if we are to experience these things and go on and disappear into nothingness in a manner in which there is no difference whether we ever existed or not, what good is there in that? kassad84
Kassad, I'm sorry but that is such a narrow minded and selfish view. There are 6 people on this page 114 alone who are telling you they feel joy and great meaning in their existence without an afterlife. If you need an afterlife to have meaning in this life then you will also need an after-afterlife and so on. What happens to your consciousness after you die, does not dictate the meaning and importance of our existence in this very second. Without an afterlife everything you do matters all the much more. It becomes solely about your lasting positive or negative impact on family, friends and potentially the rest of the world to come.
Imagine playing a video game. Any game. You play for hours and with each moment you know you can restart the level, respawn, etc. It becomes monotonous, until you realize you only have a little time left to play for whatever reason you have to leave. That last level, that last respawn, or that last car race, becomes the most important. Every second is crucial and methodically carried out with your devout attention and control of your faculties. It's the same with life. If all atheists took your pessismistic view of pointlessness then there wouldn't be any atheists excelling highly in the arts, humanities, or nobel prize winning scientists, yet there are more than you think.
If this life is truly meaningless in comparisson to eternal blissful afterlife, then all Christians should be rejoicing when someone dies, gets cancer, gets hit by a car, and be extremely jealous of that death and not be sad. If you TRULY believed without a grain of doubt that you will be resurrected to a good afterlife then you would act like this...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMaK6k4oZ20&list=UULhtZqdkjshgq8TqwIjMdCQ&index=53