NO AFTERLIFE (Page 4)

TheismIsUntenable: Yes they do.

What is a camera?

TheismIsUntenable: Yes, I've been in love and the love was returned.

Zanjan: The camera knows nothing. It only captures light and projects it onto a surface. For film, other tools outside of the camera are needed to convert to images and preserve them. For digital cameras, the tools are built in. The images are unknown until there's a reader.

TheismIsUntenable: If we're both in a room and you see Jesus and I don't, the resolution is a camera. What does it see?

If it is captured on video/picture, we know Jesus is there and I need my eyes checked. If, however, the camera captures nothing of this Jesus then we know you need your brain checked.

Tools are a way of removing subjectivity from the picture.

Zanjan: Regarding romantic love:

That love was triggered by the natural force of attraction; from there, it developed into a companionship with practical elements of co-operation, similar to maternal and familial love.

However, like the other kinds of love, it isn't selfless - there are conditions so it can be fickle. This is true for all mammals, regardless of the size and structure of their brains. Any of these loves can go unrequited because they're founded on emotions, which are connected to the lymbic system.

There's another kind of love which is unique to man, although not properly understood by many people because it needs to be learned. It's not connected to the the physical body.

This issues from the power of intellect, which has a true appreciation of others and will always act in the best interest of those other creatures, even if he/she doesn't like the other (s). It's creative, compassionate, empathetic, intuitive, faithful, visionary, beneficent, beautiful, life-changing, fragrant and enduring.

All these signs issue from, are received, and recognized by the power of the intellect, a faculty of the soul. This is unconditional love.

Zanjan: "If we're both in a room and you see Jesus and I don't, the resolution is a camera. What does it see?"

How soon they forget!

The physical senses are for detecting physical things. Physical equipment is for detecting material objects.
How do we know the person one is seeing is Jesus? Which Jesus? There's tens of thousands of them. Does the camera know? Many people aren't photogenic.

What if the camera has a double exposure or digital glitch? Any camera aimed into the light wont capture details - it's virtually blinded. Jesus was once the light of the world.

The Biblical Jesus wouldn't show Himself to anyone without an exceptionally good reason.

He'd have to draw open the curtains across the individual's soul and step through momentarily, projecting a mental image of Himself - why on earth would He bother to make that tremendous effort for someone? Only those who have a mighty high opinion of themselves would make such a request, right?

The resolution is if you don't see Him, He doesn't want to visit you.

GeraldtheGnome: The mistakes just keep getting made on here and they are on display. The term soulmates makes me want to throw up, there aren’t any souls, there is no Jesus, there is no religious god of any kind, there are no religious goddesses and there are no supernatural beings of any kind that are associated with religion. Most superstitious beliefs are made up, John Edwards and his kind are evil, they are cruel creepy con men. The Quran is another book used to con people into supernatural rubbish and there once was a belief or there still is where a camera captures the soul which is another example of a foolish belief. Jesus is a made up name from 522 years ago roughly, the name is about the mythical son of a mythical god.

There’s a superstitious belief here be Australoids and Torres Strait Islanders whose ancestry is based in what is now referred to as Australia that it is bad luck or possibly bad to see images of deceased Australoids, it’s considered possibly offensive so when a television show in Australia shows images of at least one now dead Australoid or Torres Strait Islander there quite often is the crawl session warning that the show contains images of at least one of the deceased of one of those races which always gets me saying out loud, “Get over it !” It always has that it may cause distress to some viewers. Why ? It’s just superstitious nonsense again. Isn’t this supposed to be about the afterlife myth instead of about things that are way off subject ? There’s the possibility that there is an afterlife, not the certainty of it and not the certainty that there isn’t.

Zanjan: When a beloved pet dies, it's not long before you forget the sound of its voice and the wee little quirks they had. For a few years, you'd remember the odd funny incident or accident, but that too fades with time.
There's not enough about the animal to retain - you couldn't recognize them in a crowd of same species without their hair, much less without their skin.

There's a world of difference between that attachment and the connection one has with a beloved human.

When a beloved human dies, the same thing happens but it takes longer because we've got photographs and personal mementos of them to revisit. We exchange memories of them with others. The sound of their voice goes but not the way they spoke and many things they said and did, particularly their accomplishments.

One occasionally feels their presence and talks to them, sometimes it's the other way around. They don't even have to be dead for that. Sometimes, there's a feeling their beloved is helping and you know just what they're thinking at that moment.

Sometimes, one even feels an invisible physical-like touch - a hand on their shoulder, or a slight brush along the top of their head, perhaps a tingling. It makes the heart skip a beat and one inexplicably senses who that presence is.

One dreams of people they know and in that dream, they speak to each other and one remembers their words. Sometimes, that scene is a thing that occurs in the future.

Without a soul, none of that could happen. We could make more comparisons, like with favourite plants and such.
Maybe I should start a topic titled "Dead Things You Used to Know".

GeraldtheGnome: The same mistakes once again. There is no soul no matter how much anyone wishes that there is a soul.

JX Amaro:
Re: The Soul

GtG: “There is no soul no matter how much anyone wishes that there is a soul.”

JX: Quite a remarkable statement, and one that is quite ignorant of contemporary thought on the subject.

First of all, I would point out that “Soul” derives from the translation of the Greek word “psyche” (mind) into Latin then English (through German). In short, “psyche” ---> “anima” ---> “sawol” ---> “soul.”

Second, I would point out that in contemporary religious thought, “soul” tends to mean that part of the mind associated with consciousness, especially subjective consciousness – the sense of a “self” experiencing reality.

Third, I would point out that the atheist materialists have a significant problem with this. It is so significant that they use the phrase “Hard Problem” for it. Of course, it’s not a “hard problem” for theists; it’s only a “hard problem” for those who posit a purely materialist worldview.

Fourth, I would point out that the problem of subjective conscious experience is such a “hard problem” for the atheist worldview that many default to the potty notion that consciousness is an “illusion.” Thus, for Sam Harris, consciousness is an “illusion” and he is conscious that his conscious experience is an illusion, which – presumably – is yet another illusion. Kind of like walking into a hall of mirrors, don’t ya think?

Fifth, for the theist, the “hard problem” of subjective consciousness isn’t a hard at all, “the soul” offers an easy solution. Thus, your “soul” is the part of your mind that is having the self conscious experience. There is, then, a spiritual-mind and a mechanical-mind. The mechanical-mind is charted and examined by neuroscience and can explain all sorts of interesting things. But it can’t explain why one person might like Marilyn Monroe while another likes Sophia Loren. It can’t explain why someone might like Mozart and the next Motley Crue. These are questions of “the soul” – the subjective experience of life. The philosopher Thomas Nagel calls this subjective experience “Qualia” and claims that there is no physical explanation for it. So far, no one has provided any.

Sixth, if you – GtG – want to hold to your dogmatic comment that “there is no soul” then it is up to you to prove that subjective experience can be explained through demonstrable physical evidence. Any failure on your part to do so I will take as a defeat to your point of view. Quite frankly, the existence of the soul – the subjective experience of life – is one of the best proofs for theistic philosophy (Christian or otherwise). It is also one of the best proofs that atheism is an irrational philosophy that denies objective reality. This takes us to the next point…

---)))--->

Tiu: “Two people, identical in appearance and action. One has a soul, one doesn't. How do you determine that?”

JX: Simple. Let’s call the two people Fred and Barney. Then let’s get two pizzas: one pepperoni, the other sausage. Now let’s ask each of them which pizza they PREFER. Fred – who has a soul – says, “Pepperoni.” Barney, who has no soul, and therefor no subjective sense of experience, would shrug. Barney would have NO PREFERENCE as a preference requires a subjective self. Barney, in essence, would be a robot. As a robot, Barney might make calculations about health and nutrition values but would not have a subjective sense of taste or a subjective preference for anything (art, music, romantic lovers, etc).

Again, atheists can’t get beyond the “hard problem” of consciousness (it’s beyond physical/material explanation); and therefor – as a defensive maneuver – atheists default to the nonsense that conscious experience is an “illusion” (and/or other dodges). Wrong. The illusion is the purely materialist worldview of atheism. There is a God, there is a Soul and there is more to this reality than just materialism. Objectively, if atheism is true, then humans would have NO subjective experience of life – Qualia. Objectively, as humans DO have a subjective experience of life – Qualia – atheism is false. Objectively.

For a brief, but useful, analysis of this – the “Zombie Argument” – watch this:


I would only add one thing. At the end, the Zombie argument is summarized:
1) Zombies are possible.
2) If Zombies are possible, then consciousness is not physical.
3) Consciousness is not physical.

To this I would add:
4) IF consciousness in not physical, THEN consciousness is trans-physical.
5) IF consciousness is trans-physical, then consciousness meets the traditional requirements for the religious concept of the soul.

Definition: Soul: A part of humans regarded as immaterial, immortal, separable from the body at death, capable of moral judgment, and susceptible to happiness or misery in a future state. https://www.wordnik.com/words/soul

TheismIsUntenable: "Fourth, I would point out that the problem of subjective conscious experience is such a “hard problem” for the atheist worldview that many default to the potty notion that consciousness is an “illusion.”"

I don't see an issue with treating experience of "self" as illusory at all.

"Fifth, for the theist, the “hard problem” of subjective consciousness isn’t a hard at all,"

Well if you believe in magic then anything is pretty to explain. Abracadabra! Of course you'd first have to establish that a magician exists which has never been done.

"JX: Simple. Let’s call the two people Fred and Barney..."

This doesn't resolve my challenge because I stated the their actions are identical so it matters not what you ask them as the answers they give you will be the same. You would have no ability to discern them as is discussed in the video you posted.

I don't know what type of possibility is being discussed in the zombie argument. If all we're talking about is logical possibility it seems entirely inconsequential.

Existence is not something you can extract from reasoning alone. You must have empirical evidence for it. That is how you confirm it. No empirical evidence for souls.

Zanjan: "....the answers they give you will be the same.You would have no ability to discern them as is discussed in the video you posted."

We have a way to know when somebody is just telling us what we want to hear, rather than what they actually think and feel - people have been doing it since childhood to avoid punishment. They're not convinced they can't escape the consequences of their actions.

The person who's not being true to themselves will suffer in ways they couldn't predict. Yet that's easily predictable by those who ARE true to themselves - they've made the better choice because they've seen the difference in the outcomes. Why didn't the other person see that too?

Let's see what the camera records

Consider the tyrant, applying force to a believer to recant their faith. The one who recants lies to the tyrant because, he reasons, no one can reach into your mind and steal your thoughts - he can keep his beliefs secret in his mind. Anyone can pretend.

Well, the tyrant doesn't care about that: some believers refused to recant so he's delighted with this capitulation; he's achieved his objective, which makes him believe he's controlled an outcome. The recanter figured he'd done that too. Both were fooled.

So, here we say the believer has lost his soul. Oh, technically, he still has one but it's almost empty - he's powerless. He's joined the walking dead...can we say the tyrant stole this believer's power? Or that the power wasn't there to start with?

Either way, the proof of the outcome is irrefutable. In reality, the tyrant was sorting out who among believers were like himself - powerless. He says, 'you are just like us.'

The afterlife and this world are the same in that respect - you can't take with you what you haven't got. But what you do have is indestructible.

GeraldtheGnome: There have been so many mistakes made on this forum so far.

Now when it comes to the term Zombies, there are various descriptions as to what a Zombie is and the term philosophical Zombies is the type of thing someone pretentious comes out with because it's philosophical crap. There are cases, whether they really happened or not where someone was considered to have died but didn't and therefore claimed to have come back to life. Of course there's the clinically dead and then there's the claim of people in a death like state. There are claims where coffins have been found where the inside lids of coffins had scratch marks on it from the inside by people who died after trying to escape after being thought of as having died before that. Consciousness is to do with how people think, it has nothing to do with some imagined soul.



There was one video about pseudo intellectual bullsh_t that I was thinking of putting on here. Does anyone want to buy a vowel ?





There are claims that Unicorns exist, well if they exist then they have never been found, horses though do exist, so you can understand why some think that Unicorns exist. Here's the problem with that though, there's never been anything to even hint that any horse remains show even a bump that would hint at the evolution of a horse into a Unicorn. Then there is the Pegasus, no one has even found the hints of evolution of a horse into a Pegasus since there is nothing that shows even the earliest signs of evolution of a horse into a Pegasus. Now if you look at every example of any animal (including humans) there's no visual and physical evidence of a soul, not even the hint of it so no one has a soul. A camera can't be used as proof of a soul.

Something that is completely absent from being inside you is made up, a soul is made up. Gravity can be proven, the idea that a soul can be proven or is at least possible is just a foolish thing to believe in. I'd like to know what someone on here thinks an atheist is.

GeraldtheGnome:

The idea of a soul deserves to be as absent from being believed in, just like the video I put on some people are still brainwashed about certain things. In all of the island of Ireland there's still people who are so brainwashed that the mix of politics and religion that should have never happened still causes trouble. If there is anywhere that I can consider to be like 'Heaven on Earth' then there despite some rough areas there are exactly that on Earth.

Zanjan: Empirical evidence as proof - in addition to my previous post, there’s more:

One man had changed the world; society would never be the same again.

David Alter – working alone, was an *inspired* trailblazer - that is, he didn't get his drive or ideas from the world's textbooks. From a list of things he produced, he invented the telegraph, which predates the Morse Telegraph plus a short range telephone, the forerunner of the Graham Bell telephone.

I can supply other names but the point is made. These contributions to society lasted long past the man’s lifetime; generations after him benefited in countless ways. Clearly, he had a power others didn’t and no one could ever take that from him. If it’s not possible to do that in this world, it can’t be done in the Hereafter either.

Let’s take other names that changed the world – Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad. They were the lights of the world – such was their power, their words ring down through eternity and have never been lost. Countless people were inspired and became transformed by Their contributions; those from other religions and even atheists adopted some of Their civilizing behaviours. None dispute them.

Through their life in this world, society was never the same again, even on the other side of the planet (dates available). Their power continues its effect in and from the Hereafter – if it weren’t so, these traits would have permanently disappeared. There would have been nothing on which to build another civilization.

GeraldtheGnome: You just made more mistakes, there is only the possibility of an afterlife, not the certainty of it. There were fantasy stories made about Muhammad, Jesus of mythology is himself made up, the bloody name can't be found from before the Renaissance, there were anonymous authors that are claimed to be Moses because of the shared myth about a Moses who never existed. Without the myths about the made up Moses and made up Jesus there would be less brainwashed people in the world. The same with the myth about Muhammad. Your civilization myth is far fetched at best. Like another person on here who you think is an atheist and who you think isn't an atheist is something that is wrong. The soul is as much of a myth as God is.

Zanjan: There's a cause behind a cause, behind that cause, and that one until one arrives at the original cause, which can only be God.

Why would God bother to create anything if it was all for nothing? Certainly, that doesn't satisfy even the dullest of humans, who wouldn't tie their own shoe laces without an incentive. The smarter the human, the greater must be their field of vision and their purpose.

TheismIsUntenable: "There's a cause behind a cause, behind that cause, and that one until one arrives at the original cause, which can only be God."

This is a non-sequitur fallacy.

GeraldtheGnome: You just keep making the same mistakes. There is no God, I have explained to you why. Heaven wasn't created by that god so if you claim that a heaven was created from nothing by a god created by nothing then your version of what an afterlife is is false. Your whole belief is that it was created by a supernatural one for nothing and that the imagined by you souls of each person are brought to heaven to be judged. The smarter the person is the more likely that person won't believe in disproven belief systems.

Zanjan: I haven't discussed heaven. Stay with the stream of thought; I've not concluded it yet.

TIU, again, that you and GTG can't follow the stream doesn't mean there isn't a stream.

TheismIsUntenable: You're making fallacious arguments...and I'm calling them out. If I weren't "following the stream" I wouldn't be able to do that.

There's absolutely nothing about a first cause that would necessitate a god as you stated incorrectly.

GeraldtheGnome: So many mistakes are still being made on here. The idea is that there are souls and that souls go to heaven. That's the afterlife claim of many religious people. A stream has to be around, not imagined to be around.

Zanjan: TIU, the FIRST cause can never be identified but there is one...... and it's incomprehensible to us. So, we call that the Source - God.

Zanjan: To continue: The drive one has to create something new is an inborn characteristic of humans. The pleasure one receives from doing his work is acquired and keeps him captivated. He pursues it to a successful conclusion and will revel in the victory, similar to the cat who’s caught a mouse.

Yet, for humans, this victory is shallow and temporary without one last gem – to leave something behind after they pass from this world.

Many of us want to make the world a better place than when we arrived; otherwise, our life is insignificant. Everyone needs to feel needed; therefore, real happiness is being able to make a genuine difference. If you have a brainchild, you won’t abandon it. No matter where you go, you’ll tend to it or dispatch someone to do the tending.

This is how genuine love works – it’s never forgotten. In the Hereafter, there will be expressions of this love drifting into this earthly world. The recipient of that love will recognize it.

Zanjan: Perhaps you’ll say one’s future vision was baseless; yet the future proved otherwise.

Maybe you’ll say that when one has a visitation from a dead person, that was imagination or a hallucination. Medicine has empirical evidence that an individual experiencing a hallucination can’t have just one, then no more, ever. A mental illness can’t cure itself.

Those who’ve seen a deceased person as a visitation won’t have this experience again; if that claim was true, the individual was taken by surprise. It wont return no matter how much one tries to invoke it because the purpose has been fulfilled.

One can imagine something, then imagine it again as many times as they wish but real events can’t be repeated. Those will also have a visible impact on others.

Let's say you're the one who's dying; a few days before your death, you begin to see angelic beings or relatives who had predeceased you. You see them welcoming you, helping you during your transition; you may even have conversations with them.

What need would you have of this when you're preoccupied with your body breaking down and there are people around you to help? What is the need if death is the end of everything?