I Don't Understand Death, Nobody Does!

a reply to: angryhulk

I would just like to say that I enjoyed your OP. So ty for that!

I also noticed a couple of death threads popping up. So that's kind of interesting.

a reply to: Informer1958

spirit guide said to me to choose carefully the right parents to put me on my path to learn something very important, so I chose the worst of the three parents. I am glad I did, I would have never learned to forgive had I not gone through the nightmare that was done.

Thank you for sharing such a difficult story; so true about the art of learning to forgive. I wish you well. Many would have chosen an easier path at birth.

a reply to: angryhulk
What do you mean; in the classical sense? Immortal spirit leaves its vessel by choice/the vessel decomposes as the vehicle has no thing or life spirit to animate it. That body is discarded. There is the other thing; one birth results in another condemnation of a similar death as the two are the same. One birth will spell define its mortality; its own equal death. To be born is to know at some point one WILL DIE or simply fail to exist eventually. Of all Gods odd Jokes played upon the living, this one is very creative. You are born to die.

originally posted by: spygeek

Let's examine this "proof", and see how it stands up..

What is the need to quote proof other than to be unkind? Never mind, we are getting used to your behaviour within the thread.

The first red flag indicating bias is in the headline of the article you reference: "First hint of 'life after death' in biggest ever scientific study"

Not only is this misleading, it is not an accurate representation of what can be inferred by the study.

At most, what can be inferred by study is that in the gap between clinical death and brain death, consciousness survives, and that brain death could possibly take longer to occur after clinical death than was previously thought.

How is the headline misleading? The study was set up to research out-of-body experiences. You don't think out-of-body experience could hint at a life after death? I repeat hint.

Right off the bat, you make the claim that it seems this man was "essentially non-physical", despite the fact that his physical body was there all along. This betrays your own personal bias toward your own belief..

His body was there, dead, while he was stood in the corner of the room recounting events. That's a non-physical entity. What don't you understand? This isn't an isolated case by the way, the study included 2060 participants and 41 of those described similar events.

"One man even recalled leaving his body entirely and watching his resuscitation from the corner of the room."

This is not unusual or inexplicable in any way.

Are you just saying that to annoy me?

He was "clinically dead" for 3 minutes. "Clinical death" is defined as the loss of heart beat, nothing more. All this says is that his heart stopped for 3 minutes.

Clinical death is the cessation of blood circulation and breathing.

This is a slightly misleading oversimplification. The brain begins to lose function as it is starved of oxygen after the heart has stopped, "brain death" itself has been shown to occur anywhere up to several minutes after "clinical death".

Following clinical death there is no measurable brain activity in 20 to 30 seconds.

While damage to the brain begins generally within 10 seconds of the heart stopping, the timing of brain failure is much harder to predict. All this says is that in the case of this man, his brain survived longer than would typically be expected.

Clearly his brain did not die, or he wouldn't be around afterwards to tell his story.

You're right, I better phone the AWARE study group and advise them of their stupidity while asking them to pull all their misleading publications.

“The man described everything that had happened in the room, but importantly, he heard two bleeps from a machine that makes a noise at three minute intervals. So we could time how long the experienced lasted for."

This is again, not unusual or inexplicable, and falls inline with what can be expected from a person who has experienced clinical death, but had their heart restarted before brain death.

Again, you're just saying this to annoy me.

This was stated by Dr. David Wilde, a psychologist who is a personal proponent of "life after death" with a vested interest in the concept's acceptance.

David had nothing to do with the study. The study was ran by the AWARE (AWAreness during REsuscitation) group, sponsored by the University of Southampton. The study's lead author is Dr Sam Parnia (assistant professor of critical care medicine and director of resuscitation research at the state university of New York) and was overseen by Dr Jerry Nolan (editor-in-chief of resuscitation journal and vice-chairman of ERC, European Resuscitation Council).

This is a statement of personal opinion from Dr. Wilde, who has no qualifications relating to medicine, biology, neuroscience, or neurochemistry.

He makes the argument from assertion that we "just don't know what's going on", and seems to think his psychological interpretation is not consistent with the accepted, biological explanation.

You keep going on about David when he HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH THE STUDY, HE SIMPLY SHARED HIS OPINION ON IT AND HOPED IT WOULD OPEN UP MORE RESEARCH.

a reply to: spygeek

aha I see where are you coming from. I will not say you are wrong. You are right from your pov experiences and observations, and that is important! what makes sense to you is important. But that does not have to makes sense to me. I will just take what does and leave the rest ... for now. : )

In my shallow understanding everything springs from the mind. Nothing is ever external in reality. Everything happens in "the mind". That is very much like Buddhist like to teach. But with meditation we can shut off our brain and when we are in deep meditation, I don't know how you experiance it but for me there is not 0, as you seem to point.

Even if there is no:
- thoughts
- expectations
- desires
- concepts
- experiences

there is just pure awarness and in this awarness, stuff happens during meditation. But here is a good question. If there is no "I" in deep meditation, who than is aware and who is an observer and what is being observer. This is the second step I would say. Than the third step is when observer and what is observed becomes one. That is than understanding and experiance a difference from "duality" and "nonduality".
Here difference about life and death can be cleared.

And in advanced stages samadhi or satori or kensho happens in natural "nonduality". I don't like to use labels such as these also, becouse we must get out from all the concepts to understand true meditation, And even than I feel we have totally different experiance off, not just us, but in general. After all, we all have different journeys through "the void", until we have met here on ATS or anywhere else, and try to learn from each other.

Nothing wrong with that, we are just on different "levels" (all imaginary) of understanding. There is just the mind, all else is an illusion even death and even life, and even heavens or hell.

Well this is the gist of what the saint and yogis who have mastered duality and nonduality say. And They are for me most pure human beings that have ever lived and they say this from all religions and from different time areas.

Here is a link for the core of the teachings:
www.theself.com

What is written here is the point of all religions and is for, what should have been "the bible" in my opinion : )
And one can observe a lot of contradictions on this page. And until relative (duality) and absolute (non duality) will not down in a person there will not be correct understanding of such contradictions...

well this is my short opinion. Everyone has different "experiences" in a deep meditation, where there is "no experiance". Again absolute and relative point of view.

And spirituality is not logical or rational, from our human understanding. It is what it is. We just like to put concepts or measurements to everything. But that doesn't meant it has anything to do with "reality". That is why science, with the observations of the "external" material world (duality) will not get to the world of "non duality". Which is always present and there was never anything else in "reality". But to understand that and stay in this experiance is something which is maybe the goal of buddhism, zen, hinduism or all others religions or philosophical systems.

Well for me this is a very short contradicted version of the truth of life and death and our world (well if one gets or starting to get relative and absolute, there are no contradictions in religions or spiritual text or maybe in this or previous post : ) )

Thank you for sharing you opinion, but I think we will not come to an agreement and that is OKey, we all have different observations and experiences, different life - so we can agree to disagree and still be friends and learn from each other just what makes sense for us and drop what it does not : )

Learning is the key word here and I appreciate your post, even if it is a contradiction to mine : )

originally posted by: spygeek

originally posted by: TheConstruKctionofLight
a reply to: spygeek

Actually, the only reason the universe exists is because it exists. Before we came it know it existed, it still existed. The universe is not dependant on us for anything, yet we are dependant on the universe for everything

I see what you're attempting here. To refute the premise you presuppose that there is no co dependence. We are star matter we recycle back into star matter. Its like saying recycled steel will one day be used to make another car. The new car whether it acknowledges the source of the recycled steel or not is fundamentally made of old & new steel.

Put another way the Universe does need us as fertilizer - we are fertilizer to the soil; you can't dispute that. The "us needs it more than the Universe needs us" is just a play on words.

You are strawmanning in the dark and missing point of what I was saying.

You claimed the universe depended on us for both its existence, and the meaning for its existence. I refuted this claim, and tried to explain how the inverse is actually true, if you consider us and universe as separate things.

Have you read 'Biocentrism'? It's an interesting book that states that consciousness creates the universe and not the other way around. It asserts that the current theories of the physical world do not work and cannot work unless they account for consciousness. Really fascinating book written by Dr Robert Lanza.

Give it a read, even if you are stubborn.

originally posted by: geezlouise
a reply to: angryhulk

I would just like to say that I enjoyed your OP. So ty for that!

I also noticed a couple of death threads popping up. So that's kind of interesting.

Thank you, glad you enjoyed it.

originally posted by: vethumanbeing
a reply to: angryhulk
What do you mean; in the classical sense? Immortal spirit leaves its vessel by choice/the vessel decomposes as the vehicle has no thing or life spirit to animate it. That body is discarded. There is the other thing; one birth results in another condemnation of a similar death as the two are the same. One birth will spell define its mortality; its own equal death. To be born is to know at some point one WILL DIE or simply fail to exist eventually. Of all Gods odd Jokes played upon the living, this one is very creative. You are born to die.

I don't mean to be rude, but I couldn't wrap my head around your post. Do you agree in a life after death, or not?

originally posted by: Mianeye
It's all spending and recycling of energy, that's the whole meaning with life and it's evident everywhere.

I don't believe in a conscious state after death in any form.

I have been yanked out of bed by something invisible before, so I would bet real money that that thing would laugh while disagreeing with you on your belief.

I have seen a lot of other things that clearly show that death is a state of existence, except the dead know that they are dead. What existence it is, or what it is like for those particular entities, I don't wish to know or experience though.

originally posted by: angryhulk

What is the need to quote proof other than to be unkind? Never mind, we are getting used to your behaviour within the thread.

Because it is not demonstrable proof, as you claimed it was. It was "proof" in a similar sense to my car being "a house on wheels". I was not intending to be unkind, only demonstrate that I found the study not to actually be definitive proof of what you claimed.

How is the headline misleading? The study was set up to research out-of-body experiences. You don't think out-of-body experience could hint at a life after death? I repeat hint.

It could hint at that if you really wanted it to and read into it whatever you like, but objectively speaking, it hints at nothing more than consciousness' ability to envisage its surrounding environment in the absence of direct visual sensory information.

The study was set up to investigate mental and cognitive activity after clinical death, not out of body experiences. Again, this your personal bias and that of the author of the article you linked.

A hint does not constitute proof, either.

His body was there, dead, while he was stood in the corner of the room recounting events. That's a non-physical entity. What don't you understand? This isn't an isolated case by the way, the study included 2060 participants and 41 of those described similar events

His brain was not dead. His heart had stopped for three minutes, but it was restarted before his brain had completely shut down.

Only one person described an out of body event.

Around 40 per cent of people who survived, (not 40 individuals), described some kind of ‘awareness’ during the time when they were clinically dead before their hearts were restarted. "Some kind of awareness", not an OBE.

Here are the actual published results of the study, by the researchers:

RESULTS:
Among 2060 CA events, 140 survivors completed stage 1 interviews, while 101 of 140 patients completed stage 2 interviews.

46% had memories with 7 major cognitive themes: fear; animals/plants; bright light; violence/persecution; deja-vu; family; recalling events post-CA.

9% had NDEs.

2% described awareness with explicit recall of 'seeing' and 'hearing' actual events related to their resuscitation.

One had a verifiable period of conscious awareness during which time cerebral function was not expected.

One person out of 140 reported conscious awareness during a period that cognitive function was not expected. Hardly a basis for drawing any conclusions about life after brain death.

Are you just saying that to annoy me?

No, I am simply stating a fact. His brain was still operating, albeit at an impaired level; it was still receiving sensory information, and it used this to construct a perception of what was happening. This is what happens with a functioning brain, whether near death or not.

Clinical death is the cessation of blood circulation and breathing.

Exactly. Brain death comes at a point after this.

Following clinical death there is no measurable brain activity in 20 to 30 seconds.

Without special treatment after circulation is restarted, full recovery of the brain after more than 3 minutes of clinical death at normal body temperature is rare, but reported.

Clearly a brain can survive longer than 20 to 30 seconds. 20 to 30 seconds might be "typical" according to some medical professionals, but it is not a definitive limiit that cannot be exceeded.

You're right, I better phone the AWARE study group and advise them of their stupidity while asking them to pull all their misleading publications.

It's not their fault their study was latched on to by pop media and misrepresented for attention.

The AWARE study group actually never claimed this man's brain died, and their actual publication of the study does not mention "life after death" or "out of body experience" at all.

BACKGROUND: Cardiac arrest (CA) survivors experience cognitive deficits including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It is unclear whether these are related to cognitive/mental experiences and awareness during CPR.

Despite anecdotal reports the broad range of cognitive/mental experiences and awareness associated with CPR has not been systematically studied.

METHODS: The incidence and validity of awareness together with the range, characteristics and themes relating to memories/cognitive processes during CA was investigated through a 4 year multi-center observational study using a three stage quantitative and qualitative interview system.

The feasibility of objectively testing the accuracy of claims of visual and auditory awareness was examined using specific tests. The outcome measures were (1) awareness/memories during CA and (2) objective verification of claims of awareness using specific tests.

They were investigating the relationship between cognitive and mental functions after clinical death and cognitive deficits such as PTSD in survivors. Not "life after death" or "out of body experiences" at all.

Again, you're just saying this to annoy me.

No, I am saying this because it is a fact.

David had nothing to do with the study. The study was ran by the AWARE (AWAreness during REsuscitation) group, sponsored by the University of Southampton. The study's lead author is Dr Sam Parnia (assistant professor of critical care medicine and director of resuscitation research at the state university of New York) and was overseen by Dr Jerry Nolan (editor-in-chief of resuscitation journal and vice-chairman of ERC, European Resuscitation Council).

Then why on earth did you include his quote in your reply to me, with the introduction, "It goes on to say"?

I was simply responding to your reply point by point.

You keep going on about David when he HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH THE STUDY, HE SIMPLY SHARED HIS OPINION ON IT AND HOPED IT WOULD OPEN UP MORE RESEARCH.

Again, I was simply responding to the points specifically raised by you, in order. Your final points consisted entirely of these quotes from Dr. Wilde.

If he had nothing to do with the study, why did you give me the impression in your reply that his views were significant?

originally posted by: UniFinity
a reply to: spygeek

aha I see where are you coming from. I will not say you are wrong. You are right from your pov experiences and observations, and that is important! what makes sense to you is important. But that does not have to makes sense to me. I will just take what does and leave the rest ... for now. : )

/snip

Thank you for sharing you opinion, but I think we will not come to an agreement and that is OKey, we all have different observations and experiences, different life - so we can agree to disagree and still be friends and learn from each other just what makes sense for us and drop what it does not : )

Learning is the key word here and I appreciate your post, even if it is a contradiction to mine : )

It's nice to have found someone who is actually respectful and reasonable on ATS, even when they're being disagreed with. : )

While I do not agree with your definitions of "duality and nonduality", and feel that a monist philosophy is sufficent to understand the scientific method, physchology and cognition, the self and its relationship to the 'external world', (which in reality the self is a part of anyway), I respect your position and admission that it is essentially based in a spiritual, non-logical, dualist framework.

One thing you said struck me:

There is just the mind, all else is an illusion even death and even life, and even heavens or hell.

How would you respond to the idea that there is just the external world, and the mind was the thing that was an illusion?

originally posted by: spygeek
It could hint at that if you really wanted it to and read into it whatever you like, but objectively speaking, it hints at nothing more than consciousness' ability to envisage its surrounding environment in the absence of direct visual sensory information.

The study was set up to investigate mental and cognitive activity after clinical death, not out of body experiences. Again, this your personal bias and that of the author of the article you linked.

The study was to examine the broad range of mental experiences in relation to death. It was also to test the validity of conscious experiences using objective markers for the first time to determine whether claims of awareness compatible with out-of-body experiences correspond with real or hallucinatory events. I'm not being bias at all.

His brain was not dead. His heart had stopped for three minutes, but it was restarted before his brain had completely shut down.

You would know this, where as the people there didn't. OK.

Only one person described an out of body event.

Even with the article provided you are wrong, however here's another link. Source

40 per cent of people who survived, (not 40 individuals), described some kind of ‘awareness’ during the time when they were clinically dead before their hearts were restarted. "Some kind of awareness", not an OBE.

That's not the area I was discussing.

No, I am simply stating a fact. His brain was still operating, albeit at an impaired level; it was still receiving sensory information, and it used this to construct a perception of what was happening. This is what happens with a functioning brain, whether near death or not.

... you think

Exactly. Brain death comes at a point after this.

You're so smart.

Without special treatment after circulation is restarted, full recovery of the brain after more than 3 minutes of clinical death at normal body temperature is rare, but reported.

Uhu... I don't disagree with that?

Clearly a brain can survive longer than 20 to 30 seconds. 20 to 30 seconds might be "typical" according to some medical professionals, but it is not a definitive limiit that cannot be exceeded.

Uhu... So back to the out of body experience we were discussing.

It's not their fault their study was latched on to by pop media and misrepresented for attention.

They directly quoted Sam Parnia for the majority of the article. What is misrepresented?

The AWARE study group actually never claimed this man's brain died, and their actual publication of the study does not mention "life after death" or "out of body experience" at all.

The keywords listed in the article includes 'out of body experiences' which technically means you are wrong. There is clearly an observation here that Sam Parnia could not explain and he went on to say that it "warranted further investigation".

In fact, instead of focusing on one study, how about we focus on the premise of the thread and obtain opinion on life after death. It's clear where you stand. I could supply 10 sources and you would tear apart every single one of them because you're confident in your beliefs, and that's fine, but I don't want to chase my tail arguing with you throughout the life of this thread.

You're query was to describe something non-physical that existed. I provided a link which I believe is proof a mans non-physical entity existed.

Moving on...

a reply to: angryhulk

You've restated that immortal question that has confused Man for countless aeons...

Why are we here?

No one has that answer. Only time will tell.

Personally, I believe this life is but a step on an endless journey, or what might as well be endless from my perspective as a mortal.

But I don't know that. Only the Eminence I choose to call God knows the answer to your question...maybe someday he'll, or she'll, share it with us. It's called faith.

a reply to: spygeek

yes, religions and spirituality are all using words and concepts which are often only more confusing than not in their metaphors, and with that there is much separation instead of unity and compassion which true religions should be about. But after examining them, they seem to describe the same thing but using different words and set different rules and limits. Depending on the time and area they were created. But I think that the people who were original creators and their first disciples were "true saints" with deep knowledge about our real nature. But they described their understanding with the words and concepts within their religion. And they all like to say, it is something which is not. not this and that, neti neti, etc...

And their framework is direct in many cases (all kinds of buddhist traditions, old yoga masters, ...) and it involves personal development on all levels. First you have to "master" the physical body and mind (ego), with "master" - I should say, see them for what they really are. And this can take years of effort and meditation. And while doing that when true balance comes naturally and developments can take place in other areas, but until you have strong attachment to body and senses and the mind, there are limits to how far can you go, in my opinion.... For me everything is more like a natural process than anything related to religion. And true "spirituality" is about the wisdom of "the spirit" "inside" which comes from personal "experiance" in natural absorption or true meditation and books or internet.
This is my superficial separation, but in religion and in spirituality there soon comes a time when conventional logic fails, if one truly wants to "absorb" and live in the true nature of reality. Dreams and waking state and all other states seem the same from theirs description. And I think this is true in some sense (absolute pov), but that is only my opinion, from my experiance in deep meditation. And pure love is the strongest force which connects us all...in live and death. And we are here to learn ... maybe to "love" what we "hate"....in a some weird way, this can make sense, I think : )

So this should tell you a bit about my answer. When I read it I laughed a bit out loud. "The mind" as you and me currently understand and perceive it IS illusion and "the trick" is to get out of illusion, out of samsara, out of sufferings of "the mind", out of reincarnation cycle.
For instance Rumi wrote— 'Be melting snow.Wash yourself of yourself.' he is a Sufi mystic.

The is no mind, there is no body, there is no you and I!

that is what people who were in few cases starters of religions said and many others "enlightened" ones..(Jesus - the essene teachings, buddha, krishna - hindu, Milarepa - tibetan buddhisem, Ramana Maharshi, Rumi, etc...). Those are only a few of the purest of people who could perform "miracles" and have wisdom beyond conventional understanding in my opinion...or maybe deluded old man? But I don't think so or else they and in some cases even their first pure disciples would not have caused such a major positive impact on all they have encountered even animals.

They say:
All Is One.

what is All?
what is Is?
what is One?

here is "hidden" answer of life and death and all other things we don't understand and question on ATS about "supernatural". Meditate on that maybe sometimes and see where will intuition guide you, if you like to experiment ... or not, it is ok if you don't, everything I write is just an opinion, and I claim no special knowledge or miracles... just a guy who likes all kinds of wo wo stuff a lot and practice some of it every day : )

originally posted by: angryhulk
The study was to examine the broad range of mental experiences in relation to death. It was also to test the validity of conscious experiences using objective markers for the first time to determine whether claims of awareness compatible with out-of-body experiences correspond with real or hallucinatory events. I'm not being bias at all.

If you are inserting your own words into a description of the study, like "compatible with out-of-body experiences", and are shortening "clinical death" to "death" so as to include brain death, you are being biased.

You would know this, where as the people there didn't. OK.

They did know this.

Where did they say his brain was dead? What amazing secret technology did they use to reanimate a dead brain?

All they said was they did not expect his brain to be cognitively active at the time he experienced cognition. There is nothing more to be read into this.

Even with the article provided you are wrong, however here's another link. Source

What I provided was not an article, it was an abstract of the actual study, written by the researchers, in their own words.

I apologise for making an error in typing. What I had meant to say was "Only one person described an out of body event, during a time they would not naturally be expected to". It seems I had reached the character limit for my post while going through and editing it, and this last bit was left off.

That's not the area I was discussing.

Can you clarify what area you were discussing when you said, "the study included 2060 participants and 41 of those described similar events"?

This is what I was responding to.

... you think

I know, and so do the researchers, as well as anyone with a basic level of understanding of cognition.

You're so smart.

Thankyou.

Uhu... I don't disagree with that?

It appeared that you did, when you replied to my stating that brain death can take minutes, with "Following clinical death there is no measurable brain activity in 20 to 30 seconds."

Uhu... So back to the out of body experience we were discussing.

I thought we were discussing the study?

They directly quoted Sam Parnia for the majority of the article. What is misrepresented?

The title: "First hint of 'life after death' in biggest ever scientific study"

The opening sentence: "Death is a depressingly inevitable consequence of life, but now scientists believe they may have found some light at the end of the tunnel."

The second sentence: "The largest ever medical study into near-death and out-of-body experiences has discovered that some awareness may continue even after the brain has shut down completely."

The third sentence: "It is a controversial subject which has, until recently, been treated with widespread scepticism."

The article starts with a title claiming that the study "hints" at life after death, this is misrepresenting what can be reasonably inferred by the results of the study, and plants the idea of life after death in the reader's mind.

The first sentence is an appeal to emotion that is completely irrelevant to the study, and then it goes on to assert what scientists believe without basis, reinforcing the bias of the title.

The next sentence claims that the study suggests awareness continues after brain death, this is flat out false and again serves to reinforce the bias of the author. It also states that it was a study "into out-of-body experiences", when in fact it specifically wasn't.

Thirdly, there is a claim that the subject is "controversial" and "until recently" treated with widespread skepticism. This is intended to disarm skepitcal readers and make them feel that the 'life after death' proposal may no longer be worthy of their skepticism, and to make non-skeptical readers feel more secure.

The article makes its intentions pretty clear at the beginning and even though the rest of the article is more or less objective, the initial impression stays with less astute readers and influences their judgement. The study is misrepresented, then presented.

The keywords listed in the article includes 'out of body experiences' which technically means you are wrong. There is clearly an observation here that Sam Parnia could not explain and he went on to say that it "warranted further investigation".

Again, the link I provided is not a media article, it is an abstract of the actual study, published on an online library of scientific papers.

If you are grasping at a metadata search keyword added by ncbi (which is literally no where to be found in the actual study paper itself) to refute my point then you have failed to refute anything.

Nowhere did he say that he could not explain any observations. The study produced one unexpected result, not an unexplainable one. All he said was that these experiences between clinical death and resuscitation merit further study. Of course he is going to say that, it's his job to study these things.

In fact, instead of focusing on one study, how about we focus on the premise of the thread and obtain opinion on life after death. It's clear where you stand. I could supply 10 sources and you would tear apart every single one of them because you're confident in your beliefs, and that's fine, but I don't want to chase my tail arguing with you throughout the life of this thread.

One solid, demonstrable, evidence-based proof is all I need to change my opinion. If you don't have one, that's fine.

You're query was to describe something non-physical that existed. I provided a link which I believe is proof a mans non-physical entity existed.

Moving on...

You started out with a physical entity and tried to persuade me it had become non-physical with a study that demonstrated no such thing. I'm sorry I was unconvinced.

originally posted by: UniFinity
a reply to: spygeek

/snip

So this should tell you a bit about my answer. When I read it I laughed a bit out loud. "The mind" as you and me currently understand and perceive it IS illusion and "the trick" is to get out of illusion, out of samsara, out of sufferings of "the mind", out of reincarnation cycle.
For instance Rumi wrote— 'Be melting snow.Wash yourself of yourself.' he is a Sufi mystic.

I was hoping that would get a laugh : )

The is no mind, there is no body, there is no you and I!

that is what people who were in few cases starters of religions said and many others "enlightened" ones..(Jesus - the essene teachings, buddha, krishna - hindu, Milarepa - tibetan buddhisem, Ramana Maharshi, Rumi, etc...). Those are only a few of the purest of people who could perform "miracles" and have wisdom beyond conventional understanding in my opinion...or maybe deluded old man? But I don't think so or else they and in some cases even their first pure disciples would not have caused such a major positive impact on all they have encountered even animals.

One does wonder how much is myth and how much is historical fact when it comes to these men, still, they do provide some interesting ideas..

I wanted your response though. What do you think about it?

They say:
All Is One.

what is All?
what is Is?
what is One?

here is "hidden" answer of life and death and all other things we don't understand and question on ATS about "supernatural". Meditate on that maybe sometimes and see where will intuition guide you, if you like to experiment ... or not, it is ok if you don't, everything I write is just an opinion, and I claim no special knowledge or miracles... just a guy who likes all kinds of wo wo stuff a lot and practice some of it every day : )

"What is mind?
No matter.
What is matter?
Nevermind." -Homer Simpson

What do you personally believe, all religious and philosophical woo aside, about the proposition that the mind is nothing more than the result of chemical processes and neuronal interaction in the brain? That the 'self' is just a social construction resulting from the body's own basic evolutionary needs? That there is no 'One' or 'All' or 'Is' other than what physically exists? That there is no such thing as an objective meaning for life, only temporal subjective meanings that life itself invents for its own purposes?

What implications, if any, would this have for your understanding of life and death? What would you do with life, if the reality was simply that you are born, exist for a short time, and then die, nothing more? No God, no holy spirit, no Satan, no heaven, no hell, no immortal soul, no eternal spirit, no karma, no enlightenment; nothing, just seven billion human bodies living and dying together simultaneously on a rock flying through space?

a reply to: angryhulk

Death is easy to understand, if you have an imagination. When our time in our current life is ended we go to a place outside this continuum which would be called Heaven. It is a place outside space and time. At that point all our cumulative memories of previous lives and existences return. We are met by those who are still there that we know and love. We are also met by a guide who then acts as a teacher for any questions we might have about the life we have just left. They can't answer all questions, but they can point us in the right direction to find the answer. Then we have a break and have the opportunity to see any point in time we like so watch and learn. When ready to have another life, we find our guide and let them know the period we would like to live in and the kind of role we would like. The more lives you live, the more advanced the role you can take on. You might want to be a hero. You might want to try the 'dark side' - that's not approved of, but it's a free-will system and I suppose it's good to try different things. The 'dark side' will contaminate your soul and put you back on the scale, but it's necessary if you are intent on becoming a guide or higher. Over many lifetimes you go up and down the scale until qualifying to become a guide. Then there are other grades beyond that. This period of time is particularly popular, hence the population. Everyone thinks they will be the good guys, but end up becoming the bad guys. It's a real challenge on the soul. I could explain more but it would be tedious. But that's it in a nutshell. We incarnate and we grow spiritually with every life.

a reply to: spygeek

OK look, you disagree with the premise of the Telegraphs aricle. This thread isn't about the article, I used it solely to present the possibility that a non-physical entity existed. You refute that.

I really want to stick to the thread now, next argument. It's really difficult to respond to your bit by bit analysis of posts on my phone. I've tried and performed pretty well but I'm growing tired.

When I get back to work on Monday and have access to a laptop I might respond properly but the quote/unquote option is tiresome on the mobile platform.

You don't agree with the premise of the article, nor do you believe in the existence of a form of afterlife.

You also need to understand that you do not know your belief to be correct. Nobody knows what happens to their consciousness after they die. An observer will tell you what happens to a body, that's it.

For all you know you will die and that is it, nothing, or you will die and find that consciousness in indeed seperate and continues. I don't know, you don't know.

a reply to: angryhulk

im a believer that when you die your consiousness moves to a parallel universe but the reason you dont remember anything is the trauma of the transition between this universe and 1 of the infinite number of parallels (assuming the multiverse/parallel universe theory is true) what memories you do happen to retain are forgoten or repressed shortly after birth hence why some people have past life memories but they seem like something from a dream. but hey its just what i tell myself lol

originally posted by: angryhulk
a reply to: spygeek

OK look, you disagree with the premise of the Telegraphs aricle. This thread isn't about the article, I used it solely to present the possibility that a non-physical entity existed. You refute that.

Okie dokie.

I really want to stick to the thread now, next argument. It's really difficult to respond to your bit by bit analysis of posts on my phone. I've tried and performed pretty well but I'm growing tired.

When I get back to work on Monday and have access to a laptop I might respond properly but the quote/unquote option is tiresome on the mobile platform.

I know exactly what you mean, I hate posting on ATS on my phone for this very reason. : )

You don't agree with the premise of the article, nor do you believe in the existence of a form of afterlife.

You also need to understand that you do not know your belief to be correct. Nobody knows what happens to their consciousness after they die. An observer will tell you what happens to a body, that's it.

We know that consciousness is reliant on physical neurological processes, and does not exist without them. When the brain dies, those processes cease, so we can say with a pretty good level of certainty that when the brain is dead, consciousness dies with it.

We have a lot of anecdotal evidence to show that while the brain is dying, consciousness feels like it is leaving the body, that the sensation is synonymous with that of a dissociative 'dream state', and that many people feel as though they can 'see a light', or a tunnel, or that they a floating through the air. This all makes sense from a neurological perspective; as parts of the brain shut down, are starved of oxygen and sustain damage, certain cognitive effects take place.

In the absence of evidence for any other explanations of consciousness, especially those that feature literally disembodied consciousness, the only thing we can have any certainty about is that it dies along with the brain.

For all you know you will die and that is it, nothing, or you will die and find that consciousness in indeed seperate and continues. I don't know, you don't know.

I have enough experience and knowledge of neuroscience to know that consciousness cannot exist without a brain. The only way to define, accurately describe, or study consciousness, is as a physical, neurological phenomena. It "feels" non-physical, but that's only because the brain's neurotransmitters that give rise to consciousness are not part of the body's somatosensory system.

I don't wish to get technical here and be misunderstood, so suffice to say that biologically speaking, consciousness is completely physical and there is no "non-physical" component required to explain or understand it.