I'm a skeptic of any afterlife

[NinjaPuppy]

[Arouet]

oh, buddhism is generally acknowledged to be a religion - you don't need deities for a religion.

[NinjaPuppy]

[Arouet]

Ahh, I get it. haha.

[truthleaker]

[Craig Browning]

[NinjaPuppy]

[Arouet]

the Interesting thing about the parrallel or multi-world hypothesis is that they are trying to make it testable. The theory is that if there are these parrallel worlds they will sometimes bump up against our own and that will create "bumps" in the background radiation. They are looking for those bumps. How viable this is I have no idea, but its interesting that they are testing the hypothesis.

[ProfWag]

[Arouet]

I'm going to disagree with you a bit in your approach here, PW - and it may just have been loose wording. It's not pure logic that leads me to not believe in God. The God hypothesis is an empirical claim - not a logical one. I don't think there is any logical impossibility about the concept of a deity. The issue is, I don't think there is reliable evidence of one.

We can logically think of afterlives that have a deity - and ones that don't. For example, it could be that conciousness is fundamental and has always been around and it just found a vehicle when animals and people evolved. It may have had nothing to do with the creaton of the universe.

For something like reincarnation, I do think that while you don't quite need a deity - you do need some sort of administration. There has to be a way for the souls to get matched up with bodies and that implies some kind of decision maker or organiser. Not necessarily a deity but some sort of supernatural organising force.

So i think there are various options and just THINKING about them isn't going to take us very far. The question is is what evidence is there for any particular god or afterlife hypothesis, and how reliable is it? Keep in mind, there is evidence out there for life after death. The question is - how reliable is it?

[ProfWag]

[Arouet]

I agree with you that the evidence is not convincing of a god, or life after death, but that's not because it is logical. There's no logical impossibility. Saying you just can't imagine how there could be life after death is an argument from personal incredulity. In fact, you are being - gasp - illogical when you make that argument!

What is logical is to say that you'll withold belief in a deity until sufficient evidence is presented.

[Randi McSheldrake]

[ProfWag]

[Arouet]