Is it rational to assume this will be our only life?

@etcetcetc00,

http://megan0426.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/ouroboros.jpg

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@etcetcetc00,

etcetcetc00 wrote:

My argument is very simple, and based on no currently established forms of religion of which I am aware.

Anyone who contends that once their life is over, they'll never be anything more is attempting to limit the capabilities of the Universe.

Regardless of what happened to bring the Universe and all of us into existence, it happened, and is certainly possible. Is it rational to assume it couldn't happen again?

It is rational to know it will not happen again... The good part is that our lives are not our own...We individualize it because that is how we live it... But all life is one life, and for all we know, this is the only place within sight where life has developed... Yet, it is a shared experience, and we get our lives from others, and carry on those lives, and pass them off to others, or find some other way to contribute, but it is never a shared experience, even when we drop into the dust we came from... So, it is illogical to think of our selves as spiritual individuals, and to think we might live again... First; if you live right, one life is plenty... And second, Nothing about our lives can be reproduced from day to day, so if it were possible to be recreated, it would still not be the same life... Life is not just being, but meaning, and that is in part, circumstances....

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@etcetcetc00,

etcetcetc00;59995 wrote:

My argument is very simple, and based on no currently established forms of religion of which I am aware.

Anyone who contends that once their life is over, they'll never be anything more is attempting to limit the capabilities of the Universe.

Regardless of what happened to bring the Universe and all of us into existence, it happened, and is certainly possible. Is it rational to assume it couldn't happen again?

By 'rational' I assume that you mean 'logical'/'scientific'? In which sense, the only evidence is that when we are dead, we are dead. No one has ever returned to give evidence otherwise. There's lots of egoic and emotional 'beliefs', for many reasons. No evidence though.
The universe doesn't have 'capabilities'. It is as it only can be, as it is, Now! and Now! and Now!! It doesn't 'have' potential, it is actual.

Now, if your 'beliefs' are such that you want to argue (that is a symptom of 'beliefs'), present the evidence and we can 'rationally' examine it. Until I see evidence, though, that such a 'linear' Perspective is more than just that, the notion of an 'after' anything is absurd, as is the notion of an 'after-life'.

---------- Post added at 06:07 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:05 PM ----------

rhinogrey;60049 wrote:

Ouroboros! Nice tattoo!

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@etcetcetc00,

etcetcetc00 wrote:

Regardless of what happened to bring the Universe and all of us into existence, it happened, and is certainly possible. Is it rational to assume it couldn't happen again?

What happened to bring the Universe into existence is of significant (if not critical) consideration when attempting to assign rationality to the question of wether it could happen again.

If the idea of the universe being its own cause i.e. the reason why the universe was created was because we are here to observe it, almost guarantees the re-occurance. However if the universe expands forever when and where will the universe recreation, reoccur?

While it is feasible to that what happened to bring all of us into existence could re-occur quite readily throughout the universe, I do not think it as easy to say such for the universe itself without having the knowledge of what happened ( that is if anything did happen :cool: )

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@etcetcetc00,

Fido and Nameless aren't quite getting what I have to say. I'm not talking about reincarnation or any other form of life within this universe. My point is, we don't know enough about how the universe started or how it will end to assume it won't happen again. The only hard data we have is that the universe went bang and here we are. We know whetever happened to get us here is possible. The universe did it once. I say that trying to claim that the same thing wouldn't happen again is putting an irrational limit on the capabilities of the universe, with or without cyclic cosmology.
It's got nothing to do with an afterlife. It's got to do with the same process that made our life in the first place. We wouldn't even know it happened if it did. We would just do everything we're doing now without having known before.

---------- Post added at 11:27 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:24 PM ----------

Fido;60055 wrote:

It is rational to know it will not happen again... The good part is that our lives are not our own...We individualize it because that is how we live it... But all life is one life, and for all we know, this is the only place within sight where life has developed... Yet, it is a shared experience, and we get our lives from others, and carry on those lives, and pass them off to others, or find some other way to contribute, but it is never a shared experience, even when we drop into the dust we came from... So, it is illogical to think of our selves as spiritual individuals, and to think we might live again... First; if you live right, one life is plenty... And second, Nothing about our lives can be reproduced from day to day, so if it were possible to be recreated, it would still not be the same life... Life is not just being, but meaning, and that is in part, circumstances....

I just want to say I doubt highly that the only life in the universe is on earth.

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@Fido,

Fido wrote:

The good part is that our lives are not our own...We individualize it because that is how we live it... But all life is one life

Question: Is this an Existentialist view? that all life is one? that our lives are not our own? this doesn't seem very.. right (from what I understand)

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@etcetcetc00,

I would say it's sort of a scientific existentialism. All possible life in all possible space and time exist on different flipsides of the same (((10^500)^500)^500)^6000000000* side coin. Watch this video, and I'll try to explain what I mean.
YouTube - Multiverse theory by Dr. Michio Kaku

This is one of many theories about the nature of the universe that involve the possibility, at least the way I understand it, of the universe repeating itself. If the process that made our universe is constantly making other universes, or remaking this one for infinity, the chances of this universe repeating infinitely are 100%. We don't know. I just mean to ask if the evidence of something having happened once out of one time mean it could happen again. is once and only once more plausible than both once out of many or many out of many many more than that. I'm sorry that I may have posted this in the wrong forum, but I'd like to discuss this with someone, so if that can't happen here, could someone point me in the direction of where I might?

*(((10^500)^500)^500)^6000000000 is a very rough underestimation of the chances of the universe creating and life on earth forming and developing the people alive today. This number takes into accound the atomic possibility of the materials that make up life )10^500), the chances of life forming on earth (^500, and probably higher than that), life forming to any one person (^500, and this is only a very rough estimation of the number of sperm made by every male in a direct bloodline of sexual reproduction of a person today multiplied by the eggs of the female. it does not include the chances of any of those descendants not having mated, or died before reproduction), and 6000000000 people roughly on the earth. This doesn't account for evolutionary direction leading to man, or anything from single-celled descendants.)

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@etcetcetc00,

etcetcetc00;60096 wrote:

My point is, we don't know enough about how the universe started or how it will end to assume it won't happen again. The only hard data we have is that the universe went bang and here we are.

The 'big bang' is hypothesis, not "hard data".
As there is no evidence of cyclicality of existence, it is not rational to assume cyclicality.
Furthermore, considering the synchronicity of all moments of existence, cyclicality is not possible but as 'notions and hypotheses'. Cyclicality is a relic of a linear Perspective, it is not the basic nature of existence, which is non-linear, with multilinear features.

Quote:

the chances of this universe repeating infinitely are 100%

From where do you pull this nonsense?
There is no such thing as 100% probability!

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@etcetcetc00,

etcetcetc00 wrote:

Fido and Nameless aren't quite getting what I have to say. I'm not talking about reincarnation or any other form of life within this universe. My point is, we don't know enough about how the universe started or how it will end to assume it won't happen again. The only hard data we have is that the universe went bang and here we are. We know whetever happened to get us here is possible. The universe did it once. I say that trying to claim that the same thing wouldn't happen again is putting an irrational limit on the capabilities of the universe, with or without cyclic cosmology.
It's got nothing to do with an afterlife. It's got to do with the same process that made our life in the first place. We wouldn't even know it happened if it did. We would just do everything we're doing now without having known before.

---------- Post added at 11:27 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:24 PM ----------

I just want to say I doubt highly that the only life in the universe is on earth.

You do not have doubt...I have doubt, and you have belief...

---------- Post added at 08:05 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:54 AM ----------

Albert Camus wrote:

Question: Is this an Existentialist view? that all life is one? that our lives are not our own? this doesn't seem very.. right (from what I understand)

We are not created out of nothing...Our lives are a part of a continuous chain of lives, that we hope will continue on without end... When we consieder our selves as individuals we have lost an essential perspective of our being, which, if we had, would open us up to moral obligations and mutual support... In addition, we do not eat dirt and rock... We eat life, and often life not far different from our own...To say my life will be recreated is nonsense...If it did, other than in the standard form of children, then it would be beyond recognition... We would not be the same self even in a cloned body because what we are is where we have been...And yet even there how often do we realize that people are not themselves, as when we visit an old friend and find they are suffering alzhiemers... They are dead to their past, to the future, and to meaning...We do not care for them, but care for our own sensibilities; and if we were natives, we would let them wander away to suffer the wolves and the bears...We think we are better, and are worse...

I think it is a weak spot in our character as humans that we came out of non being, and yet cannot face the non being of death... Isn't this moment of life worth all???

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@etcetcetc00,

I wonder why I even bother trying to discuss online forums. Nobody ever wants to discuss the actual idea being put forth. You always want to nit-pick details to make yourself feel smart.
Nameless I know there's no hard data. That's the premise of the discussion. It's not about what we know but what we can derive without knowing. Furthermore, any trial, despite the probability, that is repeated to infinity has a 100% chance of achieving all results infinitely. There's not such thing as 100% probablility? Question: If I roll a die, what are the chances I'll roll a single digit number?
Fido, when I said I doubt the only life in the universe is on earth, I wasn't talking about afterlife. I was talking abot aliens and it is doubt that they don't exist, not belief they do. Don't tell me what I did or did not mean, I choose my words carefully. None of anything else you said is anything other than preaching your own set of beliefs. It's not about a belief in anything because nobody honestly discusses anything about their beliefs with the idea that they could be changed. You want to talk about natural order, and being afraid of it? Whatever brought us here was an entirely natural process. It is not some unfounded supernatural belief I'm trying to push here. I'm not talking about riencarnation, heaven, nirvana, or whatever. It wouldn't be any different from this life in any detail, and nobody would know it even happened. This isn't afterlife. This isn't spirituality. It's actually pure materalism. Spiritialists would argue if the universe recreated everyone in, say, 100 trillion years, that it wouldn't be them, because they wouldn't have the right soul, or whatever.

It is irrational at this point in human understanding to assume the universe is incapable of just about anything.

I'm pretty sure this is the wrong forum for this discussion. I think I don't understand exactly what Existentialism means. Can anyone tell me where to go with this?

1 Reply

@etcetcetc00,

etcetcetc00 wrote:

I wonder why I even bother trying to discuss online forums. Nobody ever wants to discuss the actual idea being put forth. You always want to nit-pick details to make yourself feel smart.

Can the discussion continue from any part of my post?

etcetcetc00 wrote:

It is irrational at this point in human understanding to assume the universe is incapable of just about anything.

I disagree. There are physical laws. I think it would be irrational to say that "the universe can operate outside of physical laws". For example the universe is incapable of changing the speed of light i.e. the speed of light is a universal constant.

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@validity,

From a purely empirical view of the every-atheist it is irrational to assume that there will be more than one life for us. I am speaking from the thread title (our[possessive] only life). The probability is small. As was noted earlier probability is never 100%, but alas science is inductive and science is the knowledge creation tool du jour. However it is not logical to assume that it is our only life because it is not 100% certain. If I have cancer that is deemed terminal its not 100% certain I will die, and given my humanity I may not want to live my "last days" as if I were to die soon. Just like just because the sun has risen every day of my life, doesn't mean that one morning I'll sit on my porch to greet the sun and it doesn't rise. there is room in "logic" for the sun coming up, me not dying of cancer, and me having another or some form of life after this one.

A response concerning the thread as I think you are trying to work it, would be, given models of multiple universes, expanding and contracting of this universe etc... I may be living other lives as I type this, and I sure hope so. Maybe some of the other me's made better choices, maybe some other me is emporer of Earth, maybe some other me was struck dumb by one of the possible multiple God's. Think of all the life experience my other me's are gaining.

As far as a reoccuring universe, we may very well live another life exactly the same as this one with every moment the same. If the the universe is expanding and contracting in a cycle and the probability of me ever happening is so slim, the universe may by necessity of its cycle, recycle every little bit of matter the same exact way every time in the same timeframe. I may be doomed to repeat myself indefinitly which kind of spooks me, as it would ruin my sense of free will.

Anyway,
Cheers,
Russ

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@validity,

validity;60303 wrote:

For example the universe is incapable of changing the speed of light i.e. the speed of light is a universal constant.

The theoretical speed of light in a theoretical vacuum.
Outside a vacuum (anywhere/everywhere), light is measured at all sorts of different 'velocities'.

1 Reply

@nameless,

nameless wrote:

The theoretical speed of light in a theoretical vacuum.
Outside a vacuum (anywhere/everywhere), light is measured at all sorts of different 'velocities'.

My point is that the universe can not change "The theoretical speed of light in a theoretical vacuum." as it is by definition constant.

1 Reply

@validity,

validity;60341 wrote:

My point is that the universe can not change "The theoretical speed of light in a theoretical vacuum." as it is by definition constant.

See what I mean about nit-picking details? Can't we just focus on the ideas being discussed? What good does it do anyone involved in this conversation to point out how light has varying speeds in different substances? It is completely irrelevant.

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@etcetcetc00,

etcetcetc00 wrote:

See what I mean about nit-picking details? Can't we just focus on the ideas being discussed? What good does it do anyone involved in this conversation to point out how light has varying speeds in different substances? It is completely irrelevant.

What boggles my mind about your question is how you could possibly insist that person B in a different time/region/universe/world/whatever be the continuation of the life of another.

Whatever the underlying means of rebirth, your idea will require drawing connections between things where connections don't exist. I imagine your response will be 'we won't know who is the Mk II of who, but that doesn't mean that isn't the case'. But then you may as well insist the bagel I ate today could be the same bagel as the one I ate last week.

Also, as mentioned by someone else, the universe is not capable of anything and some of the limits of the universe are known.

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@etcetcetc00,

No, you ate that bagel at a different time. It was made at a different time from a different initial state. That was a different bagel. I don't really know what Mk II is, but let me go ahead and deliver my argument.

The universe was created, big bang or whatever. Because of that process, this solar system formed. This planet formed. Life formed on this planet. None of this would have happened if not for the formation of the universe. We also have no reason to believe the exact same chain of events won't happen again because we don't undrstand how it happened it the first place. I hope we can agree on this much.

According to purely scientific reasoning, life developed and evolved due to the laws of natural selection. The traits that best helped the species survive were passed on to the next. different traits were developed such as locomotion in the forms of swimming, walking/running, and flight. Senses were developed so that each life organism could interpret the world around it. Intelligence was developed by the same precesses for the same reason.

Let's hypothetically assume two things as fact now. 1st, we'll assume the materialist view on life, that life consists of nothing more than the substances that comprise it. 2nd, we'll assume the universe is not a single isolated incedent, but either a repetetive process, or just one of many universes being produced by an outside process. (See video for example).
YouTube - Multiverse theory by Dr. Michio Kaku
Our current universe certainly stands as proof that this universe is possible. We don't know if it will happen again, but we certanly can't say it won't.
If the universe is part of an infinite process, or an infinite cycle, life will form on earth again in a future universal creation process. If we assume infinite trials, evolution will lead to the development of humans, and to another world where, physically at least, all people are the people that are today.
Now, will these people be the same as the people alive today? This comes down to the hard problem of consciousness. Consciousness probably didn't develop in humans until around the time of the ancient greeks, and if anyone would like to read up on where I got this idea, you can check out The Origin Of Counsciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind by Julian Jaynes. Jaynes contends that until then, man did his decision making subconsciously, and communicated his thoughts between the two hemispheres of the brain via hallucinations. Jaynes contends that consciousness itself is an evolutionary development the brain uses to relate sensory input and memories. Consciousness could be viewed as the association of senses and memory.

There will come a time when your life is over, and all the decisions you ever make will be done. The hypothetical "other you" that comes about in an identical unverse made exactly the same way as this one, who is born of the exact same sperm and egg of the same parents on the same day in the same place you were, who has the same DNA, and goes through the same situations, makes the same decisions, and dies the same death will have seen the same things and have the same memories you will have had. What's the difference?
I'm not saying this is a continuation by any means. It is actually more of a reboot. This isn't a clone, or a twin. It does not occupy the same space and time you do. It is a life that exists for the same reasons you do and does the same things you do. Are you trying to say it doesn't have the same soul? what does that mean? It share the same experiences and has the same memory. What's special about you that this wouldn't be? We certainly have no precedent for the claim that this wouldn't be you.
We don't know for a fact if the universe repeats, but it certainly seems possible. If I see one lotto ticket on the ground and pick it up, and it wins, and I've never seen a lotto ticket, I'd be wrong to assume that this is the only one and they're all winners.

1 Reply

@etcetcetc00,

etcetcetc00 wrote:

My argument is very simple, and based on no currently established forms of religion of which I am aware.

Anyone who contends that once their life is over, they'll never be anything more is attempting to limit the capabilities of the Universe.

Regardless of what happened to bring the Universe and all of us into existence, it happened, and is certainly possible. Is it rational to assume it couldn't happen again?

Based on what we now know about biology and the nature of consciousness, I would say yes, it is rational to assume that this is the only life and existence we have. Based on our knowledge of biology and consciousness, and the lack of evidence for an afterlife, believing that we will enter into another stage of existence upon death is merely wishful thinking.

Anyone who contends that once their life is over there will be something more is attempting to extend the capabilities of nature and organisms.

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@etcetcetc00,

THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH AFTERLIFE
Please read the posts in this thread before you add your 2 cents.

1 Reply

Is it rational to assume this will be our only life?

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