To answer this question, we must ask ourselves, what is to start existing? Is it when the first memories start appearing in our brains? Is it when we are first born?

I believe that when the atoms combine to create our embryo, that is when we start "existing".

Any thoughts?

are "we" a body?
if so then i would agree with the embryo idea of yours...

but i think "we" are more than just a body, something that goes on forever...

also about the reincarnation, i cant say for sure but i deduce from observing nature in general, maybe life does go forever, just in diffrent forms. can you imagine not existing?
can you imagine the universe ceasing to exist? sure the body dies but do "you"?

i cant. i think the universe might full well go on forever. endlessly expanding, like the fractal pattersn we see in nature.

as for reincarnating maybe you would reincarnate as a diffrent species of sentient being somewhere out in the wild huge universe. who knows.

Originally posted by Dan5647
... what is to start existing?

Any thoughts?

another 'human', is begun to grow when a Female Human's Egg is fertilized & become a Human embryo or zygot...

any number of testing can prove that thenew zygot has the proper number of chromosones that distinguish the soon to be embryo as distinctly 'Human'..... and not horse, elephant, whale or monkey.


One becomes a individual (human) person when the umbilical cord is cut.
then individual experience aids in developing one's unique personhood,
character, personality, etc

to my view, the 'soul' is a euphamism...

[edit on 30-9-2007 by St Udio]

oooh, good topic.

i dont think that we exist at the moment of conception actually. that is something i disagree with most Christians on despite being one myself. i think that the human body is imbued with a "soul" during Birth, and that the child has to begin to come out of the mother to receive the soul, the divine spark, the divine essence.

this makes abortion o-kay! it must be the way!

Maybe a bigger question is this. How long are humans GOING to exist before we mindlessly sabotage the species in armageddon? Reall doesn't matter to me. I will go find anothr planet to live on after I'm vaporized or dead from massive radiation poisoning. The fact of my existence/non-existence really doesn't bother me too much.

Hmmm this is an interesting thread. There is no time of us existing and not existing, we are here to a point because we choose to, the soul and the body are not separate and the body is not a shell like most people beleive. The body is the physical representation of the mind and soul! In truth we always existed and always will just our physical senses distort all this through the brains interpretation of time. For the past, present and future are happening all at the same time (time sigh*) and yet the electric pulses that go through our brain, well the future ones, are moving to fast for our brain to comprehend yet is still there!. and our thoughts affect everything yet there is just a time lag between our thoughts and actualization in this reality, the past, present and future can both be affected, just like when u throw a rock into water, it ripples in all directions this is just like time. The creation of us, was always there and so was the time when we didn't but we always did!... we act like all this knowledge is out of reach or is unattainable... yet the truth is, to trust your self and to ask these questions, they are not unattainable, only if u choose to deny them. Religion has become to distorted over time... we need an update!

Kolosowski

RUNETANG:

i dont think that we exist at the moment of conception actually. that is something i disagree with most Christians on despite being one myself. i think that the human body is imbued with a "soul" during Birth, and that the child has to begin to come out of the mother to receive the soul, the divine spark, the divine essence.

this makes abortion o-kay! it must be the way!

I used to believe as you do but no longer.


Luke 1:39 And Mary arose in those days, and went into the hill country with haste into a city of Juda;

40.And entered into the house of Zacharias, and saluted Elizabeth.

41.And it came to pass, that, when Elisabeth heard the saluatation of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elisabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost;



Elisabeth was six months pregnant with John (the Baptist) when he leaped in her womb. If his soul recognized that of Christ it had to be in his flesh body then. To take it a bit farther.....if John recognized Christ then the soul of Christ must also have been in His body and this was a few days after conception.

Something to think about.


.............Whirlwind

John the baptist and Jesus are part of the same entity yet are separate and on there own individual journeys yet still connected, they were aware of this connection!

TheRepublic:

how do you know we were alive in the first age?

how do you know that this is the second age?

how do you know there will be a third age?

why only three ages?

how is being alive in diffrent "ages" and not remebering it not reincarnation?

The similarity in reincarnation is that our spirit is always in one soul. The spirit is the intellect of the soul. Reincarnation believes that the soul is born many times in different flesh bodies but that isn't true.

In the first age we were in a spiritual body, in the second age God placed the same soul in these flesh bodies and we will remain in the same spiritual body in the 3rd. age. We are in flesh one time only.


Perhaps the reason there will only be three ages is that by that time God will have weeded out those that don't love Him. Satan will be gone and all those that decide to follow him will also be finished. There will be no need of another age. Our spiritual bodies won't die, age, or be sick so who knows what that 3rd age holds. Perhaps that is when we can travel to many different worlds??? I don't know.


To answer your first three questions, about the three ages....

We know there was an age before this one as that is the one in which the dinosaurs lived. That was also the age in which Satan, who had been loved by God, rebelled. God tells us about that time, earth's first sinful record, in Genesis 1:2; Isaiah 14:1-14, Jeremiah 4:23-26, Ezekiel 28:11-17 and 2 Peter 3:-6.

We know that there will be a third age. If you are a Christian you know that Christ will return at His second Advent. The earth is not destroyed but men are changed into a spirit body:

1 Corinthians 15:51Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,

52.In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.


Paul again mentions that time:

11 Corinthians 12:2 I knew a man in Christ above fourteen years ago (whether in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth such an one caught up to the third heaven.


Paul was taken in spirit or in a vision and shown the next age. As he said it was the "third heaven". If the next one is a third we have to be in the second. If we are in the second there had to be a first age.


If you are interested in learning more I would be glad to discuss it with you, please let me know.



................Whirlwind

Originally posted by Kolosowski
John the baptist and Jesus are part of the same entity yet are separate and on there own individual journeys yet still connected, they were aware of this connection!

I don't understand....please explain..........Whirlwind

I believe this thread has made a turn down another road, but I will add this bit of info.

Human babies starts to become selfaware around the age of 18 months. By selfawareness, I mean that they know who they are when looking in a mirror. Its a standard way of biologist to check for selfawareness in species.