[ SECRET POST #2999 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2999 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 06 pages, 131 secrets from Secret Submission Post #429.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 1 (repeat) - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Works for me, OP. At least you're broadminded enough to contemplate there are possibilities, unlike some of your less than charming fellow travellers.

[(Anonymous)]

Not OP- I'm an atheist, but I wish I could believe in an afterlife. I literally can't make myself believe and I don't understand how belief works. Even most common ideas of heaven/paradise/an afterlife sound awesome to me, not just because they'd be havens of peace and contentment or whatever but because it meant people would still be conscious of being themselves somehow, even after their brains stop working. I'd never mock someone just for believing in an afterlife, but maybe some of that attitude comes out of fear of nothingness after death and jealousy that that's not a problem for you?

... Most of it probably comes from asshole atheists wanting to feel superior, though, which sucks.

[sarillia]

I'm a believer but I share that same thing where I don't think I could consciously change what I believe or don't believe. I don't understand when people act like it's a choice. Performing certain rituals and supporting certain institutions is a choice but I don't see how the beliefs themselves are a choice. It feels to me like it just comes down to what makes sense to you. I know atheists who think they would be happier if they were theists and I know theists who think they would be happier if they were atheists and none of them have been able to truly convince themselves of the beliefs that they think would make them happier.

[(Anonymous)]

DA

So, I'm a (Christian) believer, and in my church, we used to be taught that the Bible says we absolutely have a choice to believe or not.

Opinions in my church now differ on what happens if you choose the "or not" option -- I flail and scream against our relatively recently-imposed Evangelical overlords leaders who now bash on and on about "hell" because that's something we were never ever taught, and is unbiblical to boot. But, the main takeaway for me is, I believe God created all humans with free will, because the idea of a loving God that wants people to choose their own destiny is incompatible with this idea of "you're either going to heaven or hell but we don't know which one, and you've got no say in the matter, and even if you're a serial killer, if you're saved, you're going to heaven" that seems so popular in Evangelical circles these days.

(I will refrain from the "there's no such thing as "heaven" and "hell" in the Bible debate. Provoke not thyself to anger, etc., anon.)

[sarillia]

Your interpretation is more fitting with my own view of God but it's hard to reconcile with people I've met who sincerely want to believe but just don't.

[(Anonymous)]

lolll don't even get me started on Evangelical theology

it's like they found it behind the couch

[(Anonymous)]

You can't make yourself believe. Some people are just hardwired that way. If they can't see or touch something, it isn't real. But you can leave the door open so if something happens down the line, you'll be receptive to it and maybe then you'll be able to have what you seek.

[(Anonymous)]

da

I can believe in things I can't see or touch just fine, as long as they make logical sense. An afterlife doesn't.

Humans aren't special, human life and thoughts don't objectively matter, so there's no reason to keep the human consciousness alive after the body dies. Plus, having a place tailored specifically to each individual human's tastes is highly unlikely. The idea of keeping human thought processes in action after the body dies is also unlikely, because there exist no objecitve purpose for that. If humans were supposed to live forever, they wouldn't die in the first place.

We know that out thought proceses, feelings and opinions depend on the chemicals in our brain, the connection between individual neurons and the info stored in our long term memory. We know that a damage done to the brain can change a person's personality, mental processes and feelings to an unrecognizeable degree. Take the physical brain away, and what is there to keep us existing as thinking, feeling individuals that our brain made us in our lifetime? Nothing.

We also know that human morality is not objective and is the result of cultural conditioning. If we were to assume that an afterlife exists, it could never be a reward for being "good", because objective "good" behavior doesn't exist. So the afterlife would have to be the same for every human, no matter how they lived their life.

In conclusion, although like the OP I deeply wish there was a paradise just for me waiting for me after death, I fill it under the same unlikely dream as the wish that Santa would show up on my doorstep with a bag of presents. A pleasant fantasy, nothing more.

[(Anonymous)]

Maybe it would help if you change the idea that "afterlife" has to automatically mean "personal paradise for humans only awarded according to moral behavior". That's a very specific vision based on very limited religions, and there's no objective rulebook saying anyone who believes in an afterlife has to toe that line. Personally, I like to think of it as another state of being no more superior than the current state of being, just different, because that fits with the universe as I understand it, where nothing's perfect. I guess a lot of people don't find that appealing, but I do.

[(Anonymous)]

Your corpse will also have a state of being. But it won't be really you. The "you" that you think of when you consider an afterlife won't exist.

[(Anonymous)]

That's kind of a cop out.

[(Anonymous)]

This is interesting to me, because I can't NOT believe in an afterlife. I mean, I classify myself as agnostic (since I can't ultimately KNOW for sure until I drop off the perch), but it's more like a gut feeling? Hard to describe.

I've talked to other people who've felt similar things - atheists who would like to beleive in an afterlife, but can't, and theists who can't make themselves be atheists.

Makes me wonder if there's something psychological or hardwired about it. Because it seems to be a deep sort of gut-instinct thing, like I described above.

[(Anonymous)]

"I wish I could believe in an afterlife" anon here--I'm actually agnostic from the other direction, because even though I can't believe, part of me hopes. But some people get weird when I call myself an agnostic atheist, since admitting that I don't believe in religion or the supernatural or anything should apparently grant me ironclad faith that faith in the invisible is bullshit.

Like, my non-belief is just there, like a rock or the sky, I didn't arrive at my atheism via reason, so I'm not going to tell anyone their religious faith is less valid than my lack thereof unless they're using it to hurt people, in which case I hope there's a hell, or at least a limbo or purgatory, so they learn that they shouldn't be dicks.

[(Anonymous)]

Hey, I reckon we'd get along all right, nonny! :)

You put it into words - "my non-belief is just there, like a rock or the sky, I didn't arrive at my atheism via reason"

Likewise, I just don't see the point in telling people their beliefs aren't valid. People hold a lot of beliefs and opinions about the world all the time. Unless they're using their beliefs as justification for shitty behaviour or bigotry, I don't really mind.

[(Anonymous)]

New anon in the thread:

"Just there, like a rock or the sky" exactly describes my atheism. I was brought up going to church, but my earliest memories of it are not believing most of it (except the stuff like "love thy neighbor" - totally fine) but figuring I should keep quiet for the sake of the adults' feelings. Peope are surprised that I have no hard feelings towards any religion, that there was no spiritual crisis, loss of faith, or falling out, it was just never there in the first place and that has never changed. It's not something I can willfully change.

[(Anonymous)]

Yes, people who don't believe in an afterlife are all douchebags! /s