08/12/2024
Is there life after death?
I think the answer to this question is dependent on two ontological questions.
Moreover, the first question is the question of human nature and it can be phrased as follows:
What is a human being? (Ontological question)
And the second question is the question of the nature or death and it can be phrased as follows:
What is death? (Ontological)
Now, the reason for why the question of whether there is an afterlife is dependent on the aforementioned questions is as follows:
If we do not know what death is, then we cannot identify it. And if we do not know what a human being is, then we cannot identify who or what was pronounced dead. Nor can we identify who or what died.
This very issue is why the ethics of abortion is partly a controversial issue. Indeed! Furthermore, it is partly a controversial issue because pro-life people believe that an abortion ends the life of a human being but probably choice people believe that although life was ended, it was not the life of a human being that was ended. Moreover if it was not the life of a human being that was ended, then an abortion is not only an infringement of the human right of the unborn but not an instance of an example of murder, particularly because only human beings have human rights and because an act or killing cannot be perceived as an act of murder unless every condition that constitutes murder, including the ontological condition (i.e the victim must be a human being) is met.
And subsequnetly pro choice people believe that this is really the case.
On the contrary pro life people believe that this inferential judgement does not correspond to reality.
Moreover if it was true, then it would have corresponded to reality, particularly because the truth corresponds to reality. And subsequently the believe that this statement is not true, that is to say, that the procedure known as an abortion is not an infringement of the human right of the unborn/or to its right to life.
Therefore they believe that it is false.
As you can see, the ontological question of the nature of a human being is not only important in relation to the question of the ontological status of the unborn and in relation to the ethics of abortion but to the question of whether there is an afterlife or not.
But:
Why is this ontological question important?
Moreover, here's one reason for why:
Because there is a dispute between dualists and physicalists. Moreover the dispute is about the identity of the dead.
For according to those who subscribe to reductive physicalism the answer to the following questions, what was pronounced death? What does?, is you, particularly because you can be reduced to the biological body. In otherwords you are identical to your body.
Given this, the answer to the following ontological question, what is a human being?, is as follows:
A human being is a living thing that is made up of subatomic particles that make up atoms, and of atoms that make up elements, and of elements that make up molecules, and of molecules that make up tissues, and of tissues that make up organs, and of organs that make up the organs system, and of the organ system that makes up your physical and s*xual identity or the physical body. Not only that! For every thing that constitutes your personal identity or your mental identity can be reduced to the neural firing of your brain or to the physical states of the brain.
Moreover if the aforemebtioned thing, then the I or that which is perceived as the soul and the physical body and your s*xual identity ceases to exist when the brain dies or when its brain stem is subject to permanent and irreversible damage and when the cells that are responsible for producing the glucose that it uses as the energy that preserves its structural function dies.
Moreover those who subscribe to reductive Physicalism or to this mind-brain identity theory believe this.
And subsequnetly they believe that brain death causes the essential person or that which is perceived as the soul to cease to exist.
Moreover, if an afterlife is possible, then the essential person can survive brain death.
Therefore this is the case according to those who subscribe to reductive physicalism:
The idea of an afterlife is not possible.
Not only that!
For if our identity is determined by the s*xual nature of the body, then we are subject to the disintegration, particularly because the body's tissue is subject to disintegration. (bear in mind that our s*xual identity is the s*xual identity of the biological body if we are identical to our body)
Moreover, the physicalist believes that we are identical to our body or that our identity is determined by the s*x of our respective body. Hence we are subject to disintegration. So we are subject to biological death. Hence we are not immortal beings.
Therefore an afterlife is not possible.
Now, according to science, the question of the nature of a human being is irrelevant, particularly because we are animals or homosapien sapiens or hominids. Moreover an animal is simply a living thing that is not only a heterotrophic being but a being that is made up of eukaryotic cells and that has fur and that gives birth to live young and that has mammary glands and that descended with modification from the same ancestral line as Chimpanzees about seven million years ago via natural selection, random mutations, and environmental changes. In otherwords we biologically evolved from a common ancestor or we share the same ancestor as the chimpanzee species. Moreover the ancestor was allegedly a hominid.
Therefore the hominid is the ancestor that we allegedly share with the chimpanzee species.
Moreover importantly, this idea undermines the possibility of an afterlife particularly because biological evolution produces natural things.
Given the aforemebtioned thing, the implication of this claim is as follows:
There is nothing supernatural dwelling in the body. Nor is there any ghost in the machine. On the contrary the only that dwells in the biological body is the brain, spinal cord, and the mental states that correspond to the neural correlates that either produce them or that are identical to them.
That's all!
But is that all there is? Or is there more to the human nature than just that which is within the scope of that which can be experienced by us directly via our sensory experience of our biological body?
Here's what i think:
The answer to the question which was proposed by me above is a categorical and resounding no.
Why?
Here's some of the reasons for why i believe this:
Because of the mind-body problem and the hard problem of consciousness. Indeed! For, although we can understand how the eyes photoreceptors and cone cells convert the stimuli into electrical impulse via the sodium ions and potassium ions existing their neural pores during the neural interraction that occurs between them via the electrical impulse within their cells and via the neurotransmitters and bio-chemical messengers without their cells, and although we can detect the various
conscious states and their neutral correlates, we can still ask the following question:
Why is there something such as the following thing?--- What it is like to be aware of a yellow banana. Moreover, if the neural correlates are responsible for the emergence of phenomenal consciousness or for producing our subjective, qualitative, and personal conscious experiences, then, how do they do this?
This is the mind-body problem. Or it is known as the hard problem of consciousness.
This is because our ubdestanding of the neural correlates of consciousness does not enable us to understand how the qualia of consciousness exists. Nor does it help us to understand where it came from or how it comes into being via the physical states of the brain or via the neural correlates.
Given this, this claim is an assumption, that is to say, the cessation of the presence of the neural correlate of consciousness, particularly after the death of the brain is indicative of the following thing, namely that the death of the brain ends conscious experiences. Moreover if the aforementioned thing, then this claim does not prove the following thing, namely that the idea of an afterlife is precluded by the death of the brain; And subsequently this is really the case.
Not only that! For the correlation can be interpreted differently.
For example, it can be perceived as follows:
Consciousness was detected in the body when the patient was alive.
On the contrary it was not detected when the patient's brain died and when its delta waves. Furthermore, the best explanation for why consciousness could not be detected after his brain died and after they detected his brain's delta waves was because consciousness was not in the body anynore.
Hence the detection of delta waves or if this brain state, particularly after the death of the brain, is not indicative of the cessation of conscious experience but of the ABSENCE of conscious experiences in the body.
Furthermore, the absence of something does not necessarily imply that it does not exist anymore.
Hence the detection of the neural correlate of consciousness, particularly after the death of the brain, is not necessarily indicative of the cessation of conscious experiences.
Therefore it is not necessarily indicative of the following thing, that is to say, that the death of the brain precludes an afterlife.
Nope! Not necessarily true!
Now, here's another reason for why I do not believe that brain death can be equated with the cessation the existence of consciousness mental states:
If reductive physicalism is true, then brain states are identical to conscious mental states. Furthermore, if brain states are identical to conscious mental states, then they have the same characteristics, particularly because no thing can be identical to that which it was perceived as unless its characteristics are identical to the characteristics of that which it was perceived as. However, unlike conscious mental states, brain states not not have a subjective, qualitative, and personal nature. No! On the contrary they have an impersonal, quantitative, and objective nature. Nor do they the characteristics of intentionality particularly because no physical state of the brain is about anything. And subsequently no brain state is identical to a conscious mental state. Nor does the neural correlates of types of conscious mental states imply this.
Hence no brain state is identical to a conscious mental state.
Furthermore, if the aforementioned thing, then brain death is not indicative of the cessation of the existence of consciousness mental states. Hence this is really the case.
Therefore, reductive physicalism does not necessarily precluded afterlife.
Here's another reason for why i do not believe that science precludes the idea of an afterlife:
If human beings are essentially physical beings rather than a composite of the following distinct things, that is to say, a material body and an immaterial conscious mental state, that can interact with each other via the nervous system, then, like conscious mental states, the material body has a qualitative, personal, and qualitative nature. However this is not the case. For the material body does not have the aforementioned characteristics. On the contrary it has a quantitative, objective, and impersonal nature. Hence a human being is not essentially a material being but a composite of the following thing, namely a material body and an immaterial conscious mental state, that have the ability to interract with each other via the nervous system.
Therefore dualism is interactionism is true.
Now, the implication of this is as follows:
A soul that can interract with the body dwells in the biological body.
Moreover if a soul that can interract with the body dwells in the biological body, then an afterlife is possible.
Therefore this is really the case.
Here's another reason for why i believe that an afterlife is possible: (Bear in mind that this will be my final argument even though i have some more reasons or i have other reasons for my belief besides the ones which were meeting by me in this post.)
Now, here's the proof:
You have certain characteristics that the biological body does not have.
Moreover, if you were identical to the biological body, then the biological body has the same characteristics as you. However this is not really the case; particularly because, unlike you, the biological body does not have the characteristics of intentionality. Nor does it have a subjective, qualitative, and personal characteristic. On the contrary you have the aforementioned characteristics. And subsequently you are not identical to the biological body.
Moreover, if you are not identical to the biological body, then you are not subject to biological, particularly because only biological bodies are subject to biological death. Nor are you subject to clinical death.
Hence you are not subject to biological death or to clinical death.
So you are an immortal being.
Therefore an immortal soul exists.
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