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I love her perspective. Living with stage 4 lung cancer, Emily Levine in this TED talk discusses about why dying is something she looks forward to.
Not because she is religious, but because she is not. In particularly, she discusses my concept that we all only turn into wormfood in a much better context.
From the video, some snippets:
"And then there's this slight variation on that, which is reality looks like two things, but it turns out to be the interaction of those two things, like space -- time, mass -- energy and life and death. So I don't understand -- I simply just don't understand the mindset of people who are out to "defeat death" and "overcome death." How do you do that? How do you defeat death without killing off life? It doesn't make sense to me. "
And,
"Plus, I love being in sync with the cyclical rhythms of the universe. That's what's so extraordinary about life: it's a cycle of generation, degeneration, regeneration. "I" am just a collection of particles that is arranged into this pattern, then will decompose and be available, all of its constituent parts, to nature, to reorganize into another pattern. To me, that is so exciting, and it makes me even more grateful to be part of that process.
You know, I look at death now from the point of view of a German biologist, Andreas Weber, who looks at it as part of the gift economy. You're given this enormous gift, life, you enrich it as best you can, and then you give it back. And, you know, Auntie Mame said, "Life is a banquet" -- well, I've eaten my fill. I have had an enormous appetite for life, I've consumed life, but in death, I'm going to be consumed. I'm going into the ground just the way I am, and there, I invite every microbe and detritus-er and decomposer to have their fill. I think they'll find me delicious."
I love her perspective. Living with stage 4 lung cancer, Emily Levine in this TED talk discusses about why dying is something she looks forward to.
Not because she is religious, but because she is not. In particularly, she discusses my concept that we all only turn into wormfood in a much better context.
From the video, some snippets:
"And then there's this slight variation on that, which is reality looks like two things, but it turns out to be the interaction of those two things, like space -- time, mass -- energy and life and death. So I don't understand -- I simply just don't understand the mindset of people who are out to "defeat death" and "overcome death." How do you do that? How do you defeat death without killing off life? It doesn't make sense to me. "
And,
"Plus, I love being in sync with the cyclical rhythms of the universe. That's what's so extraordinary about life: it's a cycle of generation, degeneration, regeneration. "I" am just a collection of particles that is arranged into this pattern, then will decompose and be available, all of its constituent parts, to nature, to reorganize into another pattern. To me, that is so exciting, and it makes me even more grateful to be part of that process.
You know, I look at death now from the point of view of a German biologist, Andreas Weber, who looks at it as part of the gift economy. You're given this enormous gift, life, you enrich it as best you can, and then you give it back. And, you know, Auntie Mame said, "Life is a banquet" -- well, I've eaten my fill. I have had an enormous appetite for life, I've consumed life, but in death, I'm going to be consumed. I'm going into the ground just the way I am, and there, I invite every microbe and detritus-er and decomposer to have their fill. I think they'll find me delicious."
yeah, this is as good as any stuff in trying to relieve the angst of death. its definitely good stuff. Its how I kind of see things too. Its has a flaw that I see. "over coming death kills life". That's just a faith statement to me. We don't know that. I would have to check it out from a few angles to that that means. i can see it meaning we may be taking resources from future life, but that isn't killing life.
also, death notions don't really prove "god" or show there is "no god". It, certifiably, doesn't show religions have the answers. If god is a product of the rhythms of the system we are in, then so be it.
Normstad, may I ask why you love this perspective?
Sure.
She talks about a life well lived, and in particular, it fits in with a view I have felt before, that we are part of the whole, as it is in us. Not in a transcendent way, but in a real and physical one.
We are part of the whole, and the whole is part of us. No sentient, anthropomorphic, omnipotent entity needed.
Nature is nature, and the atoms that came from the exploding stars, the ones that were cooked in the crucible of those stars, the ones that formed the elements which are found on earth and the universe, those same elements which were the foundation of life here on earth, the atoms where the ones in your left hand may well be from a different star and time than the one in your right hand, those atoms get reintroduced into the ecosystem whence they came from once our time on earth is done.
Those atoms were there before you were born, and they will continue to be there after you die. They will become new earth, feed new plants, which will feed those that come after you. They will become new rocks, and eventually, when our sun explodes, they will be cast into the vastness of the universe, and at some point form new solar systems, and continue to live on there. (Adapted from Sagan, Krause, degrasse Tyson)
We are part of the whole, and the whole is part of us.
Part of us lives on here on earth in the DNA we have passed on to our children, and they to theirs, and so forth. We live forever in their minds, and the collective memory that we possess from generations that came before us will continue in the generations that are to come.
We are part of the whole, and the whole is part of us.
No god, no spirit, no woo at all needed, and certainly no writings from bronzed aged, superstitious desert dwellers are needed to elucidate us. It is all real, backed by science, and very much can drive your personal spirituality.
I am not afraid of death.
Unlike her bravely stating her view, I am afraid of dying. I will regret not being consciously connected with my family, my loved ones, my friends and people I've touched and influenced. But I am not afraid of death. Instead, I am in awe that those atoms that comprise me will give back so much in future eons, and become part of various other wholes.
I think there's enough testimonial evidence to at least consider the possibility of a life of some sort after death. Me being the most pragmatic guy alive, I simply cannot believe that millions of people have gotten together all over the world and generated this grand conspiracy to defraud the rest of us with phony NDE's. Nor do I believe that in all cases these NDE's are just products of a dying mind. As anyone who has read into this in depth knows it is easy to defeat Susan Blackmore's and other's insistence that it is is brain chemicals that are producing the mostly exact same descriptions of the afterlife:
Quote:
They point to scientific studies showing how psychedelic drugs, meditation, and other triggers can be used to induce non-ordinary states of consciousness, such as an NDE. The major difference between hallucinations and NDEs is that NDEs do not involve such distortions of reality. "NDE accounts from varied times and cultures were found to be more orderly, logical, defined and predictable than comparable accounts from drug or illness-induced hallucination.
So we can resign ourselves to our consciousness simply disappearing when we die and try to accept our total demise OR we can look at this evidence as something to give us a little bit of hope we do have something better waiting for us after we die. If none of it is true then what have you lost? If there isn't an afterlife then you won't be aware you allowed yourself a glimmer of hope of something better than this crummy life. But if you do take the "veridical" testimonial evidence at face value then what harm is it? Just don't throw your life away on serving Jesus Christ or getting sucked into the Christian web of deceit or any other religion for that matter. Live as if there isn't an afterlife but allowing yourself the possibility there is so that when you get ready to die you might some comfort in what might possibly be lying beyond the veil. In other words, just like you don't let Jesus use you, you use him--in the same way with the afterlife, don't let it use you, you use it.
As anyone who has read into this in depth knows it is easy to defeat Susan Blackmore's and other's insistence that it is is brain chemicals that are producing the mostly exact same descriptions of the afterlife:
You will need more to easily "defeat Susan Blackmore's and other's" than a site called near-death.com, especially considering the use of Dr Pim van Lommel and Dr Jeffrey Long.
And the 'mostly exact same descriptions' could be because people have a similar idea of heaven and hell from their cultural background. This is evident from finding NDEs are influenced by the culture of the person having them (being taken in a UFO is an example). This points to NDEs as being cultural products of the brain more than to them being real.
I am OK with the idea that people find comfort in the idea of an afterlife, but I am also aware of the opportunity for dishonest people to sell what others want to hear.
She talks about a life well lived, and in particular, it fits in with a view I have felt before, that we are part of the whole, as it is in us. Not in a transcendent way, but in a real and physical one.
We are part of the whole, and the whole is part of us. No sentient, anthropomorphic, omnipotent entity needed.
Nature is nature, and the atoms that came from the exploding stars, the ones that were cooked in the crucible of those stars, the ones that formed the elements which are found on earth and the universe, those same elements which were the foundation of life here on earth, the atoms where the ones in your left hand may well be from a different star and time than the one in your right hand, those atoms get reintroduced into the ecosystem whence they came from once our time on earth is done.
Those atoms were there before you were born, and they will continue to be there after you die. They will become new earth, feed new plants, which will feed those that come after you. They will become new rocks, and eventually, when our sun explodes, they will be cast into the vastness of the universe, and at some point form new solar systems, and continue to live on there. (Adapted from Sagan, Krause, degrasse Tyson)
We are part of the whole, and the whole is part of us.
Part of us lives on here on earth in the DNA we have passed on to our children, and they to theirs, and so forth. We live forever in their minds, and the collective memory that we possess from generations that came before us will continue in the generations that are to come.
We are part of the whole, and the whole is part of us.
No god, no spirit, no woo at all needed, and certainly no writings from bronzed aged, superstitious desert dwellers are needed to elucidate us. It is all real, backed by science, and very much can drive your personal spirituality.
I am not afraid of death.
Unlike her bravely stating her view, I am afraid of dying. I will regret not being consciously connected with my family, my loved ones, my friends and people I've touched and influenced. But I am not afraid of death. Instead, I am in awe that those atoms that comprise me will give back so much in future eons, and become part of various other wholes.
She states much the same.
So, you might say it’s a sense of connectedness to all that is which gives you a feeling of ... peace or contentment or even joy? Do you, like the woman in the video, feel that if your consciousness did in some form continue beyond your physical death, that it would somehow cheapen or devalue the life you are now living?
And reality and I -- we don't share the same values, the same goals -
To be honest, I don't have goals; I have fantasies. They're exactly like goals but without the hard work.
True that.
I don't get that. I don't understand -- to me, it's disrespectful. It's disrespectful to nature. The idea that we're going to dominate nature, we're going to master nature, nature is too weak to withstand our intellect -- no, I don't think so.
The above makes sense to me. I never understood how the people in my group could throw away their life as "not good enough, they're must be more...I deserve more." They can't even appreciate what they have. If reality didn't contain death then we wouldn't even have had this chance to begin with.
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“I love her perspective.”
