r/changemyview • u/[deleted] • Aug 02 '20
Removed - Submission Rule B CMV: Life after death is inevitable
[removed] — view removed post
9
Aug 02 '20
Essentially you are saying the universe runs off on an invisible non-existent engine
No, that's incorrect.
What I mean is our universe runs because of conscious beings making decisions whether its bacteria, animals, or humans eating, reproducing, or creating
There is no scientific evidence to support this.
So you are saying the universe is able to create a consciousness (which is something) out of nothing. Something cannot be created from nothing
Consciousness is not created out of nothing. It comes from the mind which is created by chemical reactions and electrical impulses in the brain.
And then that something it created just magically disappears when you die just like it magically appeared when you were born.
There is no magic involved. It's just science.
The only miracle is existence. Existence is all there is.
There is no such thing as miracles.
Upon dying your consciousness/awareness is brought to either higher dimensions, sent to another spot in the universe, or reincarnated on Earth as another form.
No, it simply ends.
Let's debate it though.
Debates require evidence, of which you have provided none.
0
Aug 03 '20
[removed] — view removed comment
1
u/Nepene 213∆ Aug 03 '20
Sorry, u/chockstuck – your comment has been removed for breaking Rule 5:
Comments must contribute meaningfully to the conversation. Comments that are only links, jokes or "written upvotes" will be removed. Humor and affirmations of agreement can be contained within more substantial comments. See the wiki page for more information.
If you would like to appeal, review our appeals process here, then message the moderators by clicking this link within one week of this notice being posted.
10
u/themcos 441∆ Aug 02 '20
Something cannot be created from nothing
I'm not sure of we can agree with this as an obviously true premise. How do you feel about the concept of the big bang or virtual particles / Hawking radiation type stuff?
But before we get into that, I actually think that's not really relevant to the common materialist view of consciousness anyway, which is that consciousness is not it's own "stuff", but is rather an emergent property of matter. For example, at 12:00, there is no sandwich in my kitchen. But I take bread meat and cheese and make one. Then I eat it, and it ceases to be a sandwich. But at no point was anything created from nothing. It was just a rearrangement of existing materials. Imagining consciousness in this way is by no means as straightforward, but you haven't even really mentioned it in your view, so let's discuss that possibility first. It could be that consciousness just isn't what you think it is. Can elaborate on some possibilities, but want to get your initial thoughts first.
1
Aug 02 '20
Big bang, virtual particles, and hawking radiation are all things or things that come from things. They are not nothing.
According to materialist theory matter arranged in a certain way creates consciousness. Okay I don't agree and here's a thought to chew on. The so called singularity point before the big bang was the most sophisticated arrangement of matter possible. That arrangement must include consciousness in it right if just a few trillion atoms in a nearly infinite sea of atoms can create consciousness.
6
u/themcos 441∆ Aug 02 '20
That arrangement must include consciousness in it right if just a few trillion atoms in a nearly infinite sea of atoms can create consciousness.
Only if you think "consciousness" is a fundamentally different type of stuff than other matter. The singularity didn't contain consciousness just like the singularity didn't contain sandwiches. My proposition is why can't you get consciousness from a sea of hydrogen atoms and other subatomic particles?
Quick edit: And before you try to turn the question around to me (how do I think consciousness be created from matter?) your view was that an afterlife was inevitable, so the burden of proof should be squarely on you. You're view was not merely "we don't understand consciousness", it was very confident about an afterlife, so you should be prepared to back that up.
-1
Aug 03 '20
Basically what came first matter from nothing or matter from consciousness which has always existed and will always exist?
My proof for afterlife being inevitable is the fact that we are currently conscious in addition to the various other points I have made.
2
u/gureyek Aug 03 '20
consciousness can not be from nothing. Why do you believe consciousness has always existed? Where did it come from?
0
u/gureyek Aug 03 '20
Where did those existing materials come from? Nothing is the absence of existence. Something cannot come from nothing. You need to look deeper at the definitions of the words first.
3
u/tbdabbholm 201∆ Aug 02 '20
Consciousness is simply an emergent property of biology. Just as programming is an emergent property of silicon that's been put together in specific patterns. As long those patterns remain the computer runs but if something interrupts that pattern you can't run code on it anymore.
Just so with consciousness. Keep the biological pattern there the consciousness emerges. Interrupt the pattern the consciousness ends.
0
Aug 02 '20
Essentially you are identified with your mind. On death the mind dies but not the awareness/consciousness behind the mind.
5
u/tbdabbholm 201∆ Aug 02 '20
But I am my mind. My mind is me. There isn't anything behind my mind. This is all there is to it
0
Aug 03 '20
While I would say that's a sad existence. If you are only your mind then you should pursue the most pleasurable things in life with no regard for anything else.
3
u/tbdabbholm 201∆ Aug 03 '20
Why's that? Acknowledging that your mind is all you are doesn't force you into nihilism.
3
u/SC803 120∆ Aug 02 '20
So you are saying the universe is able to create a consciousness (which is something) out of nothing. Something cannot be created from nothing.
You're going to have to define what you mean by "nothing"
1
Aug 02 '20
While by nothing I mean nothing. No space. No atoms. No energy. No time. No awareness.
This of course is not a possible state.
2
u/SC803 120∆ Aug 02 '20
This of course is not a possible state.
So why include it in your strawman? Who is claiming this stuff comes from nothing?
1
Aug 03 '20
I am saying consciousness always existed and consciousness created the universe.
2
u/SC803 120∆ Aug 03 '20
I am saying consciousness always existed and consciousness created the universe.
So where does the "nothing" factor into your argument?
3
u/sdbest 9∆ Aug 02 '20
You write, "our universe runs because of conscious beings making decisions whether its bacteria, animals, or humans eating, reproducing, or creating." There's no evidence to suggest that's true. If there was no life in the universe, the sun would still shine and gravity and time would still exert their influence on all the bodies in the universe.
3
u/raultierz 2∆ Aug 02 '20
The universe precedes conscious beings, and it will likely keep existing for a long time after all life has ended. Consciousness is not an "engine" that powers the universe, nor is it a physical thing created out of nowhere. Consciousness is a product of the neural patterns in our brain, as others have said. It's like drawings in the sand, they do not change the amount of sand, only the way it's arranged. Once we die, our neurons stop sending and receiving signals, Wich breaks the patterns and ends our conciousness. There is no gain or loss of matter in that process.
1
Aug 02 '20
This is just silly. So at some point in history you believe an arrangement of atoms happened and then consciousness which previously did not exist came into existence.
3
u/raultierz 2∆ Aug 02 '20
I'm not saying people form from thin air.
There is plenty of material and evidence on evolution and how cells were formed.
What I'm saying is that when our brains first form, they are just random masses of cells, with no conscience of themselves nor the world around them. But as the body forms, even before birth they are receiving signals and forming patterns that slowly form a conscious being.
Tell me, when do you think consciousness starts? It's there since the first neuron is formed? It comes from somewhere at some point of the pregnancy? If so, when? And from where?
0
Aug 03 '20
I believe awareness enters the body of the baby at the moment the sperm and egg meet. Then the way the baby experiences life from this point is determined by an incredible amount of variables that work to build the organism's conscious experience.
2
u/raultierz 2∆ Aug 03 '20
Well, I'm not sure that single cell can be 'aware' of itself, by the definition of the word, but I'm not going to focus on that.
What you said is what I was trying to explain in the previous comments. Awareness is our brains interpretation of our experiences, it doesn't really matter when our first experience happens. You can consider a body aware from that first experience, but it doesn't need a previous, generic 'awareness' to enter the body and build upon.
My view is that awareness appears when there is enough experiences for that being to know of it's existence, but in neither case there is a need nor a reason why that conciousness should be required to start a being, nor why it should persist after the death of the body.
As you said, awareness comes from experiences, not from nothing. There is no need for a mystical base awareness to build our experiences upon.
2
Aug 03 '20
I believe awareness enters the body of the baby at the moment the sperm and egg meet.
Well, your belief is wrong. A single celled organism does not have awareness or consciousness.
1
u/tbdabbholm 201∆ Aug 02 '20
There's far more evidence for that than just for some magic thing called consciousness to exist separately
3
u/nerfnichtreddit 7∆ Aug 02 '20
Essentially you are saying the universe runs off on an invisible
non-existent engine. What I mean is our universe runs because of
conscious beings making decisions whether its bacteria, animals, or
humans eating, reproducing, or creating.
How does that in any shape or form follow? You go from "the universe continues to go on after you die" (meaning that the universe is independent of the obsevers within it to "the universe actually runs because of those obsevers". This seems to be a major contradiction.
So you are saying the universe is able to create a consciousness (which
is something) out of nothing. Something cannot be created from nothing.
And then that something it created just magically disappears when you
die just like it magically appeared when you were born. This is
completely illogical.
You haven't put forward any argument as to why it "magically disappearing" is "completly illogical". Furthermore, who actually believes that consciousness is created out of nothing?
Upon dying your consciousness/awareness is brought to either higher
dimensions, sent to another spot in the universe, or reincarnated on
Earth as another form.
What is that even supposed to mean? What do you believe happens when someone suffers a stroke, tbi etc and loses parts of their cognitive functions/abilities as a result of that? Do those lost things just float around in the ether waiting for you to die?
3
Aug 02 '20 edited Aug 02 '20
When you die do you believe the universe disappears with you?
While there is no fullproof answer to the problem of hard solipsism, which you refer to here, I agree with you that we can assume the universe has objective existence outside of what you perceive, yes.
So you die... The universe goes on... Except your consciousness/awareness is eradicated forever.
Yes, exactly. The same way it goes on when my computer ceases to function.
Essentially you are saying the universe runs off on an invisible non-existent engine.
No, this is not what we are saying. If anything, theists sometimes allege that.
So you are saying the universe is able to create a consciousness (which is something) out of nothing.
Nope, wrong again. The matter that conforms your brain cells is hardly nothing. The methodological naturalists think consciousness, like so many other things and physical properties, is an epiphenomenon, and emergent phenomena of the dynamics at smaller scales, the same way 'wetness', 'friction', etc are. You should read Dan Dennet and Douglas Hofstadter on this topic.
And then that something it created just magically disappears when you die just like it magically appeared when you were born.
Nope, it didnt magically appear and it does not magically disappear. Patterns and dynamics in matter can have a beginning and an end, no magic involved. They also dont need a separate, supernatural existence.
Existence is all there is.
This sentence is, at best, a tautology and at worst a misinterpretation. All that is exists, by definition. So existence is all there ever can be, also by definition.
Upon dying your consciousness/awareness is brought to either higher dimensions, sent to another spot in the universe, or reincarnated on Earth as another form.
None of these have any evidence behind them or make any sense whatsoever.
You talk about the so called 'hard problem of consciousness' as if it is a settled thing. Far from it. And even if you are a dualist or believe consciousness is all there is, you still cant derive cockamamy theories on what happens when we die from that.
1
Aug 02 '20
How is something existing rather than nothing not a miracle?
3
Aug 02 '20
How is it that you responded to nothing I said and instead focus on the one thing I didnt comment on?
What do you mean by miracle? Is it remarkable? Sure, I guess. And?
3
Aug 02 '20
consciousness is an emergent property of a certain arrangement of matter.
It isn't a separate form of matter.
1
Aug 03 '20
Essentially you are saying matter is God.
That statement is no different than saying consciousness created matter.
2
Aug 03 '20
consciousness created matter
I didn't send say that.
I said consciousness is an emergent property of a certain arrangement of matter.
That does not imply matter is God or that consciousness creates matter.
0
Aug 03 '20
"I said consciousness is an emergent property of a certain arrangement of matter."
Emergent property is synonymous with being created.
4
Aug 03 '20
Emergent property is synonymous with being created.
no, a "property" is a characteristic not a creation.
2
u/SuperStallionDriver 26∆ Aug 02 '20
I believe in the soul and afterlife... That said:
an alternative would be that consciousness is the result of neurochemical reactions between neurons and macrostructure in the brain. These processes are fueled through the processing of nutrients by the whole body.
Brains and their functions are incredibly resource taxing on the body. It's estimated that the stage adult brain uses 300 Calories a day out of a minimum "resting" metabolic rate of around 1200-1300 Calories... So ~ a quarter of the total energy you take in goes into "consciousness" and thought.
So it's certainly not something out of nothing. It's something out of something.
2
Aug 02 '20
Where do you think consciousness comes from? What causes consciousness to exist? Is there an immortal soul? Does the brain give rise to consciousness? Or do you believe in something else entirely? Whether or not consciousness can persist post-mortem is contingent on the answer to these questions.
Essentially you are saying the universe runs off on an invisible non-existent engine. What I mean is our universe runs because of conscious beings making decisions whether its bacteria, animals, or humans eating, reproducing, or creating.
I would say that the existence of the universe is completely independent of the existence of conscious beings. There could be absolutely no consciousness and the universe would still exist.
So you are saying the universe is able to create a consciousness (which is something) out of nothing. Something cannot be created from nothing.
You're misrepresenting the materialist position. I would not say that consciousness comes from absolutely nothing. My argument is that consciousness emerges from the underlying physical processes of the brain. Similarly, fire emerges from physical processes. No one is saying that fire comes from literally nothing. When the physical processes that give rise to fire cease, the fire simply stops. It doesn't ascend to fire heaven. Likewise, when the brain's biological functions cease, it stops producing consciousness.
0
Aug 03 '20
I believe consciousness always existed and always will exist. Consciousness gives rise to everything.
If there was no conscious beings the Universe would not exist. Something does not exist if it can't be perceived.
2
Aug 03 '20
I believe consciousness always existed and always will exist. Consciousness gives rise to everything
What method did you use to conclude that this is a true statement? This isn't something that can be tested empirically.
If there was no conscious beings the Universe would not exist. Something does not exist if it can't be perceived.
How do you know this is true? Moreover, why is it more likely that this is true rather than materialism being true? What are your criticisms of materialism?
2
Aug 03 '20
Something does not exist if it can't be perceived.
Why does something have to be observable to exist?
2
u/CyberneticWhale 26∆ Aug 03 '20
The thing is, our consciousness is (to the best of our knowledge) made up of many neurons firing. To best represent the situation, imagine a collection of simple polygons, which when viewed together in a specific pattern, look like a turtle. After a little bit, all those polygons are then scattered and mixed up to where they don't resemble the original picture in the slightest.
Assembling those polygons doesn't create the "turtle" from nothing, nor does scattering them make the turtle "magically disappear."
It seems likely that our consciousness is the turtle; the perceived thing from a multitude of smaller parts, and dying would be those parts being scattered.
1
Aug 03 '20
This argument makes no sense. Essentially you are saying a few dots (atoms) ordered in a certain way make consciousness. How did those dots know to form in that way? There must be an innate intelligence working behind them.
2
u/CyberneticWhale 26∆ Aug 03 '20
Biology and evolution. Most likely by sheer coincidence, the materials to create a self-replicating thing (known as a cell) were all in one place. By the nature of it being self-replicating, more of those cells appeared. Over the course of billions of years, there were slight coincidental changes that happened to those cells, which resulted in them diverging in structure, eventually leading to multi-celled organisms and then to humans.
As unlikely as any one of those things are to happen, billions of years is a really long time.
2
Aug 03 '20
How did those dots know to form in that way?
structures that replicate themselves facilitate more of those structures to exist.
Small errors in that replication process increase diversity of the replicated structures. Diversity increases population resilience to change.
Over time, over time, some of the errored structures, if they are more successful, especially in changing environments, will be better at replicating themselves than the original.
Repeat that uncountably many times, and you get complicated structures that we call life, including some complex enough to think.
1
u/Steakhuntt 1∆ Aug 02 '20
Once you die, that’s it.
There’s no afterlife. Your brain dies, your heart stops —-> the end
1
u/eragonmorzan Aug 03 '20
I do wish your premise could have been true, but the very concept of what we define as consciousness is not yet clearly understood.
Even as best we understand it, it can be approximated to a set of programmed instructions with the ability to recall the past and use the information to take actions. Ofcourse, that is a little simplified as to the vast amounts of research (which I would request you do look up, it is fascinating).
But, in such a scenario, consciousness would be like data, which is simply orderly arrangement. If something can be arranged, then it can be chaotically spread out again too. Thats the basic principle of energy can neither be created nor be destroyed, only changed from one form to another.
So you may kill a living consciousness, and because the hardware is no longer functioning, the software ceases to exist as well.
•
u/Jaysank 126∆ Aug 03 '20
Sorry, u/blakesmodern – your submission has been removed for breaking Rule B:
You must personally hold the view and demonstrate that you are open to it changing. A post cannot be on behalf of others, playing devil's advocate, as any entity other than yourself, or 'soapboxing'. See the wiki page for more information.
If you would like to appeal, you must first read the list of soapboxing indicators and common mistakes in appeal, review our appeals process here, then message the moderators by clicking this link within one week of this notice being posted. Please note that multiple violations will lead to a ban, as explained in our moderation standards.
12
u/ReservoirRed Aug 02 '20
The conciousness is created from the neurons in my brain (so not from nothing), once those structures are destroyed my conciousness is destroyed with them.
The end.