What is farcical about imagined things? Must everything be either an actuality or farce, as you seem to suggest? What about blueprints for as-yet-unrealised buildings... are they farce? Is every unrealised idea a farce?
Irrelevant. fear of death is not a terminal disease. It's a psychological condition. Well do you you know for a fact that there is an afterlife? yes or no. Aren't we? How about all your religious brothers and sisters on the site? And why would it be a problem in the first place? It would be a problem if somebody was saying positively that an actual real afterlife was farcical.
light, Still you haven't answered. My honest position is what sarkus described above, it couldn't be put across more aptly. I'm agnostic about both afterlife and chance of finding evidence for it.
What does belief in the nature of the cure (imagined or otherwise) for a terminal disease have to do with the actuality of the nature of it? If the cure is actual then it will work whether it is believed in or not. If the cure is imaginary then it will not work whether it is believed in or not. The same with belief in the afterlife: belief or not in the afterlife can not alter whether the afterlife is actual or imaginary. Your analogy is thus flawed if you think it makes a point in your favour. :shrug: The difference with some minor ailments, however, is that mere "belief" in the cure can be as effective as the cure itself... which is why placebos are often seen to be successful despite the "cure" being imaginary.
Do you think that people are generally insane, and have been so especially in the past? (I know you have expressed something similar before.) Because knowing that something is imaginary, but nevertheless using it for a real purpose (such as easing fear of death) is something only an insane person could do. The moment we find out something is imaginary, it loses its previous effect on us. For example, the magic bracelet might have the positive effect on people, but only as long as they believe it really can do that. The moment they become convinced (either by an external source of information or by personal experience) that it has no healing properties, the bracelet loses its "magic" and people stop wearing it for healing purposes.
And by "being skeptical and thinking for themselves" you mean that they would think the way you think they should? You will be the judge on whether someone is "being skeptical and thinking for themselves"?
Assuming that the afterlife is imaginary: If you're using it for a real purpose you won't know or think it's imaginary. Possibly it could actually prevent you from going insane/depressed. I must beg to differ here. The placebo effect can still work even when we know that a cure is imaginary. I can provide you with evidence for this if you should be interested. In the case of afterlife it might be different. I don't see it as a disease to be scared of death. I think it's very natural. All the uncertainty and such can be hard to handle.
If you see there is no chair, will you imagine one and sit down anyway? Then please do. Give examples where the test subjects knew they are being given a placebo, and the medication still had the desired result.
Also, importantly, in the major religions, the belief in an afterlife usually involves strict conditions about it; such as that one has to do many good works in this lifetime, avoid crime. A pleasant afterlife is not considered a right, it is not considered something people would automatically be entitled to. The idea that fear of death would somehow give rise to the belief in afterlife would make sense if the thus arived-at belief in afterlife would be only about pleasant things. But the afterlife beliefs of the major religions are far from that; some of the very common scenarios (such as a long period in hell, going through a purgatory fire, or being reborn as an animal) are anything but pleasant. Out of fear of death, why would anyone come up with such grim scenarios??
Fear of death is merely suggested as giving rise to the idea of the afterlife. Anything more specific than that (requirement to do good etc) might well have arisen from the desire to control people / give them a reason to behave etc. So I would be careful of trying to add the additional characteristics as proof/evidence against the underlying suggestion, when it actually might have no bearing at all.
Again assuming that the afterlife is imaginary: People who believe in the afterlife, do not think it's imaginary. They see a chair. A chair is a poor analogy though, because it's physical. You can't "see" an afterlife, but you can easily "believe" it's there, even if it isn't. http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/dec/22/placebo-effect-patients-sham-drug
I know people who believe it becuase they want to and others who believe in it because it is a tradition in their family. I know religious people who fear death, and i know religious people who don't. The answer is that some people want to believe that there is a bigger reason why we exist, than a simple accident. They want to believe that we were created, with a purpose, by a superior beingthat watch over us, for some this brings comfort, for others it doesn't.
You seem to have a problem with the concept of somethings being tangible. IMHO, apples & chairs don't really fall under the same category as gods and life after death
They don't know, for they so much want the belief—an error in thinking, yes, or having little or no thinking, due to emotion blinding it. (Not technically insane, really.) Wisdom must then conclude, indeed, that they don't they can't, and they won't, and so there is no "could", "should" or "ought to", and so diplomacy and mediation will fail to halt the conflict. (And some may know, but still wish to make the tradeoff, eventually becoming immune, as it grooves in.)
(con't) They tried to fool us with false tales of species made intact just a few thousand years ago, a fixed and flat Earth, a solid firmament above, lone and special mammals that only existed here—the whole universe only for them, a Garden and an apple eaten, 50,000 species in a boat during a flood, a strict father figure of fundamental thinking Being of God sending one to blazes, or not, angels and evils as good and evil spirits, a Heaven of an afterlife for the experimented on who pass the test, a virgin giving birth, purgatories, limbos, and all such subsequent inventions, superstition, myths, and dredged up legends falsely layered upon the initial fabrication into an unwieldy structure that could never hold water.
hmm..too many thoughts.. fear..that which is unknown..(we fear what we don't know), what happens after we die? we don't know..its logical to fear afterlife. religion gives an excuse not to fear afterlife,they attempt to make known that which is unknown. there are tons of testimonies of ppl who have died and came back to life..not limited to our life times, ancients pry had ppl who had died(pry not as many as today) then returned then told what they saw..(hmm, possible beginnings of religion) how would you answer your four year old if they asked 'what happens after we die?' or better yet..the 'why?' game.. (why should i be a good person?)
We die ‘little deaths’ all the time. Our atoms change, some of our memories go away and some new ones reappear, although I realize that it is the core of memories that defines us as us. It’s just that we are hardly the same person now as when we were much younger. We had ‘death’ before birth, too, and now there is life after birth. Is there life only during life? Yes. If one had amnesia and began learning the world anew, then one might say that one as the previous person was ‘dead’ and that it is our new life that counts, one not even missing the old one. And, while the ‘big death’ is much more than any of these ‘little deaths’, it is that our atoms may go on to reside in a new person eventually. It’s not like there is any continuity of memory, but more like that any narrative will do.
i actually thought about this concept yesterday.. only it was in the context of burial vs being burned on a beach, i thought of how being burned would reduce me better/quicker than decaying in a grave, then i imagined my ashes spreading across the beach, integrating with the sand on the beach..i then imagined i could become a part of some childs sand castle, or ingested by some kid and becoming a part of him/her, but reality then interrupted and told me i would pry end up as part of the sand in some guys butt crack....
