Thought Provoking Thread on Opiophile

[Chip (OP)]

http://forum.opiophile.org/showthread.php?51631-Do-you-hope-for-an-afterlife

... and my take on it  http://forum.opiophile.org/showthread.php?51631-Do-you-hope-for-an-afterlife&p=995324#post995324

[Narkotikon]

Can you provide a synopsis for those of use who can't read members-only areas of Opiophile? 

[Chip (OP)]

Duck starts: Do you hope for an afterlife?

So, say at the end of life, you are given two choices: you can either die, your existence fading into black, and thats it. Nothing. Basically like it was before you were born, just total absence of anything.

Or, go onto an afterlife of some sort. Not necessarily a hell, but also not just total heaven where you get to get high forever and fuck mad bitches blah blah blah....more like reincarnation into a similar life of love and strife. Maybe as some alien lizard or something. My point is, not full on torture but not full on bliss.

I personally think I would choose the first, to just fade into nothingness. I love life and have really enjoyed it, but I truly don't know if I would want to do it over again. Im sure this could likely change when Im closer to dying...

then i have a go:

Do i hope there's an afterlife ? > yes, provided that i can check out at some point

Do i think that there is an afterlife ? no, silly - like where we're you before you were you ?

[Narkotikon]

Thanks.

I would probably choose the second option.  I like the idea of being able to do things over, preferably if I were able to keep the knowledge and experiences I've gained in this life.  You'd be continually evolving towards perfection. 

I do sort of believe in reincarnation.  I think people die, are reborn according to karma, and the whole purpose of "life" is to learn from our mistakes and experiences until we evolve into what we're meant to be.  There is eventually an end point, where Heaven would be I suppose, but it's individual to each person--the length of the journey is up to each individual. 

I think it's more likely that people don't retain memory of their past lives, at least not in full.  Maybe a faint memory or scattered glimpses into past-lived events.  Perhaps expressed through character traits.  If you were good / bad in your past life, you might be more prone to be good / bad in your current life, e.g.  Perhaps deja vu is the universe trying to tell you you've done it this way before.  Who knows. 

I don't think anyone can definitively say "this is how it is when you die."  It's one of those things you have to experience to know completely, and at that point you won't come back.  LOL. 

As for Biblical Heaven and Hell, um, no.  It's too permanent.  It doesn't take shades of human behavior into account.  It's too black-and-white.  It's too rigid.  It doesn't take evolution or the possibility of change into account.  If it is really that way, I like the idea of Purgatory. 

[Chip (OP)]

... but i'm still certain that when your time is up then it's ALL over; like it never ever happened.

... we are only alive but for a fraction of time compared to how long we are not.

ain't life such a trivial thing from my perspective ?!

[Der Alte Krieger]

I mentioned that I plan to spend eternity feasting, fighting and fucking in the halls of Valhalla with the All Father in the company of hero's 

40 years of Christianity had cured me of worshiping a deity that expects me to get on my knees


Danny says he's looking to sharing a few horns full of mead with me.

[chemicalchart]

... but i'm still certain that when your time is up then it's ALL over; like it never ever happened.

... we are only alive but for a fraction of time compared to how long we are not.

ain't life such a trivial thing from my perspective ?!

Pretty much my belief. We come from the void and return to the void. Our life is less than a blink of a blink of some gigantic disembodied eyeball and I'm okay with that. All this plodding about for eternity seems like desperate fiction to me.  Not to mention a very long time of plodding. When I'm done, I'm fucking done. Lights out.