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One enormous advantage many of the religious have in terms of mentally coping with life is that they don't believe they will ever truly die. Hats off to those w

One enormous advantage many of the religious have in terms of mentally coping with life is that they don't believe they will ever truly die. Hats off to those who find motivation to live without that.

asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago
As someone who was once religious, I can tell you at at least for me, this never really dealt with existential dread. Maybe I just didn't believe hard enough. But it stands to reason that thoughts of the afterlife do not do much: religious people do not seem, in the main, to have significantly less fear or avoidance of death. The drive to live would be pretty anemic if a mere mental trick could defuse it. Personally, now that I'm secular, I still fear death. But at least I understand that that fear only exists because of my built in neurobiological values, which are there because they helped my ancestors reproduce. That doesn't really change things much either, but at least it's a true explanation. Before there was always a cognitive dissonance: if things are going to be way way better after we die, why do we try so hard to avoid death?
- abnry 6y ago
  I remain deeply religious, and there is something of a fear of death, but it is mostly related to the fear of the unknown. I believe I will see God face to face and that's kind of terrifying. I am honestly more afraid of pain than death. Any religious faith is a faith, even though people like to suggest silly arguments that faith necessarily is blind or unbounded, but it is still a hope in something unseen.
  - srtjstjsj 6y ago
    How do you choose your supernatural beliefs? Why not choose more fun ones, like that God is a loving cool dude to hang out with?
    - abnry 6y ago
      I mean, do you have any knowledge of Christianity and its history? Not sure if you are sincere.
    - mistermann 6y ago
      One might just as well ask how a hardcore "there is no god" atheist chooses their belief. There is a long history of spontaneous religious beliefs throughout history and around the world, which can be interpreted in more than one way.
    - slothtrop 6y ago
      It's a product of his environment.
  - SpikeDad 6y ago
    Which god? Faith just makes you live a life without evidence. Seems like a poor choice to me. And with all of the negative associates of being religious seems to me you're blowing the one absolutely confirmed life for some fairy tale.
    - kls 6y ago
      Living life without evidence is one way to look at it, another way to look at it is living to a moral code that thousands of years of humanity has agreed provides a happy life. If you look at most of the world religions they pretty much agree on what those are: Abrahamic religions call them out as Pride, Envy, Gluttony, Lust (note on this, it is all consuming desire it is not just sex but sex is a powerful vector for unhealthy lust. As an example one can lust after social acceptance), Anger, Greed and Sloth. Buddhism calls the three fires out as ignorance (Greed, Sloth), attachment (Envy, Lust, Gluttony), and aversion (Pride, Anger). I don't see it as a poor choice to live to those defined moral codes. The negative association with being religious is due to many people letting other people think for them now days. If one take the actions and words of a person over studying for oneself what the text say then that is exactly what one is doing. If one ascribes negative connotations to the underpinnings, without knowledge of whether those that claim knowledge yet may be ignorant of what the text says, then one acts in the same ignorance. Most of the religious texts, espouse universal love, non-judgment (by other people) and harmony. Most of the people that claim they understand them, have never event read the texts from end to end, much less any of the competing religions text to compare and contrasting one against the other. For example let's take Abrahamic religions because they are fun to pick on, most Muslims, Jews and Christians (especially Christians) could not even tell you what Psalm 137:9 is, much less explain why someone would be happy to dash child against the rocks. Well deeper understanding would be that this is what the Israelites wanted, revenge for their dead children that were bludgeoned to death. But what happened was not revenge, but rather judgment and that is the lesson being conveyed, our hearts will seek revenge but what puts things in balance is not revenge but judgment. Point being, I have been hard pressed to find a single laymen from any of the 3 Abrahamic branches, that know the verse much less that could explain it (honestly Muslims where the most knowledgeable on the subject). Further most Christians don't even realize that Jesus was a devout pacifist, cavorted with mainly "sinners" and routinely spoke out about the pious. As a side note Jeremiah 32:35 is another fun one. Why did it not enter his mind? Is he not all knowing and omnipotent? While it may be a fairy tail, by all accounts Jesus and Buddha were pretty awesome dudes, I want to be like them, even if it's just for the time I am here.
deleted 6y ago
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snegu 6y ago
I actually found death a lot easier to deal with after I stopped being religious. The idea of existing for eternity is more terrifying to me than anything else I can imagine. I can deal with things ending.
- katzgrau 6y ago
  Existing as a human forever would suck, but I'm sure an eternal being could find other ways to keep himself occupied.
  - ianai 6y ago
    This. I hope being human is merely something we’re doing to experience human existence as one of many options.
  - ReactiveJelly 6y ago
    It would be weird after a trillion years when your human life was just a tiny sliver of your whole life. I can't handle that thought any more or less than the thought that I'll die - As a cartoon dog said, I just distract myself with pointless stuff, it seems to work.
    - katzgrau 6y ago
      Not to get too esoteric, but at some point a trillion years is meaningless. Nothing really matters or doesn't matter - it's how you want to look at it. And distracting yourself with pointless stuff is totally valid. In fact, it's probably what we're all doing in one way or the other.
- pmarreck 6y ago
  > The idea of existing for eternity is more terrifying to me than anything else I can imagine. But the presumption here is that the same “time passage” we’re familiar with here, exists there, and pretty much 100% of NDE accounts (depending on whether you believe thousands of witnesses of it constitute credible eyewitness testimony) state that there’s “no time” there or that “time is weird”. Here’s a simple question: Do you think there are immutable aspects to your person? Aspects that have remained unchanged your whole life thus far? Because those are apparently the things that continue on to the next adventure, as it were. And yet, this is supposedly a learning experience of some sort...
katzgrau 6y ago
Well, usually adherents also believe that there is a higher power watching out for them, or that they will eventually be judged for their actions. What it really highlights is that the will to live is dependent on personal perspective. There are plenty of great reasons to live, and plenty to not live. It just depends on what lens you ultimately choose to view from. If you're feeling like you don't have the will, there is absolutely a way of reframing your thinking in such a way that you could find the will.
- srtjstjsj 6y ago
  Also depends on what entity is making that choice and to what extent free will exists.
  - katzgrau 6y ago
    Doesn't your personal belief help answer that question though? It seems if you sincerely believe you have free will, you'll end up doing things that look a lot like the exercise of free will.
Barrin92 6y ago
because eternal life conceptually feels like a coping mechanism it honestly never appealed to me, because the fact that it feels like coping kind of devalues it, to me there's more dignity in accepting death just head on. It might suck, but at least it feels like accepting things as they are. Also it just weirds me out, like I'll end up trapped in an eternal versin of animal crossing or something. Of course religious people don't think of it like that and it's all more sublime and full of unity with god and so on but it still doesn't sound great. i don't know if this is just the hacky pop-culture reading of Buddhism but I've always liked the idea of Nirvana more than the kind of stories told by the Abrahamic religions.
- kls 6y ago
  TLDR full of philosophy and my personal assumptions. because eternal life conceptually feels like a coping mechanism it honestly never appealed to me It's strange but I used to be an agnostic and viewed the idea in pretty much a similar light to you, always dismissed it as wishful thinking, but three things always struck me: 1) The something from nothing paradox. 2) The fact that the universe looks like a data store. 3) The composeability of nature as almost a form of programming e.g chemistry, genetics, light/matter duality. So I was always an uncomfortable Agnostic I always said that if I had to flip a coin, I would be 70% on heads that there is a design to all of this. So with that, I kind of just meandered around philosophy and theology for a long time, not really liking religion for the people involved which kept me from really understanding the underlying philosophy trying to be conveyed in them. As I have grown older and given my being OK with either outcome I have come to understand, if there is a architect intelligent life existing for a period of time and then extinguished seems to be the least logical option. Human knowledge transferred thru generations seems to be the most inefficient way to evolve it assuming knowledge is the only point and usually in nature we see the path of least resistance. So I generally assume we are not ants just here to build something and our lives are insignificant. If that is the case then a transformed existence after this one seems logical (based on a bunch of faith and assumptions I will give you). When you look at it in that light the philosophy of many religions has some good reasons, though the explanations may be dated, as to why things are the way they are. Logical explanations about free will, why death would exist, why we seem to be abandoned to our own fate and a recognition that in our current state, eternal life would not be that great and how transformation is needed if we are to be eternal beings. Now in saying all this in my flipping coins odds thinking I am less of a betting man on the concept that this is a science project that someone abandoned. That I am closer to 50-50 on. Now please do not take this as a pitch for hey go find god. I believe every person according to their free will needs to live their life according to that free will. I am just telling you a story of how I got to from where you are, to where I am now. So anyways back to the 50-50 odds I came to the conclusion that we either are abandoned and if that is the case nothing really matters, not happiness, not love, not Hitler, not Stalin, not Gandhi, not Christ. While they all may matter in the temporal, in the grand scheme of things it all burns out and the Architect throws it in the trash bin. There will be no observer for any of it to ever matter. I for obvious reasons don't like that line of thinking so I figure this Architect either left an manuscript to life or it did not. Either there are instructions or it figures we will learn what we need to learn in this existence. So I started reading a lot of religious text and I saw a lot of similar themes. For example in Buddhism Nirvana is the final state of enlightenment where one has extinguished the 3 fires (greed, hate, ignorance). It is the destruction of desire. The Sikh's use a little different terminology in that it is the end of suffering. The Hindus see it in a similar light but see it as unity with Brahman. Now I bring this up to directly contrast it with Abrahamic religions as I really don't see them as all that different I think what is different is the style in which the concept is conveyed. Whereas many eastern religions tend to get straight to the philosophy. Abrahamic philosophy tends to be woven into a tome that is part history, part parable, part philosophy which can make it harder to extract from the text but when one understand that, in my opinion the layers of the philosophy and theology tell a deeper story. Going back to Nirvana for a moment, this concept is played out in the fall of man, the inability of man to see their imperfection, the inability of man to accept devine authority, those that finally do see life for what it is "will see" (enlightenment) and finally according to one sect of Abrahamic religion will unify with creation (i.e the bride of christ). Again not a pitch for christianity or Buddhism or Hinduism. I just find it fascinating that there are many parallels in what they say the lesson is to learn. Anyway a really long winded post to explain that I don't see an existence after this as wishful thinking anymore, I see the purpose, but only if there is any purpose at all.
noir_lord 6y ago
> Hats off to those who find motivation to live without that. My motivation is that the odds of me actually existing in the first place are so long that I'd be a fool to waste my brief time in the universe. Looked at through that point of view everything is amazing from a tree leaf to the latest giga image of Orion. "Given enough time, Hydrogen starts to wonder where it came from, and where its going." - Edward Robert Harrison. Think of all the amount of time and events that had to take place for you to be able to contemplate the universe. Spend some time looking at https://orion2020v5b.spaceforeverybody.com/ https://orion2020v5b.spaceforeverybody.com/ zoom in and realise that everyone of those white dots is a star, they where around for millions or billions of years before the statistically unlikely event that led you to be able to look at the dots, they'll largely be around for billion years after you are gone, to me that is the true meaning of awe - that I can sit here with a coffee and get to in a very small way comprehend a very small part of a vast universe. I get to appreciate it because a million and a half years ago my ancestor took the left path and not the right, the one with the predator, I get to appreciate it because two thousand years ago my ancestor didn't drink from the strange smelling stream and because 40 years ago the cashier at the petrol station agreed to a date with the security guard doing the cash pickup, it's all random, there is no meaning but what we ascribe.
- ta1234567890 6y ago
  > it's all random, there is no meaning but what we ascribe As Yoda would say, "there is no why" https://youtube.com/watch?v=TJ8KIzkCAto https://youtube.com/watch?v=TJ8KIzkCAto
- notsureaboutpg 6y ago
  >it's all random, there is no meaning but what we ascribe This kind of thinking is bizarre to me, I genuinely want to understand this. I don't believe we all exist randomly or that our existence was an accident. I am a deeply religious person precisely because I don't believe all of this is random. If all is random, why does every person who claims to believe this not live as if it were true. Almost all of these people plan out their lives and their retirements, etc. etc. and then claim that everything is random. Why do you say "I'd be a fool to waste your brief time in the universe" if your brief time here is an accident. It's a fluke and nothing you do during your time here matters at all because you yourself don't matter at all, so why pretend that doing good and spending your time wisely is important? Sorry if I sound harsh, but I really wish to understand this kind of thought, and you just never can talk about this kind of stuff this way with people in real life.
deleted 6y ago
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asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago

As someone who was once religious, I can tell you at at least for me, this never really dealt with existential dread. Maybe I just didn't believe hard enough. But it stands to reason that thoughts of the afterlife do not do much: religious people do not seem, in the main, to have significantly less fear or avoidance of death. The drive to live would be pretty anemic if a mere mental trick could defuse it. Personally, now that I'm secular, I still fear death. But at least I understand that that fear only exists because of my built in neurobiological values, which are there because they helped my ancestors reproduce. That doesn't really change things much either, but at least it's a true explanation. Before there was always a cognitive dissonance: if things are going to be way way better after we die, why do we try so hard to avoid death?

abnry 6y ago
I remain deeply religious, and there is something of a fear of death, but it is mostly related to the fear of the unknown. I believe I will see God face to face and that's kind of terrifying. I am honestly more afraid of pain than death. Any religious faith is a faith, even though people like to suggest silly arguments that faith necessarily is blind or unbounded, but it is still a hope in something unseen.
- srtjstjsj 6y ago
  How do you choose your supernatural beliefs? Why not choose more fun ones, like that God is a loving cool dude to hang out with?
  - abnry 6y ago
    I mean, do you have any knowledge of Christianity and its history? Not sure if you are sincere.
  - mistermann 6y ago
    One might just as well ask how a hardcore "there is no god" atheist chooses their belief. There is a long history of spontaneous religious beliefs throughout history and around the world, which can be interpreted in more than one way.
  - slothtrop 6y ago
    It's a product of his environment.
- SpikeDad 6y ago
  Which god? Faith just makes you live a life without evidence. Seems like a poor choice to me. And with all of the negative associates of being religious seems to me you're blowing the one absolutely confirmed life for some fairy tale.
  - kls 6y ago
    Living life without evidence is one way to look at it, another way to look at it is living to a moral code that thousands of years of humanity has agreed provides a happy life. If you look at most of the world religions they pretty much agree on what those are: Abrahamic religions call them out as Pride, Envy, Gluttony, Lust (note on this, it is all consuming desire it is not just sex but sex is a powerful vector for unhealthy lust. As an example one can lust after social acceptance), Anger, Greed and Sloth. Buddhism calls the three fires out as ignorance (Greed, Sloth), attachment (Envy, Lust, Gluttony), and aversion (Pride, Anger). I don't see it as a poor choice to live to those defined moral codes. The negative association with being religious is due to many people letting other people think for them now days. If one take the actions and words of a person over studying for oneself what the text say then that is exactly what one is doing. If one ascribes negative connotations to the underpinnings, without knowledge of whether those that claim knowledge yet may be ignorant of what the text says, then one acts in the same ignorance. Most of the religious texts, espouse universal love, non-judgment (by other people) and harmony. Most of the people that claim they understand them, have never event read the texts from end to end, much less any of the competing religions text to compare and contrasting one against the other. For example let's take Abrahamic religions because they are fun to pick on, most Muslims, Jews and Christians (especially Christians) could not even tell you what Psalm 137:9 is, much less explain why someone would be happy to dash child against the rocks. Well deeper understanding would be that this is what the Israelites wanted, revenge for their dead children that were bludgeoned to death. But what happened was not revenge, but rather judgment and that is the lesson being conveyed, our hearts will seek revenge but what puts things in balance is not revenge but judgment. Point being, I have been hard pressed to find a single laymen from any of the 3 Abrahamic branches, that know the verse much less that could explain it (honestly Muslims where the most knowledgeable on the subject). Further most Christians don't even realize that Jesus was a devout pacifist, cavorted with mainly "sinners" and routinely spoke out about the pious. As a side note Jeremiah 32:35 is another fun one. Why did it not enter his mind? Is he not all knowing and omnipotent? While it may be a fairy tail, by all accounts Jesus and Buddha were pretty awesome dudes, I want to be like them, even if it's just for the time I am here.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

snegu 6y ago

I actually found death a lot easier to deal with after I stopped being religious. The idea of existing for eternity is more terrifying to me than anything else I can imagine. I can deal with things ending.

katzgrau 6y ago
Existing as a human forever would suck, but I'm sure an eternal being could find other ways to keep himself occupied.
- ianai 6y ago
  This. I hope being human is merely something we’re doing to experience human existence as one of many options.
- ReactiveJelly 6y ago
  It would be weird after a trillion years when your human life was just a tiny sliver of your whole life. I can't handle that thought any more or less than the thought that I'll die - As a cartoon dog said, I just distract myself with pointless stuff, it seems to work.
  - katzgrau 6y ago
    Not to get too esoteric, but at some point a trillion years is meaningless. Nothing really matters or doesn't matter - it's how you want to look at it. And distracting yourself with pointless stuff is totally valid. In fact, it's probably what we're all doing in one way or the other.
pmarreck 6y ago
> The idea of existing for eternity is more terrifying to me than anything else I can imagine. But the presumption here is that the same “time passage” we’re familiar with here, exists there, and pretty much 100% of NDE accounts (depending on whether you believe thousands of witnesses of it constitute credible eyewitness testimony) state that there’s “no time” there or that “time is weird”. Here’s a simple question: Do you think there are immutable aspects to your person? Aspects that have remained unchanged your whole life thus far? Because those are apparently the things that continue on to the next adventure, as it were. And yet, this is supposedly a learning experience of some sort...

katzgrau 6y ago

Well, usually adherents also believe that there is a higher power watching out for them, or that they will eventually be judged for their actions. What it really highlights is that the will to live is dependent on personal perspective. There are plenty of great reasons to live, and plenty to not live. It just depends on what lens you ultimately choose to view from. If you're feeling like you don't have the will, there is absolutely a way of reframing your thinking in such a way that you could find the will.

srtjstjsj 6y ago
Also depends on what entity is making that choice and to what extent free will exists.
- katzgrau 6y ago
  Doesn't your personal belief help answer that question though? It seems if you sincerely believe you have free will, you'll end up doing things that look a lot like the exercise of free will.

Barrin92 6y ago

because eternal life conceptually feels like a coping mechanism it honestly never appealed to me, because the fact that it feels like coping kind of devalues it, to me there's more dignity in accepting death just head on. It might suck, but at least it feels like accepting things as they are. Also it just weirds me out, like I'll end up trapped in an eternal versin of animal crossing or something. Of course religious people don't think of it like that and it's all more sublime and full of unity with god and so on but it still doesn't sound great. i don't know if this is just the hacky pop-culture reading of Buddhism but I've always liked the idea of Nirvana more than the kind of stories told by the Abrahamic religions.

kls 6y ago
TLDR full of philosophy and my personal assumptions. because eternal life conceptually feels like a coping mechanism it honestly never appealed to me It's strange but I used to be an agnostic and viewed the idea in pretty much a similar light to you, always dismissed it as wishful thinking, but three things always struck me: 1) The something from nothing paradox. 2) The fact that the universe looks like a data store. 3) The composeability of nature as almost a form of programming e.g chemistry, genetics, light/matter duality. So I was always an uncomfortable Agnostic I always said that if I had to flip a coin, I would be 70% on heads that there is a design to all of this. So with that, I kind of just meandered around philosophy and theology for a long time, not really liking religion for the people involved which kept me from really understanding the underlying philosophy trying to be conveyed in them. As I have grown older and given my being OK with either outcome I have come to understand, if there is a architect intelligent life existing for a period of time and then extinguished seems to be the least logical option. Human knowledge transferred thru generations seems to be the most inefficient way to evolve it assuming knowledge is the only point and usually in nature we see the path of least resistance. So I generally assume we are not ants just here to build something and our lives are insignificant. If that is the case then a transformed existence after this one seems logical (based on a bunch of faith and assumptions I will give you). When you look at it in that light the philosophy of many religions has some good reasons, though the explanations may be dated, as to why things are the way they are. Logical explanations about free will, why death would exist, why we seem to be abandoned to our own fate and a recognition that in our current state, eternal life would not be that great and how transformation is needed if we are to be eternal beings. Now in saying all this in my flipping coins odds thinking I am less of a betting man on the concept that this is a science project that someone abandoned. That I am closer to 50-50 on. Now please do not take this as a pitch for hey go find god. I believe every person according to their free will needs to live their life according to that free will. I am just telling you a story of how I got to from where you are, to where I am now. So anyways back to the 50-50 odds I came to the conclusion that we either are abandoned and if that is the case nothing really matters, not happiness, not love, not Hitler, not Stalin, not Gandhi, not Christ. While they all may matter in the temporal, in the grand scheme of things it all burns out and the Architect throws it in the trash bin. There will be no observer for any of it to ever matter. I for obvious reasons don't like that line of thinking so I figure this Architect either left an manuscript to life or it did not. Either there are instructions or it figures we will learn what we need to learn in this existence. So I started reading a lot of religious text and I saw a lot of similar themes. For example in Buddhism Nirvana is the final state of enlightenment where one has extinguished the 3 fires (greed, hate, ignorance). It is the destruction of desire. The Sikh's use a little different terminology in that it is the end of suffering. The Hindus see it in a similar light but see it as unity with Brahman. Now I bring this up to directly contrast it with Abrahamic religions as I really don't see them as all that different I think what is different is the style in which the concept is conveyed. Whereas many eastern religions tend to get straight to the philosophy. Abrahamic philosophy tends to be woven into a tome that is part history, part parable, part philosophy which can make it harder to extract from the text but when one understand that, in my opinion the layers of the philosophy and theology tell a deeper story. Going back to Nirvana for a moment, this concept is played out in the fall of man, the inability of man to see their imperfection, the inability of man to accept devine authority, those that finally do see life for what it is "will see" (enlightenment) and finally according to one sect of Abrahamic religion will unify with creation (i.e the bride of christ). Again not a pitch for christianity or Buddhism or Hinduism. I just find it fascinating that there are many parallels in what they say the lesson is to learn. Anyway a really long winded post to explain that I don't see an existence after this as wishful thinking anymore, I see the purpose, but only if there is any purpose at all.

noir_lord 6y ago

> Hats off to those who find motivation to live without that. My motivation is that the odds of me actually existing in the first place are so long that I'd be a fool to waste my brief time in the universe. Looked at through that point of view everything is amazing from a tree leaf to the latest giga image of Orion. "Given enough time, Hydrogen starts to wonder where it came from, and where its going." - Edward Robert Harrison. Think of all the amount of time and events that had to take place for you to be able to contemplate the universe. Spend some time looking at https://orion2020v5b.spaceforeverybody.com/ https://orion2020v5b.spaceforeverybody.com/ zoom in and realise that everyone of those white dots is a star, they where around for millions or billions of years before the statistically unlikely event that led you to be able to look at the dots, they'll largely be around for billion years after you are gone, to me that is the true meaning of awe - that I can sit here with a coffee and get to in a very small way comprehend a very small part of a vast universe. I get to appreciate it because a million and a half years ago my ancestor took the left path and not the right, the one with the predator, I get to appreciate it because two thousand years ago my ancestor didn't drink from the strange smelling stream and because 40 years ago the cashier at the petrol station agreed to a date with the security guard doing the cash pickup, it's all random, there is no meaning but what we ascribe.

ta1234567890 6y ago
> it's all random, there is no meaning but what we ascribe As Yoda would say, "there is no why" https://youtube.com/watch?v=TJ8KIzkCAto https://youtube.com/watch?v=TJ8KIzkCAto
notsureaboutpg 6y ago
>it's all random, there is no meaning but what we ascribe This kind of thinking is bizarre to me, I genuinely want to understand this. I don't believe we all exist randomly or that our existence was an accident. I am a deeply religious person precisely because I don't believe all of this is random. If all is random, why does every person who claims to believe this not live as if it were true. Almost all of these people plan out their lives and their retirements, etc. etc. and then claim that everything is random. Why do you say "I'd be a fool to waste your brief time in the universe" if your brief time here is an accident. It's a fluke and nothing you do during your time here matters at all because you yourself don't matter at all, so why pretend that doing good and spending your time wisely is important? Sorry if I sound harsh, but I really wish to understand this kind of thought, and you just never can talk about this kind of stuff this way with people in real life.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]