The Religious Landscape is Undergoing Massive Change. It Could Decide the 2024 Election.

[Bacon]

5 minutes ago, Fizzzzle said:

The only thing scarier than death is eternity.

Big wrong. I want to live forever. I have no desire for death.

[GeneticBlueprint]

39 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

My position is that if Christ genuinely wanted the "left-leaning option" to be the default, then he would've explicitly instructed his followers to ensure that the overall societal structure reflected this desire.  However, because he was infinitely more concerned with the spiritual rather than the temporal, this wasn't priority for him in the least and therefore he essentially left it up to the individual.

 

Not disagreeing with any of that. Just pointing out that those who use it as an argument aren't necessarily trying to say "this is what Jesus said he wanted" but rather "this is the best way to achieve what he said to do." On either side.

[CitizenVectron]

16 minutes ago, Bacon said:

Big wrong. I want to live forever. I have no desire for death.

 

My view is that eternity is great, but only if you have full agency (and that includes the ability to end existence). If you could live forever inside some kind of Matrix, for instance, what control do you have over someone turning it into an eternal hell? And if something has the power to give you eternal life...then you're dealing with something outside your control, which means you lack agency. So, if we had the ability to extend our lifespans indefinitely, then I'm good with that. But some kind of actual eternity (or equivalent, in terms of millions of years experienced, etc), then I would rather die.

[Bacon]

Well, yeah, I don't want to live in heaven or hell or some false reality either. I ain't talking about religion. I just want to never die. People told me when I was younger I would change my mind and at 30 I'm still wondering how much older I got to get before that changes. Of course, I also am not chronically ill or in pain every day so yeah.

 

I few death as eternal nothingness and I would really like to avoid something so unfathomable.

[SaysWho?]

On 5/15/2023 at 1:55 PM, Massdriver said:

The Religious Landscape is Undergoing Massive Change. It Could Decide the 2024 Election. - POLITICO

WWW.POLITICO.COM

---

The new decennial Religion Census offers cause for hope — and alarm — for both parties.

 

Texas will be solid red under Dan Patrick for at least another 10 years. 

 

I think POLITICO is making inferences to the numbers, but Miami-Dade going from 40-52 percent doesn't explain the change from Hillary to Biden. There's much more to it than that.

[BloodyHell]

On 5/15/2023 at 10:56 PM, Fizzzzle said:

And yes, I'm comparing someone's religious beliefs to being a fan of Taylor Swift. I don't see that much difference. If you've ever met Swiftie you'd understand.

 

It's an arbitrary thing that someone has decided defines their entire personality. When you do that, it becomes easy to see everyone else as an 'other'

A year later, theres still a fairly active group of both Johnny Depp and Amber Heard stans, (Depps outnumber them 10 to 1 at least) that scream into an echo chamber day and night about how awful the other is, to yhe point it still trends on twitter with thousands of posts a day a year later. 

 

I do understand wanting to be part of something, but like you said, when you make it your being, it becomes pathetic. Its very much the same as Trump for his base, and a few other communities that hate and attack anyone who disagrees with anything they believe. It’s incredibly weird. 
 

[Fizzzzle]

2 hours ago, Bacon said:

Well, yeah, I don't want to live in heaven or hell or some false reality either. I ain't talking about religion. I just want to never die. People told me when I was younger I would change my mind and at 30 I'm still wondering how much older I got to get before that changes. Of course, I also am not chronically ill or in pain every day so yeah.

 

I few death as eternal nothingness and I would really like to avoid something so unfathomable.

The thing is, over a long enough time span, eternal death and eternal life aren't that much different. There are 4 possibilities:

 

1) heaven. You get to spend eternity with the same people. I'd rather stab my foot with a rusty fork.

 

2) eternal Hell. Again, not sure how much basis this actually has in actual Christian mythology, not honestly eternity is torture regardless of which face it wears.

 

3) there was a third one I forgot

 

 

[BloodyHell]

2 hours ago, Bacon said:

Well, yeah, I don't want to live in heaven or hell or some false reality either. I ain't talking about religion. I just want to never die. People told me when I was younger I would change my mind and at 30 I'm still wondering how much older I got to get before that changes. Of course, I also am not chronically ill or in pain every day so yeah.

 

I few death as eternal nothingness and I would really like to avoid something so unfathomable.

Life would get incredibly grating after while. I mean, especially if you’re talking true immortality. Do you want to still be here when the sun swallows the solar system and you can’t die?

 

I honestly think after a couple of hundred years of collecting wealth and power, and watching loved ones and family die over and over, we’d all either become dictators or go completely insane. You can only take so much loss and heartbreak before it literally breaks you.

[Signifyin(g)Monkey]

10 hours ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

I really have issues with the left's tendency to ascribe a modern political context to Christ's teachings as it's ahistorical, irrelevant, and generally won't serve the objectives of a left-wing ideology.

 

Nothing Christ said even remotely supports an overall leftist reading of his beliefs save from a few highly-selective examples.

 

Hell, I could easily make the argument that Christ espoused a more or less "libertarian" outlook as he never insinuated that "the State" should practice his moral outlook but rather emphasized the actions of the individual.  In fact, I really do take issue with the notion that Christ was any type of "revolutionary" as his own "Render unto Caesar" quote genuinely appears to be an affirmation of obedience to temporal authority.

 

Besides, he was only tangenitally concerned with the affairs of this world and directed his teachings towards preparing his followers for the world to come.

 

In summary, resist the temptation to fit Christ's words into a leftist connotation because it really just doesn't work.

He may have been concerned with the world to come, but he was also taking back, ideologically, the interpretation of Mosaic law that the oligarchic Israeli kings had grown increasingly opposed to over time, which put economic justice and the device of debt forgiveness--embodied in the 'Year of the Lord', which btw in Hebrew is called the deror, which btw is a derivative and descendant of the Babylonian term for a debt jubilee, or andurarum--back at the heart of the religion.

 

We know, for example, that his first sermon upon returning from Nazareth centered around Isaiah 61, in which Isaiah goes forth to proclaim the deror, and that it included the Lord's Prayer, itself an expression of this principle.  We also know that the only recorded act of his that could be characterized as violent is his overturning of the tables of the moneylenders in the temple of the Pharisees.

 

It is clear his preaching along these lines made him a threat to the Roman creditor class and its client appointees in Jerusalem which eventually killed him, and the lack of records documenting jubilee years around this time period suggest that the practice had been abandoned by Jesus's time, leaving Rome heavily indebted as a result--with this class and groups like the Pharisees being the clear beneficiaries and owners of these debts.  (It's noteworthy that historians of the time like Livy, Plutarch and Diodorus pointed to frictions between this class and the lay people--i.e., the debtor class--as being a key element of the fall of the empire.)  

 

But most strikingly of all, we know from the Dead Sea scrolls that Christianity's early practicioners were much more concerned with economic justice--with the problems of inequality and political polarization that arise from the dynamics of debt--than they were about things like sexual or dietary practices. (something they, again, probably got from the Babylonians)  Take, for example, the key text of 11q of Melchizadek, which collected every instance of deror  found in the early translations of the Bible; it is suggestive of the character of most of the rest of the scrolls themselves--they are by and large midrashes collecting early translations of the Bible from the Prophets to the Laws of Moses, and their principle focus is debt and the liberatory act of the jubilee.  Things like sexual practices are, in fact, treated largely as ancillary matters related to the more central issue of the abuse of creditor power--i.e., "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife" was more about "Don't make a loan to someone that you know they can't afford just so they'll wind up pledging you their wife as payment" than it was about adultery in and of itself.

 

These are clearly not the foundations of a religion that supports the vices of financial predators and corrupt bazillionaires against the poor and marginalized members of society.  Or one that cares more about who you're sleeping with than about the use of wealth and power by one social group to hold another in bondage.

 

So I would say that if the right is going to use Jesus and the Judeo-Christian tradition as a cudgel to fight for their political interests, the left should not be afraid to do the same, because the latter is on comparatively sounder footing.  If the church is going to continue to grow in importance, they shouldn't just cede it to the right; they ought to treat it as a properly contested political space.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

@Signifyin(g)Monkey - I do want to point out for clarification that biblical scholars consider the Dead Sea Scrolls to be the work of the Essene sect rather than that of early Christians.

[Bacon]

10 hours ago, Fizzzzle said:

The thing is, over a long enough time span, eternal death and eternal life aren't that much different.

 

This is very wrong and it means you have no idea of what death really is for life. I am not talking about religion. This isn't a philosophical debate. There is no, "well in my opinion-" Death is an end of existence. An end of conscience. Death is nothing. Nothing is not something you can experience. It is LITERALLY nothing. It isn't "peaceful" or any such relaxing experience. You cannot experience nothing. Again, this is not a debate. This is a literal fact. Nothing is the absence of anything. Thought, light, space, time, darkness. None of that is in nothing. You cannot experience nothing, because if you are experiencing nothing then that means you are experiencing something which means it literally cannot be nothing. Nothing does not have physical space to exist in. Because that very space would be considered something and therefore nothing cannot exist where there is something.

 

Again, if you think this is wrong you simply are unable to understand, you are religious, or you think death is some other state of existence. It is not. I wish I was smarter to make you fully understand what I mean when I talk about nothing like this. I swear no one gets it. Heaven, hell, false reality, none of that is nothing. Eternal life isn't nothing. And death isn't this eternal concept either. It is nothing. Eternal anything implies a state of existence. Existence is, even more, the opposite of nothing than the concept of anything or everything. Existence it the true opposite of Nothing. I'm not just talking about life. Something doesn't need life in the way humans think of life to exist.

 

Now, you might be saying, "gee, Bacon, this sounds a lot like a philosophical debate" and I'm sorry but no. It just means I'm not smart enough. And I'm not here thinking how much better and smarter I am than anyone either. I'm just so frustrated that no one gets what I'm talking about. Every time I bring stuff like this up I feel like everyone is being so obtuse. Like, how do you not get what I mean? Cuz if ya did, you really wouldn't be saying stuff like what I quoted. And I'm not meaning specifically you, Fiz, even Wade has shown to not really get what I mean. I'm not shitting on anyone here either. I don't care if anyone thinks this is stupid or if I'm dumb, because of course what I am talking about is actually very easy to understand. Again, there is no debate to be had here. I am not a smart person. I know this. But if you think I am wrong, or something, I'm not. This is literally just how shit works. Nothing can't exist. If Nothing could exist, there wouldn't even be a universe in which we lived.

 

As much as I hate to put it like this, death is how we experience nothing, despite the fact nothing can't actually be experienced. Consciousness and the Soul are the same thing. While those things are mostly just your brain, I really can't describe what I mean by this and that is my shortcoming and I wish I could explain better. But I'll say it like this even tho I hate it. The soul is how you experience existence. It doesn't matter if you are in heaven, or in hell, in a false reality, or isekai'd into some other universe with swords and magic, you haven't really died. It doesn't matter what vessel you have, it doesn't even matter if you lose all of your memories and the traits that make you, you. As long as you are experiencing consciousness, you haven't really died. Death is that loss of consciousness. It means you don't even have a soul. You simply don't exist. What was once there is now nothing.

 

There is no debate to be had here. Maybe you think Bacon is just some crazy guy, but it's not like I'm living every day in constant fear or anything. I really just don't what to die because Nothing is unfathomable. It is not something that could even be understood by imaginary Eldritch Horrors. Like, you don't even understand how much of an idiot I feel for even typing all this out because I feel like it just leaves me wide open to ridicule and bullying when, at least for this, I should not be ridiculed.

 

It's why shit like @BloodyHell's comment just makes me irritated. Because yeah, I do want to be here. I mean, I prefer not to be in this solar system when the sun swallows the solar system, but yeah, I'd rather live through it. It is so easy to simply exist. I know I say this as a person who can interact with billions of people without ever having to meet face to face, but I have felt this way for my entire life so far. I have never really wanted to die. I have a feeling, even when I am on my death bed, even if I am in massive pain and I am tired all the time, I won't wish to be dead, I will wish to be well. I will wish that even after the body dies that somehow my consciousness persists. Maybe I'll get isekai'd and get that big-titted elf harem I have always wanted. But I know that won't happen. I'll die just like the rest of us, and I really don't fucking want that. I don't want nothing.

[Signifyin(g)Monkey]

7 hours ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

@Signifyin(g)Monkey - I do want to point out for clarification that biblical scholars consider the Dead Sea Scrolls to be the work of the Essene sect rather than that of early Christians.

Many take this position; however, there are also scholars that dispute the Essene label as something that was conveniently assigned to the scrolls by the vested interests of later Christendom to make them seem like the work of a radical sect rather than the authoritative version of the Bible.  This tracks with the rise of the creditor oligarchy I mentioned, who would have obvious reasons to do so, so I think it’s a fairly substantive claim.

 

Even accepting them as a particular sect’s rendering of the text, however, the clear evidence of cultural connective tissue between Babylonian law and practice and the early Christian practicioners suggest the notion of the jubilee year and its associations with the restoration of liberty for the poor vs the creditor class is central to the religion.  
 

I agree it’s worth pointing out that the scrolls themselves are a point of scholarly debate, though.

[Joe]

On 5/15/2023 at 4:22 PM, CitizenVectron said:

It's really weird seeing Canada and the US take such different tacks when it comes to religious immigrants. In both cases, you had the natural allies of religious immigrants (social conservatives) go hard on racism against those immigrants over the past decade. In Canada, this hurt the conservative parties, and religious immigrants have mostly stuck to the progressive parties as they apparently value their own cultural identity/race protection over their socially religious beliefs. But in the US, you have a very large group of religious immigrants (Latin American, specifically) vote against the protection of their race/cultural rights, and for their religious social beliefs. It's strange how the priorities were different despite the relative similarity of the two countries in the grand scheme of things.

I’m curious as to what the breakdown is here between the two countries because Latinos still vote overwhelmingly for the Democratic Party in the US. A few shifts in Texas and Florida counties does not change that.

[SuperSpreader]

I think the lesson here is everyone is a human and subject to the influence of party politics. Democrats shouldn't assume just because the country is getting more diverse doesn't mean they'll automatically win, because that's a sure way to lose.

 

Normal/average people, the "common man" think that both parties/the gov are up to no good/can't be trusted, and that they control everything/voting doesn't really matter.

[BloodyHell]

3 hours ago, Bacon said:

 

This is very wrong and it means you have no idea of what death really is for life. I am not talking about religion. This isn't a philosophical debate. There is no, "well in my opinion-" Death is an end of existence. An end of conscience. Death is nothing. Nothing is not something you can experience. It is LITERALLY nothing. It isn't "peaceful" or any such relaxing experience. You cannot experience nothing. Again, this is not a debate. This is a literal fact. Nothing is the absence of anything. Thought, light, space, time, darkness. None of that is in nothing. You cannot experience nothing, because if you are experiencing nothing then that means you are experiencing something which means it literally cannot be nothing. Nothing does not have physical space to exist in. Because that very space would be considered something and therefore nothing cannot exist where there is something.

 

Again, if you think this is wrong you simply are unable to understand, you are religious, or you think death is some other state of existence. It is not. I wish I was smarter to make you fully understand what I mean when I talk about nothing like this. I swear no one gets it. Heaven, hell, false reality, none of that is nothing. Eternal life isn't nothing. And death isn't this eternal concept either. It is nothing. Eternal anything implies a state of existence. Existence is, even more, the opposite of nothing than the concept of anything or everything. Existence it the true opposite of Nothing. I'm not just talking about life. Something doesn't need life in the way humans think of life to exist.

 

Now, you might be saying, "gee, Bacon, this sounds a lot like a philosophical debate" and I'm sorry but no. It just means I'm not smart enough. And I'm not here thinking how much better and smarter I am than anyone either. I'm just so frustrated that no one gets what I'm talking about. Every time I bring stuff like this up I feel like everyone is being so obtuse. Like, how do you not get what I mean? Cuz if ya did, you really wouldn't be saying stuff like what I quoted. And I'm not meaning specifically you, Fiz, even Wade has shown to not really get what I mean. I'm not shitting on anyone here either. I don't care if anyone thinks this is stupid or if I'm dumb, because of course what I am talking about is actually very easy to understand. Again, there is no debate to be had here. I am not a smart person. I know this. But if you think I am wrong, or something, I'm not. This is literally just how shit works. Nothing can't exist. If Nothing could exist, there wouldn't even be a universe in which we lived.

 

As much as I hate to put it like this, death is how we experience nothing, despite the fact nothing can't actually be experienced. Consciousness and the Soul are the same thing. While those things are mostly just your brain, I really can't describe what I mean by this and that is my shortcoming and I wish I could explain better. But I'll say it like this even tho I hate it. The soul is how you experience existence. It doesn't matter if you are in heaven, or in hell, in a false reality, or isekai'd into some other universe with swords and magic, you haven't really died. It doesn't matter what vessel you have, it doesn't even matter if you lose all of your memories and the traits that make you, you. As long as you are experiencing consciousness, you haven't really died. Death is that loss of consciousness. It means you don't even have a soul. You simply don't exist. What was once there is now nothing.

 

There is no debate to be had here. Maybe you think Bacon is just some crazy guy, but it's not like I'm living every day in constant fear or anything. I really just don't what to die because Nothing is unfathomable. It is not something that could even be understood by imaginary Eldritch Horrors. Like, you don't even understand how much of an idiot I feel for even typing all this out because I feel like it just leaves me wide open to ridicule and bullying when, at least for this, I should not be ridiculed.

 

It's why shit like @BloodyHell's comment just makes me irritated. Because yeah, I do want to be here. I mean, I prefer not to be in this solar system when the sun swallows the solar system, but yeah, I'd rather live through it. It is so easy to simply exist. I know I say this as a person who can interact with billions of people without ever having to meet face to face, but I have felt this way for my entire life so far. I have never really wanted to die. I have a feeling, even when I am on my death bed, even if I am in massive pain and I am tired all the time, I won't wish to be dead, I will wish to be well. I will wish that even after the body dies that somehow my consciousness persists. Maybe I'll get isekai'd and get that big-titted elf harem I have always wanted. But I know that won't happen. I'll die just like the rest of us, and I really don't fucking want that. I don't want nothing.

Nobody WANTS To die, but I’m sorry, it doesn’t matter what you think now, you would eventually want death. Perhaps not in a human lifetime, you would get there. I know you’ll claim otherwise, and theres no way to test it, but nothing in your post suggests you’re thinking of the actual ramifications of it. 
 

like, you want to survive the end of the solar wystem, the heat death of the universe? Billions of years alone floating in space in extreme cold and no air? 

 

Immortality is forever. If you can’t choose to die, it would be the worst bargain in the history of man.

[Bacon]

14 minutes ago, BloodyHell said:

it doesn’t matter what you think now, you would eventually want death

You can't know this and I'm sick and tired of people thinking they know what I want in this regard. It does matter what I think now and it is bullshit of you to counter back like that.

 

14 minutes ago, BloodyHell said:

nothing in your post suggests you’re thinking of the actual ramifications of it. 

You really think I don't fuckin' know? You just assume because I didn't cover every detail of all possibilities just like you you are quick to assume that I would be the only immortal being. Who says in this hypothetical that I would be alone? You. You are simply placing your personal values over my opinion to say I am wrong. This isn't some fight to be won. Why am I alone just drifting in space as some undead non-corpse? This would be trillions of years in the future. Who knows what it holds? You fuckin' don't. You just want to shit on me because you think you know better.

 

[Bacon]

17 hours ago, Bacon said:

People told me when I was younger I would change my mind and at 30 I'm still wondering how much older I got to get before that changes. Of course, I also am not chronically ill or in pain every day so yeah.

 

3 hours ago, Bacon said:

I know I say this as a person who can interact with billions of people without ever having to meet face to face, but I have felt this way for my entire life so far.

 

[SuperSpreader]

Same. I would pick never die.

[BloodyHell]

22 minutes ago, Bacon said:

You can't know this and I'm sick and tired of people thinking they know what I want in this regard. It does matter what I think now and it is bullshit of you to counter back like that.

 

You really think I don't fuckin' know? You just assume because I didn't cover every detail of all possibilities just like you you are quick to assume that I would be the only immortal being. Who says in this hypothetical that I would be alone? You. You are simply placing your personal values over my opinion to say I am wrong. This isn't some fight to be won. Why am I alone just drifting in space as some undead non-corpse? This would be trillions of years in the future. Who knows what it holds? You fuckin' don't. You just want to shit on me because you think you know better.

 

It’s literally you who doesn’t know better, but I’m done with this argument because your only reason for it is “I don’t want to die”. It’s a philosophical discussion and you have completely ignored the issues with it, and refuse to even pretend they are real concerns that would drive even the most mentally strong person completely insane eventually. The idea of eternal life is frankly revolting. Would I like a few hundred years? Yes? Eternity? Not a chance in any of the 9 circles of hell. 

[SuperSpreader]

4 hours ago, Bacon said:

 

This is very wrong and it means you have no idea of what death really is for life. I am not talking about religion. This isn't a philosophical debate. There is no, "well in my opinion-" Death is an end of existence. An end of conscience. Death is nothing. Nothing is not something you can experience. It is LITERALLY nothing. It isn't "peaceful" or any such relaxing experience. You cannot experience nothing. Again, this is not a debate. This is a literal fact. Nothing is the absence of anything. Thought, light, space, time, darkness. None of that is in nothing. You cannot experience nothing, because if you are experiencing nothing then that means you are experiencing something which means it literally cannot be nothing. Nothing does not have physical space to exist in. Because that very space would be considered something and therefore nothing cannot exist where there is something.

 

Again, if you think this is wrong you simply are unable to understand, you are religious, or you think death is some other state of existence. It is not. I wish I was smarter to make you fully understand what I mean when I talk about nothing like this. I swear no one gets it. Heaven, hell, false reality, none of that is nothing. Eternal life isn't nothing. And death isn't this eternal concept either. It is nothing. Eternal anything implies a state of existence. Existence is, even more, the opposite of nothing than the concept of anything or everything. Existence it the true opposite of Nothing. I'm not just talking about life. Something doesn't need life in the way humans think of life to exist.

 

Now, you might be saying, "gee, Bacon, this sounds a lot like a philosophical debate" and I'm sorry but no. It just means I'm not smart enough. And I'm not here thinking how much better and smarter I am than anyone either. I'm just so frustrated that no one gets what I'm talking about. Every time I bring stuff like this up I feel like everyone is being so obtuse. Like, how do you not get what I mean? Cuz if ya did, you really wouldn't be saying stuff like what I quoted. And I'm not meaning specifically you, Fiz, even Wade has shown to not really get what I mean. I'm not shitting on anyone here either. I don't care if anyone thinks this is stupid or if I'm dumb, because of course what I am talking about is actually very easy to understand. Again, there is no debate to be had here. I am not a smart person. I know this. But if you think I am wrong, or something, I'm not. This is literally just how shit works. Nothing can't exist. If Nothing could exist, there wouldn't even be a universe in which we lived.

 

As much as I hate to put it like this, death is how we experience nothing, despite the fact nothing can't actually be experienced. Consciousness and the Soul are the same thing. While those things are mostly just your brain, I really can't describe what I mean by this and that is my shortcoming and I wish I could explain better. But I'll say it like this even tho I hate it. The soul is how you experience existence. It doesn't matter if you are in heaven, or in hell, in a false reality, or isekai'd into some other universe with swords and magic, you haven't really died. It doesn't matter what vessel you have, it doesn't even matter if you lose all of your memories and the traits that make you, you. As long as you are experiencing consciousness, you haven't really died. Death is that loss of consciousness. It means you don't even have a soul. You simply don't exist. What was once there is now nothing.

 

There is no debate to be had here. Maybe you think Bacon is just some crazy guy, but it's not like I'm living every day in constant fear or anything. I really just don't what to die because Nothing is unfathomable. It is not something that could even be understood by imaginary Eldritch Horrors. Like, you don't even understand how much of an idiot I feel for even typing all this out because I feel like it just leaves me wide open to ridicule and bullying when, at least for this, I should not be ridiculed.

 

It's why shit like @BloodyHell's comment just makes me irritated. Because yeah, I do want to be here. I mean, I prefer not to be in this solar system when the sun swallows the solar system, but yeah, I'd rather live through it. It is so easy to simply exist. I know I say this as a person who can interact with billions of people without ever having to meet face to face, but I have felt this way for my entire life so far. I have never really wanted to die. I have a feeling, even when I am on my death bed, even if I am in massive pain and I am tired all the time, I won't wish to be dead, I will wish to be well. I will wish that even after the body dies that somehow my consciousness persists. Maybe I'll get isekai'd and get that big-titted elf harem I have always wanted. But I know that won't happen. I'll die just like the rest of us, and I really don't fucking want that. I don't want nothing.

 

Yes. Death is like what it was like before you were born. Remember before you were born? It's like that. You don't experience anything because you don't exist. You have no awareness of anything happening because there is no you. 

[Bacon]

18 minutes ago, BloodyHell said:

The idea of eternal life is frankly revolting. Would I like a few hundred years? Yes? Eternity? Not a chance in any of the 9 circles of hell. 

And here is where the problem lies.

 

Fuck off, man. I like how I haven't told anyone they are wrong about what they want. I have said that death isn't peaceful and shit, but I never said that you shouldn't want it. But what do you do? You just say I am wrong. I don't know what I want, but you do, is that right? [Removed for being to mean -  Bacon]

 

[Bacon]

27 minutes ago, BloodyHell said:

It’s a philosophical discussion and you have completely ignored the issues with it

Furthermore, you aren't even talking about the same thing I was. I didn't say wanting to live forever or not was not a philosophical discussion. What I said is that the outcome of death is not a philosophical discussion. My long-ass post is more about what death factually is. There is no philosophical discussion to be held unless you believe in an afterlife. Philosophy has a lot to do with existence. Death, or more specifically the Nothing that comes after, is the thing most opposite of existence.

[SaysWho?]

It’s weird the things that some people say they’d want to experience less than stabbing themselves with a rusty fork.  

 

I’d rather exist and experience and travel than stab myself, as controversial as that is to people.

[TUFKAK]

Death vs eternity is apparently super serious business.

[Bacon]

No one knows what would happen if I or other people gained the ability to live forever. The heat death of the universe? That is such a long time away. Our sun won't even die for 5 billion years. But, if I were to die right now, or 5 billion years from now, the outcome is exactly the same. We barely even understand our universe. To assume we know much or everything is to assume a lot. Would I even be the same lump of electric meat in 5 billion years? The survival of the flesh means little to me. It means a lot to me now because without my flesh I cannot exist. But, will there come a time when consciousness can be transferred to either a new fleshy vessel or something which is able to withstand the tests of time much more reliably? How would our minds even process such a thing? Would that alter our thinking? Would we require what we need now as humans even if we aren't exactly human anymore? I don't know. No one does. This is what you can get philosophical about. Existence. Death, well, that's the end of all that.

[CitizenVectron]

I think the key thing is the stipulation of having to live forever vs the ability to live forever. Would people want to live forever without the ability to end existence, regardless of what happens? To me, that is a nightmare scenario because it could mean drifting in a vacuum for billions of years if your spaceship explodes (as an example). 

[Bacon]

28 minutes ago, CitizenVectron said:

ability to live forever

This is basically what I am talking about. I never even mentioned literal immortality in my big post. I mean, I don't even think actual immortality would be possible because it would also make you indestructible unless you obtained a non-corporeal form. Tho, it would be interesting to consider that, if you were immortal in an indestructible physical form, should the big crunch happen, your existence might be what ignites the next big bang. Would you somehow live outside of time and space or would your immortality demand a universe to exist?

[Guest]

I don't even really want to live past 70, tbh

[AbsolutSurgen]

5 minutes ago, sblfilms said:

I don't even really want to live past 70, tbh

I'm fine with 85...  There are a few people in my lifeline that had good quality of life into their 90s, so I've got my fingers crossed.

[marioandsonic]

This thread is giving me an existential crisis.

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, AbsolutSurgen said:

I'm fine with 85...  There are a few people in my lifeline that had good quality of life into their 90s, so I've got my fingers crossed.

 

Having married young (age 19), and at age 37 having my youngest kid be only 6 years from adulthood, I'm just a bit further down the road than most people my age. Not that I expect to wish for death, but I get bored pretty easily and I can imagine second 35ish years of my life being filled with various experiences that I will enjoy greatly...but eventually the curse of repetition comes for us all.

[TUFKAK]

3 hours ago, sblfilms said:

I don't even really want to live past 70, tbh

I’ll be shocked if I make it to 60 personally.

[Fizzzzle]

Judging by my family history, life past 70 is not that great. Some of that is self inflicted (I'm certainly no exception in that regard), but I'm certainly comfortable in saying 70 is my cutoff. Especially if I don't have children.

 

I've even chosen my suicide method. I'm going to travel to a beautiful, tropical place. I'm going to spend some wonderful time there drinking mai Thais on the beach. Then, one day, I'm going to swim out in the ocean until I drown. No one has to watch me battle through years of Alzheimer's or chemo, I'm just going to go quietly into that good night.