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Jimmie Phillips

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Seeing as how much of the world believes in an afterlife, how do you perceive Heaven and Hell?

Self explanatory question.

Topics: heaven hell religion
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  • sichen xia

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    Jun 9 2012: I think when we think about afterlife, it's because we aren't satisfied with present life and want to live a life as we want.I know in my country, many people do good things helping others to have the chance to live a good life in afterlife. I believe in afterlife because I don't believe death is the end of everything. That's hopeless and unreasonable. But I don't want to base my entire hope on afterlife or regard afterlife as my only reason and hope to continue. I'd like to fix my eye on my present life and cherish it. Sometimes I feel tried and bored about present life, I prefer to read novels. There I can live a life I cannot live in literal time. I feel good about that.

  • Timo X

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    Jun 8 2012: Nonexistent.

    By the way, I wonder when exactly Heaven relocated from actual heaven to this metaphysical place which is only reachable by a natural death.
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      E G 10+

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      Jun 9 2012: If it theoretically is only reachable by a natural death , how do you know it is nonexistent ?

      • Timo X

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        Jun 9 2012: Because there is no 'you' after your death to go places, metaphysical or otherwise. Consciousness requires a certain pattern of brain activity; death means that there is no such activity and therefore no consciousness. But even if you somehow consider this knowledge to be controversial, an argument from ignorance does not provide a shred of evidence for the existence of heaven (or anything else).
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          E G 10+

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          Jun 12 2012: Maybe there will gonna appear in me a certain consciousness that don't need any brain activity ,after I die . How do you know the heaven and hell is only reachable by a natural death ?

      • Timo X

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        Jun 12 2012: Maybe you will have a different type of consciousness after your death, I don't know. Maybe tomorrow I will get hit by lightning twice, I don't know. But I see absolutely no reason to assume either of those things.

        As for heaven and how it is reached, I am not an expert. My understanding is that Catholics, for example, require you to be baptized; children who die before they are baptized go to hell. Another staple of Christians is that suicide is forbidden, they are not allowed in heaven either. If you're truly interested, ask someone else, because it is nothing but superstition to me.
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          E G 10+

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          Jun 12 2012: Then what reason do you have to assume that tomorrow you won't get hit by a lightening or ... (if you say "I see absolutely no reason to assume either of those things")? none .

          So what reason do you have to think heaven and hell is nonexistent ? none .
          You just shut yourself in your ass alone .

      • Timo X

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        Jun 12 2012: Now that I thought about it a little longer, your argumentation seems rather unfair. You're arguing for some unobservable phenomenon which is exactly like consciousness in every way, except for the necessary conditions under which normal consciousness occurs. It is an argumentation akin to the one in a famous anecdote about Galileo and a pious scholar.

        When Galileo discovered that the moon had craters and mountains, that did not sit well with many of his more pious colleagues. They held that the moon was a perfect sphere because god's creation was perfect. One of the most obstinate scholars would not abandon his conviction, even after he had looked through the telescope and had seen the craters for himself. Instead, he argued that there was some unobservable substance around the moon, which filled up all the craters up to the highest mountain, such that the moon was in fact a perfect sphere.

        Galileo was baffled by the audacity of this argumentation at first, and he made no reply. After a week however, the pious scholar received a letter from Galileo. In this letter, Galileo explained that he did some further calculations. The calculations showed that the unobservable substance was in fact distributed over the moon evenly, thus changing nothing at all about the shape of the moon. The point of this story, of course, is that anything can be assumed about unobservable phenomena and that it is therefore completely trivial to talk about them.
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          E G 10+

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          Jun 12 2012: "It is an argumentation akin to the one in a famous anecdote about Galileo and a pious scholar" I would say to think about it even longer because I talk already about unobservable things (heaven and hell) and not about moon or something similar to it (I mean observable) .

      • Timo X

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        Jun 12 2012: Heaven became unobservable when people moved it from from the sky to this mystical metaphysical place and you're trying to do the exact same thing to consciousness. And you don't see the relevance of the anecdote above? Perhaps it is you who should mull things over a little longer, because I'm pretty sure the pious scholar was wrong in the end.

        Edit: I now see your other reaction as well. Obviously, you like to believe in things without any evidence, whereas I do not. I don't see why the conversation would have to involve my ass.
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          E G 10+

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          Jun 12 2012: I'm sure too the pious scholar was wrong in the end ; you didn't connect the dots to well , did you ?

      • Timo X

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        Jun 12 2012: Usually, some form of argumentation connects the dots: spell out everything, never rely on the intelligence of the reader.

        The pious scholar was wrong about the shape of the moon, there was no unobservable thing around the moon that made its shape into the one he wanted/assumed. Similarly, you are wrong about Heaven, there is no such thing simply because you want/assume it to be there.

        Edit: Oh, and I don't think I'll get hit by lightning twice tomorrow, because of the observed fact that it's a pretty rare event.
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          E G 10+

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          Jun 12 2012: There is a similarity between the substance and the heaven , I agree .
          Maybe I assume it exist but you know it doesn't mean the heaven don't exist . It might exist . You made the affirmation : that it doesn't , you said it clearly, and at the same time was the same you who said " that anything can be assumed about unobservable phenomena" , so if anything can be assumed on what relies your affirmation ?

      • Timo X

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        Jun 12 2012: I thought I had answered that question in my initial reaction. However, I have done some further research and I have come to the following, frankly quite shocking, conclusion. There indeed exists consciousness after death which, if judged worthy by Saint Peter, will proceed toward heaven. However, my research shows that it is not in fact 'your' own consciousness, but that of a random Malaysian sea slug Aplysia Oculifera. So sadly, it's still impossible for 'you' to get into heaven (yay for sea slugs though).

  • John Dunbar 10+

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    Jun 8 2012: When heaven and hell are taken metaphorically they make much more sense. An individual suffering from a flesh eating bacteria or a schizophrenic patient stuck in a torturous hallucination are good examples of hell on earth and funny enough neither of them are results of being a "sinner". My definition of heaven would be self actualization or making peace with yourself on a metaphysical level.

    However to address your question in regards to the afterlife I would say there are endless scenarios that could describe heaven or hell. I have thought one particularly terrible scenario, where the concepts of souls exist(I don't know if this true or untrue) and i could imagine hell being almost solitary confinement stuck on some plain where nothing existed but the self. Or of course I would envision heaven being the unification of the soul with the original source of its creation where there is eternal fulfillment and joy. However when discussing eternal bliss you run into some logic problems because something ceases to be enjoyable without its parallel.

    Ill throw a scenario out there. Say for instance it could be proven that the sole purpose of life was to replicate life and to resist the decay of your matter as long as physically possible. For some reasons humans think in duality where there seems to be two opposing forces that exist in some sort of equilibrium in order for the creation of something "new". What if the afterlife(assuming there is one for the questions purpose)existed as the antithesis of the above stated scenario and by resisting the force to replicate life, you allowed for a better existence for all forms of matter(for lack of a better word). Therefore the goal of the afterlife would be to allow for matter to stay in its most broken down original state. I would imagine that death in this scenario would be birth into this existence. Maybe hell would be this scenario carried out infinitely without an understanding of its purpose. Or heaven?
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    E G 10+

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    Jun 7 2012: Can we perceive or think heaven and hell and be sure we perceive/think heaven and hell ?
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    Fonkou Djoendia

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    Jun 7 2012: Personally, I don't believe in hell, Sorry but i just don't. I don't believe that a God would actually let one of his creation go to a place like that. No matter what a person does, I still believe they are good at heart. I believe that even Hitler is in heaven (if there is a heaven). Why? We should all feel sorry for that man. Because someone in their right mind would not do something so tragic. Something was wrong with him. A child of God, in his right mind, would not do something like that. So I believe that God forgave him. I personally do believe in an afterlife. So I tend not to perceive death as a bad thing, because you are going to a better place.
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    Bernard Seremonia

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    Jun 6 2012: When we were dreaming, did we live on unrealistic of something? If we answered with:

    - We were dreaming and we had lost into something not real, than our awareness within our dream exactly was not real
    - We were dreaming and we had experience sad and happy inside dream, and we considered it as another reality, then we should believe the possibility of any place typical as heaven and any place typical as hell.

    Rather than thinking dream world as unrealistic, better say that dream world is unstable reality and to keep our awareness of being accused as something that is not real.

    Or if we consider believing heaven and hell are the same as we believe or not to afterlife typical as heaven or afterlife typical of hell, then:

    - If we consider living just a coincidence that we must live, then we must believe that there should be a coincidence for the possibility of life after death to live. And we do not believe the coincidence of life after death can occur, then we do not also believe in the possibility of this life happens by coincidence.

    Therefore i believe any place beyond our experiences whether it's nice or worse, i believe afterlife whether it's nice or worse, i believe heaven and i believe hell.
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    Kate Blake 50+

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    Jun 6 2012: I have no doubt that most of us have experienced 'tastes' of heaven and hell in this very life - especially those living in war zones! This would seem like hell to me; but also violent or controlling situations; extreme poverty; frequent radio or chemotherapy.

    Heaven would be like our first 'love' experiences; winning lotto; having a child we so desperately wanted; finally getting that degree, car, partner, etc

    So no need to wait for death - which may magnify these experiences greatly - it happens here and now regularly
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    Obey No1kinobe 50+

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    Jun 6 2012: I perceive heaven and hell simply as human ideas with origins in non Hebrew pre Christian religious traditions.

    I note the Old Testament doesn't mention hell much. Seems to have infiltrated the early Christian teachings.
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    Debra Smith 200+

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    Jun 5 2012: Well, I am not sure about heaven and hell but i did feel that i was in pergatiory after my brain bleeds. I could not use the computer, I could not read, there was a woman in my room that I dall a "jiggler= you know those people who stay skinny by constantly jiggling. and I was vomiting up to 13 times a day.

  • Eric Hazelle

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    Jun 5 2012: My basic feelings about "Heaven and Hell" come from reading many near-death experiences along with the scriptures. I believe the "burning in hell forever" view current to Christianity is fatally flawed. As best I understand it, we'll be grouped with people who are basically like us in terms of honesty, decency, loving kindness and so forth. Look into your soul and think about it: if everyone around you was basically like you, would you consider yourself in good company, people with whom you could be happy, and live in peace and productivity, or would you constantly have to be watching your back, not being able to trust anyone? There's your ultimate heaven or hell; you make it for yourself.
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    Peter Law 30+

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    Jun 5 2012: Hi Jimmie,
    In this life we experience times of anger, frustration, pain, jealousy, etc. etc. We also experience joy, happiness, love, fulfilment etc etc. My take on this is that Heaven will be the good stuff, but much heightened, especially as we will meet our creator. Hell, on the other hand, will be the bad stuff, but much heightened, especially as we will miss our creator.
    A bit simplistic, but I don't think mere mortals can truly understand these things. We are like newly born children.

    :-)
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