If there is no life after death

by onacruse 50 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  onacruse

  So where does that leave us? Leave me?

  The logical consequence would be that I should get absolutely every little piece of self-gratification I can get before I die. Forget the eulogies, forget my kids, forget my lasting impression upon the entire human race for milleniums to come...it's all just a pile of stinking manure if I'm dead, and never to be again.

  Forget my friends, my wife, and any sense of pity for the little-old-lady-down-the-street who I just robbed of her life savings by cutting a hard business deal on her property...anything that lines my pockets with mountains of cold hard cash that gets me drugs and guns and a dozen beachfront properties where I can have sex with as many women and men as I want, any way I want, any time I want...and shot anyone that pisses me off, even on a whim, and just buy off the cops--who themselves are going to die.

  This, of course, is not the person that I am, or that I ever will be. But there is no logic in why I should not be that kind of person, being as that I no longer am convinced of living after my death.

  So why do I insist on continuing to behave as if I do expect to live after I die?
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  JWdaughter

  If the only life you get is THIS life, then that should be all the more reason to live in a way that doesn't hurt others. If our only real legacy is our children-then that matters. The memory of ourselves being alive-you want people to remember a self serving jerk? Does 'self gratification' make people feel good the next morning if thats ALL there is-except for the people you hurt on the way. We have human laws that would make the kind of lifetyle you envisioned unpleasant. If the only life you get is spent in jail, or in hiding or in constant subterfuge-what kind of life is it? If the only life I get is this one-I want sunshine, roses and good things for me and everyone whose lives I touch. I have to LIVE in THIS world NOW. I don't want to live in the world you described, and my belief in God or not would not change that reality. I still think 'god' was created -in the religious sense-to give people a sense of order and purpose-to make the laws that didn't occur to the primitive peoples of the day. I don't need those kind of threats to want my life to be a good, enjoyable, safe, pleasant, giving experience.

  Your described life seems like some mad max scenario-and I don't need a belief in an afterlife to find it unacceptable.

  I am wuzzy now though, so I am probably missing part of your point. But whether or not there is a God or an afterlife, I want a GOOD life. With antibiotics and respirators if necessary. Wish me luck at the docs tomorrow. This is my second bout of pnuemonia and I think I am gonna end up in the hospital this time.

  Shelly
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  J-ex-W

  Maybe because there IS reward in behaving so here-and-now, not just as promised in the here-after. I disagree, BTW, about it being logical to pursue your own gratification to the exclusion of others' needs, wants, rights if there is no hereafter. Everyone doing that now, if this life IS all there is, would only be that much more miserable and that much more tragic.
• 

  Little Drummer Boy

  So why do I insist on continuing to behave as if I do expect to live after I die?

  I don't know why you do it, but some of us just aren't a-holes and are nice because being nice makes us feel good and makes others feel good, and it isn't about some future reward. Not trying to say you're an a-hole - that the was in reference to what you were describing at the beginning. As a dub, it was never about the paradise for me. Proper dub "nice" behaviour was not an act for me, it is just who I was. In fact, for the last few years that I was in the borg, I was convinced that I wasn't going to make it through the big A - but that didn't change my personality. One of the reasons that I left the borg is because of the falseness that I began to see in many other people.

  Don't know if that made sense (I'm now on my second whiskey of the night - bad day today).

  LDB
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  Scully

  So why do I insist on continuing to behave as if I do expect to live after I die?

  Maybe you just don't want to be remembered as a big ol' jerk, by your wife, your children and your friends? The memories we leave behind, for some of us atheists, are a way of achieving a type of life after death. Some people call it a legacy.

  There's also this thing about not being able to take all your toys with you when you die, so you choose carefully the ones that are worth having and enjoying in the here and now.
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  onacruse

  Hi Shelly! I haven't posted here for some time, and I haven't had the pleasure of getting to know you...but I hope you get over the pneu-bug ASAP (gosh, what a miserable winter it's been up here this year!!)

  If the only life you get is THIS life, then that should be all the more reason to live in a way that doesn't hurt others.

  Why? The Golden Rule?

  If our only real legacy is our children-then that matters.

  If, when I die, I'm dead, and just so much worm-food, then what difference does it make whether I've had kids, or, if I have, what they think of me?

  The memory of ourselves being alive-you want people to remember a self serving jerk?

  Again, if I'm dead, unconscious, gone forever, why should I give a poop about what others think of me afterwards?
  

  If the only life you get is spent in jail, or in hiding or in constant subterfuge-what kind of life is it?

  Hence my remark about "buying off the cops." In other conversations I've had about this subject, issues about 'survival of the species' have been submitted, as well as 'genetic predisposition.' Perhaps, in fact, my behavioral tendencies are just a genetic consequence. I'm inclined to think that they are conditioned, rather like language acquisition is acquired within the first few months of existence. If so, then, even as one can learn another semantic language, one could learn to live a totally self-centered life.
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  Scully

  The memory of ourselves being alive-you want people to remember a self serving jerk?

  Again, if I'm dead, unconscious, gone forever, why should I give a poop about what others think of me afterwards?

  Well, it's likely (especially knowing your wife as I do) that if you were a self-serving jerk now she'd chime in and give you an arse-kicking so that you'd wish you were dead. And goodness knows some of us would fly down there to help her.

  Perhaps it's what being a self-serving jerk would do to current relationships (rather than future ones) that helps to curb those self-serving, jerkish behaviours.
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  onacruse

  Kate's in bed...so I have nothing to fear! roflmao
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  onacruse

  Hi J-ex:

  Everyone doing that now, if this life IS all there is, would only be that much more miserable and that much more tragic.

  Not to be a hard nut here, but--if I'm the guy on top of the misery, and the one creating the tragedy, and never the recipient of either, and have no consequence (hell, purgatory, reincarnation as a slug, etc) to pay, then what skin is it off my nose?
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  JWdaughter

  Lets just say you have a valid theory. Look at OJ. He got off. He had enough money that he got away with (some will say) murder. He is reviled. No one likes him, he has people hounding him for money and has actually been so revolting that even in American society as a celebrity he is unacceptable. He is so reviled that the book he wrote, even interviews that he gave were cancelled-for no other reason than that he is repulsive to society.

  So he has the money, can have sex with whomever he wants, can get away with murder. But say this is his only life and he will one day be, like the rest of us-worm food. Right now no one wants him over for dinner. No one wants him petting their dog, much less dating their daughter (or son). His own children don't seem to want much to do with him. Legacy smegacy, his life right now is for crap. Would you want his life if you could 'get away with murder'? He doesn't need hell after life-he has created it for himself in THIS life-because even if God doesn't 'get you' in the end, our society will get you. And even if you technically get away with it-you would have the social standing of a worm. The kind that slithers on the ground. And all that dirt would tend to spoil the taste of the fine champagne and would dirty up the nice jewelry. If this life is all you get-multiple orgasms won't keep you happy. Stuff doesn't make you happy.

  A teenager in our neighborhood just killed another kid at school yesterday. 18 years old. Lived like there is no afterlife. He will spend his entire life in prison. Because living that way-like there are no consequences, doesn't work. And if you start living that way before you can even consider the consequences,then you are more screwed. I think the ethics and values in society don't require a belief in the afterlife to make sense.

  BTW, I have no firm conviction in God or an afterlife at this point, and I believe just as strongly-if not more so, that the way we live in this life is important for us NOW. The way you feel about yourself and your relationship to others matter now. And your hypothetical world cannot exist for long. But I guess if you die early as a result of it-that will be your immediate consequence (wages of sin being death and all that!) and you won't have 90 years to test your theory. Not to mention-did you have children just to disgrace and shame them? Because we live with those things in this life. What we do to our children matter to parents whether they believe in an afterlife or not. I have always made my choices in life in a way that relates to my childrens well being MORE so than any consideration of eternal life.

  Many people live to gratify themselves no matter what they believe. Most don't lose all sense of those around them in the process and maintain some decency in the meantime.

  Do you think all those that don't believe in an afterlife live the way you describe? Or do you believe that most people secretly harbor a belief in an afterlife?