believe that consciousness survives but they don’t see it as an enduring soul. There’s no logical reason why an atheistic universe couldn’t contain immortal souls–it’s simply that Western atheism is based on a rationalistic, materialistic approach and sees no reason to posit such entities.
Edwin
That’s not true. The Jains for instance don’t believe in a monotheistic God, but they believe that souls survive the body. Buddhists are trickier–they believe that consciousness survives but they don’t see it as an enduring soul. There’s no logical reason why an atheistic universe couldn’t contain immortal souls–it’s simply that Western atheism is based on a rationalistic, materialistic approach and sees no reason to posit such entities.
Edwin
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Ahimsa
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Contarini said:
Edwin,
You could similar things concerning Advaitins.
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UnknownCloud
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An atheist wouldn’t understand this statement at all. Atheists don’t accept any form of supernatural. Notice when I say that I dismiss buddhists and other Eastern relgions as not being atheists…they really aren’t, not in the sense that the term ‘atheists’ is used. Yes, the word literally means, ‘no god’ but an ‘atheist’ talking to a buddhist about the cosmos would not consider the buddhist to have the same vantage point on reality.
Anyway, as soon as you try to ‘explain’ anything that is supernatural, the atheist will cease to consider anything you say as being ‘rational’ and you are immediately written off his record of someone who has potential information regarding ‘reality’.
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Zoot
Guest
Why is this impossible? What do we mean by spiritual soul? What do we mean by spiritual?It is impossible to deny the existence of God without likewise denying the existence of an enduring spiritual soul that survives the corruption of the body. Hence, to deny God is to deny the reality of an afterlife.
What is the sense of an “afterlife” without an enduring spiritual soul that would enter that life?
Gerry
One could drop the word “spiritual” and simply say an animating energy survives the body.
If one accepts our current state of being without a god, it’s easy to accept another form of life without a god. The continued existence of the animating force may be a very natural phenomenon.
An athiest doesn’t have to have an answer to the sense of life.
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UnknownCloud
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zoot:
Energy and spirit are not even remotely the same thing. The ‘soul’ is not a thing at all - it has no parts, no quanta, no location. I would suggest a good starting theology book on the subject of the soul - it’s all too often mistaken in its meaning.
Energy and spirit are not even remotely the same thing. The ‘soul’ is not a thing at all - it has no parts, no quanta, no location. I would suggest a good starting theology book on the subject of the soul - it’s all too often mistaken in its meaning.
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RobedWithLight
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Contarini said:
From a Catholic Christian philosophical standpoint, responding to a Western materialistic / atheistic proposition, it is. I had assumed that the poster who initiated this thread was referring to the western, materialist type of atheist, with which we are more familiar, rather than the non-theistic adherents of eastern religio-philosophic systems. The atheistic tendencies of eatern systems is good enough to merit a thread of its own.
Gerry
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RobedWithLight
Guest
That is an ironical proposition. When asked if there is a God, atheists simply reply with an emphatic NO!, and then proceed with a hundred arguments as to why they say so. That, then is their definite answer.
The rest of their propositions hence follow: no immortal soul, no afterlife, no judgment, no heaven, no hell. After death, only decay follows.
Gerry
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RobedWithLight
Guest
Buddhists and followers of other eastern systems are “atheists” only in a limited lexical sense, that is, in the way we commonly understand the word “atheist”, but the similarity stops there, since they certainly are not true materialists. Perhaps it would be better to speak of these eastern systems as being non-theist, rather than atheist.
Gerry
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UnknownCloud
Guest
Gerry, you’re agreeing with me but making it sound like you are not…Buddhists are not ‘atheists’, they are…buddhists.
Saying things like ‘buddhists are athiest, but not material athiests’ is just complicating something that needs no complication. Buddhists are buddhists and they shouldn’t be coined as ‘atheists’ just because they don’t forthrightly acknowledge the Judeo-Christian idea of God. They are not atheists, and they are not monothiests either…they are Hindu-like which means they don’t fit a neat little category other than what they are…hindu or buddhist.
Saying things like ‘buddhists are athiest, but not material athiests’ is just complicating something that needs no complication. Buddhists are buddhists and they shouldn’t be coined as ‘atheists’ just because they don’t forthrightly acknowledge the Judeo-Christian idea of God. They are not atheists, and they are not monothiests either…they are Hindu-like which means they don’t fit a neat little category other than what they are…hindu or buddhist.
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Drew98
Guest
I imagine death to be like an eternal dreamless sleep from which you never wake up. So I don’t expect to feel anything at all.
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