Are words immaterial?

[WAB]

Perspicuo,

There is really, and I really do mean really, no reason at all to fear death.

The fear of death is tied to our sense of time, I think. We imagine ourselves non-existent forever, which seems like an awfully long time. But in reality, to be dead for a second is equal to being dead for ten trillion years. Time doesn't apply to a dead person. Eternity is the snap of a finger.

When I had to have two teeth extracted, I told the oral surgeon that I wanted to be unconscious during it. In fact, I said that that was the only way I was going to agree to having the procedure done. I have an aversion to dental work of any kind. I can't stand even sitting in that hideous chair with my mouth agape while someone diddles around inside it. Anyway, when they put me out, I remember counting backwards from 100. I may have gotten to 97, but by 98 I was euphoric, then I was being wakened.

There was no intervening time for me, though there was in reality. I went from counting 98, 97, to waking up, in the snap of a finger. I'm fairly sure that death won't be any worse an experience. There just won't be any waking up. But I won't know that, nor care. I'll be gone.*

Death is nothing to be afraid of. We've already been dead for as long as we ever will be dead.


**Unless there's an afterlife, a heaven or hell, something along those lines.

 

[Juma]

I don't think there's anything medieval or magical about the idea of an intelligent universe, collective consciousness (Jung), God, in all His/Her definitions, etc.

Your right, why use any other epitet than ehat it deservers: utter bullshit.

The main difference—and it's a major improvement, don't get me wrong— is that scientistic types are, in the main, benevolent, and don't back their arguments up with the stick.

Wrong. The difference is that scientist relies on what can tested, instead of any shit that can be dreamed up.

 

[untermensche]

There is really, and I really do mean really, no reason at all to fear death.

No reason to fear being dead.

Many reasons to fear dying. It can be very unpleasant.

 

[WAB]

Your right, why use any other epitet than ehat it deservers: utter bullshit.

The main difference—and it's a major improvement, don't get me wrong— is that scientistic types are, in the main, benevolent, and don't back their arguments up with the stick.

Wrong. The difference is that scientist relies on what can tested, instead of any shit that can be dreamed up.

'Any shit...", "utter bullshit", yep, you've sure given an iron-clad argument there, Juma.

 

[WAB]

There is really, and I really do mean really, no reason at all to fear death.

No reason to fear being dead.

Many reasons to fear dying. It can be very unpleasant.

Of course dying can be very unpleasant. Living can be very unpleasant too.

 

[fast]

Edited out

 

[untermensche]

No reason to fear being dead.

Many reasons to fear dying. It can be very unpleasant.

Of course dying can be very unpleasant. Living can be very unpleasant too.

For many life is very pleasant and then this incredible unpleasantness called death arrives.

 

[Perspicuo]

It could be anything you say but NOT totally wrong. Fear of death is an inherent part of the species. Denial is also part of humanity, a reaction to anxiety and fear. Both very real and universal. On the other hand, it's surprising that you will compare your fear of death with everyone else's, conclude yours is the least... and not know any of them at all. A knowledge you cannot possibly have, and therefore conspicuously a misguided belief. Our minds can trick us that way, particularly when there is anxiety or fear at stake.

In any case, the insistent proposal of an entity without any sort of evidence no matter how much contrary evidence there is, is obviously suspect. Consciousness is a feature of the working of human brains, and to elevate a mere brain function to an supposedly inexplicable entity that somehow is not physical but interacts with it, is both medieval and magical. René Descartes would be proud.

It's more or less a figure of speech, when I say that no-one is less afraid of death than I am. Of course I can't know that for sure.

I don't think there's anything medieval or magical about the idea of an intelligent universe, collective consciousness (Jung), God, in all His/Her definitions, etc. In fact, I think that the insistence and persistence of scientistic types to marginalize and stigmatize any kind of creative thinking is eerily similar to the quelling of creative thinking undertaken by the dogmatists and doctrinaires of medieval times. The main difference—and it's a major improvement, don't get me wrong— is that scientistic types are, in the main, benevolent, and don't back their arguments up with the stick. What we have now (as in here on this forum) is not a war of the oppressors and the oppressed, but an intellectual battle essentially free of fear of retribution, punishment, pain and suffering.

I think it's a good thing that people disagree. If we were to arrive at a time when all people are in harmonious agreement on all issues, that would be the time to be truly fearful and suspicious. Conflict of ideas is natural and good. Total conformity, with zero contention among individuals, is a pipe-dream, and will never come to pass. Nor should it.

I realize I'm rambling off topic...

"I think that the insistence and persistence of scientistic types to marginalize and stigmatize any kind of creative thinking is"
> What? You sure have a vivid imagination! Creative thinking in at the heart of science, what pushes it forward more than anything else. But science is testing what we conjecture, and also heeding to logical analysis and the evidence.

Take the Christian God. It's based on the Bible. Evidence shows neither the creation stories are true, nor the exodus from Egypt, and the conquest of Canaan is dubious. It gets some kings and generals of the Mesopotamian area empires wrong, it speaks of the dead coming out of the grave at the time of Jesus' death which didn't happen and all sorts of miracles (wonderful ones, not the sort like praying your grandma being cured from cancer and actually having her survive after medical tratement) the followers of Christ could perform until civilization arrives of the time of evidence and voila miracles no more.

The immaterial soul used to be the seat and cause of morality and spirituality, and now we know which parts of the brain do that. To persist in such flights of unbridled fantasy is not "creative thinking", it's obdurate folly.

 

[fast]

The immaterial soul used to be the seat and cause of morality and spirituality, and now we know which parts of the brain do that. To persist in such flights of unbridled fantasy is not "creative thinking", it's obdurate folly.

If one holds the position that there is no soul, one should not hold the position that it's immaterial. If one holds the position that there is a soul, one should hold the position that it's immaterial, although I'm sure some would mistakenly think it's material based on the assumption that all things that exist are therefore material.

"Immaterial" implies "not material", but "not material" does not imply "immaterial".

If something exists, then something is either material or not material; likewise, if something exists, then something is either material or immaterial; however, if something does not exist, it's neither material nor immaterial.

To say of something that it's immaterial is to imply that it exists and not material, but to say of something that it does not exist fails to imply that's it's material, and it fails to imply that it's immaterial--after all, if there is something that is immaterial, there is something--but not, of course, some thing (in the narrow sense).

 

[DBT]

Is it Death people fear? Or the idea of losing everyone and everything they have known, everything they have loved and worked for all their lives?

 

[Juma]

Is it Death people fear? Or the idea of losing everyone and everything they have known, everything they have loved and worked for all their lives?

Neither. It is the self preservation reflex. There is nothing rational about it.

 

[DBT]

Is it Death people fear? Or the idea of losing everyone and everything they have known, everything they have loved and worked for all their lives?

Neither. It is the self preservation reflex. There is nothing rational about it.

Nothing I said excludes self preservation...on the contrary, it entails self preservation.

 

[Juma]

Nothing I said excludes self preservation...
.

? you did exclude self presrvation from the list...

on the contrary, it entails self preservation.

No, it doesnt. Self preservation, the built in mental "force" that prevents us from killing ourself is not about what you wrote. Those reasons are just a rationalization.

 

[WAB]

Si, Perspie! I do have a vivid imagination. And how!

However, I don't think I've imagined what looks like less and less tolerance for creative (perhaps I should have said radical? Sometimes radical thinking is a positive thing, no?) ideas among certain scientistic types. Note I say scientistic types, not scientists. Of course we can argue about whether there even is such a thing as scientism or such a species as scientistic types of individuals. Maybe there is no such ism, and no such collective?

But—

[there's always a (_!_) ]

—when I see certain people's TED talks being banned, and people's names being tagged with 'woo' and other pejoratives, especially scholars like Roger Penrose, just to name one sadly maligned genius, I gotta worry. I'm a worrier. Where's the worry smilie?

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Neither. It is the self preservation reflex. There is nothing rational about it.

Nothing I said excludes self preservation...on the contrary, it entails self preservation.

+1 for DBT.

 

[ryan]

Is it Death people fear? Or the idea of losing everyone and everything they have known, everything they have loved and worked for all their lives?

Like I said earlier, we understand a potentially infinitesimal portion of the nature of existence, so we must always assume incomplete knowledge. Sorry but this includes what happens after death and going to infinity once dead.

Your consciousness might come back in some universe where it will only feel pain and agony a trillion times worse than any pain you have ever felt on Earth; this might go on for trillions of years.

So I can easily say that death is to be and is feared for reasons beyond the reasons that you mentioned.

I think that if people could grasp what I am talking about, then we would have figured out how to literally save our souls by now. Although, it's never too late.

 

[DBT]

No, it doesnt. Self preservation, the built in mental "force" that prevents us from killing ourself is not about what you wrote. Those reasons are just a rationalization.

Self preservation and self identity goes beyond the physical body and its demise. 'Self' includes not only our physical body/self but our psyche.

 

[Juma]

No, it doesnt. Self preservation, the built in mental "force" that prevents us from killing ourself is not about what you wrote. Those reasons are just a rationalization.

Self preservation and self identity goes beyond the physical body and its demise. 'Self' includes not only our physical body/self but our psyche.

Self preservation is the fear if losing your ego. Nothing else.

 

[fast]

Si, Perspie! I do have a vivid imagination. And how!

However, I don't think I've imagined what looks like less and less tolerance for creative (perhaps I should have said radical? Sometimes radical thinking is a positive thing, no?) ideas among certain scientistic types. Note I say scientistic types, not scientists. Of course we can argue about whether there even is such a thing as scientism or such a species as scientistic types of individuals. Maybe there is no such ism, and no such collective?

But—

[there's always a (_!_) ]

—when I see certain people's TED talks being banned, and people's names being tagged with 'woo' and other pejoratives, especially scholars like Roger Penrose, just to name one sadly maligned genius, I gotta worry. I'm a worrier. Where's the worry smilie?

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Nothing I said excludes self preservation...on the contrary, it entails self preservation.

+1 for DBT.

I don't think you (specifically you) should use a smilie.

 

[Perspicuo]

Is it Death people fear? Or the idea of losing everyone and everything they have known, everything they have loved and worked for all their lives?

They're not mutually exclusive options. But fear of death is an outstanding component.

 

[Perspicuo]

Si, Perspie! I do have a vivid imagination. And how!

However, I don't think I've imagined what looks like less and less tolerance for creative (perhaps I should have said radical? Sometimes radical thinking is a positive thing, no?) ideas among certain scientistic types. Note I say scientistic types, not scientists. Of course we can argue about whether there even is such a thing as scientism or such a species as scientistic types of individuals. Maybe there is no such ism, and no such collective?

But—

[there's always a (_!_) ]

—when I see certain people's TED talks being banned, and people's names being tagged with 'woo' and other pejoratives, especially scholars like Roger Penrose, just to name one sadly maligned genius, I gotta worry. I'm a worrier. Where's the worry smilie?

- - - Updated - - -

Nothing I said excludes self preservation...on the contrary, it entails self preservation.

+1 for DBT.

"Scientistic types" is a straw man. It's the kind of automatic thought that comes to your mind when a skeptic criticizes the "obdurate follies" I mention, the ideas that just don't die even if neuroscience has built the case of mental processes as functions of the brain. When the critics criticize they have behind them the great big arsenal of research which they cannot mention in its entirety every single goddamn time.

That obduracy is the result of wish. I like how this Austrian guy put it in a now famous book: "Religion is a system of wishful illusions together with a disavowal of reality, such as we find nowhere else but in a state of blissful hallucinatory confusion. Religion's eleventh commandment is 'Thou shalt not question'.". And when someone does question is when you call "Scientism!".

No, Virginia, there is no scientistic boogeyman, only science, and the skeptics who you find odd that they don't understand your decision to believe the moon is made of cheese and at the same time the moon is not made of cheese (Ah, the cheese exists at the quantum level! LOL Sure, Deepak).

Well it's not. The moon. Is. Not. Made. Of. Cheese.
The mind is brain function as per heaps of research.